Ivanhoe

CHAPTER XLIII

1 (p. 442) epigraph: The lines are from Shakespeare’s Richard II (act 2, scene 2).

2 (p. 443) meeting of radical reformers… “dunghills”: Scott refers implicitly to the infamous Peterloo Massacre of August 1819 (see Introduction). In his sardonic reference to the “heroic language of insurgent tailors,” Scott makes his contempt for the Manchester reformists clear. “Flints” refers to striking workers, and “dunghills” to those who earn lower wages in their stead (what would be referred to today as “breaking the picket line”).

3 (p. 450) Sadducees: In Matthew 22:23, the Sadducees are a breakaway Jewish sect that maintains that the soul dies with the body, a mainstream tenet of Judaism today.

4 (p. 451) Greek fire: Scott is historically accurate in this case, even to the very year. The Third Crusaders brought this sulfurous, combustible liquid back with them from the Holy Land, where it had been used at the siege of Acre.