- Jun 2016
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Cockpit
Here alluding to the cockpit of a ship, or the part of the helm where the steering wheel is
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Prospective Glass
A spyglass, or sailor's telescope
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Temper
Temperament
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Application to my Maker
Prayer or supplication
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Osier
A variety of Eurasian willows
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like Saul, who complain’d not only that the Philistines were upon him; but that God had forsaken him;
Saul, the first king of the Israelites, summons the spirit of the prophet Samuel and tells him, "I am sore distressed; for the Philistines make war against me, and God is departed from me, and answereth me no more, neither by prophets, nor by dreams" (1 Samuel 28:15).
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start
Startle
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Chimera
Monstrous imagining (more literally, a monster in Greek mythology, with a lion's head, a goat's body, and a serpent's tail)
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Wait on the Lord, and be of good Cheer, and he shall strengthen thy Heart; wait, I say, on the Lord
Psalm 27:14 and Psalm 31:24
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I will never, never leave thee, nor forsake thee
Hebrews 13:5
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Call on me in the Day of Trouble, and I will deliver, and thou shalt glorify me.
Psalm 50:15
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He is exalted a Prince and a Saviour, to give Repentance, and to give Remission
Acts 5:31
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Call upon me in the Day of Trouble, and I will deliver, and thou shalt glorify me
Psalm 50:15
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Chequer Work
Checkerboard
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made
Arrived at
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a Stone’s Cast
A stone's throw, or a very short distance
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Magazine
Supply or storehouse
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Squab
A cushion forming part of the inside fittings of a carriage
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Muschatoes
Mustachios
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a large Pair of Mahometan Whiskers
A long moustache, such as a Muslim man might have worn
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Moletta
A variation of the word "mulatto," here used to refer to brown skin
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Frog
A loop attached to a belt, designed to hold a sword or bayonet
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Thongs
Cords
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Spatter-dashes
Long gaiters or leggings of leather, to keep boots and trousers from being spattered with mud
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Buskins
Calf-high or knee-high boots
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Pantaloons
Breeches or trousers
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crazy
Feeble
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What a Table was here spread for me in a Wilderness
"Yea, they spake against God; they said, Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?" (Psalm 78:19)
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answer’d my End
Served my purpose
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Forecast
Crusoe's comical failure to anticipate that, the larger his enclosure is, the harder it will be to catch the goats inside
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Drills
Small streams or rills
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Contrivance
Foresight; planning or ingenuity
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to have a Reprieve brought to them upon the Ladder
To have a pardon granted a moment before execution. (A criminal sentenced to hanging would have stood on a ladder with the noose around his neck, and the executioner would kick the ladder out from beneath his feet in order to hang him.)
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S. S. E.
South-southeast
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E. S. E.
East-southeast
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Graplin
Grappling-iron
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Cakes I should rather call them
Because they are unleavened
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Memorandum
In Latin, literally "a thing which must be remembered"
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answer’d
Served the need
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made shift
Contrived (ie. a makeshift waistcoat)
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feeding Elijah by Ravens
God, displeased with the pagan practices of the Israelite king Ahab, sends the prophet Elijah to tell him that a great drought will be inflicted on Israel as punishment. When Ahab grows angry with Elijah, God commands Elijah to hide in the wilderness and sends the ravens to bring him food (1 Kings 17:1-6).
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to give daily Thanks for that daily Bread
An echo of a line from the Lord's Prayer: "Give us this day our daily bread . . ."
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neither had they been wanting to me
Neither had they failed
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flea
To flay or skin them
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Want
Lack
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a Gross
A square dozen, or 144 of something
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dress
Cook
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Fewel
Fuel
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as Father Abraham to Dives
According to one of Christ's parables, a rich man dies and goes to hell, while Lazarus, the leper outside his gates, dies and is taken to Abraham's bosom. When the rich man begs Abraham to send Lazarus down from heaven to grant him reprieve from hellfire, Abraham refuses, telling him, "Between us and you there is a great gulf fixed" (Luke 16:26). Crusoe places himself in Abraham's position of spiritual transcendence over the rest of the world.
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Declivity
A downward slope, so that the boat might slide down into the water.
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Solomon
Solomon, King of Israel and Judah, was said to have built a great temple to Yahweh, which housed the Ark of the Covenant and was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar II during the Siege of Jerusalem (587 B.C.)
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Periagua
A small, flat-bottomed Caribbean boat similar to a canoe, but with a sail.
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to rub it out
To remove the seed from the husk
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Puddings
In Britain, pudding can refer to a number of sweet and savory dishes, including desserts and various types of sausages made from entrails. Here, it refers to a sweetened bread.
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Yeast
While yeast is necessary to make leavened bread rise, it is still possible to make unleavened, flatter bread without it
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dress my Meal
Separate the grain from the chaff
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Search
Searce; another word for a sieve
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against
Until
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to raise Past
To make pastry
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Pipkins
Small earthenware pots
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bruised
Ground
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but an assistant to my Work
Crusoe's conversations with the parrot are recreational, rather than work
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POLL
An abbreviation of "Polly"
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to my Mind
To my liking
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Thrash
Threshing, or the process of separating the seeds of corn from the husks
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Harrow
A very large frame set with iron teeth that is dragged over arable land to break up clods of earth
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as we serve notorious Thieves in England
As late as the eighteenth century, the heads of executed criminals were displayed on pikes at the southern gatehouse of London bridge.
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Peck-loaf
A two-gallon loaf; Crusoe's crop is so small to begin with, that every grain the birds eat is a significant loss
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Autumnal Equinox
Occurring between September 22-24, depending on the year
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Poll
So Crusoe names his parrot
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Penguins
Humboldt penguins are a species native to Chile and Peru
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Leaden-hall Market
A covered market in Gracechurch Street, London, dating from the fourteenth century
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for they are Cannibals, or Men-eaters
The portrayal of aboriginal cultures as savage or alien has an ample precedent: Herodotus describes a mythical race of man-eating "androphagi," and Shakespeare's Othello talks of encountering "The Cannibals that each other eat, / The Anthropophagi and men whose heads / Do grow beneath their shoulders" (I.iii.143-145)
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Spanish Dominions
Spain's colonies at this time included Venezuela and Colombia, so Crusoe's island is probably located off the northern coast of South America.
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W. S. W.
West-southwest
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fain
Eagerly, gladly
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Case-Bottles-Square
A bottle with a square-shaped base, often used for gin
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as I shall observe in its Order
Crusoe will relate the adventure alluded to here in due course, later in the text
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Peck
An imperial unit of dry volume, approximately 2 gallons
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Vernal Equinox
This falls between March 19-21, depending on the year
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Humiliation
In this context, meaning humility, rather than embarrassment
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cast
Counted
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the eating of Grapes kill’d several of our English Men who were Slaves there, by throwing them into Fluxes and Feavers
There is no scientific basis for this supposition. More likely, the symptoms Crusoe describes were a result of scurvy, a condition caused by vitamin C deficiency and common among sailors.
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Cassava Root
A woody shrub native to South America
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as the Children of Israel did, when they were promis’d Flesh to eat
God grants the hungry Israelites manna to eat as they cross the desert, bound for the promised land (Exodus 16:1-13)
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Meat
Food generally, not necessarily restricted to animal's flesh
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Vapours
Physiologically, the four humors (sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic, melancholic) were thought to emit "vapors" that ascended to the brain and shaped one's temperament. When the humors were unbalanced, the vapors caused distemper and illness.
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100 Weight
An imperial hundredweight, or about 112 lb
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light
Alight
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above half a Hundred Weight
More than 56 lb (a full hundredweight is 112 lb)
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Traffick
Violent altercation
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that these Winds and Rain being the Consequences of the Earthquake
Defoe's scientific reasoning is interesting, but inaccurate: there is, in fact, no causal link between seismic activity and hurricanes.
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and I believe the [94] Shocks were stronger under the Water than on the Island.
An astonishingly accurate observation, given that Defoe had probably never experienced an earthquake himself, and that plate tectonic theory was only introduced in the 20th century.
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Of which in its Place
Crusoe will describe this predicament at greater length farther along in the narrative (i.e. "More about this later.")
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Chickens Meat
Chicken's food; in this case, barley (referred to here sometimes as corn), which Crusoe realizes must have germinated and sprouted.
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Staves
Wooden planks from which barrels are made.
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Cask to be hooped
A typical wooden barrel, consisting of vertical wooden staves bound with lateral metal hoops.
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Runlet
A roundlet, or, in wine-measure, a barrel holding about 48 gallons.
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jealous
Fearful, apprehensive, or wary.
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Hodd
An open receptacle for carrying mortar, bricks, stones, or coal.
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Iron Gudgeons
The cylindrical shaft running through the center of a wheel, upon which it pivots.
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Iron Tree
The Brazil Ironwood, sometimes called the Leopard Tree, has yellow flowers and extremely hard, spotted wood.
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shoal
Shallow
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overset
Overturned
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Magazine
Storehouse
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Adze
A tool like a pickax, with a blade at right angles to the handle.
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Works
Some subsequent editions misread this word as the intransitive verb "to work," printing the line as "I set my self to enlarge my Cave, and work farther into the Earth." However, the first edition treats it as a noun.
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Iron Crows
Crowbars
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husbanded
Economized or eked out, so they would last
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Popish
Catholic
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9 Degrees 22 Minutes North
The 9th parallel north intersects both Colombia and Venezuela, from which we can estimate that Crusoe's island is somewhere off the northern coast of South America. [Insert map here.]
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240 l.
240 lb.
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tho’ had the Powder took fire, I had never known who had hurt me.
Had the explosive gunpowder caught fire from the lightning, Crusoe would ironically not have survived the explosion to have suffered harm at the hands of man or beast.
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Semi-diameter
Radius
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Spritsail-yard, and the Missen-yard
The cross-beams attached at right angles to the masts, from which the various sails hang
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Hawser
A large rope used in warping or mooring a ship
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Hogshead of Bread
A large cask, or a quantity sufficient to fill a hogshead
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Maggazin
Here not referring exclusively to an arsenal of weaponry, but more generally to Crusoe's store of provisions.
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fain
Eager
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Iron Crows
Crowbars
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Grindstone
A stone on which to sharpen stone tools
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Powder-horns
A container for gunpowder, made from an ox or buffalo horn.
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Rack
A kind of liqueur
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Cordial Waters
Medicinal concoctions, often consisting of brandy or whiskey mixed with various spices.
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Skipper
Master of the ship
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Application
Ingenuity and determination (archaic usage)
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Forecastle
The forward part of a ship below the main deck, usually the crew's living quarters.
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a Furlong
One eighth of a mile, or 220 yards.
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two Shoes that were not Fellows
did not comprise a single pair
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when a Malefactor who has the Halter about his Neck, is tyed up, and just going to be turn’d off, and has a Reprieve brought to him: I say, I do not wonder that they bring a Surgeon with it, to let him Blood that very Moment they tell him of it, that the Surprise may not drive the Animal Spirits from the Heart, and overwhelm him
Crusoe compares himself to a criminal condemned to be hanged, who receives a last-minute pardon or reduced sentence. Bleeding was thought to release adverse humors from the body, in this case those produced by the shock of the lightened sentence.
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a League and a Half
Approximately three and a half miles
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Coup de Grace
Death blow
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a-stern of us
Towards the rear of the boat
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under the Lee of the Land
In such a position that the land intercepts the wind, so that it does not buffet the boat.
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Den wild Zee
"The wild sea"
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stav’d
The hull probably bashed in
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Carrible-Islands
Caribbean islands
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beyond the River Amozones, toward that of the River Oronoque, commonly call’d the Great River
The Amazon River extends from Peru through Brazil, and the Orinoco River from Venezuela to Colombia. [Insert map here.] These details help the reader to estimate whereabouts Crusoe's island is.
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so that he found he was gotten upon the Coast of Guinea
This clause can be rather misleading: Defoe means here not Guinea, the African country for which Crusoe was bound, but the Guianas, a region in South America to the north of Brazil. [Insert map here.]
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Calenture
Feverish delirium prevalent in the tropics.
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7 Degrees 22 Min.
The degree, the primary unit if latitude, can be subdivided twice into smaller units: each degree consists of 60 minutes, and each minute of 60 seconds.
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Isle Fernand de Noronha
An archipelago off the coast of Brazil, northwest of Cape St. Augustine. [Insert map here.]
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Cape St. Augustino
[Insert map of Brazil depicting the Cape St. Augustine here.]
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because they could not publickly sell the Negroes when they came home
Presumably because slave traders needed a special license from the Spanish or Portuguese crown.
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straiten’d for
lacking
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Guinea
An country south of Guinea-Bissau and north of Sierra Leone, along the west coast of Africa. [insert map here]
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Permission of the Kings of Spain and Portugal, and engross’d in the Publick, so that few Negroes were brought
In reality, the sugar and tobacco plantations of colonial Brazil were heavily dependent on slave labor and the trans-Atlantic slave trade. In 1888, Brazil became the last country in the Western world to abolish slavery.
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St. Salvadore
[Insert a map of Brazil with Salvador highlighted here]
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100 Wt.
A hundredweight, also known as a centum weight or quintal, equal to eight stone, or about 112 lb according to the imperial system. (The American hundredweight, by contrast, equals 100 lb.)
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Pounds Sterl.
British pounds are also referred to as pounds sterling.
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Plantation and a Sugar-House
Portugal colonized Brazil in the late sixteenth century and instituted the lucrative sugar plantation system, which relied on African and Native American slave labor. In the seventeenth century, Brazil was the world's leading exporter of sugar.
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Ducats
A gold or silver trade coin, formerly current in most European countries.
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Twenty-two Days
This duration is actually remarkably short. Merchant vessels carrying slaves and cargo could take anywhere from four weeks to several months to travel from the Gold Coast to the Americas.
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Bay de Todos los Santos, or All-Saints Bay
A bay near Salvador. [Insert map of Brazil with the Bay of All-Saints highlighted here.]
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80 Pieces of Eight
Eighty Spanish dollars ("Pieces of eight" were so called because one was worth eight Spanish reales.)
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to a tittle
Down to the smallest detail; to the highest degree
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Antient
INSERT NOTE HERE.
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Antient and Pendants
INSERT NOTE HERE.
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all the Ships from Europe, which sail’d either to the Coast of Guiney, or to Brasil, or to the East-Indies
European merchant vessels would have carried salt, gold, and slaves away from Africa, and sugar and spices back from Brazil and the Indies respectively.
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the River Gambia or Sennegall, that is to say, any where about the Cape de Verd
The area south of Morocco, near modern Senegal, was an epicenter for British trade in salt and slaves. [Insert map of west coast of Africa here.]
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almost Musquet-bore
"Bore" refers to the interior of the barrel of a gun, and the diameter of the bore determines the calibre. Crusoe's gun, then, is musket calibre.
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Slugs
Bullets
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the Islands of the Canaries, and the Cape de Verd Islands also, lay not far off from the Coast
There is a geographical inconsistency here. Crusoe and Xury are somewhere along the southwest Moroccan coast if the Canary Islands are close by. Therefore, they are to the southwest of their starting point at Sale, which is in northwest Morocco. However, Crusoe claims to have sailed south and east of Sale - this is, in fact, impossible, since traveling southeast of Sale would entail "sailing" inland. [Insert map of Morocco and Canary Islands here]
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a Dram
A small portion of a drink; a swig or sip.
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if any of our Vessels were in Chase of me, they also would now give over
If any of his Master's men had tried to follow him, he was by now so far away that they would have given up.
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Barbarian Coast
The North African coast, between Tripoli and Morocco.
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presented
Aimed
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Fowling-pieces
Guns
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Twist
Crotch
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Cadiz
A coastal city in southwest Spain [insert map of Spain here]
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Curlieus
A wading bird of mottled brown color with a long, slender beak. [Insert picture of a curlew here.]
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Pinnace
A light rowboat carried aboard large merchant and war vessels.
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gib’d
Shifted from one side of the vessel to the other when running before the wind.
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Maresco
Moor
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Usage I had there
Treatment I experienced there
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Sallee
A city in northwest Morocco.
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Broadside
The battery of cannon located on the side of the ship; cannon fire.
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the Line
The Equator
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Calenture
Feverish delirium
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300 l
Three hundred British pounds.
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L. 5.9 Ounces
5 lb, 9 oz.
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Adventure
Quantity of capital or valuables
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40 l.
Forty pounds
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Mess-mate
Person with whom one regularly takes meals.
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Fore-mast Man
Common sailor
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like Jonah in the Ship of Tarshish
The Biblical Jonah boarded a ship bound for Tarshish, but was thrown overboard and swallowed by a whale when the crew discovered that he was fleeing God's commandment, and held him responsible for the violent storms encountered by their ship.
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an Emblem of our Blessed Saviour’s Parable, had even kill’d the fatted Calf for me
Another allusion to the Parable of the Prodigal Son, when the father kills the fatted calf to feast and celebrate his ruined son's return (Luke 15:23).
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if the Boat was stav’d upon Shore he would make it good to their Master
If the boat was crushed or damaged while running aground, he would reimburse their master.
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Winterton Ness
An area of foreland along the North Norfolk coast of England.
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Colliers
Coal barges.
(Shinagel 12; footnote 6)
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cut away the Foremast,
In adverse weather conditions, one may cut away the mast of a ship to prevent its capsizing. Without the force of the heavy wind on the mast, the boat has a lower probability of tipping over.
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Boat-Swain
Senior crew member.
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at all Adventures
At the mercy of all risks/dangers.
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Steerage
The lower deck of a ship, just below the main deck and above the ballast; lower classes of passengers often purchased cheaper tickets to travel in this part of the ship.
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Sheet Anchor
A very large, heavy spare anchor stored in the waist of the ship, used in emergencies.
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come home
Come loose.
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Forecastle in
With the bow (the foremost part of the hull) in the water.
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rid
Remained anchored; floated stationary.
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Ground-Tackle
Equipment used to anchor a ship.
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Yarmouth Roads
A stretch of sea east of the coastal town of Great Yarmouth, in the English county of Norfolk.
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