Chapter Dominie Sampson to Doomsday Sedgwick of D by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Dominie Sampson to Doomsday Sedgwick

Dominie Sampson A village schoolmaster and scholar, poor as a church mouse, and modest as a girl. He cites Latin like a porcus literarum, and exclaims "Prodigious!" (Scott: Guy Mannering.) (See Stilling.)

Dominions One of the orders of angels, symbolished in Christian art by an ensign.

Domino (A). A hood worn by canons; a mask.

"Ce nom, qu'on donnait autrefois, par allusion a quelque passage de la liturgie, au camail dont les prêtres se couvrent la tête et les épaules pendant l'hiver, ne designe aujourd'hui qu'un habit de déguisement pour les bals masqués." - Bouillet: Dictionnaire des Sciences, etc.

Dominoes (3 syl.). The teeth; also called ivories. Dominoes are made of ivory.

Domisellus The son of a king, prince, knight, or lord before he has entered on the order of knighthood. Also an attendant on some abbot or nobleman. The person domiciled in your house. Hence the king's body-guards were called his damoiseaux or damsels.
   Froissart styles Richard II. le jeune damoisel Richart. Similarly Louis VII. (Le Jeune) was called the royal damsel.

"Damoisel ou Damoiseau designait autrefois les fils de chevaliers, de barons, et toutes les jeunes gentilshommes qui n'etaient pas encore chevaliers. On le donnait aussi aux fils des rois qui n'etaient pas encore en etat de porter les armes." - Bouillet: Dict.Universel.

   Domisellus and domisella are diminutives of dominus, a lord. In old French we find damoiseau and damoiselle. The word Ma-demoiselle is ma domisella or damoiselle.

Don is do-on, as "Don your bonnet." (See Doff, Dup .)

"Then up he rose, and donned his clothes,
And dupp'd the chamber door."
Shakespeare: Hamlet, iv. 5.

Don A man of mark, an aristocrat. At the universities the masters, fellows, and noblemen are termed dons. (Spanish.)

Don Giovanni Mozart's best opera. (See Don Juan .)

Don Juan A native of Seville, son of Don José and Donna Inez, a blue-stocking. When Juan was sixteen years old he got into trouble with Donna Julia, and was sent by his mother, then a widow, on his travels. His adventures form the story of the poem, which is incomplete. (Byron: Don Juan.)
   A Don Juan. A libertine of the aristocratic class. The original of this character was Don Juan Tenorio of Seville, who lived in the fourteenth century. The traditions concerning him have been dramatised by Triso de Molina; thence passed into Italy and France. Glück has a musical ballet of Don Juan, and Mozart has immortalised the character in his opera of Don Giovanni (1787).

Don Quixote (2 syl.). A gaunt country gentleman of La Mancha, gentle and dignified, affectionate and simple-minded, but so crazed by reading books of knight-errantry that he believes himself called upon to redress the wrongs of the whole world, and actually goes forth to avenge the oppressed and run a tilt with their oppressors. The word Quixote means The cuish-armed. (See Quixotic.)
   A Don Quixote. A dreamy, unpractical man, with a "bee in his bonnet."

Donation of Pepin (The). When Pepin conquered Ataulf the ex-archate of Ravenna fell into his hands. Pepin gave both the ex-archate and the Republic of Rome to the Pope, and this munificent gift is the famous "Donation" on which rested the whole fabric of the temporal power of the Popes of Rome (A.D. 755).
   Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy, dispossessed the Pope of his temporal dominions, and added the Papal States to the united kingdom of Italy (1870).

Donatists Followers of Donatus, a Numidian bishop who opposed Cecilianus. Their chief dogma is that the outward church is nothing, "for the letter killeth, it is the spirit that giveth life." (Founded 314.)