Chapter Meistersingers to Melusines of M by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Meistersingers to Melusines

Meistersingers Minstrel tradesmen of Germany, who attempted to revive the national minstrelsy of the minnesingers, which had fallen into decay. Hans Sachs, the cobbler (1494-1574), was by far the most celebrated of these poets.

Mejnoun and Leilah A Persian love-tale, the Romeo and Juliet or Pyramus and Thisbe of Eastern romance.

Melampode (3 syl.). Black hellebore, so called from Melampus, a famous soothsayer and physician, who cured with it the daughters of Prætus of their melancholy. (Virgil: Georgics, iii. 550.)

“My seely sheep, like well below,
They need not melampode;
For they been hale enough I trow,
And liken their abode.”
Spenser, Eclogue vii.

Melancholy Lowness of spirits, supposed at one time to arise from a redundance of black bile. (Greek, melas chole.)

Melancholy Jacques (1 syl.). So Jean Jacques Rousseau was called for his morbid sensibilities and unhappy spirit. (1712-1777.) The expression is from Shakespeare, As You Like It, ii. 1.

Melanchthon is merely the Greek for Schwarzerde (black earth), the real name of this amiable reformer. (1497-1560.) Similarly, oecolampadius is the Greek version of the German name Hausschein, and Desiderius Erasmus is one Latin and one Greek rendering of the name Gheraerd Gheraerd.

Melantius A brave, honest soldier, who believes everyone to be true and honest till convicted of crime, and then is he a relentless punisher. (Beaumont and Fletcher: The Maid's Tragedy.)

Melanuros Abstain from the Melanurus. This is the sixth symbol in the Protreptics. Melan-uros means the “black-tailed.” Pythagoras told his disciples to abstain from that which has a black tail, in other words, from such pleasures and pursuits as end in sorrow, or bring grief. The Melanuros is a fish of the perch family, sacred to the terrestrial gods.

Melchior, Kaspar, and Balthazar The three magi, according to Cologne tradition, who came from the East to make offerings to the “Babe of Bethlehem, born King of the Jews.”

Melchisedecians Certain heretics in the early Christian Church, who entertained strange notions about Melchisedec. Some thought him superior to Christ, some paid him adoration, and some believed him to be Christ Himself or the Holy Ghost.

Meleager Distinguished for throwing the javelin. He slew the Calydonian boar. It was declared by the fates that he would die as soon as a piece of wood then on the fire was burnt up; whereupon his mother snatched the log from the fire and extinguished it; but after Meleager had slain his maternal uncles, his mother threw the brand on the fire again, and Meleager died.
   The death of Meleager was a favourite subject in ancient reliefs. The famous picture of Charles le Brun is in the Musee Imperiale of Paris.

Melesigenes So Homer is sometimes called, because one of the traditions fixes his birthplace on the banks of the Meles, in Ionia. In a similar way we call Shakespeare the “Bard of Avon.” (See Homer .)

“But higher sung
Blind Melesigenes- then Homer called.”
Milton: Paradise Regained.

Meletians The followers of Meletius, Bishop of Lycopolis, in Egypt, who is said to have sacrificed to idols in order to avoid the persecutions of Diocletian. A trimmer in religion.

Meliadus (King). Father of Tristan; he was drawn to a chase par mal engin et negromance of a fay who was in love with him, and from whose thraldom he was ultimately released by the power of the great enchanter Merlin. (Tristan de Leonois, a romance, 1489.)

Melibeus or Melibe. A wealthy young man, married to Prudens. One day, when Melibeus “went into the fields to play,” some of his enemies got into his house, beat his wife, and wounded his daughter Sophie with five mortal wounds “in her feet, in her hands, in her ears, in her nose, and in her mouth,”