Page 162 - Costellazioni 5

DANIEL T. LOCHMAN, Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene

(1) royal or divine women (e.g., the usurping Lucifera; Gloriana, the
Faerie Queene; Elizabeth I, figured in Britomart’s prophetic vision in
Book 3; Cambina, a princess and magician of peace and concord; Isis,
the goddess of concord; Mercilla, a queen in Scotland who judges
Duessa, allegorized as Mary Queen of Scots; and Mutabilitie, a goddess
who challenges the authority of Jove and Nature)
(2) dynastic founders and rulers (e.g., the false Duessa’s evil parents; Bru-
tus, the legendary Trojan founder of Britain; Gloriana’s ancestors, Elf
and Fay; Tristram’s father and mother)
(3) the occasional prophet and sage (Moses and the Palmer)
(4) an outlier, the steward in Alma’s castle (Diet). 26

Alternatively, a verbal cue may be associated with similarities in
schematic se ings that contribute to networks of remembered experi-
ence. In Book 6, for instance, the monster that protects the evil Spanish
king, Geryoneo, is housed in a temple, similar to the Temple of Venus
described by the uncertainly virtuous knight Scudamour in Book 4,
whence he fled with his beloved but unwilling Amoret. In the temple,
the idol of the goddess Venus has its feet and legs “twyned” — not
with a rope or a destructive monster, but with a mysterious “snake,
whose head and tail were fast combined” and that can be glossed as
27
an enigmatic symbol of marital concord (4. 10. 40. 8-9). The temperate
idol of Venus in turn evokes a contrasting memory of Cupid, figured
on an altar much earlier, in Book 3, from the 1590 edition. There, in

26 See uses of “wand,” rod,” and “scepter” associated with royal and divine
women (Lucifera, 1. 1. 12. 6; Gloriana, 2. 2. 40. 4; Britomart’s vision of Eliza-
beth, 3. 3. 49. 7; Cambina, 43. 42. 1 ff; Isis, 5. 7. 7. 5 ff; Mercilla, 5. 9. 30. 2; Mu-
tabilitie, 7. 6. 13. 4), dynastic founders and rulers (Duessa’s parents, 1. 4. 12.
6; Brutus and his progeny, 2. 10. 36. 2; Elf and Fay as Gloriana’s fairy ances-
tors, 2. 12. 72. 4 and 2. 12. 75. 3; Tristram’s royal parents, 6. 2. 29. 4), a prophet
and sage (Moses, 1. 10. 53. 4; Guyon’s Palmer, 2. 12. 41. 1-3), and Diet (2. 9.
27. 7). Scepters also signify reason’s rule over the body (2. 11. 2. 3), are broken
outside Ate’s dwelling (4. 1. 21. 4), and are rejected by Guyon during Mam-
mon’s temptation (2. 7. 13. 1).
27 On the symbolism of Venus’s bound legs, see Hamilton’s note to 4. 10. 40,
p. 488.

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