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The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 12.2914  Monday, 31 December 2001

[1]     From:   Mari Bonomi <mbonomi@snet.net>
        Date:   Friday, 28 Dec 2001 13:20:06 -0500
        Subj:   Re: SHK 12.2906 Cocks

[2]     From:   Markus Marti <Markus.Marti@unibas.ch>
        Date:   Saturday, 29 Dec 2001 07:25:34 +0100
        Subj:   Re: SHK 12.2906 Cocks

[3]     From:   John Drakakis <john.drakakis@stir.ac.uk>
        Date:   Saturday, 29 Dec 2001 13:44:02 -0000
        Subj:   RE: SHK 12.2906 Cocks

[4]     From:   John Velz <jvelz@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu>
        Date:   Saturday, 29 Dec 2001 01:05:34 -0600
        Subj:   Cocks Crowing


[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From:           Mari Bonomi <mbonomi@snet.net>
Date:           Friday, 28 Dec 2001 13:20:06 -0500
Subject: 12.2906 Cocks
Comment:        Re: SHK 12.2906 Cocks

> Can anyone say with certainty the hour at which the first and second
> cocks crow?

In R&J, Capulet says, approximately, the second cock hath crowed; 'tis 3
am.

I am not British so cannot speak of when (sans Daylight Savings Time)
dawn arrives in midsummer; perhaps someone on the list can enlighten us?
(pun intended)

Mari Bonomi

[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From:           Markus Marti <Markus.Marti@unibas.ch>
Date:           Saturday, 29 Dec 2001 07:25:34 +0100
Subject: 12.2906 Cocks
Comment:        Re: SHK 12.2906 Cocks

> Can anyone say with certainty the hour at which the first and second
> cocks crow?
>
> Kindly cite a published source, if you have one.

The first cock, the “trumpet  of the morn” (Hamlet .1.150) seems to crow
quite early as a  “morning cock” (Hamlet, 1.2.218); early enough (Lear,
3.4.116)  to be rather seen than heard (Lear, 4.6.19: “diminished ...
too small for sight”).

One may be “carousing” (always a good thing to do around this time of
the year) till the 2nd cock comes with or after “nose-painting, sleep
and urine” (Macbeth, 2.3.25)  and when this 2nd cock “has crowed ...
the curfew bell has rung, t’is 3 a’clock “  (R&J 4.4.3) At the moment
it is 07.30, and I haven’t heard the beast. I am going to bed now,
anyway.

:) Markus.

[3]-------------------------------------------------------------
From:           John Drakakis <john.drakakis@stir.ac.uk>
Date:           Saturday, 29 Dec 2001 13:44:02 -0000
Subject: 12.2906 Cocks
Comment:        RE: SHK 12.2906 Cocks

Dear Steve,

I’m sure you’ve tried the notes in the Arden 2 edition, but the longer
note to 1.1.155 has some source material that you might find helpful. Q2
covers itself on both counts

(a) the cock crows in order to herald the dawn
(b) there is a time of year when the cock crows all night

It’s possible that the need to mention (b) arises from the perversions
of normality occasioned by Claudius’s regicide: another one of those
customs more honoured in the breach than the observance.

Happy New Year

John D

[4]-------------------------------------------------------------
From:           John Velz <jvelz@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu>
Date:           Saturday, 29 Dec 2001 01:05:34 -0600
Subject:        Cocks Crowing

I can’t answer Steve Sohmer’s query about the times of the first and
second crowing.  But what sounds very like a cock crows some 8 or 10
times in succession in my neighborhood every night just at Midnight.
Since this started only two weeks before Christmas and continues now in
the Twelve nights period, I am inexorably reminded of the passage in
Hamlet about the cocks crowing all night long in the season of our
Savior’s birth.

My guess about first and second cockcrow would be the false dawn that
precedes dawn and heralds it and then the dawn itself when it comes a
half hour or more later.  I am regularly awake at the time of false dawn
and have witnessed the dawn’s false harbinger.

Yours ever, Steve and others interested.

John.

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