| 释义 |
† hoppestere Obs.
[OE. hoppystre, f. hoppian to hop: see -ster. The mod. form would be hopster; cf. Chaucer's tappestere, now tapster.]
A female dancer, a danceress. In the quot. from Chaucer app. used attrib. = ‘dancing’.
‘Schippes hoppesteres’ answers to navi bellatrici (= ‘warlike ships’) in Boccaccio's Teseide, which it is supposed that Chaucer misread as ballatrici (= dancers, dancing, pl. fem.). Speght (followed by Bullokar and Cockeram) erroneously explained ‘hoppesteres’ as ‘pilots’. See Skeat, Chaucer V. 80.
c1000ælfric Hom. I. 484 He..ðæs mæran witeᵹan deað þære lyðran hoppystran hire gliᵹes to mede forᵹeaf. c1386Chaucer Knt.'s T. 1159 Yet saugh I brent the shippes hoppesteres [Camb. MS. hospesterys]. |