Katharine Briggs' ever-useful *Dictionary of Fairies*  is interesting on
Hobgoblins, though rather tantalizingly so. It points out that the word was
originally applied, somewhat affectionately, to mischievous or brownie-type
spirits, as in *Midsummer Night's Dream* ('Those that Hobgoblin call you,
and sweet Puck,/ You do their work, and they shall have good luck'), and
that its application to wicked spirits was a Puritan usage: she gives the
example of Bunyan's 'Hobgoblin nor foul fiend'.

If we accept that basic distinction it seems probable that Harvey's
Hobgoblin/Apollo comparison belongs to the first type, garland-stealing
being the kind of thing that might be expected of a mischievous Puck, and
Spenser's later drery-accented frayers to the second. We could have fun
speculating whether this indicates a definitive shift in usage between the
composition of the two texts, or a distinction between Harvey's and
Spenser's religious affiliations, but more likely both meanings were
current, and either could be used depending on context, as was certainly the
case with a word like 'fairy'.

I wonder, incidentally, whether Anne's demons are specifically incubi and
succubi (certainly an object of fascinaton for Spenser, and a worldwide
phenomenon as far as I can see, though their activities don't form part of
the hobgoblin's usual job description), or workers of more general-purpose
marriage-wrecking illusions?

Charlie

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Sent: Monday, November 17, 2003 9:10 PM
Subject: Re: forward from Thomas Herron


> Interesting. There is another complexity here, which is that the placement
> of the stanza as well as its context suggests, I think, that Spenser has
> read the Catholic Sarum Missal (the default Missal for England, although
> not the only one, and I assume for Ireland) and its marriage service.
> There's reason on other grounds to think he read it (see an essay by Hal
> Weatherby on the end of Book I); there must have been an awful lot of them
> hanging around, althought Tom Herron has sent me a wonderful quotation
> from Barnaby Googe about the anger of the locals when the English
> authorities tried to remove the old Catholic prayerbooks). In the Catholic
> service of the time, then, there's a marvelous prayer in which the priest
> blesses the bed and prays that, among other things, it be free from
> fantasy, from "demonibus illsionis"--Spenser must have enjoyed thinking
> about how good a prayer this is. The demons of illusion have hurt many a
> marriage! Whether the demons and/or illusions are local Irish ones or
> English imports is another question, but the threat to marital happiness
> by being frayed by things that be not is worldwide. Anne Prescott.