Vocabulary

Prince Caspian

Chapter 1

• Term-time. In American schools, we usually refer to “semesters,” “trimesters” or “quarters.” In college, though, we still refer at times to “term papers,” but usually the word “term” is reserved for a prison sentence. For the Pevensie kids, this just meant it was time to go back to school.
  
• Boarding School. Sure, we all know this is a type of school you go to live at. But why “boarding”? Because “board” is what we now refer to as “meals.” A “boarding house,” in which many of our grandparents and great-grandparents lived in the years following the Great Depression, offered both “room” and “board” for the price of rent.

Chapter 2

• Dais. Okay, the big deal here is not what the word itself means. It’s a raised platform. The question is, how do you pronounce it? The answer: “day-iss.”
  
• Jiggered. To be confused or confounded; from archaic British. Perhaps, to be lost or taken advantage of in a back alley.
  
• Pomona. A wood-nymph known for her cultivation of fruit. She is the principal character of a fable recorded by Bulfinch.
  
• Electric Torch. A two-dollar word for “flashlight.” Of course, we easily forget than fifty or so years ago a flashlight was a much bigger deal than it is now.

Chapter 3

• Schools Baths. Swimming pools. Swimming pools!
  
• Wars of the Roses. Not a reference to that movie starring Michael Douglas, just so we’re clear. This is reference to violent struggles over the succession to the British throne.

Chapter 4

• Apartments. Rooms within a dwelling space. In America, we’d just say “apartment,” probably.
  
• Siccus. An ancient and learned medical doctor.
  
• Buskins. Soft, slipper-like leather shoes.
  
• The Leads. Flat roofed areas of a castle, covered in sheets of lead.

Chapter 5

• Recorder. Not a primitive MP3 maker, but a musical instrument of the whistle family.
  
• The Orbo. A large lute. Not very helpful? Okay, I’ll also tell you that the lute was a forerunner of the mandolin. So since the mandolin is like a small violinish (but strummed and picked) guitar, the orbo must have been a violinish guitar.
  
• Wallet. Not the thing you stick in your back pocket. Heavens, no. Caspian’s pockets couldn’t have been that big. No. A wallet of this sort is a knapsack (or backpack, of you don’t know what a knapsack is).
  
• Career. A full-speed run.

Chapter 6

• Water-butt. A portable water container. Think of a Gatorade barrel, only made out of wood.
  
• Gay. Just happy. My, wasn’t life simpler fifty years ago?

Chapter 8

• Seneschal. The main butler or steward.
  
• Sucks. Wow. I was kind of surprised to see Lewis use this expression. I really don’t know how he intended it. Possibly, this is a shortened version of the aphorism about teaching your grandmother to suck eggs, which would make it an expression conveying uselessness.
  
• Cricket-bat. Okay, it’s kind of odd to be discussing the game of cricket in connection to Narnia. But this is a reference to the revered British game of bat-and-ball, not a reference to a device designed to injure insects.
  
• Poop. A section of the deck of a ship; specifically, a weather deck at the stern (back). So a “feast on the poop” isn’t what it sounds like at first. Think context!

Chapter 9

• Bally. Used kind of as a substitute for the stronger “bloody.” Think of a mild term that a polite child might use instead of an expletive.

Chapter 12

• Cantrips. A trick.

Chapter 13

• Monomachy. Single combat, usually in the form of a duel.
  
• Pomely. Dappled, or spotted.
  
• Dastard. Not a misspelling. Think “dastardly.” A coward.

Chapter 14

• Football. Everywhere but America, this means soccer. So I suppose that’s the case in Narnia, too!

Chapter 15

• Mazers. A large drinking bowl, probably wooden.
  
• Canny. Careful and shrewd. Not really the opposite of “uncanny.”