Chapter I

); and pert, surviving in the name Peart, meant active, brisk, etc.--

"Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth."

(Midsummer Night's Dream, i. 1.)

ARCHAIC MEANINGS

To interpret an adjectival nickname we must go to its meaning in Chaucer and his contemporaries. Silly, Seeley, Seely

"This sely, innocent Custance" (B, 682)--

still means innocent when we speak of the "silly sheep," and happy in the phrase "silly Suffolk." It is cognate with Ger. selig, blessed, often used in speaking of the dead. We have compounds in Sillilant, simple child (