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Word Nerd: "dull and muddy-mettled"
Context and Language Videos
Act 2,
Scene 2
Lines 554-559

An explanation of the phrase "dull and muddy-mettled" in Act 2, Scene 2 of myShakespeare's Hamlet.

myShakespeare | Hamlet 2.2 Word Nerd: Dull and Muddy Mettled

Hamlet

The very faculty of eyes and ears. Yet I,    
A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak    
Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause,
And can say nothing — no, not for a king
Upon whose property and most dear life
A damned defeat was made. Am I a coward? 
Video Transcript: 

SARAH: Dull means unintelligent, or slow to act.

RALPH: A person's mettle is their ability to cope with difficulties with resilience. Muddy was often used to mean muddled, or confused — to have a muddy mind is to be fuzzy-headed. So someone muddy-mettled was fuzzy and confused in the face of adversity.

SARAH: Shakespeare is also making a pun on metal as a material — metal is usually shiny, and the opposite of shiny is dull and muddy.

RALPH: It was really a pun on two meanings of a single word, because mettle — the ability to cope — and metal — the material — were spelled the same way in Shakespeare's day.