Allusions in The Taming of

the Shrew
Explanations and Analysis of
 Tranio: “Let’s be no stoics nor no stocs, I pray / Or so devote
to Aristotles cheques / As Ovid be an outcast quite abjured”

• Stoicism: the Greek philosophy that,

basically, you can achieve Reason
through extreme self-control, by
forswearing destructive emotions and
refusing to indulge yourself.
• Arisotle’s checks: Aristotle’s philosophy
of checks and balances (everything in
life must be balanced) influences our
government
• Ovid: a Greek poet famous for writing
love poems.
Lucentio: “Hark, Tranio! Thou mayst hear
Minerva speak.”
• Minerva (Roman) = Athena (Greek)
goddess of wisdom, poetry, courage,
mathematics, arts and crafts, and
skill. Basically, logic.
• What does Lucentio mean when he
compares Bianca to Minerva after she
says that music and books will be her
companions?
Lucentio: “That art to me as secret and as
dear as Anna to the Queen of Carthage was”
• Queen of Carthage = Dido. In The
Aeneid, an epic poem about how
a guy named Aeneas escapes
from Troy during the Trojan War
and leads a group of Grecians to
Italy, Aeneas stops in Carthage
and falls in love with Queen Dido.
Dido wants him to stay in
Carthage but when Aeneas
leaves, she has her sister and
confidante Anna built her a
funeral pyre, where she curses
Aeneas and burns herself alive.
 Lucentio: “I saw sweet beauty in her face, / Such as the daughter of
Agenor had, / That made great Jove humble him to her hand / When
with his knees he kiss’d the Cretan strand.”

• Jove (Zeus) kidnapped Europa, the

daughter of Agenor, and carried her
through the sea on his back to the
island of Crete. Their son was King
Minos of Crete, the king involved in
the myth of Icarus (flying too close to
the sun) and the Minotaur and the
Labrynth.
• The Cretian Bull is the constellation
Taurus.
 Petruchio: “Be she as foul as was Florentius’ love / As old
as Sibyl and as curst and shrewd / As Socrates’ Xanthippe”

• Florentius vowed to marry a nasty

old witch if she would teach him the
answer to a riddle.
• Sibyl was a woman who could
predict the future cursed with
eternal life as an old woman, due to
a disagreement with Apollo.
• Xanthippe was the wife of Greek
philosopher Socrates. She was
described as being very feisty and
argumentative.
 Tranio: “Fair Leda’s daughter had a thousand
wooers; Then well one more may fair Bianca have”
• Zeus, in the form of a swan, fell in love with Leda of Sparta. Their baby was
Helen. Helen was the most beautiful woman in the world. She had 45 suitors,
but eventually married Menelaus, King of Sparta.
• Her beauty was so inspiring that Paris,
Prince of Troy, kidnapped her. (In some
myths, he wins her in a bet because he
said Aphrodite was the most beautiful
goddess.) This prompted the Trojan
War, therefore making Helen of Troy
the famous “face that launched a
thousand ships.”
 Gremio: “Yea, leave that labour to great Hercules;
/ And let it be more than Alcides’ twelve.”
• The goddess Hera, (NOT his mother) determined to make trouble for
Hercules, made him lose his mind. In a confused and angry state, he
killed his own wife and children.
• As part of his punishment for the murders, Hercules had to perform
twelve Labors, feats so difficult that they seemed impossible. Most of
them had to do with killing big, nasty monsters. Fortunately, Hercules
had the help of Hermes and Athena, sympathetic deities who showed
up when he really needed help. By the end of these Labors, Hercules
was, without a doubt, Greece's greatest hero.
• His struggles made Hercules the perfect embodiment of an idea the
Greeks called pathos, the experience of virtuous struggle and suffering
which would lead to fame and, in Hercules' case, immortality.
Petruchio: “Did ever Dian so become a grove / As Kate this chamber
with her princely gait? / O, be thou Dian, and let her be Kate, / And
then let Kate be chaste and Dian sportful!”

• Diana = Artemis. Goddess

of the hunt, the
moon,and animals. She
had the power to control
and talk to animals. She
could usually be found in
the woods (or groves),
hunting.
 Petruchio: “For patience she will prove a second
Grissel, / And Roman Lucrece for her chastity.”
• You think Petruchio’s treatment of Katherine is bad?
Griselda married Gualtieri, the Marquis of Saluzzo.
Gualtieri wanted to test his wife’s patience and
obedience. So, he tells her their first child (a girl)
must be put to death, and he does the same thing
with their second child (a boy). He secretly sends
them off. Griselda gives them up without
complaining or arguing. Then, 12 years later, he says
he’s going to divorce her and leave her with nothing,
so he can marry a 12-year-old girl. Griselda is patient
and obedient. Then—surprise!—he says that he’s
just kidding, and that the 12-year-old girl is actually
her daughter that he’s kept from her all this time.