THE KISS AND ITS HISTORY
THE KISS
And its History
BY
Dr CHRISTOPHER NYROP
Professor of Romance Philology at the University of Copenhagen
TRANSLATED BY
WILLIAM FREDERICK HARVEY
M.A., Hertford College, Oxford; Barrister-at-Law of the Inner
Temple; Lecturer in English at the University of Lund
(Sweden); sometime Professor of English Literature
at the University of Malta
LONDON
SANDS & CO.
12 BURLEIGH STREET, STRAND
1901
TO
WALTER BENSON, Esquire
I DEDICATE MY MODEST PART IN THIS BOOK
IN TOKEN OF A FRIENDSHIP WHICH
HAS GROWN STAUNCHER WITH
THE GROWTH OF
YEARS
Δώρῳ ξὐν όλίγῳ· πάντα δἐ τιμᾶντα τἀ πἀρ ϕίλων
Theocritus, Idyl xxviii., 24, 25.
“Surely great grace goes with a little gift, and all the offerings offriends are precious.”
Qu’en vain on semble mépriser,
Les vrais biens des âmes sensibles,
Les doux mystères du baiser.
Dorat.
At which some wits have vainly sneered:
The true delight of spirits tender,
The kiss’s mysteries endeared.
W. F. H.
TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE
The following treatise, which is the work of a Romance philologist ofhigh European reputation, has not only gone through two editions inDenmark, but has also been translated into German, Swedish, and Russian.The popularity which this learned and at the same time charming littlebook rapidly acquired abroad, and the favourable criticisms passed on itby Continental scholars, have encouraged me to present it to myfellow-countrymen in an English dress. With regard to the numerouspoetical quotations that form so striking a feature of this book, thosewhich I have translated myself may be distinguished from such as I haveborrowed from standard versions by the appended initials, W. F. H.
Inner Temple,
London, 2nd August 1901.
AUTHOR’S PREFACE
Was mir in die Seele zischt!
Die Worte und die Küsse
Sind wunderbar vermischt.
What ’tis that fills my mind.
The words are with the kisses
So wond’rously combined.
Heine.
Dante, in the fifth canto of his Hell, has celebrated the power a kissmay have over human beings. In the course