7.2 The “That Said” Construction 201c. That sain And done , torn my men vnto (1475 Partenay (EETS) 4132 [Visser
1265: 1265])
‘that said and done, my men turned thereto’
d. This saide , the wiseman stilled. (1500 Alphonse, Disciplina clericalis
172) 53 [MED])
‘this said, the wise men became quiet’
The ME temporal examples cited in Visser include a variety of forms: and
these words sayd , þe whiche i- seide ,^9 these wordes y- seide , this thus seid and
sungun , that sain And don, after þis now seid (Visser 1972 : 1259ff.)
Clear examples of that/ this said with temporal/ sequential meaning occur in
the mid to late sixteenth century:
(10) a. This said , she laid her mouth close to the bed: (1557 Henry, Earle of Surrey,
Certain bokes of Virgiles Aeneis turned into English [EEBO])
b. This said , weping bitterly he imbraced and kissed her a thousand times
together. (1581 Chillester, Youthes witte [EEBO])
c. This said , impatience chokes her pleading tongue, (1592– 93 Shakespeare,
Venus and Adonis 217])
d. Then, daughter, graunt me one request, To shew thou louest me as thy sisters
doe, Accept a husband, whom my selfe will woo. This sayd , she cannot well
deny my sute (1605 Anon., King Leir [ED])
e. That said , she redoubled her bloody stroke, casting a steerne aspect on
poore Dihnohin, (1606 Hind, Eliosto libidinoso [EEBO])
f. They all are made my Lord, and some giue out, That ’tis a blow giuen to
religion, To weaken it, inruining of him, That said , he neuer wisht more
glorious title, Then to be call’d the scrouge of Hugenots (1608 Chapman,
Charles Duke of Byron [ED])
The examples in (10) would all appear to be temporal/ successive in meaning,
though some may be ambiguous between temporal and concessive meaning.
For example, (10d) might be interpreted as ‘after I say this’ or ‘nevertheless’
“she cannot well deny my suit.”
Many of the earliest EEBO instances of this said are found in translations
from Latin ; it seems clear that this said (and likely this being said ) is a calque
of the Latin absolute his dictis ‘(with) these things having been said,’ though, of
course, absolutes had existed since Old English (see van de Pol and Cuyckens
2013 ).^10 (Compare French cela dit or ceci dit ; Italian detto questo , also used in
a concessive sense.)
9 Forms with a relative pronoun are now obsolete, according to Jespersen ( 1946 : 53) and Visser
( 1972 : 1267). However, I have found two examples with a relative pronoun in CEN: which hav-
ing said (1898) and having said which (1903).
10 The Latin source was noted by Mark Liberman in his Language Log discussion of my confer-
ence paper (see http:// languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/ nll/ ?p=1807 ). He observes that hic dictus in
the Vulgate Luke 19:25 is translated as having said these things in the Douay- Rheims translation