School: Killyon
- Location:
- Killyon, Co. Offaly
- Teacher: (name not given)
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0822, Page 002A
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- XML “The Drowning Mark”
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- In Shakespeare's "Tempest" Act I Scene I these words are used by one of the sailors in reference to another, during a storm at sea."He hath no drowning mark upon him."No commentator on Shakespeare has ever given a satisfactory interpretation of these words, and perhaps the following piece of folk-lore may be the correct explanation of the phrase.
An old woman, long since dead, told the story that she was once in a house when a young man entered. After he had gone out, the aged servant woman said of him "That man will never be drowned." And when asked "Why?" she replied "He has the drowning mark on him." And she explained this by saying that a large MOLE on the face was a mark which preserved the person from death by drowning.Though she called it "the drowning mark" it would be more correctly called as may be easily seen "the no-drowning mark."And in this line of Shakespeare the probability is that the two words NO-DROWNING should be connected by a hyphen.
