In Troilus and Cressida

Question

By shakespeare's era dates were used in cooking and his allusion (in Troilus and Cressida) to a man "baked with no Date in the pye" was culinarily familiar enough to make a good risque joke.

I found this on the net:

PANDARUS.
Well, well! Why, have you any discretion? Have you any
eyes? Do you know what a man is? Is not birth, beauty, good
shape, discourse, manhood, learning, gentleness, virtue, youth,
liberality, and such like, the spice and salt that season a man?

CRESSIDA.
Ay, a minc'd man; and then to be bak'd with no date in
the pie, for then the man's date is out.

I don't find this funny because I don't undertand "baked with no Date in the pye." Anybody help me please.

Thanks in advance!

Clive · Accepted Answer

Hi,

All I could find on the net was this note.

Date.—This fruit of the palm-tree was once a common

p. 204

ingredient in all kinds of pastry, and some other dishes, and often supplied a pun for comedy, as for example, in "All's Well that End's Well" (i. 1), where Parolles says:—"Your date is better in your pie and your porridge, than in your cheek." And in "Troilus and Cressida" (i. 2):—"Ay, a minced man; and then to be baked with no date in the pye; for then the man's date's out."
http://www.sacred-texts.com/sks/flos/flos10.htm

However, I believe that such puns in Shakespeare are often sexual, and 'risque' means basically 'sexual'.
The textual context is this.

characters/charlines.php?CharID=Pandarus&WorkID=troilus. 'Well, well!' why, have you any discretion? have
you any eyes? Do you know what a man is? Is not
birth, beauty, good shape, discourse, manhood,
learning, gentleness, virtue, youth, liberality,
and such like, the spice and salt that season a man?

characters/charlines.php?CharID=Cressida&WorkID=troilus. Ay, a minced man: and then to be baked with no date
in the pie, for then the man's date's out.

characters/charlines.php?CharID=Pandarus&WorkID=troilus. You are such a woman! one knows not at what ward you
lie.

characters/charlines.php?CharID=Cressida&WorkID=troilus. Upon my back, to defend my belly; upon my wit, to
defend my wiles; upon my secrecy, to defend mine
honesty; my mask, to defend my beauty; and you, to
defend all these: and at all these wards I lie, at a
thousand watches.

Note the sexual nature of this dialogue, particularly Cressida's last speech above. It makes me wonder if 'date' was a slang term for the male sexual organ.

Clive

Mariott · Answer

Thanks so much Clive! I know the shape of 'date' resembles the male's sexual organ.

And I'm still trying to figure out what are 'minced man' and 'man to be baked with no date'. Maybe 'bake' has something to do with sexual thing?

Clive · Answer

Hi,

Didn't Freud suggest that everything has a sexual aspect?

Clive

In Troilus and Cressida

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