Note 422 — Chapter III · JOHN “SOFTSWORD” 1199–1206

“Johannem Mollegladium,” Gerv. Cant. vol. ii. p. 93. This nickname is no doubt a translation of one which must have been applied to John in French, though unluckily its vernacular form is lost. A friend has suggested that “if the phrase had any English equivalent, it would probably be something embracing a more direct metaphor than ‘Soft-sword’—something like ‘Tin-sword,’ or, better still, if the thirteenth century knew of putty, ‘John Putty-sword.’”