All 7 Uses of
treason
in
King Lear
- These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us: though the wisdom of nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself scourged by the sequent effects: love cools, friendship falls off, brothers divide: in cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in palaces, treason; and the bond cracked 'twixt son and father.†
Scene 1.2treason = an act of betrayal
- that this treason were not—or not I the detector!†
Scene 3.5 *
- Thou call'st on him that hates thee: it was he That made the overture of thy treasons to us; Who is too good to pity thee.†
Scene 3.7treasons = acts of betrayal
- —Edmund, I arrest thee On capital treason; and, in thine arrest, This gilded serpent [pointing to Goneril.]†
Scene 5.2treason = an act of betrayal
- Thou art arm'd, Gloster:—let the trumpet sound: If none appear to prove upon thy person Thy heinous, manifest, and many treasons, There is my pledge [throwing down a glove]; I'll prove it on thy heart, Ere I taste bread, thou art in nothing less Than I have here proclaim'd thee.†
Scene 5.2treasons = acts of betrayal
- Know, my name is lost; By treason's tooth bare-gnawn and canker-bit.†
Scene 5.2treason = an act of betrayal
- In wisdom I should ask thy name; But since thy outside looks so fair and warlike, And that thy tongue some say of breeding breathes, What safe and nicely I might well delay By rule of knighthood, I disdain and spurn: Back do I toss those treasons to thy head; With the hell-hated lie o'erwhelm thy heart; Which,—for they yet glance by and scarcely bruise,— This sword of mine shall give them instant way, Where they shall rest for ever.†
Scene 5.2treasons = acts of betrayal
Definition:
betraying someone or something -- typically betraying one's own country
(in this context, to betray is to not be loyal--often by helping enemies)
(in this context, to betray is to not be loyal--often by helping enemies)