-------- Original Message --------
The noun 'rote' has 6 definitions in the OED, including a medieval
instrument "probably of the violin class," a "company" or "squadron", a
"certain measure or weight," and "a wheel used as an instrument of
torture
or punishment" in addition to the familiar definitions.
But the thing that makes Jansy's question of why Kinbote would define
the
word especially interesting is Shade's own reference to the works "Dim
Gulf," "Night Rote," and "Hebe's Cup" as a "damp carnival" in line 959.
This
by itself would seem to exclude all but the watery definition of the
word.
How might this apparent redundancy be, as Jansy suggests, an
insinuation of
Zemblan usage?