An extra feature of the dvd is the following Glossary.
Note that the dvd has a copyright date of 2004, with original release date of 1983.
Act I
- Town of Titipu - Actually, such a town exists (now the cement capital of Japan). It is a few hours northwest of Tokyo by train.
- serried ranks assembled - should to shoulder
- and a rumbelow - nonsense word used in many sea-chanties
- her anchor's a-trip and her helm's a-lee - A-trip means clear of mud and ready to be hauled aboard. A-lee means away from the wind; ready for making sail.
- to lay aloft - to climb up into the rigging in order to raise or lower sails
- unless connubially linked - matrimonially (i.e., unless married)
- Pre-Adamite ancestry - before Adam (and Eve)
- I a salaried minion ! - servile underling
- you very imperfect ablutioner - the implication is that the person addressed has not done a good job of washing himself (well, it does rhyme with "executioner").
- cut a dash on their wedding day - put on a showy display
- she'll toddle away, as all aver - declare
- freed from its genius tutelary - guardian spirit, guiding influence
- my father, the Lucius Junius Brutus of his race - A Roman consul (500 B.C.) who condemned his two sons to death, for their plotting to restore the monarchy
- to embrace you thus con fuoco - Italian for "with fervor"
- and for yam I should get toco - "Toco" is schoolboy slang for punishment; "toco for yam" is an expression meaning getting something bad in exchange for something good.
- interrupted an apostrophe - an exclamatory address to a person or thing
- with grief condign - suitable
- in a dull, dark dock - small enclosed space, or cell (originally, an animal cage)
- a cheap and chippy chopper - the headsman's axe is apparently not of the best quality
- perform the Happy Dispatch - suicide
- Oh blind, that seest no equipoise - counterbalancing factor
- O ni! bikkuri shakkuri to! - This choral outburst is variously translated, but might mean "Demon, you surprise and shock us!" Some think that "hiccup" is involved somehow.
- I'll spoil you gay gambado - caper, from the French gambade a leap or spring
Act II
- he glories all effulgent - giving off a flood of light
- though the tocsin sound ere long - a warning bell
- I never even killed a blue-bottle - a large fly
- Miya sama, miya sama / On n'm-ma no mayé ni / Pira-Pira suru no wa / Nan gia na / Toko tonyaré tonyaré na? - This is a legitimate Japanese song and was of fairly recent composition when Gilbert appropriated it for The Mikado. A war song of the Japanese Imperial Army, it was sung by the loyalist troops who put down a rebellion in 1877. Translations vary.
- make each prisoner pent - locked up
- mystical Germans who preach from ten till four - evangelical German Lutherans who had recently been touring England
- to ride on a buffer in Parliamentary trains - The buffer is the shock-absorbing bumper on British railroad cars. When an Act of Parliament in 1844 required that at least one train a day run to every station on a line, these slow trains were "Parliamentary trains."
- Monday Pops - weekly London concerts of classical music organized by Chappell, the music publishers of the Savoy operettas
- in fitless finger stalls - protective covering for an injured finger
- I drew my snickersnee - a long knife or small sword (from the Dutch)
- Niagara-on-the-Lake - picturesque Ontario town near Niagara Falls. It is the site of the Shaw Festival, a rival to the Stratford Festival where this production originated.
- give artistic verisimilitude - appearance of truth
