Note to Othello, 5.2.347: "Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away"


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Othello,
Act 5, Scene 2, 347.
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away: This, the Q1 reading, relates to the not unfamiliar notion of an Indian ignorant of the value of some precious object he finds. (Base = low in the scale of civilization.) A few editors prefer to read "Judean," as in F1; this is taken as an allusion to Judas, or to Herod the Great, who in a fit of jealousy had his beloved wife Mariamne killed.