HISTORICAL: SEMANTIC CHANGE

• Use the Polyglot Bible to find three words that have changed in meaning between Early Modern English (c1600s; King James Version) and now (Present-Day English; New International Version). For each word, use the Oxford English Dictionary to give a 3-5 sentence history of the word, such as whether the modern meaning already existed by 1611 (King James Version) or (if not) when it did appear, and/or when the older meaning appears to have died out.

Examples:

• [Luke 19:20] Lord, behold, [here is] thy pound, which I have kept laid up in a napkin

• This is probably not a table napkin, although this meaning was probably already in use by the late 1300s, e.g.:
  1513 Bk. Keruynge in Babees Bk. (1868) 155 Laye your knyues, & set your brede,..your spones, and your napkyns fayre folden besyde your brede

• The older meaning in Luke 19 was probably that of "a handkerchief", which is now dialectal, e.g.:
  1575 R. LANEHAM Let. (1871) 38 Out of hiz bozome drawne foorth a lappet of his napkin, edged with a blu lace

• The OED also mentions an older allusion "to hide one's talent in a napkin", which refers back to the parable in Luke 19.

• So both meanings of napkin were already present by the period of the King James Bible, but the meaning of "handkerchief" is now quite uncommon.