PISTOL

a companion of Falstaff in Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 2; he reappears in Henry V as the former Mistress Quickly's husband and as a comic foil for Fluellen and again in The Merry Wives of Windsor. A swaggering rascal and braggart, Ancient (ensign) Pistol frequently speaks in a jumble of jargon and misquotations that Shakespeare culled from the melodramas performed by the Admiral's Men, a rival theatre company. Pistol is often interpreted as a parody of the actor Edward Alleyn.