From Shakespeare's Hamlet, could someone give me an example of a semantic shift?

A "semantic shift" is the same as a "semantic change." In
terms of linguistics, it appears that it is simply a "shift" in the meaning of a word
relative to the time it is used. Some words in Hamlet, by William
Shakespeare, for example, may have been used one way in the past, but are used very
differently today, or not at all. E.g., in a more modern context, for example, "bad"
used to mean "awful," but with the advent of slang, and Michael Jackson's song of the
same name, "bad" came to mean "cool" or "tough." This is one of many reasons that the
English language is so difficult to understand and/or learn. What we say is not always
what we mean.

In terms of writing of the past, what was
said then is not always perceived today in the context of how it was used in days gone
by. It is often easier to understand a word when we can look at its etymological
development: the history, meaning and "shifts" a word has gone
through.

As an example, looking at etymologies, we can
understand from what language a word evolved, or how it was created in the first place.
Look at the word " href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=escape">escape." It comes
from the old French, around 1300.  This is its etymology or semantic
history:

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c.1300, from O.N.Fr.
escaper, O.Fr. eschaper (12c., Mod.Fr.
échapper), from V.L. excappare, lit
[literally], "get out of one's cape, leave a pursuer with just one's cape,
...."

The idea was that if
two men were fighting, one might grab the other by his cape, whereby the man captured
needed only to release the clasp of his cape and he was free, while his attacker held
only a cape in his hands. Etymologies can be fascinating. The growth of and change in
words is also seen in "semantic shifts." In Hans Heinrich Hock's 1986
publication, Principles of historical linguistics (Berlin: Mouton
de Gruyter), he states:

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historical linguistics cannot ignore semantic
change. For unless we can relate words such as Old English hlāf
‘bread’ and New English loaf not only phonetically but
also semantically, it is impossible to trace many historical
developments....

In looking
at Hamlet, we are faced also with "the historical development of
words." In the context of Shakespearean English, we often find it difficult to
understand unless we alter the order of the words, or look into meanings of words that
are considered archaic today.

As an
example, in Act Three, scene one, in Hamlet's famous "To be or not to be" speech, we
find a word that is used differently then than it is today. Hamlet
says,

...When
we have shuffled off this mortal coil...
(III.i.74)

This literally
means, "after we have cast away the ' href="http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hurly+burly">hurly burly' or
confusion of our mortal lives." Coil is used in a much different manner in modern
speech. In Hamlet, "mortal coil" means "life," but when we speak of
coils today, there is no such connection. Today, href="http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/coil">coil used as a noun
means something tightly wound, like a Slinky:

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"a connected series of spirals or rings into
which a rope or the like is
wound..."

Whereas an
Elizabethan audience would understand the language, so many years later, it is lost to a
modern audience. This is also why comic relief used in Shakespeare's plays is often not
as amusing to a modern audience, or why allusions made during that era are not timely or
effective today. It is because of the separation of time, and the semantic
shift, that the way in which words are used today is different than in the
past.

As another example, in the same speech, Hamlet refers
to "despised love" which we would believe to mean "hated" love, however in translation
today, it means "unrequited" or unreturned love. (79)