NEWINGTON BUTTS
The Bankside, as the preceding chapter indicates, offered unusual
attractions to the actors. It had, indeed, long been associated with
the drama: in 1545 King Henry VIII, in a proclamation against
vagabonds, players,[195] etc., noted their "fashions commonly used at
the Bank, and such like naughty places, where they much haunt"; and in
1547 the Bishop of Winchester made complaint that at a time when he
intended to have a dirge and mass for the late King, the actors in
Southwark planned to exhibit "a solemn play, to try who shall have the
most resort, they in game or I in earnest."[196] The players,
therefore, were no strangers to "the Bank." And when later in the
century the hostility of the Common Council drove them to seek homes
in localities not under the jurisdiction of the city, the suburb
across the river offered them a suitable refuge. For, although a large
portion of Southwark was under the jurisdiction of London, certain
parts were not, notably the Liberty of the Clink and the Manor of
Paris Garden, two sections bordering the river's edge, and the
district of Newington lying farther back to the southwest. In these
places the actors could erect their houses and entertain the public
without fear of the ordinances of the Corporation, and without danger
of interruption by puritanical Lord Mayors.
[Footnote 195: It is just possible--but, I think, improbable--that the
term "common players" as used in this proclamation referred to
gamblers. The term is regularly used in law to designate actors.]
[Footnote 196: _The Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, 1547_,
February 5, p. 1; cf. Tytler's _Edward VI and Mary_, I, 20.]
Yet, as we have seen, the first public playhouses were erected not on
the Bankside--a "naughty" place,--but near Finsbury Field to the north
of the city; and the reasons which led to the selection of such a
quiet and respectable district have been pointed out.[197] It was
inevitable, however, that sooner or later a playhouse should make its
appearance in the region to the south of the city. And at an early
date--how early it is impossible to say, but probably not long after
the erection of the Theatre and the Curtain--there appeared in
Southwark a building specially devoted to the use of players. Whether
it was a new structure modeled after the theatres of Shoreditch, or
merely an old building converted into a playhouse, we cannot say. It
seems to have been something more than an inn-yard fitted up for
dramatic purposes, and yet something less than the "sumptuous theatre
houses" erected "on purpose" for plays to the north of the city.
[Footnote 197: See page 29.]
Whatever the building was, it was situated at Newington Butts (a
place so called from the butts for archery anciently erected there),
and, unfortunately, at a considerable distance from the river. Exactly
how far playgoers from London had to walk to reach the theatre after
crossing over the river we do not know; but the Privy Council speaks
of "the tediousness of the way" thither,[198] and Stow notes that the
parish church of Newington was "distant one mile from London Bridge."
Further information about the building--its exact situation, its size,
its exterior shape, its interior arrangement, and such-like
details--is wholly lacking.
[Footnote 198: The Council again refers to the building in the phrase
"in any of these remote places." (Dasent, _Acts of the Privy Council_,
XII, 15.)]
Nor are we much better off in regard to its ownership, management, and
general history. This seems to be due to the fact that it was not
intimately associated with any of the more important London troupes;
and to the fact that after a few unsuccessful years it ceased to
exist. Below I have recorded the few and scattered references which
constitute our meagre knowledge of its history.
The first passage cited may refer to the playhouse at Newington Butts.
It is an order of the Privy Council, May 13, 1580, thus summarized by
the clerk:
A letter to the Justices of Peace of the County of Surrey,
that whereas their Lordships do understand that
notwithstanding their late order given to the Lord Mayor to
forbid all plays within and about the city until Michaelmas
next for avoiding of infection, nevertheless certain players
do play sundry days every week at Newington Butts in that
part of Surrey without the jurisdiction of the said Lord
Mayor, contrary to their Lordship's order; their Lordships
require the Justices not only to inquire who they be that
disobey their commandment in that behalf, and not only to
forbid them expressly for playing in any of these remote
places near unto the city until Michaelmas, but to have
regard that within the precinct of Surrey none be permitted
to play; if any do, to commit them and to advertise them,
&c.[199]
[Footnote 199: Dasent, _Acts of the Privy Council_, XII, 15.]
The next passage clearly refers to "the theatre" at Newington Butts.
On May 11, 1586, the Privy Council dispatched a letter to the Lord
Mayor, which the clerk thus summarized:
A letter to the Lord Mayor: his Lordship is desired,
according to his request made to their Lordships by his
letters of the vii th of this present, to give order for the
restraining of plays and interludes within and about the
city of London, for the avoiding of infection feared to grow
and increase this time of summer by the common assemblies of
people at those places; and that their Lordships have taken
the like order for the prohibiting of the use of plays at
the theatre, and the other places about Newington, out of
his charge.[200]
[Footnote 200: _Ibid._, XIV, 102.]
Chalmers[201] thought the word "theatre" was used of the Newington
Playhouse, and for this he was taken to task by Collier,[202] who
says: "He confounds it with the playhouse emphatically called 'the
Theatre' in Shoreditch; and on consulting the Register, we find that
no such playhouse as the Newington Theatre is there spoken of." But
Chalmers was right; for if we consult the "Registers" we find the
following letter, dispatched to the Justices of Surrey on the very
same day that the letter just quoted was sent to the Lord Mayor:
A letter to the Justices of Surrey, that according to such
direction as hath been given by their Lordships to the Lord
Mayor to restrain and inhibit the use of plays and
interludes in public places in and about the City of London,
in respect of the heat of the year now drawing on, for the
avoiding of the infection like to grow and increase by the
ordinary assemblies of the people to those places, they are
also required in like sort to take order that the plays and
assemblies of the people at the theatre or any other places
about Newington be forthwith restrained and forborn as
aforesaid, &c.[203]
[Footnote 201: _Apology_, p. 403.]
[Footnote 202: _History of English Dramatic Poetry_ (1879), III, 131.]
[Footnote 203: Dasent, _Acts of the Privy Council_, XIV, 99.]
The phrase, "the theatre or any other places about Newington," when
addressed to the "Justices of the Peace of Surrey" could refer only to
the Newington Butts Playhouse.
On June 23, 1592, because of a riot in Southwark, the Privy Council
closed all the playhouses in and about London.[204] Shortly after this
the Lord Strange's Men, who were then occupying the Rose, petitioned
the Council to be allowed to resume acting in their playhouse. The
Council granted them instead permission to act three times a week at
Newington Butts; but the players, not relishing this proposal, chose
rather to travel in the provinces. Soon finding that they could not
make their expenses in the country, they returned to London, and again
appealed to the Privy Council to be allowed to perform at the
Rose.[205] The warrant issued by the Council in reply to this second
petition tells us for the first time something definite about the
Newington Butts Theatre:
To the Justices, Bailiffs, Constables, and Others to Whom it
Shall Appertain:
Whereas not long since, upon some considerations, we did
restrain the Lord Strange his servants from playing at the
Rose on the Bankside, and enjoyned them to play three days
[a week] at Newington Butts; now forasmuch as we are
satisfied that by reason of the tediousness of the way, and
that of long time plays have not there been used on working
days, and for that a number of poor watermen are thereby
relieved, you shall permit and suffer them, or any other,
there [at the Rose] to exercise themselves in such sort as
they have done heretofore, and that the Rose may be at
liberty without any restraint so long as it shall be free
from infection, any commandment from us heretofore to the
contrary notwithstanding.[206]
[Footnote 204: Greg, _Henslowe's Diary_, II, 50, 73.]
[Footnote 205: Greg, _Henslowe Papers_, p. 42.]
[Footnote 206: _Ibid._, pp. 43-44.]
From this warrant we learn that so early as 1592 the Newington house
was almost deserted, and that "of long time" plays had been given
there only occasionally.
Two years later, on June 3, 1594, Henslowe sent the Admiral's and the
Chamberlain's Men to play temporarily at the half-deserted old
playhouse, probably in order to give opportunity for needed repairs at
the Rose.[207] The section of his _Diary_, under the heading, "In the
name of god Amen begininge at newington my Lord Admeralle men & my
Lord Chamberlen men As followethe 1594," constitutes the fullest and
clearest--and, one may add, the most illustrious--chapter in the
history of this obscure building; for although it extends over only
ten days, it tells us that Edward Alleyn, Richard Burbage, and William
Shakespeare then trod the Newington stage, and it records the
performance there of such plays as _The Jew of Malta_, _Andronicus_,
_The Taming of a Shrew_, and _Hamlet_.
[Footnote 207: There is no evidence that Henslowe owned the house at
Newington; he might very well have rented it for this particular
occasion.]
We next hear of the building near the end of the century: in 1599,
says Mr. Wallace, it was "only a memory, as shown by a contemporary
record to be published later."[208]
[Footnote 208: Wallace, _The First London Theatre_, p. 2.]
Two other references close the history. In _A Woman is a Weathercock_,
III, iii, printed in 1612, but written earlier, one of the actors
exclaims of an insufferable pun: "O Newington Conceit!" The fact that
this sneer is the only reference to the Newington Playhouse found in
contemporary literature is a commentary on the low esteem in which the
building was held by the Elizabethans, and its relative unimportance
for the history of the drama.
The last notice is in Howe's continuation of Stow's _Annals_
(1631).[209] After enumerating all the theatres built in London and
the suburbs "within the space of three-score years," he adds vaguely,
"besides one in former time at Newington Butts."
[Footnote 209: Page 1004.]