There is no justification for ascribing to Ruggle _Loiola_ (1648),

which is by John Hacket, but Hawkins, lxxii, cites from a note made in

a copy of _Ignoramus_ by John Hayward of Clare Hall, _c._ 1741:

‘N.B. M^r. Geo. Ruggle wrote besides two other comedies, _Re

vera_ or _Verily_, and _Club Law_, to expose the puritans, not

yet printed. MS.’

_Club Law_ (cf. ch. xxiv) has since been recovered.

THOMAS SACKVILLE (1536–1608).

Thomas Sackville became Lord Buckhurst in 1567 and Earl of Dorset in

1604. He is famous in literature for his contributions to ed. 2 (1559)

of _A Mirror for Magistrates_, and in statesmanship as Lord Treasurer

under Elizabeth and James I.

_Ferrex and Porrex_, or _Gorboduc_. _1562_

_With_ Thomas Norton (q.v.).

GEORGE SALTERNE (> 1603).

Author of the academic _Tomumbeius_ (cf. App. K).

JOHN SAVILE (_c._ 1603).

Describer of the coming of James I to England (cf. ch. xxiv, C).

ROBERT SEMPILL (_c._ 1530–95).

A Scottish ballad writer (_D. N. B._) and a suggested author of

_Philotus_ (cf. ch. xxiv).

SENECAN TRANSLATIONS (1559–81).

_Troas_ (Jasper Heywood)

_S. R._ 1558–9. ‘A treates of Senaca.’ _Richard Tottel_ (Arber, i. 96).

1559. The Sixt Tragedie of the most graue and prudent author Lucius,

Anneus, Seneca, entituled Troas, with diuers and sundrye addicions

to the same. Newly set forth in Englishe by Iasper Heywood studient

in Oxenforde. _Richard Tottel. Cum priuilegio ad imprimendum solum._

[Epistle to Elizabeth by Heywood; Preface to the Readers; Preface to

the Tragedy.]

1559. _Richard Tottel._ [Another edition (B. M. G. 9440).]

N.D. [_c._ 1560]. _Thomas Powell for George Bucke._

_Thyestes_ (Jasper Heywood)

1560, March 26. The seconde Tragedie of Seneca entituled Thyestes

faithfully Englished by Iasper Heywood, fellow of Alsolne College in

Oxforde. [_Thomas Powell_?] ‘_in the hous late Thomas Berthelettes_’.

[Verse Epistle to Sir John Mason by Heywood; The Translator to the

Book; Preface.]

_Hercules Furens_ (Jasper Heywood)

1561. Lucii Annei Senecae Tragedia prima quae inscribitur Hercules

furens.... The first Tragedie of Lucius Anneus Seneca, intituled

Hercules furens, newly pervsed and of all faultes whereof it did before

abound diligently corrected, and for the profit of young schollers so

faithfully translated into English metre, that ye may se verse for

verse tourned as farre as the phrase of the english permitteth By

Iasper Heywood studient in Oxford. _Henry Sutton._ [Epistle to William,

Earl of Pembroke, by Heywood; Argument; Latin and English texts.]

_Oedipus_ (Alexander Neville)

_S. R._ 1562–3. ‘A boke intituled the lamentable history of the prynnce

Oedypus &c.’ _Thomas Colwell_ (Arber, i. 209).

1563, April 28. The Lamentable Tragedie of Oedipus the Sonne of Laius

Kyng of Thebes out of Seneca. By Alexander Neuyle. _Thomas Colwell._

[Epistles to Nicholas Wotton by Neville, and to the Reader.]

_Agamemnon_ (John Studley)

_S. R._ 1565–6. ‘A boke intituled the eighte Tragide of Senyca.’

_Thomas Colwell_ (Arber, i. 304).

1566. The Eyght Tragedie of Seneca. Entituled Agamemnon. Translated out

of Latin into English, by Iohn Studley, Student in Trinitie Colledge

in Cambridge. _Thomas Colwell._ [Commendatory Verses by Thomas Nuce,

William R., H. C., Thomas Delapeend, W. Parkar, T. B.; Epistle to Sir

William Cecil, signed ‘Iohn Studley’; Preface to the Reader.]

_Medea_ (John Studley)

_S. R._ 1565–6. ‘A boke intituled the tragedy of Seneca Media by John

Studley of Trenety Colledge in Cambryge.’ _Thomas Colwell_ (Arber, i.

312).

1566. The seuenth Tragedie of Seneca, Entituled Medea: Translated out

of Latin into English, by Iohn Studley, Student in Trinitie Colledge

in Cambridge. _Thomas Colwell._ [Epistle to Francis, Earl of Bedford,

signed ‘Iohn Studley’; Preface to Reader; Commendatory Verses by W. P.;

Argument.]

_Octavia_ (Thomas Nuce)

_Hercules Oetaeus_ (John Studley)

_S. R._ 1566–7. ‘A boke intituled the ix^{th} and x^{th} tragide of

Lucious Anneas oute of the laten into englesshe by T. W. fellowe of

Pembrek Hall, in Chambryge.’ _Henry Denham_ (Arber, i. 327).

1570–1. ‘iij^{de} part of Herculus Oote.’ _Thomas Colwell_ (Arber, i.

443).

N.D. The ninth Tragedie of Lucius Anneus Seneca called Octavia.

Translated out of Latine into English, by T. N. Student in Cambridge.

_Henry Denham._ [Epistles to Robert Earl of Leicester, signed ‘T. N.’,

and to the Reader.]

This is B.M. C. 34, e. 48. C. Grabau in _Sh.-Jahrbuch_, xliii. 310,

says that a copy in the Irish sale of 1906 was of an unknown edition,

possibly of 1566.

_Hippolytus_ (John Studley)

_S. R._ 1566–7. ‘The iiij^{th} parte Seneca Workes.’ _Henry Denham_

(Arber, i. 336).

31 Aug. 1579. Transfer from Denham to Richard Jones and John Charlwood

(Arber, ii. 359).

_The Ten Tragedies. 1581_

_S. R._ 1580–1. ‘Senecas Tragedies in Englishe.’ _Thomas Marsh_ (Arber,

ii. 396).

1581. Seneca his Tenne Tragedies, Translated into Englysh. _Thomas

Marsh._ [Epistle to Sir Thomas Heneage by Thomas Newton. Adds

_Thebais_, by Thomas Newton, and, if not already printed, as S.

R. entries in 1566–7 and 1570–1 suggest, _Hercules Oetaeus_ and

_Hippolytus_, by John Studley. The _Oedipus_ of Neville is a revised

text.]

_Reprint_ of 1581 collection (1887, _Spenser Soc._), and editions

of Studley’s _Agamemnon_ and _Medea_, by E. M. Spearing (1913,

_Materialien_, xxxviii), and of Heywood’s _Troas_, _Thyestes_,

and _Hercules Furens_, by H. de Vocht (1913, _Materialien_,

xli).--_Dissertations_: J. W. Cunliffe, _The Influence of S. on

Elizabethan Tragedy_ (1893); E. Jockers, _Die englischen S.-Übersetzer

des 16. Jahrhunderts_ (1909, _Strassburg diss._); E. M. Spearing, _The

Elizabethan ‘Tenne Tragedies of S.’_ (1909, _M. L. R._ iv. 437), _The

Elizabethan Translation of S.’s Tragedies_ (1912), _A. N.’s Oedipus_

(1920, _M. L. R._ xv. 359); F. L. Lucas, _S. and Elizabethan Tragedy_

(1922).

Of the translators, Jasper Heywood (1535–98) became Fellow of All

Souls, Oxford, in 1558. He was son of John Heywood the dramatist, and

uncle of John Donne. In 1562 he became a Jesuit, and left England, to

return as a missionary in 1581. He was imprisoned during 1583–5 and

then expelled. John Studley (_c._ 1547–?) entered Trinity, Cambridge,

in 1563 and became Fellow in 1567. Alexander Neville (1544–1614) took

his B.A. in 1560 at Cambridge. He became secretary successively to

Parker, Grindal, and Whitgift, archbishops of Canterbury, and produced

other literary work, chiefly in Latin. Thomas Nuce (_ob._ 1617) was

Fellow of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, in 1562, and became Canon of Ely

in 1585. Thomas Newton (_c._ 1542–1607) migrated in 1562 from Trinity,

Oxford, to Queens’, Cambridge, but apparently returned to his original

college later. About 1583 he became Rector of Little Ilford, Essex. He

produced much unimportant verse and prose, in Latin and English, and

was a friend of William Hunnis (q.v.).

For a fragment of another translation of _Hercules Oetaeus_, cf. s.v.

Elizabeth. Archer’s play-list of 1656 contains the curious entry ‘Baggs

Seneca’, described as a tragedy. Of this Greg, _Masques_, li, can make

nothing.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE (1564–1616).

No adequate treatment of Shakespeare’s life and plays is possible

within the limits of this chapter. I have therefore contented myself

with giving the main bibliographical data, in illustration of the

chapters on the companies (Strange’s, Pembroke’s, Chamberlain’s, and

King’s) and the theatres (Rose, Newington Butts, Theatre, Curtain,

Globe, Blackfriars) with which he was or may have been concerned. I

follow the conjectural chronological order adopted in my article on

Shakespeare in the 11th ed. of the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_.

_Collections_

[1619]. It is probable that the 1619 editions of _Merry Wives of

Windsor_ (Q_{2}), _Pericles_ (Q_{4}), and the apocryphal _Yorkshire

Tragedy_ were intended to form part of a collection of plays ascribed

to Shakespeare, and that the ‘1600’ editions of _Midsummer Night’s

Dream_ (Q_{2}) and _Merchant of Venice_ (Q_{2}) bearing the name of

the printer Roberts, the ‘1600’ edition of the apocryphal _Sir John

Oldcastle_ bearing the initials T. P., the ‘1608’ edition of _Henry V_

(Q_{3}), the ‘1608’ edition of _King Lear_ (Q_{2}) lacking the name of

the ‘Pide Bull’ shop, and the undated edition of _The Whole Contention

of York and Lancaster_ were all also printed in 1619 for the same

purpose. The printer seems to have been William Jaggard, with whom was

associated Thomas Pavier, who held the copyright of several of the

plays. Presumably an intention to prefix a general title-page is the

explanation of the shortened imprints characteristic of these editions.

The sheets of _The Whole Contention_ and _Pericles_ have in fact

continuous signatures; but the plan seems to have been modified, and

the other plays issued separately. The bibliographical evidence bearing

on this theory is discussed by W. W. Greg, W. Jaggard, A. W. Pollard,

and A. H. Huth in _2 Library_, ix. 113, 381; x. 208; and _3 Library_,

i. 36, 46; ii. 101; and summed up by A. W. Pollard, _Shakespeare Folios

and Quartos_, 81. Confirmatory evidence is adduced by W. J. Niedig,

_The Shakespeare Quartos of 1619_ (_M. P._ viii. 145) and _False Dates

on Shakespeare Quartos_ (1910, _Century_, 912).

_S. R._ 1623, Nov. 8 (Worrall). ‘Master William Shakspeers Comedyes

Histories, and Tragedyes soe manie of the said Copies as are not

formerly entred to other men. viz^t Comedyes The Tempest The two

gentlemen of Verona Measure for Measure The Comedy of Errors As you

like it All’s well that ends well Twelfe Night The winters tale

Histories The thirde parte of Henry ye Sixt Henry the eight Tragedies

Coriolanus Timon of Athens Julius Caesar Mackbeth Anthonie and

Cleopatra Cymbeline’ _Blounte and Isaak Jaggard_ (Arber, iv. 107).

[This entry covers all the plays in F_{1} not already printed, except

_Taming of the Shrew_, _King John_, and _2, 3 Henry VI_, which were

doubtless regarded from the stationer’s point of view as identical

with the _Taming of A Shrew_, _Troublesome Reign of King John_, and

_Contention of York and Lancaster_, on which they were based. The

‘thirde parte of Henry ye Sixt’ is of course the hitherto unprinted _1

Henry VI_.]

[F_{1}] 1623. M^{r}. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, &

Tragedies Published according to the True Originall Copies. By _Isaac

Iaggard and Ed. Blount_. [Colophon] _Printed_ [by W. Jaggard] _at the

charges of W. Jaggard, Ed. Blount, I. Smethweeke, and W. Aspley_.

[Verses to the Reader, signed B[en] I[onson]; Portrait signed ‘Martin

Droeshout sculpsit London’; Epistles to the Earls of Pembroke and

Montgomery and to the great Variety of Readers, both signed ‘Iohn

Heminge, Henry Condell’; Commendatory Verses signed ‘Ben: Ionson’,

‘Hugh Holland’, ‘L. Digges’, ‘I. M.’; ‘The Names of the Principall

Actors in all these Playes’; ‘A Catalogue of the seuerall Comedies,

Histories, and Tragedies contained in this Volume’.]

_S. R._ 1627, June 19 [on or after]. Transfer from Dorothy widow

of Isaac Jaggard to Thomas and Richard Cotes of ‘her parte in

Schackspheere playes’ (Arber, iv. 182).

_S. R._ 1630, Nov. 16. Transfer from Blount to Robert Allot by note

dated 26 June 1630 of his ‘estate and right’ in the sixteen plays of

the 1623 entry (Arber, iv. 243).

[F_{2}] 1632. _Thomas Cotes, for John Smethwick, William Aspley,

Richard Hawkins, Richard Meighen and Robert Allot._ [So colophon:

there are t.ps. with separate imprints by Cotes for each of the five

booksellers.]

[F_{3}] 1663. _For Philip Chetwinde._ [For the second issue of 1664,

with _Pericles_ and six apocryphal plays added, cf. p. 203.]

[F_{4}] 1685. _For H. Herringman_ (and others).

Of later editions the most valuable for literary history are those

by E. Malone, revised by J. Boswell (1821, the _Third Variorum

Shakespeare_, 21 vols.); W. A. Wright (1891–3, the _Cambridge

Shakespeare_, 9 vols.); F. J. Furnivall and others (1885–91, the

_Shakespeare Quarto Facsimiles_, 43 vols.); H. H. Furness (1871–1919,

the _New Variorum Shakespeare_, 18 plays in 19 vols. issued); E.

Dowden and others (1899–1922, the _Arden Shakespeare_); A. T. Q.

Couch and J. D. Wilson (1921–2, the _New Shakespeare_, 5 vols.

issued). Of dissertations I can only note, for biography, J. O.

Halliwell-Phillipps, _Outlines of the Life of Shakespeare_ (1890, ed.

9), and S. Lee, _A Life of William Shakespeare_ (1922, new ed.), and

for bibliography, S. Lee, _Facsimile of F_{1} from the Chatsworth copy_

(1902, with census of copies, added to in _2 Library_, vii. 113), W.

W. Greg, _The Bibliographical History of the First Folio_ (1903, _2

Library_, iv. 258), A. W. Pollard, _Shakespeare Folios and Quartos_

(1909) and _Shakespeare’s Fight with the Pirates_ (1920), A. W. Pollard

and H. C. Bartlett, _A Census of Shakespeare’s Plays in Quarto_ (1916),

and H. C. Bartlett, _Mr. William Shakespeare_ (1922).

_1 Henry VI. 1592_

[F_{1}] 1623. The first Part of Henry the Sixt.

_2, 3 Henry VI. 1592_ (?)

_S. R._ No original entry. [Probably these plays were regarded from a

stationer’s point of view as identical with the anonymous _Contention

of York and Lancaster_ (q.v.), on which they were based. Pavier had

acquired rights over these from Millington in 1602.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, with the death of the

Good Duke Humfrey. The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, with the death of

the Duke of Yorke.

_S. R._ 1626, Aug. 4. Transfer from Mrs. Pavier to Edward Brewster and

Robert Birde of ‘Master Paviers right in Shakesperes plaies or any of

them’ (Arber, iv. 164).

_S. R._ 1630, Nov. 8. Transfer from Bird to Richard Cotes of ‘Yorke and

Lancaster’ (Arber, iv. 242).

_Richard III. 1592–3_ (?)

_S. R._ 1597, Oct. 20 (Barlowe). ‘The tragedie of Kinge Richard the

Third with the death of the Duke of Clarence.’ _Andrew Wise_ (Arber,

iii. 93).

[Q_{1}] 1597. The Tragedy of King Richard the third. Containing, His

treacherous Plots against his brother Clarence: the pittiefull murther

of his iunocent nephewes: his tyrannical vsurpation: with the whole

course of his detested life, and most deserued death. As it hath

beene lately Acted by the Right honourable the Lord Chamberlaine his

seruants. _Valentine Sims for Andrew Wise._

[Q_{2}] 1598.... By William Shakespeare. _Thomas Creede for Andrew

Wise._

[Q_{3}] 1602.... Newly augmented.... _Thomas Creede for Andrew Wise._

[There is no augmentation.]

_S. R._ 1603, June 25. Transfer from Andrew Wise to Mathew Lawe (Arber,

iii. 239).

[Q_{4}] 1605. _Thomas Creede, sold by Mathew Lawe._

[Q_{5}] 1612.... As it hath beene lately Acted by the Kings Maiesties

seruants.... _Thomas Creede, sold by Mathew Lawe._

[Q_{6}] 1622. _Thomas Purfoot, sold by Mathew Law._

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedy of Richard the Third: with the Landing of

Earle Richmond, and the Battell at Bosworth Field. [_Running Title_,

The Life and Death of Richard the Third. From Q_{1}-Q_{2}-Q_{3}-Q_{4}

(+ Q_{3})-Q_{5}-Q_{6}, with corrections.]

[Q_{7}] 1629. _John Norton, sold by Mathew Law._

[Q_{8}] 1634. _John Norton._

_Comedy of Errors. 1593_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. The Comedie of Errors.

_Titus Andronicus. 1594_

_S. R._ 1594, Feb. 6. ‘A Noble Roman historye of Tytus Andronicus.’

_John Danter_ (Arber, ii. 644).

[Q_{1}] 1594. The most Lamentable Romaine Tragedie of Titus Andronicus:

As it was Plaide by the Right Honourable the Earle of Darbie, Earle of

Pembrooke and Earle of Sussex their Seruants. _John Danter, sold by

Edward White and Thomas Millington._

[Q_{2}] 1600.... As it hath sundry times beene playde by the Right

Honourable the Earle of Pembrooke, the Earle of Darbie, the Earle of

Sussex, and the Lorde Chamberlaine theyr Seruants. _I[ames] R[oberts]

for Edward White._

_S. R._ 1602, April 19. Transfer ‘saluo iure cuiuscunque’ from Thomas

Millington to Thomas Pavier (Arber, iii. 204).

[Q_{3}] 1611. _For Edward White._

[F_{1}] 1623. The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus. [From

Q_{1}-Q_{2}-Q_{3}, with addition of III. ii.]

_S. R._ 1626, Aug. 4. Transfer from Mrs. Pavier of interest to Edward

Brewster and Robert Bird (Arber, iv. 164).

_The Taming of The Shrew. 1594_

_S. R._ No entry. [Probably the play was regarded from the point of

view of copyright as identical with the anonymous _Taming of A Shrew_

(q.v.), on which it was based.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The Taming of the Shrew.

[Q_{1}] 1631. A wittie and pleasant comedie called The Taming of

the Shrew. As it was acted by his Maiesties Seruants at the Blacke

Friers and the Globe. Written by Will. Shakespeare. _W. S. for Iohn

Smethwicke._

_Love’s Labour’s Lost. 1594_ (?)

_S. R._ No original entry.

[Q_{1}] 1598. A Pleasant Conceited Comedie Called, Loues labors lost.

As it was presented before her Highnes this last Christmas. Newly

corrected and augmented By W. Shakespere. _W[illiam] W[hite] for

Cutbert Burby._

_S. R._ 1607. Jan. 22. Transfer from Burby to Nicholas Ling (Arber,

iii. 337).

_S. R._ 1607, Nov. 19. Transfer from Ling to John Smethwick (Arber,

iii. 365).

[F_{1}] 1623. Loues Labour’s lost. [From Q_{1}.]

[Q_{2}] 1631.... As it was Acted by his Maiesties Seruants at the

Blacke-Friers and the Globe.... _W[illiam] S[tansby] for John

Smethwicke._

_Romeo and Juliet. 1594–5_ (?)

_S. R._ No original entry.

[Q_{1}] 1597. An Excellent conceited Tragedie of Romeo and Iuliet, As

it hath been often (with great applause) plaid publiquely, by the right

Honourable the L. of Hunsdon his Seruants. _John Danter._

[Q_{2}] 1599.... Newly corrected, augmented, and amended: ... _Thomas

Creede for Cuthbert Burby._ [Revised and enlarged text.]

_S. R._ 1607, Jan. 22. Transfer by direction of a court from Burby to

Nicholas Ling (Arber, iii. 337).

_S. R._ 1607, Nov. 19. Transfer from Ling to John Smethwick (Arber,

iii. 365).

[Q_{3}] 1609.... by the King’s Maiesties Seruants at the Globe.... _For

Iohn Smethwick._

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of Romeo and Iuliet. [From Q_{2}-Q_{3}.]

[Q_{4}] N.D. _For Iohn Smethwicke._ [Two issues.]

[Q_{5}] 1637. _R. Young for John Smethwicke._

_A Midsummer Night’s Dream. 1595_

_S. R._ 1600, Oct. 8 (Rodes). ‘A booke called A mydsommer nightes

Dreame.’ _Thomas Fisher_ (Arber, iii. 174).

[Q_{1}] 1600. A Midsommer nights dreame. As it hath beene sundry times

publickely acted, by the Right honourable, the Lord Chamberlaine his

seruants. Written by William Shakespeare. _For Thomas Fisher._

[Q_{2}] [1619]. ‘_Printed by Iames Roberts, 1600._’ [On the evidence

for printing with false date by William Jaggard, cf. Pollard, 81.]

[F_{1}] 1623. A Midsommer Nights Dreame. [From Q_{2}.]

On the possible date and occasion of performance, cf. my paper in

_Shakespeare Homage_ (1916).

_The Two Gentlemen of Verona. 1595_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. The Two Gentlemen of Verona.

_King John. 1595_ (?)

_S. R._ No entry. [Probably the play was regarded, from a stationer’s

point of view, as identical with the anonymous _Troublesome Reign of

King John_ (q.v.), on which it was based.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The life and Death of King John.

_Richard II. 1595–6_

_S. R._ 1597, Aug. 29. ‘The Tragedye of Richard the Second.’ _Andrew

Wise_ (Arber, iii. 89).

[Q_{1}] 1597. The Tragedie of King Richard the second. As it hath beene

publikely acted by the right Honourable the Lorde Chamberlaine his

Seruants. _Valentine Simmes for Andrew Wise._

[Q_{2}] 1598.... By William Shakespeare. _Valentine Simmes for Andrew

Wise._

[Q_{3}] 1598. _Valentine Simmes, for Andrew Wise._ [White coll.]

_S. R._ 1603, June 25. Transfer from Andrew Wise to Mathew Lawe (Arber,

iii. 239).

[Q_{4}] 1608.... With new additions of the Parliament Sceane, and the

deposing of King Richard. As it hath been lately acted by the Kinges

Maiesties seruantes, at the Globe. _W[illiam] W[hite] for Mathew Law._

[Two issues with distinct t.ps., of which one only has the altered

title. Both include the added passage IV. i. 154–318.]

[Q_{5}] 1615. _For Mathew Law._

[F_{1}] 1623. The life and death of King Richard the Second. [From

Q_{1}-Q_{2}-Q_{3}-Q_{4}-Q_{5}, with corrections.]

[Q_{6}] 1634. _Iohn Norton._

_The Merchant of Venice. 1596_ (?)

_S. R._ 1598, July 22. ‘A booke of the Marchaunt of Venyce or otherwise

called the Jewe of Venyce, Prouided that yt bee not prynted by the said

James Robertes or anye other whatsoeuer without lycence first had from

the Right honorable the lord Chamberlen.’ _James Robertes_ (Arber, iii.

122).

_S. R._ 1600, Oct. 28. Transfer from Roberts to Thomas Heyes (Arber,

iii. 175).

[Q_{1}] 1600. The most excellent Historie of the Merchant of Venice.

With the extreame crueltie of Shylocke the Iewe towards the sayd

Merchant, in cutting a iust pound of his flesh: and the obtayning of

Portia by the choyse of three chests. As it hath been diuers times

acted by the Lord Chamberlaine his Seruants. Written by William

Shakespeare. _I[ames] R[oberts] for Thomas Heyes._

[Q_{2}] [1619]. ‘_Printed by J. Roberts, 1600._’ [On the evidence for

printing with false date by William Jaggard, cf. Pollard, 81.]

_S. R._ 1619, July 8. Transfer from Thomas to Laurence Heyes

(Arber, iii. 651).

[F_{1}] 1623. The Merchant of Venice. [From Q_{1}.]

[Q_{3}] 1637. _M. P[arsons?] for Laurence Hayes._

[Q_{3}] 1652. _For William Leake._ [Reissue.]

_S. R._ 1657, Oct. 17. Transfer from Bridget Hayes and Jane Graisby to

William Leake (Eyre, ii. 150).

_1 Henry IV. 1596–7_ (?)

_S. R._ 1598, Feb. 25 (Dix). ‘A booke intituled The historye of

Henry the iiij^{th} with his battaile of Shrewsburye against Henry

Hottspurre of the Northe with the conceipted mirthe of Sir John

ffalstoff.’ _Andrew Wise_ (Arber, iii. 105).

[Q_{1}] 1598. The History of Henrie the Fourth; With the battell

at Shrewsburie, betweene the King and Lord Henry Percy, surnamed

Henrie Hotspur of the North. With the humorous conceits of Sir Iohn

Falstalffe. _P[eter] S[hort] for Andrew Wise._

[Q_{2}] 1599.... Newly corrected by W. Shakespeare. _S[imon] S[tafford]

for Andrew Wise._

_S. R._ 1603, June 25. Transfer from Wise to Mathew Law (Arber, iii.

239).

[Q_{3}] 1604. _Valentine Simmes for Mathew Law._

[Q_{4}] 1608. _For Mathew Law._

[Q_{5}] 1613. _W[illiam] W[hite] for Mathew Law._

[Q_{6}] 1622. _T[homas] P[urfoot], sold by Mathew Law._

[F_{1}] 1623. The First Part of Henry the Fourth, with

the Life and Death of Henry Sirnamed Hot-spurre. [From

Q_{1}-Q_{2}-Q_{3}-Q_{4}-Q_{5}.]

[Q_{7}] 1632. _John Norton, sold by William Sheares._

[Q_{8}] 1639. _John Norton, sold by Hugh Perry._

_2 Henry IV. 1597–8_ (?)

_S. R._ 1600, Aug. 23. ‘The second parte of the history of Kinge

Henry the iiij^{th} with the humours of Sir John ffalstaff; wrytten by

master Shakespere.’ _Andrew Wise and William Aspley_ (Arber, iii.

170).

[Q] 1600. The Second part of Henrie the fourth, continuing to his

death, and coronation of Henrie the fift. With the humours of sir

Iohn Falstaffe, and swaggering Pistoll. As it hath been sundrie times

publikely acted by the right honourable, the Lord Chamberlaine his

seruants. Written by William Shakespeare. _V[alentine] S[immes] for

Andrew Wise and William Aspley._ [Two issues, the first of which omits

III. i.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, Containing his

Death: and the Coronation of King Henry the Fift. [Distinct text from

Q.]

_Much Ado About Nothing. 1598_ (?)

_S. R._ [1600], Aug. 4. ‘The commedie of muche A doo about nothing a

booke ... to be staied’ (Arber, iii. 37).

_S. R._ 1600, Aug. 23. ‘Muche a Doo about nothinge.’ _Andrew Wise and

William Aspley_ (Arber, iii. 170).

[Q] 1600. Much adoe about Nothing. As it hath been sundrie times

publikely acted by the right honourable, the Lord Chamberlaine his

seruants. Written by William Shakespeare. _V[alentine] S[immes] for

Andrew Wise and William Aspley._

[F_{1}] 1623. Much adoe about Nothing. [From Q, with corrections.]

_Henry V. 1599_

_S. R._ No original entry. [Possibly the play was regarded from a

stationer’s point of view as identical with the anonymous _Famous

Victories of Henry V_ (q.v.) entered by Creede on 14 May 1594.]

_S. R._ [1600], Aug. 4. ‘Henry the ffift, a booke ... to be staied’

(Arber, iii. 37).

[Q_{1}] 1600. The Chronicle History of Henry the fift, With his battell

fought at Agin Court in France. Togither with Auntient Pistoll. As

it hath bene sundry times playd by the Right honorable the Lord

Chamberlaine his seruants. _Thomas Creede for Tho. Millington and Iohn

Busby._

_S. R._ 1600, Aug. 14. Transfer to Thomas Pavier, with other ‘thinges

formerlye printed and sett over to’ him (Arber, iii. 169).

[Q_{2}] 1602. _Thomas Creede for Thomas Pauier._

[Q_{3}] [1619]. ‘_Printed for T. P. 1608._’ [On the evidence for

printing with false date by William Jaggard, cf. Pollard, _F. and Q._

81.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The Life of Henry the Fift. [Distinct text from Qq.]

_S. R._ 1626, Aug. 4. Transfer from Mrs. Pavier to Edward Brewster and

Robert Birde of interest in ‘The history of Henry the fift and the play

of the same’ (Arber, iv. 164).

_S. R._ 1630, Nov. 8. Transfer from Bird to Richard Cotes of ‘Henrye

the Fift’ and ‘Agincourt’ (Arber, iv. 242).

_Julius Caesar. 1599_

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar.

_The Merry Wives of Windsor. 1599–1600_ (?)

_S. R._ 1602, Jan. 18 (Seton). ‘A booke called An excellent and

pleasant conceited commedie of Sir John ffaulstof and the merry wyves

of Windesor.’ _John Busby._ Transfer the same day from Busby to Arthur

Johnson (Arber, iii. 199).

[Q_{1}] 1602. A most pleasaunt and excellent conceited Comedie, of

Syr Iohn Falstaffe, and the merrie Wiues of Windsor. Entermixed with

sundrie variable and pleasing humors, of Syr Hugh the Welch Knight,

Iustice Shallow, and his wise Cousin M. Slender. With the swaggering

vaine of Auncient Pistoll, and Corporall Nym. By William Shakespeare.

As it hath bene diuers times Acted by the right Honorable my Lord

Chamberlaines seruants. Both before her Maiestie, and elsewhere.

_T[homas] C[reede] for Arthur Iohnson._

[Q_{2}] 1619. _[William Jaggard] for Arthur Johnson._ [On its relation

to other plays printed by Jaggard in 1619, cf. Pollard _F. and Q._ 81.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The Merry Wiues of Windsor. [Distinct text from Qq.]

_S. R._ 1630, Jan. 29. Transfer from Johnson to Meighen (Arber,

iv. 227).

[Q_{3}] 1630. _T. H[arper] for R. Meighen._

_As You Like It. 1600_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. As you Like it.

_Hamlet. 1601_ (?)

_S. R._ 1602, July 26 (Pasfield). ‘A booke called the Revenge

of Hamlett Prince Denmarke as yt was latelie Acted by the Lord

Chamberleyne his servantes.’ _James Robertes_ (Arber, iii. 212).

[Q_{1}] 1603, The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet Prince of Denmarke.

By William Shakespeare. As it hath beene diuerse times acted by

his Highnesse seruants in the Cittie of London: as also in the two

Vniuersities of Cambridge and Oxford, and elsewhere. _[Valentine

Simmes] for N[icholas] L[ing] and Iohn Trundell._

[Q_{2}] 1604.... Newly imprinted and enlarged to almost as much againe

as it was, according to the true and perfect Coppie.... _I[ames]

R[oberts] for N[icholas] L[ing]._ [Some copies are dated 1605. Distinct

text from Q_{1}.]

_S. R._ 1607, Nov. 19. Transfer from Ling to John Smethwick (Arber,

iii. 365).

[Q_{3}] 1611. _For Iohn Smethwicke._

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke. [Distinct

text from Qq.]

[Q_{4}] N.D. [after 1611]. _W[illiam] S[tansby] for Iohn Smethwicke._

[Q_{5}] 1637. _R. Young for John Smethwicke._

_Twelfth Night. 1601–2_

[F_{1}] 1623. Twelfe Night, Or what you will.

_Troilus and Cressida. 1602_ (?)

_S. R._ 1603, Feb. 7. ‘Master Robertes, Entred for his copie in

full Court holden this day to print when he hath gotten sufficient

aucthority for yt, The booke of Troilus and Cresseda as yt is acted by

my lord Chamberlens Men’ (Arber, iii. 226).

_S. R._ 1609, Jan. 28 (Segar, ‘deputye to Sir George Bucke’). ‘A booke

called the history of Troylus and Cressida.’ _Richard Bonion and Henry

Walleys_ (Arber, iii. 400).

[Q] 1609. The Historie of Troylus and Cresseida. As it was acted by the

Kings Maiesties seruants at the Globe. Written by William Shakespeare.

_G. Eld for R. Bonian and H. Walley._ [In a second issue the title

became ‘The Famous Historie of Troylus and Cresseid. Excellently

expressing the beginning of their loues, with the conceited wooing of

Pandarus Prince of Licia’; and an Epistle headed ‘A neuer writer, to an

euer reader. Newes’ was inserted.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida. [A distinct text

from Q.]

_All’s Well That Ends Well. 1602_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. All’s Well, that Ends Well.

_Measure for Measure. 1604_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. Measure, For Measure.

_Othello 1604_ (?)

_S. R._ 1621, Oct. 6 (Buck). ‘The Tragedie of Othello, the moore of

Venice.’ _Thomas Walkley_ (Arber, iv. 59).

[Q_{1}] 1622. The Tragœdy of Othello, The Moore of Venice. As it hath

beene diuerse times acted at the Globe, and at the Black-Friers, by

his Maiesties Seruants. Written by William Shakespeare. _N[icholas]

O[kes] for Thomas Walkley._ [Epistle by the Stationer to the Reader,

signed ‘Thomas Walkley’.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice. [Distinct

text from Q_{1}]

_S. R._ 1628, March 1. Transfer from Walkley to Richard Hawkins (Arber,

iv. 194).

[Q_{2}] 1630. _A. M[athewes] for Richard Hawkins._

[Q_{3}] 1655.... The fourth Edition. _For William Leak._

_Macbeth. 1605–6_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of Macbeth.

_King Lear. 1605–6_

_S. R._ 1607, Nov. 26 (Buck). ‘A booke called Master William

Shakespeare his historye of Kinge Lear, as yt was played before the

kinges maiestie at Whitehall vppon Sainct Stephens night at Christmas

Last by his maiesties servantes playinge vsually at the Globe on the

Banksyde.’ _Nathanael Butter and John Busby_ (Arber, iii. 366).

[Q_{1}] 1608. M. William Shakspeare: His True Chronicle Historie of

the life and death of King Lear and his three Daughters. With the

vnfortunate life of Edgar, sonne and heire to the Earle of Gloster, and

his sullen and assumed humour of Tom of Bedlam: As it was played before

the Kings Maiestie at Whitehall vpon S. Stephans night in Christmas

Hollidayes. By his Maiesties seruants playing vsually at the Gloabe

on the Banckeside. _[Nicholas Okes?] for Nathaniel Butter and are to

be sold at ... the Pide Bull...._ [Sheets freely corrected during

printing.]

[Q_{2}] [1619]. ‘_Printed for Nathaniel Butter, 1608._’ [On the

evidence for printing with false date by William Jaggard, cf. Pollard,

81.]

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of King Lear. [From Q_{1} with corrections.]

[Q_{3}] 1655. _By Jane Bell._

_Antony and Cleopatra. 1606_ (?)

_S. R._ 1608, May 20 (Buck). ‘A booke Called Anthony and Cleopatra.’

_Edward Blount_ (Arber, iii. 378).

_S. R._ 1623, Nov. 8. ‘Anthonie and Cleopatra’, with other playes for

F_{1} [_vide supra_]. _Edward Blount and Isaac Jaggard_ (Arber, iv.

107).

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of Anthonie, and Cleopatra.

_Coriolanus. 1606_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedy of Coriolanus.

_Timon of Athens. 1607_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. The Lyfe of Tymon of Athens.

_Pericles. 1608_ (?)

_S. R._ 1608, May 20 (Buck). ‘A booke called The booke of Pericles

prynce of Tyre.’ _Edward Blount_ (Arber, iii. 378).

[Q_{1}] 1609. The Late, And much admired Play, Called Pericles, Prince

of Tyre. With the true Relation of the whole Historie, aduentures, and

fortunes of the said Prince: As also, The no lesse strange, and worthy

accidents, in the Birth and Life, of his Daughter Mariana. As it hath

been diuers and sundry times acted by his Maiesties Seruants, at the

Globe on the Banck-side. By William Shakespeare. _[William White] for

Henry Gosson._

[Q_{2}] 1609. _[William White] for Henry Gosson._ [‘Eneer’ for ‘Enter’

on A_{2}].

[Q_{3}] 1611. _By S[imon] S[tafford]._

[Q_{4}] ‘_Printed for T[homas] P[avier] 1619._’ [The signatures are

continuous with those of _The Whole Contention_ printed n.d. in 1619.

Probably the printer was William Jaggard; cf. Pollard, 81.]

[Q_{5}] 1630. _I. N[orton]for R. B[ird]._ [Two issues.]

[Q_{6}] 1635. _By Thomas Cotes._

[F_{3}] 1664. Pericles Prince of Tyre. [Distinct text from Qq.]

_Cymbeline. 1609_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tragedie of Cymbeline.

_The Winter’s Tale. 1610_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. The Winters Tale.

_The Tempest. 1611_

[F_{1}] 1623. The Tempest.

_Henry VIII. 1613_ (?)

[F_{1}] 1623. The Famous History of the Life of King Henry the Eight.

_Doubtful Plays_

Besides the seven plays printed in F_{3} (_vide supra_) Shakespeare has

been credited (cf. ch. xxiv) with the authorship of or contributions to

_An Alarum for London_, _Arden of Feversham_, _Fair Em_, _Merry Devil

of Edmonton_, _Troublesome Reign of King John_, _Mucedorus_, _Second

Maiden’s Tragedy_, _Taming of A Shrew_, and perhaps more plausibly,

_Contention of York and Lancaster_, _Edward III_, _Sir Thomas More_,

and _T. N. K._ (cf. s.v. Beaumont).

_Lost Plays_

Meres includes ‘Loue Labours Wonne’ in his list of 1598 (App. C, No.

lii).

On 9 Sept. 1653 Humphrey Mosely entered in the Stationers’ Register

(Eyre, i. 428), in addition to _The Merry Devil of Edmonton_ with an

ascription to Shakespeare (cf. ch. xxiv):

‘The History of Cardenio, by M^r Fletcher & Shakespeare.’

‘Henry y^e first, & Hen: the 2^d. by Shakespeare, & Davenport.’

On 29 June 1660 he entered (Eyre, ii. 271):

‘The History of King Stephen. }

Duke Humphrey, a Tragedy. } by Will: Shakspeare.’

Iphis & Iantha or a marriage without }

a man, a Comedy. }

Warburton’s list of burnt plays (_3 Library_, ii. 230) contains:

‘Henry y^e 1^{st}. by Will. Shakespear & Rob. Davenport’,

‘Duke Humphery Will. Shakespear’,

and in a supplementary list:

‘A Play by Will. Shakespear.’

Of _Henry II_, _Stephen_, _Duke Humphrey_, and _Iphis and Iantha_

nothing more is known.

_Cardenio_ is presumably the play given as ‘Cardenno’ and ‘Cardenna’

by the King’s men at Court in 1612–13 and again on 8 June 1613 (App.

B). Its theme, from _Don Quixote_, Part I, chh. xxiii-xxxvii, is that

of _Double Falsehood, or the Distressed Lovers_, published in 1728

by Lewis Theobald as ‘written originally by W. Shakespeare, and now

revised and adapted to the stage by M^r. Theobald’. In 1727 it had been

produced at Drury Lane. Theobald claimed to have three manuscripts,

no one of which is now known. One had formerly, he said, belonged to

Betterton, and was in the handwriting of ‘M^r. _Downes_, the famous

Old Prompter’ (cf. App. I). Another came from a ‘Noble Person’, with a

tradition ‘that it was given by our Author, as a Present of Value, to a

Natural Daughter of his, for whose Sake he wrote it, in the Time of his

Retirement from the Stage’. Theobald is much under suspicion of having

written _Double Falsehood_ himself (cf. T. R. Lounsbury, _The First

Editors of Shakespeare_, 145).

‘The Historye of Henry the First, written by Damport’ was licensed for

the King’s men on 10 Apr. 1624 (_Var._ iii. 229, 319; Herbert, 27).

EDWARD SHARPHAM (1576–1608).

Edward was the third son of Richard Sharpham of Colehanger in East

Allington, Devonshire, where he was baptized on 22 July 1576. He

entered the Middle Temple on 9 Oct. 1594. He made his will on 22

Apr. 1608, and was buried on the following day at St. Margaret’s,

Westminster. It may be inferred that he died of plague. Unless he is

the E. S. who wrote _The Discoveries of the Knights of the Post_

(1597), he is only known by his two plays. There is no justification

for identifying him with the Ed. Sharphell who prefixed a sonnet to

the _Humours Heav’n on Earth_ (1605) of John Davies of Hereford,

calling Davies his ‘beloued Master’, or, consequently, for assuming

that he had been a pupil of Davies as writing-master at Magdalen,

Oxford.

_Dissertations_: G. C. Moore Smith, _E. S._ (1908, _10 N. Q._ x. 21),

_John Mason and E. S._ (1913, _M. L. R._ viii. 371); M. W. Sampson,

_The Plays of E. S._ (1910, _Studies in Language and Literature in

Celebration of the 70th Birthday of J. M. Hart_, 440).

_The Fleir. 1606_

_S. R._ 1606, May 13. ‘A Comedie called The fleare. Provided that they

are not to printe yt tell they bringe good aucthoritie and licence for

the Doinge thereof.’ _John Trundell and John Busby_ (Arber, iii. 321).

1606, Nov. 21. Transfer from Trundell to Busby and Arthur Johnson, with

note ‘This booke is aucthorised by Sir George Bucke Master Hartwell and

the wardens’ (Arber, iii. 333).

1607. The Fleire. As it hath beene often played in the Blacke-Fryers by

the Children of the Reuells. Written by Edward Sharpham of the Middle

Temple, Gentleman. _F. B._ [Epistle to the Reader, by the printer.]

1610; 1615; 1631.

_Edition_ by H. Nibbe (1912, _Materialien_, xxxvi).

The epistle says that the book has been ‘long lookt for’, that the

author is ‘ith’ Country’ and that further ‘Comicall discourses’ from

him are forthcoming. A date after the executions for treason on 30 Jan.

1606 is suggested, as in the case of Marston’s _Fawn_, by ii. 364, ‘I

have heard say, they will rise sooner, and goe with more deuotion to

see an extraordinarie execution, then to heare a Sermon’, and with this

indication allusions to the Union (ii. 258) and _Northward Ho!_ (ii.

397) and resemblances to the _Fawn_ are consistent.

_Cupid’s Whirligig. 1607_

_S. R._ 1607, June 29 (Tylney). ‘A Comedie called Cupids

Whirley-gigge.’ _John Busby and Arthur Johnson_ (Arber, iii. 354).

1607. Cupid’s Whirligig, As it hath bene sundry times Acted by the

Children of the Kings Majesties Reuels. _E. Allde, sold by A. Johnson._

[Epistle to Robert Hayman, signed ‘E. S.’]

1611; 1616; 1630.

Baker, _Biographia Dramatica_, ii. 146, cites Coxeter as authority for

a false ascription of the play to Shakespeare. But nobody could well

have supposed Shakespeare to be indicated by the initials E. S., for

which there is really no other candidate than Sharpham. The play must

be the further ‘Comicall discourses’ promised by the same publishers in

the epistle to _The Fleir_, and it may be added that Hayman (cf. _D. N.

B._), like Sharpham, was a Devonshire man. The date may be taken to be

1607, as the King’s Revels are not traceable earlier.

SAMUEL SHEPPARD (> 1606–1652 <).

The known work of this miscellaneous writer belongs to 1646–52, and

although it includes a political tract in dramatic form, it is only his

vague claim of a share, possibly as amanuensis, in Jonson’s _Sejanus_

(q.v.), which suggests that he might be the unknown S. S. whose

initials are on the title-page of _The Honest Lawyer_ (1616).

SIR PHILIP SIDNEY (1554–86).

Both his entertainments were printed for the first time with the third

(1598) edition of the _Arcadia_.

_The Lady of May. 1579_ (?)

1598. The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia. Written by Sir Philip Sidney

Knight. Now the third time published, with sundry new additions of

the same Author. _For William Ponsonby._ [The description of the

entertainment follows _Astrophel and Stella_ among the ‘new additions’,

beginning at the head of sig. 3 B3^v, without title or date.]

Reprints in 1599, 1605, 1613, 1621, 1622, 1623, 1627, 1629, 1633, 1638,

1655, 1662, 1674 editions of the _Arcadia_.

_Editions_ in Nichols, _Elizabeth^{1, 2}_, ii. 94 (1788–1823), and

Collections of Sidney’s _Works_.

The entertainment was in the Garden. As the Queen entered the grove,

An Honest Man’s Wife of the Country delivered a speech and a written

supplication in verse, for decision of the case of her daughter. Then

came the daughter, chosen May Lady, and haled this way by six Shepherds

on behalf of her lover Espilus and six Foresters on behalf of her

lover Therion. The case was put to the Queen by Laius an old Shepherd,

Rombus a Schoolmaster, and finally the May Lady herself. Espilus,

accompanied by the Shepherds with recorders, and Therion, accompanied

by the Foresters with cornets, sang in rivalry. A ‘contention’ followed

between Dorcas, an old Shepherd, and Rixus, a young Forester, ‘whether

of their fellows had sung better, and whether the estate of shepherds

or foresters were the more worshipful’. Rombus tried to intervene. The

May Lady appealed to the Queen, who decided for Espilus. Shepherds and

Foresters made a consort together, Espilus sang a song, and the May

Lady took her leave.

Nichols assigns the entertainment to Elizabeth’s Wanstead visit of

1578. But it might also belong to that of 1579, and possibly to that

of 1582. In 1579, but not in 1578, the visit covered May Day. The

references in the text are, however, to the month of May, rather than

to May Day.

_Pastoral Dialogue, c. 1580_

1598. A Dialogue between two Shepherds, Vttered in a Pastorall Show at

Wilton. [Appended to _Arcadia_; cf. _supra_.]

_Edition_ in A. B. Grosart, _Poems of Sidney_ (1877), ii. 50.

This dialogue between Dick and Will appears to belong to the series of

poems motived by Sidney’s love for Penelope Devereux. It must therefore

date between August 1577, when Sidney first visited his sister, Lady

Pembroke, at Wilton, and his own marriage on 20 Sept. 1583. There is no

indication that the Queen was present; not improbably the ‘Show’ took

place while Sidney was out of favour at Court, and was living at Wilton

from March to August 1580.

JOHN SINGER (?-1603 <).

On Singer’s career as an actor, see ch. xv.

On 13 Jan. 1603, about which date he apparently retired from the

Admiral’s, Henslowe paid him £5 ‘for his playe called Syngers

vallentarey’ (Greg, _Henslowe_, i. 173; ii. 226). I think the term

‘vallentarey’ must be used by Henslowe, rightly or wrongly, in the

sense of ‘valedictory’. _Quips on Questions_ (1600), a book of

‘themes’, is not his, but Armin’s (q.v.).

WILLIAM SLY (?-1608).

On Sly’s career as an actor, see ch. xv.

He has been guessed at as the author of _Thomas Lord Cromwell_ (cf. ch.

xxiv).

W. SMITH.

There are traceable (_a_) Wentworth Smith, who wrote plays for

Henslowe’s companies, the Admiral’s, and Worcester’s during 1601–3

(_vide infra_) and witnessed the will of W. Haughton in 1605; (_b_)

a W. Smith, who wrote _Hector of Germany_ and _The Freeman’s Honour_

(_vide infra_); (_c_) a ‘Smith’, whose _Fair Foul One_ Herbert

licensed on 28 Nov. 1623 (Chalmers, _S. A._ 216; Herbert, 26); (_d_)

if Warburton can be trusted, a ‘Will. Smithe’, whose _S^t George for

England_ his cook burnt (_3 Library_, ii. 231). It is possible that

(_a_) and (_b_) may be identical. A long space of time separates (_b_)

and (_c_), and if (_d_) is to be identified with any other, it may

most plausibly be with (_c_). There is nothing to connect any one of

them with the William Smith who published sonnets under the title of

_Chloris_ (1596), or with any other member of this infernal family, and

the ‘W. S.’ of the anonymous _Locrine_ (1595), _Thomas Lord Cromwell_

(1602), _The Puritan_ (1607) is more probably, in each case, aimed at

Shakespeare.

_The Hector of Germany, c. 1615_

_S. R._ 1615, April 24 (Buck). ‘A play called The Hector of Germany,

or the Palsgraue is a harmeles thinge.’ _Josias Harrison_ (Arber, iii.

566). [The four last words of the title are scored through.]

1615. The Hector of Germaine, or the Palsgrave, Prime Elector. A

New Play, an Honourable Hystorie. As it hath beene publikely Acted

at the Red Bull, and at the Curtaine, by a Companie of Young Men of

this Citie. Made by W. Smith, with new Additions. _Thomas Creede for

Josias Harrison._ [Epistle to Sir John Swinnerton, signed ‘W. Smith’;

Prologue; after text, ‘Finis. W. Smyth.’ Some copies have a variant

t.p.]

_Edition_ by L. W. Payne (1906, _Pennsylvania Univ. Publ._).

The epistle says ‘I have begun in a former Play, called the Freemans

Honour, acted by the Now-Seruants of the Kings Maiestie, to

dignifie the worthy Companie of the Marchantaylors’. If the phrase

‘Now-Seruants’ implies production before 1603, the identification of W.

Smith and Wentworth Smith becomes very probable. The prologue explains

that the Palsgrave is not Frederick, since ‘Authorities sterne brow’

would not permit ‘To bring him while he lives upon the stage’, and

apologizes for the performance by ‘men of trade’.

_Lost Plays_

Henslowe assigns to Wentworth Smith a share in the following plays:

_Plays for the Admiral’s, 1601–2_

(i) _The Conquest of the West Indies._

With Day and Haughton, Apr.–Sept. 1601.

(ii) _1 Cardinal Wolsey._

With Chettle, Drayton, and Munday, Aug.–Nov. 1601.

(iii), (iv) _1, 2 The Six Clothiers._

With Hathway and Haughton, Oct.–Nov. 1601. Apparently Part 2 was not

finished.

(v) _Too Good to be True._

With Chettle and Hathway, Nov. 1601–Jan. 1602.

(vi) _Love Parts Friendship._

With Chettle, May 1602, conjectured to be the anonymous _Trial of

Chivalry_ (q.v.).

(vii) _Merry as May be._

With Day and Hathway, Nov. 1602.

_Plays for Worcester’s, 1602–3_

(viii) _Albere Galles._

With Heywood, Sept. 1602, possibly identical with the anonymous

_Nobody and Somebody_ (q.v.).

(ix) _Marshal Osric._

With Heywood, Sept. 1602, conceivably identical with _The Royal King

and the Loyal Subject_, printed (1637) as by Heywood (q.v.).

(x) _The Three_ (or _Two_) _Brothers_.

Oct. 1602.

(xi) _1 Lady Jane._

With Chettle, Dekker, Heywood, and Webster, Oct. 1602. It is not

certain that Smith, or any one but Dekker, had a hand in Part 2,

which was apparently not finished. Part 1 is doubtless represented by

the extant _Sir Thomas Wyatt_ of Dekker (q.v.) and Webster, in which

nothing is at all obviously traceable to Smith.

(xii), (xiii) _1, 2 The Black Dog of Newgate._

With Day, Hathway, and another, Nov. 1602–Feb. 1603.

(xiv) _The Unfortunate General._

With Day and Hathway, Jan. 1602.

(xv) _The Italian Tragedy._

March 1603.

EDMUND SPENSER (1552–99).

The only record of Spenser’s dramatic experiments, unless they are

buried amongst the anonymous plays of the Revels Accounts, is to be

found in his correspondence of April 1580 with Gabriel Harvey, who

wrote, ‘I imagine your Magnificenza will hold us in suspense ... for

your nine English Commedies’, and again, ‘I am void of all judgment if

your Nine Comedies, whereunto in imitation of Herodotus, you give the

names of the Nine Muses (and in one mans fancy not unworthily) come

not nearer Ariosto’s Comedies, either for the fineness of plausible

elocution, or the rareness of Poetical Invention, than that Elvish

Queen doth to his Orlando Furioso’ (_Two other Very Commendable

Letters_, in Harvey’s _Works_, i. 67, 95). I can hardly suppose that

the manuscript play of ‘Farry Queen’ in Warburton’s list (_3 Library_,

ii. 232) had any connexion with Spenser’s comedies.

ROD. STAFFORD.

Probably the ‘Rod. Staff.’ who collaborated with Robert Wilmot (q.v.)

in the Inner Temple play of _Gismond of Salerne_.

WILLIAM STANLEY, EARL OF DERBY (1561–1642).

Derby seems to have had players from 1594 to 1618, who presumably acted

the comedies which he was said to be ‘penning’ in June 1599 (cf. ch.

xiii), but none of these can be identified, although the company’s

anonymous _Trial of Chivalry_ (1605) needs an author. A fantastic

theory that his plays were for the Chamberlain’s, and that he wrote

them under the name of William Shakespeare, was promulgated by J.

Greenstreet in _The Genealogist_, n.s. vii. 205; viii. 8, 137, and has

been elaborately developed by A. Lefranc in _Sous le Masque de ‘William

Shakespeare’_ (1919) and later papers in _Le Flambeau_ and elsewhere.

_A Midsummer Night’s Dream_ was not impossibly written for his wedding

on 26 Jan. 1595 (cf. App. A and _Shakespeare Homage_, 154).

JOHN STEPHENS (> 1611–1617 <).

A Gloucester man, who entered Lincoln’s Inn in 1611, but is only known

by his slight literary performances, of which the most important are

his _Essayes_ of 1615 (cf. App. C, No. lx).

_Cynthia’s Revenge > 1613_

1613. Cinthias Revenge: or Maenanders Extasie. Written by John

Stephens, Gent. _For Roger Barnes._ [There are two variant t.ps. of

which one omits the author’s name. Epistle to Io. Dickinson, signed ‘I.

S.’; Epistle to the Reader; Argument; Commendatory Verses, signed ‘F.

C.’, ‘B. I.’, ‘G. Rogers’, ‘Tho. Danet’.]

_Dissertation_: P. Simpson, _The Authorship and Original Issue of C.

R._ (1907, _M. L. R._ ii. 348).

The epistle to the reader says that the author’s name is ‘purposly

concealed ... from the impression’, which accounts for the change of

title-page. Stephens claims the authorship in the second edition of

his _Essayes_ (1615). Kirkman (Greg, _Masques_, lxii) was misled into

assigning it to ‘John Swallow’, by a too literal interpretation of F.

C.’s lines:

One Swallow makes no Summer, most men say,

But who disproues that Prouerbe, made this Play.

JOHN STUDLEY (_c._ 1545–_c._ 1590).

Translator of Seneca (q.v.).

ROBERT TAILOR (_c._ 1613).

Tailor also published settings to _Sacred Hymns_ (1615) and wrote

commendatory verses to John Taylor’s _The Nipping or Snipping of

Abuses_ (1614).

_Hog Hath Lost His Pearl. 1613_

_S. R._ 1614, May 23, 1614 (Taverner and Buck). ‘A play booke called

Hogge hath lost his pearle.’ _Richard Redmer_ (Arber, iii. 547).

1614. The Hogge hath lost his Pearle. A Comedy. Divers times Publikely

acted, by certaine London Prentices. By Robert Tailor. _For Richard

Redmer._ [Prologue and Epilogue.]

_Editions_ in Dodsley^{1–4} (1744–1875) and by W. Scott (1810, _A. B.

D._ iii).

Sir H. Wotton wrote to Sir Edmund Bacon (Wotton, ii. 13): ‘On Sunday

last at night, and no longer, some sixteen apprentices (of what sort

you shall guess by the rest of the story) having secretly learnt a

new play without book, intituled _The Hog hath lost his Pearl_, took

up the White-Fryers for their theatre: and having invited thither (as

it should seem) rather their mistresses than their masters; who were

all to enter _per bullettini_ for a note of distinction from ordinary

comedians, towards the end of the play the sheriffs (who by chance had

heard of it) came in (as they say) and carried some six or seven of

them to perform the last act at Bridewel; the rest are fled. Now it

is strange to hear how sharp-witted the City is, for they will needs

have Sir John Swinerton, the Lord Mayor, be meant by the Hog, and the

late Lord Treasurer [Lord Salisbury] by the Pearl.’ Swinnerton was Lord

Mayor in 1612–13. The letter is only dated ‘Tuesday’, but refers to

the departure of the King, which was 22 Feb. 1613, as on the previous

day. This would give the first Sunday in Lent (21 Feb.) for the date

of production. The phrase (I. i) ‘Shrove-Tuesday is at hand’ suggests

14 Feb., but the date originally intended was very likely altered.

The Prologue refers to the difficulties of the producers. The play

had been ‘toss’d from one house to another’. It does not grunt at

‘state-affairs’ or ‘city vices’. There had been attempts to ‘prevent’

it, but it ‘hath a Knight’s license’, doubtless Sir George Buck’s. In

I. i is some chaff, apparently directed at Garlic and the Fortune, and

an interview between a player and one Haddit, who writes a jig called

_Who Buys my Four Ropes of Hard Onions_ for four angels, and a promise

of a box for a new play. Fleay, ii. 256, identifies Haddit with Dekker,

but his reasons do not bear analysis, and Haddit is no professional

playwright, but a gallant who has run through his fortune. A passage

in Act III (Dodsley, p. 465) bears out the suggestion of satire on the

house of Cecil.

RICHARD TARLTON (?-1588).

On his career as an actor, cf. ch. xv.

_The Seven Deadly Sins. 1585_

[_MS._] _Dulwich MS._ xix, ‘The platt of The secound parte of the Seuen

Deadlie sinns.’ [This was found pasted inside the boards forming the

cover to a manuscript play of the seventeenth century, _The Tell Tale_

(_Dulwich MS._ xx).]

The text is given by Malone, _Supplement_ (1780), i. 60; Steevens,

_Variorum_ (1803), iii. 404; Boswell, _Variorum_ (1821), iii. 348;

Collier, iii. 197; Greg, _Henslowe Papers_, 129; and a photographic

facsimile by W. Young, _History of Dulwich_ (1889), ii. 5.

The ‘platt’ names a number of actors and may thereby be assigned

to a revival by the Admiral’s or Strange’s men about 1590 (cf. ch.

xiii). The play consisted of three episodes illustrating Envy, Sloth,

and Lechery, together with an Induction. This renders plausible the

conjecture of Fleay, 83, supported by Greg, _Henslowe_, ii. 153, that

it is the _Four Plays in One_ revived by Strange’s for Henslowe on

6 March 1592. And if so, the original two parts may be traceable in

the _Five Plays in One_ and the _Three Plays in One_ of the Queen’s

men in 1585. Tarlton was of course a Queen’s man, and evidence of his

authorship is furnished by Gabriel Harvey, who in his _Four Letters_

(1592, _Works_, i. 194) attacks Nashe’s _Pierce Penilesse_ (1592) as

‘not Dunsically botched-vp, but right-formally conueied, according

to the stile, and tenour of Tarletons president, his famous play of

the seauen Deadly sinnes; which most deadly, but most liuely playe, I

might haue seene in London; and was verie gently inuited thereunto at

Oxford by Tarleton himselfe’. Nashe defends himself against the charge

of plagiarism in his _Strange News_ (1592, _Works_, i. 304, 318), and

confirms the indication of authorship.

_Doubtful Play_

Tarlton has been suggested as the author of the anonymous _Famous

Victories of Henry V_ (cf. ch. xxiv).

JOHN TAYLOR (1580–1653).

Known as the Water Poet. His description of the festivities at the

wedding of Princess Elizabeth in 1613 (cf. ch. xxiv, C) is only one of

innumerable pamphlets in verse and prose, several of which throw light

on stage history. Many of these were collected in his folio _Workes_

of 1630, reprinted with others of his writings by the Spenser Society

during 1868–78. There is also a collection by C. Hindley (1872).

CHARLES TILNEY (_ob._ 1586).

Said, on manuscript authority alleged by Collier, to be the author of

_Locrine_ (cf. ch. xxiv).

THOMAS TOMKIS (> 1597–1614 <).

Tomkis entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1597, took his B.A. in

1600 and his M.A. in 1604, and became Fellow of Trinity in the same

year. He has been confused by Fleay, ii. 260, and others with various

members of a musical family of Tomkins.

_Lingua. 1602 < > 7_

_S. R._ 1607, Feb. 23 (Wilson). ‘A Commedie called Lingua.’ _Simon

Waterson_ (Arber, iii. 340).

1607. Lingua: Or The Combat of the Tongue, And the fiue Senses. For

Superiority. _G. Eld for Simon Waterson._ [Prologue.]

1617; 1622; n.d.; 1632; 1657.

_Editions_ in Dodsley^{1–4} (1744–1874) and by W. Scott (1810, _A. B.

D._ ii) and J. S. Farmer (1913, _S. F. T._).--_Dissertation_: F. S.

Boas, _Macbeth and L._ (1909, _M. L. R._ iv. 517).

Winstanley (1687) assigned the play to Antony Brewer, but Sir J.

Harington, in a memorandum printed by F. J. Furnivall from _Addl.

MS._ 27632 in _7 N. Q._ ix. 382, notes ‘The combat of Lingua made by

Thom. Tomkis of Trinity colledge in Cambridge’, and this is rendered

plausible by the resemblance of the play to _Albumazar_. It is clearly

of an academic type. As to the date there is less certainty. G. C.

Moore Smith (_M. L. R._ iii. 146) supports 1602 by a theory that a

compliment (IV. vii) to Queen Psyche is really meant for Elizabeth,

and contains allusions to notable events of her reign. I do not find

his interpretations very convincing, although I should not like to say

that they are impossible. Fleay, ii. 261, starting from a tradition

handed down by the publisher of 1657 that Oliver Cromwell acted in the

play, conjectures that the play formed part of Sir Oliver Cromwell’s

entertainment of James at Hinchinbrook on 27–9 April 1603, and that his

four-year-old nephew took the four-line part of Small Beer (_IV._ v).

Either date would fit in with the remark in _III._ v, ‘About the year

1602 many used this skew kind of language’. Boas, however, prefers a

date near that of publication, on account of similarities to passages

in _Macbeth_. The play was translated as _Speculum Aestheticum_ for

Maurice of Hesse-Cassel in 1613 by Johannes Rhenanus, who probably

accompanied Prince Otto to England in 1611; cf. P. Losch, _Johannes

Rhenanus_ (1895).

_Albumazar. 1615_

_S. R._ 1615, April 28 (Nidd). ‘Albumazar a comedie acted before his

Maiestie at Cambridg 10^o Martii 1614.’ _Nicholas Okes_ (Arber, iii.

566).

1615. Albumazar. A Comedy presented before the Kings Maiestie at

Cambridge, the ninth of March, 1614. By the Gentlemen of Trinitie

Colledge. _Nicholas Okes for Walter Burre._ [Prologue.]

1615. _Nicholas Okes for Walter Burre._ [Another edition with the same

t.p.]

1634.... Newly revised and corrected by a speciall Hand. _Nicholas

Okes._

1634. _Nicholas Okes._

1668.... As it is now Acted at His Highness the Duke of York’s Theatre.

_For Thomas Dring._ [Prologue by Dryden.]

_Editions_ in Dodsley^{1–4} (1744–1875) and by W. Scott (1810, _A. B.

D._ ii).

The play is assigned to ‘M^r Tomkis, Trinit.’ in an account of the

royal visit given by S. Pegge from Sir Edward Dering’s MS. in _Gent.

Mag._ xxvi. 224, and a bursar’s account-book for 1615 has the entry,

‘Given M^r. Tomkis for his paines in penning and ordering the Englishe

Commedie at our Masters appoyntment, xx^{ll}’ (_3 N. Q._ xii. 155).

Chamberlain wrote to Carleton (Birch, i. 304) that ‘there was no great

matter in it more than one good clown’s part’. It is an adaptation

of Giambattista Porta’s _L’Astrologo_ (1606). No importance is to be

attached to the suggestion of H. I. in _3 N. Q._ ix. 178, 259, 302,

that Shakespeare was the author and wrote manuscript notes in a copy

possessed by H. I. Dryden regards the play as the model of Jonson’s

_Alchemist_ (1610):

Subtle was got by our Albumazar,

That Alchymist by our Astrologer.

Unless Dryden was mistaken, the performance in 1615 was only a revival,

but the payment for ‘penning’ makes this improbable.

_Doubtful Later Play_

G. C. Moore Smith (_M. L. R._ iii. 149) supports the attribution by

Winstanley to Tomkis of _Pathomachia or the Battle of Affections_

(1630), also called in a running title and in _Bodl. MS. Eng. Misc._ e.

5 _Love’s Load-stone_, a University play of _c._ 1616, in which there

are two references to ‘Madame Lingua’.

CYRIL TOURNEUR (?-1626).

Tourneur, or Turnor, first appears as the author of a satire, _The

Transformed Metamorphosis_ (1600), but his history and relationships

to the Cecils and to Sir Francis Vere suggest that he was connected

with a Richard Turnor who served in the Low Countries as water-bailiff

and afterwards Lieutenant of Brill during 1585–96. His career as a

dramatist was over by 1613, and from December of that year to his death

on 28 Feb. 1626 he seems himself to have been employed on foreign

service, mainly in the Low Countries but finally at Cadiz, where he was

secretary to the council of war under Sir Edward Cecil in 1625. He died

in Ireland and left a widow Mary.

_Collections_

1878. J. C. Collins, _The Plays and Poems of C. T._ 2 vols.

1888. J. A. Symonds, _Webster and Tourneur_ (_Mermaid

Series_).

_Dissertations_: G. Goodwin in _Academy_ (9 May 1891); T. Seccombe in

_D. N. B._ (1899).

_The Atheist’s Tragedy. 1607 < > 11_

_S. R._ 1611, Sept. 14 (Buck). ‘A booke called, The tragedy of the

Atheist.’ _John Stepneth_ (Arber, iii. 467).

1611. The Atheist’s Tragedie: Or The honest Man’s Reuenge, As in diuers

places it hath often beene Acted. Written by Cyril Tourneur. _For John

Stepneth and Richard Redmer._

1612. _For John Stepneth and Richard Redmer._ [Another issue.]

Fleay, ii. 263, attempts to date the play before the close of the siege

of Ostend in 1604, but, as E. E. Stoll, _John Webster_, 210, points

out, this merely dates the historic action and proves nothing as to

composition. Stoll himself finds some plausible reminiscences of _King

Lear_ (1606) and suggests a date near that of publication.

LOST PLAYS

_The Nobleman. c. 1612_

_S. R._ 1612, Feb. 15 (Buck). ‘A play booke beinge a Trage-comedye

called, The Noble man written by Cyril Tourneur.’ _Edward Blount_

(Arber, iii. 478).

1653, Sept. 9. ‘The Nobleman, or Great Man, by Cyrill Tourneur.’

_Humphrey Moseley_ (Eyre, i. 428).

The play was acted by the King’s at Court on 23 Feb. 1612 and again

during the winter of 1612–13. Warburton’s list of plays burnt by his

cook (_3 Library_, ii. 232) contains distinct entries of ‘The Great Man

T.’ and ‘The Nobleman T. C. Cyrill Turñuer’. Hazlitt, _Manual_, 167,

says (1892): ‘Dr. Furnivall told me many years ago that the MS. was in

the hands of a gentleman at Oxford, who was editing Tourneur’s Works;

but I have heard nothing further of it. Music to a piece called The

Nobleman is in _Addl. MS. B.M._ 10444.’

For _The Arraignment of London_ (1613) v.s. Daborne.

_Doubtful Plays_

Tourneur’s hand has been sought in the _Honest Man’s Fortune_ of the

Beaumont (q.v.) and Fletcher series, and in _Charlemagne_, _Revenger’s

Tragedy_, and _Second Maiden’s Tragedy_ (cf. ch. xxiv).

NICHOLAS TROTTE (_c._ 1588).

A Gray’s Inn lawyer, who wrote an ‘Introduction’ for the _Misfortunes

of Arthur_ of Thomas Hughes (q.v.) in 1588.

RICHARD VENNAR (_c._ 1555–1615?).

Vennar (Vennard), who has often been confused with William Fennor, a

popular rhymer, was of Balliol and Lincoln’s Inn, and lived a shifty

life, which ended about 1615 in a debtor’s prison. Its outstanding

feature was the affair of _England’s Joy_, but in 1606 he is said (_D.

N. B._) to have been in trouble for an attempt to defraud Sir John

Spencer of £500 towards the preparation of an imaginary mask under the

patronage of Sir John Watts, the Lord Mayor.

_England’s Joy. 1602_

[_Broadsheet_] The Plot of the Play, called England’s Joy. To be Played

at the Swan this 6 of Nouember, 1602. [No. 98 in collection of Society

of Antiquaries.]

_Reprints_ by W. Park in _Harleian Miscellany_ (1813), x. 198; S. Lee

(1887, _vide infra_); W. Martin (1913, _vide infra_); W. J. Lawrence

(1913, _vide infra_).--_Dissertations_: S. Lee, _The Topical Side of

the Elizabethan Drama_ (_N. S. S. Trans._ 1887–92, 1); T. S. Graves,

_A Note on the Swan Theatre_ (1912, _M. P._ ix. 431), _Tricks of

Elizabethan Showmen_ (_South Atlantic Quarterly_, April 1915); W.

Martin, _An Elizabethan Theatre Programme_ (1913, _Selborne Magazine_,

xxiv. 16); W. J. Lawrence (ii. 57), _The Origin of the Theatre

Programme_.

The document appears to be a ‘bill’. It is 12¾ by 7¾ inches, and

contains a synopsis under nine heads, beginning with the civil wars

from Edward III to Mary ‘induct by shew and in Action’, and continuing

with episodes from the reign of Elizabeth, who is England’s Joy. In

sc. viii ‘a great triumph is made with fighting of twelue Gentlemen

at Barriers’, and in sc. ix Elizabeth ‘is taken vp into Heauen, when

presently appeares, a Throne of blessed Soules, and beneath vnder the

Stage set forth with strange fireworkes, diuers blacke and damned

Soules, wonderfully discribed in their seuerall torments’. Apart from

the bill, Vennar must have given it out that the performers were to be

amateurs. Chamberlain, 163, writes to Carleton on 19 Nov. 1602:

‘And, now we are in mirth, I must not forget to tell you of

a cousening prancke of one Venner, of Lincolns Inne, that

gave out bills of a famous play on Satterday was sevenight

on the Banckeside, to be acted only by certain gentlemen

and gentlewomen of account. The price at cumming in was two

shillings or eighteen pence at least; and when he had gotten

most part of the mony into his hands, he wold have shewed them

a faire paire of heeles, but he was not so nimble to get up on

horse-backe, but that he was faine to forsake that course, and

betake himselfe to the water, where he was pursued and taken,

and brought before the Lord Chiefe Justice, who wold make

nothing of it but a jest and a merriment, and bounde him over

in five pound to appeare at the sessions. In the meane time

the common people, when they saw themselves deluded, revenged

themselves upon the hangings, curtains, chairs, stooles, walles,

and whatsoever came in theire way, very outragiously, and made

great spoile; there was great store of good companie, and many

noblemen.’

Similarly John Manningham in his _Diary_, 82, 93, notes in Nov. 1602,

how

‘Vennar, a gent. of Lincolnes, who had lately playd a notable

cunni-catching tricke, and gulled many under couller of a play

to be of gent. and reuerens, comming to the court since in a

blacke suit, bootes and golden spurres without a rapier, one

told him he was not well suited; the golden spurres and his

brazen face uns[uited].’

On 27 Nov. he adds, ‘When one said that Vennar the graund connicatcher

had golden spurres and a brazen face, “It seemes”, said R. R. “he hath

some mettall in him.”’ Vennar’s own account of ‘my publique default of

the Swan, where not a collier but cals his deere 12 pense to witnesse

the disaster of the day’ was given many years later in ‘_An Apology_:

Written by Richard Vennar, of Lincolnes Inne, abusively called Englands

Joy. 1614’, printed by Collier in _Illustrations_ (1866), iii. It vies

in impudence with the original offence. He had been in prison and was

in debt, and ‘saw daily offering to the God of pleasure, resident at

the Globe on the Banke-side’. This suggested his show, ‘for which they

should give double payment, to the intent onely, men of ability might

make the purchase without repentance’. He continues:

‘My devise was all sorts of musique, beginning with chambers,

the harpe of war, and ending with hounds, the cry of peace, of

which I was doubly provided for Fox and Hare. The report of

gentlemen and gentlewomens actions, being indeed the flagge

to our theater, was not meerely falcification, for I had

divers Chorus to bee spoken by men of good birth, schollers by

profession, protesting that the businesse was meerely abused

by the comming of some beagles upon mee that were none of the

intended kennell: I meane baylifes, who, siezing mee before the

first entrance, spoke an Epilogue instead of a Prologue. This

changed the play into the hunting of the fox, which, that the

world may know for a verity, I heere promise the next tearme,

with the true history of my life, to bee publiquely presented,

to insert, in place of musicke for the actes, all those

intendments prepared for that daies enterteinment.’

Later on he says, ‘I presented you with a dumbe show’, and jests on

getting ‘so much mony for six verses’, which, I suppose, means that the

performance was intended to be a spoken one, but was broken off during

the prologue. Apparently the new entertainment contemplated by Vennar

in 1614 was in fact given, not by him but by William Fennor, to whom

John Taylor writes in his _A Cast Over Water_ (1615):

Thou brag’st what fame thou got’st upon the stage.

Indeed, thou set’st the people in a rage

In playing England’s Joy, that every man

Did judge it worse than that was done at Swan.

* * * * *

Upon S. George’s day last, sir, you gave

To eight Knights of the Garter (like a knave),

Eight manuscripts (or Books) all fairelie writ,

Informing them, they were your mother wit:

And you compil’d them; then were you regarded,

And for another’s wit was well rewarded.

All this is true, and this I dare maintaine,

The matter came from out a learned braine:

And poor old _Vennor_ that plaine dealing man,

Who acted England’s Joy first at the Swan,

Paid eight crowns for the writing of these things.

Besides the covers, and the silken strings.

Robin Goodfellow, in Jonson’s _Love Restored_ (_1612_), calls the

absence of a mask ‘a fine trick, a piece of England’s Joy’, and three

characters in the _Masque of Augurs_ (_1622_) are said to be ‘three

of those gentlewomen that should have acted in that famous matter of

England’s Joy in six hundred and three’--apparently a slip of Jonson’s

as to the exact date. Other allusions to the ‘gullery’ are in Saville,

_Entertainment of King James at Theobalds_ (1603); R. Brathwaite, _The

Poet’s Palfrey_ (_Strappado for the Devil_, ed. J. W. Ebsworth, 160);

J. Suckling, _The Goblins_ (ed. Hazlitt, ii. 52); W. Davenant, _Siege

of Rhodes_, Pt. ii, prol. It may be added that Vennar’s cozenage was

perhaps suggested by traditional stories of similar tricks. One is

ascribed to one Qualitees in _Merry Tales, Wittie Questions and Quick

Answeres_, cxxxiii (1567, Hazlitt, _Jest Books_, i. 145). In this

bills were set up ‘vpon postes aboute London’ for ‘an antycke plaie’

at Northumberland Place and ‘all they that shoulde playe therin were

gentilmen’. Another is the subject of one of the _Jests_ of George

Peele (Bullen, ii. 389). W. Fennor, _The Compters Commonwealth_

(1617), 64, tells of an adventure of ‘one M^r. Venard (that went by

the name of Englands Joy)’ in jail, where he afterwards died.

EDWARD DE VERE, EARL OF OXFORD (1550–1604).

Meres (1598) includes the earl in his list of ‘the best for Comedy

amongst vs’ but although Oxford had theatrical servants at intervals

from 1580 to 1602 (cf. ch. xiii), little is known of their plays, and

none can be assigned to him, although the anonymous _The Weakest Goeth

to the Wall_ (1600) calls for an author. J. T. Looney, _Shakespeare

Identified_ (1920), gives him Shakespeare’s plays, many of which were

written after his death.

FRANCIS VERNEY (1584–1615).

Francis, the eldest son of Sir Edmund Verney of Penley, Herts., and

Claydon, Bucks., entered Trinity College, Oxford, in 1600, and was

knighted on 14 March 1604. As a result of family disputes, he left

England about 1608, and became a pirate in the Mediterranean, dying at

Messina on 6 Sept. 1615 (_Verney Memoirs^2_, i. 47). G. C. Moore Smith

(_M. L. R._ iii. 151) gives him the following play.

_Antipoe. 1603 < > 8_

[_MS._] _Bodl. MS._ 31041, ‘The tragedye of Antipoe with other poetical

verses written by mee Nic^o. Leatt Jun. in Allicant In June 1622’, with

Epistles to James and the Reader by ‘Francis Verney’. Presumably Verney

was the author, and Nicolas only a scribe.

ANTONY WADESON (_c._ 1601).

Henslowe made payments to him on behalf of the Admiral’s in June and

July 1601 for a play called _The Honourable Life of the Humorous Earl

of Gloucester, with his Conquest of Portugal_, but these only amounted

to 30_s._, so that possibly the play was not finished.

_Doubtful Play_

The anonymous _Look About You_ (cf. ch. xxiv) has been ascribed to

Wadeson.

LEWIS WAGER (_c._ 1560).

Wager became Rector of St. James Garlickhithe on 28 March 1560. Some

resemblance of his style to that of W. Wager has led to an assumption

that they were related. He was a corrector of books.

_The Life and Repentance of Mary Magdalene > 1566_

_S. R._ 1566–7. ‘An interlude of the Repentaunce of Mary Magdalen.’

_John Charlwood_ (Arber, i. 335).

1566. A new Enterlude, neuer before this tyme imprinted, entreating

of the Life and Repentaunce of Marie Magdalene: not only godlie,

learned and fruitefull, but also well furnished with pleasaunt myrth

and pastime, very delectable for those which shall heare or reade

the same. Made by the learned clarke Lewis Wager. _John Charlwood._

[Prologue.]

1567. _John Charlwood._ [Probably a reissue. Two manuscript copies in

the Dyce collection seem to be made from this edition.]

_Editions_ by F. I. Carpenter (1902, 1904, _Chicago Decennial

Publications_, ii. 1) and J. S. Farmer (1908, _T. F. T._).

A play of Protestant tone, with biblical and allegorical characters,

including ‘Infidelitie the Vice’, intended for four [five] actors.

There is a Prologue, intended for actors who have ‘vsed this feate at

the vniuersitie’ and will take ‘half-pence or pence’ from the audience.

Carpenter dates the play _c._ 1550; but his chief argument that the

prologue recommends obedience ‘to the kyng’ is not very convincing.

See also W. Wager, s.v. _The Cruel Debtor._

W. WAGER (_c._ 1559).

Nothing is known of him beyond his plays and the similarity of his name

to that of Lewis Wager (q.v.). Joseph Hunter, _Chorus Vatum_, v. 90,

attempts to identify him with William Gager (q.v.), but this is not

plausible. On the illegitimate extension of W. into William and other

bibliographical confusions about the two Wagers, _vide_ W. W. Greg,

_Notes on Dramatic Bibliographers_ (_M. S. C._ i. 324).

_The Longer Thou Livest, the More Fool Thou Art. c. 1559_

_S. R._ 1568–9. ‘A ballett the lenger thou leveste the more ffoole

thow.’ _Richard Jones_ (Arber, i. 386).

N.D. A very mery and Pythie Commedie, called The longer thou liuest,

the more foole thou art. A Myrrour very necessarie for youth, and

specially for such as are like to come to dignitie and promotion: As it

maye well appeare in the Matter folowynge. Newly compiled by W. Wager.

_William Howe for Richard Jones._ [Prologue.]

_Editions_ by Brandl (1900, _Jahrbuch_ xxxvi. 1) and J. S.

Farmer (1910, _S. F. T._).

A Protestant moral of 1,977 lines, with allegorical characters,

arranged for four actors. Moros enters ‘synging the foote of many

Songes, as fooles were wont’. Elizabeth is prayed for as queen, but the

Catholic domination is still recent.

_Enough is as Good as a Feast. c. 1560_

N.D. A Comedy or Enterlude intituled, Inough is as good as a feast,

very fruteful, godly and ful of pleasant mirth. Compiled by W. Wager.

_By John Allde._ [The t.p. has also ‘Seuen may easely play this

Enterlude’, with an arrangement of parts. The play was unknown until

it appeared in Lord Mostyn’s sale of 1919. The seventeenth-century

publishers’ lists record the title, but without ascription to Wager

(Greg, _Masques_, lxvi).]

_Edition_ by S. de Ricci (1920, _Huntingdon Reprints_, ii).

F. S. Boas (_T. L. S._ 20 Feb. 1919) describes the play as ‘a

morality with a controversial Protestant flavour’; at the end Satan

carries off the Vice, Covetouse, on his back. Elizabeth is prayed for.

_The Cruel Debtor. c. 1565_

_S. R._ 1565–6. ‘A ballet intituled an interlude the Cruell Detter by

Wager.’ _Thomas Colwell_ (Arber, i. 307).

N.D. Fragments. C. iii in Bagford Collection (_Harl. MS._ 5919); D and

D 4(?) formerly in collection of W. B. Scott, now in B.M. (C. 40, e.

48).

_Editions_ by F. J. Furnivall (1878, _N. S. S. Trans._ 1877–9, 2*) and

W. W. Greg (1911, _M. S. C._ i. 314).

The speakers are Rigour, Flattery, Simulation, Ophiletis, Basileus, and

Proniticus.

R. Imelmann in _Herrig’s Archiv_, cxi. 209, would assign these

fragments to Lewis Wager, rather than W. Wager, but the stylistic

evidence is hardly conclusive either way, and there is no other.

_Lost Play_

Warburton’s list of manuscripts burnt by his cook (_3 Library_, ii.

232) includes ’Tis Good Sleeping in A Whole Skin W. Wager’.

GEORGE WAPULL (_c._ 1576).

A George Wapull was clerk of the Stationers’ Company from 29 Sept. 1571

to 30 May 1575. In 1584–5 the company assisted him with 10_s._ ‘towards

his voyage unto Norembegue’ in America (Arber, i. xliv, 509).

_The Tide Tarrieth No Man > 1576_

_S. R._ 1576, Oct. 22. ‘An Enterlude intituled The tide tariethe noe

man.’ _Hugh Jackson_ (Arber, ii. 303).

1576. The Tyde taryeth no Man. A Moste Pleasant and merry Commody,

right pythie and full of delight. Compiled by George Wapull. _Hugh

Jackson._ [Prologue.]

_Editions_ by J. P. Collier (1864, _Illustrations of Early English

Literature_, ii), E. Ruhl (1907, _Jahrbuch_, xliii. 1), J. S. Farmer

(1910, _T. F. T._).

A non-controversial moral, with allegorical and typical characters,

including ‘Courage, the vice’, arranged for four actors.

WILLIAM WARNER (_c._ 1558–1609).

Warner was educated at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, and became an attorney.

His chief work, _Albion’s England_ (1586), was dedicated to Henry Lord

Hunsdon, and his _Syrinx_ (1585) to Sir George Carey, afterwards Lord

Hunsdon.

_Menaechmi > c. 1592_

_S. R._ 1594, June 10. ‘A booke entituled Menachmi beinge A pleasant

and fine Conceyted Comedye taken out of the moste excellent wittie

Poett Plautus chosen purposely from out the reste as leaste harmefull

and yet moste delightfull.’ _Thomas Creede_ (Arber, ii. 653).

1595. Menaecmi, A pleasant and fine Conceited Comædie, taken out of the

most excellent wittie Poet Plautus: Chosen purposely from out the rest,

as least harmefull, and yet most delightfull. Written in English, by W.

W. _Thomas Creede, sold by William Barley._ [Epistle by the Printer to

the Readers; Argument.]

_Editions_ by J. Nichols (1779, _Six Old Plays_, i), W. C. Hazlitt

(1875, _Sh. L._ ii. 1), and W. H. D. Rouse (1912, _Sh. Classics_).

This translation is generally supposed to have influenced the

_Comedy of Errors_. If so, Shakespeare must have had access to it in

manuscript, and it must have been available before _c._ 1592. The

epistle speaks of Warner as ‘having diverse of this Poetes Comedies

Englished, for the use and delight of his private friends, who in

Plautus owne words are not able to understand them’. No others are

known.

THOMAS WATSON (_c._ 1557–92).

An Oxford man, who took no degree, and a lawyer, who did not practise,

Watson became an elegant writer of English and Latin verse. He won the

patronage of Walsingham at Paris in 1581, and became a member of the

literary circle of Lyly and Peele. His most important volume of verse

is the _Hekatompathia_ (1582) dedicated to the Earl of Oxford. At

the time of his death in Sept. 1592 he was in the service of William

Cornwallis, who afterwards wrote to Heneage that he ‘could devise

twenty fictions and knaveryes in a play which was his daily practyse

and his living’ (_Athenaeum_, 23 Aug. 1890). This suggests that the

poet, and not the episcopal author of _Absalon_ (_Mediaeval Stage_,

ii. 458), is the Watson included by Meres in 1598 amongst our ‘best

for Tragedie’. But his plays, other than translations, must, if they

exist, be sought amongst the anonymous work of 1581–92, where it would

be an interesting task to reconstruct his individuality. In _Ulysses

upon Ajax_ (1596) Harington’s anonymous critic says of his etymologies

of Ajax, ‘Faith, they are trivial, the froth of witty Tom Watson’s

jests, I heard them in Paris fourteen years ago: besides what balductum

[trashy] play is not full of them’. In the meantime Oliphant (_M. P._

viii. 437) has suggested that he may be the author of _Thorny Abbey,

or, The London Maid_, printed by one R. D. with Haughton’s _Grim, the

Collier of Croydon_ in _Gratiae Theatrales_ (1662) and there assigned

to T. W. Oliphant regards _Thorny Abbey_ as clearly a late revision of

an Elizabethan play.

TRANSLATION

_Antigone > 1581_

_S. R._ 1581, July 31 (Bp. of London). ‘Aphoclis Antigone, Thoma

Watsono interprete.’ _John Wolfe_ (Arber, ii. 398).

1581. Sophoclis Antigone. Interprete Thoma Watsono I. V. studioso.

Huic adduntur pompae quaedam, ex singulis Tragoediae actis deriuatae;

& post eas, totidem themata sententiis refertissima; eodem Thoma

Watsono Authore. _John Wolf._ [Latin translation. Verses to Philip

Earl of Arundel, signed ‘Thomas Watsonus’. Commendatory Verses by

Stephanus Broelmannus, Ἰωαννης Κωκος, Philip Harrison, Francis Yomans,

Christopher Atkinson, C. Downhale, G. Camden.]

JOHN WEBSTER (?-> 1634).

There is little clue to the personal history of John Webster beyond the

description of him on the title-page of his mayoral pageant _Monuments

of Honour_ (1624) as ‘Merchant Taylor’, and his claim in the epistle to

have been born free of the company. The records of the Merchant Taylors

show that freemen of this name were admitted in 1571, 1576, and 1617,

and that one of them was assessed towards the coronation expenses in

1604. A John Webster, Merchant Taylor, also received an acknowledgement

of a 15_s._ debt from John and Edward Alleyn on 25 July 1591 (Collier,

_Alleyn Papers_, 14). A John Webster married Isabel Sutton at St.

Leonard’s Shoreditch on 25 July 1590, and had a daughter Alice baptized

there on 9 May 1606. It has been taken for granted that none of the

sixteenth-century records can relate to the dramatist, although they

may to his father. This presumably rests on the assumption that he must

have been a young man when he began to write for Henslowe in 1602.

It should, however, be pointed out that a John Webster, as well as a

George Webster, appears amongst the Anglo-German actors of Browne’s

group in 1596 (cf. ch. xiv) and that the financial record in the

_Alleyn Papers_ probably belongs to a series of transactions concerning

the winding up of a theatrical company in which Browne and the Alleyns

had been interested (cf. ch. xiii, s.v. Admiral’s). It is conceivable

therefore that Webster was an older man than has been suspected and had

had a career as a player before he became a playwright.

Gildon, _Lives of the Poets_ (1698), reports that Webster was parish

clerk of St Andrew’s, Holborn. This cannot be confirmed from parish

books, but may be true.

As a dramatist, Webster generally appears in collaboration, chiefly

with Dekker, and at rather infrequent intervals from 1602 up to 1624

or later. In 1602 he wrote commendatory verses for a translation by

Munday, and in 1612 for Heywood’s _Apology for Actors_. In 1613 he

published his elegy _A Monumental Column_ on the death of Prince Henry,

and recorded his friendship with Chapman. His marked tendency to borrow

phrases from other writers helps to date his work. He can hardly be

identified with the illiterate clothworker of the same name, who

acknowledged his will with a mark on 5 Aug. 1625. But he is referred to

in the past in Heywood’s _Hierarchie of the Angels_ (1635), Bk. iv, p.

206, ‘Fletcher and Webster ... neither was but Iacke’, and was probably

therefore dead.

_Collections_

1830. A. Dyce. 4 vols. 1857, 1 vol. [Includes _Malcontent_, _Appius and

Virginia_, and _Thracian Wonder_.]

1857. W. C. Hazlitt. 4 vols. (_Library of Old Authors_). [Includes

_Appius and Virginia_, _Thracian Wonder_, and _The Weakest Goeth to the

Wall_.]

1888. J. A. Symonds, _W. and Tourneur_ (_Mermaid Series_). [_The White

Devil_ and _Duchess of Malfi_.]

1912. A. H. Thorndike, _Webster and Tourneur_. (_N. E. D._) [_White

Devil_, _Duchess of Malfi_, _Appius and Virginia_.]

_Dissertations_: E. Gosse, _J. W._ (1883, _Seventeenth-Century

Studies_); A. C. Swinburne, _J. W._ (1886, _Studies in Prose and

Poetry_, 1894); C. Vopel, _J. W._ (1888, _Bremen diss._); M. Meiners,

_Metrische Untersuchungen über den Dramatiker J. W._ (1893, _Halle

diss._); W. Archer, _Webster, Lamb, and Swinburne_ (1893, _New Review_,

viii. 96); W. von Wurzbach, _J. W._ (1898, _Jahrbuch_, xxxi. 9);

J. Morris, _J. W._ (_Fortnightly Review_, June 1902); E. E. Stoll,

_J. W._ (1905); L. J. Sturge, _W. and the Law; a Parallel_ (1906,

_Jahrbuch_, xlii, 148); C. Crawford, _J. W. and Sir Philip Sidney_

(1906, _Collectanea_, i. 20), _Montaigne, W., and Marston: Donne and

W._ (1907, _Collectanea_, ii. 1); F. E. Pierce, _The Collaboration of

W. and Dekker_ (1909, _Yale Studies_, xxxvii); H. D. Sykes, _W. and

Sir Thomas Overbury_ (1613, _11 N. Q._ viii. 221, 244, 263, 282, 304);

A. F. Bourgeois, _W. and the N. E. D._ (1914, _11 N. Q._ ix. 302, 324,

343); R. Brooke, _J. W. and the Elizabethan Drama_ (1916).

_Sir Thomas Wyatt. 1602_

_With_ Chettle, Dekker (q.v.), Heywood, and Smith, for Worcester’s.

_The Malcontent. 1604_

Additions to the play of Marston (q.v.) for the King’s.

_Westward Ho! 1604_

_With_ Dekker (q.v.) for Paul’s.

_Northward Ho! 1605_

_With_ Dekker (q.v.) for Paul’s.

_Appius and Virginia. c. 1608._

_S. R._ 1654, May 13. ‘A play called Appeus and Virginia Tragedy

written by John Webster.’ _Richard Marriott_ (Eyre, i. 448).

1654. Appius and Virginia. A Tragedy. By Iohn Webster. [_No

imprint._]

1659. _For Humphrey Moseley._ [A reissue.]

1679.

_Edition_ by C. W. Dilke (1814–15, _O. E. P._ v).--_Dissertations_: J.

Lauschke, _John Webster’s Tragödie A. und V. Eine Quellenstudie_ (1899,

_Leipzig diss._); H. D. Sykes, _An Attempt to determine the Date of

Webster’s A. and V._ (1913, _11 N. Q._ vii. 401, 422, 466; viii. 63);

R. Brooke, _The Authorship of the Later A. and V._ (1913, _M. L. R._

viii. 433), more fully in _John Webster_ (1916); A. M. Clark, _A. and

V._ (1921, _M. L. R._ xvi. 1).

The play is in Beeston’s list of Cockpit plays in 1639 (_Var._ iii.

159), Webster’s authorship has generally been accepted, but Stoll,

197, who put the play 1623–39, because of resemblances to _Julius

Caesar_ and _Coriolanus_ which he thought implied a knowledge of F_{1},

traced a dependence upon the comic manner of Heywood. Similarly, Sykes

is puzzled by words which he thinks borrowed from Heywood and first

used by Heywood in works written after Webster’s death. He comes to

the conclusion that Heywood may have revised a late work by Webster.

There is much to be said for the view taken by Brooke and Clark, after

a thorough-going analysis of the problem, that the play is Heywood’s

own, possibly with a few touches from Webster’s hand, and may have been

written, at any date not long after the production of _Coriolanus_

on the stage (_c._ 1608), for Queen Anne’s men, from whom it would

naturally pass into the Cockpit repertory.

_The White Devil. 1609 < > 12_

1612. The White Divel; Or, The Tragedy of Paulo Giordano Ursini, Duke

of Brachiano, With The Life and Death of Vittoria Corombona the famous

Venetian Curtizan. Acted by the Queenes Maiesties Seruants. Written by

Iohn Webster. _N. O. for Thomas Archer._ (Epistle to the Reader; after

text, a note.)

1631.... Acted, by the Queenes Maiesties seruants, at the Phœnix, in

Drury Lane. _I. N. for Hugh Perry._

1665; 1672.

_Editions_ in Dodsley^{1–3} (1744–1825) and by W. Scott (1810, _A.

B. D._ iii) and M. W. Sampson (1904, _B. L._).--_Dissertations_: B.

Nicholson, _Thomas Adams’ Sermon on The W. D._ (1881, _6 N. Q._ iii.

166); W. W. Greg, _W.’s W. D._ (1900, _M. L. Q._ iii. 112); M. Landau,

_Vittoria Accorambona in der Dichtung im Verhältniss zu ihrer wahren

Geschichte_ (1902, _Euphorion_, ix. 310); E. M. Cesaresco, _Vittoria

Accoramboni_ (1902, _Lombard Studies_, 131); P. Simpson, _An Allusion

in W._ (1907, _M. L. R._ ii. 162); L. MacCracken, _A Page of Forgotten

History_ (1911); H. D. Sykes, _The Date of W.’s Play, the W. D._ (1913,

_11 N. Q._ vii. 342).

The epistle apologizes for the ill success of the play, on the ground

that ‘it was acted in so dull a time of winter, presented in so open

and blacke a theater, that it wanted ... a full and understanding

auditory’, and complains that the spectators at ‘that play-house’

care more for new plays than for good plays. Fleay, ii. 271, dates

the production in the winter of 1607–8, taking the French ambassador

described in III. i. 73 as a performer ‘at last tilting’ to be M.

Goterant who tilted on 24 March 1607, since ‘no other Frenchman’s name

occurs in the tilt-lists. It is nothing to Fleay that Goterant was not

an ambassador, or that the lists of Jacobean tilters are fragmentary,

or that the scene of the play is not England but Italy. Simpson found

an inferior limit in a borrowing from Jonson’s _Mask of Queens_ on 2

Feb. 1609. I do not find much conviction in the other indications of

a date in 1610 cited by Sampson, xl, or in the parallel with Jonson’s

epistle to _Catiline_ (1611), with which Stoll, 21, supports a date in

1612. The Irish notes which Stoll regards as taken from B. Rich, _A

New Description of Ireland_ (1610), in fact go back to Stanyhurst’s

account of 1577, and though there is a pretty clear borrowing from

Tourneur’s _Atheist’s Tragedy_, that may have been produced some time

before its publication in 1611. Nor was Dekker necessarily referring

to Webster, when he wrote to the Queen’s men in his epistle before _If

this be not a Good Play_ (1612): ‘I wish a _Faire_ and _Fortunate Day_

to your _Next New-Play_ for the _Makers-sake_ and your _Owne_, because

such _Brave Triumphes_ of _Poesie_ and _Elaborate Industry_, which my

_Worthy Friends Muse_ hath there set forth, deserue a _Theater_ full of

very _Muses_ themselves to be _Spectators_. To that _Faire Day_ I wish

a _Full_, _Free_ and _Knowing Auditor_.’

Webster’s own epistle contains his appreciation ‘of other mens worthy

labours; especially of that full and haightned stile of Maister

_Chapman_, the labor’d and understanding workes of Maister _Johnson_,

the no lesse worthy composures of the both worthily excellent Maister

_Beamont_, & Maister _Fletcher_, and lastly (without wrong last to be

named) the right happy and copious industry of M. _Shakespeare_, M.

_Decker_, & M. _Heywood_’. In the final note he commends the actors,

and in particular ‘the well approved industry of my friend Maister

Perkins’.

_The Duchess of Malfi. 1613–14_

1623. The Tragedy of the Dutchesse of Malfy. As it was Presented

priuately, at the Black-Friers; and publiquely at the Globe, By the

Kings Maiesties Seruants. The perfect and exact Coppy, with diuerse

things Printed, that the length of the Play would not beare in

the Presentment. Written by John Webster. _Nicholas Okes for Iohn

Waterson._ [Epistle to George Lord Berkeley, signed ‘John Webster’;

Commendatory Verses, signed ‘Thomas Middletonus Poëta et Chron:

Londinensis’, ‘Wil: Rowley’, ‘John Ford’; ‘The Actors Names. Bosola,

_J. Lowin_. Ferdinand, _1 R. Burbidge_, _2 J. Taylor_. Cardinall, _1 H.

Cundaile_, _2 R. Robinson_. Antonio, _1 W. Ostler_, _2 R. Benfeild_.

Delio, _J. Underwood_. Forobosco, _N. Towley_. Pescara, _J. Rice_.

Silvio, _T. Pollard_. Mad-men, _N. Towley_, _J. Underwood_, _etc._

Cardinals M^{is}, _J. Tomson_. The Doctor, etc., _R. Pallant_. Duchess,

_R. Sharpe_.’]

1640; 1678; N.D.

_Editions_ by C. E. Vaughan (1896, _T. D._), M. W. Sampson (1904,

_B. L._), and W. A. Neilson (1911, _C. E. D._).--_Dissertations_:

K. Kiesow, _Die verschiedenen Bearbeitungen der Novelle von der

Herzogin von Amalfi des Bandello in den Literaturen des xvi. und xvii.

Jahrhunderts_ (1895, _Anglia_, xvii. 199); J. T. Murray, _The D. of M.

List of the King’s Company_ (1910, _E. D. C._ ii. 146); W. J. Lawrence,

_The Date of the D. of M._ (_Athenaeum_ for 21 Nov. 1919); W. Archer,

_The D. of M._ (_Nineteenth Century_ for Jan. 1920).

The actor-list records two distinct casts, one before Ostler’s

death on 16 Dec. 1614, the other after Burbadge’s death on 13 March

1619, and before that of Tooley in June 1623. Stoll, 29, quotes the

_Anglopotrida_ of Orazio Busino (cf. the abstract in _V. P._ xv. 134),

which appears to show that the play was on the stage at some date not

very long before Busino wrote on 7 Feb. 1618:

Prendono giuoco gli Inglesi della nostra religione come di

cosa detestabile, et superstitiosa, ne mai rappresentano

qualsivoglia attione pubblica, sia pura Tragisatiricomica,

che non inserischino dentro uitij, et scelleragini di qualche

religioso catolico, facendone risate, et molti scherni, con lor

gusto, et ramarico de’ buoni, fu appunto veduto dai nostri, in

una Commedia introdur’un frate franciscano, astuto, et ripieno

di varie impietà, cosi d’avaritia come di libidine: et il tutto

poi ruiscì in una Tragedia, facendoli mozzar la vista in scena.

Un altra volta rappresentarono la grandezza d’un cardinale,

con li habiti formali, et proprij molti belli, et ricchi, con

la sua Corte, facendo in scena erger un Altare, dove finse di

far oratione, ordinando una processione: et poi lo ridussero in

pubblico con una Meretrice in seno. Dimostrò di dar il Velleno

ad una sua sorella, per interesse d’honore: et d’ andar in

oltre alla guerra, con depponer prima l’habito cardinalitio

sopra l’altare col mezzo de’ suoi Cappellani, con gravità, et

finalmente si fece cingere la spada, metter la serpa, con tanto

garbo, che niente più: et tutto ciò fanno in sprezzo, delle

grandezze ecclesiastice vilipese, et odiate a morte in questo

Regno.

Di Londra a’ 7 febaio 1618.

The date of first production may reasonably be put in 1613–14. Crawford

has pointed out the resemblances between the play and _A Monumental

Column_ (1613) and definite borrowings from Donne’s _Anatomy of the

World_ (1612), Chapman’s _Petrarch’s Seven Penitentiall Psalms_ (1612),

and Chapman’s Middle Temple mask of 15 Feb. 1613. Lawrence thinks

that Campion’s mask of 14 Feb. 1613 is also drawn upon. But it is

not impossible that the extant text has undergone revision, in view

of borrowings from the 6th edition (1615) of Sir Thomas Overbury’s

_Characters_, to which Sykes calls attention, and of the apparent

allusion pointed out by Vaughan in I. i. 5 to the purging of the French

Court by Louis XIII after the assassination of Marshall d’Ancre on

14 April 1617. It need not be inferred that this is the ‘enterlude

concerninge the late Marquesse d’Ancre’, which the Privy Council

ordered the Master of Revels to stay on 22 June 1617 (_M. S. C._ i.

376).

_Later Plays_

_The Devil’s Law Case_ (1623).

_A Cure for a Cuckold_ (1661), with W. Rowley.

On the authorship and dates of these, cf. Brooke, 250, 255, and H. D.

Sykes in _11 N. Q._ vii. 106; ix. 382, 404, 443, 463.

_Lost Plays_

The following are recorded in Henslowe’s diary:

For the Admiral’s:

_Caesar’s Fall or The Two Shapes._

With Dekker, Drayton, Middleton, and Munday, May 1602.

For Worcester’s:

_Christmas Comes but Once a Year._

With Chettle, Dekker, and Heywood, Nov. 1602.

In the epistle to _The Devil’s Law Case_, Webster says to Sir T. Finch,

‘Some of my other works, as The White Devil, The Duchess of Malfi,

Guise and others, you have formerly seen’, and a _Guise_ is ascribed

to him as a comedy in Archer’s play-list of 1656 and included without

ascription as a tragedy in Kirkman’s of 1661 and 1671 (Greg, _Masques_,

lxxii). Rogers and Ley’s list of 1656 had given it to Marston (q.v.).

Collier forged an entry in Henslowe’s diary meant to suggest that this

was the _Massacre at Paris_ (cf. s.v. Marlowe).

In Sept. 1624 Herbert licensed ‘a new Tragedy called _A Late Murther of

the Sonn upon the Mother_: Written by Forde, and Webster’ (Herbert, 29).

_Doubtful Plays_

The ascription to Webster on the t.p. of _The Thracian Wonder_ is not

generally accepted. His hand has been suggested in _Revenger’s Tragedy_

and _The Weakest Goeth to the Wall_.

GEORGE WHETSTONE (1544?-87?).

Whetstone was a Londoner by origin. After a riotous youth, he turned to

literature interspersed with adventure, possibly acting at Canterbury

_c._ 1571 (cf. ch. xv), serving in the Low Countries in 1572–4, the

Newfoundland voyage in 1578–9, and the Low Countries again in 1585–6.

His chief literary associates were Thomas Churchyard and George

Gascoigne.

After writing his one play, _Promos and Cassandra_, he translated

its source, the 5th Novel of the 8th Decade of Giraldi Cinthio’s

_Hecatomithi_ (1565) in his _Heptameron of Civil Discourses_ (1582).

Both Italian and English are in Hazlitt, _Shakespeare’s Library_ (1875,

iii). Like some other dramatists, Whetstone turned upon the stage, and

attacked it in his _Touchstone for the Time_ (1584; cf. App. C, No.

xxxvi).

_Promos and Cassandra. 1578_

_S. R._ 1578, July 31. ‘The famous historie of Promos and Casandra

Devided into twoe Comicall Discourses Compiled by George Whetstone

gent.’ _Richard Jones_ (Arber, ii. 334).

1578. The Right Excellent and famous Historye, of Promos and Cassandra;

Deuided into two Commicall Discourses.... The worke of George

Whetstones Gent. _Richard Jones._ [Epistles to his ‘kinsman’ William

Fleetwood, dated 29 July 1578, and signed ‘George Whetstone’, and from

the Printer to the Reader, signed ‘R.I.’; Argument; Text signed ‘G.

Whetstone’; Colophon with imprint and date ‘August 20, 1578’.]

_Editions_ in _Six Old Plays_, i. 1 (1779), and by W. C. Hazlitt,

_Shakespeare’s Library_, vi. 201 (1875), and J. S. Farmer (1910, _T.

F. T._). There are two parts, arranged in acts and scenes. Whetstone’s

epistle is of some critical interest (cf. App. C, No. xix). In the

_Heptameron_ he says the play was ‘yet never presented upon stage’.

The character of the s.ds. suggests, however, that it was written for

presentation.

NATHANIEL WIBURNE (_c._ 1597).

Possible author of the academic _Machiavellus_ (cf. App. K).

GEORGE WILKINS (_fl._ 1604–8).

Lee (_D. N. B._) after personally consulting the register of St.

Leonard’s Shoreditch, confirms the extract in Collier, iii. 348, of

the burial on 19 Aug. 1603 of ‘George Wilkins, the poet’. It must

therefore be assumed that the date of 9 Aug. 1613 given for the entry

by T. E. Tomlins in _Sh. Soc. Papers_, i. 34, from Ellis’s _History

of Shoreditch_ (1798) is an error, and that the ‘poet’ was distinct

from the dramatist. Nothing is known of Wilkins except that he wrote

pamphlets from _c._ 1604 to 1608, and towards the end of that period

was also engaged in play-writing both for the King’s and the Queen’s

men. A George Wilkins of St. Sepulchre’s, described as a victualler and

aged 36, was a fellow witness with Shakespeare in _Belott v. Mountjoy_

on 19 June 1612 (C. W. Wallace, _N. U. S._ x. 289).

_The Miseries of Enforced Marriage. 1607_

_S. R._ 1607, July 31 (Buck). ‘A tragedie called the Miserye of

inforced Marriage.’ _George Vyncent_ (Arber, iii. 357).

1607. The Miseries of Inforst Manage. As it is now playd by his

Maiesties Seruants. By George Wilkins. _For George Vincent._

1611; 1629; 1637.

_Editions_ in Dodsley^{2–4} (1780–1874) and by W. Scott (1810, _A. B.

D._ ii) and J. S. Farmer (1913, _S. F. T._).

The play, which was based on the life of Walter Calverley, as given in

pamphlets of 1605, appears to have been still on the stage when it was

printed. An allusion in III. ii to fighting with a windmill implies

some knowledge of Don Quixote, but of this there are other traces by

1607. The Clown is called Robin in II. ii, and Fleay, ii. 276, suggests

that Armin took the part. He comes in singing:

From London am I come,

Though not with pipe and drum,

in reference to Kempe’s morris.

_Doubtful Plays_

Wilkins probably wrote Acts I, II of _Pericles_, and it has been

suggested that he also wrote certain scenes of _Timon of Athens_; but

the relation of his work to Shakespeare’s cannot be gone into here.

The anonymous _Yorkshire Tragedy_ has also been ascribed to him.

ROBERT WILMOT (> 1566–91 <).

A student of the Inner Temple, and afterwards Rector of North Ockendon,

Essex, from 28 Nov. 1582 and of Horndon-on-the-Hill, Essex, from 2 Dec.

1585. William Webbe, _A Discourse of English Poetry_ (ed. Arber, 35),

commends his writing.

_Tancred and Gismund. 1566_ (?)

Written with Rod. Staff[ord], Hen[ry] No[el], G. Al. and Chr[istopher]

Hat[ton].

[_MSS._] (_a_) _Lansdowne MS._ 786, f. 1, ‘Gismond of Salern in Loue’.

(_b_) _Brit. Mus. Hargrave MS._ 205, f. 9, ‘The Tragedie of Gismond of

Salerne’.

[Both MSS. have three sonnets ‘of the Quenes maydes’, and Prologue and

Epilogue.]

(_c_) A fragment, now unknown, formerly belonging to Milton’s

father-in-law, Richard Powell.

1591. The Tragedie of Tancred and Gismund. Compiled by the Gentlemen

of the Inner Temple, and by them presented before her Maiestie. Newly

reuiued and polished according to the decorum of these daies. By R. W.

_Thomas Scarlet, sold by R. Robinson._ [Epistles to Lady Mary Peter

and Lady Anne Gray, signed ‘Robert Wilmot’; to R. W. signed ‘Guil.

Webbe’ and dated ‘Pyrgo in Essex August the eighth 1591’; to the Inner

and Middle Temple and other Readers, signed ‘R. Wilmot’; two Sonnets

(2 and 3 of MSS.); Arguments; Prologue; Epilogue signed ‘R. W.’;

Introductiones (dumb-shows). Some copies are dated 1592.]

_Editions_ in Dodsley^{1–4} (1744–1874) and by J. S. Farmer (1912,

_S. F. T._) from 1591, and by A. Brandl (1898, _Q. W. D._) and J. W.

Cunliffe (1912, _E. E. C. T._) and J. S. Farmer (_S. F. T._) from

MS.--_Dissertations_: J. W. Cunliffe, _Gismond of Salerne_ (1906, _M.

L. A._ xxi. 435); A. Klein, _The Decorum of These Days_ (1918, _M. L.

A._ xxxiii. 244).

The MSS. represent the play as originally produced, probably, from an

allusion in one of the sonnets, at Greenwich. The print represents a

later revision by Wilmot, involving much re-writing and the insertion

of new scenes and the dumb-shows. Webbe’s epistle is an encouragement

to Wilmot to publish his ‘waste papers’, and refers to _Tancred_ as

‘framed’ by the Inner Temple, and to Wilmot as ‘disrobing him of

his antique curiosity and adorning him with the approved guise of

our stateliest English terms’. Wilmot’s own Epistle to the Readers

apologizes for the indecorum of publishing a play, excuses it by the

example of Beza’s _Abraham_ and Buchanan’s _Jephthes_, and refers to

‘the love that hath been these twenty-four years betwixt’ himself and

Gismund. This seems to date the original production in 1567. But I

find no evidence that Elizabeth was at Greenwich in 1567. Shrovetide

1566 seems the nearest date at which a play is likely to have been

given there. Wilmot was clearly not the sole author of the original

play; to Act I he affixes ‘_Exegit Rod. Staff._’; to Act II, ‘_Per Hen.

No._’; to Act III, ‘_G. Al._’; to Act IV, ‘_Composuit Chr. Hat._’; to

the Epilogue, ‘_R. W._’ Probably Act V, which has no indication of

authorship, was also his own.

W. H. Cooke, _Students Admitted to the Inner Temple, 1547–1660_ (1878),

gives the admission of Christopher Hatton in 1559–60, but Wilmot is not

traceable in the list; nor are Hen. No., G. Al., or Rod. Staff. But

the first may be Elizabeth’s Gentleman Pensioner, Henry Noel (q.v.),

and Cunliffe, lxxxvi, notes that a ‘Master Stafford’ was fined £5 for

refusing to act as Marshal at the Inner Temple in 1556–7.

_Doubtful Play_

Hazlitt assigns to Wilmot _The Three Ladies of London_, but the R. W.

of the title-page is almost certainly Robert Wilson (q.v.).

ROBERT WILSON (> 1572–1600).

For Wilson’s career as an actor and a discussion as to whether there

was more than one dramatist of the name, cf. ch. xv.

_The Three Ladies of London. c. 1581_

1584. A right excellent and famous Comœdy called the three Ladies of

London. Wherein is notably declared and set foorth, how by the meanes

of Lucar, Love and Conscience is so corrupted, that the one is married

to Dissimulation, the other fraught with all abhomination. A perfect

patterne for all Estates to looke into, and a worke right worthie to

be marked. Written by R. W. as it hath been publiquely played. _Roger

Warde._ [Prologue. At end of play ‘Paule Bucke’ (an actor; cf. ch. xv).]

1592. _John Danter._

_Editions_ by J. P. Collier, _Five Old Plays_ (1851, _Roxb. Club_), in

Dodsley^4 (1874), vi, and by J. S. Farmer (1911, _T. F. T._).

The stylistic resemblance of this to the next two plays justifies

the attribution to Wilson, although Hazlitt suggests Wilmot. Gosson

describes the play in 1582 (_P. C._ 185) together with a play in answer

called _London Against the Three Ladies_, but does not indicate whether

either play was then in print. In B ii Peter’s pence are dated as ‘not

muche more than 26 yeares, it was in Queen Maries time’. As the Act

reviving Peter’s pence was passed in the winter of 1554–5, the play was

probably written in 1581.

_The Three Lords and Three Ladies of London. c. 1589_

_S. R._ 1590, July 31 (Wood). ‘A comodie of the plesant and statelie

morrall of the Three lordes of London.’ _Richard Jones_ (Arber, ii.

556).