Developments in the Shakespeare
authorship problem
A summary of PhD research carried out at
Brunel University 2010–13
Dr Barry R. Clarke
PhD thesis
This work is a summary of the PhD thesis awarded without
amendments to the author by Brunel University, UK, in January 2014
entitled “A linguistic analysis of Francis Bacon’s contribution to three
Shakespeare plays: The Comedy of Errors, Love’s Labour’s Lost, and
The Tempest”.
About the author
Barry’s paper ‘The Virginia Company and The Tempest’ appeared in
The Journal of Drama Studies (July 2011). He has degrees in
theoretical physics with publications in quantum mechanics and also
writes mathematical puzzles for The Daily Telegraph and Prospect
magazine. Books of puzzles include Puzzles for Pleasure (Cambridge
University Press, 1993), Challenging Logic Puzzles Mensa (Sterling,
2003), and Mathematical Puzzles and Curiosities (Dover, 2013).
Website: http://barryispuzzled.com
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Nigel Cockburn whose work has served as an
important point of departure on this journey and to Professor William
Leahy for the opportunity to carry out this PhD research.
Copyright
© 2014 by Barry R. Clarke
All rights reserved.
Bibliographical note
This work is intended for public circulation.
Contents
Introduction
Part One: The Inns of Court
1.1 Players
1.2 Writers
1.3 Productions
1.3.1 Play characteristics
1.3.2 The Comedy of Errors
1.3.3 Love’s Labour’s Lost
1.3.4 A Thomas Nashe play?
1.4 Shakespeare’s exclusion from the 1594–5 revels
Part Two: The Virginia Colony
2.1 The Sea Venture and The Tempest
2.2 Shakespeare’s exclusion from The Tempest
Part Three: Francis Bacon
3.1 Interest in drama
3.2 Parallels with Gesta Grayorum
3.3 Parallels with The Comedy of Errors
3.4 Parallels with Love’s Labour’s Lost
3.5 The Virginia Company
3.5.1 Bacon’s connection to company
3.5.2 Company pamphlets
3.6 Parallels with The Tempest
Conclusion
1
7
7
9
11
11
12
13
15
17
21
21
25
28
28
31
36
40
43
43
45
49
56
Introduction
There is no test that can exclude William Shakespeare of
Stratford from having contributed to any of the plays in the
First Folio. However, there are arguments against his
origination of certain plays.
The idea that William Shakespeare of Stratford was not the sole
contributor to certain plays under his name is already a legitimate
area of academic study. For example, The Troublesome Reign of
John almost certainly contains the hand of George Peele,1 the
first two Acts of Pericles have been attributed to George
Wilkins,2 and parts of Timon of Athens have been credited to
Thomas Middleton.3
Shakespeare’s name appears on the First Folio collection of 36
plays that was printed by Isaac Jaggard and William Blount in
1623. The dedication to the Earls of Pembroke and Montgomery
by John Heminge and Henry Condell, two members of the Kings
Men, refers to “our Shakespeare” and the “humble offer of his
plays”, Ben Jonson’s second tribute mentions the “Sweet Swan of
Avon”, while Leonard Digges in a eulogy to “the deceased
Authour Maister W. Shakespeare” writes “thy Stratford
Moniment [sic]”. Without further information, it is difficult to
avoid the conclusion that William Shakespeare of Stratford was
their principal author.
However, there are certain facts that raise suspicion. No letters
and no play manuscripts survive for Shakespeare which seems to
be atypical for a contemporary playwright.4 A single person with
1
Brian Vickers, ‘Unique matches of three [or more] consecutive words in The
Troublesome Reign with comparable strings in other plays by Peele’ in The
Troublesome Reign of John, King of England, Appendix, ed., Charles R.
Forker (Manchester University Press, 2011). The second quarto (1611) has
“Written by W. Sh” and the third quarto (1622) is attributed to “W.
Shakespeare”.
2
MacDonald P. Jackson, Defining Shakespeare:Pericles as Test Case (Oxford
University Press, 2003).
3
S. Wells and G. Taylor, eds, The Oxford Shakespeare, second edition
(Oxford University Press, 2005), p.943.
4
See Diana Price, Shakespeare’s Unorthodox Biography (Greenwood Press,
2001).
1
such an extensive vocabulary must have had a library but no
books have been traced to Shakespeare’s name. Nevertheless, in
the absence of further evidence, the attribution to Shakespeare
must still be the default position, for any reasonable doubt
generated by comparisons with how contemporary playwrights
typically lived is still insufficient to undermine the testimony of
the First Folio. A better test of this default position would be a
comparison of Shakespeare’s extant letters and prose works
against the plays, but since no such material is available it is not
possible to exclude him from making a contribution to this or that
work. Other dramatists have the benefit of direct corroborative
evidence, for example from Henslowe’s diary,5 but there is no
record of Shakespeare receiving payment for a play that might
point directly to his authorship priority. So it is reasonable to
question what plays Shakespeare actually originated in the First
Folio. However, is there sufficient evidence available to decide
the matter?
The problem as to which authors contributed to the canon of
plays under Shakespeare’s name and at what date is an interesting
philosophical one. How much we can know after over 400 years
have passed and to what degree of certainty? What methods can
be relied upon to reconstruct the history of contributions to a
play?
Various dubious methods have been invented to answer these
questions. One such method relies on the mistaken view that an
author necessarily includes autobiographical details in his play.
Even if the correspondence of such facts is granted, what
excludes the possibility that someone else might be providing
these details? Furthermore, it turns out that a case for authorship
based on the autobiographical interpretation of a play or sonnet
can be constructed for any number of possible candidates,
including Shakespeare, which suggests that this type of evidence
is too weak to eliminate other suspects and leave just one
5
Henslowe’s diary lists payments to dramatists for plays, see Walter Greg, ed.,
Henslowe’s Diary (A. H. Bullen, 1904).
2
standing.6 As for the search for hidden messages in a play or
sonnet, it is nothing but an illusion of discovery. Practitioners of
this mode of enquiry fail to realise that their chosen method of
decipherment is entirely arbitrary, and is one that introduces a
high degree of flexibility into what can be ‘discovered’. In the
universities, there are academics who are committed to the
process of stylometric testing. Here, the frequency of certain
words, their prefixes, or endings, in a document is taken to be a
reliable marker of contribution. However, scribal, editorial, and
compositorial intervention renders this method unreliable. Far
from pointing to a particular author, one could instead be
counting only the averaged-out effect of several hands that were
engaged in the publication process. Furthermore, these
researchers invariably restrict their investigation to a database of
known dramatists and unjustifiably exclude the possibility that
one or more prose writers might have been involved.
Far more reliable is the practice of linguistic analysis,7 where a
test for authorship depends on the comparison of phrases and
collocations.8 These linguistic units are less vulnerable to outside
intervention and carry a greater cognitive complexity than
individual words. However, there is usually no measurement of
the rarity of phrase parallels, a deficiency that needs to be
remedied if they are to be informative. By exhaustively testing a
target document for phrases that are rare in relation to a database
of contemporary publications, and by identifying those authors
who employed these phrases, a profile can be built up for those
writers who record a significant number of parallels. This kind of
6
A case in point is Shake-speare’s Sonnets (1609). Several works have
appeared showing how these poems delineate the life of Francis Bacon,
Christopher Marlowe, 17th Earl of Oxford, Henry Neville, and Shakespeare.
The fact that this can be done for several candidates shows that this kind of
argument is ineffective. Scientific method requires the testing and elimination
of alternative possibilities, but these interpretative arguments take no care to
do this, only focusing on facts that support the preferred candidate.
7
For example, Brian Vickers, ‘Counterfeiting’ Shakespeare (Cambridge
University Press, 2002).
8
A collocation consists of related but separated words.
3
method can only be a test for contribution not origination, and it
is the one developed here.
There are good reasons for thinking that Shakespeare of Stratford
did not originate all of the plays under his name, that some of
them were acquired from the London Inns of Court law schools
for later revision. Arguments for this position are quite strong for
two plays, The Comedy of Errors and Love’s Labour’s Lost,
which appear to have convincing connections to the 1594–5
Gray’s Inn Christmas revels. A detailed contemporary account of
these festivities has been left to us in the Gesta Grayorum, which
was published in 1688 by William Canning. It turns out that there
are striking correspondences between these two plays and the
Inns of Court traditions and revels. Here, the argument for
Shakespeare’s exclusion proceeds from the evidence that leading
up to Christmas 1594–5, professional playing companies and
writers were not being employed by Gray’s Inn, and that they
usually engaged their own members.
As for plays that are not traditionally associated with the Inns of
Court, there is also strong evidence that The Tempest relies, at
least in part, on the events surrounding the shipwreck of the Sea
Venture at Bermuda in 1609, an expedition that was intended to
resupply the new Virginia colony. There are several rare parallels
in the play with Virginia Company related documents such as
Captain John Smith’s True Relation (1608), secretary William
Strachey’s then unpublished ‘True Reportory’ (1610, publ. 1625),
Richard Rich’s Newes from Virginia (1610), and Ralph
Harmour’s A True Discourse (1614). The Virginia Company had
an intense suspicion of actors, and publicised the view that they
were trying to ridicule the colony on the stage, seeing them as an
obstacle to attracting new investment. There is also evidence that
The Tempest was conceived as a propaganda tool to impress
invited ambassadors to King James’ court with England’s
influence in the New World. At the wedding of Princess
Elizabeth of England on 15 February 1612–13, a masque was
presented by the Middle Temple and Lincoln’s Inn, attributed to
George Chapman, which prophesied riches from the gold mines
of Virginia. The Tempest was also played at this wedding with
remuneration going to John Heminge from Shakespeare’s
4
company. In this context, the suspicion of actors suggests that the
play could not have been conceived and performed for King
James at Whitehall in November 1611 without the cooperation of
the Virginia Company of which William Shakespeare was not a
member.
One prose writer whose work merits a test against plays of the
period is the polymath Francis Bacon. Although history mainly
records his reputation as a philosopher and statesman, he is
known to have contributed to The Misfortunes of Arthur (1587–
8),9 is suspected of writing The Maske of Flowers (1613–14),10
and can be shown to have produced at least three masques for the
Inns of Court players.11 He was also one of the main organisers
and writers of the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn Christmas revels with
which The Comedy of Errors and Love’s Labour’s Lost are
associated. Bacon often wrote speeches for fictional characters
such as those performed during the Queen’s Day celebrations in
1595, and he was a leading member of the Virginia Company
which has connections to The Tempest. Chadwyck–Healey’s
Early English Books Online (EEBO) database contains a
sufficient number of Bacon’s works12 to run a rare phrase test
against these three Shakespeare plays.13 This not only serves as a
test of his contribution to the work, but also as a test for his
exclusion, because if insufficient returns result from such a large
presence in the database then this would suggest Bacon’s noncontribution.14 As we shall see, the results fall in Bacon’s favour.
9
Bacon receives a credit for constructing dumb shows, see Thomas Hughes,
Certaine deu[is]es (1587 [1588]), STC: 13921, sig. G2.
10
Christine Adams, ‘Francis Bacon’s Wedding Gift of ‘A Garden of a
Glorious and a Strange Beauty’ for the Earl and Countess of Somerset’,
Garden History, 36, No. 1 (Spring 2008), pp.36–58.
11
See for example Bacon’s letter to Lord Burghley in which he apologises for
a failed masque intended by the four Inns of Court, British Library, Burghley
Papers, Lansdowne MS 107, f.13.
12
There are 27 different works.
13
In my PhD thesis, I take a phrase or collocation that appears in less than 1 in
588 searchable documents in the EEBO database to be ‘rare’.
14
It is to be noted that when A Funerall Elegye (1612) by ‘W. S.’ was tested
Bacon recorded only 1 rare return from 27 works whereas John Ford had 16
5
Finally, the commonly raised question as to who authored the
Shakespeare work is not a well-posed one. First of all, it is clear
that several plays can be shown to have more than one
contributor so there is no single author. Traditionally, scholars
have taken this to mean that Shakespeare collaborated with other
writers but there is no evidence that his contribution, if it
occurred, was conceived contemporaneously with another writer.
Second, what test would one construct to show that this or that
author contributed to a play? The only possibility is a comparison
of style but if a candidate has insufficient prose work or letters to
compare the plays against then such a test cannot be carried out.
For a candidate who cannot be tested, the evidence simply does
not exist one way or the other.15 Unfortunately, this is the case for
Shakespeare of Stratford and so he can never be ruled out as a
contributor to some later version of a given play under his name.
Nevertheless, certain arguments can be constructed that show that
it would have been very difficult for him to have originated or
adapted certain plays. With the redundancy of a stylistic test, the
accumulation of facts that point to the exclusion of Shakespeare
from the Inns of Court and the Virginia Company is the most
persuasive way forward for arguing his non-origination of plays
associated with these institutions. This is the path followed here.
from only 9 works. So Bacon’s large presence in the database does not
guarantee him returns.
15
For example, Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford has often been
suggested as a contributor to the Shakespeare canon. He has eight published
poems in Richard Edwards, The Paradyse of Daynty Deuises (1576), STC:
7516 (searchable in EEBO) and there are 77 extant letters of his containing
some 50,000 words (see www.oxford-shakespeare.com/oxfordsletters.html
accessed 2 July 2013). I doubt that this is enough to test the hypothesis that he
contributed to this or that play in which case his claim can never be grounded
in fact. Untestable hypotheses properly belong to metaphysics not science.
6
Part One: The Inns of Court
1.1 Players
The Inns of Court records show that of the four Inns of Court,
only Lincoln’s Inn are known to have used professional
companies before 1594, and this was four times from 1564–80.
The main summary of records in relation to drama at the Inns of
Court in Shakespeare’s time is contained in the three volumes of
Alan Nelson and John Elliots’s Records of Early English Drama.
Although it is a major reference work, Nelson and Elliot’s count
of the number of professional companies that performed at the
Inns seems to be overestimated. In particular, they remark that
“All Inns of Court plays subsequent to 1587/8 seem indeed to
have been performed by professionals, including Shakespeare’s
Comedy of Errors, given at Gray’s Inn on 28 December 1594”.16
Unfortunately, any hint that players were paid is automatically
interpreted by Nelson and Elliot as a payment to an outside
company. However, this need not necessarily be the case as
players also received remuneration for acting at court and for
their expenditure on apparel.17
It is important to have an accurate picture of Inns of Court policy
with respect to the writers and performers of plays as the 1594–5
revels approached in order to obtain a reliable assessment of
precedent.
We shall see that two plays were intended for these celebrations,
The Comedy of Errors and Love’s Labour’s Lost, and if it can be
shown to a high degree of certainty that a professional company
did not play them then Shakespeare’s connection with them
comes into question. Table 1 shows the plays that Nelson and
16
Alan H. Nelson and John R. Elliott Jr, eds, Records of Early English
Drama: Inns of Court, 3 vols (D. S. Brewer, 2010), p.xxii. The view seems to
originate from Philip J. Finkelpearl, ‘John Marston’s Histrio-Mastix as an Inns
of Court Play’, Huntingdon Library Quarterly, 29, No. 3 (May 1966), pp.223–
234.
17
That is, costume material. In the early 1540s, an order was made at Gray’s
Inn that “when there shall be any such Comedies, then all the Society at that
time in Commons, to bear the charge of the Apparel”, see William Dugdale,
Origines juridiciales (London: 1666), p.285.
7
Elliot claim were performed by professional companies and
column 6 indicates whether or not the facts support their
conclusion.18
Table 1: Plays that Nelson and Elliott claim were performed by
visiting players (1416–1602)19
Season
Date
Item
Inn
Nelson and
Elliot’s view
1416–
17
Christmas
play
FI
Visiting players
no
1417–
18
Christmas
FI
Visiting players
no
1491–
92
Christmas
FI
Visiting players
(?)
no
LI
Visiting players
no
MT
Visiting players
no
1494–
95
Evidence?
1509–
10
Christmas
1564–
65
2 Feb
play
LI
Children of the
Chapel, Edwards
yes
1565–
66
2 Feb
play
LI
Children of the
Chapel, Edwards
yes
1569–
70
2 Feb
?
LI
Lord Rich’s
players
yes
1579–
80
9 Feb
comedy
LI
Children of the
Chapel, Farrant
yes
1594–
95
28 Dec
comedy
GI
Visiting players
no
1601–2
2 Feb
comedy
MT
Probably Lord
Chamberlaine’s
Men
no
18
Here FI means Furnival’s Inn, LI is Lincoln’s Inn, MT Middle Temple, and
GI Gray’s Inn.
19
Nelson and Elliot, op. cit., pp.xxii, pp.757–9.
8
1.2 Writers
In the period 1526–1588, Gray’s Inn members are known to
have written four plays and performed three.
There are four Inns of Court: Gray’s Inn, Middle Temple, Inner
Temple, and Lincoln’s Inn. Each November, so long as the
plague permitted, a master of the revels was appointed to
organise the ‘solemn revels’ which consisted of feasting, music,
and dancing. Sometimes, there would be a ‘Grand Night’ when a
play was performed. This allowed the student participants to
rehearse their rhetorical skills, an important factor in influencing
the decision makers in a court room. Gorboduc was one such
play, and in the 1561–2 season its long speeches in the scenes of
counsel were more than appropriate for their purpose. A report
prepared for Henry VIII reveals that the Inns of Court
traditionally provided the writers and performers for their revels
stating that “in some of the houses ordinarily they have some
interlude or Tragedy played by the Gentlemen of the same house,
the ground, and matter whereof, is devised by some of the
Gentlemen of the house”.20
Table 2 shows the plays that are known to have been written and
performed by Inns of Court members. We can see from this that
in the 1587–8 revels season, Gray’s Inn supplied their own
performers for both Sylla Dictator and Misfortunes of Arthur.
The writers for the latter were all Gray’s Inn members.
In the 1566–7 season, Jocasta and Supposes were enacted and, in
1573, both plays were published. After making it clear that the
writers were from Gray’s Inn, the introduction in both states
“there [by them] presented” as a strong hint that the performers
were also from Gray’s Inn.21
20
Edward Waterhouse, Fortescutus illustratus, or, A commentary on that
nervous treatise, De laudibus legum Angliae, written by Sir John Fortescue,
Knight (London: 1663), p.546.
21
Jocasta was “A Tragedie written in Greeke by Euripedes, translated and
digested into Acte by George Gascoygne and Francis Kinwelmershe of Grayes
Inne, and there by them presented, 1566” in George Gascoigne, A hundreth
sundrie flowres bounde vp in one small poesie (London: 1573), STC: 11635,
p.69. In the 1575 printed edition, the date “1566.” is appended, see George
9
Table 2: Plays written and performed by Inns of Court members
(1526–1588)22
Season
Date
Title
Attribution
Players
Venue
1526–7
?
?
John Roo
(GI)
GI
GI
1561–2
?
Gorboduc
Norton and
Sackville
(IT)
?
IT
18
Jan
Gorboduc
Norton and
Sackville
(IT)
IT
Whitehall
?
Jocasta
Gascoigne &
Kinwelmarsh
(GI)
likely
GI
GI
Supposes
Gascoigne
(GI)
likely
GI
GI
Gismond of
Salerne
Wilmot et al.
(IT)
IT
IT or
Greenwich
1566–7
1567–9
?
1579–
80
2 Feb ?
?
?
GI
1580–
81
?
?
?
?
GI
1587–8
?
Sylla
Dictator
?
GI
GI
28
Feb
Misfortunes
of Arthur
Hughes et al.
GI
Greenwich
(GI)
Gascoigne, The poesies (London: 1575), STC: 11636. Supposes was “A
Comedie written in the Italian tongue by Ariosto, and Englished by George
Gascoigne of Grayes Inne Esquire, and there presented” in George Gascoigne,
Ibid., sig. B2.
22
Here ‘IT’ means Inner Temple.
10
There is strong evidence for three plays being performed by the
Inn in the period 1526–1588, but admitting Jocasta and Supposes
would make it five.
1.3 Productions
1.3.1 Play characteristics
There is evidence that The Comedy of Errors and Love’s
Labour’s Lost were intended for the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn revels.
Plays performed at Inns of Court revels were usually based on
translations of Roman, Greek, and Italian plays, and commented
on the succession question which occupied political discourse in
the 1590s. The Comedy of Errors has both of these characteristics
which suggests that it was specifically written or at least revised
for the revels at Gray’s Inn. The argument for Love’s Labour’s
Lost proceeds from the circumstance that the play contains rare
parallels with speeches and events at these revels as described in
the Gesta Grayorum.
There are several known translation plays that were performed at
the Inns of Court. Gorboduc, which was enacted at the 1561–2
revels, was heavily influenced by Seneca who employed a fiveact structure and Choruses. The Misfortunes of Arthur which
appeared in the 1587–8 season even contains lines from Seneca.
Supposes which was performed in 1566–7, was translated by
George Gascoigne of Gray’s Inn from Ariosto’s Italian play I
Suppositi (1509). As for references to the queen’s succession,
Gorboduc obliquely warns against the crown going to the
Catholic Mary Queen of Scots and the consequent danger of her
allegiance to Spain. The queen was urged to provide an heir to
prevent this occurring. Gismond and Salerne, favoured the
Protestant claimant to the throne Catherine Grey who secretly
married the Earl of Hertford, against the queen’s wishes.
Unfortunately, Catherine died in the Tower within days of it
being performed. The Misfortunes of Arthur has parallels with the
queen’s relationship to Mary Queen of Scots, with the reckless
usurper Mordred as Mary, and the forgiving Arthur as Elizabeth.
While the public stage focused on social morality productions
and university plays were usually enacted in Latin, Inns of Court
11
plays were based on translations into English of classical works
with glances at the succession question.
1.3.2 The Comedy of Errors
The Comedy of Errors was intended for an Inns of Court
audience of law students.
The Gesta Grayorum explicitly states that on Innocents Day (28
December) evening 1594 at Gray’s Inn “a Comedy of Errors (like
to Plautus his Menechmus) was played by the Players” who
remain unidentified in the pamphlet.23 The Comedy of Errors
relies on two dramas from Plautus, the Menaechmus and
Amphitruo. William Warner’s (1558–1609) translation of the
Menaechmi was published in 1595 and if this work influenced
The Comedy of Errors then it must have been seen in manuscript.
With the Union of England and Scotland high on the agenda, the
play places its characters in Ephesus instead of Plautus’s
Epidamnus, and therefore has echoes of St Paul’s Epistle to the
Ephesians. Its theme of reconciliation and its references to
‘curious arts’ and ‘confusion’ (see The Comedy of Errors,
1.2.97–102) reinforces this association24 and John Haywood’s
Treatise of Vnion (1604) reveals that St Paul’s Epistle was related
to the issue of the Union.25 Several researchers have also pointed
out that the play contains a sub-plot centred around difficulties in
the developing law of contract that Angelo the goldsmith
confronts in relation to the non-payment for the gold chain he
supplied.26 The complexity of the argument about the conflict
23
Gesta Grayorum: or the History of the High and mighty Prince, Henry
(London: Printed for W. Canning, 1688), p.22.
24
Marie Axton, The Queen’s Two Bodies: Drama and the Elizabethan
Succession (London: Royal Historical Society, 1977), p.81.
25
Haywood’s Treatise of Vnion (1604) revealed a contemporary view of St
Paul’s relation to the succession question, see John Haywood, A treatise of
vnion of the two realmes of England and Scotland (London: 1604), STC:
13011, p.8.
26
For example, Paul Raffield, ‘The Comedy of Errors and the Meaning of
Contract,’ Law and Humanities, 3, No. 2 (2009), pp.207–229; Barbara Kreps,
‘Playing the law for lawyers: Witnessing, Evidence, and the law of contract in
The Comedy of Errors’, Shakespeare Survey Volume 63: Shakespeare’s
English Histories and their Afterlives, ed., Peter Holland (Cambridge
University Press, 2010).
12
between an ‘action of debt’ and an ‘action of assumpsit’ were
more appropriate for a legal audience than a popular one.
1.3.3 Love’s Labour’s Lost
Love’s Labour’s Lost was at least adapted for the 1594–5
Gray’s Inn revels so that the proceedings foreshadowed it.
The evidence that Love’s Labour’s Lost was intended but
remained unperformed at the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn revels is
striking. Certain rare correspondences exist between the
proceedings — as documented in the Gesta Grayorum27 — and
the play.
(i) Wonder of the world
The phrase “wonder of the world” in the play has only two
returns prior to 1594 in the context of it being applied to the
possession of knowledge. Henry Smith’s A preparatiue to
mariage (1591) has “Salomon, the myrrour of wisedome, the
wonder of the world”.28 In Love’s Labour’s Lost, Ferdinand
declares:
Navarre shall be the wonder of the world;
Our court shall be a little academie,
Still and contemplative in living art. (1.1.12–14)
The phrase “wonder of the world” refers to the ‘living art’ or the
ethics of the Stoics, which involved unveiling the secrets of the
universe.29 At the 1594–5 revels, Francis Bacon’s second
Counsellor’s speech ‘Advising the Study of Philosophy’ applies
the same epithet to the Prince:
when all miracles and wonders shall cease, by reason that
you shall have discovered their natural causes, yourself [the
Prince of Purpoole] shall be the only miracle and wonder of
the world30
27
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit.
Henry Smith, A preparatiue to mariage (1591), STC: 22685, p.50.
29
See J. S. Reid, ‘Shakespeare’s ‘Living Art’’, The Philological Quarterly, 1
(July 1922), pp. 226–7.
30
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.35.
28
13
(ii) Tasks and ladies
The lines in the play
O, these barren taskes, too hard to keepe,
Not to see Ladies, study, fast, not sleepe.
involve an association of ‘tasks’ and ‘ladies’ that does not appear
in the extant literature before 1594, but occurs in Francis Bacon’s
sixth Counsellor’s speech at the revels:
What! nothing but tasks, nothing but working-days? No feasting,
no music, no dancing, no triumphs, no comedies, no love, no
ladies?31
(iii) Seasick from Muscovy
In Love’s Labour’s Lost there is:
Princess. Amazed, my Lord? Why looks your highness sad?
Rosaline. Help hold his brows, he’ll swoon. Why look you pale?
Seasick, I think, coming from Muscovy. (5.2.391–3)
On 1st February, the Prince of Purpoole complains of seasickness
on returning from his mock journey to Moscow.32 In the Gesta
Grayorum the Prince’s letter of apology to Sir Thomas has:
I found, that my Desire [to entertain the queen at
Greenwich] was greater than the Ability of my Body;
which, by length of my Journey [from Russia] and my
Sicknesse at Sea, is so weakened, as it were very
dangerous for me to adventure it.
This example from the Gesta Grayorum and the one in Love’s
Labour’s Lost are the earliest two returns for the association of
‘seasick’ and ‘muscovy’.33
(iv) Three years without ladies
A further correspondence has been suggested by White34 who
observes that “it [the Gesta] has various elaborate edicts couched
in the legal terms of ‘Items’ that we find in Love’s Labour’s
31
Ibid., p.41.
See Rupert Taylor, The Date of ‘Love’s Labour’s Lost’ (New York: 1932),
pp.8–9.
33
It appears in the First Folio (1623) but not in the 1598 LLL quarto.
34
R. S. White, Natural Law in English Renaissance Literature (Cambridge
University Press, 1996), p.150.
32
14
Lost.” An investigation reveals a similarity of this kind between
the play and the ‘Articles of the Knights of the Order’ that were
read out at the revels. One of these Articles is as follows:
Item, No Knight of this Order shall be inquisitive towards any
lady or Gentlewoman, whether her beauty be English or Italian,
or whether, with Care taking, she have added half a Foot to her
Stature; but shall take all to the best. Neither shall a Knight of
the aforesaid Order presume to affirm, that Faces were better
twenty Years ago, than they are at this present time, except such
Knight have passed three Climacterical Years.35
In Love’s Labour Lost (1.1), Longaville reads out the following
edict:
Item, Yf any man be seene to talke with a woman within the
tearme of three yeares, hee shall indure such publique shame as
the rest of the Court can possible deuise.36
Later, in Act 2 the Queen decides that “Till painefull studie shall
out-weare three yeares, / No woman may approach his silent
Court.”37 Both the play and the Gesta Grayorum frame this as a
legal ‘Item’ in which there is a demand not to see a woman for
three years.
The rarity of these parallels suggest that Love’s Labour’s Lost
was intended for the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn revels but was cancelled
on the Grand Night (2nd February) when the scaffolding for the
audience had to be taken down.38
1.3.4 A Thomas Nashe play?
Love’s Labour’s Lost might have originally been a Thomas
Nashe manuscript.
The pamphleteer Thomas Nashe has six matches with Love’s
Labour’s Lost that precede the date of the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn
revels suggesting that the play sourced his work. However, since
he has no ‘rare’ matches after 1594 more evidence is required
before asserting his priority.
35
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit, p.28.
William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost (1598), STC: 22294, sig. A3 v.
37
Ibid., sig. B4.
38
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.53.
36
15
(i) Plodders
Love’s Labour’s Lost contains the use of “plodders” to refer to
unimaginative writers. In Scene 1.1 we have “Small haue
continuall plodders euer wonne, / Saue base authoritie from
others Bookes”. The first known occurrence is in Nashe’s The
vnfortunate traueller (1594) with “Grosse plodders they were all,
that had some learning and reading, but no wit to make vse of it”.
(ii) Continent of
There is “continent of beauty” in Scene 4.1 of the play, and the
earliest known use of “continent of” in relation to a human
characteristic is “To my journey’s end, & discend to the second
continent of Delicacy, which is Lust, or Luxury” in Nashe’s
Christs teares ouer Ierusalem (publ. 1613) from 1593, and so
precedes Love’s Labour’s Lost.
(iii) Procor gellida
In Scene 4.2, there is “facile procor gellida, quando pecas omnia
sub vmbraminat”. Only five uses of “procor gellida” or its variant
spellings occur before 1594. The earliest is in Huleots dictionarie
(1572) under the heading “Chewe the cudd”. However, it also
occurs in the Harvey–Nashe controversy, having been used in
Gabriel Harvey’s Foure letters (1592), and as “Faust praecor
gelida” in Nashe’s The apologie of Pierce Pennilesse (1592).
(iv) Trip and go
In the same scene of the play there is “trip and go my sweete”.
There was a character in Plautus’s An enterlude for children to
play named Iack Iugler (1590) called ‘Alice trip and go’ and
there are only three known uses of this before 1594. Nashe has
one of them as “shalt not breath a wit, trip and goe” in The
apologie of Pierce Pennilesse (1592).
(v) Gaudy blossoms
Finally, in Scene 5.2 we find “Nip not the gaudie blossomes of
your Loue”. There are only two cases of “gaudy blossoms” in
EEBO before 1594: Michael Drayton has the earliest with “Thy
gaudy Blossomes blemished with cold” in Idea the shepheardes
(1593), and Nashe has the next as “be-deck it with gaudy
blossoms” in Christs teares ouer Ierusalem (1613) from 1593.
16
All of these parallels are ‘rare’, occur before Christmas 1594, and
their number raises the intriguing possibility that Thomas Nashe
might have been involved in Love’s Labour’s Lost before the
1594–5 revels as a contributor.39 Since work by non-members of
the Inns was unwelcome in 1594, an early draft of Nashe’s
manuscript might have been acquired without his consent and
adapted for the revels. In this regard, it would also be an
interesting topic for further research to examine Henry VI, Part 3
for traces of Nashe’s hand.40
1.4 Shakespeare’s exclusion from the 1594–5 revels
Shakespeare was involved in neither the writing nor the
performing of any play at the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn revels.
Section 1.2 has already provided evidence that as the 1594–5
Gray’s Inn revels approached, precedent favoured the actors and
writers being Inns of Court members. An argument will now be
presented for Shakespeare’s exclusion from both the writing and
acting of plays intended for these revels.
Both Oxford and Cambridge Universities were turning away
professional players in the period 1587–1604. On 29 June 1593,
only 18 months before the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn revels, the Privy
Council sent a letter to the Vice Chancellor of Cambridge
University complaining that “common Plaiers do ordinarily
resorte to the Vniuersytie of Cambridge there to recite Interludes
and Plaies some of them being full of lewde example” and
demanded that “no Plaies or Interludes of common Plaiers be
vsed or sette forth either in the vniuersity or in any place within
the compasse of ffiue miles” of the town. It also mentions “The
like lettre to Vicechancellor [sic] and Heades of the houses and
seuerall colledges of Oxenforde”.41 The Inns of Court were
39
The absence of matches for Nashe with the play after 1594 means that a
comparison of style cannot confirm this hypothesis. A state of mutual
borrowing is required to argue for a contribution.
40
Perhaps Love’s Labour’s Lost had been stolen from Nashe. If he was the
author of the Groats-worth of Witte letter to the three dramatists (and at the
time he was a suspect) that complained about the plagiarism of Henry VI, Pt 3,
then this might also have been his. Further work is required on this issue.
41
Alan Nelson, ed., Records of Early English Drama: Cambridge, Vol. 1
(University of Toronto Press, 1989), pp.348–9.
17
known as the Third University so it is likely that this policy
applied there too, especially since the Inns of Court revels were
intended to give the students experience and instruction in royal
court etiquette and legal court rhetoric.42
The most convincing evidence that Shakespeare was not at
Gray’s Inn on Innocents Day (28 December) 1594 to perform The
Comedy of Errors appears in a document from the Accounts of
the Revels office dated 15 March 1595 which clearly states that
he was performing before the queen at Greenwich that evening,
see Figure 1.43
Sir Edmund Chambers, seeing that this posed a problem for
Shakespeare’s appearance at Gray’s Inn on 28 December,
attempted to discredit the document by claiming that the
administrator meant to record Shakespeare’s appearance at
Greenwich as being on 27th December instead of the 28th.44
However, the document clearly states “Innocents daye” so that
any error could not have arisen from writing “xxviij” [28th]
instead of “xxvij” [27th]. Altering the facts to suit a favoured
theory is a dubious practice, and the document should be afforded
the respect it deserves.
The Gesta Grayorum suggests that no payment was made to an
external actor or writer for the revels, noting that “about 12th of
December [...] it was determined that there should be elected a
Prince of Purpoole [...] which was intended to be for the Credit of
Gray's Inn, and rather to be performed by witty inventions rather
than chargeable Expences [sic].”45 This suggests that no one was
paid and that all the creative writing was to be done in-house.
42
Many students from Oxford and Cambridge attended an Inn of Court.
Finkelpearl notes that “[from] 1587 to 1603, the records of the Middle Temple
mention 1,070 names, of whom forty-three percent definitely spent some time
at Oxford or Cambridge”, see Philip J. Finkelpearl, John Marston of the
Middle Temple (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1969), p.6.
43
This seems to have first been pointed out by H. C. Hart, ed. Love's Labour's
Lost, second edition (1913; reprinted, London: Methuen, 1930), p.xxviii.
44
E. K. Chambers, Modern Language Review, 2 (1906), pp. 10–11. Chambers’
main evidence takes the Gesta Grayorum’s reference to “a Company of base
and common Fellows” (p.23) out of its context, the comedic trial of a sorceror.
45
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.2.
18
Figure 1.
Shakespeare and the
Lord Chamberlain’s
Men recorded as
being at Greenwich
on Innocents Day
evening 1594,
rendering then
unable to perform
The Comedy of
Errors at Gray’s Inn.
19
In fact, the only known contributors to the revels, Francis
Bacon,46 Thomas Campion,47 and Francis Davison,48 were all
Gray’s Inn members. Furthermore, Arthur Brooke’s Masque of
Beauty and Desire, which was performed at the Inner Temple
Hall in the 1561–2 Christmas season, is the only known example
of an external writer being used for an Inns of Court revels. For
this he was unpaid and had to be granted special admittance
which was placed on record.49 Several people are known to have
been granted special admittance for the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn revels,
and their names are documented but William Shakespeare was
not one of them.50 Also, neither the Gray’s Inn Pension Book nor
the Ledger Book51 shows a payment to an external writer or
company for these revels, and this absence occurs at a time when
payments to outsiders were appearing in these records. So
precedent conspires with other evidence to suggest that Gray’s
Inn made use of their own writers and performers for these plays.
This assessment of performers and writers at Gray’s Inn, and at
the Inns of Court in general, has consequences for future studies.
For example, in Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida and Inns of
Court revels (2000), Elton points out how the play contains many
features of law student revels tradition.52 In fact, Knapp and
Kobialka judge that “there is evidence that at least two, and
possibly as many as six, of Shakespeare’s plays were performed
in the great halls of the Inns of Court during his lifetime.”53 So it
is an area that deserves further investigation.
46
The six Privy Councillors speeches.
‘A Hymn in Praise of Neptune’.
48
‘Masque of Proteus’.
49
Nelson and Elliot, op. cit., pp.85, 865.
50
For example, John Lyly was granted admission, see Nelson and Elliot, op.
cit., pp.124–5, 886–6.
51
Nelson and Elliot, op. cit., pp.121–4.
52
W. R. Elton, Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida and Inns of Court revels
(Ashgate, 2000).
53
They go on to list The Comedy of Errors, Twelfth Night, Love’s Labour’s
Lost, Troilus and Cressida, Timon of Athens, and Measure for Measure, see
Margaret Knapp and Michal Kobialka, ‘Shakespeare and the Prince of
Purpoole: The 1594 Production of The Comedy of Errors at Gray’s Inn Hall’,
47
20
Part Two: The Virginia Colony
2.1 The Sea Venture and The Tempest
Parts of The Tempest refer to the Sea Venture third-supply ship
which was wrecked at Bermuda while bound for Virginia in
July 1609.
The shipwreck of the Sea Venture at Bermuda in July 1609 was
sensational news when it reached England in late 1610. Not only
were Sir Thomas Gates, Captain Christopher Newport, and Sir
George Somers on board, the Virginia colony’s entire command
structure, but never before had the entire crew of a ship survived
a wreck at Bermuda. Fortunately, after ten months building two
new ships using the cedar wood trees at Bermuda and parts of the
Sea Venture wreckage, they managed to resume their voyage to
Virginia.
There is evidence that certain facts obtained from this voyage
were unknown in England until 1610. In The Tempest, Caliban’s
speech on edible items runs as follows:
I’ prithee, let me bring thee where Crabs [apples] grow;
And I with my long nayles will digge thee pig-nuts;
Show thee a Iayes nest and instruct thee how
To snare the nimble Marmozet; I’le bring thee
To clustring Philbirts [hazelnuts], and sometimes I’le get thee
Young Scamels [birds] from the Rocke. (2.2.167–172)
The search string ‘crab(s) near.40 filberds/filberts/filbirts/
philbirts/philberts’ produces no returns from the EEBO database
before 1611.54 The earliest occurrence appears in a book
published in 1615 by Ralph Harmor who was secretary to the
colony from 1611–14. Describing Virginia he states that
some filberds haue I seene, Crabbes great store, lesse, but
not so sower as ours, which grafted with the Siens of
English aple trees, without question would beare very
in Robert S. Miola, ed., The Comedy of Errors: Critical Essays (Routledge,
2001).
54
The second earliest return is Shakespeare’s The Tempest in the First Folio
(1623) followed by Purchas’s publication of Harmor’s report in 1625, see
Samuel Purchas, Purchas his pilgrimes, 4 vols (London: W. Stansby, 1625).
21
goode fruite, and we doubt not but to haue the Siens
enough the next yeere, there being in Sir Thomas Gates
his garden at Iames town, many forward apple & peare
trees come vp.55
Sir Thomas Gates was resident in Virginia for two periods, from
24 May to 20 July 1610 and from August 1611 to March 1614.
Here, both The Tempest and an account of the Virginia colony
contain the only known use of this combination of ‘Philberts’ and
‘crabs’ before 1616.
Also of interest is the reference to ‘Young Scamels from the
Rocke’. In the 1890s, Newton suggested that a bird called a
‘Seamel’ had been misprinted as ‘scamel’ in the play.56 In fact,
several authors contemporary with the Bermuda shipwreck refer
to young birds that were taken for food from the rocks at
Bermuda by the voyagers. In 1625, Captain John Smith who had
already spent time at Virginia recollected that
The Cahow is a Bird of the night, for all the day she lies
hid in holes in the Rocks, where they and their young are
also taken with as much ease as may be, but in the night if
you whoop and hollow, they will light vpon you, that with
your hands you may chuse the fat and leaue the leane57
William Strachey, who was Secretary and Recorder at Virginia,
also mentioned them in his 1610 report:
A kinde of webbe-footed Fowle there is, of the bignesse of an
English greene Plouer, or Sea-Meawe, which all Summer wee
saw not, and in the darkest nights of Nouember and December
(for in the night onely they feed) they would come forth, but not
flye farre from home, and houering in the ayre, and ouer the Sea,
made a strange hollow and harsh howling […] Our men found a
55
Ralph Harmor [the younger], A True Discourse of the present estate of
Virginia, and the successe of the affaires there till the 18 of Iune. 1614
(London: 1615), STC: 12736, p.23.
56
A. Newton, A Dictionary of Birds (London: Adam and Charles Black, 1893–
1896), p.815.
57
John Smith, The generall historie of Virginia, New-England, and the
Summer Iles (London: 1625), STC: 22790a, sig. Z2.
22
prettie way to take them, which was by standing on the Rockes or
Sands by the Sea side, and hollowing, laughing, and making the
strangest out-cry that possibly they could: with the noyse whereof
the Birds would come flocking to that place, and settle vpon the
very armes and head of him that so cryed58
It is clear that Smith and Strachey were referring to the same bird
because in a 1625 marginal note to Strachey’s account of the
“Sea-Meawe”, the editor Samuel Purchas has added “Web-footed
Fowle. They call it of the cry which it maketh a Cohow.” So were
Strachey’s ‘Sea-Meawe’ or ‘cahow’ and Newton’s ‘seamel’ the
same bird? In John Day’s Ornithology (1678) the Index has a bird
called a “Sea-Mall” under ‘M’, which refers the reader to ‘TAB.
LXXVI’ where a picture of a gull is captioned “Larus cinereus
minor the Common sea mew or Gull”.59 In 1817, Forster gave the
variation ‘Seamal’, which is close to Newton’s ‘seamel’.60 So the
evidence suggests that Caliban’s speech alludes to information
about Bermuda and Virginia that was unknown in England before
1610. Furthermore, whoever wrote Caliban’s speech in The
Tempest knew this information before it was published.
Ariel even mentions the ‘Bermoothes’ or Bermuda:
Safely in harbour
Is the Kings shippe, in the deep Nooke, where once
Thou calldst me vp at midnight to fetch dewe
From the still-vext Bermoothes, there she’s hid
Bermuda is only mentioned in the contemporary literature in
relation to exploration, and Abrams has pointed out that Richard
Rich’s Newes from Virginia, registered on 1 October 1610,
demonstrates the “first recorded instance of the ooth-spelling in
English, and Shakespeare’s the second.”61
58
Purchas, Purchas, Vol. 4, op. cit., pp.1740–41.
John Day, The Ornithology of Francis Willughby, Fellow of the Royal
Society, No.3 (1678).
60
“240. Larus Canus: Common Gull, Common Seamal, Seamew, or White
Webfooted Gull, Winter gull” in Thomas Forster, A Synoptic Catalogue of
British Birds (London: Nicols, Son, and Bentley, 1817), p.32.
61
Richard Abrams, ‘Newes from Virginia (1610): Source for Prospero’s
Epilogue?’ Notes and Queries, 257, No. 4 (December 2012), pp.545–47. Rich
uses the spelling ‘Bermoothawes’ on the title page, Richard Rich, Newes from
59
23
It is also worth noting that William Strachey’s ‘True Reportory’
(1610), which was first published in 1625, mentions “the sharpe
windes blowing Northerly”62 while The Tempest has “To run
vpon the sharpe winde of the North” (2.2). These are the only two
examples before 1626 that mention ‘the sharp wind(s)’ in the
context of being northerly.63
The term “freshes” used in The Tempest is unusual in the
contemporary literature:
for Ile not shew him
Where the quicke Freshes are. (3.2.66–7)
There are only two examples before 1611. The first known use is
in Bernardino de Escalante’s A discourse of the nauigation
[China] (1579), and the second is in John Smith’s A true relation
[Virginia] (1608). Smith’s A true relation also employs the rare
“nonpareil” that appears in The Tempest as “Cals her a nonpareill” (3.2.100), which again has only two appearances in the
searchable contemporary literature before 1611.64
The first known performance of The Tempest was in November
1611 and neither the information about the cahow, the
coincidence of ‘crabs’ and ‘Philberts’ at the colony, nor the use
of ‘the sharp wind(s)’ in a northerly context, had been published
at this time. There also seem to be glances in the play at
published Virginia pamphlets such as Captain John Smith’s A
true relation (1608) and Richard Rich’s Newes from Virginia
(1610). So it appears that certain parts of The Tempest refer not
only to the 1609 Virginia expedition but to the colony in general,
and whoever inserted these references in the play seems to have
been familiar with Virginia Company affairs.
Virginia (London: 1610), STC: 21005. Abrams appears not to have been
aware that in 1901 Luce had already identified the “Bermoothawes” spelling
in Rich’s pamphlet, see Morton Luce, ed., The Tempest (London: Methuen,
1901), Appendix 1, p.159.
62
Purchas, Purchas his pilgrimes, op. cit., p.1738.
63
There are 7 returns from EEBO before 1611 for the above search string but
none in the context of it being a north wind.
64
It is used even earlier in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night (1602) as “though you
were crown’d / The non-pareil of beautie”.
24
2.2 Shakespeare’s exclusion from The Tempest
Due to the Virginia Company’s attitude to actors, the writing
and performing of The Tempest required its cooperation.
George Chapman is credited with a masque that was performed
by the Middle Temple and Lincoln’s Inn at the wedding of
Princess Elizabeth on 15 February 1612–13.65 As Sullivan
informs us
It proclaimed the English interest in America, and
prophesied for the married pair honour and riches such as
they believed would come from the great gold mines of
Virginia.66
It was clear that this was being used as propaganda to impress
invited ambassadors with England’s supposed new-found wealth
because it mentions “a rich Island lying in the South-Sea” and
refers to “A troupe of the noblest Virginians inhabiting, attended
hether the God of Riches, all triumphantly shyning in a Mine of
gould.”67 In fact, not only had no gold been found, but the
colonists had been struggling for survival against typhoid and
dysentry. The Tempest was also played at these 1612–13
celebrations68 and Nuzum has suggested that the play was
similarly used for propaganda purposes.69 So when the first
known performance of the play was given at Whitehall on 1st
65
George Chapman, The memorable masqve of the two honovrable Hovses or
Innes of Court; the Middle Temple and Lyncolnes Inne (1614), STC: 4982.
66
Mary Sullivan, ‘Court masques of James I’ (unpublished doctoral thesis,
University of Nebraska, 1913), p.73, see also pp.67–81.
67
Chapman, The memorable, op. cit., sig. D2v. The masque has a phrase
“flintie-hearted” in the Presentment which appears in Shakespeare’s Venus and
Adonis as “O! pity,’ ‘gan she cry, ‘flint-hearted boy”. This was rare in 1593.
An EEBO search on ‘flint/flinty hearted’ with spelling variations returns one
example before 1593, this being Augustin Marlorat, A catholicke and
ecclesiasticall exposition (1575), STC: 17406.
68
The Accounts of the Treasurer of the Chamber lists a payment to John
Heminge dated “1613, May 20” for playing The Tempest at the wedding, see
MS Rawl. A., 239, Bodleian Library, Oxford.
69
David Nuzum, ‘The London Company and The Tempest’, West Virginia
Philological Papers, 12 (1959), pp.12–23.
25
November 1611 by the “King’s Players”70 it might well have had
the same function. However, as we shall now see, due to the
attitude of the Virginia Company to players who were thought to
be ridiculing the enterprise on the stage, it is unlikely to have
been performed before the king without Virginia Company
cooperation.
The Reverend William Crashaw gave a sermon in London on 21
February 1610 “before the right honourable the Lord LaWarre,
Lord Governour and Captaine Generall of Virginia, and others of
his Majesties Councell for that Kingdome, and the rest of the
adventurers in that plantation”71 which informed his congregation
that:
As for Plaiers: [...] nothing that is good, excellent or holy
can escape them [...] they abuse Virginea [...] and such as
for which, if they speedily repent not, I dare say
Vengeance waits for them72
This was no isolated caution. The rules of conduct for the
Virginia plantation appeared in Lawes (1612), which was edited
by William Strachey. Every morning and evening a prayer was
recited to the entire colony:
O Lord we pray thee fortifie us against this temptation: let
Sanballat, & Tobias, Papists & players & such other
Amonites & Horonits the scum and dregs of the earth [...]
let such swine wallow in their mire73
70
E. K. Chambers, Elizabethan Stage, 4 vols, Vol. 4 (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1945), p.177.
71
Alexander Brown, Genesis of the United States, 2 vols, Vol. 1 (Cambridge,
MA: 1890), p.361.
72
Ibid. pp.366–7. Referring to the beginning of Act 2 in The Tempest, Cawley
conjectures that Shakespeare “heard Crashaw's sermon [... and] penned the
[Gonzalo-Adrian and Sebastian-Antonio] scene partly to show Crashaw that a
player could speak well of colonisation”. Here, Cawley unwittingly confirms
that Crashaw perceived and conveyed to the Council members present that
there was a risk involved in handing a sensitive company document to an
actor, see Robert R. Cawley, ‘Shakspere's Use of the Voyages in The
Tempest’, PMLA, 41 (1926), pp.688–726, p.701.
73
William Strachey, ed., For The Colonie in Virginea Britannia. Lawes
Divine, Morall and Martiall. (Oxford: 1612), sig. P4v.
26
So actors were seen as a threat to the colony and it is
inconceivable that a professional company or dramatist could
have been involved in The Tempest without Virginia Company
backing. Since William Shakespeare was not one of the 660
names listed on the Second Virginia Charter as subscribers 74 he
had no direct access to Virginia Company affairs. There had to be
inside assistance.
74
Alexander Brown, Genesis of the United States, 2 vols, Vol. 1 (Cambridge,
MA: 1890), pp.209–228.
27
Part Three: Francis Bacon
3.1 Interest in drama
Francis Bacon produced masques for the Inns of Court and had
early experience of contributing to a play.
Sir Francis Bacon is best known to history as a philosopher,
scientist, and politician. Although deprived of advancement
under Queen Elizabeth largely due to the influence of his first
cousin and Principal Secretary Robert Cecil, after King James
ascended to the throne in 1603 Bacon was knighted (1603),
became Solicitor General (1607), Attorney General (1613), and
Lord Chancellor (1618). What is less well-known is the evidence
of his early contribution to a play, his writing of a masque, and
the documents that show he was a producer of Inns of Court
masques.
The Misfortunes of Arthur was written and performed by
members of Gray’s Inn before the queen at Greenwich 28
February 1587–8. In the printed quarto (see Figure 2) we
discover that “The [five] dumbe shows were partly devised by
Maister Christopher Yelverton, Maister Frauncis Bacon, Maister
John Lancaster and others, partly by the saide Maister flower.”75
Bacon also wrote speeches for fictional characters. In 1595, The
Earl of Essex was attempting to woo Queen Elizabeth, and Bacon
wrote a device for 17 November, Queen’s Day, “in which
Philautia tries to persuade Erophilus not to love the Queen”.76
Philautia’s orators were a hermit, Secretary of State, and a
soldier, who set out the case for abstinence to Erophilus’s
esquire.
75
Thomas Hughes, Certaine deu[is]es (1587 [1588]), STC: 13921, sig. G2. A
dumb show is a pantomime enacted in silence, sometimes to music, and is
usually intended to illustrate the theme of the play that incorporates it.
76
Francis Bacon, Francis Bacon: The Major Works, ed. Brian Vickers
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), p.xxvii.
28
Figure 2. Credits for writing The Misfortunes of Arthur (1587–8).
There is evidence that Bacon produced at least three Inns of
Court masques. In an undated letter discovered amongst the
papers of Lord Burghley, who died on 4 August 1598, Francis
Bacon apologises for the failure of an intended masque from the
four Inns of Court, and suggests another from Gray’s Inn:
Yt may please your good Lordship I am sory the joynt
maske from the fowr Innes of Cowrt faileth. Wherin I
conceyue thear is no other grownd of that euent but
impossibility. Neuerthelesse bycause it falleth owt that at
this tyme Graies Inne is well furnyshed, of gallant yowng
gentlemen, your lordship may be pleased to know, that
rather then this occasion shall passe withowt some
demonstration of affection from the Innes of Cowrt, Thear
are a dozen gentlemen of Graies Inne that owt of the honour
which they bear to your lordship, and my lord
Chamberlayne to whome at theyre last maske they were so
much bownden, will be ready to furnysh a maske wyshing it
were in their powers to performe it according to theyr
myndes. And so for the present I humbly take my leaue
resting77
At the wedding of Princess Elizabeth in February 1612–13, a
joint masque from Gray’s Inn and the Inner Temple was
77
British Library, Burghley Papers, Lansdowne MS 107, f.13; in Bacon’s
hand, no address, fly-leaf missing, docketed “Mr Fra. Bacon”.
29
presented to King James. Francis Beaumont is credited as the
author while Bacon received the following commendation:
Yee that spared no time nor trauell, in the setting forth,
ordering, & furnishing of this Masque […] as you did then by
your countenance, and louing affection aduance it78
A year later, John Chamberlain informed Sir Dudley Carleton of
another performance:
Sir Francis Bacon prepares a mask which will stand him in
above £2000, and although he has been offered some help by
the House [Gray’s Inn], and specially by Mr. Solicitor, Sir
Henry Yelverton, who would have sent him £500, yet he
would not accept it, but offers them the whole charge with the
honour.79
This was ‘The Maske of Flowers’ which was performed by
members of Gray’s Inn on Twelfth Night, Thursday 6 January
1613–14, at the marriage between Robert Carr, the Earl of
Somerset, and Lady Frances Howard, daughter of the Earl of
Suffolk, the Lord Chamberlain. In the published quarto, Bacon is
credited as follows:
To the verie Honorable Knight, Sir Francis Bacon […] having
beene the principall, and in effect the only person that did both
incourage and warrant the Gentlemen, to shew their good
affection towards so noble a Coniunction in a time of such
magnificence.80
However, there are facts that suggest that Bacon not only
produced but also wrote this masque. Adams has suggested
correspondences between the presentation of the action and the
garden’s construction, with Bacon’s essays ‘Of Masques and
78
Francis Beaumont, The Masqve of the Inner Temple and Grayes Inne
(London: 1613), STC: 1664, sig. B. On the title page we find “By Francis
Beamont [sic], Gent.”.
79
The letter is dated 9 December 1613. John Nichols, The Progresses,
Processions, and Magnificent Festivities, of King James the First, 4 vols, Vol.
II (New York: AMS Press Inc, 1828), p.705.
80
John Coperario, The maske of flowers. Presented by the Gentlemen of
Graies–Inne, at the court of White-hall, in the Banquetting House, vpon Twelfe
night, 1613 (London: 1614), STC: 17625, sig. A3.
30
Triumphs’ (1625)81 and ‘Of Gardens’, concluding that
Bacon’s writing style, his garden preferences, and his knowledge
of flowers, visible in his two garden descriptions and The Masque
of Flowers support other evidence presented here that he [...] was
equipped to script and produce one [a masque] with a garden of
flowers as its defining theme and visual focus.”82
So Francis Bacon was engaged in producing drama through the
Inns of Court and there is a case here for his contributing to it.
3.2 Parallels with Gesta Grayorum
Francis Bacon has at least 8 rare phrase matches of his work
with the Gesta Grayorum.
A detailed account of the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn Christmas revels
appears in the Gesta Grayorum, which seems to have been
written shortly after the proceedings.83 It is a document
noteworthy for the fact that it contains the first known reference
to a performance of The Comedy of Errors stating that on the
evening of 28 December 1594 (Innocents Day) after 9pm “a
Comedy of Errors (like to Plautus his Menechmus) was played by
the Players”. 84
According to The Pension Book of Gray’s Inn 1569–1669,
Francis Bacon was elected as a Treasurer in the year preceding
the 1594–5 revels,85 a post which he held until 26 November
1594, a month before they began:
81
The Masque of Flowers avoids ‘dancing in song’ which Bacon abhorred but
has ‘acting in song’ and ‘dancing without song’, the latter involving dancing
the measures.
82
Christine Adams, ‘Francis Bacon’s Wedding Gift of ‘A Garden of a
Glorious and a Strange Beauty’ for the Earl and Countess of Somerset’,
Garden History, 36, No. 1 (Spring 2008), pp.36–58, see p.53.
83
Nichols thought that “The publisher was Mr. Henry Keepe, who published
the ‘Monuments of Westminster’”, see John Nichols, The Progresses and
Public processions of Queen Elizabeth, 3 vols, Vol. 3 (London: J. Nichols and
Son, 1823), p.262n.
84
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.20.
85
The Gray’s Inn Pension Book shows that around this time, when a record
exists, two Treasurers were elected, for example, in November 1586–8, 1590,
1594–96.
31
Mr Pooley paid to Mr Bacon one of the treasurers of this house
by the hands of Mr Lany the somea of xxixli xviis xid in full
discharge of his accompt of his office of Treasurershippe.86
This meant that the financing of the 1594–5 Christmas revels
would have been within his control. From May 1588 and
throughout the 1590s he regularly attended Gray’s Inn Pensions,
committee meetings that managed the affairs of Gray’s Inn.87
There is evidence from a rare phrase interrogation of the EEBO
database that Francis Bacon was the main compiler of the Gesta
Grayorum. The ‘rare’ phrase matches between the Gesta
Grayorum and Francis Bacon’s work are listed below.88 The first
two are from the Articles of the Knights of the Order, a comic list
of promises each knight had to keep after admission to the Order,
as read out by the King at Arms.
(i) Narrow observation
The phrase “narrow observation”89 does not appear before its use
in the Gesta Grayorum and its next use appears in the line “as
men of narrowe obseruation may concyue them” in Francis
Bacon, The two bookes (1605).90 There are only four uses before
1670.
(ii) Selling of smoke
In the Gesta Grayorum “selling of Smoak”91 refers to the case of
Alexander Severus who found that his secretary was accepting
gifts from the poor to prosecute their suites while intending to
take no action. Severus secured his secretary to a post and choked
him with smoke cautioning that “they which sell smoke should so
perish with smoke”.92 There are only three uses before 1594 in
86
Reginald J. Fletcher, ed., The Pension Book of Gray’s Inn 1569–1669
(London: 1901), p.101.
87
Ibid.
88
Here ‘rare’ means that it appears in less than 1 in 588 searchable documents
in EEBO both before the target date and at the date of its later use.
89
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.30.
90
STC: 1164, sig. Ff2.
91
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.30.
92
See Pierre de La Primaudaye, The French academie (1586), STC: 15233,
p.411 which is mentioned in the Gesta Grayorum as one of the recommended
books.
32
the context of an incident at court. In Bacon’s private wastebook
Promus (1592–4) which presumably only Bacon had access to,
he has the Latin Fumos vendere [To sell smoke].93
Preceding the speeches of the six Counsellors is the Prince’s
speech.
(iii) The right way
The speech has “set them the right way to the wrong place”.94
The only match with this before 1670 appears in Bacon’s
unpublished ‘Valerius Terminus’ (1603) which has “thereby set
themselves in the right way to the wrong place”.95
The six Counsellors’ speeches from the revels are undoubtedly
Bacon’s. James Spedding, the Victorian editor of Bacons Works
thought that
All of these councillors speak with Bacon’s tongue and out of
Bacon’s brain; but the second and fifth speak out of his heart and
judgment also. The propositions of the latter contain an
enumeration of those very reforms in state and government which
throughout his life he was mostly anxious to see realized. In those
of the former may be traced, faintly but unmistakably, a first hint
of his great project for the restoration of the dominion of
knowledge, – a first draft of ‘Solomon’s House,’ – a rudiment of
that history of universal nature, which was to have formed the
third part of the ‘Instauratio’.96
A few examples should suffice to indicate Bacon’s hand, the first
from the Second Counsellor’s speech.
(iv) Alexander to Aristotle
The Gesta Grayorum has “Alexander the Great wrote to
Aristotle, upon publishing of the Physicks, that he esteemed
93
British Library, Harley 7017, f.85.
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.32.
95
Francis Bacon, ‘Valerius Terminus, or Of the Interpretation of Nature
(1603)’ in James Spedding, ed., The Philosophical Works of Francis Bacon, 5
vols, Vol. III (London: Longman & Co., 1861), p.232.
96
James Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, and Douglas Denon Heath, eds, The
Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, 7 vols, Vol. 1 (London: Longmans, 1861–
74), p.342.
94
33
more of excellent Men in Knowledge, than in Empire”.97 In The
two bookes (1605), Bacon writes “in his [Alexander’s] letter to
Aristotle after hee had set forth his Bookes of Nature; wherein he
expostulateth with him for publishing the secrets or misteries of
Philosophie. And gaue him to vnderstand that himselfe esteemed
it more to excell other men in learning & knowledge, than in
power and Empire.”98 Their source is The lives of the noble
Grecians and Romans, but these two quotations are more
compatible with each other than either of them with Plutarch’s
version.99
The next two examples are from the Third Counsellor’s speech.
(v) Brick and marble
There is a line attributed to Augustus Caesar in the Gesta
Grayorum “I found the City of Brick, but I leave it of
Marble”.100 In ‘Mr Bacon’s discourse in the Praise of his
Sovereign’ (1592) he has “as Augustus said, that he had received
the city of brick, and lefte it of marble.”101 There are no other
examples before 1670 of a ‘city of brick’ being associated with
the idea of it being left as marble.
(vi) Emperor Trajan the wallflower
The Third Counsellor states that “Constantine the Great was wont
to call with Envy the Emperor Trajan, Wallflower, because his
Name was upon so many Buildings”.102 Only five matches before
1670 use either ‘Trajan’ or ‘wallflower’ and none use both. In
The two bookes (1605) Bacon has “For Traiane erected many
famous monuments and buildings, insomuch as Constantine the
97
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.34.
Francis Bacon, The two bookes (1605), STC: 1164, pp.Kv–K2.
99
“Alexander to Aristotle greeting. Thou hast not done well to put forth the
Acroamatical sciences. For wherin shal we excell other, if those things which
thou hast secretly taught vs, be made common to all? I do thee to vnderstand,
that I had rather excell others in excellency of knowledge, then in greatnes of
power.” Plutarch, The lives (1579), STC: 20066, p.725.
100
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.36.
101
James Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, and Douglas Denon Heath, eds, The
Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, 7 vols, Vol. 1 (London: Longmans, 1861–
74), p.131.
102
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.36.
98
34
Great, in emulation was woont to call him Parietaria, Wall
flower, because his name was vppon so many walles”103 and this
is the only correspondence, one which EEBO failed to return.104
For examples relating to the narrative of the Gesta Grayorum,
the two examples that follow are striking.
(vii) Rich cloth of state
The pamphlet has “And there took his place in his Throne, under
a rich cloth of state”.105 A search of EEBO for the string ‘a rich
cloth’ in relation to ‘of (e)state’ returns only one record before
1594106 and only five before 1670. However, only Bacon’s “he
was set upon a Low Throne richly adorned, and a rich cloth of
State over his head” mentions a throne.107
(viii) The greater lessens the smaller
The closing narrative of the Gesta Grayorum, which has not
been subjected to a rare phrase test, has the following:
But now our Principality is determined; which, although it
shined very bright in ours, and others Darkness; yet, at the
Royal Presence of Her Majesty, it appeared as an obscure
Shadow: In this, not unlike unto the Morning-Star, which
looketh very chearfully in the World, so long as the Sun
looketh not on it: Or, as the great Rivers, that triumph in
the Multitude of their Waters, until they come unto the Sea.
Sic vinci, sic mori pulchrum. [To be conquered is a
beautiful death]108
103
Francis Bacon, The two bookes (1605), STC: 1164, sig. I3v.
The EEBO searches failed to detect Bacon’s entry because ‘wallflower’ is
separated into two words ‘wall flower’, and the ‘e’ at the end of ‘traiane’ has
been incorrectly keyed in as a ‘c’ to make ‘traianc’.
105
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.9.
106
“ryche clothe of estate” in Geoffrey Chaucer, The workes (1542), STC:
5069.
107
Francis Bacon, ‘New Atlantis’, Sylua syluarum (1627), STC: 1168 & New
Atlantis (1658), Wing: B307.
108
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.68. I also note the following: “Ner. When the
moone shone we did not see the candle / Por. So doth the greater glory dim the
lesse, / A substitute shines brightly as a King, / Untill a King be by, and then
his state / Empties it selfe, as doth an inland brooke / Into the maine of waters:
musique hark”, The Merchant of Venice (5.1.92–7).
104
35
In A Brief Discourse touching the Happy Union of the
Kingdom of England and Scotland (1603), Bacon has the same
figure illustrated with the same two examples of light and
water:
The second condition [of perfect mixture] is that the greater
draws the less. So we see when two lights do meet, the greater
doth darken and drown the less. And when a small river runs
into a greater, it loseth both the name and stream109
Again, in his essay ‘Of Deformity’ (1625), Bacon has “the stars
of natural inclination are sometimes obscured by the sun of
discipline and virtue.”110
Based on this evidence, there seems little doubt that Bacon was a
main participant both in the scripting of the Gray’s Inn revels and
its subsequent reporting in the Gesta Grayorum.
3.3 Parallels with The Comedy of Errors
Francis Bacon has at least 9 rare phrase matches with The
Comedy of Errors.
The first known performance of The Comedy of Errors was at the
1594–5 Gray’s Inn revels and the case has already been made for
Francis Bacon’s contribution to both the organization and writing
of these festivities. We shall now examine rare phrase parallels
between the play and Bacon’s work. It might seem inadvisable to
include a translation from Latin to English in such comparisons,
but Bacon’s De Sapienta Veterum or ‘The Wisdom of the
Ancients’111 is admitted because it was cast into English by Sir
Arthur Gorges, whom Bacon was acquainted with the year before
109
James Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, and Douglas Denon Heath, eds, The
Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, 7 vols, Vol. 3 (London: Longmans, 1861–
74), p.98.
110
Francis Bacon, The Essayes or Covnsels, Civill and Morall of Francis Lo.
Vervlam. (London: 1625), STC: 1148, sig. Kk3v, this is not as yet fully
searchable text in EEBO.
111
Francis Bacon, The wisedome of the ancients, written in Latine by the Right
Honourable Sir Francis Bacon Knight, Baron of Verulam, and Lord
Chancelor of England. Done into English by Sir Arthur Gorges Knight
(London: 1619), STC: 1130.
36
its publication.112 This suggests that Bacon supervised the
translation.
(i) doomed to
In Scene 1.1.153, there is “doomed to die”. There are only 2
returns from the EEBO database before 1594 for ‘doomed to’ and
9 returns before 1619 when it appeared in Bacon’s The wisedome
of the ancients (1619) as “doomed to perpetuall imprisonment”.
(ii) so good a mean
The construction “hauing so good a meane” occurs in Scene
1.2.18 and the search string ‘so good a mean’ occurs for only 2
documents before 1594 and only 6 before Bacon used it in 1623
in a letter to the Earl of Bristol “and where I have so good a mean
as Mr. Matthew”.113
(iii) voluble and …
The play has “voluble and sharp discourse’ at Scene 2.1.93. The
search for ‘voluble and’ or ‘and voluble’, which invites an
association with another descriptor, has 5 returns before 1594. It
also appears in Bacon’s private and then unpublished wastebook
Promus (1592–4), which is not in the searchable database, as ‘No
wise speech though easy and voluble’.114
(iv) in crannies
In Scene 2.2.31 we find “creepe in crannies”. There are no
returns for ‘in crannies’ before 1594, and only one before
Bacon’s employment in Sylua syluarum (1627).115
112
In the account of Bacon’s ‘gifts and rewards’ dated July 1618, Item 27
reads “To Sir Arthur Gorge’s man that brought your Lp. [Lordship] a book
….. £0 10s 0d”, in James Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, and Douglas Denon
Heath, eds, The Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, 7 vols, Vol. 6 (London:
Longmans, 1861–74), p.328.
113
Basil Montagu, ed., The Works of Francis Bacon, 3 vols, Vol. 3
(Philadelphia: A. Hart, 1850), p.149.
114
British Library, Harley 7017, f.85.
115
Sylua syluarum (1627), STC: 1168, p.68. This was a posthumous
publication so must have been written before Bacon died in 1626.
37
(v) fine and recovery
The string ‘by fine and recoverie’ appears in Scene 2.2.74–5, and
appears to originate from Valentine Leigh’s The most profitable
(1577). Bacon has two uses of “fine and recoverie”, the first
being in ‘An account of the lately erected service, called, the
Office of Compositions for Alienations’116 (1598) which is the
third earliest return from the database.
(vi) concealing sin
The play has “Apparell vice like vertues harbenger: / Beare a
fair presence, though your heart be tainted, / Teach sinne the
carriage of a holy Saint” (3.2.12–14). It originates from Horace
(Epistles I, xvi) as “pulchra Laverna, da mihi fallere, da iusto
[or iustum] sanctoque videri, noctem peccatis et fraudibus
obice nubem” [Fair Laverna (goddess of theft), grant me to
escape detection; grant me to pass as just and upright, shroud
my sins in night, my lies in clouds!].117 No occurrences of this
idea could be found prior to 1594 in an EEBO search.118
However, in his private wastebook the Promus (1592–4),
Bacon imitates Horace’s Epistles with “Da mihi fallere da
justume sanctumque viderj [grant me to escape detection; grant
me to pass as just and upright]”119 which occurs before the date
of The Comedy of Errors.
(vii) folded
At Scene 3.2.36, the play has “The folded meaning of your
words deceit”. There are no returns before 1594 for the use of
‘folded’ to describe a concealed or vague meaning, and only 6
before 1670.120 However, Bacon uses it twice in The wisedome
of the ancients (1619) as “conducing as well to the folding vp,
116
Basil Montagu, ed., The Works of Francis Bacon, Vol. XIII (London:
William Pickering, 1831), p.378.
117
Horace Satires, Epistles and Ars Poetica, trans. by H. Rushton Fairclough
(London: William Heinemann Ltd, Harvard University Press, 1942), pp.354–5.
118
A number of EEBO searches were conducted to locate occurrences
including ‘da mihi fellere’, ‘sin near.8 saint’, ‘just near.8 sin(s)’, ‘just near.10
night’, and ‘deceive near.15 just’.
119
British Library, Harley 7017, f.91v.
120
The search strings used were ‘folded near.5 meaning’, ‘folding up’, and
‘fold(ed)(eth)(ing)(ings)(s)’.
38
and keeping of things vnder a veil” together with “And the
second (out of the foulds of Poeticall fables) laies open those
deep Philosophicall mysteries”.121
(viii) present satisfaction
The phrase ‘present satisfaction’ appears in the play at Scene
4.1.5. There are only two occurrences122 before Bacon’s use in
his unpublished ‘Valerius Terminus’123 (1603) and The two
bookes (1605).
(ix) food, sport, and rest
At Scene 5.1.84–6, there is “In food, in sport, and lifepreseruing rest / To be disturb’d, would mad or man, or beast”.
A number of searches were constructed to locate uses in
EEBO.124 The sense of this complex of associations could only
be found in two authors125 before Bacon’s “To be free minded,
and chearefully disposed at howers of meate, and of sleepe, and
of exercise, is the best precept of long lasting”126 from his
Essayes (1597).
These 9 matches, 2 before and 7 after the revels, argue a mutual
borrowing between Bacon and the play’s author(s). Since
mutual borrowing is highly unlikely, this can be interpreted as
evidence of Bacon’s contribution to the play. The only other
writers who have a comparable number of matches to Bacon
are Thomas Heywood and Thomas Nashe. Heywood’s 7 rare
121
Francis Bacon, Wisdom of the Ancients (1619), STC: 1130. Francis Bacon’s
mother once wrote to her son Anthony complaining of Francis’s “enigmatical
folded writing”, in Catherine Drinker Bowen, Francis Bacon: The Temper of a
Man (Little, Brown, 1963), p.84. So it was used in Bacon’s family.
122
These are in Richard Cosin, An apologie (1593) and William Cornwallis
Essayes (1600–01).
123
British Library, Harley 6462.
124
Searches made were ‘exercise near.6 sleep’, ‘sport near.6 sleep’, ‘exercise
near.6 rest’, and ‘sport near.6. rest’.
125
“Meate, slepe, al manner of exercise, and al the hole gouernance of the
body, must be vsed for the helth therof, and muste not be set vppon pleasure,
and delycacye” Juan Luis Vives, An introduction to wysedome (1544), STC:
24848, & (1550), STC: 24849; “let the partie vse moderate exercise, temperate
sleepe, a quiet minde, meates of good iuyce” Johann Jacob Wecker, A
compendious chyrurgerie (1585), STC: 25185.
126
Francis Bacon, ‘Of Regiment of Health’, Essayes (1597), STC: 1137, p.9.
39
matches127 all follow the date of the Gray’s Inn revels 1594–5,
his earliest being from 1600. Nashe has 3 that precede the
revels and 1 that follows. For example, the locution “put the
finger in the eie and weep” (2.2.207) is matched by Nashe’s
“and then he puts his finger in his eie, and cries” in Pierce
Penilesse (1592), which is only one of 3 examples before 1594.
Also the rare word ‘distemperature’ in “a huge infectious
troope / Of pale distemperatures” (5.1.81–2), finds Nashe with
the earliest known match in “discerne the distemperature of
their pale clients” from The terrors of the night (1594).
3.4 Parallels with Love’s Labour’s Lost
Francis Bacon has at least 8 rare phrase matches with Love’s
Labour’s Lost.
One of the Grand Nights at the 1594–5 Gray’s Inn revels was
cancelled so, with the correspondences pointed out in §1.3.3,
Love’s Labour’s Lost could have been the intended performance:
On the next Morning [7 January] His Highnesse [the Prince
of Purpoole] took his Journey towards Russia, with the
Ambassador [...] there he remained until Candlemas (2
February); at which time […] his Excellency returned home
again; in which the Purpose of the Gentlemen was much
disappointed by the Readers and Ancients of the House; by
reason of the Term [c.23 January]: so that very good
Inventions, which were to be performed in publick at his
Entertainment into the House again, and two grand Nights
which were intended at his Triumphal Return, wherewith
his reign had been conceitedly determined, were by the
aforesaid Readers and Governors made frustrate, for the
Want of Room in the Hall, the Scaffolds [theatre galleries]
being taken away, and forbidden to be built up again (as
would have been necessary for the good Discharge of such a
Matter) thought convenient.128
Two rare matches of Bacon’s Counsellor’s speeches at the revels
with Love’s Labour’s Lost have already been discussed in §1.3.3,
127
That is, they appeared in less than 1 in 588 documents in EEBO both in
1594 and at the later date Heywood used them.
128
Gesta Grayorum, op. cit., p.53.
40
parallels (i) and (ii). There are other rare parallels that deserve
consideration.
(i) repute, carriage, bearing, and estimation
In Scene 1.1, the play has “a man of good repute, carriage,
bearing, & estimation”. All combinations of two from these four
descriptors were searched for in the context of being the quality
of a person, for example, ‘reputation near.5 estimation’. There
were no returns before 1594 for any of these combinations and
only 4 before Bacon used one in 1621 as “by a moderate Carriage
and bearing” in The historie of the reigne of King Henry the
Seuenth (1622).129
(ii) continent of
The play has “I my continent of beauty” in Scene 4.1, and
searches were carried out for ‘continent of’ in the context of an
area of a human characteristic or interest. There are no returns
from EEBO before 1594, although Thomas Nashe has “the
second continent of Delicacy” in Christ’s teares ouer Ierusalem
(1613) which was written in 1593. The 1598 quarto of Love’s
Labour’s Lost has the next use. Bacon has “continent of Nature”
in The two bookes (1605), his being the fourth use after the 1598
quarto.
The remaining four all appear in Scene 5.2.
(iii) the trick on’t
The play has “I see the tricke on’t” and there are no returns
before 1594 for the searches ‘trick on it’ and ‘put(ting) trick(s)
upon’. Bacon has the earliest known other use with “Some build
rather vpon abusing others, and as wee now say, putting trickes
vpon them”130 in The essaies (1612) which is currently only in
digital image format and not searchable text in EEBO. This
locution also occurs in The Tempest as “Doe you put trickes
vpon’s with Saluages” (2.2.57–8).
129
“A gentleman of your sorts, parts, carriage, and estimation” in Ben Jonson
‘Every Man In His Humour’, The workes (1616), STC: 14752.
130
Francis Bacon, The essaies (1612), STC: 1141, sig. C.
41
(iv) window of my heart
For “Behold the window of my heart, mine eie”, there are no
returns for ‘window fby.3 heart(s)’ before 1594. Bacon has the
earliest known example in ‘Device of an Indian Prince’131 (1595)
with “Your Majesty shall obtain the curious window into hearts of
which the ancients speak” which is not in the EEBO database.
(v) folly in fools
There is “Follie in Fooles beares not so strong a note, / As fool’ry
in the Wise, when Wit doth dote”132 which appears in the First
Folio (1623) but not the 1598 quarto of the play. The idea of folly
affecting a wise man more than an ordinary one is echoed in
James Spedding’s translation of Bacon’s Proverb 11 in the eighth
book of De Augmentis Scientiarum (1623) “Hence a little folly in
a very wise Man […] detracts greatly from their character and
reputation […] which in ordinary men would be entirely
unobserved.” This derives from a parable of Solomon.133 The
relationship between concepts should not have been lost in the
translation.
(vi) a leaden sword
The line “You leere vpon me, do you? There’s an eie / Wounds
like a leaden sword” originates from Diogenes as “draweth forth a
leaden swerd out of an Iuery skaberd” and was recorded by
Desiderius Erasmus.134 The search string for EEBO was ‘leaden
131
British Library, Burghley Papers, Lansdowne MS 107, f.13; in Bacon’s
hand, no address, fly-leaf missing, docketed “Mr Fra. Bacon”. See James
Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, and Douglas Denon Heath, eds, The Letters and
Life of Francis Bacon, 7 vols, Vol. 1 (London: Longmans, 1861–74), p.390.
132
A time-consuming search was carried out to discover if any returns from
the search ‘folly near.15 fool(s)’ (114 before 1594) also appeared in those
returned from ‘folly near.15 wise’ (214 before 1594) in the context of folly in
the wise being noticeable. This meant that every document returned was
opened up and the passage containing it was read for context. There were none
before 1608.
133
Ecclesiates 10:1 “As dead flies do cause the best ointment to stink; so doth
a little Folly him that is in reputation for wisdom and honour”. In Twelfth
Night there is “For folly that he wisely shows is fit; / But wise men, folly
fall’n, quite taint their wit.”
134
Desiderius Erasmus, Flores aliquot sententiarum (1540), STC: 10445.
42
sword’ in the context of causing an injury with it. Only one
example before 1594 occurs and this is “you had with this your
leadden sweard killed God haue mercie on his sowle” in Jerónimo
Orsório’s A learned and very eloquent treatie [sic] (1568). In
Bacon’s private wastebook Promus of Formularies and
Elegancies (c.1592–4), which precedes the play, he has the Latin
“Plumbeo jugulare gladio [to kill with a leaden sword]”135 which
departs from Erasmus’s version and is close to the Love’s
Labour’s Lost version.
Other authors also register rare returns. Ben Jonson has 4 rare
matches, the earliest being in 1608, Thomas Heywood has 7 with
the earliest being 1600, and Thomas Dekker has 8 with the
earliest being from 1600. It could only be argued that these
authors borrowed from the play unless the First Folio version is a
revision that was made much later than the 1598 quarto version.
However, Francis Bacon has matches that precede the revels, his
Counsellor’s speeches having been written beforehand. This
means that Bacon has rare matches both before and after the play,
and since mutual borrowing is unlikely then there is a case to be
made for Bacon’s contribution.
3.5 The Virginia Company
3.5.1 Bacon’s connection to company
In February 1607, just two months after the first voyagers had set
sail for Virginia, Sir Francis Bacon gave a speech in Parliament
urging that “the solitude of Virginia was crying out for
inhabitants.”136 In 1609, his name appeared on the Second
Virginia Charter as one of 52 Council members, and Keirnan has
suggested that the Charter “may have been prepared in part by
Bacon in his capacity as Solicitor General.”137
135
See Mrs Henry Pott, The Promus of Formularies and Elegancies (Boston:
Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1883), p.264.
136
“The allusion to Virginia is not in the printed speech but is to be found in
the Journals” in Samuel Gardiner, History of England, Vol. I (Longman,
Green, and Co., 1905), p.333n.
137
Michael Kiernan, ed., The Essayes or Counsels, Civill and Morall, The
Oxford Francis Bacon, Vol. XV (1985; reissued by Oxford University Press,
43
Figure 3: Strachey’s dedication to Bacon in his
Historie of Travaile (1612)
Sometime after January 1618, William Strachey sent a
manuscript copy of his Historie of Travaile to the “Lord High
Chancellor of England” with the following citation (see Figure
3):
Your Lordship ever approving himself a most noble fautor
[supporter] of the Virginia Plantation, being from the
beginning (with other lords and earles) of the principal
counsell applyed to propagate and guide yt.138
Bacon’s interest did not end with the Virginia Company. In
May 1610, “Sir Fran. Bacon” appeared on a Patent for the
Newfoundland colony “reserving to all manner of persons of
2000), p.244. This idea appears to originate from Alexander Brown, Genesis of
the United States, 2 vols, Vol. 1 (Cambridge, MA: 1890), p.207.
138
Strachey, Historie of Travaile into Virginia Brittania (1612; For the
Hakluyt Society, 1849). Bacon became Lord Chancellor in January 1618, a
date that serves as the terminus post quem for the dedication.
44
what nation soever, as well as the English, the right of trade
and fishing in the parts aforesaid”.139
He was also admitted a free brother of the East India Company
eight years later.140 When Bacon was expelled from office in May
1621, he found the leisure to complete new work. His chaplain,
Dr William Rawley saw parallels in this with the Bermuda
shipwreck:
Methinks they are [Bacon’s misfortunes] resembled by those
of Sir George Sommers [on the Sea Venture], who being
bound, by his employment, for another coast [Virginia], was
by tempest cast upon the Bermudas: And there a shipwreck’d
man made full discovery of a new temperate fruitful region,
which none had before inhabited; and which mariners, who
had only seen its rocks, had esteem’d an inaccessible and
enchanted place.141
3.5.2 Company pamphlets
Francis Bacon has 5 rare parallels with the Virginia Company’s
True Declaration propaganda pamphlet.
The pamphlets relating to the Virginia colony are shown in Table
3. They were designed to attract new adventurers and planters by
setting out the justification for colonization and extenuating the
difficulties the planters had encountered at Virginia.
The first pamphlet to be officially endorsed by the London
Virginia Council was A True and Sincere Declaration which
appeared in 1610.142 It expressed the hope that God might:
139
W. Noël Sainsbury, ed. Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series,1574–
1660 (London: Longman, 1860), p.21.
140
W. Noël Sainsbury, ed. Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series, East
Indies, 1617–1621 (London: Longman, 1870), p.229.
141
John Blackbourne, ed., ‘Dr Rawley’s Life of the Author’, The Works of
Lord Bacon, 4 vols, Vol. I (London: 1730), p.22.
142
A True and Sincere Declaration of the purpose and ends of the Plantation
begun in Virginia. Set forth by the authority of the Gouernors and Councellors
established for that Plantation (London: Printed for I. Stepney, 1610). It was
entered in the Stationers’ Register on 14 December 1609.
45
nourish this graine of seed, that it may spread till all people of
the earth admire the greatnesse, and sucke the shades and fruite
thereof143
In his Essaies (1612), Bacon uses a similar mode of expression:
The Kingdome of heauen is compared not to any great kernel, or
nut; but to a graine of Musterd, which is one of the least of grains,
but hath in it a propertie and spirit hastily to get vp and spread. So
are there States that are great in Territory.144
Table 3. Key to publications discussing the Virginia colony
(† date of delivery of sermon)
Publication
Nova Britannia
Stationers’ Register
18 February 1609
Good Speed to
Virginia
Virginia
Britannia
Sauls
Prohibition
Staide
True and
Sincere
Declaration
Crashaw’s
Sermon
True
Declaration
3 May 1609
Author
“R. I.” Robert Johnson
(?)
“R. G.” Robert Gray (?)
4 May 1609
William Symonds
28 May 1609†
Daniel Price
14 December 1609
Unattributed (Virg. Co.)
19 March 1610
William Crashaw
8 November 1610
Unattributed (Virg. Co.)
143
Ibid.,sig. D2.
Francis Bacon, The Essaies of Sr Francis Bacon Knight, the Kings
Solliciter Generall (London: 1612), sig. Q3v.
144
46
While publications such as Virginia Britannia (1609) gave the
spreading of the faith as the justification for colonization,145
the True Declaration (1610) found this to be insufficient:
To preach the Gospell to a nation conquered, and to set their
soules at liberty, when we haue brought their bodies to
slauerie; It may be a matter sacred in the Preachers, but I know
not how iustifiable in the rulers. Who for their meere ambition,
doe set vpon it, the glosse of religion.146
In a letter to Sir George Villiers (1616), Francis Bacon gives the
same view “To make no extirpation of the natives under pretence
of planting religion: God surely will no way be pleased with such
sacrifices.”147 In fact, there are several rare parallels between
Bacon’s work and the True Declaration which suggest that he
contributed to it, and he is the only author to register more than 3
rare returns from EEBO for this pamphlet.
(i) vulgar opinion
The phrase “of vulgar opinion” is returned by EEBO as being first
used in True Declaration (1610). Its third use appears in Bacon’s
The charge (1614)148 after Barnabe Rich’s Opinion deified
(1613).149
(ii) scum of men/people
There are two returns for ‘scum of men/people’ before True
Declaration and a total of 5 before Bacon’s use in 1625, notably,
in the context of a plantation “It is a Shamefull and Vnblessed
145
William Symonds, A Sermon preached at White-chappel, in the presence of
many, Honourable and Worshipfull, the Aduenturers and Planters for
Virginia. 25 April 1609. [Virginia Britannia] (London: 1609), sig. C.
146
Counseil for Virginia, A true declaration of the estate of the colonie in
Virginia with a confutation of such scandalous reports as haue tended to the
disgrace of so worthy an enterprise (London: 1610), STC: 24833, sig. B2v.
147
James Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, and Douglas Denon Heath, eds, The
Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, 7 vols, Vol. 6 (London: Longmans, 1861–
74), p.21.
148
Francis Bacon, The charge (1614), STC: 1125.
149
Barnabe Rich, Opinion deified (1613), STC: 20994.
47
Thing, to take the Scumme of People, and Wicked Comdemned
[sic] Men, to be the People with whom you Plant.”150
(iii) which is an infallible argument that
This rare construction is found in True Declaration and appears to
originate from Lyly’s Euphues (1578).151 Also preceding True
Declaration is “which still is an infallible argument, that our
Industry is not awaked”152 from Bacon’s speech to the Lower
House of Parliament (1606–7) concerning the general
Naturalization of Scotland.
(iv) venting the population
True Declaration has “what an inundation of people doth
ouerflow this little Iland: Shall we vent this deluge, by indirect
and vnchristian policies? Shal we imitate the bloody and
heathenish counsell of the Romanes, to leaue a Carthage standing,
that may exhaust our people by forraine warre?” Here ‘vent’ is
used in the sense of the ‘reduction’ of the number of people. The
idea was also employed in A true and sincere declaration (1610)
“by trans-planting the rancknesse and multitude of increase in our
people; of which there is left no vent, but age.”153 Daniel’s The
first part of the historie of England (1612) contains the only other
use before 1623 as “And by this immoderate vent [of
garrisons]”.154 These result from the search ‘vent near.10 people’
in EEBO. A search with ‘vent near.10 war’ gives one further
return before 1623 and that is Bacon’s “And if there should bee
any bad Bloud left in the Kingdome, an Honourable Forrain
Warre will vent it” in King Henry the Seuenth (1629), completed
in 1621.155
150
Francis Bacon, The essayes (1625), STC: 1148.
John Lyly, Euphues (1578), STC: 17051.
152
Francis Bacon, Resuscitatio (1657), Wing: B319, see also Spedding et. al,
Letters and Life, op. cit., Vol. 3, p.313.
153
A True and Sincere Declaration, op. cit.
154
Samuel Daniel, The first part (1612), STC: 6246, & (1618), STC: 6248.
155
Francis Bacon, The historie of the reigne of King Henry the Seuenth (1629),
STC: 1161.
151
48
(v) time flies without returning
True Declaration has “when procrastinating delayes and lingering
counsels, doe lose the oportunity of flying time.” A search of
EEBO with ‘flies/flieth/flying near.10 time’, checking each record
returned for the context that time does not return, yields only 4
examples prior to 1610. It can be found in Virgil’s Georgica156 as
sed fugit interea, fugit irreparabile tempus [but times flies
meanwhile, flies irretrievable]. A Latin search of EEBO shows
that the earliest use is in Fraunces’s The Arcadian rhetorike
(1588)157 while the next is Bacon’s exact use of Virgil’s Latin tag
in The two bookes (1605).158 As with True Declaration, Bacon
also applies it in a legal setting stating “and that is the cause why
those which take their course of rising by professions of Burden,
as Lawyers, Orators painefull diuines, and the like, are not
commonlie so politique for their owne fortune, otherwise then in
the ordinary way, because they want time to learne particulars, to
waite occasions, and to deuise plottes.”
3.6 Parallels with The Tempest
Sir Francis Bacon has 13 rare parallels with The Tempest, 3
before the play and 10 after.
It has previously been pointed out that there are documents
showing that Sir Francis Bacon produced two masques at
Whitehall:
20 February 1612–13: Elizabeth–Palatine marriage
celebrations, jointly played by Gray’s Inn and Inner
Temple players, writing credited to Francis Beaumont.159
6 January 1613–14: Earl of Somerset–Lady Frances
Howard marriage celebrations, played by Gray’s Inn
members, writing credited to George Chapman.160
156
Virgil, Georgica, Book III, lines 284–5.
Abraham Fraunce, The Arcadian rhetorike (1588), STC: 11338.
158
Francis Bacon, The two bookes (1605), STC: 1164, sig. Dd2v. See also
Bacon’s De Augmentis (1620) in James Spedding, ed., The Philosophical
Works of Francis Bacon, 5 vols, Vol. V (London: Longman & Co., 1861), p.
74.
159
Francis Beaumont, The masque of the Inner Temple and Grayes Inne
(London: 1613), STC: 1664, sig. B.
157
49
The first of these was about 18 months after The Tempest was
played at Whitehall in November 1611. Bacon has a number of
rare parallels with this play which suggests that he contributed to
it. As we shall now see, there are 6 notable instances in Scene 1.2
alone.
(i) granting and denying suits
The play has “Being once perfected how to graunt suits, / how to
deny them: who t’advance and who / To trash for ouer-topping”
(lines 79–81). A search of EEBO with ‘suits near.5 deny’ and
‘grant near.5 suit’ yields no returns for granting suits before
1623. On 29 September 1620, Bacon wrote a letter to King James
claiming that “to grant all suits were to undo yourself, or your
people. To deny all suits were to see never a contented face.”161
This example is not in the EEBO database and is the first known
case after The Tempest (1610) that uses the antithesis of granting
and denying suits.
(ii) Ivy and royalty
The Iesuites play at Lyons in France (1607)162 might have been
the source for The Tempest’s “that now he was / The Iuy which
had hid my princely Trunck, / And suckt my verdure [health] out
on’t” (lines 86–7). Bacon has “But it was ordained, that this
Winding-Iuie of a PLANTAGANET, should kill the true Tree it
selfe” in his The historie of the reigne of King Henry the Seuenth
160
George Chapman, The memorable masqve of the two honovrable Hovses
or Innes of Court; the Middle Temple and Lyncolnes Inne (1614).
161
See James Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, and Douglas Denon Heath, eds,
The Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, 7 vols, Vol. 7 (London: Longmans,
1861–74), p.90, also British Library, Harley MS 3787, f.187. Bacon also has
“There is Vse also of Ambitious Men, in Pulling downe the Greatnesse, of any
Subiect that ouer-tops” Francis Bacon, The essayes or counsels (1625), STC:
1148, although there are 28 examples of ‘overtop(ping)(s)’ before 1611.
162
This has “they [Jesuits] insinuate themselues into Princes Courts, and they
enter into their secrets, where being imbraced, they thriue like Iuie [Ivy],
which desists not till it hath suckt the heart out of the most noblest” R. S., The
Iesuites play at Lyons in France (1607), STC: 21514. However, unlike The
Tempest and Bacon’s version, it has no indication of a tree.
50
which he finished in October 1621.163 No other examples of ivy
being used to describe Princes have been found to occur before
1623.
(iii) Self-deception by repetition
The play has “Like one / Who hauing into truth, by telling of it, /
Made such a synner of his memorie / To credite his owne lie, he
did beleeue / He was indeed the Duke, out o’ th’ Substitution /
And executing th’ outward face of Roialtie / With all
prerogatiue” (lines 99–105). In Henry the Seuenth Bacon
discusses the imposter Perkin Warbeck “Insomuch as it was
generally beleeued (aswell amongst great Persons, as amongst the
Vulgar) that he was indeed Duke Richard. Nay, himselfe, with
long and continuall countefeiting, and with oft telling a Lye, was
turned by habit almost into the thing hee seemed to bee; and from
a Lyer to a Beleeuer.” There are no cases before this emphasising
that Warbeck deceived himself by habitual repetition. Quiller–
Couch sees these lines from The Tempest as counterfeit coining
metaphors164 and again in Henry the Seuenth Bacon has “To
counterfeit the dead image of a King in his coyne, is an high
Offence by all Lawes: But to counterfeit the liuing image of a
King in his Person, exceedeth all Falsification”.165
(iv) A human screen
The use of a person as a screen is expressed in the play as “To
haue no schreene between this part he plaid, / And him he plaid it
for” (lines 107–8). The Tempest has the first use of a screen in
this context and Francis Bacon has the second. In fact, there are
three examples of Bacon’s use, for instance, in his Henry the
Seuenth “Their ayme was at Arch Bishop Morton and Sir
163
Francis Bacon, The historie of the reigne of King Henry the Seuenth (1629),
STC: 1161, & 1676, Wing: B300. Bacon completed this work in October
1621.
164
Arthur Quiller–Couch and John Dover Wilson, The Tempest (first edition
1921; Cambridge University Press, 1961), p.91.
165
Bacon, King Henry the Seuenth, op. cit., completed in October 1621.
51
Reginold Bray, who were the Kings Skreens in this Enuy.” The
other two are in his 1625 essays ‘Of Enuy’ and ‘Of Ambition’.166
(v) Unwholesome fens
The play has ‘unwholesome fen’ (line 322). The use of
‘unwholesome’ is unusual to describe marshes or fens. There are
only 3 examples before 1611,167 and only 10 before 1690. One is
in Bacon’s ‘Of Plantations’ (1625) when he cautions against
building a plantation on “marish and vnwholesome Grounds”.
Huloet’s dictionarie (1572) does not distinguish between a moor,
a fen, and a marsh.168
(vi) Print of goodness
There are only two occurrences of “print of goodnesse” (line 352)
before The Tempest when searched as ‘print of good(ness)’. One
is John Jewel’s A replie (1565)169 and the other is Bacon’s “hath
the print of Good” in his The two bookes (1605).170 There are
only 5 cases before 1691.
In Scene 2.1, Francis Bacon has two rare parallels, one after the
presumed date of The Tempest and one before.
(vii) Beyond credit
The play has “beyond credit” (lines 59–60) which has 5 returns
before 1611. The earliest examples appear in Holinshed’s
166
For example, “There is also great vse of Ambitious Men, in being Skreenes
to Princes, in Matters of Danger and Enuie” Francis Bacon, ‘Of Ambition’,
The essayes or counsels (1625), STC: 1148.
167
For example, “The aire of Famagusta is very vnwholesome, as they say, by
reason of certaine marish ground adioyning it” Richard Hakluyt, The principal
nauigations (1599–1600), STC: 12626a; “This fountaine thus flowing out of
this grounde, falleth into a marishe (to speake with Ezechiel) where standeth a
poole of vnwholesome water” Robert Parker, A scholasticall discourse (1607),
STC: 19294.
168
“Asia is also a meere, fenne, or marishe, nere to the ryuer Caystrus”,
Huloet, Huloet’s dictionarie, op. cit., sig. Ciij, and “Moore, fenne, or
marishe.”, Ibid., see under ‘M’.
169
John Jewel, A replie vnto M. Hardinges answeare (1565), STC: 14606.
170
Francis Bacon, The two bookes (1605), STC: 1164.
52
Chronicles (1577, 1587).171 It also appears in Bacon’s
‘Considerations touching a war with Spain’ (1624)172 and there
are 11 examples before his use, still within the limit of rarity.
(viii) His project
There is also “For else his proiect dies” (line 299). A search for
‘his project’ produces 10 returns before 1611, just outside the
limit of rarity.173 However, the first occurrence returned by
EEBO is Francis Bacon’s “For, if his project had taken effect”174
in his account of the trial of the Earl of Essex from 1601. Since
this is before The Tempest, is moderately rare, and is the first
known use, then this seems noteworthy.
The following occurs in Scene 2.2.
(ix) Putting tricks upon
The Tempest has “Doe you put trickes vpon’s with Saluages” and
an EEBO search with ‘put(ting) trick(s) upon’ reveals no returns
before Bacon’s first known use “Some build rather vpon abusing
others, and as wee now say, putting trickes vpon them” from The
essaies (1612).175 See also §3.4, parallel (iii), for Love’s Labour’s
Lost.
In Scene 3.1, Francis Bacon has four uses of a rare parallel, two
before and two after the play.
(x) Quicken what’s dead
For “The Mistris which I serue, quickens what’s dead” (line 6)
there are 5 examples before 1611 returned from the search
‘quicken(s) near.4 dead/life/alive’ in the sense that ‘quickens’
171
Raphael Holinshed, The firste volume (1577), STC: 13568b, & The first
and second volumes (1587), STC: 13569.
172
Francis Bacon, Certain miscellany work (1670), Wing: B275.
173
This must be less than 9 before 1611 to appear in less than 1 in 588
documents.
174
Francis Bacon, A declaration of the practises (1601), STC: 1133.
175
Francis Bacon, The essaies (1612), STC: 1141, sig. C, which being in
digital image format was not returned by the search. There is also Thomas
Randolph, The jealous lovers (1613), STC: 20692, who would have been 5
years old in 1610.
53
signifies revival. The earliest example appears in Pilkington’s
Aggeus and Abdias (1562).176 There are at least four uses of this
figure by Francis Bacon. In his essay ‘Of Sutes’ (1597), he has
“Secrecie in Sutes is a great meanes of obtaining, for voicing
them to bee in forwardnes may discourage some kind of suters,
but doth quicken and awake others.”177 There is a speech ‘The
Article of Naturalization’ delivered on 17 February 1607
“whether it [denial of naturalisation] will not quicken and excite
all the envious and malicious humours.”178 In the posthumously
published Sylva Sylvarum written in English, Bacon writes “For
as Butterflies quicken with Heat, which were benummed with
Cold.”179 Closer, but dependent on an 1858 translation from
Latin, is “butterflies stupified and half dead with cold [… the
heated pan] quickens and gives them life” from the Novum
Organon (1620).180
(xi) Mountaineers with bags of flesh under their throats
In Scene 3.3, The Tempest has “Who would beleeue that there
were Mountayneeres, / Dew-lapt, like Buls whose throats had
hanging at ‘em / Wallets of flesh?”181 A number of searches were
constructed to locate this notion, including ‘mountains/
mountaineers near.20 throats’ and only four examples were
returned before 1627. Notable is Philippe de Mornay’s “as they
that haue swilled in the snowe waters from the mountaynes, call
those imperfect, which haue not wyde and hanging throtes like
themselues” (1597).182 Francis Bacon has “Snow-water is held
176
“it is the gospell that quickens and geues lyfe” James Pilkington, Aggeus
and Abdias (1562), STC: 19927.
177
Francis Bacon, Essayes (1597), STC: 1137.
178
Francis Bacon, The union of the two kingdoms of Scotland and England
(1670), Wing: B340, see also James Spedding, Robert Leslie Ellis, and
Douglas Denon Heath, eds, The Letters and Life of Francis Bacon, 7 vols, Vol.
3 (London: Longmans, 1861–74), pp.307, 322.
179
Francis Bacon, Sylua syluarum (1627), STC: 1168.
180
James Spedding, ed., The Philosophical Works of Francis Bacon, 5 vols,
Vol. 4 (London: Longman & Co., 1861), p.117.
181
“if they [vainglorious tragedians] but once get Boreas by the beard, and the
heauenlie bull by the deaw-lap” in Thomas Nashe, Menaphon Camillas
alarum to slumbering Euphues (1589), sig. A2r.
182
Philippe de Mornay, A notable treatise (1579), STC: 18159.
54
vnwholesome; In so much as the people who dwell at the Foot of
the Snow Mountaines, or otherwise vpon the Ascent, (especially
the Women,) by drinking of Snow-water, haue great Bagges
hanging vnder their Throats”.183
(xii) Piony in April
Scene 4.1 has “Thy bankes with pioned, and twilled brims /
Which spungie Aprill, at thy hest betrims; / To make cold
Nymphs chast crownes”. Searches for ‘pioned’, ‘piony’, and
‘april near.30 piony’, produce no results before 1611. However,
noting “Nymphs chast crownes”, there is Rembert Dodoens’s A
niewwe herball (1578) which has “his flowers and leaues are
much smaller [than the usual female piony], and the stalkes
shorter, the whiche some call Mayden or Virgin Peonie” and he
continues with “Pionie floureth at the beginning of May, and
deliuereth his seed in June.”184 Only two examples have been
located that mention it in April: The Tempest, and Bacon’s essay
‘Of Gardens’ (1625) where we find “In Aprill follow, The
Double white Violet; [list of flowers] The Tulippa; The Double
Piony.”185
(xiii) In some passion
Also in Scene 4.1, “in some passion” (line 143) appears only
once before 1611186 and 6 times before 1690. In A collection of
apophthegms (1674) dictated to his secretary (c.1624), Bacon has
“where being in some passion that he could not suddenly
pass.”187
This gives 3 rare parallels before the date of The Tempest and 10
after, a mutual borrowing that argues a contribution. The only
other authors who significantly register are Thomas Heywood
and John Marston with 3 returns each.
183
Francis Bacon, Sylua syluarum (1627), STC: 1168, p.340, not recovered in
an EEBO search due to vertical rule in “Snow|Mountaines”.
184
Rembert Dodoens, A niewwe herball (1578), STC: 6984, pp.244–5.
185
Francis Bacon, The essayes (1625), STC: 1148, p.267. This is not keyed
text so is unavailable to an EEBO search.
186
“to speake in some passion” William Barlow, The svmme and svbstance
(1604), STC: 1456.5.
187
Francis Bacon, A collection of apophthegms (1674), Wing: B278.
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Conclusion
This study lends weight to the view that certain plays in the First
Folio (1623) did not originate from Shakespeare’s hand, and that
they were instead later acquired by his company for revision,
expansion, and performance. There are other plays such as
Measure for Measure, Troilus and Cressida, Twelfth Night, and
Timon of Athens with Inns of Court connections that deserve
further investigation. However, it should be reiterated that there is
no test that can be performed that can eliminate Shakespeare from
contributing to some later version of a play. The development of
Rare Collocation Profiling (RCP) allows the conclusion to be
drawn that Francis Bacon contributed to The Comedy of Errors,
Love’s Labour’s Lost, and The Tempest. My hope is that others
will take up PhD research and press the investigation further.
56