Anne Hathaway's Cottage
Anne Hathaway’s Cottage was originally a farmhouse. Built in 1463, it had only three rooms, two of which survive—the kitchen and the parlour. The first Hathaway to live in the cottage was Anne’s grandfather John Hathaway, a tenant sheep farmer. Anne, later Shakespeare’s wife, was born in the cottage in 1556. The Hathaway family lived there for 13 generations.
When the site was a farm it was known as "Hewlands" and had more than 90 acres (36 hectares) of land attached to it. The Hathaway family were successful sheep farmers. The garden was a farmyard with some livestock and space for growing herbs and vegetables.
Anne’s father died in 1581 and her brother Bartholomew inherited the tenancy of the 90-acre farm and later bought the freehold. He then added an extension, increasing the size of the cottage and inserted new chimneys and an upper floor. This work was completed before Bartholomew’s death in 1624.
Anne Hathaway's Cottage
By the late 19th century, the family’s fortunes had declined. Some property including land and other houses were mortgaged, and eventually sold. In 1838 the cottage itself was sold, but the Hathaway family continued to live in the cottage as tenants.
One of the last Hathaways to live in the cottage was Mary Baker. When the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust purchased the cottage in 1892, Mary and her family were paid the large wage of £75 per year. Their duties were to share family stories and to care for the cottage, both of which they continue to do today. Her son William Baker occupied part of the cottage until he left in 1911.
Anne Hathaway (Folger)
Anne Hathaway (1556 – 6 August 1623) was the wife of William Shakespeare, the English poet, playwright and actor. They were married in 1582, when Hathaway was 26 years old and Shakespeare was 18. She outlived her husband by seven years.
This drawing by Sir Nathaniel Curzon, dated 1708, purportedly depicts Anne Hathaway. Samuel Schoenbaum writes that it is probably a tracing of a lost Elizabethan portrait, but there is no existing evidence that the portrait actually depicted Hathaway.
Anne Hathaway
Very little is known about her life beyond a few references in legal documents. Her personality and relationship to Shakespeare have been the subject of much speculation by many historians and writers.
Hathaway is believed to have grown up in Shottery, a village just to the west of Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. She is assumed to have grown up in the farmhouse that was the Hathaway family home, located at Shottery and now a major tourist attraction for the village. Her father, Richard Hathaway, was a yeoman farmer who died in September 1581 and left his daughter the sum of ten marks or £6 13s 4d (six pounds, thirteen shillings and fourpence) to be paid "at the day of her marriage." In her father's will, her name is listed as "Agnes," leading to some scholars believing that she should be referred to as "Agnes Hathaway."
Anne Hathaway
Hathaway married Shakespeare in November 1582 while already pregnant with the couple's first child, to whom she gave birth six months later. The age difference, added to Hathaway's antenuptial pregnancy, has been employed by some historians as evidence that it was a "shotgun wedding," forced on a somewhat reluctant Shakespeare by the Hathaway family. There is, however, no other evidence for this inference.
For a time it was believed that this view was supported by documents from the Episcopal Register at Worcester, which records in Latin the issuing of a wedding licence to "William Shakespeare" and one "Anne Whateley" of Temple Grafton. The following day, Fulk Sandells and John Richardson, friends of the Hathaway family from Stratford, signed a surety of £40 as a financial guarantee for the wedding of "William Shagspere and Anne Hathwey."
Anne Hathaway
Frank Harris, in The Man Shakespeare (1909), argued that these documents are evidence that Shakespeare was involved with two women. He had chosen to marry one, Anne Whateley, but when this became known he was immediately forced by Hathaway's family to marry their pregnant relative. Harris believed that "Shakespeare's loathing for his wife was measureless" because of his entrapment by her and that this was the spur to his decision to leave Stratford and pursue a career in the theatre.
However, according to Stanley Wells, writing in the Oxford Companion to Shakespeare, most modern scholars take the view that the name Whateley was "almost certainly the result of clerical error."
Anne Hathaway
Germaine Greer, in Shakespeare's Wife, argues that the age difference between Shakespeare and Hathaway is not evidence that he was forced to marry her, but that he was the one who pursued her. Women such as the orphaned Hathaway often stayed at home to care for younger siblings and married in their late twenties. As a husband Shakespeare offered few prospects; his family had fallen into financial ruin, while Hathaway, from a family in good standing both socially and financially, would have been considered a catch. Furthermore, a "handfast" and pregnancy were frequent precursors to legal marriage at the time.
Anne Hathaway
Examining the surviving records of Stratford-upon-Avon and nearby villages in the 1580s, Greer argues that two facts stand out quite prominently: first, that a large number of brides went to the altar already pregnant; and second, that autumn, not spring, was the most common time to get married. Shakespeare was bound to marry Hathaway, who had become pregnant by him, but there is no reason to assume that this had not always been his intention. It is nearly certain that the respective families of the bride and groom had known one another.
Anne Hathaway—Folger Library
Interview with Katherine West Scheil:
Well, there are a handful of facts that we know about Anne. So, the Hathaway family were long-standing residents of Shottery since the early 16th century. That's the village just outside of Stratford. We know that the Hathaways and the Shakespeare family were friends well into the 18th century.
Of course, we know that Anne and William were married in November of 1582. We also know that Anne was pregnant when they got married, because daughter Susanna was born in May the next year, and if you do the math pretty quickly, that's not a full nine months. We know that they had three children together, the daughter Susanna and then twins, Hamnet and Judith.
Anne Hathaway—Folger Library
Interview with Katherine West Scheil:
We know that Anne probably lived in New Place, that's Shakespeare's retirement home in Stratford, from about 1597 until the end of her life in 1623. We know about the infamous "my second best bed" bequest in Shakespeare's will. We'll probably get to that later in the conversation.
We also know that Anne is buried next to William in Holy Trinity Church in Stratford, so there's Shakespeare's monument on the wall of the left side of the church, and then Anne's grave, and then William's grave. And that's pretty much it.
Anne Hathaway—Folger Library
Interview with Katherine West Scheil:
And do we know for sure that she was older?
Yes. Well, if the epitaph on her grave is correct...
Older than Shakespeare? I mean, older than William?
Yes, yes.
Eight years older?
Yes, yes. Now, there have been a few biographers who've tried to say that maybe the engraving on the epitaph is incorrect, to try to make the age difference a little bit less, but that's pretty speculative.
Anne Hathaway documents
Apart from documents related to her marriage and the birth of her children, the only recorded reference to Hathaway in her lifetime is a curious bequest in the will of her father's shepherd, Thomas Whittington, who died in 1601.
Whittington left 40 shillings to "the poor of Stratford," adding that the money was "in the hand of Anne Shakespeare wife unto Master William Shakespeare, and is due debt unto me, being paid to mine executor by the said William Shakespeare or his assigns according to the true meaning of this my will."
Anne Hathaway documents
This passage has been interpreted in several different ways. One view is that Whittington may have lent Anne the money, presumably because she was short of cash while her husband was away. More likely, however, it may have been "uncollected wages, or savings held in safekeeping," since the will also lists debts owed to him from her brothers in the same amount.
Maggie O'Farrell on the Significance of Names in Hamnet
You won’t find the name of the famous father anywhere in my novel Hamnet. The word "Shakespeare" never appears; characters are given first names but not surnames. The playwright himself is given neither: he remains entirely nameless throughout.
I realized fairly early on in my exploratory attempts at the book that I had a tricky decision. The name "William Shakespeare" carries perhaps more heft and association than any other. Is there a person over the age of ten on the planet who hasn’t heard of him?
The only answer was to do away with it altogether, to strip him of it: he would be "the father," "he," "the son," "the Latin tutor," "the glover’s boy."
Maggie O'Farrell on the Significance of Names in Hamnet
In a way, Hamnet is at its heart about names: their divergent meanings, their connections to their owners, and the way the two can become separated. It is, as the critic and scholar Stephen Greenblatt pointed out, "the same name, entirely interchangeable in parish records of the time."
It has always seemed to me, ever since I first heard the name "Hamnet" an act of enormous significance to have called a play after your dead son. Nobody would do this lightly, to use the name of a lost child, to write it over and over again on a manuscript, to hear it spoken repeatedly, throughout weeks of rehearsals and months of production. If we consider the play through the lens of the echoed name, the shadowy and mysterious person we know as the literary behemoth William Shakespeare becomes briefly visible to us as a human being, a grieving man, a heartbroken father.
Maggie O'Farrell on the Significance of Names in Hamnet
I have, ever since hearing about the short and much-overlooked life of Hamnet Shakespeare, always viewed the play as a message from a father in one realm to a son in another.
There is of course another character in the book with a significant name. The woman we have been taught to call Ann Hathaway is, like her husband, given neither appellation in the novel. The narrative she has been yoked to for almost half a century—that of the illiterate peasant who lured a boy-genius into the marriage he regretted—distressed and angered me. I wanted, more than anything, with Hamnet’s mother, to ask readers to forget everything they think they know about her, and to open themselves up to a new interpretation.
Maggie O'Farrell on the Significance of Names in Hamnet
In the course of my research, I read her father’s will. Richard Hathaway, the sheep-farming yeoman, died a year before she married William, and he left her a very generous dowry. In the wording of the will, he refers to her as "my daughter Agnes." It seems to exemplify history and scholarship’s treatment of her, that we may have been calling her by the wrong name for all this time.
So I decided to give this name back to her: in Hamnet, she is Agnes, all the way through.
Shakespeare's Birthplace
The house itself is relatively simple, but for the late 16th century it would have been considered quite a substantial dwelling. The house was originally divided in two parts to allow Shakespeare's father to carry out his business from the same premises.
The building is not outstanding architecturally, and typical of the times was constructed in wattle and daub around a wooden frame. Local oak from the Forest of Arden and blue-grey stone from Wilmcote were used in its construction, while the large fireplaces were made from an unusual combination of early brick and stone, and the ground-floor level has stone-flagged floors.
Shakespeare Birthplace Trust (SBT)
The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust (SBT) is an independent registered educational charity based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England, that came into existence in 1847 following the purchase of William Shakespeare's birthplace for preservation as a national memorial.
It can also lay claim to be the oldest conservation society in Britain. Receiving no government funding or public subsidies, it is totally dependent upon the public for support, and relies on donations and the income generated from visitors.
Shakespeare's Will
Folger Library--Shakespeare Documented
Shakespeare's last will and testament: made 25 March 1616, proved 22 June 1616.
From the Folger Library: Shakespeare Documented. Contributed by The National Archives (UK)
Primary sources: Visit Shakespeare Documented to see primary-source materials documenting Shakespeare's life. This online resource of items from the Folger and other institutions brings together all known manuscript and print references to Shakespeare and his works, as well as additional references to his family, in his lifetime and shortly thereafter.
https://shakespearedocumented.folger.edu/resource/document/william-shakespeares-last-will-and-testament-original-copy-including-three
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
Shakespeare’s last will and testament provides one of the richest surviving documents for understanding his familial and professional networks. The will names many of the important people in his life, including family, friends, colleagues, and neighbors, as well as describing specific pieces of personal property.
The handwriting does not match that of Shakespeare’s lawyer, Francis Collins, suggesting that the will was drawn up by a clerk. The document is written on three sheets of paper, with William Shakespeare’s signature appended to each sheet, as prescribed in contemporary manuals.
Most individuals in early modern England did not begin writing a will until death was imminent. Many scholars believe that when Shakespeare sent for Francis Collins (who had also drawn up the deeds of bargain and sale for the Blackfriars gatehouse) to draft his will, he was almost certainly ill, although he did not die for another several months. The signatures are written in shaky strokes of the pen, suggestive of someone who had trouble holding a writing implement due to illness.
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
Scholars have suggested that the will was drafted in January, then revised and partially redrafted on March 25 to reflect the change in the marital status of his daughter Judith.
She married Thomas Quiney just over a month earlier, on February 10. At the top of the first leaf January is crossed out and replaced with March. On the same leaf, a reference to Shakespeare's son-in-law is altered to his daughter, Judith.
On the second leaf a section making provisions for Judith "vntill her marriage" is deleted. Thus it is thought that the first leaf was entirely rewritten and then revised, and that the second and third leaves were merely revised.
The preamble of the will and the itemization of bequests are very formulaic. Shakespeare left the bulk of his property to his two daughters: Susanna Hall, his first child, and Judith Quiney.
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
He left money and clothes to his sister Joan Hart and her three sons, and plate to his grand-daughter Elizabeth Hall, whom he refers to as his niece. The will also makes bequests of his various properties: New Place; the house on Henley Street in which he was born; the tithes purchased in 1605; the Combe property; the cottage near New Place; and the Blackfriars gatehouse in London. His monetary bequests add up to roughly £350.
The only specific objects he bequeaths are a large silver gilt bowl to his daughter Judith; a sword to Thomas Combe, the nephew of his friend John; his clothing to his sister Joan; and his second best bed to his wife.
Shakespeare left a gift of £10 to the poor of Stratford, as well as bequests to his overseer, Thomas Russell, and his lawyer, Francis Collins.
He left 26 shillings and 8 pence each to his theatrical fellows Richard Burbage, John Heminges, and Henry Condell, as well as to Hamnet Sadler, William Reynolds, and Anthony and John Nash, to buy mourning rings.
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
Scholars have tended to focus on five main issues in the will. It has often been noted that Shakespeare's only mention of his wife Anne Hathaway reads as an afterthought: an interlineal insertion on the last leaf, where he bequeaths her the "second best bed with the furniture" (valance, hangings, linen, etc.)
While this has been read as a slight to Anne, the language was not entirely unusual. As Lena Cowen Orlin demonstrates in forthcoming work, "best," "second-best," and "worst" were all common descriptors in contemporary wills, used to identify objects rather than to signify sentiment.
The second best bed bequest should not be seen as a window into William and Anne’s marriage, but as a way to distinguish one bed from another so that his wife received the right bed. (On the other hand, it is noteworthy if not downright odd that Shakespeare’s wife is mentioned nowhere else in his will than in this interlineation.)
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
Shakespeare’s bequest of all of his clothing to his sister Joan has been noted as unusual, given that they were men's clothing. The clothing was probably given to her to sell, or intended for her husband, William Hart. As matters passed, however, William Hart died a week before Shakespeare.
The wording of his revised bequest to Judith is thought to have protected her as a prospective widow to account for her new marital status. However, Shakespeare also provides his new son-in-law with an incentive--if Quiney accumulated property, Shakespeare would match it. Shakespeare may have been wary of Quiney, who, on the day following the will's date, was fined five shillings by the ecclesiastical court in Stratford-upon-Avon for fornication.
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
Another interlinear insertion, Shakespeare’s bequest to Richard Burbage, John Heminges, and Henry Condell, three of the King’s Men, confirms his association with members of his playing company to the last days of his life. The fact that he calls them “my ffellowes” may suggest that he still considered himself a King’s Man.
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
Shakespeare’s three signatures are all slightly different from one another. Further, the signature on the first leaf is almost entirely worn away. However, if we assume that Shakespeare was ill at the time of signing, and that he was being asked to sign his name at the very bottom of two sheets of paper and halfway down another sheet – not to mention that, if bedridden, he would be writing at an awkward angle from an awkward position – the fact that the signatures are shaky and variously formed is not remarkable. His other three surviving signatures show similar slight inconsistencies, suggesting that (like some other literate men) Shakespeare was given to variation rather than mechanical repetition when signing his name.
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
The will is attested at the end by Shakespeare’s lawyer, Francis Collins, as well as four friends: Julius Shawe, John Robinson, Hamnet Sadler, and Robert Whattcote. The executors were his daughter, Susanna Hall, and her husband, John Hall. The overseers were Francis Collins and Thomas Russell (the stepfather of Leonard Digges).
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
The original will, the entry of probate, and the registered copy survive. The probate clause in Latin at the end of the third leaf indicates that John Hall, Shakespeare's son-in-law and co-executor, made an oath to administer the estate on behalf of himself and his wife Susanna, on June 22.
Other associated documents, such as an inventory of his goods, do not survive and were presumably lost with other Prerogative Court inventories for this date in the Great Fire of London in 1666. Another copy of the will survives at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.
The pin-hole marks at the top of each leaf of the will are where the three sheets were formerly attached by pins, a narrow strip of parchment, or string.
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
The will has undergone a series of conservation treatments. According to a 1913 report of the Royal Commission on Public Records, by the 1850s the document had suffered handling damage and was repaired with transparent paper, possibly pelure d’oignon. Then each leaf was set between two sheets of glass in separate locked oaken frames, which were stored in a locked oaken box in the strong room at Somerset House. At the time of the 1913 report, visitors were permitted to view Shakespeare's will and Lord Nelson's will in the strong room for "the usual charge of one shilling."
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
At some point after 1913, the will was repaired again and lined with silk. From 1996-99, the silk lining and old repairs were removed, and small tears on the edges were fixed. All three leaves were lined with Greenwich repair paper and wheat starch adhesive. They were encapsulated and sewn into a fully bound, reverse calf, parchment binding. The binding was stored in a green buckram slipcase with gold tooling. In 1999, the document, binding, and slipcase were stored in a grey folding boxboard box. In 2015-16, it has undergone further conservation: the lining has been removed and multi-spectral imaging has taken place.
Shakespeare's Will (Folger)
The original copy of the will was first noted by George Vertue in 1737 (Schoenbaum, p. 242, which cites British Library, MS Portland Loan 29/246, p. 19) and first printed in the third edition of Lewis Theobald's Works of Shakespeare (1752).
It was kept in the Prerogative Office, first at Doctors' Commons, and then, when the building was torn down in 1861, at the new Prerogative Office at Somerset House, until being transferred in 1962 to the Public Records Office on Chancery Lane.
Since 2003 it has been maintained by the successor to the Public Records Office, The National Archives in Kew.
Shakespeare's will
In his will Shakespeare famously made only one bequest to his wife, his "second-best bed with the furniture." There is no reference to the "best" bed, which would have been included in the main bequest to Susanna.
This bequest to Anne has often been interpreted as a slight, implying that Anne was in some sense only the "second best" person in his intimate life.
A few explanations have been offered: first, it has been claimed that, according to law, Hathaway was entitled to receive one third of her husband's estate, regardless of his will, though this has been disputed.
It has been speculated that Hathaway was to be supported by her children.
Shakespeare's will
Germaine Greer suggests that the bequests were the result of agreements made at the time of Susanna's marriage to Dr Hall: that she (and thus her husband) inherited the bulk of Shakespeare's estate. Shakespeare had business ventures with Dr Hall, and consequently appointed John and Susanna as executors of his will. Dr Hall and Susanna inherited and moved into New Place after Shakespeare's death.
This would also explain other examples of Shakespeare's will being apparently ungenerous, as in its treatment of his younger daughter Judith.
Shakespeare's will
There is indication that Hathaway may have been financially secure in her own right. The National Archives states that "beds and other pieces of household furniture were often the sole bequest to a wife" and that, customarily, the children would receive the best items and the widow the second-best.
In Shakespeare's time, the beds of prosperous citizens were expensive affairs, sometimes equivalent in value to a small house. The bequest was thus not as minor as it might seem in modern times.
In Elizabethan custom, the best bed in the house was reserved for guests. If so, then the bed that Shakespeare bequeathed to Anne could have been their marital bed, and thus not intended to insult her.
Shakespeare's will
It has sometimes been inferred that Shakespeare came to dislike his wife, but there is no existing documentation or correspondence to support this supposition.
For most of their married life, he lived in London, writing and performing his plays, while she remained in Stratford. However, according to John Aubrey, he returned to Stratford for a period every year.
When he retired from the theatre in 1613, he chose to live in Stratford with his wife, rather than in London.
Anne Hathaway—burial
A tradition recorded in 1693 is that Hathaway "greatly desired" to be buried with her husband. In fact she was interred in a separate grave next to him in the Church of the Holy Trinity, Stratford-upon-Avon. The inscription states,
"Here lyeth the body of Anne wife of William Shakespeare who departed this life the 6th day of August 1623 being of the age of 67 years."
A Latin inscription followed which translates as
"Breasts, O mother, milk and life thou didst give. Woe is me—for how great a boon shall I give stones? How much rather would I pray that the good angel should move the stone so that, like Christ's body, thine image might come forth! But my prayers are unavailing. Come quickly, Christ, that my mother, though shut within this tomb may rise again and reach the stars."
The inscription is believed to have been written by John Hall on behalf of his wife Susanna, Anne's daughter.
New Place—Stratford—Shakespeare's Retirement Home
New Place was Shakespeare's final residence in Stratford; he died there in 1616. Though the house no longer exists, the site is owned by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, which maintains it as a specially-designed garden for tourists.
The house stood on the corner of Chapel Street and Chapel Lane, and was apparently the second largest dwelling in the town. New Place was built atop the site of a former 13th-century timber building in 1483 by Sir Hugh Clopton, a wealthy London mercer and Lord Mayor.
Built of timber and brick (then an innovation in Stratford) it had ten fireplaces, five handsome gables, and grounds large enough to incorporate two barns and an orchard.
New Place—Stratford—Shakespeare's Retirement Home
The previous owner, William Underhill, left New Place to his son who in 1597 sold it to Shakespeare for £60. After the father's death, it emerged that he had been poisoned by his eldest son and heir.
According to some sources, the son died in May 1598 while still a minor and before the fact that he had murdered his father was discovered. According to other sources, however, the son was hanged in 1599 for his father's murder and attainted for felony, whereby his property, including New Place, was forfeit to the crown.
In 1602 the Court of Exchequer appointed a commission to "obtain an account of the possessions of Fulke Underhill of Fillongley, county Warwick, felon, who had taken the life of his father, William Underhill, by poison."
When his younger brother came of age in 1602, his father's former properties were regranted to him, and he and Shakespeare negotiated a confirmation of the sale.
New Place
At Shakespeare's death in 1616, the house passed to his daughter Susanna Hall, and then his granddaughter, Elizabeth Hall, who had recently remarried after the death of her first husband, Thomas Nash, who had owned the house next door.
The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust acquired New Place and Nash's House in 1876. Today the site of New Place is accessible through a museum that resides in Nash's House, the house next door. The site received 109,452 visitors during 2018.
Shakespeare's life (Folger Library)
Since William Shakespeare lived more than 400 years ago, and many records from that time are lost or never existed in the first place, we don't know everything about his life. For example, we know that he was baptized in Stratford-upon-Avon, 100 miles northwest of London, on April 26, 1564. But we don't know his exact birthdate, which must have been a few days earlier.
We do know that Shakespeare's life revolved around two locations: Stratford and London. He grew up, had a family, and bought property in Stratford, but he worked in London, the center of English theater. As an actor, a playwright, and a partner in a leading acting company, he became both prosperous and well-known. Even without knowing everything about his life, fans of Shakespeare have imagined and reimagined him according to their own tastes.
Shakespeare—Birth and childhood (Folger)
William Shakespeare was probably born on about April 23, 1564, the date that is traditionally given for his birth. He was John and Mary Shakespeare's oldest surviving child; their first two children, both girls, did not live beyond infancy. Growing up as the big brother of the family, William had three younger brothers, Gilbert, Richard, and Edmund, and two younger sisters: Anne, who died at seven, and Joan.
Their father, John Shakespeare, was a leatherworker who specialized in the soft white leather used for gloves and similar items. A prosperous businessman, he married Mary Arden, of the prominent Arden family. John rose through local offices in Stratford, becoming an alderman and eventually, when William was five, the town bailiff—much like a mayor. Not long after that, however, John Shakespeare stepped back from public life; we don't know why.
Shakespeare—Birth and childhood (Folger)
Shakespeare, as the son of a leading Stratford citizen, almost certainly attended Stratford's grammar school. Like all such schools, its curriculum consisted of an intense emphasis on the Latin classics, including memorization, writing, and acting classic Latin plays. Shakespeare most likely attended until about age 15.
Shakespeare—marriage and children (Folger)
A few years after he left school, in late 1582, Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway. She was already expecting their first-born child, Susanna, which was a fairly common situation at the time. When they married, Anne was 26 and William was 18. Anne grew up just outside Stratford in the village of Shottery. After marrying, she spent the rest of her life in Stratford.
In early 1585, the couple had twins, Judith and Hamnet, completing the family. In the years ahead, Anne and the children lived in Stratford while Shakespeare worked in London, although we don't know when he moved there.
Some later observers have suggested that this separation, and the couple's relatively few children, were signs of a strained marriage, but we do not know that, either. Someone pursuing a theater career had no choice but to work in London, and many branches of the Shakespeares had small families.
Shakespeare—marriage and children
Shakespeare's only son, Hamnet, died in 1596 at the age of 11. His older daughter Susanna later married a well-to-do Stratford doctor, John Hall. Their daughter Elizabeth, Shakespeare's first grandchild, was born in 1608.
In 1616, just months before his death, Shakespeare's daughter Judith married Thomas Quiney, a Stratford vintner. The family subsequently died out, leaving no direct descendants of Shakespeare.
Shakespeare—London theater (Folger)
For several years after Judith and Hamnet's arrival in 1585, nothing is known for certain of Shakespeare's activities: how he earned a living, when he moved from Stratford, or how he got his start in the theater.
Following this gap in the record, the first definite mention of Shakespeare is in 1592 as an established London actor and playwright, mocked by a contemporary as a "Shake-scene."
The same writer alludes to one of Shakespeare's earliest history plays, Henry VI, Part 3, which must already have been performed. The next year, in 1593, Shakespeare published a long poem, "Venus and Adonis."
Shakespeare—London theater (Folger)
The first quarto editions of his early plays appeared in 1594. For more than two decades, Shakespeare had multiple roles in the London theater as an actor, playwright, and, in time, a business partner in a major acting company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men (renamed the King's Men in 1603).
Over the years, he became steadily more famous in the London theater world; his name, which was not even listed on the first quartos of his plays, became a regular feature—clearly a selling point—on later title pages
Shakespeare—final years (Folger)
Shakespeare prospered financially from his partnership in the Lord Chamberlain's Men (later the King's Men), as well as from his writing and acting. He invested much of his wealth in real-estate purchases in Stratford and bought the second-largest house in town, New Place, in 1597.
Among the last plays that Shakespeare worked on was The Two Noble Kinsmen, which he wrote with a frequent collaborator, John Fletcher, most likely in 1613. He died on April 23, 1616—the traditional date of his birthday, though his precise birthdate is unknown.
We also do not know the cause of his death. His brother-in-law had died a week earlier, which could imply infectious disease, but Shakespeare's health may have had a longer decline
Shakespeare—final years (Folger)
The memorial bust of Shakespeare at Holy Trinity Church in Stratford is considered one of two authentic likenesses, because it was approved by people who knew him. (The bust in the Folger's Paster Reading Room is a copy of this statue.)
The other such likeness is the engraving by Martin Droeshout in the 1623 First Folio edition of Shakespeare's plays, produced seven years after his death by his friends and colleagues from the King's Men.
The Droeshout portrait of William Shakespeare as it appears on the title page of the first folio. This is the final, or second state, of the engraving.
Folger Library
The Folger Shakespeare Library, established on Capitol Hill in 1932 as a gift to the American people, is home to the world’s largest collection of First Folios, the book that gave us Shakespeare. It has 82 copies of the First Folio, all of which were collected by the library’s founders, Henry and Emily Folger.
The First Folio of Shakespeare, published in 1623, is an extraordinary book. About half of Shakespeare's plays had never previously appeared in print, including As You Like It, Julius Caesar, Macbeth, The Tempest, and many more. Without the First Folio, 18 plays might have been lost forever.
Today, there are 235 recorded First Folios—that is, until the next one is discovered.
https://www.folger.edu/shakespeare/first-folio/faq
https://www.folger.edu/shakespeare/first-folio/printing
Black death in England
The Black Death was a bubonic plague pandemic, which reached England in June 1348. It was the first and most severe manifestation of the second pandemic, caused by yersinia pestis bacteria. The term Black Death was not used until the late 17th century.
Originating in Asia, it spread west along the trade routes across Europe and arrived on the British Isles from the English province of Gascony. The plague was spread by flea-infected rats, as well as individuals who had been infected on the continent. Rats were the reservoir hosts of the y. pestis bacteria and the Oriental rat flea was the primary vector.
The first-known case in England was a seaman who arrived at Weymouth, Dorset, from Gascony in June 1348. By autumn, the plague had reached London, and by summer 1349 it covered the entire country, before dying down by December.
Black death in England
Low estimates of mortality in the early twentieth century have been revised upwards due to re-examination of data and new information, and a figure of 40–60 percent of the population is widely accepted.
In 1361–62 the plague returned to England, this time causing the death of around 20 per cent of the population. After this the plague continued to return intermittently throughout the 14th and 15th centuries, in local or national outbreaks. From this point on its effect became less severe, and one of the last outbreaks of the plague in England was the Great Plague of London in 1665–1666.
It is impossible to establish with any certainty the exact number of inhabitants in England at the eve of the Black Death, and estimates range from 3 to 7 million. The number is probably in the higher end, and an estimate of around 6 million inhabitants seems likely.
Black death in England
England was still a predominantly rural and agrarian society; close to 90 per cent of the population lived in the countryside. Of the major cities, London was in a class of its own, with perhaps as many as 70,000 inhabitants.
The term "Black Death"—which refers to the first and most serious outbreak of the second pandemic—was not used by contemporaries, who preferred such names as the "Great Pestilence" or the "Great Mortality."
Black death in England
It was not until the 17th century that the term under which we know the outbreak today became common. It is generally agreed today that the disease in question was plague, caused by yersinia pestis bacteria. These bacteria are carried by fleas, which can be transferred to humans through contact with rats. Flea bites carry the disease into the lymphatic system, through which it makes its way to the lymph nodes. Here the bacteria multiply and form swellings called buboes, from which the term bubonic plague is derived.
After three or four days the bacteria enter the bloodstream, and infect organs such as the spleen and the lungs. The patient will then normally die after a few days.
Black death in England
A different strain of the disease is pneumonic plague, where the bacteria become airborne and enter directly into the patient's lungs. This strain is far more virulent, as it spreads directly from person to person. These types of infection probably both played a significant part in the Black Death, while a third strain was more rare. This is the septicaemic plague, where the flea bite carries the bacteria directly into the blood stream, and death occurs very rapidly.
A study reported in 2011 of skeletons exhumed from the Black Death cemetery in East Smithfield, London, found yersinia pestis DNA. An archaeological dig in the vicinity of Thornton Abbey in Lincolnshire, reported in The Guardian, November 2016, not only confirms evidence of the Y. pestis DNA in the human remains exhumed there but also dates the remains to mid-1349.
Black death in England
Modern medical knowledge suggests that because it was a new strain, the human immune system would have had little or no defence against it, helping to explain the plague's virulence and high death rates.
The Black Death seems to have originated in Central Asia, where the Y. pestis bacterium is endemic in the rodent population. It is unknown exactly what caused the outbreak, but a series of natural occurrences likely brought humans into contact with the infected rodents.
Conditions in London were ideal for the plague: the streets were narrow and flowing with sewage, and houses were overcrowded and poorly ventilated. By March 1349 the disease was spreading haphazardly across all of southern England.
Black death in England
Pestilence is less virulent during the winter months, and spreads less rapidly. The Black Death in England had survived the winter of 1348–49, but during the following winter it gave in, and by December 1349 conditions were returning to relative normality. It had taken the disease approximately 500 days to traverse the entire country.
Various methods were used including sweating, bloodletting, forced vomiting and urinating to treat patients infected with the plague. Several symptoms of the illness included blotches, hardening of the glands under the groin and underarms, and dementia.
Black death in England
Although historical records for England were more extensive than those of any other European country, it is still extremely difficult to establish the death toll with any degree of certainty. Difficulties involve uncertainty about the size of the total population, but also issues regarding the proportion of the population that died from the plague. Contemporary accounts are often grossly inflated, stating numbers as high as 90 per cent. Modern historians give estimates of death rates ranging from around 25 per cent to more than 60 per cent of the total population.
Black death in England
It is conspicuous how well the English government handled the crisis of the mid-fourteenth century, without descending into chaos and total collapse. To a large extent this was the accomplishment of administrators such as Treasurer William de Shareshull and Chief Justice William Edington, whose highly competent leadership guided the governance of the nation through the crisis..
Black death in England
The Black Death also affected arts and culture significantly. It was inevitable that a catastrophe of such proportions would affect some of the greater building projects, as the amount of available labour fell sharply. The building of the cathedrals of Ely and Exeter was temporarily halted in the years immediately following the first outbreak of the plague. The shortage of labour also helped advance the transition from the Decorated style of building to the less elaborate Perpendicular style.
The Black Death may also have promoted the use of vernacular English, as the number of teachers proficient in French dwindled, contributing to the late-14th-century flowering of English literature, represented by writers such as Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower.
In his diaries, Samuel Pepys gave a vivid description of the Great Plague of London; one of the last outbreaks of the second pandemic. The Black Death was the first occurrence of the second pandemic, which continued to strike England and the rest of Europe more or less regularly until the 18th century.
Black death in England
Over the following decades the plague would return—on a national or a regional level—at intervals of five to 12 years, with gradually dwindling death tolls. Then, in the decades from 1430 to 1480, the disease returned in force.
An outbreak in 1471 took as much as 10–15 per cent of the population, while the death rate of the plague of 1479–80 could have been as high as 20 per cent.
From that point outbreaks became fewer and more manageable, due largely to conscious efforts by central and local governments—from the late 15th century onward—to curtail the disease. This included quarantines on people and goods coming from infected places, bans on public gatherings (such as fairs), enforced household quarantine for the infected (known as 'locking up') and quarantines on ships and crews coming from ports where Plague outbreaks had occurred.
Black death in England
From the early seventeenth century there was also greater use of quarantine facilities, called pesthouses, in preference to household quarantine. Some of these, such as the Forlorn Hope Pesthouse established by Bristol in 1665–6, appear to have been proper quarantine hospitals, staffed by doctors. The establishment of such a hospital may help to explain why the death rate in Bristol in the 1665–66 outbreak was "only" c.0.6 percent. This was much lower than the mortality rate of 10–20 percent witnessed in Bristol's Plague epidemics of 1565, 1575, 1603–04 and 1645.
The Great Plague of 1665–66 was the last major outbreak in England. It is best known for the famous Great Plague of London, which killed 100,000 people (20 per cent of the population) in the capital.
Next Week
Hamnet, Maggie O'Farrell