That Shakespeare Life

When William Shakespeare was just 24 years old, a man named Timothy Bright would introduce a system of writing called charactery to England, setting off a wildfire of shorthand manuals, methods, and training where people flocked to learn this new, symbol based, system of writing that allowed the spoken word to be captured verbatim in real time. Notes and letters from philosophers and travellers in the late 16th and early 17th centuries remark that the fascination and mastery of shorthand was a skill seen internationally as uniquely English. The skill was so popular in England that it would even travel across the Atlantic with the British Colonists and find a place in the foundation of the New World, with the system of tachygraphy (created in 1626) being used by American President Thomas Jefferson in the 18th century. While many of the surviving copies of shorthand we have today exist on ink and paper, we have extant records that indicate shorthand was also useful on wax tablets, writing tables, and even with

  Leicester’s Men are a group of actors who formed what many consider to be the founding company of English Renaissance Theater. Established with the sponsorship of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, the playing company travelled around England and abroad performing plays with the legal protection of being in the Earls’ service. The company was unique for its’ time in that they separated themselves from the traditional income model of playing companies, choosing instead to operate as an independent entity where they could generate their own income instead of getting paid by their sponsor. By 1574, five men including James Burbage, John Perkin, John Laneham, William Johnson, and Robert Wilson would be listed on a royal patent for Leicester’s Men, making their playing company the first to receive an official royal patent and, in so doing, giving these men the freedom to create what we know today as English Renaissance Theater. Playing companies, including Shakespeare’s company the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, would

In 1603, as King James VI of Scotland became King James I of England following the death of Elizabeth I, one of the people James’ tapped to walk in his coronation parade was William Shakespeare, along with the entire Lord Chamberlain’s Men company who received the official patronage of James I to become the King’s Men. The new title and status brought big changes to the performance of plays, the subject matter selected for play writing, and gave William Shakespeare the position in society he had long sought after. Our guest this week, Lucy Munro, is here to share her research into the King’s Men and what the shift from Elizabethan into Jacobean England brought about for Shakespeare. Get bonus episodes on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The wig was first introduced to England around 1572, when Shakespeare was only 8 years old. The fashion would catch on very quickly in England, promoted by the Queen herself, who was known for wearing wigs in her older years, and defined by her naturally curly red hair in her youth. There are over 100 references to “hair” across Shakespeare’s works, many of them calling attention to the color of the hair, and assigning value not only to particular colors, but also reflecting the importance of keeping one’s hair neatly tended. In Henry V, the Duke of Burgundy says that prisoners are notable for being “overgrown with hair” and in Henry VI Part II, the Earl of Warwick defines a “ghastly” man as being recognizable by how his “well proportioned beard [is] made rough and rugged.” Later in that same play, Winchester, calls attention to the cultural importance of a well kept grooming regime when he associates a demonstrative problem with wild hair. He says, “Comb down his hair; look, look! it stands upright.” These a

Bridewell Palace was built in the early 16th century as a residence for King Henry VIII. The palace was a unique structure because it deviated from the architectural designs of the time period by not having a great hall and featuring an elaborate staircase. It was also constructed around a large inner courtyard. Under Edward VI in the 1550s, Bridewell Palace was given to the City of London as a home for the city’s homeless children and a place of punishment for “disorderly women.” It was run in conjunction with Bedlam Hospital throughout Shakespeare’s lifetime and formed the blueprint for later large prisons, including the Clirkenwell Bridwell prison opened as a correctional institute for prostitutes and vagrants in 1615 and Tothill Fields Bridewell prison that was opened in 1618 in Westminster. The building itself was mostly destroyed by the Great Fire of London in 1666, but the reputation of Bridwell would far outlast the original structure, with the term “bridewell” continuing in use around the world into

Born in Portugal, Dr. Roderigo Lopez fled to England in the 16th century as a Jewish refugee. His family was Jewish, forced to convert to Catholicism, and when he arrived in England he joined the Church of England to become Protestant while still practicing Jewish rituals at home. Serving at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital in 1576, Lopez rose through the ranks as a doctor until he was the Chief Physician there. He served as doctor to some of England’s most notable dignitaries including Sir Francis Walsingham, Robert Dudley, the Earl of Leicester, Robert Devereaux, the Earl of Essex, and even Queen Elizabeth herself. These highly prestigious professional connections were  a boon for Dr. Lopez’ medical career, but the danger of these connections led to Dr. Lopez being entangled with spies and ultimately to his execution on grounds of plotting an assasination against Queen Elizabeth. The scandal of Dr. Lopez’ trial in 1594 happened while Shakespeare was in London, and the cultural anti-semitism of 16th century Englan

In Henry VI Part I, William Shakespeare presents one of history’s most famous characters, a woman, named Joan La Pucelle, known today as Joan of Arc. For the French, she was a truly holy woman, chaste, and pure. She was also a brilliant military strategist and a force to be reckoned with in battle. Nicknamed “the Maid of Orleans,” the real Joan of Arc was a heroine for France during the Hundred Years’ War and would be canonized as a saint. The depiction of Joan La Pucelle in Shakespeare’s play is an intriguing investigation because as Shakespeare was depicting this famous heroine on the 16th century stage, the Hundred Years’ War would have been recent history for the audience, and at the time it was presented, England was not friends with France. In the play, Shakespeare leaves us a pile of cultural realities to unpack with his depiction of Joan La Pucelle, with not only her overt military leadership in a society where women were not called upon to lead armies, but she is also involved in the occult, consulti

William Braford is most well known today as the man who served as the second governor of Plymouth Colony, leaving Europe for Virginia in 1620 aboard the Mayflower. Prior to this infamous voyage, Bradford was an Englishman whose life overlapped that of William Shakespeare, having been born in Yorkshire, England, when Shakespeare was 26 years old. There’s no evidence to suggest Shakespeare knew Bradford personally, but the life of William Bradford shines a light on a huge aspect of Shakespeare’s life: the presence and subsequent response to religious extremism in England. Queen Elizabeth restored Protestantism to England in 1559, along with requirements that everyone attend Protestant Church services. Many religious groups refused, moving to underground church services that were decidedly illegal in England. One of the people who attended such services was a young William Bradford. Relations with religious groups in England remained a tense tightwire act across two monarchs of Shakespeare’s life, a situation we

Portraits of ladies and gentlemen from the late 16th century show men and women adorned in all manner of finery, including everything from flowing gowns, to magnificent swords, and even those infamous Tudor ruff collars,but what exactly did it take to get into all those fine outfits? When Shakespeare surveyed his closet in the morning before he got dressed for the day, were there certain items he needed like an undershirt or socks? This week, we are diving into the world of early modern clothing to look at what Shakespeare, his contemporaries, and his female counterparts would have worn under their clothes. Our guest this week is Tudor clothier and historical costumer, Bess Chilvers, who joins us to answer questions (some of which have been submitted by our members here at That Shakespeare Life), about what kind of underwear there would have been for people in turn of the 17th century England, including underwear, support garments, apparati needed for wigs, socks, and more.  Get bonus episodes on Patreon Host

When we study court in Shakespeare history the phrase “appeared at court” or “performed at court” frequently gets used to describe what Shakespeare was doing at various points of his life. However, the overlap between “court” legally (as in, where you go for a legal trial) and the social phenomenon of Renaissance England where the monarch gathered their “court” together can make it hard to know what it means to go to court. This week we’ve set out to rectify this gap in knowledge with our guest, Natalie Mears, who is here to share her research into Courts, Courtiers, and Culture in Tudor England, an article which she published in The Historical Journal back in 2003. In that paper, Natalie cites a play by Thomas Norton and Thomas Sackville called Gorboduc that was performed in 1561-1562 at court, and that play is an example of how performances were used to not only comment on events of the day by the performers (similar to what you might think of today as an editorial cartoon) but in the case of Gorboduc, the

When William Shakespeare first arrived in London sometime in the 1580s, James Burbage was already making waves in the early modern performance industry by establishing The Theater, a playhouse which the Burbages owned. After a fight with the owner of the land on which The Theater was built, the building itself would be dismantled by the Burbages and William Shakespeare who helped the Burbages clandestinely move the building timber by timber across the Thames to create the theater known as The Globe. Today, we refer to The Globe, as well as the first indoor playhouse, the Blackfriars, as Shakespeare’s theaters. Of course, the bard was intimately involved and arguably held a position of leadership in these establishments but defining terms from his lifetime like shareholder, leaseholder, and housekeeper, all help us take a closer look at who exactly owned the theater and how that was different from being an owner in a playing company. Our guest this week, Lucy Munro, is the author of the article for King’s Coll

In the 1950s when Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet was adapted into West Side Story, popular culture in the US resonated with the gang culture and street fighting depicted on stage because the brass knuckled “rumbles” taking place on streets like those in New York City were current events of the day. Turns out, historically, these gang fights were a real issue for Shakespeare’s lifetime as well, and scenes like Mercutio and Romeo fighting in the streets of Verona, the mob that goes after Cinna the Poet in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, and the tavern brawls that break out in several scenes across Shakespeare’s works would have been viewed by Shakespeare’s 16th century audience as a reflection of their current events and realities of life on the streets of Elizabethan London. Here this week to help us explore the 16th century history, current events, street fights and even gangs that were present during Shakespeare’s lifetime as he wrote about the Capulets and Montagues being “warring families” duking it out in th

It seems even William Shakespeare had household floors to keep clean. While it likely wouldn’t have been the actual William doing the majority of the sweeping in his household, one item the bard seems to have been familiar with through his nineteen uses of the word “sweep” and one use of the word “besom” across his works is the household broom used for sweeping floors. The bard uses “broom” at least 3 times in his plays, mentioning once a broom-staff, and in The Tempest, Shakespeare calls attention to a “broom-grove” suggesting there was a particular plant or tree used for growing the material to make brooms in the 16th century. Here today to help us explore the people who made brooms, exactly who was doing the sweeping in Shakespeare’s lifetime, as well as the folklore surrounding the broom also called broom-besom, is our guest and author of “Why does Puck Sweep?” the article examining the household cleaning scene of one of Shakespeare’s most famous characters in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Please welcome our

In Cymbeline, Act I Scene 1 Posthumus Leonatus says “I’ll drink the words you send though ink be made of gall” and in Twelfth Night Sir Toby Belch calls attention to a particular kind of ink when he says “Let there be gall enough in thy ink, though thou write with a goose-pen…” in Act III Scene 2. Both of these scenes from Shakespeare’s plays are referencing the most popular kind of ink used in Shakespeare’s lifetime and that is iron gall ink. The phrase iron gall ink was a phrase used to describe common, or standard, ink and as Sir Toby Belch illuminates with his lines, the ink was used to dip your goose-pen into to write letters or any kind of correspondence on paper you wanted to write down. The ink was made from a fermentation of oak galls which is partially where the ink gets it’s name, the other part--the iron--comes from the iron salt that is added during the fermentation process to create iron gall ink. Here today to share with us the history of iron gall ink and explain exactly how the ink of Shakesp

Shakespeare mentions the word “crocodile” five times in his plays, but crocodiles not being native to England must have been introduced to the bard from outside his natural habitat there in London. The crocodile itself was well known in English literature, having been written about in association with Egypt and Africa by writers like Pliny the Elder centuries prior to Shakespeare. This particular beast was brought back to the forefront of popular imagination during Shakespeare’s lifetime, however, when explorers to the New World came home with stories of a new creature similar to the crocodile and unique to North America named the alligator. The alligator is mentioned only once in Shakespeare’s works in Act V Scene 1 of Romeo and Juliet where it is included on a list of items on display in an apothecary shop. That reference is particularly interesting when you consider that a display of natural specimens in an apothecary shop is very likely one of the real places Shakespeare himself might have encountered one

In Elizabethan England, the basilisk was a feared and hateful creature, capable of killing someone with just a glance. Of the 8 references to basilisks in Shakespeare’s plays, half of these invoke the reputation of being able to kill with a look. European bestiaries record the basilisk as a legendary serpent ruling as King of the reptiles and while the folklore far outpaces the science, recent historical studies of animals from Elizabethan England reveal that the basilisk may have been a term applied to a real snake that made its home across Northern Europe when Shakespeare was writing about basilisks in his plays. Our guest this week is author of The Grass Snake and the Basilisk, a research project that takes a historical perspective on how the specific attributes of human life in Elizabethan England created an ideal home for the grass snake, an animal who defends itself by creating a death like gaze. We are pleased to welcome Rob Lender to the show this week to explain the history of the real animal Shakesp

In Elizabethan England on the corner of Friday Street and Bread Street was a fine dining and drinking establishment called the Mermaid Tavern. The building itself burned down in the Great Fire of London in 1666, but the legend of this storied tavern lives on through the records of people like Ben Jonson and 17th century travel writer Thomas Coryat, who wrote about the Mermaid Tavern in the early 1600s, when Shakespeare was in his late 40s to early 50s, describing it as the meeting place of Fraternity of Sireniacal Gentlemen, a drinking club that met on the first Friday of the month and is thought to have included famous members, most with very close ties to Shakespeare. Men like Ben Jonson, John Fletcher, and Francis Beaumont, were thought to have been members and there are a few scholars who think that William Shakespeare might have been among the members of this club as well. Our guest this week, Michelle O’Callaghan, is a historical researcher into the history of English taverns, and the author of the arti

In 1588, one man named Tom Bright introduced an innovative new method for quickly writing down what you hear during a live performance, publishing a manual he called “Charactery.” A term of Bright’s own invention, Charactery is the first English version of an ancient method of shorthand dating back to the time of Cicero, that allowed anyone to pirate versions of live performance, provided they had enough patience to learn the complicated system. Bright’s innovative technology applied a complicated array of symbols and characters that while intimidating to review today, was a huge hit in Elizabethan England, with several additional shorthand methods being published in England within just a few years of Bright’s work. Walking the line between illegal behavior and artistic prowess, masters of shorthand in the late 16th century are responsible for many of the surviving copies of the sermons from Shakespeare’s lifetime, and our guest this week argues in his publication, Shakespeare, Playfere, and the Pirates, that

In Elizabethan England two of the most popular forms of public entertainment were animal baiting and hunting. Bull and bear baiting happened in a dedicated arena while hunting was usually done on private lands or hunting parks where private, usually very elite, groups of people would gather for the hunt. What each of these sports has in common is they both employ use of dogs. Hunting dogs were raised meticulously with manuals from Shakespeare’s lifetime outlining the detailed husbandry involved in how to build kennels, how to feed, and even how to groom hunting dogs. When it came to choosing the right dog for the job, there were specific breeds of dogs that were favored for particular sport. Shakespeare gives us a glimpse into the world of dogs and favoring specific breeds when he mentions “hounds and greyhounds, mongrels, spaniels, curs, Shoughs, water-rugs and demi-wolves” in Macbeth Act III. Shakespeare uses the word dog or hound over 200 times across his works, writing about spaniels, beagles, the Thessal

Bull Ring market in Birmingham, England, UK was first known as Corn Cheaping because in the 12th century, which is when we have the first reference to Corn Cheaping, it was used as a corn market. Corn Cheaping had an iron ring setup on a grassy section of Corn Cheaping that was used as a bull baiting arena, where bulls who had been selected for slaughter would be tied and baited for entertainment before being processed into meat. That’s where the name Bull Ring Market comes from. Today, in the 21st century, Bull Ring Market is still being used as an open air market, selling fish, meat, poultry, exotic vegetables, and even household supplies. But how did the market get from the 12th century to today, and why has the original purpose survived so many centuries? Headland Archaeology discovered some answers about the history of Bull Ring Market when they conducted an archaeological dig at Beorma Quarter, close to Bull Ring Market. Today, our guest, Steve Thomson, lead archaeologist for this project, is here today