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Оглавление3. The Author of the Plays.
Who, if not Shaksper, could have written the Shakespearian works? Was it the sharp-minded Bacon; the dead poet, Marlowe? the much-travelled Earl of Derby? the sensitive Earl of Oxford? or perhaps the linguistically talented Queen Elizabeth?
In order to establish a profile of the missing author (Six hundred Characters in Search of an Author), we have to know what he read, what he quoted, what historical events he did refer to. Furthermore we have to work out from which social position he was writing.
Since I am not the first to question the authorship of Will Shaksper, I have meticulously gathered all the facts that have survived the passage of time. I have only allowed hard facts to be part of my theory and I have left speculation to those who enjoy parlour games.
3.1 Titus Andronicus
As the first pale eerie light dawns over the grave yard the story teller relates of blood baths of the ghosts of murdered children, of how the Duke of Cornwall had both eyes gauged out of his head on an open stage and how his tormentor stamped on the eyes with the heels of his shoes like a flamenco dancer; of the daughter of a Roman general whose tongue is cut out and whose hands are cut off, after she has been raped; of how everything comes to a head with a banquet where an offended, one armed father-the other arm having been hacked off by his wife’s lover- disguised as a cook, serves a pie made of the flesh of her children, skewered like pigs at a village wedding, to the Queen of the Goths.
Alejo Carpentier, Concert baroque
“Titus Andronicus” is generally regarded as being Shakespeare’s first drama, or at least one of the first. Anything that could help us to date the piece would be of great interest. This very date is indeed available to us; not in the usual way as a date on a copy of the first edition but on an illustrated publication of extracts from Titus Andronicus signed and dated by the artist, a certain Henricus Peacham.
Henricus Peacham, Tamora pleading for her sonnes
This document from Henry Peacham (Harley Papers, Marquess of Bath at Longleat, Vol. 1. f.159) throws up difficult questions for the experts. The first question being: Who did it? Was the illustration done by the learned curate Henry Peacham (1546-1634), author of “The Garden of Eloquence conteyning the figures of Grammar and Rhetorick” (1577), or was it done by Henry Peacham, the younger (1578-c.1643), a learned writer, author of “The Complete Gentleman, The Truth of Our Times, and the Art of Living in London” (1622) ?
T.M. Parrott writes in 1950: „There is a temptation to identify this Henricus with Henry Peacham the Younger.” Speaking of the illustrations, he goes on to say: “These, however, are in the opinion of good judges so different in style from and so inferior to the Titus picture, as to make a common origin unlikely if not impossible.” Joseph Quincy Adams remarks in his foreword to the facsimile edition of the first Quarto of Titus Andronicus: „The faces in Peacham’s work [Emblemata Varia] are entirely without character, the details often clumsy in execution, and the whole drawing lacking in vitality.”
Peacham, the Younger: Emblem
Eugene M. Wraith, another editor of “Titus Andronicus”, says of Henricus Peacham’s title page: „Someone has written in what resembles Renaissance handwriting ‚Henrye Peachams Hande 1595’, but this may be a forgery by John Payne Collier, and is, in any case, only a guess. Among other pencilled annotations in a relatively modern hand is one above the figure of Tamora: ‚Written by Henry Peacham – author of the Complete Gentleman.’ This too may be by Collier.” (Adams point out that another pencilled annotation opposite the lines from Act 1 ‚So far from Shakspear Titus Andronicus Sc.2’ refers to a scene-division which Collier adopted in his edition of the play.)
John Payne Collier (1789-1883) was one of the most competent and unscrupulous forgers of all time. Before his career as a Shakespeare researcher and publisher of old English literature took off, he was a journalist and literary critic. Collier didn’t forge for the money; he did it for the fame and the recognition. He felt that he could reap the most fame by filling in empty spaces in old books and manuscripts with home-made “discoveries”, mostly stories and anecdotes that suited his own purposes. He fabricated and “discovered” emendations in the famous “Perkins Folio”. Later he used these so-called discoveries in his own Shakespeare edition of 1853. Collier also “enhanced” the Revel’s account of 1605, the diaries of John Manningham, and the “Book of Plays” from Simon Forman.
The author and illustrator “Henricus Peacham” quotes three passages from Titus Andronicus: The plea for mercy made by the Goth Queen Tamora for her first born son, blunt reply from the Roman military comander Titus (Act 1, Scene 1) and finally the famous confession of Aaron-the-Moor for the most vicious and malevolent deeds. (Act 5, Scene 1). The text crowns a small drawing of Tamora, Demetrius, Chiron and Aaron. Peacham’s copy is more precice than the first quarto edition published in 1594. (E.g. as pointed out by Sir E. K. Chambers: The text that we see below Peacham’s illustration uses the word “haystackes”, this is in agreement with the First Folio edition of 1623. The first quarto edition (1594) speaks of “haystalkes”. )
“Henricus Peacham” takes the liberty of adding his own words when quoting passages from the play. He even has Alarbus deliver a speech long after the man died.
The biggest mystery however is the way Peacham wrote the date.
“Henricus Peacham Anno mo qo g qto“.
mo stands for millesimo (in the 1000th year), qo stands for quingentesimo (in the 500th year) and qto for quarto, in the fourth year. Peacham’s renaissance-shorthand poses no problems, at least not yet. (In his book Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries (1598) Richard Hakluyt mentions a communication from the Turkish Vesir Sinan Bassa to Queen Elizabeth wherein Roman numerals and modern english date specification stand side by side: “IESU vero Anno millesimo quingentesimo nonagesimo” and “in the yeere of Iesus 1590”.)
Only the small g in the third position of the date, doesn’t want to reveal its secret. Why does Peacham stray from his system with the Roman numerals at this point? Why doesn’t he write “nonagesimo” as we would expect (in the 90th year) = mo qo no qto?
What is that small g doing in the third position?
After pondering over this annoying problem for some time, the mathematician and literature theorist David L. Roper came up with the solution. The date that “Henricus Peacham” wanted to write down wasn’t in the fifteen ninetees; it was either in the sixtees, or the seventees of that century. He wished to avoid confusion between “sexagesimo” and “septuagesimo”, both of which would have been abrieviated to so. So he used a different system and wrote a small g, the seventh letter of the alphabet. The date stated here is 1574. (At this point in time Will Shaksper the actor was 10 years old.)
The usage of the small letter “g” for the number 7 was not Henricus Peacham’s own idea. It comes from a method of writing dates that was in common usage by the Greeks (and the Hebrews as well). The Greeks didn’t write numbers, they designated numbers to letters according to their position in the alphabet I.e. 1=α (roman: a), 2=β (roman: b) ... 7=ζ (roman: g). Therefore Peacham used a small g in the third position. He did not write octogesimo = oo or nonagesimo = no because that would have meant that he was his own sixteen years old son. (In 1594, when Henry Peacham Jr. was sixteen years old, the Roman numerals had become unfashionable; only a Turkish Vesir might use it.)
A comparison between the handwriting of Peacham the elder and Peacham the younger confirms this.
Henricus Peacham Anno mo qo g qto
Henricus Peacham, 1621
There are people who wish that this discovery would just go away. Must such a wonderful theory be spoiled by one small “g”? There are those who would question Peacham’s mental health. There are others who would discard “Titus Andronicus” like a lizard detaching its tail, when in danger.
3.2 The Two Gentlemen of Verona
This comedy is about the mercurial Proteus and how he betrayed his best friend, Valentine. Proteus has a strong infatuation for Valentine’s girlfriend, Silvia, the daughter of the Duke of Milan. Proteus betrays Valentine hoping to have the field clear so that he can win Silvia over. After Valentine has been banished from the city, Proteus sends his page (who is in reality his own girlfriend, Julia, dressed as a boy) to Silvia to proclaim his love for her. Silvia, however, knows of the relationship between Proteus and Julia, furthermore she is truely in love with Valentine, so she rejects Proteus.
Here we have one of Shakespeare’s early works. The comedy has some wonderful and brilliantly funny scenes but the plot seems a bit naive and the ending seems to be “constructed”. The literary content, however, is not the focus of our current attention. We want to discuss what the author reveals of his knowledge of local scenes, Verona and Milan, and what he knows about the history and geography of Italy.
In this play, Verona seems to be an unattractive city. Nobody wants to stay there. The young nobleman Valentine goes to Milan to “attend the Emperor in his royal court”. Shortly thereafter, on the instructions of his father, his friend Proteus follows him to “practice tilts and tournaments, / hear sweet discours, converse with noblemen/ and be in eye of every exercise/ worthy his youth and nobleness of birth” (I/3).
Strange though it may seem, on our arrival in in the new city the “Emperor” seems to vanish into thin air. We only hear of “The Duke of Milan”. Has the author forgotten about the Emperor on the mystifying sea journey between Verona and Milan?
In his book, the highly recommended: “The Shakespeare Guide to Italy” (2010) Richard Paul Roe tells us of a short visit by Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, to the duchy of Milan. Following Charles’ V victory over François I in Pavia (1525) and the treaty of Cambrai (1529), Milan, Genoa and Naples were under Spanish rule. As a token of his allegiance, Francesco II Sforza, Duke of Milan (1495-1535), invited the Emperor for a visit. Charles V was expected to stay for a long time, however, he only stayed in Milan for four days: 10th through to 14th March -1533.
This could well explain how Shakespeare was suddenly short of an Emperor. Shakespeare sends the two young men to Milan to attend the Emperor’s court; instead of the Emperor they meet the Duke’s daughter Silvia and both of them fall in love with her.
Shakespeare seems to be speaking of Verona as if it were a port. A matter that we find most irritating. Valentin takes his leave with the following words:
Once more adieu; my father at the road
Expects my coming, there to see me shipp’d. (I/1)
However, the author isn’t speaking of a seaport: Richard P. Roe brings clarity into the situation.
„Along select channels of the seas, and in the large and smooth rivers the world over, there are wide places for ships to anchor called ‚roads’ or ‚roadsteads’. – In 1580, when the famous essayist Michel de Montaigne saw Verona’s road, he remarked in his Diary about the ‚vast quay’ [clôture vaste]. The road and the adjacent quay were just downstream from the great stone bridge called ‚Ponte Navi’ (Ship Bridge).“
Bernardo Bellotto (Canaletto): Ponte Navi (1748)
What on Earth was the author thinking when he sent our two romantic heroes through Italy on a ship?
For reason of safety and comfort, wealthy travellers in the 16th century actually did greatly prefer canals and waterways to overland travel. Richard P. Roe points out, (as did his predecessor Sir Edward Sullivan) that, at that point in time, Italy had a very comprehensive system of canals and waterways joining Lake Maggiore with the Adriatic Sea. One could reach Milan from Verona by going up the Adige to Legnano, from there along the “Nicholasa” canal into the Tartaro, after that, up-river to the canals “La Fossetta” and “La Fossa”- from there up the river Po, after Cremona turn into the Adda- from the Adda into the “Navigilo Martesana” (the Martesana canal) in the direction of Milan.
Vincenzo Coronelli: Burchiello and Barca
Sixteenth century Milan was circumvented by two rings of canals. Sir Edward Sullivan writes in 1918: “We find the city in 1497 in ship communication on one side (by the Naviglio della Martesana) with the Adda, and on the other (by the Naviglio Grande) with the Ticino, the Po, and Lago Maggiore – a condition sufficient to justifiy Carlo Pagnano’s statement in 1520 that Milan, far as it was from the sea, might easily be taken to be a seaport town.”
“That’s all very well,” say the friends of Shakespearian literature, but:”Why does the author talk about the tide in Verona?” (II/3)
PANTHINO. Launce, away, away, aboard! Thy master is shipp’d, and thou art to post after with oars. What’s the matter? Why weep’st thou, man? Away, ass! You’ll lose the tide if you tarry any longer.
LAUNCE. It is no matter if the tied were lost; for it is the unkindest tied that ever any man tied.
PANTHINO. What’s the unkindest tide?
LAUNCE. Why, he that’s tied here, Crab, my dog.
PANTHINO. Tut, man, I mean thou’lt lose the flood, and, in losing the flood, lose thy voyage, and, in losing thy voyage, lose thy master, and, in losing thy master, lose thy service, and, in losing thy service -
The answer: The author couldn’t resist the delightful plays on the words: tide (= the swelling of the sea and, =the opportune moment) and tied (=bound). He gives way to the temptation and turns the Adige into the Thames. Perhaps more readily, because now he can make a cynical reference to “The Tide tarrieth for no Man” by George Walpull (1576).
Still in a humorous vein, he has Speed mark the arrival of Launce in Milan with the words “Welcome to Padua”. Whereupon they march straight to an “alehouse”.
Launce and Crab, 1762
Nonetheless, it would be a mistake to take Launce for a run-of-the-mill scoundrel from Southwark; he relates that his master Proteus and Mistress Julia have “parted very fairly in jest.”
“What, are they broken?” asks Speed.
Launce answers “No, they are both as whole as a fish.”
This dialogue is based on a colloquial Italian phrase “sano come un pesce”.
Furthermore, Launce is well acquainted with the new arrivals on the shelves of the English book shops:
LAUNCE. He lives not now that knows me to be in love; yet I am in love; but a team of horse shall not pluck that from me; nor who ‘tis I love; and yet ‘tis a woman; but what woman I will not tell myself; and yet ‘tis a milkmaid; yet ‘tis not a maid, for she hath had gossips; yet ‘tis a maid, for she is her master’s maid and serves for wages. She hath more qualities than a water-spaniel- which is much in a bare Christian. Here is the cate-log [Pulling out a paper] of her condition. ‘Inprimis: She can fetch and carry.’
This “cate-log” is a reference to “Of Englishe dogges the diversities, the names, the natures, and the properties...” London 1576, from a certain Dr. Caius, in which the characteristics of the cocker-spaniel are discussed on page 16.
When writing a play, there’s no point in making references to current affairs, catch phrases, or indeed a book, if everybody’s forgotten what it is that you’re referring to. Consequently, we can assume that “The two Gentlemen of Verona” was written in 1577, without fear of being accused of recklessness.
On his arrival in Milan, Proteus foolishly falls in love with the beautiful Silvia, a love that leads to the betrayal of his friend. In Act 4, Scene 2, after delightful confusion (Julia, disguised as a boy, hears her boyfriend Proteus sing a love song to Silvia, the girlfriend of his best friend, accompanied by minstrels, in the employ of Thurio, the man to whom the Duke, her father, has promised Silvia’s hand...) Proteus suggests “Saint Gregory’ s Well” as the meeting place for a midnight tête-à-tête with Thurio, just for the sake of being rid of the fool.
This meeting place has caused a lot of frowns. Some people are pleased to see that the working man from Stratford has, once again, pulled something amazing out of the hat, others scour the pages of “Piccata Milanese” looking for disused wells in Milan. The American, Richard P. Roe shows us that “St. Gregory’s well” means the “Foppone di San Gregorio”, a cemetery situated next to a quarantine station, known as “Lazaretto”.
Franciscus Schott writes in the year 1600: “San Gregorio is the refuge for plague victims. It covers an area of 4.800 Ellen (2,800 yards) and is surrounded by flowing water. The area is enclosed by a pillared wall. It has countless bed-rooms and is adequately equipped for all of the community’s needs. This location lies outside the Porta Orientale.”
The German travelogue writer, Schott, (Itinerarii Italiae rerumque Romanarum Libri tres) wasn’t exactly zealous when it came to accuracy. He recorded the length as being 700 yards, instead of the more generally accepted 440 yards, and he gave the name “San Gregorio” to the entire complex, instead of just the graveyard.
Il Lazaretto and Foppone di San Gregorio (1629)
The “Lazaretto” was built in 1488 outside the city walls of Milan. The main function of the 288 cells was to isolate the potential contagious disease carriers from the rest of the community. Surrounded by the walls and the moats, those from whom the town wished to protect itself, were left to rot. The dead were carted out and dumped in a mass grave. This mass grave was given the name “Il Foppone” or “Il Pozzo di San Gregorio”.
Why does the author speak of “Saint Gregory’s well” when refering to such a dreadful place?
“Il Foppone” is a langobardian expression, commonly used colloquially in Milan and Bergamo, it means the ditch - pit, pool, cavern, hole, slot or, also, the well. In 16th century, the Foppone from Bergamo was a stone quarry, later used as a mass grave for the plague victims.
“Saint Gregory’s well”, this hell-on-earth was the place where Proteus arranges to meet the gullible Thurio for a tête-à-tête. A macabre insider-joke from the author, hardly comprehensible for anybody in England.
The author names “Milan. An abbey” as the scenario for act 5, scene 1, Silvia and her protector, Eglamour meet there to flee to Mantua together. The author informs us that the abbey is in Milan and that Silvia is not out of danger. “I fear I am attended by some spies” cries Silvia, but there is a secret passage into the city, just close by “at the postern by the abbey wall”. In other words, the abbey is not far from one of the gates in the city wall. Such an abbey can, in fact, be found in a place that fits this decription. “Il Convento di San Dionigi” (as one can see in the above illustration). It adjoins the city wall, not far from the “Porta Orientale” otherwise known as “Porta Venezia” (the gate that one would use to leave the city to travel to Venice or Mantua via Brescia.) Eglamour urges the young woman to rest assured: “Fear not. The forest is not three leagues off; / if we recover that, we are sure enough.”
On one thing we can also rest assured: Shakespeare knew a lot more about Milan than a man in England could have read in books.
3.3 Romeo and Juliet
When Shakespeare wrote this most comical tragedy, he already had four Italian, one French and two English sources for material. It has been proven that he drew inspiration from Clitia [Gerardo Boldieri] (1553), Matteo Bandello (1554), Pierre Boaistuau (1561) and Arthur Brooke (1562). The genius required no further research and a trip to Italy was unnecessary. However, the author was not satisfied with literature alone. Surprisingly enough, although it was not mentioned in any literary works, he knew about local sycamores (“the grove of sycamore / That westward rooteth from the city’s side”, I/1) and, more surprisingly still, he knew about the small Franciscan church, situated between Juliet’s house and the Franciscan monastery “San Francesco al Corso”; “Saint Peter”, where Juliet used to go to confession.- Richard P. Roe discovered that marriage ceremonies had been performed for six hundred years in “Saint Peter’s” or “San Pietro Incarnario”.
LADY. Marry, my child, early next Thursday morn
The gallant, young, and noble gentleman,
The County Paris, at Saint Peter’s Church (III/5).
Shakespeare knows more: For instance he knows that the name “Romeo” has its roots in the late middle ages (Romaeus= he who pilgers to Rome). That explains why Juliet responds to his first advances with the words (I/5):
Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
Which mannerly devotion shows in this;
For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss.
Again, thanks to the research of Richard Roe we know that the dramatist was an expert in Italian history. According to the Italian source, the story is set in and around Verona during the rule of Bartolomeo della Scala (“Escalus”) i.e. between 1301 and 1304. Bartolomeo, who was a friend of Dante, resided in the Palazzo del Commune on the Piazza dei Signori; however, he conducted legal hearings ten miles south west of Verona in the Castello Scaligero of Villafranca (English-Freetown- so called because of tax exemptions). In 1357 the legal hearings of the area were transferred from “Freetown” to the newly completed Castelvecchio di Verona, but at the time in which the story is set, they were still held in Villafranca.
Bartolomeo della Scala appears early in “Romeo and Juliet” under the name of Prince Escalus in the role of mediator between the “two households, both alike in dignity” and puts an end to their quarrel with mandatory words:
PRINCE. You, Capulet, shall go along with me;
And, Montague, come you this afternoon,
To know our farther pleasure in this case,
To old Freetown, our common judgement place. (I/1)
Shakespeare was the only author who knew which function and person “Freetown” was to be allocated to. Matteo Bandello (Novelle, 1554) names Villafranca as the place where Giulietta is to become acquainted with Count Paris de Lodrone against her will: the wrong groom. Pierre Boaistuau (Histoires tragiques, 1561) names Villefranche the place where Juliette is to be married to “Comte Paris”. Arthur Brooke (Romeus and Juliet, 1562) follows in Boaistuau’s suit but substitutes the elder Montague’s castle for „Freetown”. Brooke’s blustering old bone-breaker does his best to make his daughter do as she’s told: „Unless by Wednesday next thou bend as I am bent, and at our castle called Freetown thou freely do assent To County Paris’ suit, and promise to agree...“
Villafranca di Verona, Castello Scaligero
The author of “Romeo and Juliet” did things differently: he declared “Old Freetown” to be the “common judgement place” of Bartolomeo della Scala alias Escalus. With that he hit the nail on the head. He was better informed than his Italian and English colleagues.
3.4 The Merchant of Venice
Shakespeare’s Venetian plays attain a degree of vibrancy and clarity, when read in Venice and Padua, that is missing when we read them in Liverpool and Hamburg or Cambridge and Heidelberg. His descriptions of the places, the people, with their idiosyncrasies and their customs seem, for those who have knowledge of these matters, to correlate so exactly with reality, that the question is not if, but to what extent did Shakespeare weave his Italian experiences into his work.
Theodor Elze, Venetian Sketches on Shakespeare, 1899
Just like a bored, chain-smoking doctor in an army recruiting station the present day Shakespearian is shamefully reduced to a superficial, heartless examination of his patient. His “patients”, the most wonderful plays in the history of literature however are not ill. The only thing that’s wrong with them is that they don’t have an author. Without an author they have no historic foundation, no chronology and no individual motivation. It is high time to replace this incorrect and antiquated guess work with a thorough diagnosis, devoid of ambiguity and dementia.
The Merchant of Venice is set in the sixteenth century, in the town of the same name and in “Belmont”, a luxurious villa situated between Venice and Padua.
The rich heiress, Portia of Belmont, the shining light of the story, a true heroine, has a row of foreign aristocratic suitors, each waiting to make a choice, between a golden, a silver and a leaden casket, that will decide if he is to marry Portia or immediately leave Belmont. Among the premature departures we find the “Neapolitan prince”, the “County Palatine”, “Monsieur Le Bon”, Baron “Falconbridge” and “the Duke of Saxony’s nephew”.
These men are by no means fantasies of the author.
NERISSA. First, there is the Neapolitan prince.
PORTIA. Ay, that’s a colt indeed, for he doth nothing but talk of his horse; and he makes it a great appropriation to his own good parts that he can shoe him himself; I am much afear’d my lady his mother play’d false with a smith. (I/2)
According to H. H. Holland (1933) the “Neapolitan prince” bears a lot of similarity to Prince Don Juan d’Austria (1547-1578). Being the admiral of the Mediterranean fleet, John of Austria often had cause to stay in Naples. Don Juan’s mother, Barbara Blomberg, the daughter of a harness maker from Regensburg, had an affair with Emperor Charles V. The Emperor is transformed to the “smith”, an irreverent reference to the God Vulcan and his relationship with Venus. The riding skills of the illegitimate Prince are convincingly described by John Lothrop Motley in “The rise of the Dutch Republic” (1856): “Throughout the land, there was no man who could match him, be it in piercing the rings or jousting at the tilt. He was famous for his bravery and for his skill in taming the most skittish horse.” In 1575 the Venetian envoy to Naples described Don Juan as being a well-dressed, fine figure of a man whose skill with horses was unsurpassed.
Don Juan d’Austria (John of Austria)
Could it be that the whole point of this aristocratic, though rather ignominious cameo appearance was to take a jibe at Queen Elizabeth’s arch enemy Don Juan d’Austria?
If we look a little closer at the virtuous Portia, heiress of Belmont, she proves to be an ideal mirror image of the Virgin Queen. Portia is portrayed as being flawless, mild mannered, knowledgeable, pleasant and well educated. Her wealth is immense; her understanding of the law is superior to that of men. In speech and in bearing she has a regal manner. However, after Bassanio chooses the right casket she surprises him with her subservience:
PORTIA. ... But now I was the lord
Of this fair mansion, master of my servants,
Queen o’er myself: and even now, but now,
This house, these servants and this same myself
Are yours, my lord: I give them with this ring.
Portia’s words throw Bassanio into the sweetest confusion.
BASSANIO. Madam, you have bereft me of all words;
Only my blood speaks to you in my veins;
And there is such confusion in my powers
As, after some oration fairly spoke
By a beloved prince, there doth appear
Among the buzzing pleased multitude ...
Our laughable parade of suitors continues:
NERISSA. Then is there the County Palatine.
PORTIA. He doth nothing but frown, as who should say ‘An you will not have me, choose.’ He hears merry tales and smiles not. I fear he will prove the weeping philosopher when he grows old, being so full of unmannerly sadness in his youth. I had rather be married to a death’s-head with a bone in his mouth than to either of these. God defend me from these two!
In 2009 I cast some light on the matter (see: Kreiler 2009). Louis VI, Elector Palatine of the Rhine (1539-1583) began his rule in 1576. Although his father and his younger brother Johann were Calvinists, Ludwig was a Lutheran.
Louis VI, Elector Palatine
Right at the beginning of his rule, Ludwig forbade the Calvinist services in the Heidelberg palace chapel and rid his household of Calvinists. A sickly person from childhood, he introduced a police state that controlled the citizens according to strict Lutheran rules. He fought vehemently against hedonistic pleasures wherever he could. He even abolished Shrove Tuesday and Saint John the baptist’s day, holidays that were very popular throughout the land. When he died in 1583 his fun-loving brother (“Der Jaeger von Kurpfalz”) took over the affairs of state.
Nerissa’s next question requires very close attention:
NERISSA. How say you by the French lord, Monsieur Le Bon?
PORTIA. God made him, and therefore let him pass for a man. In truth, I know it is a sin to be a mocker, but he- why, he hath a horse better than the Neapolitan’s, a better bad habit of frowning than the Count Palatine; he is every man in no man. If a throstle sing he falls straight a-cap’ring; he will fence with his own shadow; if I should marry him, I should marry twenty husbands. If he would despise me, I would forgive him; for if he love me to madness, I shall never requite him.
In the period of time between 1574 and 1584 “Monsieur” was the official term used, when speaking of one of Queen Elizabeth’s prominent suitors, Hercule-François Duc d’Alençon (1555-1584), the younger brother of the King of France. (The epithet “le Bon” was often seen, as an embellishment to the names of rulers-one is reminded of Jean le Bon, King of France, or Philippe le Bon, Duke of Burgundy.) Alençon was a highly strung, fickle and unreliable person, explaining Portia’s remark: “he will fence with his own shadow”. If we feel that the foregoing is insufficient evidence for the conclusion, Alençon = Le Bon perhaps we should ask why he jumps in the air (“he falls straight a capering”), when a throstle sings.
Hercule-François Duc d‘Alençon, called Monsieur
The key to the riddle is that “mauvis” is French for “thrush” [old English throstle] and that a certain Michel de Castelnau, Sieur de la Mauvissière (1517-1592) was the French ambassador to the English court. From this position, he championed the cause of the “French marriage” with such fervour and resilience that whenever Mauvissière, the thrush, sang, “Monsieur” began to dance.
Michel de Castelnau-Mauvissière
The next in line are: Falconbridge, a young Baron from England and his neighbour, a Scot. Falconbridge’s ignorance of Latin, French and modern Italian make it impossible for Portia to even consider him as a suitor. He’s a fine figure of a man, but without the necessary linguistic abilities he remains a figure, and thereby dumb. Shakespeare’s portrayal of the young nobleman avoids any direct reference. The Scot who “borrowed a box of the ear of the Englishman” also remains faceless. Our peripatetic joke once again sets course for Germany.
NERISSA. How like you the young German, the Duke of Saxony’s nephew?
PORTIA. Very vilely in the morning when he is sober; and most vilely in the afternoon when he is drunk... Therefore, for fear of the worst, I pray thee set a deep glass of Rhenish wine on the contrary casket; for if the devil be within and that temptation without, I know he will choose it.
We may identify “the Duke of Saxony’s nephew” with John Casimir - Count Palatine of Pfalz-Simmern, son in law of Augustus I, Elector of Saxony, and brother in law of Duke Johann Frederick II of Saxony.
This presumption evolves to certitude when we consider that John Casimir (1543-1592) had also asked for Elizabeth’s hand in marriage. -Blinded by his own high opinion of himself, the young Palatine commissioned Sir James Melville to take portraits of himself and his parents to Queen Elizabeth in the spring of 1564. She received Melville in Hampton Court, where he gave her the two portraits. On the following day Elizabeth gave the portraits back to Melville conveying her gratitude for the pictures, but nonetheless, declining to keep them. “She would have none of them,” Melville said, and wrote to the duke and his father dissuading them “to meddle any more in that marriage.” (Memoirs of Sir James Melville of Halhill [1603], ed. A.F. Steuart, London 1929).
Johann Casimir, Count Palatine
Casimir enjoyed his wine. After he assumed the rule of the Palatinate (following the death of his brother, Louis VI), one of the first things that he did was to have make the biggest wine barrel in the world. The palatine high society drank the entire contents of the barrel (127.000 litres) in two months flat. When he visited London in February 1579, Elizabeth held a two day tournament in his honour. He showed his gratitude with dispatches of wine to Sir Walsingham and Lord Leicester.
Although we know that they don’t have the shadow of a hope, two more sorry candidates must hazard a hopeless guess. The first is the black prince of Morocco; he comes across as a “Miles gloriosus”, a braggart who boasts that no lesser personages than the Shah of Persia and the Sultan of Turkey perished under his mighty sword. The Prince of Morocco could have been one of many black emirs were it not for the fact that the contents of the golden casket, which he chose so proudly and greedily, prophesied the fate of one man and one man alone. Therein lies a death’s-head. Two Maghrebian princes (one ebony and the other nut-brown, in complexion) met their deaths in the fatal battle of Alcazar of 1578 (Alcazar, or Alcazarquivir, lies between Fez and Tanger). The darker of the two victims was a certain Prince Mulay Mohammed otherwise known as Abu Abdallah Mohammed II, who, in alliance with Don Juan d’Austria, ruled over Morocco for a short time. Mulay Mohammed fought and died at the side of the young “Crusader-King” Sebastian of Portugal (1554-1578) who marched on Morocco with an army of 18,000. The majority of Portugal’s aristocracy were among the 8,000 casualties. Two years later Portugal lost her independence and was taken over by Spain. (George Peele in his play “The Battle of Alcazar” praises the Negro “Muly Mahamet” with the words: “this brave Barbarian Lord Muly Molocco”.)
The casket that springs open to finish our sorry line-up shows the last aspirant a jester’s head-a mirror. The mirror gazer, “Prince of Arragon” by name, had chosen the silver casket, that very metal that his ships speed to him from the new continent. The man behind the name “Arragon” was actually the first suitor whom Elizabeth sent packing, in no uncertain terms. No lesser person than: Philip II, King of Spain (PHILIPPVS·REX·ARAGONVM).
Philip II of Spain
Shakespeare hated the man’s guts and he made no secret of the matter.
The identification of these six men must lead to a re-appraisal of Shakespearian philology.
It will be interesting to see how Messrs Stanley Wells (“Shakespeare for All Time”), Peter Ackroyd (“The Biography”), Stephen Greenblatt (“Will in the World”), Bill Bryson (“The World as Stage”) and James Shapiro (“Contested Will”) try to waffle these new discoveries under the carpet.
First of all the casket game scene is obviously a play on Elizabeth’s “French Wedding” (A sixteenth century version of “Waiting for Godot”) which received enthusiastic acclaim both from critics and theatre goers in the whole of Europe. The main work on the preparation of the marriage contract took place in the time between 1578 and 1583 after which, Elizabeth bought herself out of her promise.
Queen Elizabeth (1533-1603)
Secondly, the noblemen, parodied here, can be allocated to a specific period in time. Don Juan d’Austria and Prince Mulay Mohammed both died in 1578. The melancholy Elector Palatine departed for a better world in 1583. One year later the bustling Hercule-François Duc d’ Alençon followed him to the grave. If the author had waited until the late eighties, or the early nineties of the sixteenth century, his parodies would have been out of date on the opening night. I can say with certitude that the comedy was written in the late seventies or the early eighties of the sixteenth century.
Thirdly, the historical references must have been addressed to the Queen’s courtiers and a small circle of aristocrats. The parodies in the play would have been gone over the heads of the audiences in the Swan and the Globe, just as they went over the heads of following generations.
The author’s political, historical and poetic competences prove -fourthly- that he was a member of the academic aristocratic elite.
The name of the author of “The Merchant of Venice” is not- fifthly - William Shaksper.
In this comedy, Shakespeare, once again demonstrates his extensive knowledge of Italy. He knows that it is a tradition to give a friend a “dish of doves”. He knows about the Venetian “gondola” and he names Shylock’s servant “Gobbo”- thereby making a humorous reference to the “Gobbo di Rialto” a statue on the Campo San Giacometto, erected in 1541.
Il gobbo di Rialto
“Gobbo” bears the weight of a stone staircase, with infinite patience, on his shoulders. It was under the arcades of this square that the merchants and traders gathered (Shylock: „There I have another bad match: a bankrupt, a prodigal, who dare scarce show his head on the Rialto; a beggar that was us’d to come so smug upon the mart“.)
With the following words from Portia Shakespeare finally gives a specific name to a place in Italy that he must have seen with his own eyes.
PORTIA. Now, Balthasar,
As I have ever found thee honest-true,
So let me find thee still. Take this same letter,
And use thou all th’ endeavour of a man
In speed to Padua; see thou render this
Into my cousin’s hands, Doctor Bellario;
And look what notes and garments he doth give thee,
Bring them, I pray thee, with imagin’d speed
Unto the Tranect, to the common ferry
Which trades to Venice. Waste no time in words,
But get thee gone; I shall be there before thee. (III/4)
Portia, the heiress of Belmont, asks Balthasar to ride to Padua with the greatest of haste, there to procure men’s clothes and the dossier on the case: Shylock versus Antonio. As soon as Balthasar has “notes and garments” he is to hasten to the “Tranect” the landing stage of the common ferry to Venice. Portia and Nerissa travel with the somewhat slower coach to the Tranect where they wait for Balthasar. On his arrival the two women disguise themselves as a young lawyer and his assistant before they head for Venice to save Antonio.
Portia plans to “measure twenty miles to-day”. The village of Mira with the Villa dei Leoni (a country-residence of the Contarini family) lies about ten miles from Venice- including the crossing. If we’re not too strict about the ten miles then we could say that Belmont could have been in Stra - from Stra, Bathasar wouldn’t have had to travel far to the landing stage for the common ferry. Portia mentions a cloister that lies about two miles from Belmont. She could have meant the ancient cloister of Sant’ Ilario, close to Mira, or she could have meant the nunnery Monastero delle Muneghete close to Stra. We have neither the salient facts nor the inclination to say which of the two it was. After all Shakespeare wrote a comedy and not a travelogue.- But, what did he mean by the “Tranect”?
We encounter the place-name Tranect (with a capital”T”) in the good quarto (1600) and the First Folio (1623). (The word isn’t to change to “traject” (=traghetto =ferry) -because then we would have to accuse Shakespeare of doubling back on himself, which he did not usually do: “Bring them ... unto the Ferry, to the common ferry“.) Besides, where on the common ferry should beautiful Portia change her clothes? The shroud of mystery is removed by Violet M. Jeffery in her article “Shakespeare’s Venice” (1932).
The ferry to Venice docks in Lizza Fusina, where the Brenta river channel flows into the Laguna thus making the ship’s journey from Padua to Venice possible. Where two waterways meet, there used to be the problem of the river bed getting silted up making the passage of ships impossible. Today this problem is solved using locks. In the sixteenth century one used a different construction. The barges in Lizza Fusina were pulled over the dam by a ship-heaver, called “il carro”, or “Machina Traductrix”. Such was the name that the traveller Stephan Vinandus Pighius gave to this machine in 1587.
Vinzenzo Coronelli, Il carro
We encounter a description of the “Machina Traductrix” in Montaigne’s Italian diary, first edited in 1774. The french philosopher visited Italy in 1580.
We had lunch in an inn at Cà Fusina from whence one can embark for Venice. All of the ships that take this route are carried over land in Cà Fusina with the help of a system of levers and pulleys, operated by two horses, somewhat similar to an oil press. A wagon is pushed under the barge. Wagon and barge are then pulled over a wooden ramp to the canal that flows to the Venetian Laguna.
Franciscus Schott (1600) and Paulus Hentzner (1612) speak in a similar way of this construction.
The term Tranect originates from the Latin trans-nectere [nectere =to knit]. The meaning of the term is clear. A machine that lifts ships from one waterway to another by means of ropes, pulleys and levers.
When M. Jeffery made this discovery in 1932, she could hardly have realized that she had knocked the poor chap from Stratford out of the running. Shaksper, the genius at the kitchen table didn’t know that a “tranect” was a cross between a ship transporter, an inn and a changing room. (Any more than he knew what Antonio’s “Argosies” were, or his “Andrews”: Ragusian and Genoese hired ships, used by the Venetians to sail to the coasts of Africa and to the West Indies.)
Dating “The Merchant of Venice” at 1578/79, I called the attention to the statements of Stephen Gosson and Gabriel Harvey (both from the year 1579): one speaks of a play “The Jew” wherein is shown „the greedinesse of worldly chusers“ and the other one tells the recipient of his letter that he is: “fast bownde unto thee in more obligations then any merchant in Italy to any Jewe there” (see: Kreiler 2009). Moreover I made it quite clear that the author has plagiarised from “The Merchant of Venice”. Munday’s novel “Zelauto” (1580) envelops the extortionist theme from Shakespeare’s comedy.
In the third part of Zelauto, Munday tells the story of a scandalous loan, with its blood thirsty guarantee clause, similar to that in “The Merchant of Venice”. He ignores Shakespeare’s source (Il Pecorone IV.1) and bases his story directly on the liberties that Shakespeare took with Fiorentini’s work. In Fiorentino’s novel the heiress of Belmont conducts the defence of the merchant alone, Shakespeare provides her with a second woman disguised as a clerk. This constellation of characters was adopted by Munday and used as the basis of a new story.
3.5 The Taming of the Shrew
Whoever claims that it is possible to write about a place that one has never visited has obviously never tried to write a novel or a play. Any author will tell you that the first thing that they do is to go to the scene of their story and “get the feel” of the place. The feel of a trip to London might involve the missing tooth of a bus conductor, or the stoop of a flower girl. The authors don’t know themselves what they’re looking for, and they can only relate their experiences in such a way that the reader feels as if he’s there after a certain period of deliberation. (For instance, some people even say that they can smell the English countryside when they read Thomas Hardy and that they can taste the food described by Henry Fielding.)
Richard P. Roe read “The Taming of the Shrew” through the eyes of a connoisseur of Italy and thereby made some truly amazing discoveries.- The high born student, Lucentio, accompanied by his servant Tranio, travels from Pisa to Padua, where he waits for another servant, Biondello to bring his extensive luggage after him, in a barge.
LUCENTIO. If, Biondello, thou wert come ashore,
We could at once put us in readiness,
And take a lodging fit to entertain
Such friends as time in Padua shall beget.
But stay awhile; what company is this? (I/1)
A barge is slower than a mounted rider, so Lucentio and Tranio first have to seek simple lodgings - probably close to one of the canal docks in Padua. While they are waiting, they notice a small group of noble people: an elderly man, Baptista Minola with his two daughters, Katherina and Bianca, along with their respective suitors - Gremio and Hortensio. Baptista won’t hear of the nuptials of his younger daughter before the elder daughter, Katherine, is married off. In no time at all, Lucentio has fallen in love with Bianca. Baptista sends his daughter Bianca into the house nearby (a good reason for Lucentio not to change his lodgings). The area of the town is revealed later on in the story when “Saint Luke’s” parish church is named as the church where the marriage takes place.
Roe actually went to Padua to look for the place that is described here. He found Saint Luke’s parish church “San Luca”, built 1320, close to a canal dock. The canal, in the southern part of the old city (corner of Via 20 Settembre and Via San Gregorio Barbarigo), is still in existence. Across the road from the dock, the house that used to be a hostel (osteria) is still standing.
Shakespeare writes an exact description of a rich person’s house in Padua. That of “Cà gremio”:
GREMIO. First, as you know, my house within the city
Is richly furnished with plate and gold,
Basins and ewers to lave her dainty hands;
My hangings all of Tyrian tapestry;
In ivory coffers I have stuff’d my crowns;
In cypress chests my arras counterpoints,
Costly apparel, tents, and canopies,
Fine linen, Turkey cushions boss’d with pearl,
Valance of Venice gold in needle-work;
Pewter and brass, and all things that belongs
To house or housekeeping. (II/1)
The author of “The Taming of the Shrew” is no stranger to Pisa’s proverbial riches and even refers to “The divine Comedy” of Dante (Now my son, we approach the city they call Dis, with its grave citizens) when he jokingly speaks of “Pisa, renowned for its grave citizens” (I/1).
In the framing device, the lord’s servants boast to the drunken tinker, Christopher Sly, of the riches in their master’s house.
Corregio, Jupiter and Io (c. 1530)
Dost thou love pictures? We will fetch thee straight
Adonis painted by a running brook,
And Cytherea all in sedges hid,
Which seem to move and wanton with her breath
Even as the waving sedges play wi’ th’ wind.
We’ll show thee Io as she was a maid
And how she was beguiled and surpris’d,
As lively painted as the deed was done.
Or Daphne roaming through a thorny wood,
Scratching her legs, that one shall swear she bleeds
And at that sight shall sad Apollo weep,
So workmanly the blood and tears are drawn.
All of the subjects here can be found in the Italian art of the 16C, but not in the English art of the same period.
3.6 Measure for Measure
With an old camera in my rucksack and a veiled suspicion in my head, following in the footsteps of Richard P. Roe, I went to Padua in search of “the moated grange”.
Shakespeare’s blackest comedy “Measure for Measure” is set in Vienna- yet not in Vienna. The characters all have Italian names. The source of the piece is Italian (Giraldi Cinthio, Hecatommithi VIII,5) and the intrigues are all Italian by nature.
We remember: Angelo, the Deputy of the Duke, promises to pardon Isabella’s brother Claudio of the crime of fornication if she goes to bed with him. In the same breath, he orders Claudio’s execution. Fortunately the Duke, disguised as a monk, manages to put a stop to this puritan hypocrite’s machinations.
I formerly vented the suspicion that Shakespeare’s Vienna stands for Milan where a similar assault, sentenced by the governor of Milan, took place in 1547 (see: Kreiler 2009 – and: The Plot of Measure for Measure. Notes and Queries, July 29, 1893). However; how did Shakespeare know about Milan? In Cinthio’s Hecatommithi, the event is set in Innsbruck and the governor is replaced by Maximilian I (1459-1519), the Holy Roman Emperor. - Shakespeare then speaks of “Vienna” thus bringing the story under the sovereignty of the Habsburgs.
We have to ask: “Which Italian town, under Habsburg influence, has a “convent of the order of Saint Clare”, a church with the name of “Saint Luke’s” and a “moated grange” nearby?
DUKE. I will presently to Saint Luke’s; there, at the moated grange, resides this dejected Mariana. (III/1)
