Titus Andronicus

Dating Shakespeare’s Plays: Titus Andronicus

The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus

itus Andronicus can be dated between version, discovered in Sweden in 1904, and 1579 (the publication of North’s Plutarch) now in the Folger Library. It is usually asserted and 1594, when it was first published. that the play was set up from foul papers, i.e. T “from Shakespeare’s Working Manuscript” Publication date (Bate). Chambers suggests that Strange’s Men transferred it to Pembroke’s, who transferred it to Sussex’s, where it was revised into its present form. The play was apparently first registered on 6 However, it is not clear whether the play had been February 1594: performed by the playing companies separately, as is usually thought, or once in combination, as [SR 1594] John Danter. Entred for his Copye vnder thandes of bothe the wardens a booke argued by George and accepted by Bate. intitled A Noble Roman Historye of Tytus The second quarto followed in 1600: Andronicus. vjd. John Danter. Entred also vnto him by warraunt from Master Woodcock the [Q2, 1600] The most lamentable Romaine ballad thereof. tragedie of Titus Andronicus. As it hath sundry times beene playde by the Right Waith has reviewed the interpretations of “a Honourable the Earle of Pembrooke, the Earle of Darbie, the Earle of Sussex, and booke” cautiously accepting that the SR refers to the Lorde Chamberlaine theyr seruants. the play. It is also possible that “a booke” refers At London: printed by I. R. [James Roberts] to the prose history, whose title was transferred for Edward White, and are to bee sold at his from Pavier’s widow in 1626 to Edward Brewster shoppe, at the little north doore of Paules, at the and Robert Bird. It was transferred again in 1630. signe of the Gun, 1600. If Waith is correct that the SR refers to this play, then it would be the earliest reference in the SR There were very few changes from Q1 to Q2, only to a play by Shakespeare (1594). It was published some corrections and some new errors. A third in the same year and its status was changed from quarto appeared in 1611. “a noble Roman History” to “a most lamentable Roman Tragedy”: [Q3, 1611] The most lamentable Romaine tragedie of Titus Andronicus. As it hath sundry times [Q1 1594] The most lamentable Romaine beene plaide by the Kings Maiesties seruants. tragedie of Titus Andronicus as it was plaide by London: printed [by Edward Allde] for Eedward the Right Honourable the Earle of Darbie, Earle [sic] White, and are to be solde at his shoppe, of Pembrooke, and Earle of Sussex their seruants. nere the little north dore of Pauls, at the signe of London: printed by Iohn Danter, and are to be the Gun, 1611. sold by Edward White & Thomas Millington, at the little North doore of Paules at the signe of All these quarto editions were anonymous, the Gunne, 1594. despite Meres’s attribution of the play in 1598 to There is only one extant copy of that quarto Shakespeare. The play occurs in the 1623 First Folio (F1):

Title page to the anonymous first quarto of Titus Andronicus, 1594. By permission of the Folger Shakespeare Library.

[F1, 1623] The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus and errors. F1 adds more detailed stage directions Andronicus and the fly-killing scene (3.2). There has been varied speculation about the time of composition It occupies the second position in the tragedies of this extra scene: Waith, followed by Wells & after Coriolanus and before Romeo and Juliet. Taylor (TxC ), consider that it was composed at the It is usually accepted that the initial plan of same time as the rest of the play; Bate, however, the First Folio intended Troilus and Cressida considers it a later addition, perhaps written c. for this position. The subsequent pagination is 1600 by another author. inconsistent, with a blank page before the next play, suggesting that there had been problems in acquiring the copyright of Troilus. It has also been Performance dates proposed that the manuscript of Titus required There are three possible references to a play about a hasty change of plan, perhaps contributing to Titus in the late 1580s or early 1590s. In the some of the inconsistencies. F1 gives the running induction to Jonson’s Bartholomew Fair (1614), title as The Tragedy of Titus Andronicus and the there is a mocking reference to a spectator who text follows Q3 with a few further corrections

© De Vere Society 2 Dating Shakespeare’s Plays: Titus Andronicus is “fixed and settled in his censure . . . He that given by a particular company for the first time. will swear Jeronimo or Andronicus are the best Honigmann points out that Henslowe was able plays yet, shall pass unexcepted at here as a man to write “newe” on occasions and often had room whose judgement shows it is constant, and hath for more letters than ‘ne’; this consistent variation stood still these five and twenty or thirty years.” suggests that ‘ne’ was not intended to stand for A literal reading of this would indicate that a play the word ‘new’, and that Chambers went too about Titus was being performed between 1584 far in claiming that a play marked ‘ne’ seems and 1589 (presumably alongside Kyd’s Spanish generally to have been a new play in a full sense. Tragedy).1 Similarly, a reference in an anonymous Frazer notes that the same play was marked as ‘ne’ play called A Knack to know a Knave, performed on 11 June 1596 and again on 11 February 1597. in 1592, contains the following allusion: She argues that ‘ne’ must be an abbreviation for the theatre at Newington Butts, which Henslowe As Titus was to the Roman Senators, may have owned. Thus, Henslowe might not have When he had made a conquest on the Goths: been recording Titus Andronicus as a ‘new’ play That in requital of his seruice done, in 1594. Did offer him the imperial Diademe, The play was soon performed at the home of Sir John Harrington in Rutland, (east Midlands) on A Knack, which Henslowe marked as ‘ne’, was 1 January 1596 by a London company.3 published in 1594, perhaps from a memorial reconstruction, and it is possible that the reference The Henry Peacham Drawing & to Titus was added after the company acquired a Chronogram new play.2 A third possible allusion occurs when Strange’s Men (i.e. before they changed their title to Derby’s Men on 25 September 1593) were playing at the Rose. There is an entry in Henslowe’s diary on 11 April 1592 for tittus & vespacia which Henslowe also marks as ‘ne’. It was a popular play: performances continued until January 1593. Maxwell thinks that these three allusions refer to Shakespeare’s play. Most commentators tend to believe that these are not alluding to Titus Andronicus but to another play which may have been Shakespeare’s source. The consensus is that the earliest references to Detail of Peacham ms. Titus are Henslowe’s entries for January and February 1594, when Sussex’s Men played: Among the papers of the Marquis of Bath (held ne – Rd at titus & ondronicus the 23 of jenewary in the library at Longleat House, Somerset) is a . . . . iijli viijs single sheet, folio size, with a detailed illustration of Tamora’s entrance and some 40 lines of text Since the 23 January 1594 was a Sunday, this date from Titus. There is a signature by ‘Henricus is usually corrected to 24 Jan. Henslowe records Peacham’ (usually identified as Henry Peacham, two further performances in June 1594 by “my born 1576 and the author of The Compleat Lord Admeralle men & my Lorde Chamberlen Gentleman, 1620).4 There is also a series of letters men” although again it is not clear whether the identified as a chronogram, usually explained as companies had played jointly or separately. indicating a date of 1594 or 1595 (taking the third Chambers tends to assume that Henslowe’s ‘ne’ symbol to be a nine). David Roper has explained attached to Titus & Ondronicus means ‘new’ in the system of symbols thus: the sense ‘the first ever performance’. Sometimes, however, as Chambers records, it may refer to a The system used by Peacham was a medieval newly revised, corrected or augmented play, or response to the need for abbreviation. It required to a play new at that theatre, or even to a play that the initial letter of a word be written in the

normal manner, followed by the final letter, According to the 1687 testimony of Edward or letters in superscript form. ... The date on Ravenscroft (later supported by Malone and the Peacham Document should therefore be others), Shakespeare’s contribution to this play a straightforward exercise in expanding these was limited to a few master touches (Chambers, written abbreviations. Unfortunately, this has WS, not proved to be the case. The third symbol has II, 254–5): proved to be an insurmountable obstacle for I have been told by some anciently conversant all those who have made the attempt. Indeed, with the Stage, that it was not Originally his, there is even uncertainty as to whether it was but brought by a private Author to be Acted, intended as a ‘q’ or a ‘g’. and he only gave some Master-touches to one or Hence, either Anno mo qo g qto or Anno mo qo two of the Principal Parts or Characters; this I q qto gives the required date. am apt to believe, because ’tis the most incorrect and indigested piece in all his Works; It seems Before solving this chronogram, the errors rather a heap of Rubbish than a Structure. contained in previous attempts at finding a solution require attention be given to the three J. Dover Wilson ascribed much of Act 1 to George abbreviations carrying superscripts. These make Peele. Brian Vickers, in a long and energetic it plain that the date has been written in the chapter, confidently assigns co-authorship to conventional form of ‘thousands’, ‘hundreds’, Peele as follows: ‘tens’ and ‘units’. There is no reason to doubt that mo = millesimo (1000); that qo = quingentesimo Peele Act 1; Act 2 Scenes 1,2 (500) and qto = quarto (4), although some may Shakespeare Act 2 Scene 3; Acts 3, 4, 5. see qto as quinto (5). Vickers cites about 30 tests of co-authorship David Roper then considers various interpretations for this play. According to Vickers, editors such of the third letter: whether it represents or as Bate simply dismiss ‘disintegrators’ without , and argues that overall it should be dated examining their arguments in detail. 1575 (‘g’ is the seventh letter of the alphabet). Vickers, however, accepts the 1594/5 date for Sources both illustration and composition; he considers that the drawing illustrates a scene of English Bullough reviewed the material used in the play actors playing the German play Eine sehr klägliche and could identify no clear source for the main Tragoedia von Tito Andronico und der hoffertigen story, concluding that it was fictional. There is Käyserin (printed in 1620), which was derived a prose version of the story, called The Tragical from Shakespeare’s play. If so, this would appear History of Titus Andronicus, printed by Cluer Dicey to be a remarkably quick transformation of an (1760?), now in the Folger. Bullough believed English play from composition, to borrowing and that this might be a copy of, or at least derived illustration. Jonathan Bate has interpreted the from, the relevant section in the now lost Tragical chronogram as indicating 1605. Roman Historye (printed in 1594). However, the fact that The Tragical Historywas in 1760 billed as Attribution “Newly Translated from the Italian Copy printed at Rome” suggests that it was not the 1594 prose The play was attributed to Shakespeare by Meres history. in 1598 and by the editors of F1. Accordingly, The Ballad of Titus Andronicus (printed in 1620) Chambers accepts Shakespeare’s sole authorship, on the same subject, which may have been the as do Wells & Taylor and Hughes. For the work cited in the 1594 entry in the SR, appears doubters, the play “simply offended their literary to derive solely from this or from a similar prose taste, and they wished to absolve Shakespeare of version. There seems to be no doubt that there is the responsibility for perpetrating it.” Similarly, a connection between prose – ballad – play, but Bate passes over the question of authorship very it is not clear which came first. The prose history quickly and attributes the play to Shakespeare. and the ballad are much shorter than the play. Some commentators, however, have taken Bullough reports two similar plays, one published Titus Andronicus to be a revision of another play. in German (1620) Eine sehr klägliche Tragoedia

© De Vere Society 4 Dating Shakespeare’s Plays: Titus Andronicus von Tito Andronico und der hoffertigen Käyserin kingdom. Spencer comments, “The author seems and another Aran en Titus in Dutch (1641), which anxious not to get it all right but to get it all in.” both seem to derive from Shakespeare’s play. Vickers takes this wide range of sources to support Bullough observes that many elements of the his argument for co-authorship with Peele. play derive from a wide range of classical sources: There have also been various suggestions about Ovid’s Metamorphoses (available in Latin or from possible influences from works in English: Golding’s 1567 translation into English) related the tragic tale of Philomela, who was raped and In 1570, there was a poem called A Lamentable mutilated so as not to be able to incriminate the Ballad of the Tragical End of a Gallant Lord and of his Beautiful Lady, With the Untimely perpetrator. Seneca’s Thyestes (available in Latin or Death of Their Children, Wickedly Performed by from the collected translation into English, edited a Heathen Blackamore, Their Servant: The Like by Newton in 1581) seems to have supplied details Seldom Heard Before. (Pepys 1.546)5 of sons who are killed and then served as food at a feast. There are also about 15 allusions to Virgil’s This is a fairly short poem and describes some Aeneid (available in Latin or from the translation events which are similar to events in Titus. The into English, by Phaer and Twyne in 1584). The following works have also been suggested as punishment of a Moor by being smeared with possible influences on Titus: honey and then left to be stung by insects derives from Apuleius’s Metamorphoses (available in Latin Thomas Kyd, The Spanish Tragedy (? 1589) or from the collected translation into English, may have given a model for Titus’s revenge. edited by Adlington in 1566). The themes of the Christopher Marlowe, The Jew of Malta (first performed about 1589 but not published until murderous Moor and of the marriage of the Moor 1633) shows villains similar to those in Titus and the white woman were common, occurring in Andronicus, particularly Aaron. Italian in Bandello’s Novelle (1554) and translated George Peele, The Battell of Alcazar (popular into French by Belleforest in 1570. on stage in the early 1590s, published 1594), Bullough mentions that some of the Roman where the character of Muly Mahamet is similar history in the play, including a variety of names, to the character of Aaron. derives from Plutarch (translated by North in 1579 The First Part of the Tragicall Raigne of Selimus, from Amyot’s French translation of 1559). Plutarch sometime Emperour of the Turkes (perhaps performed in 1592, published 1594) showed a did not write about the later Roman Emperors scene in which Titus’s hand is chopped off (act but his “Life of Scipio” shows the ingratitude of 3, scene 1). a ruler towards a successful general. Subsequent In 1593, Thomas Nashe’s Christs Teares commentators, noted by Vickers, have suggested over Ierusalem covered the conquest by Titus that Plutarch was more widely used, especially for and Vespasian and included a consul called the contrast between traditional republican virtue Saturninus and a mother eating her own child. and decadent imperial wantonness. The play also draws extensively on the Greek historian, The possibility that these works influenced Titus Herodian, whose History of the Empire after depends on the date of its composition. If Titus Marcus had been translated into Latin and into had been composed in the 1580s or earlier, then English in 1550 by Nicholas Smyth. This work these other works would probably be alluding to was known to Holinshed (Chronicles, 1587), who it. follows Herodian when referring to the Emperor Bassianus who killed his brother. Orthodox Date T. J. B. Spencer contrasts the various uses of Roman History in Shakespeare’s plays. In Chambers proposed a date of 1593/4, immediately Coriolanus and in Julius Caesar, Shakespeare prior to publication. This date has tended to gain closely follows his source; in Titus, the debt is acceptance, e.g. by Jonathan Bate. wide-ranging and confused, and sometimes Many commentators, however, have more of a pastiche. At times Titus’s Rome is a found Titus Andronicus a very crude work by free commonwealth with the emperor elected on Shakespearean standards, thinking it unlikely merit, on other occasions Rome is a hereditary to have been composed alongside Richard III

© De Vere Society 5 Dating Shakespeare’s Plays: Titus Andronicus and Romeo and Juliet. Dover Wilson points out Oxfordian Date that it is a play “less homogeneous in style and more ramshackle in structure than most”. These Oxfordians have tended to place the play much commentators have, therefore, favoured an earlier earlier. E. T. Clark suggests that in writing Titus date, saying that the play was not new in 1594, Andronicus, the Earl of Oxford undertook for the merely established by that date, and that Jonson first time c. 1577 to serve Queen and Country by was substantially correct in dating it to 1584–89. means of drama. The play was hurriedly written, Similarly, Maxwell prefers 1589–90. Eugene contrasting the past greatness of Spain as Rome Waith prefers a date before 1590 with a revision with its current decadence. He used a range of c. 1593. Alan Hughes, more recently, prefers a allusions found throughout his own copy of crude draft c. 1588, citing many parallels with Amyot’s Plutarch, without studying any one Life the portrayal of violence in plays dated to the late in particular. He had purchased a copy of Amyot’s 1580s, e.g. Tamburlaine (c. 1587), The Jew of Malta Plutarch in 1569 (Nelson, 53). Oxford was (c. 1590) and the anonymous Troublesome Reign of probably keen to depict the horrors of the Sack King John (published 1591). Hughes adds that, “in of Antwerp, known as the Spanish Fury.6 This the end, we can only conjecture or despair.” atrocity committed by Spanish Catholics against Wells & Taylor seem to have disagreed on dates the Dutch Protestants, began on 4 November and on attribution. Vickers notes that Stanley 1576. Saturninus is clearly to be identified with Wells ignores the possibility of collaboration Philip II of Spain and Tamora as Mary Stuart. (in his introduction to the play in The Oxford Lavinia represents both Queen Elizabeth and the Shakespeare) whereas Gary Taylor, in a chapter city of Antwerp, ravished “within its walls and in its entitled ‘Works included in this Edition’ in Textual low-lying situation” by the Spanish Fury (Clark). Companion, accepts joint authorship as “plausible”. Clark suggests that this may have been the play Furthermore, they tend to disagree on date: Wells recorded as “The historye of Titus and Gisippus . . . prefers an early date c. 1590–1, but Taylor prefers showen at Whitehall on Shrovestuesdaie at night 1592–3. Taylor devotes more space to dating Titus [February 19, 1577], enacted by the Children of than to any other play, asserting that the 1594 title Pawles.” She proposes that ‘and Gisippus’ may have page indicates separate performances by the three been a misrepresentation of ‘Andronicus’ as both companies listed. He argues that the reference in have similar letters. She suggests that the play was A Knack to know a Knave (performed by Strange’s then revised in the 1580s to include Aaron, after Men in 1592 but printed in 1594) was probably Oxford had been denounced by Charles Arundel.7 added in 1594, because Titus had not been listed among the plays performed by Strange’s Men External Oxfordian Evidence in 1592–3. Taylor states the dilemma regarding dates: “Titus Andronicus must have belonged to In Bartholomew Fair (1614) Jonson had stated that Strange’s Men either long before 1592 or not until admirers of Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedyand Titus after January 1593 [to allow its transfer between Andronicus had “stood still these five and twenty, companies].” or thirty years”. This would date the two plays Wiggins dates this play c. 1592. He notes as having reached their peak of appeal between that the “ascription of three companies on the 1584 and 1589. Jonson gave similar figures in title page [Q1, 1594], Derby’s Men, Pembroke’s Cynthia’s Revels (1600): “they say, the umbrae Men and Sussex’s Men, presents three issues of of ghosts of some three or four plays, departed interpretation: first whether it indicates three a dozen years since, have been seen walking on successive productioons by the named companies your stage here.” A few lines further on, there or whether (as Bate proposes) the three companies follows mention of The Old Hieronymo (an earlier may have performed the play together; secondly version of The Spanish Tragedy), clearly one of the whether the companies are named in a meaningful plays “departed” a dozen years since (i.e. c. 1588). chronological sequence, and finally whether Although separated by a gap of 14 years, Jonson’s “Derby’s Men” refer to the troupe patronised by statements are entirely consistent. As Honigmann the 4th Earl of Derby [d. 1593] or the 5th [d. emphasises, Jonson clearly believed Titus and The 1594]. Spanish Tragedy both to have been written and

© De Vere Society 6 Dating Shakespeare’s Plays: Titus Andronicus to have reached the zenith of popularity in the Other Cited Works 1580s. Peele would have been employed at some time later, perhaps c. 1594, to revise the opening Bate, Jonathan (ed.), Titus Andronicus, London: (Act 1 and Act 2 scenes 1 & 2). Methuen Arden 3, 1995 Bullough, G. Narrative and Dramatic Sources of Shakespeare, vol. VI, London, Routledge, 1966 Conclusion Chambers, E. K. The Elizabethan Stage, Oxford, 1923 —, William Shakespeare: a study of facts and problems, Titus Andronicus can be dated between 1579 (the 2 vols, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1930 publication of North’s Plutarch) and 1594, when Clark, E. T., Hidden Allusions in Shakespeare’s Plays, it was first published. It may refer to the Sack of 1974 Antwerp in 1576. There are various reasons to Farmer, J. S. (ed.), A Knack to know a Knave, Kessinger believe it was so popular in the 1580s, that it was Publishing, (1911) rptd 2007 Frazer, Winnifred, “Henslowe’s ‘ne’ ”, NQ, 236 (1991): acted by a range of companies. 34-5 George, David, “Shakespeare and Pembroke’s Men”, Notes SQ, 32 (1981): 305–23 Hess, W. R. et al., “Shakespeare’s dates: their Effects upon Stylistic Analysis”, The Oxfordian,vol.II. 1. The quotation comes from the Induction to Portland, 1999 Bartholomew Fair, 107, which according to E. Honigmann, E. A. J., Shakespeare’s Impact upon his A. Horsman, was written and acted in 1614. Contemporaries, 1982 He says (11) that some exaggeration of the age Horsman, E. A. (ed.), Bartholomew Fair: Ben Jonson, of Jeronimo and Andronicus “is likely in this London: Revels Plays, 1960 context.” Hughes, Alan (ed.), Titus Andronicus, The New 2. Chambers, ES, IV, 24–25, cites the play’s entries Cambridge Shakespeare: CUP, 1994 in the SR and in Henslowe’s Diary. He reports Maxwell, J. C. (ed.), Titus Andronicus, London: the suggestion that the play may have been Methuen Arden 2, 1953 revived in 1597 under the name Osric. Nelson, Alan H, Monstrous Adversary: The Life of 3. Mentioned by Bate, 43, the performance was Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, Liverpool: described by a Frenchman, Jacques Petit, who LUP, 2003 was a tutor in the household at the time. Roper, D., “The Henry Peacham Chronogram”, The 4. Chambers, WS, I, 312–22, refers to the Shakespeare Oxford Newsletter, 37.3, Fall 2001 Peacham manuscript and gives a facsimile Spencer, T. J. B., “Shakespeare and the Elizabethan of the illustration. This is the earliest known Romans”, Shakespeare Survey, 10, 1957: 27–38 illustration of any play of Shakespeare. Vickers, Brian, Shakespeare Co-Author, Oxford: OUP, 5. This publication is held at the Pepys Library, 2002 Magdelene College, Cambridge. Waith, Eugene M. (ed.), Titus Andronicus, Oxford: 6. George Gascoigne quickly published his eye- OUP, 1984 witness account of The Spoyle of Antwerpe. Wells, S. & G. Taylor (eds), The Complete Oxford Faithfully reported, by a true Englishman, who Shakespeare, Oxford: OUP, 1986 was present at the same (1576). Gascoigne was —, William Shakespeare: a textual companion. Oxford: known to Oxford at Gray’s Inn during the late OUP, 1987 1560s. Nelson (80) describes how Gascoigne Wiggins, Martin (ed.) British Drama 1533–1642: A and Oxford sailed together to Holland in 1572. Catalogue, Volume III: 1590–1597. Oxford, 7. Clark in Hidden Allusions in Shakespeare’s Plays OUP, 2013 (1931, reprinted 1974) 47–59 develops this Wilson, J. D. (ed.), Titus Andronicus, New Cambridge argument in great detail. Chambers, ES, IV, Shakespeare: CUP, 1948 93, cites the performance of Titus and Gisippus at court on 19 February 1577. However, most Oxfordians believe that Titus and Gisippus is more likely to have been an early version of Two Gentlemen of Verona. For biographical details about Oxford’s denunciation by Charles Arundel, see Nelson, (249–257).