THE EARLIEST PLAY WRITTEN BY FRANCIS BACON WHEN HE WAS ONLY SEVEN YEARS OLD LIKE WILL TO LIKE ONE OF THREE WORKS WRITTEN IN THE NAME OF HIS LITERARY MASK ULPIAN FULWELL AND THEIR LINKS TO HIS SHAKESPEARE PLAYS By A Phoenix FOR THOSE UNABLE TO IMMEDIATELY READ THIS PAPER YOU MIGHT WISH TO TURN TO pp. 79-80 FOR THE ANAGRAM OF F. BACON IN THE FIRST SIX LINES OF LIKE WILL TO LIKE. 1 CONTENTS 1. What we know of the man Ulpian Fulwell in whose name were printed Like Will To Like (1568), The Flower of Fame (1575) and Ars Adulandi, or The Art of Flattery (1576) p. 4 2. The Flower of Fame written by Francis Bacon and its links to his Shakespeare Works p. 8 3. The Art of Flattery written by Francis Bacon and its links to his Shakespeare Works p. 47 4. Like Will to Like the earliest play written by Francis Bacon when he was seven years old and its links to his Shakespeare Works p. 77 References p. 108 2 FACSIMILES Fig. 1 Francis Bacon’s MSS The Northumberland Manuscript p. 29 Fig. 2 The Northumberland MSS & a Remarkable Discovery p. 30 Fig. 3 The First Page of The Rape of Lucrece p. 39 Fig. 4 The Last Page of The Rape of Lucrece p. 40 Fig. 5 Title Page of The Flower of Fame 1575 (deciphered) p. 44 Fig. 6 Mildred Cecil Acrostic in The Art of Flattery p. 70 Fig. 7 Edmund Harman Acrostic in The Art of Flattery p. 70 Fig. 8 Anagram of F. Bacon in The Art of Flattery p. 73 Fig. 9 Title Page of The Art of Flattery 1576 (deciphered) p. 74 Fig. 10 First Page of Like Will to Like & anagram of F. Bacon p. 80 Fig. 11 Title Page of Like Will to Like 1576 p. 88 Fig. 12 Title Page of Like Will to Like Second Edition Undated p. 89 Fig. 13 Title Page of Like Will to Like 1587 p. 90 3 1. WHAT WE KNOW OF THE MAN ULPIAN FULWELL IN WHOSE NAME WERE PRINTED LIKE WILL FOR LIKE (1568), THE FLOWER OF FAME (1575) AND ARS ADULANDI, OR THE ART OF FLATTERY (1576) Every man of superior understanding in contact with inferiors wears a mask. …from the moment you learn to speak you are under the necessity of drinking in and assimilating what perhaps I may be allowed to call a hotch-potch of errors. Nor do these errors derive their strength only from popular usage. They are sanctioned by the institutions of academies, colleges, orders, and even states themselves. [Francis Bacon, The Refutation of Philosophies, trans. Benjamin Farrington, The Philosophy Of Francis Bacon (Liverpool University Press,1964), p. 108] Virtually all the educated literary world knows nothing or next to nothing about the man Ulpian Fulwell and are completely unfamiliar with the three works printed in his name which in modern times have long since been overlooked, neglected and remain largely inaccessible and unread. It seems that posterity has conspired to keep Ulpian Fulwell the man hidden from us in what amounts to a four hundred year near silence during which time very little has come down to us. The few brief notices there have been of Ulpian Fulwell starting with Wood in the seventeenth century contain hardly any biographical information and what very little is given is marred by inaccuracies and glaring omissions.1 The very brief entry for Ulpian Fulwell in the Dictionary of National Biography by Gordon Goodwin printed at the end of the nineteenth century (1889) contains such scant biographical information that to give a sense of its paucity it is necessary to quote what there is of it in its entirety: FULLWELL, ULPIAN (fl 1586), poet, ‘a Somersetshire man born, and a gentleman’s son,’ …In 1570 Fulwell was rector of Naunton, Gloucestershire…to which he had presumably been presented by Queen Elizabeth…Fulwell became a commoner of St. Mary Hall, Oxford, in 1578, but probably did not take a degree. In 1572 he married at Naunton a lady whose baptismal name was Eleanor, and thenceforward some years his signature occurs frequently in the register of that parish, chiefly in reference to the christening of his various children. In 1585 his name appears in connection with the burial of a son; in the following year Joseph Hanxman became rector of Naunton.2 It will be observed that Gordon Goodwin in not knowing anything about his parental background, early education, nor a single fact about the first twenty-five years of his life, save what he had gleaned from Wood that he was a ‘Somerset man born, and a gentleman’s son’, writes ‘fl 1586’, most probably the year of his death. The entry is further marred by a series of misquotations, errors and incorrect statements.3 In an edition printed in the series of The Tudor Facsimile Texts of Like Will To Like by Ulpian Fulwell (‘Issued for Subscribers’) in 1909 its editor John S. Farmer states at the end of its brief introduction (and I quote in full) ‘Little is known of the author beyond his name: see “Dictionary of National Biography.”4 Three years earlier neatly tucked away at the back of The Dramatic Writings of Ulpian Fulwell (‘Privately Printed for Subscribers by the Early English Drama Society’) the same editor states ‘FULLWELL (ULPIAN), fl. 1586).Very little is known of the author of this play’ before repeating the biographical information from the Dictionary of National Biography.5 4 There has been two unpublished PhD dissertations written about Ulpian Fulwell and the writings printed in his name. In the first of these entitled ‘The English Works Of Ulpian Fulwell’, the very first line by its author Edward Clarence Wright reads ‘Very few recorded facts are available about the life of Ulpian Fulwell’6 and he says in his preface that his general introduction ‘attempts as complete a biographical sketch of Fulwell as existing documents in the University of Illinois Library can make it.’7 He is unfortunately unaware of two important articles by Irving Ribner which produces some new information on Fulwell’s family background and also errs in his attempted identification of Edmund Harman whose importance will become apparent later.8 In her unpublished PhD dissertation ‘A Biography of Ulpian Fulwell and A Critical Edition Of The Art Of Flattery’, writing in 1980, Roberta Buchanan correctly points out ‘The Dictionary of National Biography article by Gordon Goodwin, published at the end of the nineteenth century, is still used as the major reference source for information on Fulwell.’9 Unlike her PhD predecessor, Buchanan is aware of the two articles by Ribner from which she omits some important information in what remains the fullest biographical account of Fulwell to date.10 Based on her PhD thesis Roberta Buchanan published the heavily condensed Ars Adulandi, Or The Art Of Flattery By Ulpian Fulwell A Critical Edition With A Biography Of The Author (Institut Fur Anglistik und Amerikanistik Universitat Salzburg, Austria, 1984).11 In the recent modern entry for Ulpian Fulwell in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004-21) largely based upon Buchanan and the two Ribner articles (listed in its sources with Anthony Wood, Mark Eccles, Peter Happe, editor of Like Will to Like, and the archive source TNA: PRO apology for Ars Adulandi, ecclesiastical documents E 135/9/5) its author David Kathman presents the most accessible biographical account of his subject to date: Fulwell, Ulpian (1545/6-1584x6), playwright and satirist, was born in Wells, Somerset, the elder son of two sons of Thomas Fulwell (d. 1563) linen draper, and his wife, Christabel James (d. 1584). His childhood was marked by conflict over 400 acres of ecclesiastical land that his father had leased in 1539 from kinsman John Goodman, the corrupt subchanter of Wells Cathedral. When Thomas Fulwell proved too independent of Goodman the latter unleashed a decades-long campaign of violent harassment that resulted in numerous lawsuits ….Fulwell’s mother later deplored her two sons’ ‘unthrifty courses’ and tried unsuccessfully to disinherit them from the leased land (Buchanan, x-xi). After his father’s death, in 1563 Fulwell studied to be a clergyman, and was ordained on 15 September 1566…. [c. 1566-7] Fulwell became engaged to Marie Stubbard but he did not go through with the marriage after discovering that his bride-to-be was already married to William Gascoigne. Late in 1570 he became rector of Naunton, Gloucestershire, and there, on 13 May 1572, he married Eleanor Warde (d. 1577). Fulwell does not seem to have been a very conscientious rector; in 1572 the episcopal visitation noted that the church was in a state of decay, and in 1576 he was fined for negligence because the clerk was illiterate and parents were not sending their children to learn the catechism. ….After the book’s publication [Ars adulandi, or, The Art of Flattery] Fulwell was called before the court of the high commission in London, and on 7 July 1576 was ordered to make a public recantation before the bishop of Bath and Wells. ….His wife, Eleanor, died in December 1577, and on 14 April 1578 he married Marie Whorwood. The couple had six children, all baptized at Naunton [here all named]…In March 1579, at the advanced age of thirty-three, Fulwell matriculated at St Mary Hall, Oxford …Although there is no record of his graduation he was described master of the arts in May 1584. Fulwell had died by July 1586, when there was a dispute over the advowson of the 5 Naunton rectory, leaving his wife and children in poverty.