It has been supposed that some of the paternal ancestors of William Shakespeare were advanced, and rewarded with lands and tenements in Warwickshire, for services rendered to Henry VII. The rolls of that reign have been recently most carefully searched, and the name of Shakespeare, according to any mode of spelling it, does not occur in them.

Many Shakespeares were resident in different parts of Warwickshire, as well as in some of the adjoining counties, at an early date. The register of the Guild of St. Anne of Knolle, or Knowle, beginning in 1407 and ending in 1535, when it was dissolved, contains various repetitions of the name, during the reigns of Henry VI., Edward IV., Richard III., Henry VII., and Henry VIII. Malone carries back his information regarding the Shakespeares of Warwick no higher than 1602, but a William Shakespeare was drowned in the Avon, near Warwick, in 1574, a John Shakespeare was resident on "the High Pavement" in 1578, and a Thomas Shakespeare in the same place in 1585.

The earliest date at which we hear of a Shakespeare in the borough of Stratford-upon-Avon is 1555, when T. Siche instituted a proceeding in the court of the bailiff, for the recovery of 81. from John Shakespeare, who in the Latin record of the suit is called "glover." Taking it for granted, as we have reason to do, that this John Shakespeare was the father of the poet, the document shows that he was a glover, and not a butcher, as Aubrey had affirmed,' nor a dealer in wool, as Rowe

1 Aubrey's words are these:-"William Shakespeare's father was a butcher, and I have been told heretofore by some of the neighbours, that when he was a boy he exercised his father's

had stated; as this testimony is unquestionably more authentic than either of these traditions.

Though the register is in the law-Latin of the times, John Shakespeare's trade, "glover," is expressed in English by the common contraction for the termination of the word; and it is, as usual at the time, spelled with the letter u instead of v. But although John Shakespeare is often subsequently mentioned in the records of the corporation of Stratford, no addition accompanies his name. We may presume that in 1556, he was established in his business, because on the 30th April of that year he was one of twelve jurymen of a court-leet. Thus we find him in 1556 acting as a regular trading inhabitant of Stratford-upon-Avon.

Little doubt can be entertained that he came from Snitterfield, three miles from Stratford; and upon this point we have several new documents before us. It

trade; but when he killed a calf, he would do it in a high style, and make a speech." But at what date Aubrey obtained his information has not been ascertained: Malone conjectured that Aubrey was in Stratford about 1680: he died about 1700, and, in all probability, obtained his knowledge from the same source as the writer of a letter, dated April 10, 1693, to Mr. Edward Southwell, printed in 1838. It appears from hence that the parish clerk of Stratford, who was "above eighty years old" in 1693, had told Mr. Edward Southwell's correspondent that William Shakespeare had been "bound apprentice to a butcher;" but he did not say that his father was a butcher, nor did he add any thing as absurd as Aubrey subjoins, respecting the killing of a calf "in a high style."

1 Rowe is supposed to have derived his materials from Betterton, the actor, who died in 1710, and who, it is said, went to Strat ford to collect such particulars as could be obtained: the date of his visit is not known.

By a

appears from them, that a person of the name of Richard Shakespeare was resident at Snitterfield in 1550: he was tenant of a house and land belonging to Robert Arden, (or Ardern, as the name was anciently spelled,) of Wilmecote, in the parish of Astou Cantlowe. conveyance, dated 21st December, 11th Henry VIII., we find that Robert Arden then became possessed of houses and land in Snitterfield: the property descended to his son, and it was part of this estate which was occupied by Richard Shakespeare in 1550. If we suppose Richard Shakespeare of Snitterfield to have been the father of John Shakespeare of Stratford, who married Mary Arden, the youngest daughter of Robert Arden, it will explain the manner in which John Shakespeare became introduced to the family of the Ardens. Robert Arden, who married Agnes Webbe, and died in 1556, had seven daughters, as in 1550 he executed two deeds, by which he settled in trust for some of his daughters, certain lands and tenements.1 In these deeds he mentions six daughters by name, four of them married and two single. Mary, his youngest daughter, was not included, and it is possible that he had either made some other provision for her, or that, by a separate and subsequent deed of trust, he gave to her an equivalent in Snitterfield for what he had made over to her sisters. It is certain that Mary Arden brought property in Snitterfield, as part of her fortune, to her husband John Shakespeare.

They are thus described: "Totum illud messuagium meum, et tres quartronas terræ, cum pratis eisdem pertinentibus, cum suis pertinentiis, in Snytterfylde, quæ nunc sunt in tenura cujusdam Ricardi Henley, ac totum illud cottagium meum, cum gardino et pomario adjacentibus, cum suis pertinentiis, in Snytterfyld, quæ nunc sunt in tenura Hugonis Porter."

D

The Ardens were an ancient family in Warwickshire, which derived its name from the forest of Arden, or Ardern, in or near which they had possessions; yet Robert Arden, in these deeds, is called "husbandman:" "Robertus Ardern de Wilmecote, in parochia de Aston Cantlowe, in comitatu Warwici, husbandman." But it is evident from his will that he was a man of good landed estate. His seventh daughter, Mary, John Shakespeare married in 1557, which date is fixed by these facts.

Mary Arden and her sister Alicia were certainly unmarried, when they were appointed" executores" under their father's will, dated 24th November, 1556, and it is probable that they were chosen on that account, in preference to their married sisters. Joan, the first child of John Shakespeare and his wife Mary, was baptized in the church of Stratford-upon-Avon on the 15th September, 1558, so that we may fix their union towards the close of 1557, about a year after the death of Robert Arden.

What were the circumstances of John Shakespeare at this time, we can only conjecture; he seems to have been established, a year before, in business as a glover, a branch of trade much carried on in that part of the kingdom, and he served upon the jury of a court-leet in 1556; and his union with the youngest of seven coheiresses, brought him some independent property.

Under her father's will she inherited 61. 138. 4d. in money, and a small estate in fee, in the parish of Aston Cantlowe, called Asbyes, consisting of a messuage, fifty acres of arable land, six acres of meadow and pasture, and a right of common for all kinds of cattle. Malone's estimate, that Mary Arden's fortune was equal to 1107. 13s. 4d., seems an under calculation of its value. He 13

also speculated, that at the time of their marriage John Shakespeare was twenty-seven years old, and Mary Arden eighteen; but we have no evidence upon the point. Had she been so young, it seems unlikely that her father would have appointed her one of his executors in the preceding year, and we incline to think that she must have been of age in November, 1556.

On the 2d October, 1556, John Shakespeare became the owner of two copy-hold houses in Stratford, the one in Greenhill-street, with a garden and croft attached to it, and a house in Henley-street, with a garden; for each he was to pay to the lord of the manor an annual rent of sixpence. In 1557 he was again sworn as a juryman upon the court-leet, and in the spring of the following year he was amerced in the sum of

14

fourpence for not keeping clean the gutter in front of his dwelling. It is probable that he was first admitted a member of the corporation of Stratford in 1557, when he was made one of the ale-tasters of the town; and in September, 1558, he was appointed one of the four constables. He continued constable in 1559, and he was besides one of four persons, called affeerors, whose duty it was to impose fines upon their fellow-townsmen for offences against the bye-laws of the borough.

1 The original memorandum runs thus:

"Francis Berbage, Master Baly that now ys, Adreane Quyny, Mr. Hall, Mr. Clopton, for the gutter alonge the chappell in Chappell Lane, John Shakspeyr, for not kepynge of their gutters cleane, they stand amerced."

The sum which they were so amerced, 4d., is placed above the names of each of the parties.

JOHN SHAKESPEARE's eldest child, Joan, baptized, as already stated, on the 15th September, 1558, died in her infancy. In the registers of marriages, baptisms. and deaths at Stratford, some confusion has been produced by the fact, that two persons of the name of John Shakespeare were living in the town at the same time, and it is not easy to distinguish between the entries which relate to the one, or to the other: thus, it was formerly thought that John Shakespeare, the father of the Poet, had lost his first wife, Mary Arden, and had taken a second, in consequence of a memorandum in the register, showing that on the 25th November, 1584, John Shakespeare had married Margery Roberts; Malone, however, has succeeded in proving, that this entry and others, of the births of Philip, Ursula, and Humphrey Shakespeare, relate to John Shakespeare, a shoemaker, and not to John Shakespeare the glover.

John Shakespeare was again chosen one of the affeerors of Stratford in 1561, and he and his associates seem to have displayed great vigilance and perhaps severity from the number of persons who were amerced in sums varying from 68. 8d. to 2d. "The bailiff that now is," was fined 38. 4d. for "breaking the assize," he being a "common baker:" three other bakers were severally compelled to pay similar amounts on the same occasion, and for the same offence. In September following, John Shakespeare was elected one of the chamberlains of the borough, a responsible post, in which he remained two years.

His second child, Margaret, or Margareta, (as the name stands in the register,) was baptized on the 2d December, 1562. She was buried on 30th April, 1563. A year afterwards William Shakespeare was born. The day of his birth cannot be fixed with absolute certainty, but he was baptized on 26th April, 1564, and the memorandum in the register is in the following form:

"1564. April 26. Gulielmus filius Johannes Shakspere."

So that whoever kept the book either committed a common clerical error, or was no great proficient in the rules of grammar. It seems likely that our great dramatist had been brought into the world only three days before he was baptized,' and it was then the custom to carry infants very early to the font. A house is still pointed out by tradition, in Henley-street, as that in which William Shakespeare first saw the light, and we know that his father was the owner of two copy-hold dwellings in Henley-street and Greenhill-street; it is probable that the birth took place in the former. William was at this time the only child of his parents, they having previously lost their two girls.

A malignant fever, denominated the plague, broke out in Stratford while he was in extreme infancy; he was not two months old when it made its appearance, having been brought from London, where, according to Stow, it raged with great violence throughout the year 1563. and did not so far abate that term could be kept at Westminster, until Easter, 1564. It was most fatal at Stratford between June and December, 1564, and Malone calculated that it carried off in that interval more than a seventh part of the whole population, consisting of about fourteen hundred inhabitants. It does not appear that it reached any member of the immediate family of John Shakespeare, and it is not at all unlikely that he avoided its ravages by quitting Stratford for Snitterfield, where he owned some property in right of his wife, and where perhaps his father was still living as a tenant.

1 The inscription on his monument supports the opinion that he was born on the 23d April: without the contractions it runs thus:

"Obiit Anno Domini 1616. Etatis 53, die 23 Aprilis:"

and this, in truth, is the only evidence upon the point. Malone referred to the statement of the Rev. J. Greene, as an authority, but he was master of the free-school at Stratford nearly two centuries after the death of Shakespeare, and, in all probability, spoke only from the tenor of the inscription in the church.

That John Shakespeare was at this date in moderate, and probably comfortable, though not in affluent circumstances, appears from a piece of evidence in the records of Stratford, being a list of the names of persons in the borough who, on this calamitous visitation of the plague, contributed to the relief of the poor. The meeting at which it was determined to collect subscriptions with this object was convened in the open air, "At a hall holden in our garden," etc.; no doubt on account of the infection. The donations varied between 78. 4d. (given by only one individual of the name of Richard Symens) and 6d.; and the sum against the name of John Shakespeare is 1s. Of twenty-four persons enumerated five others gave the same amount, while six gave less: the bailiff contributed 3s. 4d. and the head alderman 2s. 8d. while ten more put down either 2s. 6d. or 28. each, and another 4s. These subscriptions were raised on the 30th August, but on the 6th September, a further sum being required, the bailiff and six aldermen gave 1s. each, Adrian Quyney 1s. 6d., and John Shakespeare and four others 6d. each. We are, we think, warranted in concluding, that in 1564 John Shakespeare was an industrious and thriving tradesman.

He continued to advance in rank and importance in the corporation, and he was elected one of the fourteen aldermen of Stratford on the 4th July, 1565; and rather more than three years afterwards, when his son William was about four years and a half old, he became the chief officer or bailiff of Stratford-upon-Avon from Michaelmas 1568, to Michaelmas 1569, the autumn being the period of election. In the mean time his wife had brought him another son, who was christened Gilbert, on the 13th October, 1566.

Joan seems to have been a favourite name with the 16

Shakespeares; for a third daughter, born to John and Mary Shakespeare, they also baptized Joan, 15th April, 1569. The partiality for the name of Joan, in this instance, may be accounted for by the fact that a maternal aunt, married to Edward Lambert, was called Joan; and it is possible that she stood god-mother upon both occasions.

We have now traced John Shakespeare through various offices in the borough of Stratford, until he reached the highest distinction which it was in the power of his fellow-townsmen to bestow: he was bailiff, and ex-officio a magistrate.

Two new documents have recently come to light which belong to this period, and which show, beyond all dispute, that although John Shakespeare had risen to a station so respectable as that of bailiff of Stratford, with his name in the commission of the peace, he was not able to write. The records of the borough establish that in 1565, when John Wheler was called upon by nineteen aldermen and burgesses to undertake the duties of bailiff, John Shakespeare was among twelve other marksmen, including George Whately, the then bailiff, and Roger Sadler, the "head alderman." There was, therefore, nothing remarkable in this inability to write; and if there were any doubt upon this point, (it being a little ambiguous whether the signum referred to the name of Thomas Dyxun, or of John Shakespeare,) it is put at rest by two warrants, (in possession of the Shakespeare Society,) granted by John Shakespeare as bailiff of Stratford, the one dated the 3d, and the other the 9th December, 11 Elizabeth, for the caption of J. Ball and R. Walcar, for debt, to both of which his mark only is appended. The same fact is established by two other documents of a later date, to which we shall hereafter advert.