court must therefore have taken place on St. Stephen's night (December 26), 1606. This is the only piece of external evidence that bears on the date of the play. But there is internal evidence to show that King Lear was not written before 1603. As the notes point out, there are several passages that prove Shakespeare's knowledge of Harsnet's Declaration of Egregious Popishe Impostures. The names of the devils mentioned by Edgar when feigning madness are undoubtedly borrowed from this book," while certain other remarks made by him in his rôle of Tom of Bedlam point to a like indebtedness.2 Harsnet's book was entered in the Stationers' Registers on March 16, 1603, and appeared later in the same year. Unfortunately this is the only evidence that is at all definite. It is highly probable that the play was written in 1606, though the arguments urged in support of a date nearer the end than the beginning of the period from 1603 to Christmas, 1606, are not conclusive. Some students would assign King Lear to 1605 because they surmise that the publication in that year of an old play on the same subject (The True Chronicle History of King Leir) was caused by the successful appearance of Shakespeare's version on the stage. Malone notes that in iii. 4. 189 Edgar says “I smell the blood of a British man, ” and he argues therefrom that this must have been written after James's proclamation as King of Great Britain on October 24, 1604. But it has been pointed out that as early as 1603, even before James's arrival in London, the poet Daniel addressed to him a Panegyrike Congratulatory, which has the lines : "Shake hands with union, O thou mightie state, No Scot, no English now, nor no debate.” More weight attaches to the plea put forward by Mr. Aldis Wright, for, though it does not force acceptance, it strengthens the supposition of a late date. In the second scene of the first act there are references to "these late eclipses in the sun and moon.” In October, 1605, there was a great eclipse of the sun following an eclipse of the moon in the previous month, and Mr. Wright argues that "it can scarcely be doubted that Shakespeare had in his mind the great eclipse, and that Lear was written while the recollection of it was still fresh, and while the ephemeral literature of the day 1 See iii. 4. 120; iii. 6. 7, 31; and iv. 1. 62. abounded with pamphlets foreboding the consequences that were to follow.”i Similarly, he hazards the further plausible suggestion that the reference in the same scene to “machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders” may have been prompted by the Gunpowder Plot of November 5, 1605. All this, however, is mere supposition. There were eclipses of the sun and moon in 1598 and again in 1601,- and it is not impossible that Shakespeare's words were suggested by a recollection of them. None the less, the trend of the arguments, though inconclusive in themselves, is to support the date 1606; and as King Lear was acted before James at Christmas, 1606, and as the plays represented at court were usually new plays, that date may be accepted.3 3. THE SOURCES OF THE PLOT The story of King Lear was familiar in various forms to the Elizabethans. From the twelfth to the sixteenth century it had been told again and again in chronicles and romances, both French and English. It is first found in the Historia Britonum of Geoffrey of Monmouth, written in Latin about 1135. Geoffrey attached an immemorially old folk tale about a father and three daughters to a mythical British king, to whom he gave the name of a Celtic seagod, Leir. From Geoffrey the story passed into Wace's French poem, Brut (c. 1155), and thence into Layamon's Brut (c. 1200), where the story is first given in English. Thereafter it is told in the metrical chronicles of Robert of Gloucester (c. 1300), Robert Manning (c. 1338), and John Harding (c. 1450), and in the more detailed prose chronicles of Robert Fabyan (1516), John Rastell (The Pasttime of the People, 1530), Richard Grafton (1568), and Raphael Holinshed (1577), while a similar story is given in Camden's Remains (1605). Two versions of it occur in translations of the Gesta Romanorum, the great mediæval storehouse of legendary tales. And it found a poetical setting in Elizabethan literature in John Higgins's contribution to The Mirror for Magistrates (1574), in Warner's Albion's England (1586, ch. 14), and in Spenser's Faërie 1 Preface to the Clarendon Press edition, p. xvi. 2 See King Lear, ed. W. J. Craig (1901), p. xxiii. 3 The metrical evidence affords little or no assistance. For a statement of the metrical characteristics, see Fleay's Shakespeare Manual, p. 136, and Prof. Ingram's paper on “Light and Weak Endings” in the Transactions of the New Shakspere Society, 1874, pt. ii. Cf. Table I in chapter iv of W. A. Neilson and A. H. Thorndike's The Facts about Shakespeare (1913). 4 See Wilfred Perrett, The Story of King Lear, Berlin, 1904. Queene (1590, Book ii, canto x). Including the early play entitled The True Chronicle History of King Leir, which appeared in 1605,1 there are extant at least eight Elizabethan versions of earlier date than the drama by which it has been immortalized. Of the contemporary versions Shakespeare may have known those in Holinshed's Chronicle, The Mirror for Magistrates, and the Faërie Queene, as well as the early play. Holinshed's Chronicle was the great source of Shakespeare's histories. Certain passages in some of them, e.g. Henry V and Henry VIII, are little more than versified renderings of Holinshed's prose. But the fact that it provided so much material for Shakespeare's other plays has led to overstatement of its influence on King Lear. In Holinshed's account Leir loves Cordeilla far above her two elder sisters, and intends her to succeed to his kingdom; but, being displeased with her answer at the love-test, he determines that his land shall be divided after his death between Gonorilla and Regan (who so far were unmarried), and that a half thereof shall immediately be assigned them, while to Cordeilla he reserves nothing. But in time the two dukes whom the two eldest daughters had married rise against Leir and deprive him of the government, assigning him a portion on which to live. The daughters, however, seem to think that whatever the father has is too much, and gradually curtail his retinue. Leir is constrained to flee the country and seek comfort of Cordeilla, who has married a prince of Gallia. In Gallia he is honored as if he were king of the whole country. Cordeilla and her husband then raise'a mighty army, cross over to Britain with Leir, and defeat the forces of Gonorilla and Regan. Leir is restored and rules for two years, and is succeeded by Cordeilla. It will be seen that Holinshed's story, meager as it is, differs in many points from Shakespeare's. It was certainly not used as the basis of King Lear. Indeed there is absolutely nothing to prove 1 There is entered in the Registers of the Stationers' Company, under the date May 14, 1594, The moste famous Chronicle historye of Leire kinge of England and his Three Daughters. No copy of this is known, but it is probably the same as The Tragecall historie of kinge Leir and his Three Daughters, which was entered on May 8, 1605, and appeared in the same year with the following title, The True Chronicle History of King Leir and his three Daughters, Gonorill, Ragan, and Cordella. As it hath bene diuers and sundry times lately acted. This is reprinted in George Steevens' Six Old Plays (1779), vol. ii; in W. C. Hazlitt's Shakespeare's Library (1875), pt. ii, vol. ii ; by W. W. Greg for the Malone Society (1907); and by Sidney Lee in the Shakespeare Classics (1909)An abstract is given in Furness's Variorum Shakespeare. See R. A. Law's "The Date of King Lear" in the Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, vol. xxi. 2 These three versions are reprinted in Appendix A. that Shakespeare consulted it, though the probability is, considering his use of other parts of the Chronicle, that he had read Holinshed's version. The story in The Mirror for Magistrates has more points of similarity. According to it, Leire intended “to guerdon most where favour most he found” (cf. i. 1. 53–54); and Cordell in her reply refers to the chance of bearing another more good-will, meaning a future husband (cf. i. 1. 103-104). Leire does not resign the government at once, but is deprived of his crown and right by the husbands of Gonerell and Ragan, who promise him a guard of sixty knights. This number Gonerell reduces by half, whereupon Leire goes to Cornwall to stay with Ragan, who after a time takes away all his retinue but ten, then allows him but five, and finally but one. Another indignity he has to suffer is that “the meaner upstart courtiers think themselves his mates.” And his daughters call him a “doting fool.” As in Holinshed, Leire flees to France, returns with Cordell and an army which proves victorious, and is restored to his kingdom. But, generally, this account bears a much closer resemblance than Holinshed's to the story of King Lear. Some of the details of The Mirror for Magistrates are paralleled in Shakespeare's play. This, however, is a circumstance on which too great stress is apt to be laid, for similarity or even identity of idea does not prove indebtedness. The most striking point is Cordell's allusion in the love-test to her future husband. But it happens that in Camden's Remains a similar story of the love-test is told of Ina, king of the West Saxons, and there the youngest daughter replies to her father "flatly, without flattery, that albeit she did love, honour, and reverence him, and so would whilst she lived, as much as nature and daughterly duty at the uttermost could expect, yet she did think that one day it would come to pass that she should affect another more fervently, meaning her husband, when she were married.” Malone, who drew attention to this passage, thinks that Shakespeare had it in his thoughts rather than the lines in The Mirror for Magistrates, as Camden's book had recently been published, and as a portion near at hand "furnished him with a hint in Coriolanus." No definite opinion can be advanced; but the effect is only to render Shakespeare's debt to The Mirror for Magistrates more doubtful. In one striking point Shakespeare is indebted to Spenser. In 1 Perhaps the parallelisms are due to the intermediary of the early play, which resembles in several points the story in The Mirror for Magistrates. There would be less difficulty in showing the early dramatist's acquaintance with it than there is in showing Shakespeare's. Holinshed's Chronicle the heroine's name is Cordeilla, in The Mirror for Magistrates it is Cordell, and in the early play it is Cordella; in King Lear the name has the beautiful form first adopted in the Faërie Queene. The two great Elizabethans are alike also in their division of Lear's kingdom, for neither makes Lear reserve to himself any share in the government, while in Holinshed and in The Mirror for Magistrates the two elder daughters are not given at once their full share, and wrest the supreme power by force of arms. Shakespeare is sometimes said to be indebted to the simile 2 in Spenser's account; but this is a point that cannot be pressed. We are on surer ground in dealing with the early play, the anonymous True Chronicle History of King Leir. The main incidents of this drama, and in particular some of its deviations from the usual story, have their counterpart in King Lear. In one of his snatches of song, Shakespeare's fool speaks of “That lord that counsell’d thee to give away thy land” (i. 4. 154-155). There is nothing in the rest of the play to explain the allusion; but we find that in the old play the love-test is proposed by a courtier, Skalliger by name, and that Lear at once resigns his whole kingdom to Gonorill and Ragan. Another courtier, Perillus, who is entirely the early dramatist's own invention, is the prototype of Kent. He pleads for Cordella, but in vain, and afterwards, with Kent's fidelity, attends in disguise on the old king. A messenger, and the miscarriage of letters, play an important part in the development of the plot. Again, in the pathetic scene in which Leir comes to recognize Cordella, he kneels to her (cf. iv. 7. 59). These are some of the most striking points of similarity in the development of the two plays. But indebtedness may be traced even in minor matters. We seem to catch an echo now and then of some of the statements and phrases of the old play. Thus : "I am as kind as is the pellican, That kils it selfe to save her young ones lives” reminds us of Lear’s reference to his "pelican daughters” (iii. 4. 77). The allusion to Gonorill's "young bones”. "poore soule, she breeds yong bones, And that is it makes her so tutchy sure suggests ii. 4. 165, while the sentiment is the same as that expressed in ii. 4. 107–113. It is probable, too, that Perillus's description of 1 Spenser once has the form "Cordeill," apparently shortened from Holinshed's "Cordeilla." It would appear that the exigencies of metre suggested "Cordelia." Spenser was undoubtedly indebted to Holinshed for the story. 2 See i. 4. 237. |