That Shakespeare Life

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Ep 114: The Tabard Inn with Martha Carlin Jun 22, 2020

Show notes

For the entirety of Shakespeare's life, the Tabard Inn was a well established public inn on the mainstreet of Southwark, leading to London Bridge, and it was famous because Chaucer had set the opening scene of The Canterbury Tales there, but according to a 27 page hand written document once owned by famous antiquary David Laing, the Tabard Inn served as a frequent meeting place for William Shakespeare, who gathered there with famous friends like Richard Burbage, Ben Jonson, and other "roystering associates" of the 16th century, all of whom carved their names into the wooden panels of this iconic public house in an act of graffiti that turns out to be a key piece of history.This paper record was left unnoticed for decades inside the Edinburgh University Library until a reference to it was rediscovered by Martha Carlin in 2013. Martha is Professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and she joins us today to share with us her fantastic discovery, the history of the Tabard Inn, why Shakespeare and his friends were writing on the walls there in the late 16th century.

Ep 113: Supernovas & Eclipses with Michael Rowan Robinson Jun 15, 2020

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In 1572, when William Shakespeare was 8 years old, a large supernova streaked across the sky making a lifelong mark in the memory of not just a young William Shakespeare, but across the consciousness of all of England who saw it that night. At the height of Renaissance thought, and during the time Galileo was presenting his ideas in Italy, William Shakespeare was writing Hamlet, King Lear, and other plays which not only allude to the work of famous physicists and astronomers of the 16th century, but in some cases, including the stars they studied, and even some family relatives of these astronomers, by name.

We do not often connect William Shakespeare and his work in theater with Euclidean Geometry, or the Copernican theory of the universe, but when we study the life of the bard, we discover that he was not only well educated in both, but contemporaries to the bard like Thomas Digges, and Tycho Brahe, were publishing works right alongside the plays of Shakespeare that captured the attention of England, and Europe, during the 16th century. Our guest this week, Dr. Michael Rowan Robinson has published extensively on the topics of mathematics, astronomy, and Shakespeare, and he is here today to explain the mathematical history of the bard, including the influence of Copernicus and Kepler on plays like Hamlet and King Lear.

Ep 112: Cutlery and Forks with Brigitte Webster Jun 08, 2020

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We sit down to a properly set table and expect to see at minimum a fork, knife, and a spoon. More elaborate settings may have more utensils, but for William Shakespeare, his lifetime was the first moment in England's history when dining habits were caught somewhere between the age of eating with one's hands, and the advent of proper utensils at the dining table. While the invention of the fork happened centuries prior to Shakespeare, the fashion of using them to eat with at a table for meals did not arrive in Europe until the youth of Shakespeare's parents, when in 1533 Catherine de Medici of France travelled from Italy to France to marry Henry II. Across Europe the couple held festivals to demonstrate their power, including the showcase of Catherine's unique eating methods, namely--the use of a fork. As the custom of eating with a fork made its' way across Europe, the fork was met with a mixed reception, and even morphed into a political symbol. By the time William Shakespeare was taking the world by storm, the fork was a novel eating instrument in England, fascinating some, and infuriating others.

Here to help us explore what the experience of eating at a table, and using a fork, would have been like for William Shakespeare is our guest, now three time a visitor here at That Shakespeare Life, Tudor enthusiasts, expert culinary historian, and my friend, Brigitte Webster.

Ep 111: Aqua Vitae and Scotch Whisky with Rosie Wilmot Jun 01, 2020

Show notes

Do you know the origin of the word "whiskey"? Turns out we have Scotland to thank for not only the drink we know as whiskey today, but the word we use to describe it as well. The earliest record of whiskey on paper happens in 1494 with a reference to aqua vitae in the Exchequer Rolls, but there was a great interest--and a good deal of illicit smuggling of Scotch whiskey-- happening not just in Shakespeare's lifetime, but under the title "aqua vitae" (which is used no less than 6 times in Shakespeare's plays), the beverage was also hugely popular for centuries prior to Shakespeare's life in the Catholic Church as a kind of holy water. After the Dissolution of the monasteries under Henry VIII, the monks with skills in distillery went underground to create whiskey, and in so doing formed one of the largest illegal operations in Europe. You may have thought all of the parodies of drunken friars like Friar Tuck from the Robin Hood tales, and in similar way, even Shakespeare's own Falstaff, may have been merely jokes for a story, but as our guest this week, Rosie Wilmot of the Scotch Whisky Association in Edinburgh Scotland is here to share with you today, these stories and aqua vitae, in particular, have a real historical basis directly from the life of William Shakespeare.

Ep 110: The Paston Letters with Rob Knee May 25, 2020

Show notes

The Paston Letters are a collection of over 1,000 pieces of correspondence between 1422 and 1509 which, while never intended to last into the modern era, have been preserved throughout the centuries for the unique light they shed on the everyday events in 15th century England. John Paston was a lawyer in England, and while the letters sometimes represent the communication of John Paston to members of the aristocracy most of the letters are written by his wife Margaret, who is writing to her husband at work in London. Replete with illustrations as well as words, the letters detail mundane items like shopping lists and recipes, provide examples of medieval colloquial expressions, and perhaps the most powerful content found in the Paston Letters is their timeline of how the War of the Roses unfolded. During the late 15th century, England was effectively lawless whilst the King was paralyzed due to his surrounding nobles stifling the enforcement of law. The Paston Letters show that the government of England was hugely disorganized, with even the succession to the crown coming under contestation. This overarching discontent led to the rising of Jack Cade, and outlines the rise of the War of the Roses. Since Shakespeare's history plays, also detail the rise of the War of the Roses, including characters like Jack Cade, and the character of Falstaff whom some scholars believe was based on a relative to the Pastons, a John Fastolf, there is often the suggestion that Shakespeare used the Paston Letters as a source for his plays. Is this true? Our guest, Rob Knee, from the Paston Heritage Society, is here this week to separate legend from fact as we explore the Paston Letters and their role in the life of William Shakespeare.

Ep 109: 16th Century Playing Cards with Kathryn James May 18, 2020

Show notes

With court records of Mary Queen of Scots playing cards, as well as James I of England preferring the game Maw when entertaining royal dignitaries, we know that playing cards was not just popular for royals but a pastime at all levels of society during Shakespeare's lifetime, and it was a relatively new arrival to England overall. Playing cards did not reach Europe until 1360, and the first mention we have of playing cards in England comes in 1463 when King Edward IV banned the import of playing cards to England in an effort to bolster the English economy by focusing production of cards at home. With the influx of French and Spanish playing cards during Shakespeare's lifetime, along with laws trying to have cards made in England exclusively, what did the average playing card look like? There is a representation of a six of diamonds on the wall of a small Suffolk church in Hessett, near Bury St Edmunds, which dates from the 15th century and that provides one example of design, but the pack of cards which has historically come to be associated with England specifically is a pack from Rouen, France, designed by Pierre Marechal. As playing cards grew in popularity, so did their design and the invention of various games--some of which like Noddy and Maw show up by name several of Shakespeare's plays. The suits, size of card, as well as material used to make playing cards was also widely varied in the 16th century, so how do we determine what counts as historically accurate for William Shakespeare? To find out this week, we turn to Kathryn James, Curator of Early Modern Books and Manuscripts at the Beinecke Library at Yale University. She joins us today to share about the collection of 16th century playing cards in house at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library with some key insights on the economics, design, and appearance of playing cards from the life of William Shakespeare.

Kathryn James is the Curator of Early Modern Books and Manuscripts at Yale's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. She is a Lecturer in the Yale History Department and the co-founder of the Yale Program in the History of the Book. Her new book, English Paleography and Manuscript Culture, 1500-1800 (2020) is available through Yale University Press.

Ep 108: Elizabethan Corsets with Cass Morris May 11, 2020

Show notes

The first historical written reference to a separate undergarment for women is found in the wardrobe accounts of Mary Tudor. There, the records indicate Mary had

"Item for making of one peire of bodies of crymsen satin| Item for making two pairs of bodies for petticoats of crymsen satin | Item for making a pair of bodies for a Verthingall of crymsen Grosgrain"The fashion of using a "pair of bodies", which clothing historians explain is another phrase for corsets, was a staple item for women in Elizabethan England. Not all women were able to afford the bright red undergarments apparently favored by Mary Tudor, nor the silk and satin she uses in this wardrobe account either. Considering these items were part of a woman's underclothes, they were intentionally not on public display and that means, with the exception of 1-2 portraits which were rather scandalous for their time, along with only 2 surviving corsets from the time period, it takes a great deal of research to piece together the history of women's undergarments from Shakespeare's lifetime.

Our guest this week, Cass Morris, is and she has done extensive research into the history of corsets. Cass joins us today to set straight some myths about what women wore in the 16th century, as well as to share what she's learned about how Shakespeare's playing company portrayed female characters on stage, and whether items like a corset could have been used (or varied) to distinguish between the classes of women in Shakespeare's stories.

Ep 107: Beer & Taverns with Rebecca Lemon May 04, 2020

Show notes

During the life of William Shakespeare, plain water was often unclean and filtration, while available, was rudimentary at best. It was not safe to drink the water of the Thames river, and in order to compensate for a general lack of fresh drinking water, the most popular beverage in Elizabethan England even for regular meal times, was beer or ale. Drunkenness was a common occurrence, as was the consistent consumption of large amounts of alcohol. There are court records showing the monarchs of England often celebrated festivals, parties, and visiting dignitaries with the serving of excessive amounts of alcohol, at times amounting to hundreds of barrels of wine, beer, or ale. One of Shakespeare's most enduring characters is a drunken knight, and even Shakespeare's own death is shrouded in a mystery involving excess drink. With all of this drinking going on in the life of William Shakespeare, what was the opinion and response to drunkenness? Our guest this week, Rebecca Lemon, included an entire chapter on beer and addiction to alcohol in her latest publication titled Addiction and Devotion in Early Modern England. Dr. Lemon joins us today to explain some of the most common alcoholic beverages, the state of alcoholism in the 16th century, and what understanding these facts about the cultural relationship to alcohol can tell us about Shakespeare's characters whose personalities were specifically inclusive of drunken behavior like Falstaff and Prince Hal.

Ep 106: Rudolf II and the Hapsburg Family with Peter Wilson Apr 27, 2020

Show notes

Throughout Shakespeare's lifetime one of the most widely circulated and reported on current events was the state of the Holy Roman Empire. Ruled for much of Shakespeare's lifetime by an eccentric named Rudolf II, who secluded himself in Bohemia to the neglect of his Empire. Rudolf II and his weird choice to isolate himself in Bohemia would have been enough to make Shakespeare's references to Bohemia in his plays make sense, but on top of Rudolf II there was also Don John of Austria, the half brother to King Philip II of Spain and a threat to the English throne, with many in England concerned he might take over England should the Spanish Armada have succeeded in 1588. For historians, we can look back and see that the Spanish Armada was defeated, but for 28 year old William Shakespeare, that outcome was far from a certainty. Later when William Shakespeare was 49 years old, the eldest daughter of James I, named Elizabeth, married the Frederick V, a senior prince of the Holy Roman Empire, who would go on to become the King of Bohemia--and the irony of that situation could hardly have been lost of William for whom the entirety of his life had been spanned by upheaval in the Holy Roman Empire and an odd relationship to Bohemia. We see glimpses into the contemporary mindset of England and the politics abroad with the Holy Roman Empire as Shakespeare as well as his contemporaries comment on the threat of Don John, the war between the Spanish and Dutch, and even the oddities of the strange, isolated, King of Bohemia, Rudolf II, in plays like King John, which was written the same year Rudolf II died, and Jonsons' The Alchemist which specifically calls out, and insults, the Hapsburg family with his multiple references to Austrian princes. Here to help us unpack this veritable mountain of history packed into just a few lines of text, and introduce us to the life of Rudolf II, the Hapsburg family, and this part of 16th century current affairs is our guest, Peter Wilson.

Ep 105: Guns in Elizabethan England with Grace Tiffany Apr 20, 2020

Show notes

Famously, William Shakespeare's Globe burned down from canon fire in 1599 and several of Shakespeare's plays mention guns, gunpowder, and bullets. While we think of Shakespeare's era as one of romantic sword battles, duels with a rapier in the streets, and even the massive naval battles with the Spanish Armada, for the life of William Shakespeare everything was under constant strain and a theme of developing the new. The development of new weapons technology was no exception as the late 16th century saw England replace the serpentine, culverine, and demi-canon, with smaller more portable hand canons, pistols, and muskets. While the average person on the street would not have carried these weapons regularly, we know from the burning of The Globe theater that canons, at least, has a place in 16th century theater, so does that mean guns and gunpowder did as well? Here to help us explore the advent of the hand gun and portable firearms that took place in England during the life of William Shakespeare is our guest, Grace Tiffany.

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