Second-Seeing Shakespeare (eBook)

&quote;Stay Passenger, why goest thou by so fast?&quote;

Peter Dawkins (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2020 | 1. Auflage
200 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
978-1-0983-0419-5 (ISBN)

Infos

In this Sherlockian investigation, historian Peter Dawkins uncovers clues hiding in plain sight which show that the prima facie evidence suggesting that William Shakspeare of Stratford-upon-Avon wrote the Shakespeare works is not what it seems. Instead, it is a double-truth showing a very different authorship, and the involvement of a philanthropic secret society dedicated to the enlightenment and good of all humanity. Follow a treasure trail of clues and uncover an esoteric wisdom, secrets kept for centuries and truths with the potential to turn everything we know about history and literature on its head.

Textauszug

Second-Seeing the Shakespeare Monument

The Stratford Monument

The eulogic poem, “Upon the Lines and Life of the Famous Scenicke Poet, Master William Shakespeare,” by Leonard Diggs, included in the prefatory pages of the 1623 Shakespeare First Folio, refers to the “Stratford Moniment” commemorating “Shake-speare”: -

Shake-speare, at length thy pious fellowes give

The world thy Workes, by which, out-live

Thy Tombe, thy name must when that stone is rent,

And Time dissolves thy Stratford Moniment,

Here we alive shall view thee still.

This “Moniment” to which Digges refers is to be found in Holy Trinity Church, located on the banks of the River Avon in Stratford-upon-Avon, England. The monument is placed high up on the chancel’s north wall, in a prominently visible position.

Figure 2: The Shakespeare Monument, Holy Trinity Church, Stratford-upon-Avon

At first sight the monument appears to be a typical Renaissance classical-style marble stone memorial, with a bust of Shakespeare placed in an archway that has a pillar on each side of it, an entablature above it that supports a marble box displaying the Shakespeare coat of arms, and a plinth below it bearing an inscription. Sitting on the entablature above each pillar and on either side of the heraldic box is a naked boy (putto), such that the two putti appear to act as heraldic supporters. The bust depicts Shakespeare holding a quill pen in his right hand, whilst his left hand rests on a sheet of paper that is laid on a cushion. A skull on top of the heraldic box crowns the whole monument.

The monument overlooks a small, strangely-inscribed and unnamed stone slab set into the broad chancel step that is said to mark the grave of “Will Shakspeare gent”, this being his name and rank as recorded in the Stratford Parish Register of burials in Holy Trinity Church. It was probably this rank of gentleman,1 plus being, as a named member of the King’s Company of actors, a “groom extraordinary of the [King’s] Chamber”, as well as a wealthy householder of Stratford-upon-Avon and lay-rector of Holy Trinity Church from 1605 until his death on 23 April 1616, which accounts for this privileged burial position. The bodies of his wife Anne (née Hathaway, d. 1623), his eldest daughter Susanna Hall (d. 1649), her husband, John Hall (d. 1635), and Thomas Nash (d. 1647), first husband of Will Shakspeare’s grand-daughter Elizabeth Hall, were later interred adjacent to his grave.

The Shakespeare Monument was erected sometime after the death of Will Shakspeare (23 April 1616) and before the printing of the Shakespeare Folio (c. February 1622 – November 1623). No-one seems to know who erected the monument or who paid for it, and there is no evidence that Shakespeare’s family had anything to do with it. The sculptor, according to Sir William Dugdale’s Diary of 1653, was “one Gerard Johnson”, which would have been Gerald Janssen the younger, as his father, the funerary monument sculptor Gheerart Janssen, died in 1611. The coat of arms displayed on the monument was first granted to William’s father, John Shakspere, in 1596, which William inherited on his father’s death in 1601.

The monument was restored in the mid-18th century, having fallen into a poor state of repair. Between 1746 and 1748 sufficient funds were collected and early in 1749 it was substantially “repaired and beautified” by “Heath the carver”, under the auspices of the Rev. Kenrick, vicar of Holy Trinity Church, and the Rev. Joseph Greene, master of Stratford-upon-Avon’s grammar school, who was a scholar and an antiquarian. It required that the bust be taken down for repairs, which was done, and a plaster-cast of the head was made. John Hall, a limner from Bristol, carried out the repainting of the monument, having painted a picture in colour on pasteboard of the monument before the renovations began (according to a note on the back of the picture).2

In a letter dated 27 September 1749 to the Rev. John Sympson, the Rev. Greene noted that “care was taken, as nearly as could be, not to add to or diminish what the work consisted of, and appear’d to have been when first erected: And really, except changing the substance of the Architraves from alabaster to Marble; nothing has been chang’d, nothing alter’d, except supplying with original material, (sav’d for that purpose,) whatsoever was by accident broken off; reviving the Old Colouring, and renewing the Gilding that was lost”.3 He refers to the Shakespeare bust and the cushion before it, “on which as on a desk this our Poet seems preparing to write,” and of the two columns and the two painted figures which, he says, “represent Comedy and Tragedy”.4

Nearly a century before the restoration was carried out, Sir William Dugdale, a Warwickshire historian and antiquarian, sketched the Shakespeare Monument when he visited Stratford-upon-Avon in 1634 and had it engraved by Wenceslaus Hollar (or his assistant Richard Gaywood) for his Hi story of the Antiquities of Warwickshire, published in 1656.5 The engraving was copied by Michael van der Gucht for Nicholas Rowe’s Life of Shakespeare, published in 1709, and by Grignion for Bell’s Shakespeare, published in 1786. This has caused confusion, because there are several major differences between Dugdale’s record and the appearance of the Shakespeare Monument after the 1749 repairs, which is as we see the monument today. Because of this, several people over the years have questioned the veracity of the renovations. However, there are many good reasons to conclude that both Dugdale’s sketch and the Hollar engraving are fundamentally inaccurate depictions of the monument.

Figure 3: Engraving of the Shakespeare Monument made by Wenceslaus Hollar from sketch by Sir William Dugdale, published in Dugdale’s Antiquities of Warwickshire (1656).

The same is true of an engraving of the monument made by George Vertue in 1723, which was published in 1725 in Alexander Pope’s The Works of Shakespear. Virtue’s engraving looks similar to the monument as we know it today, except for two differences: Shakespeare’s face appears more bearded than it does now, and the putti are each shown holding a lit candle, with the dexter putto’s left hand resting on an hourglass and the sinister putto sitting by a skull. However, the fact that the candles are shown alight suggests that the candles and thus the other differences are the result of artistic licence. In fact, in 1737 Vertue vis ited Stratford-upon-Avon and sketched the Shakespeare Monument,6 and his sketch appears to show the monument much as we see it now, including the two putti drawn in such a way as to suggest they are holding a spade and a torch.7

Figure 4: Engraving of the Shakespeare Monument made by George Vertue in 1723 and published in Alexander Pope’s The Works of Shakespear (1725).

John Hall’s 1746 colour picture of the monument also varies slightly from the monument as we see it now, which might seem more surprising. In Hall’s picture both the putti are shown seated by a skull, whereas in reality, whilst there is a skull by the sinister putto, there is no skull next to the dexter putto. In terms of colour, though, Hall’s depiction is supported by an account written by John Aubrey in the early 1670s, which describes Shakespeare as wearing “a Tawny satten doublet I thinke pinked and over that a black gowne like an Under-gratuates at Oxford, scilicet the sleeves of the gowne doe not cover the armes, but hang loose behind”.8

Various people have researched this carefully, to determine the truth as to whether the monument was substantially altered or not, the conclusion being that the renovations were done reasonably faithfully so as to restore the look of the original monument, including the two putti and their respective symbols.9

In terms of materials, the monument is carved in pale blue limestone, the two columns that support the entablatures and coat-of-arms above the bust are of black polished marble, the two putti and the skull are of sandstone, and the capitals and bases of the columns are of gilded sandstone. The architraves, frieze and cornice were originally of red-veined white alabaster, but they were replaced in 1749 with white marble. The effigy and the cushion are carved of one piece of bluish Cotswold limestone, and the inlaid panels are of black touchstone. In terms of colour, the main marble monument appears white, the two putti white, the inlaid panels black, the polished marble columns black, the capitals and bases gold, the inscription lettering gold, and the coat of arms black, gold and red. The bust has a black gown overlaying a red doublet with white collar and cuffs. The cushion is half black, half red, with gold tassels and surrounding cord.10

Shakespeare Monument Inscription

Approaching closer to the monument, one is able to read the inscription, which is laid out in three distinct sections. The top section consists of two lines in Latin, the middle section of six lines in English, and the...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 6.4.2020
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Neuzeit (bis 1918)
• ISBN-10: 1-0983-0419-5 / 1098304195
• ISBN-13: 978-1-0983-0419-5 / 9781098304195