Chapter XXV: Humanism and Mediaevalism (10)

[1521-1537.] John Skot. ‘Here begynneth a treatyse how the hye fader of heuen sendeth dethe to somon euery creature to come and gyue a counte of theyr lyues in this Worlde, and is in maner of a morall playe’ (B. M. and Huth Library).

[1529-1537.] John Skot (in St. Paul’s Churchyard).

There are modern editions by Hawkins (1773, vol. i), Gödeke (1865), Hazlitt-Dodsley (1874. vol. i), Pollard (1890, part only, and in full in _Fifteenth Century Prose and Verse_, 1903), H. Logeman, _Elckerlijk and Everyman_ (1892), F. Sidgwick (1902). Another is announced in a series edited by I. Gollancz.

There are about 900 lines. Pollard, 202, assigns the text to the end of the fifteenth century; Ten Brink, ii. 302, to the reign of Edward IV. Prof. H. Logeman, _Elckerlijk_ (1892), argues the play to be an English version of the closely similar Dutch _Elckerlijk_, attributed to Petrus Dorlandus of Diest, but K. H. de Raaf, _Spyeghel der Salicheyt van Elckerlijk_ (1897), would invert the relation: cf. Brandl, xiv. The characters are Messenger, God, Death, Everyman, Fellowship, Kindred, Goods, Good Deeds, Knowledge, Confession, Beauty, Strength, Discretion, Five Wits, Angel, Doctor. The Messenger prologizes. God sends Death for Everyman, who finds that no one will accompany him save Good Deeds. The Doctor epilogizes. There are no indications of the _mise en scène_, except that there was a central scaffold for the ‘House of Salvation’ (Gödeke, 174, 200, cf. Brandl, xx).

THE WORLD AND THE CHILD.

_Editions._

An Oxford bookseller, John Dorne, had a copy of ‘mundus, a play’ in 1520[949].

1522. Wynkyn de Worde. ‘Here begynneth a propre newe Interlude of the Worlde and the chylde, otherwyse called (Mundus & Infans)....’

1523. Wynkyn de Worde.

There are a reprint by Lord Althorp (Roxburghe Club, 1817) and modern editions in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; Manly, i. 353.

The _dramatis personae_ are Mundus or the World, Infans or Dalliance or Wanton or Love-Lust and Liking or Manhood or Shame or Age or Repentance, Conscience, Folly, Perseverance. The representative of Man in various ages is alternately won over to good and evil. There are 979 lines. Collier, ii. 224; Pollard, li, assign the play to the reign of Henry VII; Brandl, xlii, thinks that the use of the _Narrenmotif_ points to a date of composition not long before that of publication. Mundus says, ‘Here I sette semely in se’ (l. 22), and Manhood ‘Here in this sete sytte I’ (l. 285).

JOHN SKELTON. (_Magnificence._)

Skelton was born, probably in Norfolk, about 1460. He studied at Cambridge and acquired fame as a scholar. Both universities honoured him with the degree of _poeta laureatus_. He was tutor to Henry VIII as a boy, and became rector of Diss in Norfolk. But he died in sanctuary at Westminster (1529), driven there on account of his bitter satires against Wolsey. In his _Garland of Laurell_ (pr. 1523), a late work, he has a list of his writings, including—

‘Of Vertu also the souerayne enterlude:
...
His commedy, Achademios callyd by name:
...
And of Soueraynte a noble pamphelet;
And of Magnyfycence a notable mater.’

Bale, _Scriptores_, i. 652, ascribes to him _Comoediam de uirtute_, Lib. 1; _De magnificentia comoediam_, Lib. 1; _Theatrales ludos_, Lib. 1; _De bono or dine comoediam_, Lib. 1. _Magnificence_ is, however, his only extant play.

Warton (Hazlitt-Warton, iii. 287) describes a piece shown him by William Collins, the poet, at Chichester, about 1759. He says:—

‘It is the Nigramansir, a morall _Enterlude_ and a pithie, written by Maister Skelton laureate, and plaid before the King and other estatys at Woodstoke on Palme Sunday. It was printed by Wynkyn de Worde in a thin quarto, in the year 1504. It must have been presented before Henry VII, at the royal manor or palace at Woodstock in Oxfordshire, now destroyed. The characters are a Necromancer or conjurer, the devil, a notary public, Simony, and Philargyria or Avarice. It is partly a satire on some abuses in the church.... The story, or plot, is the trial of Simony and Avarice.’

Warton proceeds to describe the action at some length. Nothing further is known of the play. Ritson, _Bibliographia Poetica_, 106, said ‘it is utterly incredible that the _Nigramansir_ ... ever existed,’ and Mr. H. E. D. Blakiston (_Eng. Hist. Rev._ for April, 1896) has called attention to several cases in which Warton showed _mala fides_ as a literary historian. In another place (iii. 310) Warton incidentally calls the piece ‘Skelton’s _The Trial of Simonie_.’ E. G. Duff, _Hand Lists of English Printers_, Part i, knows of no extant copy.

_Magnificence._

_Editions._

[1529-1533.] John Rastell. ‘Magnyfycence, a goodly interlude and a mery, deuysed and made by mayster Skelton, poet laureate, late deceasyd.’ Folio.

1533. John Rastell. Quarto.

1821. J. Littledale (Roxburghe Club).

1843. A. Dyce, _Poetical Works of Skelton_, i. 225.

1890. Pollard, 106 (extract).

The characters are Felicity, Liberty, Measure, Magnificence, Fancy, Counterfeit Countenance, Crafty Countenance, Cloked Collusion, Courtly Abusion, Folly, Adversity, Poverty, Despair, Mischief, Good Hope, Redress, Sad Circumspection, Perseverance. The plot shows Magnificence brought low by evil counsellors, and restored by good ones. The players come in and out of ‘the place.’ There are 2,596 lines. The play was written later than 1515, as a reference to the liberality of the dead Louis of France (l. 283) must intend Louis XII who died in that year, not the niggard Louis XI.

SIR DAVID LYNDSAY. (_Ane Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis._)

Sir David Lyndsay ‘of the Mount’ in Fifeshire was born in 1490. By 1511 he was employed in the royal household, first as an actor or musician, then as ‘Keeper of the Kingis Grace’s person.’ In 1529 he became Lyon King at Arms, a post which included the charge of court entertainments. His satire did not spare the church, and he seems to have been in sympathy with Knox and other reformers, but he did not so far commit himself as to endanger his office, which he held until his death in 1555.

_The Thrie Estaitis._

_Performances._

(i) _Jan. 6, 1540_, _Linlithgow_, before James V. This performance, the first of which there is any satisfactory evidence, was described by Sir W. Eure in a letter to Cromwell (Ellis, _Original Letters_, 3rd Series, iii. 275; Brewer-Gairdner, xv. 36), enclosing a ‘Copie of the Nootes of the Interluyde.’ The version seems to have been different from that now extant. ‘Solaice’ figured as the presenter. Eure mentions the ‘scaffald’ and ‘the interluyds of the Play.’ He adds that, as a result, James V admonished the Bishops to reform their ways.

(ii) _June 7_ (_Whit-Tuesday_), 1552, _Cupar of Fife_. The Bannatyne MS. (see below) has the ‘Proclamation maid at Cowpar of Fyffe, upon the Castell-hill, 7 June, beginning at seven.’ This was therefore the extant version. The year is fixed by an incidental reference to the day (June 7) as Whit-Tuesday.

(iii) 1554 (?), _Edinburgh_. Henry Charteris, in his preface to Lyndsay’s _Warkis_ of 1568 (Laing, iii. 231), says of the ‘makar’s’ relations to the clergy, ‘Sic ane spring he gaif thame in the Play, playit besyde Edinburgh, in presence of the Quene Regent, and are greit part of the Nobilitie, with ane exceding greit nowmer of pepill, lestand fra ix houris afoir none till vj houris at evin.’ The Bannatyne MS. gives the play as ‘maid in the Grenesyd besyd Edinburgh,’ and ‘in anno 155-ȝeiris.’ Cf. Appendix W, p. 366.

_Editions._

(_a_) 1602. Robert Charteris. ‘Ane satyre of the thrie estaits, in commendation of vertew in vituperation of vyce. Maid be Sir Dauid Lindesay of the Mont, alias, Lyon King of Armes.’

Diligence, as presenter, summons the three estates before Rex Humanitas. Many ‘Vycis’ and other allegorical personages appear before the Rex on his ‘royall sait.’ In ll. 1288-1411 comes the first interlude (although the term is not used in the text) of ‘The Sowtar and Tailor.’ At l. 1931 is the ‘End of the First Part of the Satyre,’ with the direction, ‘Now sall the Pepill mak collatioun: then beginnis the Interlude: the Kings, Bischops, and principal Players being out of their seats.’ This interlude introduces the Pauper, Pardoner, Sowtar, and others. Part ii begins at l. 2298. At l. 4283, ‘Heir sall enter Folie,’ and at l. 4483, ‘Heir sall Folie begin his Sermon, as followis.’ The theme is, of course, _Stultorum numerus infinitus_, and at the close the preacher names recipients of his ‘Follie Hattis or Hudes’ (cf. ch. xvi). At l. 4629, the people are finally dismissed to dance and drink, Diligence calling on a minstrel.

(_b_) †1568. Bannatyne MS. (ed. Hunterian Club, 1873-1896, Part iv).

George Bannatyne included in his collection of pieces by the Scots ‘makaris’ (_a_) the ‘Proclamation’ at Cupar of Fife (see above), (_b_) a preliminary interlude, not in Charteris’s edition, of a Cottar, an Auld Man and his Wife, a ‘Fuill,’ &c.; (_c_) seven extracts from the play, headed, ‘Heir begynnis Schir Dauid Lyndsay Play maid in the Grenesyd besyd Edinburgh, quhilk I writtin bot schortly be Interludis, levand the grave mater thereof, becaws the samyne abuse is weill reformit in Scotland, praysit be God, quhairthrow I omittit that principall mater and writtin only Sertane mirry Interludis thairof verry pleasand, begynnyng at the first part of the Play.’

1869. F. Hall, _Works of Lindsay_, Pt. iv (E. E. T. S. o. s. 37).

1879. D. Laing, _Works of Lindsay_, vol. ii.

[Other editions are enumerated by Laing, iii. 259. There is an analysis of the play in T. F. Henderson, _Scottish Vernacular Literature_, 219.]

III. TUDOR MAKERS OF INTERLUDES.

HENRY MEDWALL.

Medwall was chaplain to John Morton, cardinal and Archbishop of Canterbury (1486-1500), who is probably the ‘my lord’ of _Nature_, i. 1438. Besides _Nature_, he wrote an interlude ‘of the fyndyng of Troth, who was carried away by ygnoraunce and ypocresy,’ played by the King’s players before Henry VIII at Richmond on Jan. 6, 1514. The ‘foolys part’ was the best, but the play was too long to please the King (cf. p. 201). See also s.v. _Lucrece_ (p. 458).

_Nature._

_Editions._

[1530-4.] William Rastell. ‘A goodly interlude of Nature compyled by mayster Henry Medwall,’ &c.

1898. Brandl, 73.

There are two ‘partes’ of the ‘processe’ (i. 1434). The first (1439 ll.) has Mundus, Worldly Affection, Man, Nature, Innocency, Reason, Sensuality, Privy Council, Pride, a Boy, Shamefastness. In the second (1421 ll.), on a different day, some of these recur, with Bodily Lust, Wrath, Envy, Sloth, Gluttony, Humility, Charity, Abstinence, Liberality, Chastity, Good Occupation, and Patience. The personages come in and out at ‘dorys’ (i. 728) and sit down on ‘stole’ or ‘chayr.’ There was also a fire (ii. 518 sqq.). Probably the scene was in a room. At the end ‘they syng some goodly ballet.’

JOHN HEYWOOD.

John Heywood was born either in London or at North Mimms in Hertfordshire, about 1497. He is claimed as a member of Broadgates Hall, afterwards Pembroke College, Oxford. From about 1515 he was employed at Court; in 1519 he is called a ‘singer,’ later a ‘player at virginals,’ and finally he was master of a company of children, possibly the singing-school of St. Paul’s. His advancement with Henry VIII and the Princess Mary is ascribed to Sir Thomas More, whose kinsman he became. More’s sister Elizabeth married John Rastell, lawyer and printer. John Heywood’s wife was their granddaughter, Elizabeth. It may be added that their daughter, another Elizabeth, was the mother of John Donne. Heywood took More’s line in Church matters, but conformed to the Act of Supremacy. He was in high favour under Mary, and at her death retired to Malines. He was alive in 1577, but dead in 1587.

Heywood’s extant interludes are all early work; although Bale, writing in 1557 (_Scriptores_, ed. 2, ii. 110), only ascribes to him _De Aura, comoediam_; _De Amore, tragoediam_; _De quadruplici P._ The _Pardoner and Friar_, which mentions Leo X as alive, must be before 1521. _Love_ and the _Four Ps_ may be about as early: the rest may belong to the following decade (Brandl, li). In 1538 Heywood showed a play of children before Mary (Madden, 62). In 1539, Wolsey paid him for a masque of Arthur’s Knights, or Divine Providence, at court (Brewer, xiv. (2) 782). In 1553 he set out a play of children at court (_Loseley MSS._ 89). At Mary’s coronation he sat in a pageant under a vine against the school in St. Paul’s Churchyard and made speeches (Holinshed (1808), iv. 6).

See W. Swododa, _J. Heywood als Dramatiker_ (1888).

_Plays._

i. _The Pardoner and the Friar._

_Editions._

1533. Wyllyam Rastell. ‘A mery Play betwene the pardoner and the frere, the curate and neybour Pratte.’

There are modern editions in F. J. Child, _Four Old Plays_ (1848); Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; Pollard, 114 (extract).

The scene of the action is supposed to be a church. About 1,000 lines. The date of composition was under Leo X (1513-1521).

ii. _Love._

_Editions._

1533. William Rastell. ‘A play of loue, A newe and mery enterlude concerning pleasure and payne in loue, made by Ihon̄ Heywood.’

[Unique copy in Magd. Coll., Camb. See Greg, _Plays_, 143.]

[1546-1586.] John Waley.

[Unique copy, without title-page, in Bodl., bound with _Weather_ and _Four Ps._ (Bodl. 4ᵒ, P. 33, Jur.). Copies of these three plays, with one now lost, of ‘Old Custom,’ are mentioned in an inventory of the effects of John, Earl of Warwick, 1545-1550 (_Hist. MSS._ ii. 102).]

1898. Brandl, 159.

Little more than a series of disputations between Lover Loved, Lover not Loved, Loved not Loving, and No Lover nor Loved. There are 1,573 lines. Towards the end, ‘Here the vyse cometh in ronnynge sodenly aboute the place among the audiens with a hye copyn tank on his bed full of squybs fyred.’

iii. _Four Ps._

_Editions._

[1541-1547.] William Myddleton. ‘The playe called the foure P. P. A newe and very mery enterlude of A palmer. A pardoner. A poticary. A pedler. Made by Iohn Heewood.’

[1549-1569.] William Copland.

1569. John Allde.

There are modern editions in W. Scott, _Ancient British Drama_, vol. i (1810): Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; Manly, i. 483.

[Copyright, with that of _Love_ and _Weather_ transferred, Jan. 15, 1582, from late Sampson Awdeley to John Charlwood (Arber, ii. 405). The _Four Pees_ is mentioned with other early plays in _Sir Thomas More_ (Shakes. Soc. 1844).]

There are no indications of _mise en scène_. There are 1,236 lines.

iv. _Weather._

_Editions._

1533. William Rastell. ‘The Play of the wether. A new and very mery enterlude of all maner wethers made by Iohn̄ Heywood.’

[1564-1576.] Anthony Kytson.

1898. Brandl, 211.

1903. Gayley, 19.

The characters are Jupiter, Merry Report, ‘the vyce,’ Gentleman, Merchant, Ranger, Water Miller, Wind Miller, Gentlewoman, Launder, A Boy (‘the lest that can play’). All in turn petition different weather from Jupiter. The piece is 1,255 lines long. Jupiter has his ‘thron’ (l. 179).

v. _John, Tib and Sir John._

_Editions._

1533/4. William Rastell. ‘A mery play between Iohan Iohan the husbande, Tyb his wyfe and Syr Ihān the preest.’

1819. Chiswick Press.

1898. Brandl, 259.

1903. Gayley, 61.

The action proceeds in the ‘place’ (l. 667), which represents Johan’s house with a fire (ll. 399, 460). The door of the priest’s chamber is also visible (ll. 316, 673). There are 680 lines.

vi. _Witty and Witless._

_Manuscript._

_Harl. MS._ 367.

_Edition._

1846. F. W. Fairholt (Percy Soc.). ‘A dialogue concerning witty and witless.’

Thomas Hacket entered the ‘pleye of wytles’ on S. R. in 1560-1 (Arber, i. 154). This piece is a mere dialogued _débat_ or _estrif_.

vii. _Gentleness and Nobility._

[1516-1533.] John Rastell. ‘Of Gentylnes and Nobylyte. A dyaloge ... compilid in maner of an enterlude with diuers toys and gestis addyt therto to make mery pastyme and disport.’

1829. J. H. Burn.

This resembles _Witty and Witless_ in character. It is only conjecturally assigned to Heywood. The copy in the British Museum of Rastell’s edition (C. 40, i. 16) has a mounted woodcut portrait with the initials I. H., but I do not know whether that really belongs to it.

JOHN BALE.

[_Authorities._—Collier, i. 123; ii. 159; Ward, i. 173; Lives
of Bale in _D. N. B._ (article by Mandell Creighton) and
Cooper, _Athenae Cantabrigienses_; his own works, especially
_Illustrium Maioris Britanniae Scriptorum Catalogus_ (1548,
ed. 2, 1557-9, i. 704) and _Vocacyon to Ossory_ (_Harl.
Miscellany_, ed. 1808, i. 328); editions of plays named below,
especially that of Schröer.]

John Bale was born in 1495 at Cove, near Dunwich, in Suffolk. He was placed as a boy in the Carmelite convent of Norwich, thence went to that of Holn, or Holm, in Northumberland, and finally to Jesus College, Cambridge. He took orders, but was converted to Protestantism by Lord Wentworth, and married a ‘faithful Dorothy.’ He became vicar of Thorndon, in Suffolk, and earned the protection of Thomas Cromwell _ob editas comoedias_. Cromwell’s accounts (Brewer, xiv. 2. 337) show payments to him for plays on Sept. 8, 1538, at St. Stephen’s, Canterbury, and on Jan. 31, 1539. At his patron’s fall in 1540 he fled to Germany, and joined vigorously in polemic. In his _Epistel Exhortatorye of an Inglyshe Christian_ (1544), written under the pseudonym of Henry Stalbridge, he says: ‘None leave ye unvexed and untrobled—no, not so much as the poore minstrels, and players of enterludes, but ye are doing with them. So long as they played lyes, and sange baudy songes, blasphemed God, and corrupted men’s consciences, ye never blamed them, but were verye well contented. But sens they persuaded the people to worship theyr Lorde God aryght, accordyng to hys holie lawes and not yours, and to acknoledge Jesus Chryst for their onely redeemer and saviour, without your lowsie legerdemains, ye never were pleased with them.’ He returned in 1547, and in 1548 printed in his _Scriptores_ the following list of his ‘in idiomate materno, comedias sub vario metrorum genere.’

1. ‘Lib. 14. Vitam D. Ioannis Baptistae.
2. Com. 1. de Christo duodenni.
3. Com. 2. de baptismo & tentatione.
4. Com. 1. de Lazaro resuscitato.
5. Com. 1. de consilio pontificum.
6. Com. 1. de Simone leproso.
7. Com. 1. de coena Domini & pedum lotione.
8. Com. 2. de passione Christi.
9. Com. 2. de sepultura & resurrectione.
10. Lib. 2. super utroque regis coniugio.
11. Lib. 2. de sectis Papisticis.
12. Lib. 2. erga Momos et Zoilos.
13. Lib. 2. Proditiones Papistarum.
14. Lib. 1. contra adulterantes Dei verbum.
15. Lib. 2. _de Ioanne Anglorum rege._
16. Lib. 1. de imposturis Thomae Becketi.
17. Lib. 1. _de magnis Dei promissionibus._
18. Lib. 1. _de predicatione Ioannis._
19. Lib. 1. _de Christi tentatione._
20. Lib. 1. _Corruptiones legum divinarum._
21. Lib. 1. Amoris imaginem.
22. Lib. 4. Pammachii tragoedias transtuli.’

As Bale gives a Latin translation of the opening words of each piece, his five extant plays can be identified with those I have italicized. It is to be noted that Nos. 18 and 19 have the same subject as No. 3, which seems to form part of a complete Passion cycle (Nos. 2-9).

In 1547 Bale was made rector of Bishopstoke, Hants, in 1551 of Swaffham, Norfolk, and in 1553 Bishop of Ossory, in Ireland. On the day of the proclamation of Queen Mary he had some of his plays performed at the market-cross of Kilkenny (cf. p. 374). But he had to take refuge at Basle, and on the accession of Elizabeth found himself too old to resume his see, and retired on a prebend in Canterbury Cathedral, where he died in 1563.

_Plays._

i. _God’s Promises._

_Editions._

(i) 1577. ‘A Tragedye or enterlude manyfestyng the chefe promyses of God vnto man by all ages in the olde lawe, from the fall of Adam to the incarnacyon of the lorde Jesus Christ. Compyled by John Bale, An. Do. 1538, and now fyrst imprynted 1577. [List of characters.] _Iohn Charlwood for Stephen Peele_, 1577.’

(ii) n.d. [Another edition]. ‘Compyled by Johan Bale, Anno Domini M.D.XVXXVIII.’ _B. L._

(iii) 1874. Hazlitt-Dodsley, i. 277 (and in all earlier editions of Dodsley, from 1744).

A prologue by _Baleus prolocutor_ is followed by seven ‘Actes,’ in which _Adam_, _Noah_, _Abraham_, _Moses_, _David_, _Esaias_, _Iohannes Baptista_ discourse in turn with _Pater Coelestis_. Each Act ends with one of the pre-Christmas antiphons known as the seven Oes (cf. vol. i. p. 344), to be sung by a ‘Chorus cum organis’ in Latin or English. _Baleus Prolocutor_ epilogizes, ending ‘More of thys matter conclude hereafter we shall.’ This play is practically a _Prophetae_.

ii. _John Baptist._

_Editions._

(i) n.d. ‘A Brefe Comedy or Enterlude of Johan Baptystes preachynge in the Wyldernesse; openynge the craftye assaultes of the hypocrytes, with the gloryouse Baptyme of the Lorde Jesus Christ. Compyled by Johan Bale, Anno M.D.XXXVIII.’

(ii) 1744. _Harleian Miscellany_, i. 97.

_Praefatio_ by _Baleus Prolocutor_. Then _Incipit Comoedia_. Bale has a final speech. The _Interlocutores_ are _Pater Coelestis_, _Ioannes Baptista_, _Publicanus_, _Pharisaeus_, _Iesus Christus_, _Turba vulgaris_, _Miles armatus_, _Sadducaeus_.

iii. _Temptation._

_Editions._

(i) n.d. ‘A brefe Comedy or enterlude concernynge the temptacyon of our Lorde and sauer Iesus Christ, by Sathan in the desart. Compyled by Iohan Bale, Anno M.D.XXXVIII.’

(ii) 1870. A. B. Grosart, _Miscellanies of Fuller Worthies Library_, vol. i.

_Praefatio_ by _Baleus Prolocutor_. Then _Incipit Comoedia_. Bale has a final speech. The other _Interlocutores_ are _Iesus Christus_, _Satan tentator_, _Angelus primus_, _Angelus alter_. The play calls itself an ‘Acte.’

[These three plays closely resemble each other. They were all
written at Thorndon in 1538, and are markedly Protestant in
tone. They were also all performed at Kilkenny, on Aug. 20,
1553.]

iv. _Three Laws._

_Editions._

(i) n.d. A Comedy concernynge thre lawes, of nature, Moses, and Christ, corrupted by the Sodomytes Pharysees and Papystes. Compyled by Johan Bale. Anno M.D.XXXVIII.

_Colophon_: Thus endeth thys Comedy [&c.]. Compyled by Johan Bale. Anno M.D. XXXVIII, and lately inprented per Nicolaum Bamburgensem.

(ii) 1562. Edition by Thomas Colwell.

(iii) A. Schröer, in _Anglia_, v. 137.

The play may have been written in 1538, but the allusions (ll. 2073, 2080) to King Edward and the Lord Protector show that it was revised after 1547. It is not, like (i), (ii), and (iii), a miracle-play, but a morality, and its Protestantism is far more advanced and polemical than theirs. It is 2,081 lines long, and has five _Actus_, with the usual _Praefatio_ by _Baleus Prolocutor_. The other _Interlocutores_ are _Deus pater_, _Natura lex_, _Moseh lex_, _Christi lex vel Euangelium_, _Infidelitas_, _Idololatria_, _Sodomismus_, _Ambitio_, _Auaricia_, _Pseudodoctrina_, _Hypocrisis_, _Vindicta Dei_, _Fides Christiana_. At the end is a note how ‘Into fyue personages maye the partes of thys Comedy be deuyded,’ and another for ‘The aparellynge of the six vyces or frutes of Infydelyte.’

v. _King John._

_Manuscript._

In possession of the Duke of Devonshire, found amongst papers probably belonging to the Corporation of Ipswich. Written in two hands, of which one is believed to be Bale’s.

_Editions._

(i) 1838. Ed. J. P. Collier for Camden Soc.

(ii) 1890. Extract in Pollard, 146.

(iii) 1897. Manly, i. 525, from (i).

‘Kynge Johan’ contains 2,656 lines, but is divided into ‘ij playes,’ i.e. Acts. At l. 1119 is a reference to ‘the seconde acte’ and a ‘Finit Actus Primus.’ There are nineteen personages—_Kynge Johan_, _Ynglond_, _Clargy_, _Sedycyon_, _Cyvyle Order_, _Stevyn Langton_, _Commynalte_, _Nobylyte_, _Cardynall Pandulphus_, _Pryvat Welth_, _Dissimulacyon_, _Raymundus_, _Symon of Swynsett_, _Usurpyd Power_, _The Pope_, _Interpretour_ (a presenter), _Treasor_, _Veryte_, _Imperyall Majestye_—but these are marked with brackets to show that they can be taken by nine actors. The play is strongly Protestant. It was doubtless written before 1548, as ‘Lib. 2. de Ioanne Anglorum Rege’ are included in Bale’s _Scriptores_ list of that year. Collier, i. 123, quotes a deposition as to ‘an enterlude concernyng King John’ performed ‘in Christmas tyme [1538-9] at my Lorde of Canterbury’s’ which was certainly anti-Papal, and was probably Bale’s. But the extant text has undergone a later revision, for the prayer at the end is for Elizabeth. Fleay, _Hist. of Stage_, 62, conjectures that it was performed upon her visit to Ipswich in August, 1561. There was probably a single stage or pageant. The characters enter and go out. At l. 1377 Sedycyon speaks ‘extra locum’; at l. 785 is the phrase ‘Ye may perseyve yt in pagent here this hower.’

NICHOLAS GRIMALD.

Grimald was the son of a Genoese clerk in the service of Henry VII. He migrated from Christ’s College, Cambridge, to Oxford, where, after a short stay at Brasenose, he became Fellow and Lecturer first of Merton in 1540, then of Christ Church in 1547. To this period belong his Latin plays, and the bulk of his lyrics and other poems in _Tottel’s Miscellany_. He was widely read in theology and scholarship, and was chosen chaplain to Bishop Ridley, for whom he did much controversial work. Under Mary in 1555 he was imprisoned, but escaped by a recantation. He was dead before 1562. Bale, _Scriptores_ (1557), i. 701, ascribes to him amongst other writings:—

_Archiprophetae tragoediam._
_Famae comoediam._
_Christum nascentem._
_Christum redivivum._
_Protomartyrem._
_Athanasium, seu infamiam._
_Troilum ex Chaucero, comoediam._

Of these the first and fourth survive; of the others some can only be conjecturally put down as plays.

†1540. _Christus Redivivus._

_Editions._

1543. Gymnicus, Cologne. Christus redivivus. Comoedia tragica, sacra et nova. Authore Nicolao Grimaoldo.

1899. J. M. Hart, in _Publications of the Modern Language Association of America_, xiv. No. 3.

The dedication is dated, ‘Oxoniae, e Collegio Martonensi. Anno 1543’; but according to the account of the play given therein by the author, it was performed by the _pubes_ of B. N. C. before he joined Merton.

1547. _Archipropheta._

_Manuscript._

_Brit. Mus. Royal MS._ 12 A. 46.

_Edition._

1548. Gymnicus, Cologne. Archipropheta, Tragoedia iam recens in lucem edita. Autore Nicolao Grimoaldo.

The dedication is dated 1547. The play is divided into Acts and Scenes, and has choruses. It deals with the story of John the Baptist. Herford, 116, suggests a possible influence from the _Iohannes Decollatus_ (1546) of Jakob Schöpper of Dortmund (Bahlmann, _Lat. Dr._ 93).

NICHOLAS UDALL.

[_Authorities._—Bale, _Scriptores_ (1557), i. 717; Ward, i.
254; Pearson, ii. 413; Kempe, 63, 90; S. L. Lee, s.v. Udall in
_D. N. B._; T. Fowler, _Hist. of C. C. C._ 370; Maxwell-Lyte,
_Hist. of Eton_ (3rd ed. 1899), 117; J. W. Hales, _The Date
of the First English Comedy_, in _Englische Studien_, xviii
(1893), 408; E. Flügel, _Nicholas Udall’s Dialogues and
Interludes_, in _Furnivall Miscellany_ (1901), 81.]

_Life._

Nicholas Udall, Uvedale, Owdall, Woodall, or Yevedall, was born in Hampshire in 1505, and educated at Winchester and Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where he held an informal lectureship in 1526-8. He was an early Oxford exponent of Lutheran views. In 1532 he assisted Leland in preparing verses for the London pageants at the coronation of Anne Boleyn. From 1533-7 he was vicar of Braintree, Essex, and not improbably wrote the play of _Placidas_, alias _Sir Eustace_, recorded in 1534 in the churchwardens’ accounts. But from 1534 he was also head master of Eton. Thomas Cromwell’s accounts for 1538 include ‘Woodall, the schoolmaster of Eton, for playing before my Lord, £5’ (Brewer, xiv. 2. 334). In 1541 he left Eton, under an accusation of theft and other misbehaviour. But he found favour with Katharine Parr, Somerset, and Edward VI through literary and theological work, was made tutor to Edward Courtenay and obtained in 1551 a prebend at Windsor, and in 1553 the living of Calborne, Isle of Wight. He had not, however, so far committed himself on the Protestant side as to make it impossible to conform under Mary. He was tutor to Bishop Gardiner’s household, and either in 1553 or 1554 became head master of Westminster. Here he remained to his death in 1556. A letter of Mary in 1554 states that he had ‘at soondrie seasons’ shown ‘dialogues and enterludes’ before her, and requires the Revels office to provide him with ‘apparell’ for his ‘devises’ at the coming Christmas. The Revels accounts for the year mention ‘certen plaies’ made by him, but the items referring to them cannot be disentangled from those for masks given at the same Christmas. Bale does not mention Udall in the 1548 edition of his _Scriptores_, but in that of 1557 he gives a list of works ‘Latine et Anglice,’ including ‘Comoedias plures, Lib. 1,’ and adds that he ‘transtulit’ for Katherine Parr, ‘tragoediam de papatu.’ When Elizabeth was at Cambridge on Aug. 8, 1564, ‘an English play called Ezekias made by Mr. Udal’ was given before her by King’s College men (Nichols, _Progr. of Eliz._ i. 186).

_Roister Doister._

_Editions._

[1566-7. In this year the play was entered on the Stationers’ Registers to Thomas Hacket, and to this edition the unique copy, without title-page or colophon, presented in 1818 to the Eton College library, probably belongs.]

1818. Briggs.

1821. F. Marshall.

1830. Thomas White, in _Old English Drama_, vol. i.

1847. W. D. Cooper, for Shakespeare Society.

1869. E. Arber, in _English Reprints_.

1874. Hazlitt-Dodsley, iii. 53.

1897. J. M. Manly, ii. 3 (based on Arber).

1903. E. Flügel, in C. M. Gayley, _Representative English Comedies_, 105.

The play is divided into _Actus_ and _Scenae_, and is called in a prologue, which refers to Plautus and Terence, a ‘comedie, or enterlude.’ The prayer at the end is for a ‘queene’ who protects the ‘Gospell.’ Probably Elizabeth is meant. This, however, must be later in date than that of the play itself, which has been fixed by Prof. Hales to 1553-4, on the ground that a passage in it is quoted in the third edition (1553 or 1554) of T. Wilson’s _Rule of Reason_, but not in the earlier editions of 1550-1 and 1552. Prof. Hales thinks that Udall was master of Westminster as early as 1553, and wrote it for the boys there. If Wilson’s date is 1554, the play may have been one of those given at court in the Christmas of 1553.

IV. LIST OF EARLY TUDOR INTERLUDES.

Pre-Controversial Moralities.

The _dramatis personae_ are all abstractions, with an occasional moral type, such as Hickscorner, or a social type, such as a Taverner.

1. †1486-1501. _Henry Medwall._ _Nature._

See s.v. Medwall.

2. †1513. _Hickscorner._

[1501-35.] W. de Worde. Hyckescorner.

[1546-86.] J. Waley.

Fragments of unidentified editions are described by Greg, _Plays_, 139. On Jan. 15, 1582, the copyright was transferred from the late Sampson Awdeley to John Charlwood (Arber, ii. 405). Modern reprints are in Hawkins, vol. i; Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; Manly, vol. i. There are 1,026 lines. Ten Brink, iii. 125, dates the play at about the beginning of the sixteenth century. Collier, ii. 227, and Ward, i. 119, place it in the reign of Henry VII, whose ship, the Regent, is named. Brandl, xxviii, notes that this is spoken of (l. 356) as sunk, which occurred in 1513. This is one of the ‘auncient Plays’ in _Captain Cox_, cxviii.

3. †1513-29. _Youth._

[1546-86.] J. Waley. Thēterlude of Youth.

[1549-69.] W. Copland.

Greg, _Plays_, 141, mentions a fragment of a third edition. The play is printed in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. ii. There are about 1,200 lines. Collier, ii. 230; Ward, i. 126; Pollard, liv, put the date in Mary’s reign; Brandl, xxviii, early in that of Henry VIII. Passages are borrowed from _Hickscorner_. This is named in _Captain Cox_, cxviii.

4. †1517. _John Rastell._ _The Nature of the Four Elements._

[1516-33.] John Rastell. A new interlude and a mery of the nature of the .iiii. elements declarynge many proper poynts of phylosophy naturall and of dyuers strange landys and of dyuers strannge effect and causis, which interlude, if the whole matter be played, will contain the space of an hour and a half; but if you list you may leave out much of the said matter, as ... and then it will not be past three quarters of an hour of length.

There are modern editions by Halliwell (Percy Soc. lxxiv), and in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i, and extracts in Pollard, 97. There are about 900 lines. A note says ‘also, yf ye lyst, ye may brynge in a Dysguysinge,’ and a direction for the ‘dance’ or disguising shows that the stage was a ‘hall.’ The date is fixed by Collier, ii. 238; Ward, i. 126; Pollard, 205, on the ground that the discovery of America is said to be ‘within this twenty years’ and by ‘Americus’ (i.e. Amerigo Vespucci, 1497). The authorship has been doubted, apparently in ignorance of the ascription of it to Rastell by Bale, _Scriptores_ (1557), i. 660 ‘Insignis his Cosmographus, de trium mundi partium, Asiae, Africae, et Europae descriptione, ingeniosissimam ac longissimam comoediam primum edidit, cum instrumentis & figuris, quam uocabat _Naturam naturatam. Lib. 1. Exuberans diuinae potentiae gratia._’ The opening words quoted by Bale translate those of the play ‘Thaboundant grace of the power devyne.’ Probably Rastell was also the printer, although the unique and imperfect copy (_B.M._ 643, b. 45) has only a manuscript imprint.

5. †1541-8. _John Redford._ _Wit and Science._

Printed by Halliwell (Shakespeare Soc., 1848) and Manly, vol. i, from _Brit. Mus. Addl. MS._ 15,233, which is imperfect at the beginning, but has the colophon ‘Thus endyth the Play of Wyt and Science, made by Master Jhon Redford.’

There are 1,059 lines. The final prayer is for the ‘Kyng and Quene.’ Brandl, lxxii, dates the play between 1541, when the ‘gaillard,’ which is mentioned, was first danced in England, and the death of Katharine Parr in 1548. It was adapted in more than one Elizabethan interlude; cf. Brandl, loc. cit.; J. Seifert, _Wit- und Science-Moralitäten_ (1892); and p. 200, n. 2. Redford was at one time Master of the St. Paul’s song-school. The MS. also contains songs and fragments of other moralities by him.

Pseudo-Interludes: Disputations.

6. †1521. _John Heywood._ _Love._

7. †1521-31. _John Heywood._ _Witty and Witless._

8. †1521-31. _John Heywood_ (?). _Gentleness and Nobility._

See s.v. Heywood.

Pseudo-Interlude: Banns.

9. †1503. _W. Dunbar._ _The Droichis Part of the Play._ Printed in Dunbar’s _Works_ (ed. J. Small, for Scottish Text Soc.), ii. 314.

One MS. is headed ‘Ane Littill Interlud of the Droichis Part of the [Play]’; another, and the fuller, ‘Heir followis the maner of the crying of ane playe.’ Both have at the end ‘Finis off the Droichis Pairt of the Play.’

There are 176 lines. The Droich (dwarf) enters to an ‘amyable audiens’ in Edinburgh, ‘to cry a cry.’ He calls himself ‘Welth,’ and bids

‘Ȝe noble merchandis ever ilkane
Address ȝow furth with bow and flane
In lusty grene lufraye,
And follow furth on Robyn Hude.’

The piece is clearly a ‘banns’ for a May-game; cf. vol. i. p. 174. The S. T. S. editors (i. ccxxxiii), think it was written for the reception of Princess Margaret in 1503.

Pseudo-Interlude: Translation.

10. _Necromantia._

[1516-33.] John Rastell. Necromantia. A dialog of the poet Lucyan, for his fantesye faynyd for a mery pastyme. And furst by hym compylyd in the Greke tonge. And after translated owt of the Greke into Latyn, and now lately translated out of Laten into Englissh for the erudicion of them, which be disposyd to lerne the tongis. Inter locutores, Menippus and Philonides.

R. G. C. Proctor, in _Hand Lists of English Printers_, Pt. ii, distinguishes two editions, one certainly, the other probably, printed by Rastell. Hazlitt, _Manual_, 164, describes the translation as ‘after the manner of an interlude.’ The Latin and English are in parallel columns, and Collier, ii. 280, who saw a fragment in the Douce collection, thought that it was ‘a modern Latin play, possibly by Rightwise.’ Bale, _Scriptores_ (1557), i. 656, says that More translated Lucian’s ‘_Menippum, seu Necromantiam, Dial. 1. Salue atrium, domusque uesti[bulum]_’; but the reference is probably to the Latin version of this and other dialogues published in 1506.

Farces of Mediaeval Type.

11. †1521. _John Heywood._ _The Pardoner and the Friar._

12. †1521. _John Heywood._ _The Four Ps._

13. †1521-31. _John Heywood._ _The Weather._

14. †1521-31. _John Heywood._ _John, Tib and Sir John._

See s.v. Heywood.

Translation from Spanish.

15. _Calisto and Melibaea._

[1516-33.] John Rastell. A new cōmodye in englysh in maner Of an enterlude ryght elygant & full of craft of rethoryk wherein is shewd & dyscrybyd as well the bewte & good propertes of women as theyr vycys & euyll cōdiciōs with a morall cōclusion & exhortacyon to vertew.

A modern reprint is in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i. The _dramatis personae_ are Calisto, Melibaea, Sempronio, Celestina, Parmeno. The play is a partial English version through the Italian of the Spanish _Celestina_ (1492) of Fernando Rojas de Montalvan and Rodrigo Costa. A later translation is J. Mabbe, _Celestina_ (1630), ed. J. Fitzmaurice Kelly in _Tudor Translations_; cf. J. G. Underhill, _Spanish Literature in the England of the Tudors_, 65, 375.

Translation from Classical Latin.

16. _Terence._ _Andria._

[1516-33.] John Rastell (?). Terens in englyssh. The translacyon out of Latin into englysh of the furst comedy of tyrens callyd Andria.

Translations from Neo-Latin.

17. 1537. _Thersites._

[1558-63.] John Tysdale. A new Enterlude called Thersytes. This Enterlude Folowynge Dothe Declare howe that the greatest boesters are not the greatest doers.

There are modern editions in J. Haslewood, _Two Interludes_ (Roxburghe Club, 1820); F. J. Child, _Four Old Plays_ (1848); Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i; also a facsimile by H. S. Ashbee (1876) and extracts in Pollard, 126. There are 915 lines. The _dramatis personae_ are Thersites, Mulciber, Miles, Mater, Telemachus. Mulciber has ‘a sharp sword made in the place,’ and Mater ‘the place which is prepared for her.’ The date is fixed by a prayer for Prince Edward, born Oct. 12, 1537, and Queen Jane Seymour, who died Oct. 24, 1537. Bolte, in _Vahlen-Festschrift_, 594, says that the piece is translated from the _Thersites_ of J. Ravisius Textor, printed in his _Dialogi_ (1651), 239. The first edition of the _Dialogi_ was in 1530 (Bahlmann, _Lat. Dr._ 31).

18. †1560. _Thomas Ingelend._ _The Disobedient Child._

[Probably an Elizabethan play, but included here on account of its relation to _Thersites_.]

[1561-75.] Thomas Colwell. A pretie and Mery new Enterlude: called the Disobedient Child. Compiled by Thomas Ingelend late Student in Cambridge.

There are modern editions by Halliwell (Percy Soc. xxiii) and in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. ii. The closing prayer is for Elizabeth. Bolte, loc. cit., considers this a translation of the _Iuvenis, Pater, Uxor_ of Ravisius Textor (_Dialogi_, 71). Brandl, lxxiii, finds in it the influence of the _Studentes_ (1549) of Christopherus Stymmelius (Bahlmann, _Lat. Dr._ 98).

Farces on Classical Models.

19. †1550-3. _W. Stevenson_ (?). _Gammer Gurton’s Needle._

1575. Thomas Colwell. A Ryght Pithy, Pleasaunt and merie Comedie: Intytuled Gammer gurton’s Nedle: Played on Stage, not longe ago in Christes Colledge in Cambridge. Made by Mʳ S. Mʳ of Art.

1661. Thomas Johnson.

There are modern editions in Hawkins, vol. i; W. Scott, _Ancient British Drama_ (1810), vol. i; _Old English Drama_ (1830), vol. i; Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. iii; Manly, vol. ii. The latest is by H. Bradley in C. M. Gayley, _Representative English Comedies_ (1903).

The play is divided into Acts and Scenes, has a prologue and a _plaudite_; but the subject is not taken from Latin comedy. It is probably identical with the _Dyccon of Bedlam_ entered by Colwell on the Stationers’ Register in 1562-3, since ‘Diccon, the bedlem’ is a character. The 1575 edition may, therefore, not have been the first. Jusserand, _Théâtre_, 181, thinks that the satire is even pre-Reformation in tone. The authorship is much in dispute. I. Reed, _Biographia Dramatica_ (1782), suggested John Still, afterwards bishop of Bath and Wells, who was a M.A. of Christ’s in 1565. C. H. Ross, in _Modern Language Notes_, vii (1892), no. 6, and _Anglia_, xix. 297, accepts John Bridges, afterwards bishop of Oxford, who is spoken of, but with doubtful seriousness, as the author, in _Martin Marprelate’s Epistle_ (1588). But Bridges’ initial is not S, nor was he a Christ’s man. H. Bradley, in _Athenæum_ for August 6, 1898, and J. Peile, _Christ’s College_ (1900), 54, 73, point out that one William Stevenson, a Bachelor Fellow of Christ’s, is shown by college accounts to have been in charge of plays there between 1550 and 1553. His seems to me by far the strongest claim yet made.

20. †1553-4. _Nicholas Udall._ _Roister Doister._

See s.v. Udall.

21. †1553-8. _Jack Juggler._

[1562-9.] W. Copland, A new Enterlude for Chyldren to playe, named Jacke Jugeler, both wytte, and very playsent Newly Imprentid.

According to Grosart, two leaves of another edition are bound with the Duke of Devonshire’s copy.

The play was entered by Copland on the Stationers’ Register in 1562-3. There are modern reprints in J. Haslewood, _Two Interludes_ (Roxburghe Club, 1820); F. J. Child, _Four Old Plays_ (1848); A. B. Grosart, _Fuller Worthies Library Miscellanies_ (1873), vol. iv; Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. ii, and a facsimile by E. W. Ashbee (1876). The piece is an imitation of the _Amphitruo_ of Plautus. Brandl, lxxi, assigns it to the reign of Mary on the strength of a Catholic sentiment.

Tragedy on Classical Model (?).

22. †1516-33. _Lucrece._

A fragment of a ‘Play concerning Lucretia’ is attributed by R. G. C. Proctor, in _Hand Lists of English Printers_ (1896), Part ii, to the press of John Rastell (1516-33). It is in the Bagford collection of fragments, _Harl. MS._ 5919, f. 20 (no. 98), and consists of two pages, containing a scene in which Publius Cornelius instructs a confidential friend with the initial B to sound the feeling of ‘Lucres’ towards him, and the beginning of a scene between B. and ‘Lucres.’ Halliwell-Phillipps, ii. 340, says that the play was written by Medwall, †1490, and gives the title as ‘A godely interlude of Fulgeus, Cenatoure of Rome, Lucres his daughter, Gayus Flaminius and Publius Cornelius, of the Disputacyon of Noblenes.’ The ‘Fulgius and Lucrelle’ of seventeenth-century play-lists (Hazlitt, _Manual_, s.v.; Greg, _Masques_, lxx) may be related to this. The heroine is not Shakespeare’s Lucrece.

Latin Neo-Mysteries.

23. †1535-45. _Thomas Watson_ (?). _Absolon._

Ascham, _Scholemaster_ (ed. Mayor, 1869), highly praises, together with Buchanan’s _Jephthes_, the _Absolon_ of Thomas Watson ‘in Sᵗ John’s College Cambridge’ which he never would publish because an anapaest sometimes stood where he thought, incorrectly, that there should have been an iambus. Watson became bishop of Lincoln. Fleay, _Biog. Chron._ ii. 267, and others ascribe the play in error to John Watson, bishop of Winchester, and speak of a manuscript at Penshurst, which, however, is not mentioned in the account of the Penshurst MSS. in _Hist. MSS._ iii. app. 227. Probably the play is identical with the _Absolon_ preserved in _Brit. Mus. Stowe MS._ 957, described by G. B. Churchill and W. Keller, _Die lat. Universitäts-Dramen Englands in der Zeit der Königin Elisabeth_ (_Shakespeare-Jahrbuch_, xxxiv (1898), 229). An eighteenth-century ascription on the first leaf to John Bale is of no authority. The play is of a Senecan type, with acts and scenes and a chorus. The first line was originally ‘Adhuc animus vexatur excusso metu,’ but in the MS., which has many corrections, ‘Animus adhuc’ has been substituted.

24. †1540. _Nicholas Grimald._ _Christus Redivivus._

25. †1547. _Nicholas Grimald._ _Archipropheta._

See s.v. Grimald.

26. †1550. _John Foxe._ _Christus Triumphans._

1551. Christus triumphans, Comoedia apocalyptica. Autore Ioanne Foxo Anglo. London 1551. 8ᵒ.

1556. Oporinus, Basle.

1590. Nuremberg, Gerlach.

In 1672 and 1677 the Latin text was edited by Thomas Comber for school use. A French translation by Jacques Bienvenu appeared in 1562. There is also

1579. John and Richard Day. Christ Jesus Triumphant, A fruitefull Treatise, wherein is described the most glorious Triumph, and Conquest of Christ Iesus our Saviour.... Made to be read for spiritual comfort by Iohn Foxe, and from Latin translated intoo English by the Printer....

There are later editions of 1581 and 1607. This is generally regarded as a translation of the _Christus Triumphans_, but Greg, _Masques_, cxxiii, doubts this, and notes that ‘a modern reprint [1828] in the B. M. is not dramatic.’ The reprint is in fact a translation of the _De Christo Triumphante, Eiusdem Autoris Panegyricon_ appended to the Basle edition of the play. But possibly it does not represent the whole of Day’s work. The 1551 edition is given by Bahlmann, _Lat. Dr._ 107. According to S. L. Lee, in _D. N. B._, it only rests on the authority of Tanner. In 1551 Foxe was tutor to the children of Lord Surrey, who had been executed some years before. In 1555 he entered the printing office of Oporinus at Basle, and in 1564 that of John Day in London. The MS. of the play is _Lansd. MS._ 1073. It is an ‘Antichrist’ play, written under the influence of the _Pammachius_ (1538) of Thomas Kirchmaier or Naogeorgus (Bahlmann, _op. cit._ 71). A full analysis is given by Herford, 138.

Translation from Latin Neo-Moral.

27. †1530-40. _J. Palsgrave._ _Acolastus._

1540. Thomas Berthelet. Ioannis Palsgravi Londoniensis, ecphrasis Anglica in comoediam Acolasti. ¶ The Comedye of Acolastus translated into oure englysshe tongue, ... Interpreted by John Palsgraue.

This is a translation of the _Acolastus_ (1530) of Wilhelm de Volder, known in learning as Gnaphaeus or Fullonius, of the Hague (Bahlmann, _Lat. Dr._ 39). It is arranged for school use, with marginal notes on grammar, &c. The original play is the most important of the group dealing with the Prodigal Son motive: cf. Herford, 152.

Drama of Catholic Controversy.

28. 1553. _Respublica._

Printed by Collier, _Illustrations of Old English Literature_ (1866), vol. i, and Brandl, 281, from sixteenth-century MS. of Mr. Hudson Gurney of Keswick Hall, Norfolk, with the heading ‘A merye enterlude entitled Respublica, made in the yeare of our Lorde, 1553.’

The play is divided into Acts and Scenes, and is a ‘Christmas devise’ (prol. 6) by ‘boyes’ (prol. 39). The place-names are of London. The controversial tone is Catholic, and political, rather than theological. Brandl, lviii, finds the model in Lyndsay’s _Satyre_. Except for the Prologue (the Poet) all the characters are abstractions. Avarice, _alias_ Policy, is ‘the vice of the plaie.’

Dramas of Protestant Controversy.

29. 1538. _John Bale._ _God’s Promises._

30. 1538. _John Bale._ _John Baptist._

31. 1538. _John Bale._ _The Temptation._

32. 1538. _John Bale._ _The Three Laws._

33. ?1539, 1561. _John Bale._ _King John._

See s.v. Bale.

34. †1547-53. _R. Wever._ _Lusty Juventus._

[1549-69.] W. Copland. An Enterlude called lusty Iuuentus. Lyuely describing the frailtie of youth: of natur prone to vyce: by grace and good counsayll, traynable to vertue.—At end of play, ‘Finis, quod R. Wever.’

[1548-86.] A. Vele.

Copyright was entered on the Stationers’ Register by John King in 1560-1. There are modern reprints in Hawkins, vol. i, and Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. ii. The characters are abstractions with the Devil, a Messenger, and Little Bess a ‘Curtisane.’ The prayer is for a king and his council who rule, which points to the reign of Edward VI.

35. †1547-53. _T. R._ _Nice Wanton._

1560. John King. A Preaty Interlude called, Nice wanton.—At end of play, ‘Finis T. R.’

There are reprints in Hazlitt-Dodsley, vol. i, and Manly, vol. i. The characters are curiously heterogeneous: Messenger, Barnabas, Ismael, Dalila, Eulalia, Iniquitie, Baily Errand, Xantippe, Worldly Shame, Daniel. Brandl, lxxii, considers the play an adaptation of the _Rebelles_ (1535) of George Van Langeveldt or Macropedius, of Utrecht (Bahlmann, _Lat. Dr._ 55). The rhyme ‘queenes’—‘things’ in the final prayer shows an original date of composition under Edward VI.

36. †1547-53. _Somebody, Avarice and Minister._

Fragment of unidentified edition amongst papers of the reign of Edward VI in Lambeth Library, reprinted by S. R. Maitland, _List of Early Printed Books at Lambeth_ (1843), 280. Brandl, lix, considers this a politico-religious interlude of the school of Lyndsay.

Protestant Controversy: Translation.

37. †1561. _Henry Cheke._ _Freewill._

[1558-63.] John Tisdale. A certayne Tragedie wrytten fyrst in Italian, by F. N. B. entituled, Freewyl, and translated into Englishe, by Henry Cheeke.

The copyright of a book ‘of frewil’ was entered on the Stationers’ Register on May 11, 1561 (Arber, i. 156). The original is the _Tragedia del Libero Arbitrio_ (1546) of Francesco Nigri de Bassano. The translator cannot be, as stated in the _D. N. B._, Henry, the son of Sir John Cheke, if the date of his birth is as there given (†1548).

Protestant Controversy: Pseudo-Interludes.

38. †1547-53. _Robin Conscience._

Often described as an ‘interlude,’ but really a series of dialogues between Robin Conscience, his father Covetousness, his mother New-guise, and his sister Proud-beauty. Collier, ii. 315, describes it from a printed fragment in the Devonshire library, and inclines to ascribe it to the reign of Edward VI; cf. Herford, 55. Hazlitt, iii. 225, prints the full text from a later edition.

39. 1549. _Ponet._ _Bishop of Rome._

A tragoedie or Dialoge of the uniuste usurped primacie of the Bishop of Rome. A translation by John Ponet, Bishop of Winchester, from the Italian of Bernardino Ochino (1549); cf. Bale, i. 694; Herford, 33. Among the speakers are Edward VI and Somerset.

Lost Interludes.

See s.v. Skelton for the alleged _Nigramansir_ (1504).

S. Jones, _Biographia Dramatica_ (1812), ii. 328, describes ‘A newe Interlude of Impacyente Poverte, newlye Imprinted. M. V. L. X.’ The copyright of this play, which is in the Sir Thomas More list (cf. p. 200) and that in _Captain Cox_, cxviii, was transferred on the Stationers’ Register from the late Sampson Awdeley to John Charlwood on Jan. 15, 1582.

Halliwell-Phillipps, _Dictionary of Old English Plays_ (1860), quoting ‘Coxeter’s Notes,’ is the authority for ‘An Interlude of Welth and Helth, full of Sport and mery Pastyme,’ n.d.

FOOTNOTES

[1] On these tendencies generally, see Davidson, 130; Ward, i. 32; R. Rosières, _Société française au Moyen Âge_, ii. 228; E. King, _Dramatic Art and Church Liturgy_ (_Dublin Review_, cxxv. 43). Mediaeval liturgiologists such as Belethus, Durandus, and Honorius of Autun (P.L. clxxii), lay great stress on the symbolical aspect of ritual and ceremonial. J. M. Robertson, _The Gospel Mystery-Play_ (_The Reformer_, N.S. iii (1901), 657), makes an ingenious attempt to show that the earlier gospel narratives of the Passion, those of Saints Matthew and Mark, are based upon a dramatic version. This, he thinks, to have been on classical lines, and to have been performed liturgically until about the second century, when it was dropped in deference to the ascetic views of the stage then prevalent (cf. vol. i. p. 11). But the narrative, with its short speeches, its crowd of characters and its sufferings ‘coram populo’ cannot, on the face of it, be derived from a _classical_ drama. A nearer parallel would be the Graeco-Jewish Ἐξαγωγή of Ezechiel (first century B.C., cf. Ward, i. 3). The Gospel narrative is, no doubt, mainly ‘a presentation of dramatic action and dialogue’; but this may be because it was built up around _Logia_. Of external evidence for Mr. Robertson’s view there is none. The ritual of the first two centuries was probably a very simple one; cf. F. E. Warren, _Liturgy of the Ante-Nicene Church_, 54. The earliest liturgical dramas, even in the Greek churches, and those only guessed at, are of the fourth (cf. p. 206). Mr. Robertson claims support from _Galatians_, iii. 1 οἷς κατ’ ὀφθαλμοὺς Ἰησοῦς Χριστὸς προεγράφη ἐσταυρωμένος. Lightfoot, however, declares that the meaning of προγράφειν is ‘write up in public,’ ‘placard,’ ‘proclaim.’ If it cannot, as he says, mean ‘paint,’ still less can it mean ‘represent dramatically.’

[2] Duchesne, 47: A. V. G. Allen, _Christian Institutions_, 515.

[3] Duchesne, 393, 469, with the _Ordo dedicationis Ecclesiae_ from a ninth-century Metz _Sacramentary_ there printed; Maskell, _Monum. Rit. Eccl. Angl._ (1882) I. cccxxvi, 196, with text from _Sarum Pontifical_. The ceremonies are symbolically explained by Hugo of St. Victor, _de Sacramentis_, ii. 5. 3 (_P. L._ clxxvi, 441), who says, ‘Interrogatio inclusi, ignorantia populi.’

[4] Duchesne, 236; Martene, iii. 71; Gasté, 69; Feasey, 53; _Use of Sarum_, i. 59; _Sarum Missal_, 258; _Sarum Processional_, 47; _York Missal_, i. 84; _York Processional_, 148. The custom is described in the _Peregrinatio Silviae_ (Duchesne, 486) as already in use at Jerusalem in the fourth century. ‘Etiam cum coeperit esse hora undecima, legitur ille locus de evangelio, ubi infantes cum ramis vel palmis occurrerunt Domino, dicentes: _Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini_. Et statim levat se episcopus et omnis populus porro: inde de summo monte Oliveti totum pedibus itur. Nam totus populus ante ipsum cum ymnis vel antiphonis, respondentes semper: _Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini_. Et quotquot sunt infantes in hisdem locis, usque etiam qui pedibus ambulare non possunt, quia teneri sunt, in collo illos parentes sui tenent, omnes ramos tenentes, alii palmarum, alii olivarum; et sic deducitur episcopus in eo typo quo tunc Dominus deductus est. Et de summo monte usque ad civitatem, et inde ad Anastase per totam civitatem, totum pedibus omnes, sed et si quae matronae sunt aut si qui domini, sic deducunt episcopum respondentes, et sic lente et lente, ne lassetur populus; porro iam sera pervenitur ad Anastase.’

[5] Cf. ch. xiv.

[6] Collier, i. 82; Feasey, 68, 75, quoting payments ‘for the prophets.’ their ‘raiment,’ ‘stages’ for them, &c., from sixteenth-century Revels and churchwardens’ accounts. The _Sarum Processional_, 50 (from eds. 1508, 1517), has ‘finito evangelio, unus puer ad modum prophetae indutus, stans in aliquo eminenti loco, cantat lectionem propheticam modo quo sequitur.’ Then come alternating passages between the ‘propheta’ and ‘tres clerici.’ Perhaps the latter were also sometimes disguised, but the _Sarum Processional_, as well as the thirteenth-century _Consuetudinary_ and the _York Missal_ (_MS. D_), all specify that the clergy, other than the prophet, shall be ‘habitu non mutato.’ Several of the London records given by Mr. Feasey mention an ‘angel,’ and one of them a ‘chylde that playde a messenger.’ A Coutances Order of 1573 (Gasté, 74) forbids ‘spectacula ... cum habitibus inhonestis’ at the Gospel during Mass on Palm Sunday.

[7] Martene, iii. 72; Gasté, 72; R. Twigge, _Mediaeval Service Bks. of Aquitaine_ (_Dublin Review_, cxv. 294; cxvii. 67); Pearson, ii. 296.