An anonymous Elizabethan play, the full title of which is Famous Victories of Henry the fifth: Containing the Honourable Battel of Agin-court, generally thought to be a source for Shakespeare's Henriad

Henriad

Henriad is a common title used by scholars for Shakespeare's second historical tetralogy, comprising Richard II; Henry IV, Part 1; Henry IV, Part 2; and Henry V....

, and originally published in 1600. The play is of unknown authorship, but in 1891 F. G. Fleay attributed it to Richard Tarleton; in 1910 H. Dugdale Sykes attributed it to Samuel Rowley

Samuel Rowley

Samuel Rowley was a 17th century English dramatist and actor.Rowley first appears in the historical record as an associate of Philip Henslowe in the late 1590s. Initially he appears to have been an actor, perhaps a sharer, in the Admiral's Men, who performed at the Rose Theatre...

,, and in 1928 B. M. Ward suggested the extant version was based on an early court masque

Masque

The masque was a form of festive courtly entertainment which flourished in 16th and early 17th century Europe, though it was developed earlier in Italy, in forms including the intermedio...

 written by Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford was an Elizabethan courtier, playwright, lyric poet, sportsman and patron of the arts, and is currently the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works....

. Subsequently E. M. W. Tillyard claimed the play for the young Shakespeare in 1944, followed by Seymour Pitcher in 1961.

Plot summary

The play covers the same ground later traversed in significantly greater detail in the Shakespearean trilogy, covering the wildness of the prince in several episodes, a coronation in which he dismisses the dissolute companions of his youth, and his invasion of France, victory at Agincourt

Battle of Agincourt

The Battle of Agincourt was a major English victory against a numerically superior French army in the Hundred Years' War. The battle occurred on Friday, 25 October 1415 , near modern-day Azincourt, in northern France...

, and eventual marriage to the Princess Katherine. More specifically, C.A. Greer identified fifteen plot elements that occur in both the anonymous play and in the Henry trilogy. These included the robbery of the King's receivers, the meeting of the robbers in an Eastcheap Tavern, the reconciliation of the newly-crowned King Henry V with the Chief Justice, the new King's rejection of his comic friends, the gift of tennis balls from the Dolphin, and Pistol's encounter with a French soldier (Derick's in The Famous Victories).

Date

Just as the authorship of Famous Victories is disputed, so to is its chronological placement in the development of the English drama. However, as published in 1598 the play is advertised as one acted by "her Queen's Majesty's Players" (a company which, while surviving into the 1590s was in deep decline by 1590), and it is generally agreed that Richard Tarlton

Richard Tarlton

Richard Tarlton , an English actor, was the most famous clown of his era.His birthplace is unknown, but reports of over a century later give it as Condover in Shropshire, with a later move to Ilford in Essex...

, who died in 1588, played the clown role in the play. Lyles-Scoufus, as mentioned, places it in around 1583; Ward argued for a date circa 1576. It is generally agreed, however, that the play antedates the canonical Shakespearean treatment of the same historical materials in I Henry IV, II Henry IV, and Henry V by some years.

External links

• http://www.elizabethanauthors.org/famvic101.htm at Elizabethan Authors.

/www.elizabethanauthors.org/famvic101.htm