What is a Playhouse?: England at Play, 1520–1620

231 Pages·2022·38.35 MB·English

by  Callan Davies

WHAT IS A PLAYHOUSE?
This book offers an accessible introduction to England’s sixteenth- and early
seventeenth- century playing industry and a fresh account of the architecture,
multiple uses, communities, crowds, and proprietors of playhouses.
It builds on recent scholarship and new documentary and archaeological
discoveries to answer the questions: what did playhouses do, what did they look
like, and how did they function? The book will accordingly introduce readers to
a rich and exciting spectrum of “play” and playhouses, not only in London but
also around England. The detailed but wide-r anging case studies examined here go
beyond staged drama to explore early modern sport, gambling, music, drinking, and
animal baiting; they recover the crucial influence of female playhouse owners and
managers; and they recognise rich provincial performance cultures as well as the
burgeoning of London’s theatre industry.
This book will have wide appeal with readers across Shakespeare, early modern
performance studies, theatre history, and social history.
Callan Davies researches the cultural, literary, and theatrical history of early
modern England. He has taught at universities across the UK and at Shakespeare’s
Globe, and he is part of the project teams Before Shakespeare and Middling Culture.
His work includes studies of Elizabethan playhouses, rhetoric, practice-a s- research
and a monograph with Routledge, Strangeness in Jacobean Drama.
“We thought we knew the answer to Davies’ title question, but it turns out that
playhouses were much more various, multiple, and collaborative venues than trad-
itionally allowed. Based on new archival work and a refreshing critical intelligence,
Davies’ exciting and readable book is a theatre- history gamechanger.”
Emma Smith, Hertford College, Oxford
“In What is a Playhouse? England at Play, 1520– 1620, Callan Davies brilliantly
explores and expands our understanding of what an early modern playhouse was in
London and beyond, resulting in a book which is a much-n eeded addition to the
field of theatre study.”
Heather Knight MCIfA, FSA, archaeologist who led
the excavations of Curtain, Theatre and Boar’s Head playhouses
“What was a playhouse and how was it used in the sixteenth and seventeenth cen-
turies? Davies’ detailed study capitalises on recent archaeological discoveries and
offers new archival research to revisit and reassess what we think we know about
early modern playing venues, a concept which was more elastic and varied than
traditional narratives have conditioned us to believe. Rigorous yet engaging, What
is a Playhouse? is a welcome corrective to Globe- centric conceptions of playing
spaces, accentuating a plurality and diversity of venues that ‘housed’ play in all its
forms.”
David McInnis, University of Melbourne
“Callan Davies’ new book, What is a Playhouse? England at Play, 1520–1 620, offers
a fresh and stimulating perspective for anyone interested in the history of theatre
and popular entertainment. His decentring of older London-c entred narratives of a
male- dominated theatre world opens up a more generous view of the multipurpose
functions of playhouses and a well- researched view of the wide range of indoor and
outdoor spaces used and supported by diverse participants -- men, women, children
and animals - - in the Shakespearean era and earlier. An important reassessment of
the pervasive influence and meaning of play in early modern England.”
Sally- Beth MacLean, Professor; Director of Research/ General Editor,
Records of Early English Drama (REED)
WHAT IS A PLAYHOUSE?
England at Play, 1520– 1620
Callan Davies
Cover image: Designed and created by Tyler Davies, copyright
First published 2023
by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2023 Callan Davies
The right of Callan Davies to be identified as author of this work has been asserted
in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks,
and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing- in- Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: Davies, Callan, 1990– author.
Title: What is a playhouse? : England at play, 1520–1620 / Callan Davies.
Description: First Edition. | New York : Routledge, 2023. |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
Identifiers: LCCN 2022008495 (print) | LCCN 2022008496 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781032138879 (Hardback) | ISBN 9781032138077 (Paperback) |
ISBN 9781003231127 (eBook)
Subjects: LCSH: Play–Great Britain–History. | Recreation–Great Britain. |
Architecture and recreation–Great Britain. |
Children’s playhouses–Great Britain–History.
Classification: LCC GV1200 .D38 2023 (print) |
LCC GV1200 (ebook) | DDC 790.0941–dc23/eng/20220427
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022008495
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022008496
ISBN: 978- 1- 032- 13887- 9 (hbk)
ISBN: 978- 1- 032- 13807- 7 (pbk)
ISBN: 978- 1- 003- 23112- 7 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/ 9781003231127
Typeset in Bembo
by Newgen Publishing UK
In memory of my Dad, Mick

CONTENTS
Note on Texts and Spelling viii
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgements xi
Introduction: The “Playhouse” Canon 1
1 Archetypes 25
2 Multipurpose Spaces 72
3 Crowd Capacities 112
4 Community Hubs 144
5 Businesses 170
Coda: Archives and Afterlives 199
Index 209
NOTE ON TEXTS AND SPELLING
Sixteenth- and seventeenth- century English spelling has been modernised
throughout: in my own manuscript transcription, in quotations from contem-
porary printed sources, and (with permission) in citations from the Records of
Early English Drama. Readers can follow references to REED materials for the
series’ original transcription.
ILLUSTRATIONS
1.1 “Interior appearance of the corral de comedias de Almagro.”
Credit: José Manuel Torrejón Ortí. 20 Nov. 2011, 13.22.
Attribution- ShareAlike 3.0 Spain (CC BY- SA 3.0 ES). 31
1.2 Ad Londinvm epitome & ocellvm [1647]. Wenceslaus Hollar.
MAP L85c no.29 part 1. The Globe and the Bear-Baiting arena are
labelled the wrong way round. Used by permission of the
Folger Shakespeare Library under a Creative Commons
Attribution- ShareAlike 4.0 International License. 55
2.1 The roaring girle. Or Moll Cut- Purse (London, 1611). STC 17908.
Used by permission of the Folger Shakespeare Library under a
Creative Commons Attribution- ShareAlike 4.0 International License. 85
2.2 Paradoxes of defence, by George Silver (London, 1599). STC 22554.
Used by permission of the Folger Shakespeare Library under a
Creative Commons Attribution- ShareAlike 4.0 International License. 86
2.3 Londinum florentissima Britanniae urbs, by Claes Visscher. GA795.
L6.V5 1625 Cage. Used by permission of the Folger Shakespeare
Library under a Creative Commons Attribution- ShareAlike 4.0
International License. 88
2.4 Woodcut from Antibossicon, by William Lilly. (London, 1521).
STC 15606. Used by permission of the Folger Shakespeare
Library under a Creative Commons Attribution- ShareAlike 4.0
International License. 91
2.5 Second frontis picture of Cotswold Games from Annalia Dubrensia
(London, 1636). STC 24954 copy 3. Used by permission of
the Folger Shakespeare Library under a Creative Commons
Attribution- ShareAlike 4.0 International License. 96