Shakespeare's environment

by C. C. Stopes

FOOTNOTES:

[7] See the paper reprinted above, [p. 17].

[8] The illustrations in my “Shakespeare’s Family,” including one of this cottage, were put in by Mr. Elliot Stock, without my knowledge, and against my will.

[9] See the Book of John Fisher of Warwick. “Every man is only careful for himself ... given to easy trades of life, providing for themselves, not having consideration for their posterity, which should not so be.”

[10] John Lambert had licence granted him till the Octaves of Michaelmas 1589 (Coram Rege Roll, 1311, f. 516, Mich. Term 31-32 Eliz. Westminster).

IV
MARY ARDEN’S ARMS

There has been much discussion concerning Shakespeare’s descent from the Ardens of Park Hall, and, through them, from the heroes of national legend. In some of the objections brought forward against his assumed pedigree, prejudice has been treated as proof, and opinion as reasoning. The critical strictures are best summed up in Nicholls’s “Herald and Genealogist,” 1863, vol. i, p. 510, and in “Notes and Queries,” 3rd Series, vol. v, p. 493: (1) That the relationship is imaginary and impossible, and those who assert it in error. (2) That the Ardens were connected with nobility, while Robert Arden was styled “husbandman.” (3) That the heralds knew the claim was unfounded when they scratched out the arms of Arden of Park Hall, and inserted the arms of Arden of Alvanley, in Cheshire. Though this was equally unjustifiable, the family being further off, there was less likelihood of complaint.

French, in his “Shakespeareana Genealogica,” p. 431 et seq., opposes these statements by others; and the interesting reproduction of the drafts and patents of Shakespeare’s arms, with the accompanying letterpress by Mr. Stephen Tucker, Somerset Herald, puts a student in a position to estimate them at their true worth. (See “Miscell. Geneal. et Herald.,” 1886, Ser. II, vol. i, p. 109.) I would now bring forward some arguments which may act as cumulative evidence to determine wavering opinion on the question.

Dugdale’s table shows that Walter Arden married Eleanor, daughter of John Hampden, of Hampden, in co. Bucks, and had, besides his eldest son and heir Sir John, esquire of the body to Henry VII, five sons, Martin, Thomas, Robert, Henry, William; Martin being placed as the second son, and Thomas as the third. But Thomas is given as second son and Martin as third, in Harl. MS. 1167, from which the visitation is published. (Compare Harl. 853, ff. 113-114; 1110, f. 24b; 1563, f. 5, f. 39; Harl. 2011, ff. 64b, 65, f. 75.)

The will of Walter Arden in 1502 (31 July, 17 Hen. VII) at Doctors’ Commons proves that at that date he had a son Thomas, named second in order. “Thomas Arden and John Charnells,[11] Squires,” attest the document. (See French, p. 452.)

I will that my sonne Thomas have dureing his lief x marcs whiche I have given to him. And that my sonne Martin have the Maner of Natfield dureing his lief according as I thereof made hym astate yf it canne be recorded, And yf not, thenne I will that the same Martyn and every of my other sonnes, Robᵗ, Henry, and William, have eche of them v marcs by yere duryng eche of ther lifes. And that my feoffees of my landes make eche of them a sufficient astate of landes and tenements to the yearely value of v marcs duryng eche of their lifes.

This is an income too small for a younger brother to live on, even in those days, and we must imagine that the father had either placed them, married them well, or endowed them in some way during his life. He could not be expected to do much. His father Robert had spent his substance in the Wars of the Roses, and was brought to the block in 30 Hen. VI (1452). Park Hall would be forfeited to the Crown and its acres impoverished. When Walter Arden was restored by Edward IV he would probably be encumbered by debt, and his large family (for there were daughters also) further limited his powers. This may help to account for the smallness of the legacies. Thomas, being the second son, might have had something from his mother or her kin. This same Thomas was alive in 1526, for Sir John Arden then wills that his brothers “Thomas, Martin, and Robert should have their fees during their lives.” We may, therefore, suppose that Henry and William had meanwhile died. It is probable that William had gone to reside at Hawnes, in Bedfordshire, as one bearing his name and arms appeared in that place about his time.

Seeing that Sir John was esquire of the body to Henry VII, it is very likely that his younger brother Robert was the Robert Arden, yeoman of the chamber (indeed Leland says he was so), to whom Henry VII granted three patents; the first on 22nd February 17 Henry VII: “In consideration of good and true services of our beloved servant Robert Arden, a yeoman of our chamber, we appoint him Keeper of our Royal Park at Aldercar,” i.e., Altcar, co. Lanc., 17 Henry VII (second part, pat. m. 30). In the same series, m. 35, 9th September 17 Henry VII, he was granted the office of Bailiff of Codmore, co. Derby, and Keeper of the Royal Park there. The third is 24th September 23 Henry VII (first part, pat. m. 12), a grant of Yoxall, for life, or a lease of twenty-one years if it descended to heirs, all royal rights reserved, at a rental of £42 a year. (See Boswell-Malone’s “Shakespeare,” Appendix, vol. ii, 544, 545.)

It is not recorded that Martin received Natfield, and it would not seem that he did so, as he lived at Euston, co. Oxford (Harl. Visit.). He married Margery, daughter and coheir of Henry East, of the Hayes, in co. Worcester; and his daughter and heir Eleanor (elsewhere Elizabeth) married first William Rugeley, of Shenston, co. Stafford, and then Thomas Gibbons, of Ditchley, co. Oxford (Visit. Ox. Harl. Public.).

Where meanwhile was Thomas Arden? Dugdale does not mention him again. There is no record of any Thomas Arden, either in Warwickshire or elsewhere, save the Thomas who is found, the year before Walter Arden’s death, living at Wilmcote, in the parish of Aston Cantlowe, on soil formerly owned by the Beauchamps. On 16th May, 16 Henry VII, a deed was drawn up at Snitterfield, commencing:

Sciant presentes et futuri quod ego Johannes Mayowe de Snytterfeld dedi, concessi et hac presenti carta mea confirmavi Roberto Throkmerton Armigero, Thome Trussell de Billesley, Rogero Reynolds de Henley-in-Arden, Willelmo Wodde de Wodhouse, Thome Ardern de Wylmecote et Roberto Ardern filio ejusdem Thomæ Ardern, unum mesuagium cum suis pertinenciis in Snytterfield. (See Halliwell-Phillipps’s “Outlines,” vol. ii, p. 207.)

The deed is in the miscellaneous documents of Stratford-on-Avon (see Halliwell-Phillipps’s “Calendar of the Stratford Records,” p. 291, vol. ii, No. 83).

This list of trustees is worth noting. Thomas Trussel is identified by his residence being given. He became Sheriff for the county in 23 Henry VII, and was of an old and well-known family (see Harl. Visit. and Dugdale). No Robert Throckmorton in the county could have precedence of him, save Robert Throckmorton of Coughton, who six months later, in November of the same year, was knighted, “a noble and pious man,” says Dugdale. He made his will in 1518, before he set out for the Holy Land. This was proved in 1520. His son George succeeded him at Coughton. Edward Arden, of Park Hall, was brought up in his care, and married Mary, his son Robert’s daughter.

That a man of the same name, living at the same time, in the same county, retaining the same family friends, under circumstances suitable in every way to the second son of Walter Arden’s will, should be accepted as that son, seems perfectly natural and just, when no other claimant has ever been brought forward. But we know that this Thomas and this Robert were Mary Arden’s grandfather and father; we know that this property was that afterwards left in trust by this Robert Arden for his daughters; we know that the Shakespeares claimed the relationship, and that the heralds allowed it. Men should be judged truthful until proved guilty of falsehood, and no proof has ever been laid down against their statement. I bring forward only as a faint sidelight[12] the fact that of Robert Arden’s seven daughters at Wilmcote, the four younger, Margaret, Joyce, Alice, Mary, bore Arden names. The first and third, Agnes and Katharine, had Throckmorton names; and Joane was the name of Thomas Trussel’s unknown wife.

Mr. Nicholls’s second objection to this unbelieved-in Thomas, that he could not be a son of the Ardens because he is styled “husbandman,” is of little weight. The word is an old English equivalent for “farmer,” and might be applied to any gentleman resident on his lands. In this sense it is often used in old wills; it is so used in Stratford-on-Avon records, and in the examination of John Somerville, who stated that he had received no visitors but “certain husbandmen, near neighbours” (S.P.D.S. Eliz., 1583). “The kingdom of heaven is like unto a husbondman that went out first bi the morowe to hire werkmen into his vineyard” (Matt. xx, 1, Wycliffe). Even Dryden, in “Threnodia Augustalis,” says “The Royal Husbandman appeared”; and Mr. French notes other uses of the word: “The Arden Husbandman of Wilmecote in 1523 and 1546 paid the same amount to the subsidy as the Arden Esquire of Yoxall, 1590” (French, “Shaks. Gen.,” p. 423). It is more than probable that this Thomas married an unambitious wife. There is even yet a chance of finding her name through some will or deed.

Mr. Nicholls’s third assertion, that the heralds scratched out the arms of Arden of Park Hall because they dare not quarter them with those of the Shakespeares, requires to be more fully dealt with.

Drummond, in his “Noble British Families,” exemplifies many varieties of the arms of Arden, and traces them back to their derivation. He notes that “none of the branches or sons of the Earls of Warwick bore their arms, but only the eldest son, who was earl”; and that “the elder branch of the Ardens took the arms of the old Earls of Warwick, the younger branches took the arms of Beauchamp with a difference.” Now it is quite true that the Ardens of Park Hall bore Ermine, a fesse chequy or and az., arms derived from the Earls of Warwick, and that this was the pattern scratched out in Shakespeare’s quartering. But no critic seems to have noted the reason. Mary Arden was heiress not in the eldest line, but through a second son. The true pattern for a second son was three cross crosslets fitchée, and a chief or. As such they were borne by the Ardens of Alvanley, with a crescent for a difference. They were borne without the crescent by Simon Arden[13] of Longcroft, the second son of Thomas, son of Sir John, and full cousin of Mary Arden’s father. It is true that among the tombs at Yoxall the fesse chequy appears; but that branch gained a right to this coat after the extinction of the elder line in 1643.

Glover’s “Ordinary of Arms” mentions among the “marks of cadency” a martlet. Martin Arden, of Euston, co. Oxford, was clearly in the wrong to assume as he did the arms of his elder brother. William Arden, of Hawnes, in co. Bedford, correctly bore the three cross crosslets and the martlet. The three cross crosslets fitchée were the correct arms, and the martlet the correct difference, for Thomas Arden, as the second son of an Arden who might bear Ermine, a fesse chequy or and az. Thus Glover enumerates (vol. ii, ed. 1780) among the arms of Warwickshire and Bedfordshire: “Arden or Arderne. Gu., three cross crosslets fitchée or; on a chief of the second, a martlet of the first. Crest, a plume of feathers charged with a martlet or.” It is strange that Mr. Nicholls omitted to consider this. Camden and the other heralds of the sixteenth century were only seeking correctness in the restitution of arms, which were impaled in John Shakespeare’s case on the right, as of the older and nobler origin.

A similar contention arose about Edmund Neville, Edward Arden’s nephew (S.P.D.S. Eliz. 185, 72):

Pedigree of Neville and statement that he may bear Latimer’s arms. Richard Lord Latimer’s eldest son was John, Lord Latimer; his second son, William Neville of Latimer. John’s son John, Lord Latimer, died without male issue, leaving four daughters, his heirs, who divided his lands, and may quarter his arms. William Neville’s son was Richard Neville, who married Barbara, sister of Edward Arden of Park Hall, and their son is Edmund. By the custom and usage of England, after the decease of John, Lord Latimer, without issue male, Richard Neville, his cousin german, may bear the arms of the family, without distinction or difference.

If heraldry, therefore, has anything to say to this dispute, it is to support the claim of Thomas to being a cadet of the family of the Park Hall Ardens.

Nothing is recorded to account for Shakespeare allowing the arms of his mother, impaled on his father’s shield, to lapse from his own. It may be that, on his father’s death in 1601, he thought of the old meaning of quartering, “that it may be known whom a man hath married”; it may be that, tender of his Anne’s feelings, who had no arms to quarter, he let his spear shine alone on his shield; or it may be that, having proved his pedigree, he felt that

Honours best thrive

When rather from our acts we them derive

Than our fore-goers.

—“All’s Well,” Act II, sc. iii.

“Athenæum,” 10th August 1895.