Page 317. In further confirmation of the opinion here expressed, the curious reader is referred to Wlson de Colombiere's Vray theatre d'honneur, vol. ii. p. 313, for the account of a duel on appeal for murder which was fought at Valenciennes in the year 1454, where the dead body of the vanquished party was adjudged to be hanged on a gallows as a convicted murderer.
The frequent use which has been made in the course of these remarks of a work cited under the title of Bartholomæus de proprietatibus rerum, may require that a more particular description of it should be given. It is a general history of nature, composed in Latin by Bartholomew Glanvile, an English Minorite or Franciscan, of the family of the earls of Suffolk. He flourished about the year 1360, and appears to have been the Pliny of his time. It was several times printed abroad in the infancy of the typographic art, and translated into the English, French, Dutch, and Spanish languages. The English version was made by John Trevisa, a Cornish man, and vicar of Barkley in Gloucestershire, at the request of his patron Thomas Lord Barkley, in the year 1398, and originally printed by Wynkyn de Worde; for there is no evidence that it came from Caxton's press in English, though it has been so asserted. Neither is the date of Wynkyn de Worde's edition, if it ever had any, been ascertained. The next edition was printed in 1535, by Thomas Berthelette, in folio. The last was published under the title of Batman uppon Bartholome, his Booke de proprietatibus rerum, &c. Printed by Thomas East, 1582, in folio. Stephen Batman appears to have been a worthy and pious character, and was chaplain to Lord Hunsdon. His additions were compiled from Gesner and other writers of his own time. In a manuscript diary of expenses in the reign of Elizabeth, the price of this book is stated to have been eight shillings.
ON
THE ANACHRONISMS
AND
SOME OTHER INCONGRUITIES
OF
SHAKSPEARE.
The transgressions against the rules of chronology committed by those who, in recording the events of preceding ages, introduce matters which have originated in subsequent periods, seem almost exclusively to belong to authors whose works, in point of date, are to be separated from those admirable compositions which are usually styled the Classics. In the latter, such instances seldom, if ever, occur; whilst in the writers, as well as the artists, of the middle ages, they are innumerable. Nor do these absurdities diminish as we approach periods more enlightened as to general science. From the time of Chaucer to that of Shakspeare, there is scarcely an author to be found who is not implicated in this accusation; and about the age of Elizabeth, the dramatists in particular seem to have been remarkably inattentive to the unities of time and place. It has been observed that Ben Jonson is almost the only writer against whom the charge of uniting dissimilar manners and discordant periods is not to be laid; and though the poets of the ensuing century are not wholly free from the imputation in question, it is certain that from about the reign of king James the First more care was taken to preserve a due attention to the manners and customs of particular ages, or at least to avoid any very palpable anachronisms, than had already been done. But whilst the compositions of dramatic writers remained pretty free from these blemishes, the directors of the theatres continued to practise their, perhaps innocent, impostures on the public; and every absurdity that could be devised, or distortion of reality in costume, still continued to disgrace the stage. We were not indeed more absurd in this respect than other European nations, nor was it until a short time before the late revolution that the French theatre had reformed itself in this respect. Many persons now recollect the state of the English stage in Garrick's time, when that excellent performer used to exhibit his Hamlet in a common French suit of black velvet and a cocked hat, and his Macbeth in a scarlet coat with broad gold lace like the uniform of a modern general. Quin is said to have played Othello in a flowing powdered periwig. How Shakspeare's characters were habited on the stage in his time, would be difficult or even impossible to ascertain with accuracy at present, except in a few instances; but we have no reason to suppose that much propriety was manifested on the occasion. Unluckily for us it was not then the practice to decorate the printed plays with frontispieces; and the theatrical prints and pictures even of succeeding times are not very commonly to be met with. It is on this account that the cuts to Mr. Rowe's edition of Shakspeare, and those to the first octavo edition of the works of Beaumont and Fletcher, are at present extremely valuable, as they serve to record many pleasant absurdities that will not fail to excite a smile in the beholder.
It was reserved for the great actor who to the scenic talents of a Garrick unites that managerial skill and judgment in the costume of nations which the other wanted, to reform these follies; and, by exhibiting to us times as they were, to render the stage what it should be, a true and perfect mirror of history and manners.
The above very slight notice of the subject before us may perhaps be sufficient for the purpose of introducing the mention of those anachronisms that are ascribable to Shakspeare: and this has not been done with any view to exhibit him as more culpable in this respect than most of his contemporaries, but solely for the purpose of collecting them together as an object of amusement: nothing however could have been less judicious than the conduct of Mr. Pope when he placed them to the account of the publishers. Nor is the catalogue offered as a complete one; the diligent and critical reader will discover some that are here unnoticed.