The first clear reference to the play is dated as 16 May 1631 when an entry was made in the Stationer's Register, effectively licensing texts for publication. The entry, made for John Jackman, referred to manuscripts of two plays by 'Tho: Dekker', these being 'The Wonder of a Kingdom' and 'a Tragedy called The Noble Spanish Soldier'. A similar entry was made on 9 December 1633, this time for Nicholas Vavasour. The play was printed in a quarto version in 1634, probably by John Beale, on behalf of Vavasour, who initialled the foreword entitled 'The Printer to The Reader'.
Sources, Authorship and Date
These aspects of the play have attracted more critical attention than all others combined, reference frequently being made to the following known facts:
(1) Although the entries in the Stationer's Register refer unambiguously to Dekker as the author, the title page of the Quarto states that the play is written by 'S.R.', the only Jacobean playwright with those initials being Samuel Rowley.
(2) It has been observed, initially by nineteenth century scholar A. H. Bullen, that three sections of a play by John Day called 'The Parliament of Bees' are nearly identical to sections of NSS. Furthermore a further five sections correspond closely to parts of 'The Wonder of a Kingdom' which as is noted above, was registered alongside NSS in 1931.
(3) In 1601, theatre manager Philip Henslow made part payment for an anonymous play called 'The Spanish Fig', no text of which survives under that name.
(4) In April 1624 a poster appeared in Norwich advertising a touring play, being 'An excellent Comedy called The Spanish Contract' to be performed by Lady Elizabeth's men, a company with which Dekker is believed to have had connections.
(5) There is some evidence of confusion in how the play has been compiled for printing, in particular, a cast list which omits several significant characters, the late appearance of two pointless characters (Signor No and Juanna) and the delayed identification of Alanzo as Captain of the Guard. These have been argued to be evidence of revision of an earlier work.
(6) Dekker's 'The Welsh Embassador' reworked much of the material in NSS, albeit in a comedic form. This is generally dated as c1623.
As may be imagined, these facts offer a considerable range of possibilities as to authorship and provenance of the play. Various critics, such as Fleay and Bullen, have tried to make sense of all of them by postulating, largely without evidence, a variety of permutations of collaboration and revision so as to give all of the authorship candidates a role in the production of the text we now have. The most persuasive contribution however, comes from Julia Gasper who, building on work by R. Koeppel, convincingly identifies the source of NSS as being Volume V of Jacques-Augueste de Thou's Latin 'Historiarum Sui Temporis', published in 1620 <1>.