Sunday, 10 April 2016

10 April, 1592 - The Comedy of Hieronimo

Here's what Lord Strange's Men performed at the Rose playhouse on this day, 424 years ago...

Henslowe writes: R at the comodey of Jeronymo the 10 aprell 1591 ... xxviijs 

In modern English: Received at The Comedy of Hieronimo, 10th April, 1592 ... 28 shillings

Today's entry is a bit of a puzzle. We have already seen Henslowe record The Spanish Comedy of Don Horatio, and we have seen him record its companion play, Hieronimo (which we know today as The Spanish Tragedy). So, what is The Comedy of Hieronimo? Most scholars think it is just an alternative name for The Spanish Comedy of Don Horatio, and I'm going to follow suit (you can read more about the complexities surrounding these plays in the entry for 23rd February). Today's entry is thus an interesting reminder of how fluid play-titles can be in this period; it looks almost as if Edward Alleyn's performance as Hieronimo in the play gradually caused Henslowe to start thinking of it as Hieronimo's comedy rather than Horatio's.

So, today, Lord Strange's Men gave another performance of the play which I will now call The Comedy of Hieronimo. This lost play was most likely about the events leading up to those in Thomas Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy. On this outing, Don Horatio received solid box office, continuing this week's general trend in which audiences are smaller than they were during the highs of Easter Week, but not disastrously so.

Wednesday, 23rd February - 13 shillings and sixpence
Monday, 13th March - 29 shillings
Wednesday, 30th March - 39 shillings
Monday, 10th April - 28 shillings

Henslowe links



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