8 October, 1594 - Philippo and Hippolito

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

Henslowe writes: y^e 7 of octobȝ 1594 ... R at phillipo & hewpolito ... xij^s 

In modern English: [8^th] October, 1594 ... Received at Philippo and Hippolito ... 12 shillings

Two Young Men by Crispin van den Broeck, c.1590

Today, the company returned one last time to Philippo and Hippolito, their enigmatic lost play about two men of that name. You can read more about this play in the entry for 9 July.

This is the last known performance of Philippo and Hippolito. It debuted back in July and for three months it was one of the most frequently performed plays at the Rose. But its box office gradually shrank to untenable levels and the players have decided to let it go to its reward. Sadly, we will never know what this play was about or what adventures those two guys go up to.

Just for the hell of it, here's a graph of the box office records of the three plays that the company has recently ceased performing. Among other things, it brings out how much more frequent the performances of Philippo and Hippolito were. 

Henslowe links

• Transcript of this page of the Diary (from W.W. Greg's 1904 edition)
• Facsimile of this page of the Diary (from the Henslowe-Alleyn Digitisation Project)

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