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Bear Gardens And Bear-Baiting During The Commonwealth

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

J. Leslie Hotson
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Extract

The attack of the Puritans and of the city authorities upon the amusements of London under Charles I and the Interregnum was directed primarily against plays and playhouses. The sport of bear-baiting—one of the favorite entertainments of the Londoners—was allowed to continue almost without interruption throughout the Commonwealth.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 40 , Issue 2 , June 1925 , pp. 276 - 288
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1925

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References

1 J. Q. Adams (Shakespearean Playhouses, pp. 336, 337) erroneously assumes that the sport was put down from 1642 until the Restoration.

2 Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, 1639, p. 420.

3 London and the Countrey Carbonadoed, p. 66.

4 Greg, Henslowe Papers, p. 19.

5 Pills to Purge Melancholy, 1714, II, 96. Harry Hunks was a famous bear in Shakspere's time.

6 Spenser Society, 1876.

7 The Actors Remonstrance or Complaint, January 24, 1643 (Brit. Mus. E 86.8).

8 Journals, House of Commons, III, 325b.

9 Journals, House of Commons, III, 463b.

10 Mercurius Aulicus, July 13-20, 1645 (Brit. Mus. E 296.33).

11 Mercurius Britanicus, Aug. 11-18, 1645 (Brit. Mus. E 296.34).

12 October 7, 1645 (Brit. Mus. E 304.4).

13 Journals, House of Commons, V, 246a.

14 Ibid., 248a. Cf. Perfect Occurrences, July 16-23, 1647 (Brit. Mus. E 411.2 6).

15 Cal. Stale Papers, Dom. 1645-47, 599. Journals, House of Commons, V, 272a. A Perfect Diurnall, Aug. 9-16, 1647 (Brit. Mus. E 518.8).

16 Oct. 19-26, 1647 (Brit. Mus. E 411.23).

17 Brit. Mus. E 417.20.

18 Brit. Mus. E 455.1.

19 Brit. Mus. E 457.8.

20 August 24-31, 1648 (Brit. Mus. E 461.30).

21 August 30, 1649 (Brit. Mus. E 572.7).

22 May 15-22, 1649 (Brit. Mus. E 556.8).

23 July 24, 1649 (Brit. Mus. E 565.24).

24 Brit. Mus. E 593.17. For a real Thursday performance, compare the Bear Garden bill, preserved among the Alleyn papers, which is reprinted by Adams, Shakespearean Playhouses, 133.

25 April 13-21, 1652 (Brit. Mus. E 660.3).

26 June 8-16, 1652 (Brit. Mus. E 667.17).

27 Mercurius Democritus, April 7-14, 1652 (Brit. Mus. E 659.25). Cf. Ordish, Early London Theatres, p. 241.

28 November 3-10; 1652 (Brit. Mus. E 681.3).

29 Nov. 8-15, 1654 (Brit. Mus. E 817.4), Ned of Canterbury is at top of the list of bears in Taylor's Bull, Beare, and Horse, 1638.

30 Evelyn says that Duncombe got them from Naples. Diary of John Evelyn, ed. Bray, I, 192.

31 Rymer, Foedera (1732), XIX, 572.

32 Diary, Ibid., p. 7.

33 Notes and Queries, Eleventh Series, II, 152.

34 Bull, Beare, and Horse, p. 59.

35 Brit. Mus. E 124.24.

36 Brit. Mus. E 794.23.

37 Nov. 2-9, 1653 (Brit. Mus. E 718.3).

38 Certain Passages of Every Dayes Intelligence (Brit. Mus. E 237.17).

39 May 9-16, 1655 (Brit. Mus. E 838.18).

40 Brit. Mus. E 852.29.

41 Perfect Proceedings of State Affairs, September 20-27, 1655 (Brit. Mus. E 854.2).

42 The Academy, XXII, 315. Cf. Adams, Shakespearean Playhouses, 337.

43 Edited by J. W. W. Bund, I (1920), 31. Cf. The last Speech and dying Words of Thomas (Lord, alias Colonel)Pride; being touched in Conscience f or kis inhuman Murder of the Bears in the Bear-garden, when he was High-Sheriff of Surrey. Taken in Short-hand, by T. S. late Clerk to his Lordship's Brew-house. 1680 (Harleian Miscellany, 1809, III, 136). Both mentioned by H. E. Rollins, Studies in Philology (1923), pp. 60, 61.

44 The Academy, ibid.

45 Printed for John Johnson, 1660 (Brit. Mus. E 1050.4).

46 Cal. State Papers, Dom., 1661-1662, 574.

47 A True Register … of St. James, Clerkenwell, ed. Robert Hovenden, IV, 347 (Harl. Soc., 1891). Discovered by H. E. Rollins. Cf. Studies in Philology (1923), p. 61.

48 Col. State Papers, Dom., 1663-1664, 217. For the later history of the Hope, see J.Q.Adams's Shakespearean Playhouses, 337-41. The first document he quotes after the Restoration is a letter from the Earl of Manchester, September 29, 1664. This letter says that the game is “now removed to the usual place on the Bankside”; but, until now, no one has discovered from where it was removed.