Henry V

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Historical Records

Performance Records

Playlists in Philip Henslowe's diary

Fol. 14 (Greg, I. 27)

ye 28 of novembʒ 1595	. . . . . . ne . . .	Res at harey the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iijli vj
ye 2 of desembʒ 1595		Res at harey the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxxvs
ye 8 of desembʒ 1595	——————	Res at hary the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxxxiijs
ye 16 of desembʒ 1595		Res at hary the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxivs
ye 28 of desembʒ 1595		Res at harye the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . lvjs
ye 5 of Jenewary 1595	140-1[0]1-0d	Res at harey the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxvjs

Fol. 14^v (Greg, I. 28)

ye 19 of Jenewary 1595	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	Res at harye the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxs
ye 5 of febreary 1595		Res at harye the 5	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xviijs

Fol. 15^v (Greg 1.30):

ye 24 of aprell 1596	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	Res at hary the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvs
ye 26 of maye 1596		Res at hary the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxiijs

Fol. 21^v (Greg 1.42)

ye 17 of June 1596	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	Res at hary the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxvijs
ye 10 of July 1596		Res at harye the v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiiijs
ye 15 of July 1596		Res at hary v	. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxijs

Theatrical Provenance

This "Henry V" was performed at the Rose playhouse by the Admiral's men throughout the season of 1595-6; its thirteen performances earned a 30s return to Henslowe on average.

Probable Genre(s)

History Harbage

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

No doubt the play was based on historical information in the standard histories of the day, the most ubiquitous of which was Holinshed's Chronicles.

References to the Play

None known.

Critical Commentary

This "Henry V" as an old play

Malone "suppose[s]" that the Admiral's play was The Famous Victories of Henry the fifth: Containing the Honorourable Battell of Agin-court, which was registered at Stationers' Hall on 14 May 1594 and published in 1598 with a title-page advertisement of ownership by the Queen's men (p. 297, n3). Malone is thus giving Famous Victories a revival some ten years after its debut (which occurred perhaps in 1585; William Knell is said to have played the part of Prince Hal [McMillin and MacLean, p. 196]).

Collier declares that the "harey the v" first played on 28 November 1595 "was a new play." But then he confuses the issue by referring to p. 26 in his edition of the diary, where he says there is "a notice of the representation of another play, called Henry V" on 14 May 1592. Collier is here (apparently) referring to the play Henslowe recorded as "harey the vj" on fifteen dates in the spring of 1592 as having been performed by Lord Strange's men (see Collier, p. 26, n.1). Although noting that Malone takes "no notice of this play," Collier himself is the one making the error, if subsequent editors of the diary may be trusted: Greg and Foakes transcribe the title of the play performed by Lord Strange's men at the Rose on 14 May 1592 as "harey the 6" (Greg, I, 14; Foakes, p. 18). Having thus (apparently) introduced an errant reading of Henslowe's 14 May 1592 manuscript, Collier consideres which of Henslowe's entries might be for The Famous Victories of Henry V (the play published with attribution to the Queen's men) or Shakespeare's Henry V. He then considers the possibility that one or more of these "Henry" plays "was Shakespeare's Henry V," but he doesn't make a case for that identification. His final position appears to be that Henslowe's "Henry V" is not the Queen's Famous Victories, so it has to be Shakespeare's Henry V, i.e., it could not be a third, discrete play on the subject of Henry V (p. 61, n1).

Fleay, BCED claims that "Henry V" was "[p]robably a mended version of The Famous Victories of Henry 5," that is, the play belonging to the Queen's men (2.#176, p. 304). Greg II identifies the play in Henslowe's diary as The Famous Victories of Henry V, which had belonged to the Queen's men. To account for the migration of the script from Queen's to the Admiral's, he creates a narrative in which "the Admiral's men appropriated and revised the play and stayed the publication till 1598 when Creede printed it from the original MS" (#82, p. 178).

This "Henry V" as a new play

Sharpe breaks from the entrenched position of the Admiral's "Henry V" as an old play recycled from the repertory of the Queen's men by implying that at the least it was some kind of make-over (p. 60).

Ingram, thinking in the context of commerce at the Swan playhouse in November 1595, considers Henslowe's "Henry V" "probably not the Famous Victories of Henry V played more than a decade earlier by Tarlton and the Queen's men, though it may have been derived from the latter" (p. 121)

Knutson treats the "Henry V" in Henslowe's playlists for 1595-6 as a discrete play (pp. 70-1). Regarding its repertorial context, she suggests that the Admiral's play might have participated in a three-way dramatic conversation on the prince who became Henry V by looking across the stages in 1595-6 of the Rose, Swan, and Theater. Persuaded by the recent construction of the Swan playhouse on the Bankside (see Ingram, pp. 116-20) and the availability of the Queen's men (see McMillin and MacLean, p. 51), she imagines repertorial competition across The Famous Victories of Henry V at the Swan, "Henry the V" at the Rose, and 1 Henry IV at the Theater (p. 169).

Gurr considers it necessary as late as 2009 to disassociate Henslowe's "harey the v" from The Famous Victories of Henry V owned by the Queen's men, which he does on the basis of the latter's title-page assignment of company in 1598 as well as Henslowe's marking the 1595 play as "ne."

Wiggins, Catalogue #1021 considers it "safest to treat this as a distinct play, yet another dramatization of a popular story."

For What It's Worth

If this play was indeed a discrete dramatization of the exploits of King Henry V of England, its receipts may provide insight into the profit the Queen's men had expected of their Famous Victories of Henry V in the 1580s and the Chamberlain's men were to expect of their Henry V in 1599.

Works Cited

Gurr, Andrew. Shakespeare's Opposites: The Admiral's Company 1594-1625. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009.

Ingram, William. A London Life in the Brazen Age: Francis Langley, 1548-1602. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1978.

Knutson, Roslyn Lander. The Repertory of Shakespeare's Company, 1594-1613. Fayetteville, AR: The University of Arkansas Press. 1991.

McMillin, Scott and Sally-Beth MacLean. The Queen's Men and their Plays. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

Sharpe, Robert B. The Real War of the Theaters. Boston: D. C. Heath, 1935.

Site created and maintained by Roslyn L. Knutson, Professor Emerita, University of Arkansas at Little Rock; 9 February 2021.