Spanish Duke of Lerma

Henry Shirley (1623?)

Historical Records

King's Men Repertory List (1641)

On 7 August 1641, Robert Devereux, 3rd Earl of Essex sent a letter to the Masters and Warden of the Stationers' Company with a list of 61 plays in the repertory of the King's Men asking for "your care (as formerly my Predecessors haue done) that noe Playes belonging to them bee put in Print w^thout their knowledge & consent." The play appears in Essex's list as:

The Duke of Lerma or y^e spanish Duke.

(National Archives, LC 5/135, Chambers, "Plays," 369)

List of King's Men Plays Performed at the Blackfriars before 1642

The play appears in a list of titles (prepared c. 12 January 1669) allotted to Thomas Killigrew's King's Company as having been part of the repertory of the pre-war King's Men.

Plays Acted at the Theatre Royall. A Catalogue of part of His Ma^tes Servants Playes as they were formerly acted at the Blackfryers & now allowed of to his Ma^tes Servants at y^e New Theate

[…]

The Duke of Lerma

(National Archives, LC 5/12, p. 212, qtd. Nicoll, 315–16)

Stationers' Register

Humphrey Moseley entered the play on 9 September 1653, along with three others attributed to Henry Shirley:

The spanish Duke of Lerma.

The Duke of Guize            by Henry Shirley.

The Dumbe Bawd &

Giraldo, y^e Constant Louer

(Liber E, p. 286; cf. Eyre, 1.429)

Sir Robert Howard's The Great Favourite (1668)

In the prefatory address "To the Reader," Sir Robert Howard describes the process by which he came to write the play published as The Great Favourite, Or, the Duke of Lerma, which was acted by the King's Company in 1668:

For the Subject, I came accidentally to write upon it; for a Gentleman brought a Play to the Kinds Company, call'd The Duke of Lerma; and by them I was desir'd to peruse it, and return my opinion whether I thought it fit for the Stage; after I had read it, I acquainted them, that in my judgement it would not be of much use for such a design, since the contrivance, scarce would merit the name of a plot; and some of that, assisted by a disguise; and it ended abruptly: and on the Person of Philip the 3. there was fixt such a mean Character, and on the Daughter of the Duke of Lerma, such a vitious one, that I cou'd not but judge it unfit to be presented by any that had a respect, not only to Princes, but indeed to either Man or Woman; and about that time, being to go into the Countrey, I was perswaded by Mr. Hart to make it my diversion there that so great a hint might not be lost, as the Duke of Lerma saving himself in his last extremity, by his unexpected disguise, which is as well in the true story as the old Play; and besides that and the Names, my altering the most part of the Characters, and the whole design, made me uncapable to use much more; though perhaps written with higher Stile and Thoughts; then I coul'd attain to…

(Howard, sig. A2r–v)

Theatrical Provenance

Acted by the King's Men at the Blackfriars (and possibly the Globe)

Probable Genre(s)

Foreign History (Harbage)

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

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References to the Play

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Critical Commentary

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For What It's Worth

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Works Cited

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Howard, Sir Robert. The Great Favourite. London, 1668. Wing H2996.

Nicoll, Allardyce. A History of Restoration Drama 1660–1700. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1928.

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