Ptolemy

Anon. (1578)

Historical Records

Stephen Gosson, The School of Abuse (1579), 23 (EEBO-TCP):

And as some of the players are farre from abuse: so some of their playes are without rebuke... Ptolome, showne at the Bull, ... very liuely discrybing howe seditious estates with their owne deuises, false friendes with their owne swoordes, and rebellious cōmons in their owne snares are ouerthrowne: neither with amorous gesture wounding the eye, nor with slouenly talke hurting the eares of the chast hearers.

Theatrical Provenance

At the Bull Inn (Gosson)

Probable Genre(s)

Pseudo-history (?) (Harbage).

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

None known.

References to the Play

Only Gosson, above.

Critical Commentary

Harbage suggests this play might the same as "Telemo", performed by Leicester's Men at Court on 10 February 1583.

On the basis of Gosson's description, Wiggins 648 speculates that

There were many Ptolemies in antiquity who might have been the title character, including the fifteen belonging to the Ptolemaic dynasty which ruled Egypt from Alexander the Great's general Ptolemy Soter in the fourth century BC to Cleopatra's son Caesarion in the first. Probably the best known in the sixteenth century were Ptolemy VI Philometor (reigned 180—145 BC), whose story is told in 1 Maccabees 10—11 (and was retold by Anthony Munday in The Mirror of Mutability in 1579) and Ptolemy XIII (reigned 51—47 BC), the brother of Cleopatra and murderer of Pompey. However, Gosson's summary better fits Ptolemy V Epiphanes (reigned 204—181 BC), Ptolemy VIII Euergetes (182—116 BC) or Ptolemy XII Auletes (80—51 BC).

For What It's Worth

Under construction.

Works Cited

Gosson, Stephen. The School of Abuse. Printed at London: for Thomas Woodcocke, 1579. EEBO-TCP, open access

Site created and maintained by Domenico Lovascio, University of Genoa; updated 26 February 2015.