Cutlack
Historical Records
Performance Records (Henslowe's Diary)
F. 9 (Greg I.17)
Under the play list for "my lord admeralls men" on 14-16 May 1594:
- Res at Cvlacke the 16 of maye 1594 xxxxijs
Under the play list "begininge at newington for "my Lord Admeralle men & my Lorde chamberlen men" for 10 performances, June 3-13:
ye 6 of June 1594 Res at cvtlacke xjs
In Henslowe's play lists beginning 15 June 1594, the date on which W. W. Greg decided that the Admiral's players had returned to the Rose after their 10-day run at Newington with the Chamberlain's players:
ye 17 of June 1594 Res at cutlacke xxxvs ye 24 of June 1594 Res at cvtlacke xxvs ye 27 of June 1594 Res at cvttlacke xxxvjs
F. 9v (Greg I.18)
ye 4 of Julye 1594 Res at cvtlacke xxiiijs ye 15 of Julye 1594 Res at cvtlacke xxxvs ye 29 of Julye 1594 Res at cvtlacke xxixs ye 8 of aguste 1594 Res at cvttlacke xiijs vjd ye 22 of aguste 1594 Res at cvttlacke xxiijs vjd
F. 10 (Greg I.19)
ye 6 of septemb[er] 1594 Res at cvtlacke xjs ye 26 of septmb[er] 1594 Res at cuttlacke xiiijs
NB: The entry 8 August 1594 is one of several in the diary that shares a calendar date with another play. In this instance, Henslowe entered "Philipo and Hippolito" for 7 August and The Massacre at Paris for 8 August, duplicating those dates with the assignment of the 7th to The Jew of Malta and the 8th to "Cutlack."
Theatrical Provenance
The newly formed Admiral's men introduced "Cutlack" without the enigmatic sign "ne" on 16 May 1594 when they acquired the lease at the Rose playhouse that they were to maintain until their move to the Fortune in the fall of 1600. They gave the play 12 performances before retiring it, apparently for good, as it does not reappear in records from Henslowe's diary. The absence of a "ne" suggests a prior history with another company before May 1594.
Probable Genre(s)
Tragedy? (Harbage)
Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues
There are two competing interpretations of the eponymous character of the play.
St. Guthlac
Saint Guthlac (674–715), the Anglo-Saxon prince who became a hermit, was, in the words of Henry Mayr-Harting, "one of the most famous and influential holy men in the first 120 years of English Christianity". The main source for his life is the vita written by an eighth-century monk, Felix, which states that, after a wild youth spent as a warrior, he made his home at Croyland, then a remote island in the Lincolnshire fenland. There, he was tormented mercilessly by the local demons, until eventually overcoming them. In some versions he achieves this victory through passive suffering, but in others he drives them away with the aid of a whip or scourge given to him by Saint Bartholomew. In time Guthlac grew famous for the sanctity of his life, and Croyland became a place of pilgrimage even for Anglo-Saxon royalty. William Camden writes of St Guthlac:
- If I should exemplifie unto you out of that Monke, the Devils of Crowland, with their blabber lips, fire-spitting mouthes, rough and skaly visages, beetle heads, terrible teeth, sharpe chins, hoarse throats, blacke skinnes, crump-shoulders, side and gor-bellies, burning loines, crooked and hawm'd legges, long tailed buttockes, and ugly mishapes, which heeretofore walked and wandered up and downe in these places, and very much troubled holy Guthlake and the Monkes, you would laugh full merily: and I might bee thought a simple sily-one full worthily. Howbeit, in regard of the admirable situation of this place, so farre different from all others in England, and considering the Abbay was so famous, I am well content to dwell a while in the description of these particulars…
Robert Boies Sharpe was the first to propose the idea that this was a play about St. Guthlac, noting that "Guthlac's life presented fine opportunities for an Alleyn interpretation". Sharpe further notes the similarities between Guthlac and the demon-fighting Saint Dunstan, whom Guilpin mentions in the epigram about Cutlack discussed below. Quoting the passage above from Camden, Sharpe further suggests that there was the opportunity for a slightly comic treatment of the demon motif:
- Camden uses Felix's Life of Guthlac with a relish for its comic possibilities; indeed, may not some of the graphic touches in this paraphrase by his translator give a glimpse of the Admiral's play itself?
Sharpe's suggestion is followed by Andrew Gurr, who identifies Cutlack as Guthlac, "the warrior turned hermit who fought with devils". Most recently, the identification has been proposed again by Todd A. Borlik, in the course of an argument about the possible relationship between The Tempest and stories of Lincolnshire fen devils.
Guichlac
Guichlac was the king of the Danes in the time of Belinus and Brennius, sons of Mulmutius Dunwallow ("Mulmutius Dunwallow"). The identification is supported by the following evidence: first, the narrative of Guichlac in Geoffrey's The History of the Kings of Britain (the name is spelled "Ginchtalacus" in the 1966 Penguin edition); second, the connection of the name "Gutlack," or "Cutlake," with that narrative:
Guichlac's story, according to Geoffrey of Monmouth in The History of the Kings of Britain: Internet Archive
- • Brennius was returning to Britain with a force of Norwegian warriors to defend his holdings against the military take-over of his brother, Belinus, when Guichlac followed and attacked him.
- • In the course of the battle, Guichlac saw and desired the woman Brennius had married. Boarding Brennius's ship, Guichlac kidnapped the wife.
- • A storm arose suddenly, scattering the ships of both factions. In a curious turn of fate, Guichlac's ship beached in Northumbria where Belinus was encamped (on Brennius's territory). Belinus took Guichlac and Brennius's bride as prisoners to use as pawns of his revenge against Brennius.
- • Meanwhile Brennius landed with his Norwegians in Scotland; Belinus sought him out and defeated him.
- • At a council at York, Belinus released Guichlac, who offered yearly tribute in return for allowing him to go home to Denmark with Brennius's stolen bride.
- • There Guichlac remained until Belinus's son, Gurguint Barbtruc, invaded his home, killed him, and subjugated his people, all because Guichlac refused to pay to the son the tribute he had paid the father, Belinus.
"Gutlack" and "Cutlake" as variant spellings of "Guichlac" in the late 16th century:
- King Gurgunt I am hight, King Belins eldest sonne,
- Whose syre Dunwallo first, the Brittish crowne did weare.
- Whom truthlesse Gutlack forste to passe the surging seas,
- His falshode to reuenge, and Denmarke land to spoile.
- (B3r)
- My Brothers Kingdome seemes, forsooth, an Ouer-match to myne,
- My Kingdome, Cutlake, therefore is an Under-match to thyne?
- Nay, giue (and so I hope ye will) the Prize to me, and than,
- Let Cutlake with his Crowne of Danske vn-crowne me, if he can.
- (p. 63)
Cutlack's narrative was well known to Spenser. In Book II of The Faerie Queene, in the history book Arthur reads in the library at Alma's castle, Spenser tells the story of Mulmutius Dunwallow in some detail, but he truncates the actions of the bellicose sons. He thus omits the sub-plot of the Danish king, Guichlac, except to say that Belinus's son, Gurgunt, "Danmarke wonne,/ And ... did foy and tribute raise,/ The which was dew in his dead fathers dayes" (II.x.41.3-5).
References to the Play
In Epigram #43, "Of Clodius," Everard Guilpin mocks a braggart who copies moves from characters in plays, one of which is Cutlack (Google Books):
- Clodus me thinks lookes passing big of late,
- With Dunstons browes, and Allens Cutlacks gate :
- What humours haue possest him so, I wonder,
- His eyes are lightning, and his words are thunder:
- What meanes the Bragart by his alteration?
- He knows he's known too wel, for this fond fashion :
- To cause him to be feared : what meanes he than ?
- Belike, because he cannot play the man.
- Yet would be awde, he keepes this filthy reuell,
- Stalking and roaring like to Job's great deuill.
Critical Commentary
Collier (Diary, p. 34), Fleay (BCED, 2.301), and Greg (II. Item 40, p. 163) identified the reference to the play in Guilpin's epigram.
Gurr interprets "Allens Cutlacks gate" as a reference to the gait, or stride, of the character in the Admiral's play as performed by Edward Alleyn (203n). In another context, Gurr characterizes Cutlack as "heroic" (50).
See also Wiggins serial number 858.
For What It's Worth
Theatrical interest in the historical time of Cutlack continued into 1598, when the Admiral's men purchased "Mulmutius Dunwallow" from William Rankins on 3 October 1598.
The fact that King Gurgunt is a major figure in the Norwich pageant welcoming the queen to the city on 16 August 1578 suggests some currency at least in one part of England for the ancillary characters in Gurgunt's story, one of whom is Cutlack. (Gurgunt was the son of Belinus, nephew of Brennius. He sought the tribute his late father had won from Cutlack; failing to receive it, Gurgant invaded Cutlack's territory, killing Cutlack and subjecting his people.)
Based on the evidence that "Cutlack" was the Danish king, Guichlac, the genre of the play might as well be "history" as Harbage's guess of "tragedy."
Works Cited
Site created and maintained by Roslyn L. Knutson, Professor Emerita, University of Arkansas at Little Rock; updated 8 March 2010.