Branhowlte (Brunhild)

Anon. (1597),Property "Documentary Source" (as page type) with input value "{{{documentarySources}}}" contains invalid characters or is incomplete and therefore can cause unexpected results during a query or annotation process.Property "Paratext" (as page type) with input value "{{{paratexts}}}" contains invalid characters or is incomplete and therefore can cause unexpected results during a query or annotation process.Property "Contributor" (as page type) with input value "{{{contributors}}}" contains invalid characters or is incomplete and therefore can cause unexpected results during a query or annotation process.Property "Partnering Institution" (as page type) with input value "{{{partneringInstitutions}}}" contains invalid characters or is incomplete and therefore can cause unexpected results during a query or annotation process.

Historical Records

Performance Records (Henslowe's Diary)

F. 43v (Greg, I. 82)

lent vnto Robarte shaw for the company to bye viij }
yr of clothe of gow[e]lde for the womones gowne in bran } iiijli
howlte the 26 of novmbʒ 1597 the some of }

Henslowe Papers

Greg, Papers (Appx. I, art. 1, p. 115. l. 29)

Under the heading “The Enventary of the Clownes Sewtes and Hermetes Swetes, with dievers other sewtes, as follweth, 1598, the 10 of March:
Item, ... branhowlttes bodeys



Henslowe's Inventory of Playbooks

Greg, Papers (Appx. I, art. 1, p. 121. l. 193)

Under the heading “A Note of all suche bookes as belong to the Stocke, and such as I have bought since the 3d of Marche 1598:
Brunhowlle.


Theatrical Provenance

"Brunhild" (modernization of "Branhowlte" by Harbage, also Wiggins, Catalogue #1089) was acquired by the Admiral's men by November 1597 and brought to the stage at the Rose soon after. Greg II thought that the play had been acquired from Pembroke's men, recently at the Swan, but broken up in the wake of (and perhaps because of) the trouble the company attracted when it offered "The Isle of Dogs" (p. 188, #118; commentary in heading to Section VIII, p. 187).


Probable Genre(s)

Tragedy ? (Harbage)

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

Wiggins, Catalogue (#1089) suggests several continental sources including The History of the Franks by St. Gregory of Tours and Les antiquitiés et histoires Gauloises et Françaises by Claude Fauchet as well as the exactly contemporary Theatre of God's Judgements by Thomas Beard (1597).

References to the Play

Information welcome.

Critical Commentary

Beyond modest conjecture on the identity of the titular character and the story in which she features, Fleay, BCED (2.306, #203) and Greg II (p. 188, #118) add only that a play attributed to John Fletcher, Thierry and Theodoret (1621), dramatized the same subject.


Gurr, puzzling over the payment of 10s. to William Haughton on 5 November 1597 that directly precedes the payment for the cloth of gold for "Branholt," muses that "it is not possible to identify what play Haughton was being paid for unless it was Branholt (p. 230 n.72).


Wiggins, Catalogue observes that the Admiral's men acquired several plays along with Brunhild that required "striking women's costumes"; see his commentary for further conjecture on possible repertorial consequences of these acquisitions (#1089).



For What It's Worth



Works Cited

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



Site created and maintained by Roslyn L. Knutson, Professor Emerita, University of Arkansas at Little Rock; 1 July 2019.