Mother Redcap

Michael Drayton and Anthony Munday (1597)

Historical Records

Henslowe's Diary

F37v / Greg 1.70:

layde owt the 22 of desemb[er] 1597 for a boocke called } iij^ll

mother Readcape to antony monday & m^r drayton . . . . }

Layd owt the 28 of desemb[er] 1597 to antoney monday }

toward his boocke w^ch J delyvered to thomas . . . . . . . } v^s

dowton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . }

F43v / Greg 1.82:

A Juste a cownt of all suche money as J haue

layde owt for my lord admeralles [men] players begynyng

the xj of octob[er] whose names ar as foloweth

borne gabrell shaw Jonnes dowten Jube towne

synger & the ij geffes 1597

_________________________________________

...

layd owt the 22 of desemb[er] 1597 for a boocke called } iij^ll

mother Read cape to antony monday & drayton . . . . . }

layd owt the 28 of desemb[er] 1597 for the boocke called } v^s

mother Read cape to antoney mondaye . . . . . . . . . . . . .}

F44 / Greg 1.83:

layd owt for my lord admeralles meane as foloweth 1597

1597

__________________________________________________

pd vnto antony monday & drayton for the laste .}

payment of the Boocke of mother Readcape the } lv^s

5 of Jenewary 1597 the some of . . . . . . . . . . . .}

Henslowe Papers

Greg, Papers 117:

Under Henslowe's title, "The Enventary tacken of all the properties for my Lord Admeralles men, the 10 of Marche 1598" is:

Item, j syne for Mother Readcap; j buckler

Greg, Papers 121:

Under Henslowe's title, "A Note of all suche bookes as belong to the Stocke, and such as I have bought since the 3d of March 1598" is:

"Read Cappe."

Theatrical Provenance

Henslowe paid Drayton and Munday a total of £6 on behalf of the Admiral's men at the end of 1597 / start of 1598.

Probable Genre(s)

Comedy (?) (Harbage).

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

Greg notes that " 'Mother redd cappe her last will and Testament,' presumably a chapbook, was entered S. R. 10 Mar. 1595." (2.189).

References to the Play

Critical Commentary

For What It's Worth

There was a pub called Mother Red Cap at least as early as 1638, when Richard Brathwaite (1588?-1673) mentioned passing through Holloway in his Barnabees journall:

Thence to Hollowell, Mother red cap,

In a troupe of Trulls I did hap;
Whoors of Babylon me impalled,
And me their Adonis called;
With me toy'd they, buss'd me, cull'd me,

But being needy, out they pull'd me. (sig.L4)

Pepys visited a pub by this name in Holloway (presumably the same pub) on 24 September 1661:

So we rode easily through and only drinking at Halloway at the sign of a woman with Cakes in one hand and a pot of ale in the other, which did give good occasion of mirth, resembling her to the mayd that served us; we got home very timely and well. (184)

Pepys's editors, Latham and Matthews gloss this pub as "The Mother Redcap; a well-known house on the Great North Road" (184n).

Jacob Larwood and John Camden Hotten

Works Cited

Brathwaite, Richard. Barnabees journall under the names of Mirtilus & Faustulus shadowed: for the travellers solace lately published, to most apt numbers reduced, and to the old tune of Barnabe commonly chanted. By Corymboeus. 1638. Print.

Larwood, Jacob, and John Camden Hotten. The History of Signboards, From the Earliest Times to the Present Day. 2nd edn. London, 1866. Print.

Latham, Robert, and William Matthews, ed. Samuel Pepys. The Diary of Samuel Pepys, vol.2: 1661. Berkeley: U of California P, 1970. Print.

Pepys, Samuel. The Diary of Samuel Pepys, vol.2: 1661. Ed. Robert Latham and William Matthews. Berkeley: U of California P, 1970. Print.

Site created and maintained by David McInnis, University of Melbourne; updated 02 Feb 2011.