Fragment of a play in the Journal of Benjamin Greene

Anon. (1610-1613)

Historical Records

Benjamin Greene's journal

The following dramatic fragment appears in the journal of Benjamin Greene, preserved among the India Office Marine Department Records at the British Library (IOR/L/MAR/A/XII). The fragment was first published by William Foster (in "Forged Shakespeariana", 42) as an afterthought, following discussion of the supposed performances of Hamlet on board The Dragon in 1607. It comes from a journal recording a separate voyage (see Theatrical Provenance), but was offered by Foster as evidence of the theatrical interests of East India Company crew members more generally:

	Corus
Astorildo emperor coelicia		Carrabunculo R fletruria
Cleobulo & Druball his sonnes		Brufard his bastard sonne
Corderia his wife		Merinda his wife
liuia her daughter		Dionisia his faire daughter
Lord Pridamor		Catropus Brufards frend
lo: Parracie		flox (?) the hostler
Jack Pretty Cleobuloes man		Nibs the coachman
Tuckit Druballs man		Racrox & Rabix [illegible]
		Attendants
		Cristobell
		Vna
		Plebia
		Curia &c.

Enter at one dore---Corus

& Racrox at thother

Ra. Welmet frend what newes if thou wilt goe to the rose we will a cupe of merrigoe downe.

Co. I pray keepe of you are a great disturber of the common.

Theatrical Provenance

Benjamin Greene was a factor (one of the third class of the East India Company's servants) on the Darling, one of three ships (the others being the Peppercorn and Trades Increase) in the EIC's sixth voyage (to Surat in western India, 1610-13), under Sir Henry Middleton's leadership. Greene's journal records events from 15 November 1610 to 22 December 1612, at which point Middleton's ships had reached Bantam on Java. (Greene would die at Bantam, although he was apparently still alive in February 1613 [Jourdain 236, 243].) Greene does not refer to any performances, but the transcription above occurs on a sheet at the end of his diary (Foster 42).

Probable Genre(s)

Unknown.

Possible Narrative and Dramatic Sources or Analogues

While no direct narrative source is obvious, the fragment's characters' names are evocative of the sixteenth-century prose romance tradition. Astorildo is a character in the third installment of the sprawling Spanish romance Espejo de príncipes y caballeros (written by Marcos Martínez, published 1587), which appeared in English translations around the turn of the century, as the Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth books of The Mirror of Knighthood series, published from 1598 to 1601. (Astorildo only appears in the last three books; a "Cleobulo" is mentioned once in the Ninth [sig. Qq2v] although the name Cleobulus was more readily familiar as one of the Seven Sages of Greece.) Besides its use in the Espejo, the name Astorildo also appears in Belianís de Grecia (1545). That both of these Spanish texts are found in Don Quixote's library is indicative of their genre. The names Corus, Drubal, and Pridamor all appear in Emanuel Ford's popular English romance Parismus, the Renoumed Prince of Bohemia (1598) and its sequel Parismenos (1599).

On the place names in the fragment, see For What It's Worth below. For a selective list of dramatic allusions to the Mirror of Knighthood series, see the LPD entry for "Torrismount".

References to the Play

None other than Greene's fragment.

Critical Commentary

Sydney Race suggested that the fragment was a Collier forgery, but as Foster points out, "Surely it would have been quite natural for some unknown person to have alleviated the tedium of a voyage by trying his hand at dramatic composition; and in this connexion I may recall that Dr. Boas found in the British Museum a whole play [i.e. William Mountfort's The Launching of the Mary], written by one of the Company's servants on his homeward way" ("Reply", 414).

Frederick S. Boas, who assumed that the play was titled "Corus," cautioned that the fragment "may have been added to the journal after it had left Greene's hands" (88n).

For What It's Worth

If Astorildo is identified as "emperor coelicia," perhaps this indicates Celicia (or Cilicia) in Asia Minor. It might also be logical to understand the two characters names at the top of each column representing different rulers. While Foster's transcription "Carrabunculo R[ex] fletruria" is somewhat perplexing, the final word might perhaps be explained as a transcription error for Hetruria (or Etruria) if the manuscript used an unfamiliar majuscule H graph that could be misread as fl. Cilicia and Etruria, then, would represent two, perhaps antagonistic, mediterranean kingdoms between which the play's narrative could unfold.

The Rose was a fairly common tavern sign in London. In 1636, John Taylor, the Water Poet, counted ten around London and Westminster (sig. D2r). Some of these Roses are mentioned in contemporary drama, such as Haughton's Englishmen for My Money, The London Prodigal, and Dekker and Middleton's The Roaring Girl (Hoy 3:53). While a local tavern allusion would be appropriate in city comedies such as these, it seems somewhat in tension with the apparent Mediterranean setting suggested by the fragment's characters' names. (OED defines "merry-go-down" as "Strong ale," and cites usages in Nashe's Lenten Stuff and Heywood's 2 If You Know Not Me.)

Greene, the "cheefe Marchaunt in the Little Darling," composed his journal in accordance with the Company's commission that "contynuall & true Iournalls be kept of euery dayes Nauigacion duringe the whole voyadge" by the principal members of each ship (Birdwood 329, 331). Foster does not specifically say that the dramatic fragment is written in Greene's hand, but we might assume that if it had been conspicuously different Foster would have noted the discrepancy. If we indulge in conjecture that Greene was the author or the translator of the fragment, the fact that he spoke Spanish, French, and Italian might embolden us in considering sources (CSP Colonial 2:197).

According to John Jourdain, Greene fell ill at Pasaman in October 1612 and died at Bantam (235-36). His will, which he wrote in his sickness, is dated 5 February 1613 (National Archives, PROB 11/137, f. 213v). The will also provides some clues about Greene's background. Besides legacies granted to Sir Henry Middleton and various crew members of the Trade's Increase, Greene also left bequests to his father Edward, his mother Mary, and "the poore of Henbury and Bartley in Glocestershire neere Bristoll" (f. 213r). If this is an accurate indication of his origins, we can then be fairly confident that he is the same "Beniamyn Greene," son of Edward, who was baptized on 29 January 1586 at Saint Augustine the Less, Bristol (Sabin; Ancestry.com). Greene would thus have been twenty-seven when he died.

Works Cited

Ancestry.com. England, Select Births and Christenings, 1538-1975 [Online Database]. Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, 2014.

Birdwood, George, ed. The Register of Letters &c. of the Governour and Company of Merchants of London Trading into the East Indies, 1600-1619. London, 1893. (Internet Archive)

Boas, Frederick S. "Hamlet and Richard II on the High Seas." Shakespeare & The Universities and Other Studies in Elizabethan Drama. New York: D. Appleton, 1903. 84–95.

[CSP Colonial] W. Noël Sainsbury et al., eds. Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series. 44 vols. London: HMSO, 1860–1969.

Foster, William. "Forged Shakespeariana". Notes & Queries 9th S. VI. (21 July 1900), 41-42.

---. "Reply". Notes & Queries, CXCV (16 September 1950), 414-15.

Hoy, Cyrus. Introductions, Notes, and Commentaries to Texts in 'The Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker' Edited by Fredson Bowers. 4 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1980.

Martínez, Marcos. The seuenth booke of the Myrrour of knighthood Being the second of the third part. Englished out of the Spanish language. London: Printed by Thomas Purfoot for Cuthbert Burby, and are to be sould at his shop neere the Royall Exchange, 1598.

---. The eighth booke of the Myrror of knighthood Being the third of the third part. Englished out of the Spanish tongue. London : Printed by Thomas Creede, for Cuthbert Burbey, and are to be sold at this shop neare the Royall Exchaunge, 1599.

---. The ninth part of the Mirrour of knight-hood, being the fourth booke of the third part thereof: wherein is declared, the high and noble actes of the sonnes and nephewes of the noble Emperour Trebacius, and of the rest of the renoumed princes and knights, and of the high cheualrie of the gallant ladyes: wherein also is treated of the most cruell warre that euer was in Greece, with the amorous euents, and the end thereof. At London: Printed [by Simon Stafford] for Cuthbert Burbie, and are to be sold at his shop, at the Royall Exchange, 1601.

Jourdain, John. The Journal of John Jourdain, 1608-1617. Ed. William Foster. Cambridge: Hakluyt Society, 1905. (Internet Archive)

Race, Sydney. "J. P. Collier's Fabrications". Notes & Queries, CXCV (5 August 1950), 345-46.

Sabin, Arthur, ed. The Registers of the Church of St. Augustine the Less, Bristol, 1577-1700. Publications of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, Records Section, 3. Bristol: Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, 1956.

Taylor, John. Taylors travels and circular perambulation, through, and by more then thirty times twelve signes of the Zodiack, of the famous cities of London and Westminster With the honour and worthinesse of the vine, the vintage, the wine, and the vintoner; with an alphabeticall description, of all the taverne signes in the cities, suburbs, and liberties aforesaid, and significant epigrams upon the said severall signes. London, 1636.

Site created and maintained by David McInnis, University of Melbourne; updated by Misha Teramura, 01 September 2015.