I am knee-deep in Shakespeare right now, with this year’s Shakespeare in the Park featuring two Shakespeare in repertory. While A Winter’s Tale and Merchant of Venice prepare to open next week, I thought I’d share some more information about the props in Shakespeare’s time.
I’ve written previously about what the props in Shakespeare’s time might have been. Henslowe’s Diary provides a list of the props in storage at Henslowe’s Rose Theatre. Though his diary does not mention Shakespeare, he was a contemporary and his theatre was similar in size and organization. I gave an excerpt of what was on that list, but since then, I’ve dug up the list in its entirety:
- One rock, one cage, one tomb, one hell mouth.
- One tomb of Guido, one tomb of Dido, one bedstead.
- Eight lances, one pair of stairs for Phaeton.
- Two steeples and one chime of bells and one beacon.
- One globe and one golden scepter.
- Two marchpanes, and the City of Rome.
- One golden fleece, two rackets, and one bay tree.
- One wooden hatchet, one leather hatchet.
- One wooden canopy, old Mahomet’s head.
- One lion skin, one bear’s skin and Phaeton’s limbs and Phaeton’s chariot and Argosse’ head.
- Neptune fork and garland.
- One crosier staff, Kent’s wooden leg.
- Jerosses head and rainbow, one little altar.
- Eight visors, Tamberlayne bridel, one wooden mattock.
- Cupid’s bow and quiver, the Cloth of the Sun and Moon.
- One boar’s head and Cerberus three heads.
- One caduceus, two moss banks and one snake.
- Two fanes of feathers, Belendon stables, one tree of golden apples, Tantelus tree, nine iron targets.
- One copper target, seventeen foiles.
- Four wooden targets, one greave armor.
- One sign for Mother Redcap, one buckler.
- Mercury’s wings, Tasso pictures, one helmet with a dragon, one shield with three lions, one elm bowl.
- One chain of dragons, one gilt spear.
- Two coffins, one bull’s head.
- Three timbrels, one dragon in fostes.
- One lion, two lion heads, one great horse with his legs, one sackbutt.
- One wheel and frame in the siege of London.
- One pair of wrought gloves.
- One Pope’s miter.
- Three Imperial crowns, one plain crown.
- One frame for the heading in Black Jone.
- One ghost’s crown and one crown with a sun.
- One black dog.
- One caldron for the Jew.
Maybe at some point, I’ll look into what some of these props actually were.
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