Egerton MS 1994 is a manuscript collection of
English Renaissance plays, now in the
Egerton Collection of the
British Library. Probably prepared by the actor
William Cartwright around 1642, and later presented by him to
Dulwich College, the collection contains unique copies of several Elizabethan, Jacobean, and Caroline dramas, including significant works like ''
Edmund Ironside'' and ''
Thomas of Woodstock''.
The collection contains fourteen plays and an anonymous
masque:
* ''
The Elder Brother
''The Elder Brother'' is an early seventeenth-century English stage play, a comedy written by John Fletcher and Philip Massinger. Apparently dating from 1625, it may have been the last play Fletcher worked on before his August 1625 death.
Dat ...
'', by
John Fletcher and
Philip Massinger — folios 2–29
* ''
Dick of Devonshire
''Dick of Devonshire'' is an anonymous Jacobean era stage play, based on the autobiography of the real-life English sailor Dicke of Devonshire. Written in 1626, it survived as part of MS Egerton 1994; a manuscript collection prepared by the ac ...
'', attributed to
Robert Davenport or
Thomas Heywood — ff. 30–51
* ''The Captives'', by Thomas Heywood — ff. 52–73
* ''The Escapes of Jupiter'', by Thomas Heywood — ff. 74–95
* ''
Edmund Ironside'' — ff. 96–118
* ''
Charlemagne'' — ff. 119–35
* ''The Fatal Marriage or A Second Lucretia'' — ff. 136–60
* ''
Thomas of Woodstock'' — ff. 161–85
* ''
The Lady Mother
''The Lady Mother'' is a Caroline era stage play, a tragicomedy generally attributed to Henry Glapthorne, and dating from the middle 1630s. Never printed in its own era, the play survived in a manuscript marked as a theatre prompt-book, revealing ...
'', by
Henry Glapthorne — ff. 186–211
* A masque — ff. 212–23
* ''The Two Noble Ladies and the Converted Conjurer'' — ff. 224–44
* ''Nero'' — ff. 245–67
* ''
The Poor Man's Comfort
''The Poor Man's Comfort'' is a Jacobean era stage play, a tragicomedy by Robert Daborne — one of his two extant plays.
Date, performance, publication
The play's date is uncertain, though it is generally assigned to the 1610–18 era ...
'', by
Robert Daborne — ff. 268–92
* ''Love's Changelings' Change'' — ff. 293–316
* ''The Launching of the Mary'', attributed to Walter Mountfort — ff. 317–49.
''Thomas of Woodstock'' was one of
Shakespeare's sources for his ''
Richard II
Richard II (6 January 1367 – ), also known as Richard of Bordeaux, was King of England from 1377 until he was deposed in 1399. He was the son of Edward the Black Prince, Prince of Wales, and Joan, Countess of Kent. Richard's father died ...
'', and ''Edmund Ironside'' has been attributed to Shakespeare by some commentators.
Some of the plays, like ''The Two Noble Ladies'' and the two Heywood works, are judged to be autograph scripts, in the handwriting of the authors. (''The Escapes of Jupiter'' consists of excerpts from Heywood's ''The Golden Age'' and ''The Silver Age''.) The untitled masque in the collection has strong commonalities with the work of
George Chapman; it borrows a long passage from ''
The Tragedy of Byron'', suggesting Chapman influence rather than authorship.
[J. D. Jump, "The Anonymous Masque in MS. Egerton 1994," ''Review of English Studies'', vol. 11 No. 42 (April 1935), pp. 186-91.]
''The Launching of the Mary'' is a "first draft, written at different times, with different inks, and on different paper." The play was written at sea but subsequently supplied to a professional playing company when its author, Walter Mountfort, had returned to London.
The anonymous works in the collection have been the subject of attribution studies, and disagreements. ''Dick of Devonshire'' has been assigned to Davenport, but also to Heywood.
References
{{reflist
17th-century manuscripts
17th-century plays
Egerton collection
English Renaissance plays