Latin tragedy Progne on 5 September. The plays were all written by Christ Church men, but the actors appear to have been drawn in part from other colleges. John Rainolds of Corpus, afterwards a bitter opponent of the academic stage, played Hippolyta in Palamon and Arcite.[1] All the plays are unfortunately lost. The Spanish ambassador reported that there had been nothing about religion in them, and delivered himself of the compliment, 'Memorabilia profecto sunt Oxoniensium spectacula'.[2] More deserving, more felicitous, or less audacious than Cambridge, Oxford received the honour of a second royal visit in 1592.[3] It lasted from 22 to 28 September.[4] The plays, given on 24 and 26 September, were Leonard Hutten's Bellum Grammaticale and Gager's Rivales. Both performances were at Christ Church, but probably actors from other colleges took part. A jaundiced Cambridge visitor described them as 'but meanely performed'. Elizabeth, however, was gracious, and before departing 'schooled' John Rainolds, who had recently been fulminating against Gager,
- ↑ Cf. Boas, 106, 390.
- ↑ Sp. Papers, i. 578; cf. Boas, 385.
- ↑ Sometimes the Chancellor brought distinguished foreign visitors, who were entertained with plays. In May 1569 Thomas Cooper, Vice-Chancellor and Dean of Christ Church, wrote to Leicester (Pepys MSS. 155), proposing 'a playe or shew of the destruction of Thebes, and the contention between Eteocles and Polynices for the governement therof', for a projected visit on 15 May by Odet de Coligny, Cardinal de Châtillon, and asking help 'for provision for some apparaile' (not 'apparaiti', as the Hist. MSS. report on the Pepys MSS. has it). It is not certain that the visit actually took place (Boas, 158). But in 1583 Leicester brought Albertus Alasco, Prince Palatine of Siradia in Poland, who saw the Rivales and Dido of William Gager (q.v.) on 11 and 12 June. The plays were given at Christ Church by men of that and other colleges, with the assistance of George Peele (Boas, 179, from Holinshed and academic archives). In Jan. 1585 Leicester came again, with Pembroke and Philip Sidney, and saw Gager's Meleager at Christ Church, and possibly also a comedy at Magdalen. Apparel was borrowed from John Lyly, who was then connected with the Blackfriars theatre (Boas, 192, from academic archives).
- ↑ There is only one narrative, by Philip Stringer (of St. John's, Cambridge), printed by Nichols, Eliz.1, and Plummer, 245. Wood, Hist. of Oxford, ii. 248, follows an independent source. Boas, 252, makes some additions from academic archives, and cites from Twyne MS. xvii, f. 174, an order that 'the schollers which cannot be admitted to see the playes, doo not make any outcries or undecent noyses about the hall stayres or within the quadrangle of Christchurch, as usually they were wont to doo'. This was repeated at the visit of 1605. John Sanford's Apollinis et Musarum Eidyllia, reprinted by Plummer, 275, contains verses laudatory of the various guests.
munem laetitiam contaminare, nihilominus tamen eandem commaculare non potuit. Ad spectacula itaque omnes, alieno iam periculo cautiores, revertuntur'.
