was issued to Philip Rosseter and his partners for a new theatre at Porter's Hall in the Blackfriars. In the patents for companies the model of the 1574 patent is in the main followed, but as a rule the 'usual howse' in which the company will play is named. This, however, does not seem to be meant to fetter their discretion to use some other convenient house, and a general authority to play in the provinces is, except in the case of the Revels Children, always added. There is no such limitation on playing to two days a week as was imposed on the companies by the Council order of 1600. Most of the patents contain a clause reserving 'all auctoritie power priuiledges and profittes' appertaining to the Master of the Revels under his patent or commission. This is omitted in the licence for the King's men and in both of those for the Revels Children, whose 1604 patent contains a special clause requiring their plays to have the 'approbacion and allowaunce' of Samuel Daniel, whom Queen Anne had appointed for that purpose.[1] It became the duty of the Master to scrutinize the phraseology of plays in the light of an Act to Restrain Abuses of Players, passed in May 1606, which imposed a penalty of £10 for any profane or jesting use of the names of God, Christ Jesus, the Holy Ghost, or the Trinity, in any stage-play, interlude, show, May-game, or pageant. This statute, even if not always literally observed, entailed much revision of existing dramatic texts.
If the system of patents did not render the London players independent of the Master of the Revels, still less did it abrogate from the ultimate authority of the King in Council. There is evidence that the theatres were closed in the autumn of 1605, during which plague was prevalent, and in this matter the responsibility for action still rested with the Council.[2] Unfortunately the full Register for the period 1603-13 is missing. A letter of 12 April 1607 from the City asking for a restraint is addressed to the Lord Chamberlain, whose function it would no doubt be to move the Council. In this or some later year the Whitefriars vestry seem also to have made a protest against the dumping of a play-house in their precinct.[3] That plague interfered with plays in 1608-9,
- ↑ There is no reference to licensing in the later Queen's Revels patent of 1610. That for the Queen's men in 1609 has the usual provision for licensing by the Master of the Revels. This was, however, not inconsistent with 'a kind of gouernment and suruey ouer the said players' by the Chamberlain of the Queen's Household (cf. ch. xiii).
- ↑ Philip Gawdy (Letters, 160) writes on 28 Oct. 1605 of his nephew in London, 'Playes he was never at any, for they are all put downe'; cf. App. D, Nos. cxxxix, cxl.
- ↑ Cf. ch. xvii.
