Several of these men were to achieve distinction in their 'quality'; of none of them is there any earlier record, unless John Perkin is to be identified with the Parkins who had been in 1552-3 one of the train of the Lord of Misrule.[1] By 6 December 1571 the company were in London.[2] Three years later they obtained a very singular favour in the patent of 10 May 1574, the general bearings of which have already been discussed.[3]
pro Iacobo Burbage & aliis de licencia speciali Elizabeth by the grace of God quene of England, &c. To all Iustices, Mayors, Sheriffes, Baylyffes, head Constables, vnder Constables, and all other our officers and mynisters gretinge. Knowe ye that we of oure especiall grace, certen knowledge, and mere mocion haue licenced and auctorised, and by these presentes do licence and auctorise, oure lovinge Subiectes, Iames Burbage, Iohn Perkyn, Iohn Lanham, William Iohnson, and Roberte Wilson, seruauntes to oure trustie and welbeloued Cosen and Counseyllor the Earle of Leycester, to vse, exercise, and occupie the arte and facultye of playenge Commedies, Tragedies, Enterludes, stage playes, and such other like as they haue alredie vsed and studied, or hereafter shall vse and studie, aswell for the recreacion of oure loving subiectes, as for oure solace and pleasure when we shall thincke good to see them, as also to vse and occupie all such Instrumentes as they haue alredie practised, or hereafter shall practise, for and during our pleasure. And the said Commedies, Tragedies, Enterludes, and stage playes, to gether with their musicke, to shewe, publishe, exercise, and occupie to their best commoditie during all the terme aforesaide, aswell within oure Citie of London and liberties of the same, as also within the liberties and fredomes of anye oure Cities, townes, Bouroughes &c whatsoeuer as
- ↑ Mediaeval Stage, i. 406; Kempe, 47. The garments provided for Ferrers by the Revels included fools' coats for 'Children, John Smyth, Ayer apparent . . . Seame 2, Parkins 3, Elderton 4'.
- ↑ App. D, No. xviii.
- ↑ Cf. ch. ix. The patent is printed from the Patent Roll in M. S. C. i. 262; also from a copy of the entry on the Patent Roll preserved amongst Rymer's papers in Sloane MS. 4625 by Steevens, Shakespeare (1773), ii. 156, and therefrom in Variorum, iii. 47. This text omits the words 'oure Citie of London and liberties of the same as also within'. Collier, i. 203, and Hazlitt, E. D. S. 25, printed the Signet Bill, erroneously describing it as the Privy Seal, from the State Paper Office. This has the omitted words, and Collier correctly explains the omission in Steevens's text as due to an inaccurate copyist, pointing in proof to the words 'in oure said Citye of London'. This did not, however, prevent Fleay, 45, from asserting that in the Patent 'an alteration had been made from the Privy Seal', on the ground that its terms 'infringed on the powers of the City authorities'. Such an alteration not merely did not take place, but would have been a diplomatic impossibility, as the Patent Roll was made up, not from the Letters Patent, but from the Privy Seals on which these were based.
