Page:The Elizabethan stage (Volume 4).pdf/276

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Johannes Ronner, Willelmus Readyng, Edmundus Stokedale, Johannes Rawlyns, Johannes Crane, Ricardus Gyrke, Johannes Radstone, Oliuerus Page, Ricardus Pokeley, Ricardus Parseley, & Willelmus Clement, recognoverunt se & eorum quemlibet, per se debere domino Regi xx li, bonis etc soluendis etc: The condicion, etc, that yf the above bounden John Nethe, Robert Southyn etc & eny and euery of them, do not at herafter play eny interlude or comen play within eny of our Soueraygn Lorde the kynges domynyons, without the especiall licence of our seid Soueraygn Lorde, or of his most honourable Councell for the tyme beyng, had & obteyned for the same, And also yf they the seid Recognytours, & euery of them, do att all & euery tyme & tymes herafter, when they or any of them shalbe, by the seid Counsell or eny of them, sent for, personally appere before the seid Counsell or some of them, that then, etc, or els etc.


vi.


[1553. City order cited from Letter Book, R, f. 246, in V. H. London, i. 295.]


Plays and interludes were forbidden before 3 p.m. on Sundays and holidays.


vii.


[1558. A reference to plays is cited from Letter Book, V, f. 216, in V. H. London, i. 322.]


viii.


[1559, April 7. Proclamation. Despatches in V. P. vii. 65, 71, also record this, which, however, is not preserved. It forms no part of Procl. 504 for peace with France, which both Machyn and Holinshed describe as proclaimed immediately before it, and which bears date 7 April. Procl. 503, of 22 March, prescribing Easter Sacrament in both kinds, has a clause enjoining mayors and other officers to commit to prison 'all disordred persons, that shall seke willingly to breake, either by misordred dede, or by railing, or contemptuous speach, the common peace and band of charytie'; but, apart from the discrepancy of dates, this seems too general in its terms to answer the descriptions.]


(a)


[Entry in Machyn's Diary, 193, misdated April 8.]


Bluw-mantyll dyd proclaymyd that no players shuld play no more tyll a serten tyme of no mans players; but the mare or shreyff, balle, constabull, or odur offesers take them, lay them in presun, and the quen commondement layd on them.


(b)


[Extract from Holinshed, Chronicle, iii. 1184.]


The same time also [April 7] was another proclamation made under the queenes hand in writing, inhibiting that from thenceforth no plaies nor interludes should be exercised, till Alhallowes tide next insuing.