Price, Diana. "Reconsidering Shakespeare's Monument". Review of English Studies 48 (May 1997), 175. Its inscription starts with two lines in Latin, comparing Shakespeare with famous classical writers: calling him as nearly as could be, not to add to or diminish what the work consisted of, and appeared to have been when first erected. And really except [for] changing the substance of the architraves from alabaster to marble, nothing has been changed, nothing altered, except the supplying with the original material (saved for that purpose) whatsoever was by accident broken off, reviving the old coloring and renewing the gilding that was lost.” (171, Greene’s emphasis) It’s Shakespeare’s face. It matches the proportions of the Chandos portrait (Fig. 22), the Cobbe portrait, and others. It has the wall-eye, the swollen or drooping eyebrow, the signature depressions in the forehead. It even shows the prominent scar above the left eyebrow which possibly caused the eyebrow to droop (Fig. 23). The presence of that scar meant that there was an absence of fatty tissue and a consequent effect on the skull, the surface of which duly became ‘bumpier’ in the immediate region of the scar.

Yes, William’s father, John Shakespeare, was granted a coat of arms in 1596. It was disputed in 1602 by York Herald, Ralph Brooke, saying that the arms were too similar to existing coats of arms, and that the family was unworthy. However, the challenge was unsuccessful, as the Shakespeare coat of arms appears in later heraldic collections and on William Shakespeare’s funeral monument in Holy Trinity Church, Stratford-upon-Avon. Does Shakespeare have descendants? William Shakespeare statue". New York City Department of Parks & Recreation. 12 February 2007 . Retrieved 22 October 2008.Along Curtain Ro We still need to account for those distinguishing facial features, some of which appear to be pathological or traumatic in nature. The discovery of the death mask in the mid-19th century was naturally exciting, and not just for artists; scientists were fascinated by it, too. Was there any way of proving beyond all reasonable doubt that the death mask was Shakespeare’s? Potentially, yes. If his grave in Holy Trinity Church were opened, and his skull exhumed, it could be compared with the death mask. Shakespeare’s gravestone in the chancel of Holy Trinity does not mention his name or any personal information. Rather, it reads: A review of all the evidence indicates that the Stratfordians have a major problem. To uphold their faith in William Shakspere of Stratford as the great poet-dramatist, they must either dismiss the Dugdale/Hollar effigy, even though it meets the requirements for solid, primary-source evidence, or cloud the issue with spurious debates over “authenticity.”

An authoritative version of Shakespeare’s texts naturally created the expectation that such texts – and only such texts – would be used in theatrical performance. Indeed, most 18th-century theatre managers believed that Shakespeare’s plays no longer needed to be heavily adapted for performance. Some of the playwright’s words could be cut to keep the performance to a reasonable length; but words written by others should not be added to the original script. Beneath the poem, in smaller lettering, an inscription gives the details of his death in abbreviated Latin: died the year of the Lord 1616, in his 53rd year, on 23 April. [13] Marble full-length figure of William Shakespeare by Louis-François Roubiliac". British Museum . Retrieved 11 November 2013. Schoenbaum overlooked the fact that Stopes, Greenwood and Lee had seen the sketch and reported on it, although it had not yet been published. E.K. Chambers also mentioned its survival (2:184). More recently, Gerald Downs of Redondo Beach, California, took the first photograph of it (Fig. 1). Richard F. Whalen is the author of Shakespeare: Who Was He? The Oxford Challenge to the Bard of Avon (Greenwood/Praeger 1994). He is a past president of the Shakespeare Oxford Society and has written numerous articles for Oxfordian publications. He is co-general editor of the Oxfordian Shakespeare Series of the most popular plays, with introductions, commentaries, and notes reflecting authorship by Edward de Vere (Earl of Oxford). This article expands on a paper delivered at the eighth annual Edward de Vere Studies Conference, April 15–18, 2004, at Concordia University in Portland, Oregon. He thanks Barbara Burris, Ramon Jiménez, Eddi Jolly, and David Roper for their assistance.This does not suggest to me that the various representations all drew on an original portrait. If they had, the ‘look’ would be similar, even though some of the distinguishing details might have been lost. Experimenting on himself, Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) once forced a darning needle around the side of his eye so that he could poke at the rear of his own eyeball and reported seeing ‘white, darke & coloured circles’ so long as he kept stirring with ‘ye bodkin’.