The portrait of Edward Alleyn, founder of Dulwich College, shows a grand, respectable figure. So what was he doing mixed up in a fatal stabbing in East London? Anna Sayburn investigates.
The Best of British exhibition at Dulwich Picture Gallery opens with a roomful of sober Elizabethan gentlemen. You wouldn’t guess from their stern gazes that these were the Heat magazine fodder of their day; actors on the scandalous Elizabethan stage, at a time when England’s greatest playwright was branded a ‘filthy play-maker’ and ‘common players’ could be whipped as vagabonds, unless they had the protection of an aristocractic patron.
Edward Alleyn was one of the first actors to tread the boards of the purpose-built Elizabethan theatres. Previously, players would perform at court (think the players in Hamlet), in the great halls of manor houses, or in the yards of galleried inns. But the first buildings we’d recognise as theatres, known then as play-houses, were too disreputable to be built in the city itself. Like much of the fun and games of Elizabethan times, they were established just outside the city walls, firstly in an area east of the city, known as the Liberty of Norton Folgate. ‘Liberty’ means the area was not subject to the City of London’s bye-laws. It makes an evocative name. The pop group Madness certainly thought so; it’s the title of their latest album.
I looked it up. To my astonishment, Norton Folgate still exists, a strip of urban hinterland between Bishopsgate Street and Shoreditch, exactly as shown in the Elizabethan map in my book. So I went to have a look. Would the 400-plus years of development, fire, redevelopment, blitz, and more redevelopment have left any traces of the Liberty of old?
Beyond the oppressive cliffs of glass and steel that make up Bishopsgate, runs a scruffy row of boarded-up shops, seedy-looking bars, sauna and massage establishments and grubby cafes. The side-streets, behind noisy bars and clubs, reek of urine. Not much, in other words, has changed in Norton Folgate. It’s still a place where you can get away with things that would be frowned on in the city proper.
Sandwiches to gherkins - Norton Folgate today
Blue plaques, street names and churches hold the keys of memory in London. First, on Liverpool Street, I noticed the plaque marking the original site of Bedlam, where the unfortunate insane were displayed to the public. Then I found Curtain Street, a reminder of The Curtain, the playhouse built alongside James Burbage’s The Theatre. Later I discover The Curtain was named for the district, once the outer walls of a priory, not the other way round. Silly me; there was no swish of the curtain at the Elizabethan playhouse, any more than there was a proscenium arch.
No sign of The Theatre itself, which was just a few hundred yards’ north, although I did spot Burbage Buildings, which looked like a clue. Later I discovered The Theatre was at the corner of Curtain Street and New Inn Yard, a noisy corner now cut through by Great Eastern Street.
Where you find theatres, you find actors and playwrights. Thespians known to have lived in the area included the playwrights William Shakespeare, Ben Jonson and Christopher Marlowe, and the actors Richard Burbage (son of James), and brothers John and Edward Alleyn. Edward, who played Marlowe’s Tamburlaine The Great to wild acclaim, was the rising star.
I was hoping to find a clue to the location of Hog Lane, no longer on the map of the area, but once in Shoreditch, close to The Theatre. It was in Hog Lane that Chistopher Marlowe, surely one of the most troublesome playwrights ever born, was found in September 1589, fighting in a brawl with Bishopsgate innkeeper William Bradley. Bradley was then stabbed and killed by Marlowe’s friend and fellow-playwright, Thomas Watson.
The two playwrights were hauled off to Newgate prison, charged with murder. Marlowe was bailed in short order, by a man who, curiously enough, did legal work for Philip Henslowe, owner of a number of theatres, and soon to become Edward Alleyn’s father-in-law. Both playwrights were later acquitted, Marlowe on the grounds that he didn’t strike the final blow, and Watson on a plea of self-defence. A similarly successful defence would be entered by the man who killed Christopher Marlowe, four years later.
But what was the quarrel with William Bradley about? Goodness knows Marlowe seems to have been ready enough with a quarrel, or a knife. But according to my sources (David Riggs’ The World of Christopher Marlowe, Faber and Faber), the Alleyn brothers were players in more than one sense in this little drama.
John Alleyn, Edward’s brother, was a publican as well as an actor, with public houses in Bishopsgate Street. Bradley, a rival publican, had borrowed money from John, and defaulted on the loan.The quarrel quickly got out of hand. Thomas Watson, who wrote regularly for Alleyn’s company, the Admiral’s Men, seems to have tried to assist with collection of this debt. His tactics were so heavy-handed that Bradley entered a petition against him with the Queen’s Bench, asserting he was in fear of his life. The court was due to meet in November to consider the case.
So it was convenient that Marlowe, not named in the petition but a friend to Watson and both Alleyn brothers, was the one to get into a fight with Bradley. And even more convenient that his friend Watson should happen to be passing at the time, find the two men with knives drawn, and of course intervene to try to keep the peace. According to court testimony, Bradley advanced on Watson (with the splendidly dramatic words ‘Art thou now come?’) until Watson was backed into a ditch, at which point he was forced to deliver the fatal blow.
Marlowe seems to have had more luck with his legal assistance, via the Alleyn family, than Watson, who languished in jail till February the next year. Maybe Edward Alleyn was eager to have another block-busting part to play, and thought Marlowe more likely to provide it than Watson.
But both Marlowe and Watson were eventually acquitted, and the Alleyn brothers safely revenged on the defaulting publican, without a stain on their characters. It’s not exactly a morality play.
St Botolph-without-Bishopsgate
I didn’t find Hog Lane. Later, Professor Google informed me that it’s now called Worship Lane, and leads west from Curtain Street towards the Finsbury Fields, now shrunk to Finsbury Square. But wandering slowly back along Bishopsgate Street, I did find another chink of the past. The church of St Botolph Without Bishopsgate was rebuilt in the 18th century, but stood on the same site for many centuries before that. Reading the board outside, I discovered that the church had links with many historical figures – including one Edward Alleyn, christened here in 1566. Little chinks of the past like these are everywhere in London, if you take the trouble to look.
Image of Edward Alleyn: With thanks to the trustees of Dulwich Picture Gallery.
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