hereunto subscribed my name and fastened the seal of my office endorsed with the signet of my arms, At the Office of Arms, London, the xx. day of October, the xxxix. [ie. 38th] year of the reign of our Sovereign Lady Elizabeth, by the grace of God Queen of England, France and Ireland, defender of the faith, etc. 1596.
Note. The document quoted above is a very rough draft, with many interlineations. Dethick made a copy of it, introducing some unimportant verbal changes, which is also in the Heralds’ Office, but the fairer copy is badly torn in two places. Bracketed words in the transcript above are supplied from the second copy. Both documents give on the margin a pen and ink sketch of the arms assigned to Shakespeare. The second draft has the following notes added at the bottom:
This John hath a pattern thereof under Clarenc. Cooke’s hand in paper xx. years past. A justice of peace, and was bailiff, officer, and chief of the town of Stratford-upon-Avon xv or xvi years past. That he hath lands and tenements of good wealth and substance, 500 li. That he mar—(remainder missing).
Good facsimiles of both papers are provided in Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica, edited by J. J. Howard, Second Series, vol. i, p. 109 (1886).
It is reasonably conjectured that the motive for John Shakespeare’s effort thus to establish his social position came from the poet, and that it reflects the latter’s ambition and worldly prosperity. Other wealthy actors—e.g. Augustine Phillips and Thomas Pope of Shakespeare’s company—assumed arms to which they appear to have had no hereditary right.
