occur at all in Shakespeare (No. 14 on page 44). This might be mere chance, for the adjective “inhuman” does occur. But there is a distinct difference between its meaning and the modern sense of the word, the same difference that exists between German “unmenschlich” and “entmenscht.” It is the second meaning that is represented by the word in Shakespeare’s language, something like “totally divested of any human feeling.” It is therefore not used very often. In Tit. Andr. (V, ii, 177) it characterises the murderers and ravishers of Lavinia, in 3 Hen. VI the fury Margaret (“more inhuman, more inexorable, ten times more than tigers of Hyrcania”), in Rich. III it is applied by Anne to the murder of her husband (I, ii, 60), Henry V calls so the men who intend to kill the holy person of the King, the dying Roderigo finds no stronger expression for the moral monster Iago, Bertram deserves it, whom the King in All’s Well considers as the murderer of his own loving wife, Shylock is termed “inhuman,” who thirsts for the blood of his innocent adversary. In all cases, then, it designates the highest degree of moral depravity, almost always assassins. Would Shakespeare use it to characterise the action of poor people, who lose their heads and turn in exasperation and rage against their foreign oppressors?
§ 3. The Position of the Play in the Development of the Drama
A reader of the play who has been patient enough to lend his ear to the arguments brought forth until here will perhaps object that no matter if what Sir Thomas More says to the multitude appears sentimental or unsentimental, convincing or not, the author will have found it in his literary source. Just the contrary, however, is the case. The whole speech is an invention. Hall, whose description of “Evil Mayday” the play uses, mentions nothing of the sort. His report only contains a statement that Sir Thomas More and others entreated the masses “and had almost brought them to a staye,” but the violence was renewed and they did not succeed. How then did the idea of a great oration which had a marvellous effect on the multitude enter the authors’ mind? This question is only part of a greater problem: the general attitude of the authors to the sources. To find a key to this, however, the question must first be answered: How did the idea to write a drama on Sir Thomas More
