Shakespeare's Knowledge of Law
A Journey Through the History of the Arguments
(originally appeared in a slightly different form in The Oxfordian, October 2001)
V. The Selective-Amnesia Decades
Table Three: The Selective-Amnesia Decades
Writer's skeptical of Shakespeare's knowledge of law appear in Bold.
1929 Sir Plunket Barton Links Between Shakespeare and the Law 1942 Clarkson & Warren The Law of Property in Shakespeare 1954 Louis Marder "Law in Shakespeare" Renaissance Papers 1958 R. C. Churchill Shakespeare and His Betters 1962 H. N. Gibson The Shakespeare Claimants 1967 George Keeton Shakespeare's Legal & Political Background 1972 O. Hood Phillips Shakespeare and the Lawyers 1991 S. Schoenbaum Shakespeare's Lives 1993 Ian Wilson Shakespeare: The Evidence 1994 Daniel Kornstein Kill All the Lawyers? 1994 Irvin Matus Shakespeare, IN FACT
In order to determine how later writers, critical of Shakespeare's having had legal training, deal with Greenwood, I surveyed their works for references to Greenwood and Robertson.In 1929, thirteen years after the final salvo in the Greenwood-Robertson debate, Sir Plunket Barton wrote Links Between Shakespeare and the Law. He only mentions Greenwood once, and that as support for the claim that Shakespeare's use of legal terms were accurate (149-150). He only acknowledges reading Shakespeare Law, in which Greenwood deals with critics other than Robertson. Barton cites Robertson for his "industry and research" in demonstrating that "Shakespeare's legal allusions were less numerous and far less technical than those of Ben Jonson and other dramatists of that time." (10) He gives no indication that Robertson's "industry and research" contained marvelous flaws and were extensively critiqued by Greenwood.
Another thirteen years pass (one gets the feeling that the Greenwood-Robertson debates were so decisive and embarrassing that time had to pass in order for certain skeptics to count on public forgetfulness) before Clarkson and Warren publish their book. Greenwood's name does not appear in the index, but he is mentioned once in a footnote as support for their critique of Charles Allen's example of supposed bad law in Shakespeare. Their bibliography only lists one of Greenwood's books, Shakespeare's Law, while Robertson only gets three glancing mentions in footnotes.
In 1954 Louis Marder used Clarkson and Warren to support his conclusion that "Shakespeare, therefore, was no lawyer" in a short essay "Law in Shakespeare" that appeared in the booklet Renaissance Papers (41). In his brief history of the argument, Marder skips over any mention of Greenwood or Robertson.
In 1958, R. N. Churchill wrote Shakespeare and His Betters, an attempt to quell the new life given to the Shakespeare authorship controversy by the book This Star of England, written by Dorothy Ogburn and Charlton Ogburn, Sr., a lawyer. Churchill's index gives twelve listings for Greenwood, eleven of which are incidental (for example, he twice mentions that Greenwood and Robertson were friends, and that he was president of the Shakespeare fellowship and friends with Thomas Looney, and so on). But one reference stands out in its side-swiping effort: "Gilbert Standen's more recent Shakespeare Authorship: A Summary of the Evidence is written from the point of view of a Group Theorist who believes Oxford to be the leading figure. Neither this nor Slater's Seven Shakespeares nor the various works of Greenwood can truly claim to be unbiased towards the traditional authorship. It would be surprising if they were" (219-220). In other words, the only time Churchill finds Greenwood worth mentioning is indirectly in a sweeping, unsupported claim of bias. Robertson on the other hand gets several approving mentions (160, 163-4, 219), but the reader still gets no sense that their was a detailed debate.
However, in the 1962 book The Shakespeare Claimants, H. N. Gibson mentions Greenwood five times, does acknowledge the debate, giving the upper hand to Robertson, and gives the kind of direct attention to The Baconian Heresy that other writers before and after seem to avoid. The reader gets a hint of how Gibson will handle Greenwood early on:
The classic work on this subject from the Stratfordian viewpoint is The Baconian Heresy by that very great Elizabethan scholar, J. M. Robertson. In the course of my investigations I have noticed a remarkable fact. Not a single one of the theorists1 whose works I have read—and I have read many—ever mentions this important book.… I can conjecture only one explanation for this strange suppression. One of the main props on all the theories is a book entitled The Shakespeare Problem Restated, in which Sir George Greenwood, while himself supporting no particular alternative candidate and always vigorously denying that he was a Baconian, delivered a trenchant attack on the authorship of the Stratford actor. This work J. M. Robertson, with his wealth of Elizabethan scholarship, subjected to such a merciless criticism in The Baconian Heresy that it was left incapable of supporting anything, even the wreckage of itself. (11-12, original italics)
What is remarkable here is that Gibson lists in his bibliography Is There a Shakespeare Problem?, which devotes several hundred pages to refuting The Baconian Heresy. He does not mention Shakespeare's Law and Latin, which finalizes the refutation regarding Shakespeare's knowledge of law and the classics.
The next time he mentions Greenwood, he presents the reader with a promise to reveal Greenwood's arguments:
Unlike all the other theorists, however, he had no particular candidate to put in the actor's place, and he always indignantly repudiated the suggestion that he was a Baconian. The real author for him was an unknown lawyer. There is no need to say anything about his arguments here—except that they showed great forensic skill and an equally great lack of Elizabethan scholarship—for his work has provided the exponents of each theory in turn with most their ammunition for bombarding the Stratfordian defences. His arguments therefore can be most conveniently dealt with where they occur in the various theories. (19)
The reader patiently waits for those arguments. Then, as the book begins delving into the argument over Shakespeare's legal knowledge, he has reason to expect some as Gibson brings in Robertson. Gibson admits that "As I can lay claim to no legal expertise myself, I rely very largely for my criticism of this part of the Baconian case on J. M. Robertson, who was not only a great Elizabethan scholar, but spent five years of his life in a lawyer's office" (49). He then spends six pages summarizing Robertson's legal arguments.
And what of Greenwood? He is never mentioned—precisely in the one area that would demand his presence. In fact, the reader must wade through another 220 pages before Gibson comes back to Greenwood in the middle of a discussion of the First Folio where he states:
Of the arguments [the theorists] use only a few are original; many are borrowed from the writings of Sir George Greenwood, whose whole case, as we have already noted (see p. 49), was so roughly handled by J. M. Robertson in The Baconian Heresy that the name of this latter work is never mentioned by the theorists, and is carefully omitted from their bibliographies. (269)
Readers may be forgiven for not seeing Greenwood's real arguments clearly stated—they aren't. Gibson has pulled a sleight-of-hand, promising to show something to come, and then later, stating that it was shown. The reader looks in vain. Or rather, the reader gets Robertson's arguments only. For Gibson, one side of a case is sufficient.
James G. McManaway's, in his 1962 booklet The Authorship of Shakespeare (published by The Folger Shakespeare Library), seems to allude to Clarkson and Warren's The Law of Property without citation when he writes, "Research has shown that Shakespeare uses legal terms and situations less frequently than some of the other dramatists, and often less accurately" (34). He cites no examples, and he also makes no mention of Greenwood.
But Milward W. Martin does, in his 1965 book Was Shakespeare Shakespeare? A Lawyer Reviews the Evidence. Using words suspiciously like Gibson's, he makes great claims for The Baconian Heresy: "Mr. Robertson, a great scholar of Elizabethan literature and himself with five years' experience in a lawyer's office, devotes over one hundred pages to listing citation after citation from the Shakespearean plays (on which our anti-Stratfordian friends rely), following each with citation after citation from many other contemporary authors using identical or equally legalistic language" (89-90). Later Milward informs us, "In that manner Mr. J. M. Robertson utterly slaughters The Shakespeare Problem Restated with his The Baconian Heresy" (114). We are expected to take on his authority that Robertson is a reliable authority. Milward also approvingly quotes Clarkson and Warren, but he never presents any notion that Greenwood successfully refuted Robertson claims.
Among other writers who address the question of Shakespeare's legal knowledge is legal scholar George W. Keeton, who writes in his 1967 book Shakespeare's Legal and Political Background. The bibliography lists five of Greenwood's books (including the notoriously ignored Shakespeare's Law and Latin), but not The Shakespeare Problem Restated, oddly enough. Keeton seems not to have noticed Greenwood's refutations:
...the writings of J. M. Robertson (who received a legal education in a Scottish law office) and Sir Dunbar Plunket Barton (an Irish judge of high literary attainments) are acute, and go far towards demolishing the assertion that Shakespeare's law is impeccable, and Sir Arthur Underhill's verdict was in similar terms. Almost alone among modern English legal writers, Sir George Greenwood (who, like Robertson, was deeply interested in the Bacon-Shakespeare controversy, although with a different viewpoint) is inclined to accept the accuracy of Shakespeare's use of legal terminology. (20)
In a footnote Keeton cites Greenwood as support for his contention that critics who say Shakespeare erred in Shylock's having Antonio sign a single bond (136). Keeton continues:
It is also necessary to compare Shakespeare's work with that of contemporary writers. This has shown that Shakespeare's knowledge is not remarkable, wither in extent or accuracy, for the other Elizabethan dramatists showed a similar disposition to use legal terms. This point is made with clarity in Sir Dunbar Plunket Barton's Links Between Shakespeare and the Law, and more fully investigated in The Law of Property in Shakespearian [sic] and Elizabethan Drama by P. S. Clarkson and C. T. Warren. These inquiries show that the frequent references to fines and recoveries in Shakespeare have their counterparts in plays by other Elizabethan authors, and they seem to have been present to the minds of Elizabethan writers almost as much as they were to Elizabethan lawyers. (15)
But an examination of relevant section of The Law of Property (128-133) reveals that precisely one other dramatist used the term fine and recovery—Middleton, who did study law at Gray's Inn. One has to wonder how so many lawyers writing on this question can get so many facts wrong. In any event, there is plenty of evidence that a critical reader must treat all authoritative statements with skepticism, especially those that do not provide examples.
In 1972, the next skeptic, O. Hood Phillips, in the bibliography of his Shakespeare and the Lawyers lists four books by Greenwood, but not Shakespeare's Law and Latin.2 While mentioning Robertson several times with implicit approval, Phillips mentions Greenwood six times, twice as support for arguments concerning the single bond in The Merchant of Venice (104) and Charles Allen's specious claims in Notes on the Bacon-Shakespeare Question. (135n) Apart from inconsequential mentions regarding Shakspere's will (18-20) and Julius Caesar (137), two mentions are noteworthy. Phillips writes, "With regard to Mariana's right to dower on Angelo's death for treason (Measure for Measure, V. I.), Shakespeare gets the subtle point of law right, apparently by accident." (134) Phillips does not say why the correct usage must be qualified as "apparently by accident," but he does supply a note that points out that "Greenwood suggest on the contrary that the passage may indicate the dramatist's knowledge of law: Is There a Shakespeare Problem? pp. 98-101" (134n). Phillips can't help but follow the tradition of side-swiping Greenwood without support:
Greenwood's early studies of Shakespeare's law led him to disbelieve that the man of Stratford wrote the works, but later his fixed anti-Stratfordianism coloured his studies of Shakespeare's law. Although a competent lawyer, he sometimes misquoted Shakespeare. (166)
If misquoting Shakespeare had a bearing on Greenwood's legal arguments, Phillips doesn't supply any examples.
Finally, Daniel J. Kornstein, in his highly praised 1994 book Kill All the Lawyers?, quotes approvingly both Mr. Phillips (232-3) and Messrs. Clarkson and Warren (237-8).3 Kornstein does take Twain to task (properly so) for claiming that only a "practicing" or trained lawyer can use legal terms accurately, since Twain himself proves the opposite by using legal terms accurately in Pudd'nhead Wilson (230-232). Kornstein asserts that "Elizabethan dramatists often used legal allusions in their plays, and some used them more frequently and more accurately than Shakespeare" (232). But he fails to give any evidence, simply pointing the reader to other sources. Furthermore, he fails to mention Greenwood anywhere, while Robertson's The Baconian Heresy does appear in the bibliography.
What is to be made of this pattern of ignoring Greenwood and the debate, or citing him primarily as support for other arguments? Clearly, there must be a problem with putting too much attention on Greenwood. As a writer, Greenwood exhibits a level of clarity and persuasiveness that simply overwhelms the kind of opposition put up by Robertson. Furthermore, Greenwood raises the difficult specter of qualitative arguments. The skeptics focus on quantitative arguments. Furthermore, when the issue of Shakespeare's knowledge of law is far from the skeptic's mind, a few will occasionally make an admission that reveals how deeply they actually regard Shakespeare's knowledge. Again, this knowledge appears qualitatively, in ways that the skeptics apparently believe is inconsequential to the argument.
The Law of Property
Many skeptics avoid the Greenwood-Robertson debates and hold up Clarkson and Warren's The Law of Property in Shakespeare and Elizabethan Drama as the research that proves Shakespeare's knowledge of law is not unusual when compared to other dramatists. Clarkson and Warren studied seventeen dramatists other than Shakespeare. Four were members of the Middle Temple, the Inner Temple, or Gray's Inn, and therefore would be eliminated from the comparison:4
Francis Beaumont (son of a judge, and a member of the Inner Temple)
John Ford (attended Middle Temple, friends at Gray's Inn)
John Marston (member of the Middle Temple)
Thomas Middleton (member of Gray's Inn)John Fletcher would be eliminated because of his connection to Beaumont. Therefore, twelve dramatists remain:
George Chapman (no known connection to law, although he wrote "Memorable Maske
of the two Honorable Houses or Inns of Court, the Middle Temple and
Lyncoln's Inne", 1614, for the Princess Elizabeth's nuptials.)
Thomas Dekker
Robert Greene
Thomas Heywood
Ben Jonson
Thomas Kyd (a 'noverint' …a notary… but never a member of an Inn)
John Lyly
Christopher Marlowe
Philips Massinger
George Peele
Cyril Tourneur (no known connection to law…some question his existence)
John WebsterNarrowing the scope to Property Law, Clarkson and Warren cite examples from all these. However, several dramatists are deficient in the number and technicality of the examples. Those with fewer than 50 examples in a special index include:
John Ford (16 examples, 2 repeated)
Robert Greene (20 examples, 4 repeated)
Thomas Kyd (2 examples)
John Lyly (11 examples)
Christopher Marlowe (14 examples, 2 repeated)
John Marston (33 examples, 6 repeated)
George Peele (4 examples)
Cyril Tourneur (10 examples, 2 repeated)
John Webster (43 examples, 8 repeated)Clarkson and Warren list six pages of examples from Shakespeare covering quite a range (almost 280 examples, about 130 repeated). Of the remaining four non-lawyers:
George Chapman (50 examples, about 12 repeated)
Thomas Dekker (60 examples, about 14 repeated)
Thomas Heywood (80 examples, about 18 repeated)
Ben Jonson (124 examples, about 35 repeated)Quantitatively, Shakespeare overwhelms all dramatists, even Ben Jonson. Clarkson and Warren do not arrange their study to support any of their propositions regarding Shakespeare's knowledge of law and possible legal training. They expect the reader to believe their authoritative propositions. How they expect to use a quantitative methodology to refute the proposition that Shakespeare had legal training is unclear. Just because one person uses more legal terms than another in no way establishes anything.
And the fact that they limit their study to Property Law is telling: Since real property was closely connected to an Englishman's sense of self, social standing, and clout, it behooved him to know about the legal aspects of acquiring, inheriting, possessing, distributing, defending, willing, and selling property. It's safe to say most intelligent Englishmen made some study of real property and its legal terms, even when they had no legal training.
The fact is, Clarkson and Warren unknowingly imply that there is evidence that Shakespeare had a far-reaching knowledge of law that transcended his contemporaries:
Long ago we realized that the subject of the law in the drama was so broad that it had best be treated in installments. References will be noted throughout this book to later treatises on the law pertaining to Equity, Marriage and Divorce, Criminal Law, etc. For these our materials have already been collected, and we hope to continue this work with a series of volumes on those subjects. (xxvi)
The authors never followed up with any later volumes, but their willingness to propose such volumes possibly speaks volumes about the extent of Shakespeare's law, for surely Shakespeare would remain the centerpiece of later volumes. But still, there quantitative method would be weak. Like most skeptics, Clarkson and Warren avoid a qualitative approach to resolving the debate.
Let us now turn to some qualitative evidence for Shakespeare's legal learning.
Footnotes
1. By "theorists" Gibson means anti-Stratfordians. back2. This is a significant omission, not only because Shakespeare and the Lawyers attempts to be a comprehensive survey of the topic and Shakespeare's Law and Latin is the significant conclusion to the Greenwood-Robertson debate, but also because Phillips knows the book exists. He cites it in his 1964 article "The Law Relating to Shakespeare, 1564-1964" in The Law Quarterly Review, volume 80. (421n). back
3. While the book's jacket boasts several examples of advance praise, it is unfavorably reviewed in Brooklyn Law Review, Winter 1995, pp. 1517-1534. back
4. Biographical information is drawn from Saunders' A Biographical Dictionary of Renaissance Poets and Dramatists, 1520-1650. back
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