The Elizabethan Swan Theatre
Early Modern London's Largest Open-Air Shakespearean Theatre
Perhaps it took its name from swans on the Thames, like many riverside taverns. It may have been named, as a charter of Edward VI mentions, after “a house and tenement called the Swan.” Or perhaps it borrowed its name from a popular Bankside brothel.
However it obtained its name, the Swan was built between 1594 and 1596 by the prominent citizen and goldsmith Francis Langley. Standing in the Liberty of Paris Garden, the theatre was London’s fourth, the other three being the Theatre, the Curtain, and the Rose. The Swan spent much of its life as a stage for spectacles such as fencing and bull- and bear-baiting.
De Witt’s Interior View
In 1596, a Dutchman named Johannes de Witt traveled to London and produced a sketch of the Swan’s interior, accompanied by a written description. Though de Witt’s original sketch is lost, a copy made by his friend Aernout van Buchell survives. This drawing, which lay undiscovered in Utrecht until 1888, now provides us with the only contemporary view of an open-air Shakespearean theatre’s interior.
De Witt was impressed by the theatre’s wooden columns, painted so expertly to resemble marble that they could “deceive even the most cunning” observer. His sketch of the circular open-air theatre depicts the stage at centre, surrounded by three tiers of seats; behind the stage are two roofed galleries, with the Swan’s flag flying above.
The Swan is believed to have been the largest of the Elizabethan theatres; indeed, de Witt claims that it was the finest and biggest of all the existing theatres, and that it could accommodate 3,000 persons.
Drama in the Swan
By February 1597 at the latest, the Swan was ready to stage plays, and Lord Pembroke’s Men occupied the theatre. However, the production of Thomas Nashe and Ben Jonson’s “seditious” The Isle of Dogs led to a restraint on July 28 of that year (and to the arrest of Jonson and others), and the theatre was temporarily closed. When Langley died in 1601, Paris Garden passed into the ownership of Hugh Browker.
In 1602, the Swan was to be the stage for the entertainment England’s Joy. This production incited indignation, however, when it failed to materialize after the money had been collected. In a contemporary report, the audience “revenged themselves upon the hangings, chairs, stools, walls, and whatsoever came in their way, very outrageously, and made great spoil.”
Henslowe’s Lady Elizabeth’s Men probably occupied the Swan from their formation in 1611 until the Hope theatre was built in 1614, and play production revived during this time. Thomas Middleton’s A Chaste Maid in Cheapside—likely produced in 1613—is the only extant play known to have been produced at the Swan.
Like a Dying Swan
The theatre again fell into disuse, and was occasionally used for prize-fighting after 1620. By 1632, the Swan had “fallen to decay” according to a contemporary report. While it appears in Merian’s View of London in 1638, by the time of Hollar’s in 1647 it has been wiped from the London landscape.
Sources:
- Chambers, E.K. The Elizabethan Stage. Vol. II. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1951.
- Kent, William, ed. An Encyclopedia of London. Revised: Godfrey Thompson. London: J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd., 1970.
- Weinreb, Ben and Christopher Hibbert, eds. The London Encyclopedia. London: Macmillan London Ltd., 1983.
- Wheatley, Henry B. London Past and Present. Vol. III. Detroit: Singing Tree Press, 1968.
