Shakespeare's birthplace, home and grave: in pictures

In 1864 the Reverend John M. Jephson published his book on the birthplace, home, and grave of Shakespeare. Nestled within the pages of text are a series of photographs of sites relating to Shakespeare’s life in Stratford-on-Avon. For a photo-historian like myself these photographs are of particular interest because they predate the commercial continuous and half-tone printing processes we are all more familiar with today. 

The fifteen images were all taken in 1863 by the well-known Victorian photographer Ernest Edwards. Each one is an albumen print stuck directly onto the page by hand. Commercial publishing of outdoor photography was still in its early years and these images are among the first to bring realistic images of Shakespeare’s birthplace and memorials into the public eye.

Ancient house shakeseare detail.jpg

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By the time of Jephson’s visit the bridge, the chapel, the church, the poet’s birthplace in Henley Street, and the old house in Chapel Street were the only visible remains of the period when Shakespeare lived here. In the picture above we can see Shakespeare’s birthplace but in his time the streets were not rows of brick cottages. Instead they were probably detached and surrounded by yards and gardens and numerous stately buildings owned by wealthy burghers, all built on the banks of a lovely river and surrounded by parks, villages and forest tracks.

When Shakespeare was born  in 1564, his father was renting the Henley Street property while working as a farmer in nearby Snitterfield.  In the same year the plague raged through the town killing many of the villagers. This seems to have opened up opportunities for John Shakespeare as ten years later he was able to purchase two freehold houses in Henley Street.

c13939_0004_m_wr.jpg

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Shakespeare attended the local Grammar School which which can be seen in the right foreground slightly overhanging the footpath. The tower was also part of the school but the children ascended the steps to the schoolroom in the building next to it. According to Jephson many commentators had highlighted the fact Shakespeare was taught in a chapel but this mode of education the same whether in a church, or separate building, as the schoolmaster was usually the local parish priest. 

new place shakepeare 1863.jpg

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On the banks of the Avon River is the Holy Trinity Church where Shakespeare was baptised and his bones are buried. Next to him are the remains of his wife, Anne Hathaway and his eldest daughter Susanna.  Within a few yards of the grave and against the north wall is the celebrated monument seen in the photo above. Many consider it to be the best likeness of the poet extant and Digges in his prefix to the first folio edition mentions it implying it must have been erected soon after his death. 

According to Jephson the bust had been painted a stone colour to make it more look more classical but by 1863 this had been removed and the old colours restored. The hair, moustache, and beard were painted chestnut, the eyes brown, and his complexion given a ruddy hue.  For a number of years it was thought the face was modelled from a death mask by Gerard Johnson. And this story can be dated back to 1849 when Ludwig Becker, a portrait painter from Darmstadt, brought a miniature oil painting of a corpse crowned with a laurel wreath to the British Museum. He believed it was of Shakespeare and had been taken from a death mask once in the possession of the Kesselstadt family of Cologne. Like many great stories these claims have been contested over the years. In 1904 the art historian M. H. Spielmann, in an Encyclopaedia Britannica article of 1904, expressed his disbelief. But as late as 1995 Professor Hildegard Hammerschmidt-Hummel, claimed it was authentic and even wrote a book on the subject.

References

Jephson, J., & Edwards, E. (1864). Shakespere, his birthplace, home, and grave : A pilgrimage to Stratford-on-Avon in the autumn of 1863 / by J.M. Jephson ; with photographic illustrations by Ernest Edwards. London: Lovell Reeve.