2.459–60 Painter alone is the source for Edward’s attempt to use her father, Warwick, as a go-between in his pursuit of the Countess: ‘almost out of his wittes, [he] demaunded of his Secretarie. “Doe you thinke it expedient, that I make request to her father, bicause I want counsell [1575 = father, whose counsel I want] in other thinges?” To whome the Secretarie boldly sayde, that he thought it vnreasonable to seke ayde at a fathers hands to corrupt his daughter: faithfully telling to the King, ye reproch and infamie that would followe thereof, aswell for the old seruice, that her father had done to his auncestors, as for his great prowesse in armes, for which he was so greatly commended. But Loue, the mortal enemie of all good councell, so blinded the eyes of the king, that without any further deliberation, he commaunded the Secretarie to goe seke the father, to demaund help of him [1575 = demaunde his counsell] for matters of importance: which the Earle vnderstanding, obeyed incontinently [at once]’ (sig. 3R2r).

  2.467–512 Cf. Edward’s more self-critical approach in Painter: ‘we with the measure of Reason, ought to moderate our doings with suche prouidence [foresight], as with out straying we may choose the right way of equitie and iustice. And if at any tyme, the weake fleshe doth faint and giue ouer, we haue none to blame but our selues. Who deceyued by the fading shadow and false apparance of things, fall into the ditch by our selues prepared. And that which I doe alleage, is proued, not without manifest reason, wherof I nowe doe fele experience, hauing let slip the raines of the bridle to [too] far ouer my disordinate affections, being drawen from the right hand, & traiterously deceyued’ (sig. 3R2v). Warwick is ‘ouercome with pitie’ in response to the King’s ‘sorowfull complaynt, stopped by sobbes and sighes’ (sig. 3R3v). In the play, Edward manoeuvres Warwick into a defensive position as a smokescreen for his own duplicity.

  2.480–5 In Painter, Edward elicits Warwick’s vow to help him by affirming, rather than questioning, his integrity and fidelity: ‘I haue diuers tymes proued the fidelitie of thy Counsell, whereby I haue brought to passe things of great importaunce, and therein hitherto neuer founde thee slack and vnfaythfull’ (sig. 3R3r). Rather than express distrust of Warwick, Edward makes direct promises: ‘You haue also foure sonnes, whom you cannot honorably aduaunce with out my fauour: swearing vnto you by my regall Scepter, that if you comfort me in my troubles, I wil endue ye three yongest, with so large possessions, yt they shall haue no cause to be offended with their eldest brother. Remember likewyse, what rewardes I haue bestowed vpon them that serue me. And if you haue knowen howe liberall I haue bene towardes other, thinke then I praye you, how bountifully you binde me towardes you, vpon whome my life and death dependeth’ (sig. 3R3v). As well as ‘sound[ing] the depth of the Earles affection’ (sig. 3R4r), the promise of ‘rewardes’ openly reveals Edward’s true motives of using Warwick as procurer and pander to his daughter, aims achieved more deviously in E3 (see 481n.).

  2.514–20 Cf. Painter, ‘I fele my self brought into two so straunge and perillous poyntes, that passing eyther by one or other, I muste needes fall into very great daunger. But to resolue my selfe vpon that which is moste expedient, hauing giuen vnto you my fayth in pledge, to succour and helpe you euen to the abandoning of honor and lyfe, I will not be contrarie to my wordes’ (sig. 3R4v).

  2.536 My mother In Painter, ‘The Peres and noble men … went to the mother’ in support of the King, ‘blaming the crueltie of the Countesse, that was vnmaried’ (sig. 3T2r; see 417–20n. and 442 SD LN), but to no avail. Then, encouraged by his courtiers and as a last resort, Edward decides to use the mother as go-between (in Warwick’s absence and after his embassage on the King’s behalf), via his ‘Secretarie’. The mother is put under greater pressure than Warwick, and faces the threat of dishonour to her whole family as ‘[Edward’s] last refuge is in force’ (sig. 3T2v). She then begs her daughter, the Countess, for everyone’s sake, to give in to the King: ‘the mother of faire Ælips went to her daughters chamber, … with sobbing sighes she sayde vnto her. “… if thou wilt somewhat moderate thy rigor, all this heauinesse shortly shall [1575 = may] be tourned into ioy. For our King and soueraigne Lorde is not onely in Loue with thee, but for the ardent affection and amitie that he beareth vnto thee, is out of his wittes” ’ (sig. 3T3r).

  2.593–5 Cf. Painter, ‘if so be he so doe continue obstinate in his olde folly, I am determined rather to dye, than to doe the thing that shall hurt me and pleasure him. And for feare that he take from me by force, yt which of mine owne accorde I wil not graunt, following your counsell, of two euilles, I will choose the leaste, thinking it more honorable to distroy and kill my selfe with mine owne handes, than to suffer suche blot or shame to obscure the glorye of my name … You shall tell the king, that I had rather lose my life, after ye most cruell and shamefull maner that may be deuised, than to consent to a thing so dishonest, hauing of long time fyxed this saying in my minde, That honest death, doth honor and beautifie the forepassed lyfe’ (sigs 3S4v–3T1r).

  2.617 Unless Shakespeare wrote this line in both E3 and Son 94, the only safe inferences from the coincidence are that either (1) the author(s) of E3 had encountered Shakespeare’s sonnets in MS; or (2) the composition of Son 94 was at a date late enough for Shakespeare to have known the play, in performance or in print. The level of cross-reference in this scene between the sonnet and the play (cf. 506–7n., 551–5n.) may weigh in favour of identifying the writer of this passage as either Shakespeare himself or a close friend (see Francis Meres, Palladis Tamia (1598), on circulation of Shakespeare’s ‘sugred Sonnets among his priuate friends’, sigs 2O1v–2r). The line seems to play on the proverb ‘The lily is fair in show but foul in smell’ (see Dent, L297), and on the biblical ‘lilies of the field’, which, as symbols of God’s glory, are contrasted with man’s desire for superficial ‘glory’ symbolized by rich clothing or ‘rayment’, hence a possible pun on weeds as garments (see Matthew, 6.28; Duncan-Jones suggests a conceivable allusion to the Sermon on the Mount at Son 94.12, see Ard3 n.). Cf. 610–12n. The line has the proverbial force of the Latin proverb, corruptio optimi pessima or ‘The corruption of the best is worst’ (Dent, C668). The Latin presumably has an earlier source than the English, which is dated by Dent from c. 1618. Dent cites Thomas Adams, The Happiness of the Church (1618), sig. L5r, ‘But it is euer true: Optimi corruptio pessima. The fairest flowers putrified, stinke worse then weedes’; later, Dent, L297, asserts that Adams ‘simply borrowed’ his putrified flower image ‘from Edward III’. Cf. also Dent, N317, ‘Nothing so good but it … may be abused’. Baldwin, Genetics, 298, n. 10, claims that ‘The author of Edward III was himself “turning” a proverb, to be found in John Florio’s Second Frutes (1591), p. 181 [sig. 2A3r], “Euen of prickles Roses doe proceede, / And whitest Lillies from a stinking weede” ’. See LLL 5.2.351–2 for the conventional value of the lily: ‘Now, by my maiden honour, yet as pure / As the unsullied lily, I protest’. Cf. Son 54.3–4, for a flower’s smell as virtue, ‘The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem / For that sweet odour which doth in it live’.

  3.92–4 Lambrechts, 161, failing to identify the commonplace nature of this sentiment, proposes a direct connection with Soliman and Perseda, 4.1.145–6, ‘What should he doe with crowne and Emperie / That cannot gouerne priuate fond affections?’ Cf. Painter, ‘Haue not I good cause to complayne my Lorde, that after so many famous victories achieued by sea and lande, wherewith I haue renowmed the memorie of my name in all places, am nowe bounde and vanquished [1575 = daunted] with an appetite so outragious, that I can not helpe my self, whereby mine owne lyfe or rather death, is consumed in such anguishe and mortall payne, that I am become the very mansion of all mischiefes, and onely receptacle of all miseries?’ (sig. 3R3r).

  3.100–1 Cf. Painter, ‘The mother … went forth wyth her daughter, accompanied onely with two Gentlewomen, her Damoselles, to the Kings Pallace. When they were come thyther, they sent worde to the Secretarye, that broughte her the message, who conducted them to the Kinges chamber, and presenting them before the King sayde. “Syr, beholde the company which you haue so long time desired. They be come to doe your grace humble reuerence” ’ (sig. 3T4r).

  3.135 Cf. Painter, ‘fearing to be defloured, and seing her abandoned of all humayne succour, falling downe prostrate at his fete, she sayde vnto him. “… let me proue and vnderstand by effecte, if your Loue be such, as oftentymes by letters and mouth you haue declared vnto me. The request which I will make vnto you, shall be but easie, and yet shall satisfie me more than al the contentation of the worlde.… before I doe open and declare the same more at large, assure the performaunce thereof vnto me by othe.” The King hearing her prayer to be so reasonable, wherevnto rather than to refuse it, he swore by his Scepter, taking God to witnesse and al the heauenly powers, for confirmation of that which he pretended to promise: then he sayde vnto her. “Madame the onely maistresse & keper of my louing heart, sithe that of your grace and curtesie, you haue vouchsafed to come to my Palace, to make request of my only fauour and good will, which now I irreuocably doe consent, and graunt, swearing vnto you by that honorable sacrament of Baptisme, whereby I was incorporated to the Church of God, and for the Loue that I beare you (for greater assurance I can not giue) I wil not refuse any thing, that is in my power and abilitie, to the intent you may not be in doubt whether I doe loue you, & intend hereafter to imploy my self to serue and pleasure you: for otherwise I shoulde falsifie my fayth, and more feruently I cannot bynd my selfe if I shoulde sweare by all the othes of the worlde” ’ (sigs 3T4v–3V1r).

  3.165 Resolute Cf. Painter, ‘I doe beseche him most humbly, to send me no more letters … For I am in such wise resolued in the aunswere, which I made him in my Castle, that I will persist immutable, to the ende of my life’ (sigs 3R1v–2r); ‘for a resolute aunswere she sayth, that rather she is contented to suffer moste cruell death, than to commit a thing so contrary to her honor’ (sig. 3T1v); see also 169–85 LN. Also used by Edward himself, ‘And floting thus betweene hope and dispaire, he resolued in the ende to attende [await] the fathers aunswere’ (sig. 3S3r).

  3.169–85 Cf. Painter, ‘plucking out a sharpe knife, which she had [1575 = which was hidden] vnder her kirtle, all bathed and washed in teares, reclining her pitiefull eyes towardes the King, that was astonned and [1575 = king, that was] appalled with that sight, she sayde vnto him. “Sir, the gift that I require, and wherfore your faith is bound, is this. I most humbly desire you, that rather than to dispoyle me of myne honor, with the sworde girded by your side, you wil vouchsafe to ende my lyfe, or to suffer [let] me presently, with this sharpe poynted knife in my hande, to thrust my self to the [1575 = thrust it to my] heart, that myne innocent bloude, doing my funerall honor, may beare witnesse before God of my vndefiled chastity, being so [1575 = chastity, as being vtterly] resolued honorably to dye, and that before I doe [1575 = that rather then to] lose myne honor, I may murder my selfe before you, with this blade & knife in my [1575 = in present] hande” ’ (sig. 3V1r–v).

  3.169 wedding-knives The presentation of a pair of knives to a bride was a continental practice that came to England in the early part of the 16th century; they were ‘the finest that a bridegroom (or lover) could afford, [and] were presented in a wood-lined and finely decorated sheath with a cord attached – known as a “caul and string” ’ (Simon Moore, Cutlery for the Table (Sheffield, 1999), 113). Cf. Richard Barnfield, The Affectionate Shepherd (1594), ‘A paire of Kniues, a greene Hat and a Feather, / New Gloues to put vpon thy milk-white hand / Ile giue thee’ (sig. C2r). For illustrations of ladies wearing such knives and the knives themselves, cf. the marginal drawings in Speed’s European Atlas of 1631 reproduced by Moore (26).

  3.199 Warden of the North According to Froissart, 276, Percy and ‘lorde Nevyll’ were left in England in the lead-up to the battle of Crécy as ‘wardyns of his realme’. Confusion of ‘Nevyll’ with Warwick in relation to Warwick the ‘kingmaker’ is just conceivable. Cf. also Holinshed, 353, who describes how, in 1338, before Edward led his army into Flanders, and while still in England, he sent an army to curb Scottish skirmishes in the Borders, under Warwick’s command: ‘it was agreed … that the earle of Warwike being appointed to go thither, should haue with him the power beyond Trent northwards’ (not in Froissart). In the play, this is the last we hear of Warwick, who has no involvement even in the subsequent Scottish campaign, which is reported to King Edward in Sc. 10 by Lord Percy. Warwick’s disappearance from the play at this point probably has more to do with theatrical expediency, or may result from addition of his role in a late revision (see LR, 5n. and pp. 62–3). The office of Warden of the Marches, as it is historically known (see OED warden n.1 4b), was an important one; one notable warden in the 16th century was Henry Carey, Lord Hunsdon, who as Lord Chamberlain was to become the patron of Shakespeare’s company, the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, in May 1594 (see Wallace T. MacCaffrey, ‘Carey, Henry, first Baron Hunsdon (1526–1596)’, ODNB).

  3.201 Newhaven Stow describes a failed French attempt to invade England in 1545, during which their ‘whole fleete remoued … to a place in Sussex, called Newhauen, four miles from Lewes’ (sig. 3T1v), but the context of Edward’s instruction makes it clear that the French port is meant (Stow’s phrasing illustrates the unfamiliarity of the ‘place in Sussex’, which did not become a seaport until 1713). Newhaven would have registered with an Elizabethan audience because of its role in the Wars of Religion in France in the early 1560s, when the French Protestants (the Huguenots) sought support from England against the Catholic Duke of Guise (later notorious for the massacres of Protestants, both in Vassy, in 1562, and in Paris on St Bartholomew’s day 1572, the subject of Marlowe’s Massacre at Paris (c. 1592–3?)). See pp. 15–16.

  3.204–5 Cf. Painter, ‘ “Madame the houre is come that for recompence of your honest chastitie and vertue, I wyll and consente to take you to Wife, if you can finde in your heart [1575 = if you thincke good].” The Countesse hearing those wordes, began to recolour her bleake and pale face, with a vermelion teint and Roseal rudde, and accomplished with incredible ioye and contentation [1575 = incredible delight and ioye], falling downe at his fete sayd vnto him. “My Lord, forasmuch as I neuer loked to be aduaunced to so honorable state as Fortune nowe doth offer, for merite of a benefite so hyghe and gret, which you present vnto me, vouchsauing so much to abase your selfe to ye espousal of so pore a Lady, your Maiesties pleasure being suche, beholde me ready at your commaundement” ’ (sigs 3V1v–2r).

  4.35 Cf. Froissart, 149, ‘In this season ther raygned a kyng in Cicyll called Robert, who was reputed to be a great astronomyer, and alwayes he warned the Frenche kyng … that in no wyse he shulde fight agaynst the king of Englande; for he sayd, it was gyven the king of Englande to be right fortunate in all his dedes. This kyng Robert wold gladly have sene these two kynges at a good acorde, for he loved so moch the crowne of Fraunce, that he was right sorie to se the desolacyon therof.’

  4.73–6 In Froissart, 122–3, Edward was induced to quarter the arms of France with his own in order to obtain the alliance of the Flemings in 1339, because they were ‘bounde by faith and othe, and on the somme of two myllyons of floreyns in the popes chaumbre’ to make ‘no warre agaynst the kyng of Fraunce’. In order to quit their ‘bondes’ they sought ‘pardon’ from Edward ‘as king of France’. Edward initially ‘thought it was a sore matter to take on hym the armes of France’, but in order to secure these allies, he finally agreed: ‘the king quartred the armes of Fraunce with Englande: and from thens forthe toke on hym the name of the kynge of Fraunce’. At Sluys the French ‘sawe well howe the kyng of England was ther personally, by reason of his baners’ (Froissart, 147). Cf. also Sharrock, sig. B4v, ‘For he to blouddy warres the Frenchman summons, as right heyre / Vnto the crowne, and armes of Fraunce with th’English mixt doth beare’.

  4.133–6 Cf. Froissart, 147, ‘the kyng and his marshals … cam with a quarter wynde, to have the vauntage of the sonne: and so at last they tourned a lytell to get the wynde at wyll … This batalye was right fierse and terryble: the batayls on the see ar more dangerous and fierser, than the batayls by lande … ther is no remedy but to fight, and to abyde fortune’. Melchiori suggests Holinshed, 3.358, as the immediate source: ‘at length the Englishmen hauing the aduantage, not onlie of the sunne, but also of the wind and tide, so fortunatlie, that the French fleet was driuen into the streights of the hauen, in such wise that neither the souldiers nor mariners could helpe themselues, in somuch that both heauen, sea, and wind, seemed all to haue conspired against the Frenchmen’.

  4.177 *Nonpareille Cf. Ubaldini, 17, ‘The two fleetes notwithstanding approching nigh one vnto another began a conflict, but they continued it but a while, except one ship called the Non Pariglia, & another called the Marie Rose, which hauing taken in their top-sailes staied themselues there, to make as it were a certain experience of their manhood vpon the Spanish fleete, behauing themselues honorably for a season’.

  Sc. 5 may have been inspired by Froissart, 282: ‘It was no marveyle though they of the countrey were afrayed, for before that tyme they had never sene men of warre, nor they wyst nat what warre or batayle ment. They fledde away as ferr as they might here spekyng of thenglysshmen, and left their houses well stuffed, and graunges full of corne, they wyst nat howe to save and kepe it’. Cf. also the description of Edward’s landing (1346) in Sharrock, sig. C2r–v, ‘The Britayne fleet in harbour safe … / Their wery corps here well refresht, their tentes they farther moue, / And houses rifeling spoyle, their farmers owners quite out droue. / Come hourded vp in store, in broade barne bayes, by country swaine / And otes the warlike praunser fatts, the straw left to remaine. / For needefull vse. Vulcanus brandes the roofes downe ratling teare. / Yong children reft of home, their wofull mothers wandring beare: / Their fathers lately sent by fawchon dint to shadowes dombe. / These but preambles are to greater warres in time to come’.