5.38–45 Cf. Froissart, 2.53–4, later in Edward’s reign (1360), ‘the prophecies of the frere of Avygnon’: ‘IN this season a frere minor full of great clergie was in the cite of Avignon, called frere John of Rochetayllade, the whiche frere pope Innocent the vi. held in prison … for shewyng of many mervailes after to come … This frere … made dyverse bookes founded on great sciences and clergie, wherof one was made the yere of our Lorde M.CCC.xlvi. [1346] wherin were written suche mervailes, that it were hard to beleve them; howebeit, many thynges accordyng therto fell after. And whan he was demaunded of the warres of France, he sayd that all that had ben seen was nat lyke that shulde be seen after: for he sayde that the warres in Fraunce shulde nat be ended, tyll the realme were utterly wasted and exyled in every parte’.

  5.62–8 Cf. Froissart, 278–83: ‘the kyng … ordayned thre batayls, one to go on his right hande, closyng to the see syde, and the other on his lyfte hande, and the kynge hymselfe in the myddes, and every night to lodge all in one felde’ (278–9). They are seen as operating separately but in parallel at this point – one ‘by the see syde, and … on the see togyder’, the other led by ‘lorde Godfray as marshall … [who] rode of fro the kynges batayle as sixe or sevyne leages, in brennynge and exilyng the countrey … They toke what them lyst and brought into the kynges hoost’ (280). Froissart later describes the way in which ‘Ye have harde here before of the order of thenglysshmen, howe they went in thre batayls, the marshalles on the right hande and on the lyft, the kyng and the prince of Wales his sonne in the myddes’ (281). At ‘the good towne of Cane [Caen] … they of the towne, who were redy in the felde, sawe these thre batayls commyng in good order, … they were sore afrayd, and fledde away toward the towne’ (283). Cf. also Holinshed, 3.369–70.

  6.1–3 Cf. Holinshed, 3.371, ‘at length by one of the prisoners named Gobin de Grace, [Edward] was told where he might passe with his armie ouer the riuer of Some, at a foord in the same riuer, being hard in the bottome, and verie shallow at an eb water’. As hinted at in Froissart, 290–1, disclosing fords over rivers was a serious offence: ‘Sir, I promyse you on the jeopardy of my heed I shall bringe you to suche a place, where as ye and all your hoost shall passe the ryver of Some without paryll.’ It was still a serious offence in France in 1590: The true discourse of the wonderful victory, obtained by Henrie the fourth, the French King, … near the town of Ivry (1590) prints an order of the French parliament ‘against those that harbor Rebels and Theeues, and helpe them to passe and repasse the Riuers’; the penalty for helping ‘the said Rebells, Theeues, and others of naughty life ouer the riuer of Loire’ is ‘being broken on a wheele’ (sigs F2v–3r).

  6.36–42 Underlying this passage is the historical lead-up to the battle, with the French King’s pursuit of King Edward’s army along the south bank of the river, hoping to trap them between his army and the Somme (all bridges having been defended or destroyed), and his sending of an army along the north side to prevent the crossing at Blanchetaque. In a desire to retain enough detail from the chronicles to convey the impossible odds, Prince Edward is given a bird’s-eye view of the position of the French army. Cf. Holinshed, 3.370–1, just before Edward finds a means of crossing the Somme, ‘At the same instant time was the French king come to Amiens, with more than a hundred thousand men, and thought to inclose the king of England, that he should no waie escape … The French king vnderstanding that the K. of England sought to passe the riuer of Some, sent a great baron of Normandie, one sir Godmare du Foy, to defend the passage of the same riuer, with a thousand men of armes, and six thousand on foot with the Genowaies … And suerlie when the Englishmen at the lowe water entered the foord to passe ouer, there was a sharpe bickering … in the water, and the Genowaies did them much hurt, and troubled them sore with their crosbowes: but on the other side, the English archers shot so wholie together, that the Frenchmen were faine to giue place to the Englishmen, so that they got the passage and came ouer … and then the Frenchmen fled’ (from Froissart, 289–91). Froissart, 292, adds more detail than Holinshed about the whereabouts of the French King: ‘The French kyng the same mornynge was departed fro Araynes [Amiens], trustyng to have founde thenglysshmen bytwene hym and the ryver of Some; but whan he harde howe that sir Godmar du Foy and his company were dysconfyted, he taryed in the felde and demaunded of his marshals what was best to do. They sayd, Sir, ye can nat passe the ryver but at the brige of Abvyll, for the fludde is come in at Blanche taque. Than he retourned and lodged at Abvyle’. Holinshed, 3.371, skips straight to the French King’s departure from Abbeville, from which he ‘marched towards his enimies’.

  6.155–7 As dramatists worked from a ‘plot’ that specified the action of each scene, there is no need to assume that these allusions to Scs 2 and 3 are direct evidence for common authorship of the four scenes in question, or for two or more dramatists working closely together. Brooke, xxi–xxii, suggests that this passage and 8.100–1 show that the earlier love-scenes are unlikely to have been later additions ‘by Shakespeare to eke out the insufficiently long military scenes’. He fails, however, to observe that these references too could be later additions. Melchiori speculates that these references to the earlier scenes could be evidence for revision of those scenes, on the grounds that ‘If the writer had been referring [here] to the final version of the episode [i.e. Edward’s pursuit of the Countess], he would have imputed to the king much more grievous offences than a temporary lapse into wantonness and love-sickness’ (24, n. 6). Such hypotheses, though tempting, do little to further investigation of the composition of the play.

  6.200–2 Perseus receives gifts, in the form of weapons to kill Medusa, from the Gods and from the Hesperides (see 12.29n.). One of his gifts is a polished shield from Athena, an effective weapon against Medusa, which enables him to see her in it as a harmless reflection, and so to behead her. Subsequently the head of Medusa, which still retains its power and is used by Perseus to turn his enemies to stone, is given to Athena, who places it on her shield, the Aegis: see Golding, Ovid, 4.934ff. The two halves of the story are conflated here: cf. Greene’s Arbasto. The Anatomy of Fortune (1589), sig. B3r, ‘I stood astonished, as if with Perseus shield I had beene made a sencelesse picture’, and Greene’s Never Too Late (1590), sig. E4v, ‘they stood as the pictures that Perseus with his shield turnde into stones’. Only Perseus’ horse is found in Shakespeare (e.g. in H5 3.7.20–1).

  6.212–18 Cf. Segar, sigs Q4v–P1r, describing the knightly vows of the Middle Ages, ‘Sir, you that desire to receiue the order of Knighthood, sweare before God and by this holie Bible, that ye shall neuer fight against this mightie and excellent Prince that bestoweth the order of Knighthood vpon you, … otherwise dooing you shall incurre infamie, and being taken in warre, shall bee subiect to the paines of death. Ye shall also sweare, with all your force & power to mainteine and defend al Ladies, Gentle-women, Orfants, widowes, women distressed and abandoned. The like ye must doo for wiues being desired, and shunne no aduenture of your person in euerie good warre wherein ye happen to be.’ It is worth noting that Prince Edward’s vow avoids specific reference to women (perhaps a conscious omission on the part of the author(s) in the light of Scs 2 and 3).

  6.219–26 Holinshed, 3.371, describes how ‘[Edward] ordeined three battels, in the first was the prince of Wales, and with him the earle of Warwike … They were eight hundred men of armes, and two thousand archers, and a thousand of other with the Welsh men … The third battell the king led himselfe, hauing with him seauen hundred men of armes, and two thousand archers, and in the other battell were to the number of eight hundred men of armes, and twelue hundred archers’.

  7.3–11 Cf. Holinshed, 3.372, ‘There were of Genowaies crosbowes to the number of twelue or fifteene thousand, the which were commanded to go on before, and with their shot to begin the battell; but they were so werie with going on foot that morning six leagues armed with their crosbowes, that they said to their constables; We be not well vsed, in that we are commanded to fight this daie, for we be not in case to doo any great feat of armes, we haue more need of rest. These words came to the hearing of the earle of Alanson, who said; A man is well at ease to be charged with such a sort of rascals, that faint and faile now at most need.

  ‘Also at the same instant there fell a great raine, and an eclipse with a terrible thunder, and before the raine, there came flieng ouer both armies a great number of crowes, for feare of the tempest comming: then anon the aire began to wax cleare, and the sunne to shine faire and bright, which was right in the French mens eies, and on the Englishmens backs. When the Genowaies were assembled togither, and began to approch, they made a great leape and crie, to abash the Englishmen, but they stood still and stirred not at all for that noise.… Then the English archers stept foorth one pase, and let flie their arrowes so wholie and so thicke togither, that it seemed to snowe. When the Genowaies felt the arrowes persing their heads, armes and breasts, manie of them cast downe their crosbowes, and cut the strings, and returned discomfited. When the French king saw them flee awaie, he said: “Slea these rascals, for they will let and trouble vs without reason”.

  ‘Then ye might haue seene the men of armes haue dasht in amongst them, and killed a great number of them, and euer the Englishmen shot where they saw the thickest prease: the sharpe arrowes ran into the men of armes, and into their horsses, and manie fell horsse and man amongst the Genowaies, … and when they were once downe they could not recouer againe. The throng was such that one ouerthrew another.’ See also Froissart, 297–8.

  8.2 this little hill Clark’s production placed Edward on a high chair, the lords speaking to him from below, probably taking a cue from the request of Artois that Edward presently descend (16); Artois, however, has presumably ascended from the battlefield below to which he begs the King to descend in support of his son (contrast 2.87, where Montague’s request to the Countess to descend clearly indicates movement between different stage levels). The triumphant Prince will ascend the hill to join his father. The hill originates in the chronicles: cf. Froissart, 300, ‘they with the prince sent a messanger to the kynge, who was on a lytell wyndmyll hyll’ (see also Holinshed, 3.372, who refers to it just as ‘a windmill hill’). Shakespeare shows knowledge of this detail at H5 1.2.108–10, in the Archbishop of Canterbury’s description of the Black Prince’s exploits at Crécy, ‘Whiles his most mighty father on a hill / Stood smiling to behold his lion’s whelp / Forage in blood of French nobility’ (see pp. 69–70).

  8.5–9 Faced with the apparent mistiming of King Edward’s prayer of thanksgiving for victory at this point, and with the placement of the SD Sound retreat just before, when it is absent in Q at 57, and with the fact that 4 and 57 can combine to make up a regular blank verse line, GWW proposes that 5–9 have been transposed with 57–60, and that it is the latter that should stand here, while the former should be relocated to follow 62. While this saves the need to add a second SD for retreat at 57, and while the Prince’s unexpected entry gains in surprise and suddenness, what is less certain is that Q’s text is truly in need of improvement. The transposition slightly blurs the logic of the sequence of events: him at 59 is less clear (despite Edward’s mention of our son in 1), and the King’s confident refusal to help his son seems misplaced after 59–60.

  8.10–56 The play builds tension by multiplying the one messenger of the chronicles to three and amplifying their concern. For the King’s ostensible insensitivity in response to the pleas from his closest lords, cf. the attitude to military honour of Old Siward at Mac 5.9.5–19 or Volumnia at Cor 1.3.1–25; also JC 5.4.10–12, Brutus on Young Cato. Cf. Holinshed, 3.372, ‘Certeine Frenchmen and Almaines perforce opened the archers of the princes battell, and came to fight with the men of armes hand to hand. Then the second battell of the Englishmen came to succor the princes battell, and not before it was time, for they of that battell had as then inough to doo, in somuch that some which were about him, as the earle of Northampton, and others sent to the king, where he stood aloft on a windmill hill, requiring him to aduance forward, and come to their aid, they being as then sore laid to of their enimies. The king herevpon demanded if his sonne were slaine, hurt, or felled to the earth? “No (said the knight that brought the message) but he is sore matched”. “Well (said the king) returne to him and them that sent you, and saie to them that they send no more to me for any aduenture that falleth, so long as my son is aliue, for I will that this iournie be his, with the honor thereof”. With this answer the knight returned, which greatlie incouraged them to doo their best to win the spurs, being half abashed in that they had so sent to the king for aid’. See also Froissart, 300.

  8.60.3 King of BOHEMIA Cf. Holinshed, 3.372, ‘The valiant king of Bohem being almost blind, caused his men to fasten all the reines of the bridels of their horsses ech to other, and so he being himselfe amongst them in the formost ranke, they ran on their enimies.… by the meanes aforesaid [he] went so far forward, that ioining with his enimies he fought right valiantlie, and so did all his companie: but finallie being entred within the prease of their enimies, they were of them inclosed and slaine, togither with the king their master, and the next daie found dead lieng about him, and their horsses all tied ech to other’ (see also Froissart, 298–9). Bohemia’s final courageous attack on the English ranks, on learning of their triumph on the field and the dire situation of the French, is described by Sumption, 1.529, as ‘the incident by which the battle was most often remembered by both sides, the great example of that reckless valour that made a knight into the preux chevalier of contemporary poets’. The play, however, introduces the story only to emphasize the heroic achievement of Prince Edward, which did not include killing Bohemia.

  8.88–93 In a later play of chivalric romance, The Weakest Goeth to the Wall (1600), the knighting of another ‘faire bud of Chiualrie’ (sig. G4v), Ferdinand, unknown and long-lost son of Lodwick, Duke of Bullen, is staged by his unknowing father after he has displayed his prowess in battle: ‘Fer. My name is Ferdinand. / Lod. I know it well, / And litle thinkes he tis the Sextons hands / Draws forth a sword to giue him Knight-hood here: / … Kneele downe young Ferdinand, and now againe, / Rise vp Sir Ferdinando, Lodwicks Knight’ (sig. H2r–v). This was printed as a play acted by the Earl of Oxford’s (boys’) company, but the chivalric stereotype of the boy warrior is the same as in plays for adult actors. Cf. also 3H6 2.2.56–61, ‘QUEEN MARGARET … You promised knighthood to our forward son. / Unsheathe your sword and dub him presently. / Edward, kneel down. / KING HENRY Edward Plantagenet, arise a knight.’

  8.109–13 Sc. 6 is the only scene in which, with the arming of Prince Edward, the play draws direct attention to arms and armour. If the picture could be associated with the Prince, it would appear on his armour or shield. In this case, these lines might belong in Sc. 6, either before the ceremonial arming begins, between 6.178 and 179, as the King takes the coat-armour to put on his son (see 6.178.1n.), or between 203 and 204, after the Prince has received his shield. The first seems more plausible, as the emblem of the pelican is radically at odds with the description of the shield and its Medusa-like power to turn people to stone. King Edward would then be asking a herald, rather than his son, to explain the picture. This would imply that Q’s SPs for these speeches were adapted to fit their move to 8.109–13.

  A further possibility is that these speeches belong to Sc. 3, where they would follow 3.90. The Prince, returned from recruiting for the wars in France, appears with a banner (perhaps) bearing the pelican emblem. He then represents a potent symbol to the delinquent King. The King notices the insignia and asks for an explanation, after which he exclaims ‘Away, loose silks of wavering vanity!’ Censure of the King here is appropriate. Richard Rainolde, A Chronicle of all the noble Emperors of the Romans, from Julius Caesar (1571), sig. X7r, describes a banner bearing the pelican emblem, ‘These be the most causes why noble men wore armour: and herevpon the kinge of Spayne called Alphonsus in his banner hath a portured Pelican woundinge her owne brest, and with her bloud nourishing her yong ones wt this title: Prolege & pro grege. As who should say, A Prince ought to venture his life, for ye defence of godly lawes and for his people: These are the .ii principall pointes of warres.’ The emblem would likewise be appropriate to the Prince in his role of example to many princes more (18.220). More certainly, it would associate the Prince with Queen Elizabeth (see 109–12 LN) in a complimentary fashion, an association clinched at the end of the play, when the Prince embraces the Queen, his mother (18.190–1).

  Comparable misplacement of short passages occurs in other plays: cf., e.g., the short misplaced passage in David & Bethsabe, ll. 1585 SD–1588 (see Peele, 3.244, 178–9).

  8.109–12 pelican … heart The famous pelican portrait of Elizabeth attributed to Nicholas Hilliard was painted c. 1574. ‘[I]n [Elizabeth’s] own time many other devices … were current as symbols of her patriotic and historical destiny. Among these was the pelican which freely sheds her blood for the nourishment of her young … Philip II had used the device as a sign of Catholic devotion: two of his medals bore on the reverse the pelican “feeding her young with her own blood” and the motto PRO LEGE REGE ET GREGE. With its underlying religious connotation, the pelican’s sacrifice was an appropriate symbol for Elizabeth’s personal surrender to the welfare of her country and for the championing of the Protestant cause. Some notion of her fondness for this impresa may be gathered from its appearance in at least three of her portraits’ (John F. Leisher, Geoffrey Whitney’s A choice of emblemes and its relation to the emblematic vogue of Tudor England (1987), 71–2). See Fig. 5. Cf. the purported allusion to Elizabeth in Lyly, Euphues, 341–2, ‘This is she that, resembling the noble Queen of Navarre, useth the marigold for her flower, which at the rising of the sun openeth her leaves and at the setting shutteth them, referring all her actions and endeavours to Him that ruleth the sun. This is that Caesar that first bound the crocodile to the palm-tree, bridling those that sought to rein her. This is that good pelican that to feed her people spareth not to rend her own person.’