Did you know that before Shakespeare's famous "Hamlet", there may have been another?
On this day in Tudor history, 15th August 1594, playwright Thomas Kyd was buried in London, aged just 36.
He's not a household name, not like William Shakespeare anyway, but he wrote "The Spanish Tragedy", one of the biggest theatrical hits of the Elizabethan age, being performed 29 times at the Rose Theatre and published in 11 editions, more than any of Shakespeare's plays at the time.
And it's thought that he may have written the now-lost "Ur-Hamlet", the play that inspired Shakespeare's masterpiece.
Find out more about him in this video:
Hello
Do we have a record of Kyd’s will?
I’m not sure, but Frederick S Boas mentions that Kyd’s mother renounced the administration of her son’s goods in December 1594 – see bottom part of page xv at https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.182515/page/n13/mode/2up
I’m not sure, but Frederick S Boas mentions that Kyd’s mother renounced the administration of her son’s goods in December 1594 – see bottom part of page xv at https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.182515/page/n13/mode/2up