John Hall, Master of Physicke: A casebook from Shakespeare's Stratford

John Hall, Master of Physicke

John Hall, Master of Physicke

A casebook from Shakespeare’s Stratford

Greg Wells

Manchester University Press

Copyright © Greg Wells and Paul Edmondson 2020

The right of Greg Wells and Paul Edmondson to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

Published by Manchester University Press

in association with the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

Altrincham Street, Manchester M1 7JA

www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk

Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

Registered Charity Number 209302

Every purchase supports the vital care and conservation of the Shakespeare Houses and Collections

www.shakespeare.org.uk

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978 1 5261 3453 0 hardback

First published 2020

The publisher has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for any external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Front cover: Cochlearia Britannica, common English scurvy-grass: used by Hall to treat ulcers and acne. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597)

Typeset by Servis Filmsetting Limited, Stockport, Cheshire

For Mary Wells

Contents

List of figures

List of plates

List of tables

Foreword by Professor Sir Stanley Wells CBE

Preface

Acknowledgements

Note on the text

1Introducing John Hall, Master of Physicke

2John Hall’s working library

3John Hall’s manuscript of A Little Book of Cures

4Textual introduction

John Hall’s A Little Book of Cures

Appendix 1 John Hall’s working library

Appendix 2 Early modern glossary of medical and pharmaceutical terms

Bibliography

Index of names and works

Index of places

Index of ailments and treatments

Figures

1The signature of John Hall. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. BRT8/1.

2John Hall, ‘professor of medicine’, 14 May 1622. Courtesy of Kent History & Library Centre. U269/Q24.

3Title-page of The Treasurie of Poor Men (1560). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SR 97.8.

4The front of the house known as Hall’s Croft. Photo Andrew Thomas. © the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

5An artist’s reconstruction of New Place. © Phillip Watson. Reproduced by permission of Phillip Watson.

6A grant by John Thornborough, Bishop of Worcester, to John Hall for a family pew at Holy Trinity Church, February 1633. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. ER78/7.

7Susanna Hall’s gravestone and epitaph. Photo Andrew Thomas. © the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

8 and 9 Sidrick Davenport’s letter of complaint to John Hall, 5 July 1632. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. ER1/1/94.

10 John Hall’s gravestone and epitaph. Photo Andrew Thomas. © the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

11 Title-page of Philip Barrough’s The Method of Physick (1617). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SR 97.8.

12 Title-page of Daniel Sennert’s De scorbuto tractatus (Wittenberg: Zacharia Shürer, 1624). Reproduced by permission of the Bavarian State Library, Munich. Urn: nbn:de:bvb:12-bsb10474699-9.

13 Title-page of Robert Burton’s The Anatomy of Melancholy (London: Peter Parker, 1676). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SR 95.1.

14 The epigraph to Hall’s casebook. Reproduced by permission of The British Library. BL, Egerton MS 2065.

15 The first page of Hall’s manuscript: ‘Curationum historicarum et empiricarum, in certis locis et notis personis expertarum et probatarum, Libellus, or Little Book of Cures’. Reproduced by permission of The British Library. BL, Egerton MS 2065.

16 Page 35 of Hall’s manuscript. Reproduced by permission of The British Library. BL, Egerton MS 2065.

17 Page 67 of John Hall’s manuscript. Reproduced by permission of The British Library. BL, Egerton MS 2065.

18 Portrait of James Cooke, from Select Observations on English Bodies (London: John Sherley, 1683). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SR 97.8.

19 Title-page of James Cooke’s Select Observations on English Bodies (London: John Sherley, 1657). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SR 97.8.

20 Title-page of the revised edition of James Cooke’s Select Observations on English Bodies (London: John Darby, 1683). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SR 97.8.

21 Early seventeenth-century medical chest. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. STRST : SBT 2001-5.

22 Portrait of William Compton, 1st Earl of Northampton. Reproduced by permission of the Marquess of Northampton.

23 Michael Drayton. A print from 1796 based on the 1619 engraving by William Holle (d. 1624). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

24 A seventeenth-century urine flask. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT-2013-1-7.

25 A seventeenth-century fleam for blood-letting. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

26 Pewter bleeding bowl, loop handle, seventeenth to eighteenth century. Reproduced from the Wellcome Collection. CC BY.

27 A presumed portrait of Elizabeth, Lady Barnard (née Hall). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. STRST: SBT 1994-19/105.

28 Weston House, Warwickshire, from William Dugdale, The Antiquities of Warwickshire (1730), p. 583. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SR 87.2.

29 Westwood Park, Worcestershire, from The History of Worcestershire (1781), p. 352. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SR 87.2.

30 Effigy of Sir Henry Rainsford, St Helen’s Church, Clifford Chambers. Photo by John Cheal. © The Hosking Houses Trust. Reproduced by permission of The Hosking Houses Trust.

31 Seventeenth-century cauldron. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 1993-25.

32 Warwick Priory c . 1900. Reproduced by permission of Warwickshire County Record Office. PH 505-20.

33 Effigy of Richard and Mary Murden, Church of the Holy Cross, Moreton Morrell, Warwickshire. Photo © Paul Edmondson.

34 Huddington Court, Worcestershire, home of John and Margaret Winter. Photo © Paul Borzone. Reproduced by permission of Paul Borzone.

35 Portrait of Spencer Compton, 2nd Earl of Northampton. Reproduced by permission of the Marquess of Northampton.

36 Sixteenth-century pewter medical syringe. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 2007-7.

37 A seventeenth-century cupping glass. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 2013-1/8.

38 Effigy of Anne, Lady Rainsford, St Helen’s Church, Clifford Chambers. Photo by John Cheal. © The Hosking Houses Trust. Reproduced by permission of The Hosking Houses Trust.

39 Tomb of John Thornborough, Bishop of Worcester (1551–1641) in Worcester Cathedral. Photo © Paul Edmondson.

40 A seventeenth-century pestle and mortar. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 1993-31-92.

41 John Trapp, a schoolmaster at the King’s New School, Stratford-upon-Avon from 1624.

Plates

1Richard Brackenburgh (studio of), Interior of an apothecary’s, mixing a remedy, c . 1673. Oil on panel. 31 × 24 inches. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 1999.40.

2John Hall’s usual area of medical practice. © Philip Watson. Reproduced by permission of Phillip Watson.

3Title-page of John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

4Scabiosa major vulgaris , common scabious. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 582. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

5Glycyrriza vulgaris , common liquorice. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 1119. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

6Solanum hortense , garden nightshade. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 268. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

7Sena orientalis , senna of the east. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 1114. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

8Borago hortensis , garden borage. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 653. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

9Burglossa vulgaris , common bugloss. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 655. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

10 Capparis folio acuto , sharp-leaved capers. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 748. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

11 Cochlearia Britannica , common English scurvy-grass. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 324. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

12 Rha capitatum l’obelii , Turkey rhubarb. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 316. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

13 Absinthium iatifolium suie ponticum , broad-leaved wormwood. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 937. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

14 Malus granata siue punica , pomegranate tree. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 1262. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

15 Canelle folium e bacillus , cinnamon leaf and bark. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 1348. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

16 Helenium , elecampane. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 649. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

17 Althaea ibiscus , marsh mallow. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 787. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

18 Capillus veneris verus , true maidenhair. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 982. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

19 Crocus florens , saffron flower. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 123. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

20 Bellis hortensis multiplex flore albo , double white daisy. From John Gerard, The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes (1597), p. 510. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT OS 97.7.

21 Seventeenth-century majolica drug jar from Venice. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 1993-31-46.

22 Mid-seventeenth-century ceramic drug jar from Delft. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 1993-31-57.

23 Sixteenth-century ceramic drug jar from Tuscany. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 1993-31-68.

24 Late sixteenth-century majolica wet-drug jar. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 1993-31-301.

25 Osias Dyck, A Doctor Casting the Water ( c . 1660s). Oil on panel. 34.3 × 30.5 inches. Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. SBT 1994-17.

Tables

1Sources named in James Cooke’s Select Observations and Hall’s manuscript.

2Authors and texts identified from anonymous borrowings in Hall’s manuscript.

3Hall’s most frequently used texts, and the number of times he consulted them.

Foreword

This richly illustrated volume offers the first ever complete translation into English of a Latin medical notebook by Shakespeare’s son-in-law, John Hall (1575–1635). Published incompletely in 1657, Hall’s notebook affords an extraordinary keyhole view of life in Stratford-upon-Avon in the seventeenth century. It was mainly written between 1634 and 1635, but includes documentation relating to much earlier cases, the earliest being Case 69 (Mrs Boughton whom Hall treated for swallowing difficulties in 1611). Hall’s Latin manuscript is now preserved in the British Library.

Hall followed in his father’s footsteps by training as a doctor, and graduated from Queens’ College, Cambridge in 1593/4, taking his MA in 1597. He was living and working in Stratford-upon-Avon as a physician by June 1607, when he married Shakespeare’s elder daughter, Susanna. With their only child, Elizabeth, born nine months later, they were resident in Old Town by 1613 in, we believe, the timber-framed house now known as Hall’s Croft.

Hall’s links with his famous father-in-law were close. They travelled to London together in 1614, and Hall probably treated Shakespeare two years later, during his final illness. Shakespeare named him (along with Susanna) as joint residuary legatee and executor of his will, for which Hall was granted probate in London on 22 June 1616. Susanna Hall inherited the bulk of her father’s estate, including the grand house, New Place.

For close on twenty years after, Hall continued to work as the town’s physician, treating patients of all ages and all classes of society, including the Earl of Northampton (Queen Elizabeth I was godmother to the Earl’s eldest son), the Bishop of Worcester, Shakespeare’s friend, the poet and playwright Michael Drayton, and the residents of Stratford-upon-Avon. Sometimes Hall travelled on horseback forty or more miles, with his bag of remedies by his side, to do so.

Specialising in the treatment of scurvy, Hall kept up to date with his medical studies, amassing a working library of some sixty volumes, mostly in Latin, by forty-three authors. Greg Wells’s thorough investigation of the books Hall was regularly using develops significantly our understanding of Hall’s own intellectual background and professional practice. He emerges as a well-read scholar-physician with a remarkable library within his ready reach.

Hall made detailed notes on his cases, recording his patients’ symptoms and the treatments he gave them. Many of the remedies he prescribed were herbal. Some of their ingredients, such as senna and rhubarb, are still in medical use today; others may seem weird and wonderful to us. The Revd Walker may have been surprised to see his six-month-old son, who suffered from fits, being treated by having sliced peony roots hung round his neck and peony powder sprinkled in his hair, and it is difficult to understand how Hall thought he could cure the Earl of Northampton’s quinsy by applying a plaster made of two whole swallows’ nests ‘including straw, dirt, and swallows’ droppings’; still, these patients recovered.

It is especially appropriate that this important book is the work of Dr Greg Wells who, like Hall himself, answered his vocation to practise medicine. In his retirement from a distinguished professional career, Greg took a Master’s degree with the University of Warwick (History of Medicine), and then his Doctorate (awarded to him in what proved to be the last few months of his life). His many friends, colleagues and admirers salute him for his rigorous scholarship as well as for professional and personal courage and compassion.

Professor Sir Stanley Wells CBE

Honorary President, the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

Preface

It has been my pleasure as well as my loving duty to work on this book, which brings to a wider audience the groundbreaking doctoral thesis of my dear, late friend, Dr Greg Wells (1947–2017). For as long as Greg had made Stratford-upon-Avon his home (since 1985), he was devoted to Hall’s Croft, and to learning about the medical practice of John Hall. Like Hall himself, Greg dedicated his life to the improvement and progress of his fellow humans.

Greg transcribed the whole of Hall’s Latin manuscript (some 191 pages), and then translated it into English. His bilingual thesis can be consulted at the University of Warwick. In identifying Hall’s Latin borrowings from the medical textbooks of his contemporaries, Greg’s original work makes a substantial contribution to our knowledge of early-modern libraries, and establishes the first of its kind in Stratford-upon-Avon.

This first complete translation of Hall’s Little Book of Cures reinstates material omitted by earlier editions. There is, for example, the Bishop of Worcester, whom Hall treated for ‘scorbutic arthritis’ (Case 164) – but also for extreme melancholy (earlier editions omit the reason for this: the bishop’s son had committed murder). For the first time, it is now possible to read about Hall’s conversations with his patients, his prayers for their recovery, and his thanksgivings for their cures. Of Richard Wilmore of Norton Curlieu, Budbrooke (whom Hall had treated for ‘astonishing worms’ when Wilmore was 14 years old), Hall writes: ‘I saw him in passing two years later and asked whether he ever felt any corrosion of the stomach or passed worms. He replied that he had been free of all pain and torment since that time. Praise God’ (Case 77).

Although he relied on the recipes and remedies of others, Hall occasionally made his own potions. To Mrs Richardson (suffering from uterine wind, Case 122), he administered, among other things, ‘snail water (my own compound)’, and records, ‘she recovered her lost strength wonderfully, and said this divine water far surpassed potable gold, and she wished never to be without it because, she said, it was the equal of anything. She was thus completely cured, and after the death of her husband remarried and bore an heir six years later.’

This volume is published in association with the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust whose charitable objectives include conserving and presenting the family homes of William Shakespeare, including those sites most associated with John Hall: Hall’s Croft and New Place. We are delighted and proud to be presenting a book which brings to life the work, intellect, faith and social interactions of Shakespeare’s son-in-law.

Revd Dr Paul Edmondson

Head of Research, the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

Acknowledgements

In preparing this book I am particularly grateful to Greg Wells’s dear friend, John Heavens, for his work in helping to separate the Latin and English texts; to my colleague and photographer Andrew Thomas for his work in supplying all of the images from the collections of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust; to Oscar Lake, Greg’s grandson, for his work on the list of images, and for his having identified the herbs and plants that Hall most frequently used; to Robert Bearman for reading and commenting on the introductory chapters; to Nicholas Molyneux for information about Westwood Park, Huddington Court and Warwick Priory; to Nick de Somogyi for the tripartite index; and especially to Mary Wells, Greg’s widow, for all of her help in preparing the notes on Hall’s patients, and for her assistance and encouragement.

Note on the text

Chapter 1, ‘Introducing John Hall, Master of Physicke’, draws on material from Greg’s own essay, ‘His son-in-law John Hall’, in The Shakespeare Circle: An Alternative Biography, edited by Paul Edmondson and Stanley Wells (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), material which is reproduced here with the special permission of the publisher.

Arabic numerals printed in bold in square brackets mark the page numbers of Hall’s Latin manuscript. So, for example, ‘[p. 3] I prescribed antiscorbutic beer of this sort’ indicates that Hall started that prescription on page three of his manuscript.

Hall’s many borrowings from his sources are easily identifiable in this edition. They are set in italics and their source is identified at the foot of the page. Unless otherwise stated, all translations are Greg’s own.

A full list of the sources Hall regularly used (his personal, working library) immediately follows the text of the casebook. Mary Wells, Greg’s widow, has provided the thumbnail sketches of Hall’s patients for each of the cases. This information is indebted to Joan Lane’s John Hall and His Patients: The Medical Practice of Shakespeare’s Son-in-Law (1996), where more detailed, contextual information about Hall’s patients can be found. Lane, however, was not without her occasional errors in some of her identifications, partly because she was following James Cooke’s influential but long out-of-date abridged and partial version of Hall’s Little Book of Cures (from 1679). Greg’s corrections of Cooke’s and Lane’s misidentifications of patients are included in the footnotes. The index aims to open up Greg’s work as much as possible and is in three parts: ‘Names and works’, ‘Places’ and ‘Ailments and treatments.’

1

Introducing John Hall, Master of Physicke

The earliest reference to John Hall is his admission to Queens’ College, Cambridge, aged 14, in 1589. The last is his will dated 25 November 1635. His Little Book of Cures, Described in Case Histories and Empirically Proven, Tried and Tested in Certain Places and on Noted People forms the most substantial account of his life and work among his patients in the locale made famous by Hall’s father-in-law, William Shakespeare. Most of the records relating to Hall concern his life in Stratford-upon-Avon, starting with his marriage to Susanna, the Shakespeares’ eldest child, in June 1607.

Hall was born in Carlton, Bedfordshire, the son of William Hall. John Taplin has written importantly and extensively on Hall’s family background in Shakespeare’s Country Families (Taplin 2018: 85–112). Taplin’s book is not widely known but is available for consultation in the Shakespeare Centre Library. Hall received his BA in 1593/4 and his MA in 1597. A doctorate in medicine was required for licensing by the College of Physicians of London or to teach at a university, but not otherwise. An academic doctorate was no more necessary as a medical qualification then than it is now. Although Hall never obtained, or claimed to have, the degree of Doctor of Medicine, his MA made him better qualified than most physicians in England at this time. Hall never used the title of Dr, nor was he addressed so by his contemporaries, though he has frequently and confusingly been granted it post mortem.

1 The signature of John Hall, churchwarden, Holy Trinity Church, Stratford-upon-Avon, 20 April 1621. Hall’s is the third signature down, just below Thomas Wilson (the vicar). Seventh down is July Shaw (who lived next door but one to New Place and who was one of the witnesses of Shakespeare’s will), and ninth down is Bartholomew Hathaway (Anne Shakespeare’s brother).

Of the 814 physicians practising outside London between 1603 and 1643, only 78 per cent had formally matriculated at a university (Raach 1962: 250). Of that 78 per cent, 40 per cent held BAs, 34 per cent MAs and 30 per cent were Doctors of Medicine. Hall may, like many English students, have travelled around the Continent and studied for a few weeks or months at one or more universities. If so, the purpose was to gain wider experience rather than a further degree. But short-term, unregistered students who paid their bills, and stayed out of trouble, commonly left no records behind them.

Outside London, physicians were supposed to be licensed by the local bishop but this was not, in practice, essential, and the records are patchy. A physician often applied for a licence only when a dispute arose with a patient or colleague, for the extra status it gave. There are no records of licences in the Worcester diocese before 1661, so either they have been lost, or none were granted. John was recognised as ‘professor of medicine’ (that is, practising medicine as a profession) by Stratford’s Church Court in 1622 (Brinkworth 1972: 148). This was a ‘Peculiar’ Court, sharing some responsibilities with the bishop but independent of him in two years out of three, so the recognition is equivalent to an episcopal licence.

Hall would have studied medical textbooks as part of his MA, but in addition ‘often a young physician would acquire practical bedside knowledge by working with an established physician’ (Wear 2000: 122). We know that Hall had access to medical books. As executor of his father’s will he received ‘all my books of physic’ (Marcham 1931: 25). This may indicate that Hall’s father was also a physician, but medical books were commonly owned by householders. In fact it tended to be their wives who provided the first line of medical care for the family and servants. Hall’s father, William, bequeathed books of astronomy, astrology and alchemy to his servant Matthew Morrys, but only on condition that Matthew should instruct John in these arts, if he wished to learn them. These kinds of books were far less common in a standard household library, and might be indicative of William Hall’s main interests. At some point, Morrys, too, moved to Stratford-upon-Avon and seems to have maintained friendly contact with the Halls; he named two of his children Susanna and John, after them. Two years after Shakespeare’s death, in 1618, John made Morrys a trustee, along with John Greene, of the gatehouse in Blackfriars that Susanna had inherited from her father (Schoenbaum 1987: 275).

2 On 14 May 1622, John Hall was recorded as a ‘professor of medicine’ (i.e. a practitioner of medicine) in the records of the Stratford-upon-Avon Ecclesiastical Court (also known as the Bawdy Court). This is evidence of Hall being licensed in medicine by a court which had authority to license him when the bishop was not present. The record includes ‘He did not appear. Pardoned.’ Immediately below Hall’s name are three ‘professors of surgery’: Isaac Hitchcox, John Nason (similarly ‘pardoned’) and Edward Wilkes (‘Let him be cited for the next court.’). They would all have had to present their licences before the ecclesiastical authorities in order to continue their practice.

3 Title-page of The Treasurie of Poor Men (1560), a popular medical book of the day, written in English, and which emphasises by contrast Hall’s own motivation for writing. His text was in Latin and drew freely on other Latin medical texts. Hall wanted to demonstrate that he was a learned physician who was conversant with the best minds of his time.

It is likely that Hall also learned about medicine from his brother-in-law, William Sheppard, who had gained his MA at King’s College, Cambridge in 1590, and his doctorate in medicine in 1597. After marrying John’s sister, Sara, Sheppard moved to Leicester in 1599. It is likely that Sara had met William in Cambridge through her brother (since no other connection between the families is known), and that Sheppard invited John to accompany him to Leicester as his medical assistant. If so, then Hall would have had time for four or five years of supervised practice, and a visit to the Continent, before setting up on his own.

Settling in Stratford-upon-Avon

The reasons behind Hall’s move to Stratford-upon-Avon are unknown. Stratford was prosperous and had no resident physician, but the same applied to other small towns. The only identified link is through Abraham Sturley, estate agent to the Lucy family at nearby Hampton Lucy. The Lucys had estates near Carlton, so there might have been contact between Sturley and the Hall family there (Mitchell 1947: 10). There is no way of knowing whether John had met the Shakespeare family before his move.

John and Susanna Shakespeare married in Holy Trinity Church on 5 June 1607. Elizabeth, who was to be their only child, was christened on 21 February the following year. It is not known for certain where they lived before Susanna inherited New Place on the death of her father. Hall’s Croft was alluded to by the renowned Stratford-upon-Avon antiquarian Robert Bell Wheler in 1814. He says that he has seen ‘in some old paper relating the town, that Dr Hall resided in that part of Old Town which is in the parish of Old Stratford’ (Halliwell-Phillipps 1886: 321).

Dendrochronological evidence, commissioned by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, shows that the oldest part of Hall’s Croft, facing on to the road, was built from trees felled in the summer of 1613 (Anon. 1990). If they did live there for a while, it is likely that they rented it rather than owned it, since there is no record of sale, and the house is not mentioned in Hall’s will with his other two properties (a house in London and a house in Acton, Middlesex). Hall did own a ‘close on Evesham Way’, for which he paid a charge to the Stratford Corporation from 1612 to 1616 (Stratford-upon-Avon Corporation Chamberlain’s Accounts 1585–1619: 228, 245, 263, 276). It is likely that Hall used the close as a meadow for the horse he needed in order to visit his patients.

4 The house known as Hall’s Croft, the only surviving dwelling of the right period in Old Town that could have belonged to John Hall. The front of the building can be dated to around 1613. It is possible that the present house replaced an earlier dwelling on the same site, which might also have been the home of the Halls from the time of their marriage in 1607. This photo was taken in 1951 when the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust bought the house in order to preserve it for the nation.

John Hall and William Shakespeare

References to contacts between John Hall and his father-in-law are sparse. In 1611 their names appeared (with sixty-nine others) on what is thought to be a subscription list raising money to support a bill in Parliament for repairs to the highways (Bearman 1994: 44). The Halls would eventually inherit the 107 acres of land purchased by Shakespeare in 1602, land which would have been affected by the proposed enclosure at Welcombe in 1614. The clerk of the Stratford Corporation, Thomas Greene (a distant kinsman of Shakespeare), records a meeting in London on 17 November 1614, commonly assumed to have been with both Shakespeare and Hall, though Greene did not unequivocally state this. Greene visited ‘my cousin Shakespeare’, ‘to see him how he did’. In the conversation that followed, ‘He [Shakespeare] told me that they assured him they meant to enclose no further than to Gospel Bush […] and he and Mr Hall say they think there will be nothing done at all’ (Ingleby 1885: iii). Shakespeare was probably reporting Hall’s views based on prior discussions in Stratford, to emphasise their agreement on the issue.

5 An artist’s reconstruction of New Place. Hall and his family moved in from 1616 on his wife having inherited on the death of her father, William Shakespeare.

In his will of 1616, Shakespeare made Hall joint residuary legatee and executor, along with Susanna (the main executor). Hall proved Shakespeare’s will on 22 June 1616 and seems to have discharged his duties satisfactorily (Schoenbaum 1987: 306).

Physicians in Shakespeare’s plays

The relationship between Hall and Shakespeare becomes important when considering