Page:Titus Andronicus (1926) Yale.djvu/154



The drawing and script reproduced at the head of this edition of Titus Andronicus is of special interest as the first known illustration to any play of the Shakespearean canon. It is from the pen of Henry Peacham, artist, schoolmaster, epigrammatist, and pamphleteer, and was discovered by Sir E. K. Chambers in Volume I of the Harley Papers at Longleat.

The document, dating from 1595, is important as indicating that the Elizabethans regarded Moors as coal-black, not tawny. In the drawing, Tamora is represented kneeling before Titus, pleading for the life of her sons. Two bound figures, presumably her sons, kneel behind her, and Aaron the Moor stands beside them. The figures behind Titus are supposedly the executioners. The only known text to which Peacham could have had access is the First Quarto of 1594. The text of the MS. is an arrangement of lines from the speeches of Tamora and Titus (I. i. 104–121) and of Aaron (V. i. 125–144), with an interpolation of two lines and a half for Titus which are not found in any of the printed texts. Peacham has supplied his own stage directions. Certain minor variations between the lines of the MS. and those of the printed texts are noticeable, and the possibility of an earlier version of the play might thence be inferred. There seems to be some confusion as to whether the death of only one son (Alarbus) or of more than one is contemplated. Titus's lines, as well as Tamora's last line, seem to indicate that only one is to be put to death, and this circumstance agrees substantially with the texts of the versions which we have. Chambers thinks that the drawing clearly indicates that