Merry Christmas
2023! This is my gift to everyone.
This is the
third part of my series exploring pages 260 and 261 of the Tragedies (pages
from the Tragedy of Hamlet) in the First Folio of Shakespeare (1623).
In this post, I
will be using a circle of a standard radius (about a 26-line radius of lines in
the First Folio).
Again, in case
you are new to this blog, I often draw circles in the First Folio to find
hidden messages. I started doing this to
test a hypothesis that the author of the plays was a Freemason or Rosicrucian. Because the Freemasons use the symbol of the
compass and square, I decided to draw circles in the First Folio to see what I
might find. I primarily use one circle
of fixed radius (with a radius of about 26 lines in the First Folio). I always draw this circle in red. I have two circles of fixed radius that I use
less often. I don’t want to repeat
myself here, so you can go to these posts to learn more about this method:
https://hiddenmessagesinshakespeare.blogspot.com/2020/08/why-miranda-is-hidden-mermaid-part-ii.html
https://hiddenmessagesinshakespeare.blogspot.com/2014/10/post-2-part-1-king-of-sea-messages.html
I also made a
video with a brief explanation:
“Finding Hidden
Messages in Shakespeare with a Compass,”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9lLgZHhsTM&t=145s
On to the
images! (Note: Click on the images to see them in higher resolution.)
On page 261 the
words “Starres” (stars) and “Starre” (star) appear. The word “Starres” appears in Hamlet’s love
letter to Ophelia, in the line “Doubt thou, the Starres are fire.”
Coincidentally, or perhaps not, this is line 17 of the
left-hand column (Edward de Vere was the 17th Earl of Oxford). The word “Starre” appears lower down in line
43, in the line: “Lord Hamlet is a Prince out of thy Starre.” These are the only appearances of these
words on the page.
I centered a circle
on the capital letter “S” beginning each word and looked at the two intersections
of the circles, one on page 260, and the other on page 261.
The circles
intersect on page 260 at the words “Armes,” “over,” and “Crowns” (lines 35-37
of the right-hand column of page 260).
Reading these words from bottom to top, the words read as “Crown[es]
over Armes.”
In heraldry, a
crown can be a charge in a coat of arms set atop [over] the shield, to signify
the status of its owner. A royal coat of
arms may display a royal crown. A
princely coat of arms may display a princely crown,
and so on.
Furthermore, the
de Vere family coat of arms includes a star (mullet) in the first quarter of
the shield:
Because the
circles begin with circles centered on “star” and “stars,” with a star being a
feature of the de Vere family coat of arms, and because the intersection
of the circles falls on words with meaning with respect to a coat of arms, with
the word “over” being very close to “of Vere,” the hidden message is about the
de Vere coat of arms, and more specifically to Edward de Vere’s coat of arms.
This interpretation
is buttressed by other words near the centers and intersections of the
circles.
As mentioned above,
on circle is centered on the word “Starres” in the line “Doubt thou,
the Starres are fire.” In
heraldry, a blazon is a formal description of a coat of arms, flag or similar
emblem, from which the reader can reconstruct the appropriate image. The word
“blazon” sounds like “blaze on,” and “blaze” means a brilliant burst of fire; a
flame. Therefore, the phrase “Starres are fire” alludes to the de Vere family coat
of arms, with the star, and its blazon (i.e., its description). Furthermore, to “doubt that the stars are fire”
implies that the blazon for Edward de Vere should be doubted. In other words, it is not an accurate blazon by
the formal rules of heraldry.
The other circle is centered on the
word “Starre” in the line “Lord Hamlet is a Prince out of thy Starre.” The line in the plain context of the play is
that Polonius is saying that he told Ophelia that Hamlet is “out of her league,”
in modern vernacular. However, there is
a second meaning in the context of the hidden messages. It alludes to Edward de Vere, being a clear equivalent
to Hamlet, being “out of thy star,” in that he is not entitled under the rules
of heraldry to the de Vere family coat of arms with its star. Because the line reads that Hamlet/de Vere is
a “Prince out of thy Starre,” and because
the intersection of the circles on page 260 indicates that Edward de Vere
blazon should include a crown over his coat of arms, the message is that Edward
de Vere was of royal blood—he was a Tudor and Seymour.
When Polonius describes Hamlet’s
descent into “madness” (actually Hamlet was pretending to be mad) he states
that Hamlet fell—
Into the Madnesse whereon now he raues,
And all we waile for.
(lines 52-53 of the left-hand
column of page 261, highlighting added)
The mention of “wailing” alludes to
the fact that Edward de Vere should have been the Prince of Wales, heir apparent
to the throne. A close examination of
the lines shows that the word “wailes” (Wales) can be spelled with the letters
of “Madnesse” and “waile.” The letters in blue, read backwards, result in: "we-all-[and]-es" (i.e., "we-all-es" or "Wales").
Another
interesting point is that the word “Commission” appears near the intersections
of the circles on page 260, in line 38, below the word “Crownes,” in the line “Commission
to imploy those Soldiers.” In the design
process of a coat of arms, a coat of arms is “commissioned” after it is
designed.
Turning to the
intersection of the circles on page 261, The circles intersect after the word
“honest.” As I discussed in part 1 of this series of posts, “honest” can be translated
into Latin as verus, and into French as ouvert. Both translations contain the letters “ver,” alluding
to the name de Vere. Immediately below and above the word “honest,” are letters
that spell “two-ord.” With some letter rearranging
the words become “twodor”-- the name “Tudor.”
In addition, these lines may contain a word puzzle hiding the names de Vere and Tudor:
Ham. I sir, to be honest as this world goes, is to bee
one man pick'd out of two thousand.
Pol. That's very true, my Lord.
As far as I can determine, the simplest solution to the word puzzle is to translate the words "out of" into Latin. In Latin, "out of" is foris. Foris also means "out of doors." In the scene, Hamlet is walking out of doors in the lobby (i.e., a portico, covered way, gallery). Later in the scene Polonius asks Hamlet if he will "walk out of the air" (come indoors). It is an easy step to transform "out of doors" into "out of [the] Tudors."
I have considered many possible solutions to this puzzle, and the solution above seems to be the intended and best solution, but there may be alternatives. The puzzle solution seems to depend on Latin so I will show the Latin roots of various words in the line and propose a more complex possible alternative solution (the reader may see other possible valid solutions or implied meanings):
The following shows the Latin words above their English counterparts:
verus universe
Ham. I sir, to be honest as this world goes, is to bee
unus vir severus foris, de; ex duo tu arena
one man pick'd out of two thou-sand.
verus verum
Pol. That's very true, my Lord.
When translating the English words into Latin root words I have to make some choices. Translating into Latin, "honest" is verus, "world" is universe, "man" is vir, "one" is unus, and "two" is duo. The other words require some further explanation. In Latin, "pick" is strictivus, and "strict" translates to severus. The word sever (which includes letters spelling "Vere") means "to divide into parts; break or interrupt." (This is a clue that the concealed names are broken up into disjointed parts.) The words "out of," translated separately into Latin are foris (also meaning "out of doors," see above) and de, respectively, and translated together are ex. If the word "thousand" is broken up or severed into "thou" and "sand," the "thou" part translates to tu and the "sand" part translates to arena ("sand; theater"), so when the words and letters of the Latin words for "two thou-sand" are rearranged, the result is "una tu-do-are" (i.e., "a Tudor").
In Latin, the first and third lines, and the first three words of line two (I think one/unus can be ignored) are word play on the name de Vere. The remaining letters of line two can be used to spell "Oxford" or "Tudor." Thus, the following message can be constructed, with letters reused if the letters of the first three Latin word shown for line two are excluded:
"E. de Vere, Oxford (Oxenford) is [a] Tudor."
With either solution, the preferred simple one or the more complex alternative, the message is that one man, or one truth-- Edward de Vere -- is made from his dual nature as de Vere/Tudor, and that he is out of the Tudor succession.
In the next image, the circle centered on “Starre,”
in the line “Prince out of thy Starre,” is moved to place the center of
the circle on the word “Prince.” The
center of the other circle remains the same as before. As a result, the intersections of the circles
move to new locations on page 260 and 261.
(Note: Click on image to see it in high resolution.)
The
intersection of the circles on page 260 falls on the word “borne” in the phrase
“Was falsely borne…,” at line 31 of the right-hand column. The “W” in “Was” is the first letter of the
acrostic WORM formed by the first letters of lines 31-34. The word “worm” is a pun on the name
Vere. “Worm” in French is ver
(earthworm translates to ver de terre). Similarly, “worm” in Latin is vermis,
meaning grub, worm, or maggot. There is
an example of this pun in the “joy of the Worme” scene in Act 5, scene 2 of
Antony and Cleopatra.
As I showed in my previous post, Part 2 of Edward de Vere in Hamlet, this
section of page 260 contains hidden messages that Edward de Vere is not, in
fact, a de Vere. Please refer to that
post for a full explanation. The intersection
of the circles on page 260 reinforces the hidden message that Edward de Vere
is a Tudor prince and not a de Vere.
The circles intersect on page 261 at the word “daughter,” in the
line “Have you a daughter. Immediately, below
this there are letters and words that can be combined to spell the name “Tudor.”
Above the
intersection are the words “the Sun” (a homonym of “son”), and the words “very
true,” a word play on the name de Vere.
The Latin translations of “very” and “true” are verus and verum,
respectively. Edward de Vere’s motto was Vero Nihil Verius (“Nothing
more true than truth” or “Nothing truer than truth”).
Nearby, the
word “Magots” (maggots) appears. It has
already been shown that the words “worm” and “maggot” when translated into
Latin and French are word plays on the name de Vere.
The mention of
a dead dog may be also significant in that Thomas Seymour shot and killed the
king’s spaniel when he tried to break into the king’s appartments, just prior
to his arrest.
In my opinion
the hidden message is that a “Tudor daughter” (Lady Elizabeth, later Queen
Elizabeth) had an illegitimate son fathered by Thomas Seymour, and the son was
Edward de Vere.
The next image is
the same image except that a line (in blue) is drawn from right to left through
the intersections of the circles. The
line points to text at the beginning of Act 2, scene 2, where Rosincrance and Guildensterne
appear before the king and queen. In
particular, the blue line points at the word “Resembles” at the beginning of line
32 (the king’s lines). Here is the text:
King. Welcome deere Rosincrance and Guildensterne.
Moreouer,
that we much did long to see you,
The
neede we haue to vse you, did prouoke
Our hastie sending.
Something haue you heard
Of Hamlets transformation: so
I call it,
Since not th'exterior, nor the inward
man
Resembles that it was. What
it should bee
More then his Fathers death, that thus
hath put him
So much
from th'vnderstanding of himselfe,
I cannot
deeme of. I intreat you both,
That
being of so young dayes brought vp with him:
And since so
Neighbour'd to his youth, and humour,
That you
vouchsafe your rest heere in our Court
Some
little time: so by your Companies
To draw
him on to pleasures, and to gather
So much
as from Occasions you may gleane,
That
open'd lies within our remedie.
(highlighting
added)
(Note: Click on the imaged to see it in high resolution.)
The following image shows a closeup of the text.
The word “More”
appears as the first word of line 33 of page 260 directly below the word
“Resembles.” (As it so happens, 33 is the simple cipher of the letters in the
name Bacon, but I’m not sure if that is significant.)
At lines 35-37,
the capital letters at beginning of each line form the acrostic ITA. The Latin word ita can mean “yes.” “Yes” spelled backwards is “sey.” When “sey” is combined with “more,” the
result is “seymore,” which is a homonym for the name Seymour.
This result is
reinforced by other nearby words. The
word “So,” the first word of line 34, above the ITA acrostic, and below the word
“More,” can also be translated into Latin as ita. The word “Since,” the first
word of line
31, above the word “More,” means “seeing that,” so there is another “see-more”
(Seymour). The word “resembles,” first word
of line 32, means “to exhibit similarity or likeness to” [C14:from Old French
resembler, from re- + sembler to look like, from Latin similis like]. Therefore, “resemble” includes the idea of being
“seen” to be like something else. With
this meaning another “see-more” (Seymour) is present. “Resemble” can translated
into Latin as assideo, which can also mean “to sit by.” (As deo means “god” in Latin, I wonder
if another allusion is being made, such “god of asses” or “god of fools.” Such a jibe would be appropriate for Thomas
Seymour’s behavior, or even perhaps a humorous description of the wit of Edward
de Vere.) The acrostic SIT is formed by
the first letters of lines 34-36, so resembles “sits by” “More” in more ways
than one to form “see more” (Seymour). In
addition to all this, the first letters of the words beginning lines 38-39
(That, Some) can be combined to spell the name Thomas. Thus, a hidden message containing the name
Thomas Seymour is present.
The overall
message is that Edward de Vere resembles his father, Thomas Seymour, perhaps in
more ways than one.
The next image adds
some highlighting:
In the image
above, the instances of the words “more,” “see,” “sey” (spelled backwards and forwards),
“ita” (English “yes”) (spelled backwards and forwards) are
highlighted. There are even more that
are not shown. Highlighting every
possible iteration of words is more confusing than it is helpful.
Letters
spelling the name “Tudor” are shown highlighted in purple on line 37. Other nearby combinations of letters can be
used to spell the same name.
The hidden
meaning is that the names “Seymour” and “Tudor” are found in close to one
another proximity (i.e., they are like neighbors), and that Edward de Vere is similarly
“adhered” to the names Tudor and Seymour.
The import of
all this is that Edward de Vere was the illegitimate son of Lady Elizabeth
Tudor (later Queen Elizabeth) and Thomas Seymour.
Merry Christmas!
