ABSTRACT
A point has now been reached when we must look to William Shakespeare for help in unravelling the enigma of his father. The first clue lies in the list of people not attending church in 1592:
The last two names are familiar - Bardolfe a character out of Henry IV, Henry V, and The Merry Wives O f Windsor - and Fluellen a soldier in Henry V. In a supplementary list of recusants for 1592, the name of Court appears - he was also a character out of Henry V.2 It has been generally recognized by Shakespeare historians that these are the most auto biographical of Shakespeare’s plays. This is particularly the case with The Merry Wives O f Windsor, where the names of Herne, Horne, Brome, Ford, Page, Poins, Peto, Bardolfe and Fenton appear-and these were all people resident in Stratford during Shakespeare’s youth.3 Given that the town only had a population of approximately 1,750 people (about 390 families), this is a most remarkable concentration of local names in one play, suggesting powerful autobiographical associations for Shakespeare. [It is also perhaps no co-incidence that the name of the street at the end of Henley Street is Windsor Street.] Occasionally a single local name appeared in one of his other plays with, as we have seen, the exception of the Henry IV and Henry V series where there were the four references to Bardolfe, Fluellen, Court and Poins.
