Hierarchy of the Blessed Angels, or, What's In A Name

Yesterday I posted a rather lengthy piece on Thomas Heywood's complaint about the printer/publisher William Jaggard (of First Folio fame).  Jaggard was the piratical printer of The Passionate Pilgrim, whose third edition (1612) included various poems from Heywood's Troia Britannica (1609), along with poems from many other authors, attributed entirely to Shakespeare.  Jaggard legally owned the rights to Troia Britannica, and it was not a legal complaint Heywood was making.  It was more a moral complaint:  "Here, likewise, I must necessarily insert a manifest injury done me in that worke, by taking the two epistles of Paris to Helen, and Helen to Paris, and printing them in a lesse volume under the name of another, which may put the world in opinion I might steale them from him..."  In an age where plagiarism was rather a loose concept, Heywood's sentiments are interesting.  Aside from this rather dubious take on plagiarism, which seems to be more motivated by the wish to castigate Jaggard than to uphold a pure reputation, Heywood's complaint is famous for mentioning Shakespeare as being "much offended" by Jaggard's publication.  He was perhaps more offended in Heywood's overheated imagination than in fact.  Shakespeare must have been used to seeing his name on numerous title pages by this point in his career, and probably found it more amusing than maddening.  After all, a publisher doesn't put a man's name on the cover unless he thinks it is going to sell books.  Rather flattering really...

Today I would like to draw attention to Heywood's other mention of Shakespeare.  It occurs in his 1635 Hierarchy of the Blessed Angels, a description of which I give here, taken from Collectanea Anglo-Poetica (The Chetham Society, 1878, p. 250):

The Hierarchie of the blessed Angells. Their Names, Orders, and Offices. The fall of Lucifer with his Angells. Written by Tho. Heywood. ... London Printed by Adam Islip 1635. Folio, pp. 639, including frontispiece, introductory matter and index...The Hierarchie of the blessed Angells is a long and very desultory poem of above six hundred pages, in nine books...

It is a long and, to quote Chambers Cyclopaedia, "curious specimen."  Among its description of angels and devils the Hierarchie gives a description of various contemporary or near contemporary playwrights with their shortened first names.

Mellifluous Shakespeare, whose enchanting quill
Commanded mirth or passion, was but Will;
And famous Jonson, though his learned pen
Be dipped in Castaly, is still but Ben.
Fletcher and Webster, of that learned pack
None of the meanest, was but Jack;
Dekker but Tom, nor May, nor Middleton,
And he's but now Jack Ford that once was John.

(Library of the world's best literature, ancient and modern, ed. C. D. Warner, et al, 1897,  p. 7349)

Surely the most incidental of verse, but interesting none the less for the grouping.  This was published in 1635, and Shakespeare's name is still prominent among those who had lived to be noteworthy (or nearly so) in the Carolinian period, though he had been dead nearly 20 years:  Ben Jonson (d.1637), John Fletcher (d. 1625), John Webster (d. 1634), Thomas Dekker (d. 1632), Thomas May (d. 1650), Thomas Middleton (d. 1627), John Ford (d. c. 1640), Shakespeare (d. 1616).

For those interested in Heywood's dramatic work, the standard edition of his surviving works (he claims to have had a main finger or entire hand in 220 plays--and he made this statement long before his writing days were over), the standard edition is The Dramatic Works of Thomas Heywood, 6 volumes, edited by R. H. Shepherd, London: J. Pearson, 1874.  Fortunately this work is available in full view and PDF formats from both Google Book Search and the Internet Archive.  Only a couple of dozen plays survive from Heywood's enormous output, and these, he says, only found their way into print accidentally.  In any event, here are the links.  I also provide links to a less inclusive work edited by J. P. Collier, but, of course, extreme care should be taken when consulting Collier editions.

The Dramatic Works of Thomas Heywood Now First Collected with Illustrative Notes and a Memoir of the Author in Six Volumes, edited by R. H. Shepherd, John Pearson, 1874, GBS, full view and PDF.  The date given after the play title is the date on the title page, not necessarily the date of composition.  The [IA] in bold after each volume number is a link to the Internet Archive version.  This is the most current standard edition of the works of Heywood.

• Vol. I [IA]
  • Memoir of Thomas Heywood;
  • Commendatory Poems;
  • The First and Second parts of King Edward the Fourth (1600);
  • The Second Part of King Edward the Fourth;
  • If You Know Not Me, You Know No Bodie ; or, The troubles of Queen Elizabeth (1605);
  • If you know not me, you know no body. The Second Part. (1632).
• Vol. II [IA]
  • The Fayre Mayde of the Exchange;
  • A Woman Kilde with Kindnesse;
  • The Four Prentises of London. With the Conquest of Jerusalem (1615);
  • The Fair Maid of the West, or A Girle Worth Gold, The First Part (1631);
  • The Fair Maid of the West, of A Girle Worth Gold, The Second Part (1631);
• Vol. III [IA]
  • The Golden Age : or The lives of Jupiter and Saturne, with the deifying of the Heathen Gods. (1610);
  • The Silver Age, Including The love of Jupiter to Alcmena : The birth of Hercules. And The Rape of Prosperine. Concluding, With the Arraignment of the Moone. (1613);
  • The Brazen Age The first Act containing, the death of the Centaure Nessus, The Second, The Tragedy of Meleager: The Third The Tragedy of Iason and Media. The Fourth. Vulcans Net. The Fifth. The Labours and death of Hercules (1613);
  • The Iron Age : Contayning the Rape of Hellen, &c. (1632);
  • The Second Part of the Iron Age Which contayneth the death of Penthesilea, Paris, Priam, and Hecuba : &c. (1632).
• Vol. IV [IA]
  • The English Traveller (1633);
  • A Pleasant Comedy, called A Hayden-Head Well Lost (1634);
  • The late Lancashire Witches (1634);
  • Londons Ius Honorarium. Exprest in sundry Triumphs, pagiants, and shews : At the Initiation or Entrance of the Right Honourable George Whitmore, into the Maioralty of the famous and farre renouned City of London (1631);
  • Londini Sinus Salutis, or, Londons Harbour of Health, and Happinesse. Expressed in sundry Triumphs, Pageants and Showes ; at the Initiation of the Right Honorable, Christopher Clethrowe, Into the Maioralty of the farre Renowned City of London (1635);
  • Londini Speculum : or, Londons Mirror, Exprest in sundry Triumphs, Pageants, and Showes, at the Initiation of the right Honorable Richard Fenn, into the Mairolty of the Famous and farre renowned City of London (1637).
• Vol. V [IA]
  • A Challenge for Beautie (1636);
  • Loves Maistresse : or, The Queens Masque (1636);
  • The Rape of Lucrece (1638);
  • Porta pietatis, or, The Port or Harbour of Piety. Exprest in sundry Triumphes, Pageants, and Showes, at the Initiation of the Right Honourable Sir Maurice Abbot, Knight, into the Maioralty of the famous and farre renowned City London (1638);
  • The Wise-woman of Hogsdon (1638);
  • Londini Status Pacatus : or, Londons Peaceable Estate. Esprest in sundry Triumphs, Pageants, and Shewes, at the Innitiation of the right Honhourable Henry Garway, into the Maioralty of the Famous and farre Renowned City London (1639).
• Vol. VI [IA]
  • The Royall King, and The Loyall Subject (1637);
  • Pleasant Dialogues and Dramma's, Selected Out Of Lucian, Erasmus, Textor, Ovid, &c. With Sundry Emblems extracted from the most elegant Iacobus Catsius (1637);
  • Fortune By Land and Sea. A Tragi-Comedy (1655).

The Dramatic Works of Thomas Heywood with a Life of the Poet and Remarks on His Writings, Ed. J. Payne Collier, 1850 from GBS, full view and PDF.  Dates indicated after each play is the date on the title page.  Internet Archive editions of the works are given as [IA]. Caution must be exercised when examining any work touched by J. P. Collier, a known forger.

• vol. I (1850) [IA]
  • The First Part of King Edward IV (1600);
  • The Second Part of King Edward IV;
  • The Fayre Mayde of the Exchange (1607);
  • Fortune by Land and Sea (1655);
  • The Fair Maid of the West, or A Girle Worth Gold. The first part (1631);
  • The Fair Maid of the West, or A Girle Worth Gold. The second part (1631).
• vol. II (1851) [IA]
  • The Royall King, and The Loyall Subject (1637);
  • A Woman Kilde With Kindnesse (1607);
  • If You Know Not Me, You Know No Bodie; or, The Troubles of Queen Elizabeth (1605);
  • The second part of If You Know Not Me, You Know No Bodie. With the building of the Royal Exchange : and the Famous Victorie of Queen Elizabeth, in the Yeare 1588. (1606);
  • The Golden Age : or, The Lives of Jupiter and Saturne, with the defining of the Heathen Gods (1611);
  • The Silver Age, including The Love of Jupiter to Alcmena : The Birth of Hercules, and The Rape of Prosperine. Concluding with the Arraignment of the Moon. (1613).

A more complete, and growing, webliography of Heywood can be found at my Shakespeare's Contemporaries page.