The Wounds of Civil War

Last updated March 07, 2019

The Wounds of Civil War is an Elizabethan era stage play, written by Thomas Lodge. A dramatization of the ancient Roman conflict between Marius and Sulla, the play is generally considered Lodge's only extant solo drama.^[1]

Thomas Lodge was an English physician and author during the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods.

In historiography, ancient Rome is Roman civilization from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD, encompassing the Roman Kingdom, Roman Republic and Roman Empire until the fall of the western empire. The civilization began as an Italic settlement in the Italian peninsula, dating from the 8th century BC, that grew into the city of Rome and which subsequently gave its name to the empire over which it ruled and to the widespread civilisation the empire developed. The Roman empire expanded to become one of the largest empires in the ancient world, though still ruled from the city, with an estimated 50 to 90 million inhabitants and covering 5.0 million square kilometres at its height in AD 117.

Gaius Marius was a Roman general and statesman. He held the office of consul an unprecedented seven times during his career. He was also noted for his important reforms of Roman armies, authorizing recruitment of landless citizens, eliminating the manipular military formations, and reorganizing the structure of the legions into separate cohorts. Marius defeated the invading Germanic tribes, for which he was called "the third founder of Rome." His life and career were significant in Rome's transformation from Republic to Empire.

Publication

The Wounds of Civil War was entered into the Stationers' Register on 24 May 1594, and was published in quarto later that year by the bookseller John Danter. The title page of the quarto identifies Lodge as the author, and states that the play was performed by the Admiral's Men. The 1594 quarto is the only publication of the play before the nineteenth century.^[2]

The Stationers’ Register was a record book maintained by the Stationers' Company of London. The company is a trade guild given a royal charter in 1557 to regulate the various professions associated with the publishing industry, including printers, bookbinders, booksellers, and publishers in England. The Register itself allowed publishers to document their right to produce a particular printed work, and constituted an early form of copyright law. The Company's charter gave it the right to seize illicit editions and bar the publication of unlicensed books.

This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1594.

The size of a book is generally measured by the height against the width of a leaf, or sometimes the height and width of its cover. A series of terms is commonly used by libraries and publishers for the general sizes of modern books, ranging from folio, to quarto (smaller) and octavo. Historically, these terms referred to the format of the book, a technical term used by printers and bibliographers to indicate the size of a leaf in terms of the size of the original sheet. For example, a quarto historically was a book printed on a sheet of paper folded twice to produce four leaves, each leaf one fourth the size of the original sheet printed. Because the actual format of many modern books cannot be determined from examination of the books, bibliographers may not use these terms in scholarly descriptions.

Date

The date of the authorship and premier performance of the play is not known with certainty. Many scholars have considered the scene in Act III that includes a chariot drawn by four Moors as an imitation of the famous similar scene in Marlowe's Tamburlaine, indicating that Lodge's play must post-date Marlowe's.^[3]The Wounds of Civil War is generally dated to the 1587–92 period. (A minority view allows the possibility the Lodge's play may have pre-dated Marlowe's, and that Marlowe may have been influenced by Lodge.)^[4]

Moors medieval Muslim inhabitants of the Maghreb, Iberian Peninsula, Sicily, and Malta

The term "Moors" refers primarily to the Muslim inhabitants of the Maghreb, the Iberian Peninsula, Sicily, and Malta during the Middle Ages. The Moors initially were the indigenous Maghrebine Berbers. The name was later also applied to Arabs.

Christopher Marlowe, also known as Kit Marlowe, was an English playwright, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. Marlowe was the foremost Elizabethan tragedian of his day. He greatly influenced William Shakespeare, who was born in the same year as Marlowe and who rose to become the pre-eminent Elizabethan playwright after Marlowe's mysterious early death. Marlowe's plays are known for the use of blank verse and their overreaching protagonists.

Sources

Lodge's primary source on the First Civil War in ancient Rome was the Roman History of Appian; an English translation of Appian's work, by "W. B.," had been published by Henry Bynneman in 1578. Lodge departs from his source when it suits his purposes, as in elevating the minor figure Junius Brutus into a significant character. Lodge condemns militarism and tyranny as leading to civil disruption; he favors the unifying influences of a balanced, moderate, and just society.^[5] (Lodge conceived of Elizabethan England as that type of society, and was a conservative defender of the existing social order against potential change and "innovation.")

Appian of Alexandria was a Greek historian with Roman citizenship who flourished during the reigns of Emperors of Rome Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus Pius.

This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1578.

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References

↑ Terence P. Logan and Denzell S. Smith, eds., The Predecessors of Shakespeare: A Survey and Bibliography of Recent Studies in English Renaissance Drama, Lincoln, NE, University of Nebraska Press, 1973; pp. 153-7.
↑ E. K. Chambers, The Elizabethan Stage, 4 Volumes, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1923; Vol. 3, p. 410.
↑ William A. Armstrong, "Tamburlaine and The Wounds of Civil War," Notes and Queries 5 (1958), pp. 381-3.
↑ N. B. Paradise, Thomas Lodge: The History of an Elizabethan. New Haven, Yale University Press, 1931; pp. 129-34.
↑ Andrew Hadfield, Shakespeare and Republicanism. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005; pp. 66-72.

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[1] Terence P. Logan and Denzell S. Smith, eds., The Predecessors of Shakespeare: A Survey and Bibliography of Recent Studies in English Renaissance Drama, Lincoln, NE, University of Nebraska Press, 1973; pp. 153-7.

[2] E. K. Chambers, The Elizabethan Stage, 4 Volumes, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1923; Vol. 3, p. 410.

[3] William A. Armstrong, "Tamburlaine and The Wounds of Civil War," Notes and Queries 5 (1958), pp. 381-3.

[4] N. B. Paradise, Thomas Lodge: The History of an Elizabethan. New Haven, Yale University Press, 1931; pp. 129-34.

[5] Andrew Hadfield, Shakespeare and Republicanism. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005; pp. 66-72.