MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR
PROPERTIES.
IV, 4, 78.
“Properties” for stage purposes was in use much earlier than Shakespeare’s time, and has remained in the vocabulary of the theatre until the present day. In its technical theatrical signification, such as the above quotation, it refers to any portable article whether costume, furniture, or weapons required during the acting of the play. In Elizabethan times the properties used were few and simple; they consisted of things that were absolutely necessary, thus giving a realistic appearance to the performance. If a bedroom scene is being represented, a bed, table, chairs or stools and lights are the properties mentioned in the play, and, no doubt, produced on the stage. In scenes of open country, a wood, a park, and artificial trees, mossy banks, and sometimes a rock, or a tomb, would be fixed on the stage. That such properties were in use can be proved from the notes in Henslowe’s invaluable Diary, where such things are mentioned. In shop scenes, a counter and a few articles to indicate the nature of the business were no doubt exhibited. No painted scenery was known, but the stage was draped with tapestry and perhaps a few pictures were also displayed. The floor in all scenes was covered with rushes, which were suitable for any setting. If a room was being represented, rushes were quite appropriate, as at that date they were the substitute for our carpet. If a nature scene, they harmonised with the green foliage and completed the picture. Many other articles besides the above-mentioned were brought into use; thus it is quite evident that, however simple the setting, it sufficed in conveying the proper allusion. Even in our own times, I have witnessed a play of Molière’s, in which a table and two chairs were the only properties on the stage.
“Of all properties for my Lord Admiral’s men, the 10th of March, 1598: 1 rock, 1 cage, 1 tomb, 1 Hell mouth, 2 marchepanes and the sittie (city) of Rome (rather a tall order), 2 wooden canopies, old Mahomet’s head, and other accessories.”
ACT. HISS.
III, 3, 40.
CUE.
III, 3, 40.
The concluding word or words of a speech in a play serving as a signal or direction to another to begin his speech. The word cue has been taken as French queue, that is, the tail or ending of the preceding speech; but no such use of queue has even been used in French, where the cue is called replique, and no literal sense of queue or cue leading up to this appears in the sixteenth century English. On the other hand, in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries it is found written Q, q or qu, and it was explained by seventeenth century writers as a contraction for some Latin word (qualis, quando), said to have been used to mark in actors’ copies of plays the points at which they were to begin. But no evidence confirming this has ever been found.
Q. A qu, a term used among stage-plaiers, a Lat qualis—at what manner of word the Actors are to beginne to speake one after another hath done his speech. 1625.
Q. A note of entrance for actors, because it is the first letter of quando—when, showing when to enter and speak. 1633. From Butler’s English Grammar. The word is printed both Qu and Cue in the Folios and quartos. All modern editions print cue.
III, 2, 46.
MASQUED. VIZARDED.
IV, 6, 40.
In the early days of the masque the performers always wore masks or vizards.
PART.
(Enter Sir Hugh Evans, disguised with others, as fairies.)
Trib, fairies; come! and remember your parts; be bold, I pray you; follow me into the pit, and when I give ords, do as I pid you; come come; trib, trib.
V, 4, 2.
SCENE.
IV, 6, 17.
COMEDY. PROLOGUE.
III, 5, 76.
A comedy was a theatrical piece generally depicting the manners of the period, always of an amusing and cheerful character, a happy conclusion being one of the essential features. Some of Shakespeare’s so-called comedies almost verge on the side of tragedy, as, for instance, the plot of the “Merchant of Venice,” “The Winter’s Tale,” and others.