Anne Shakespeare's Epitaph

Anne Shakespeare's grave is commemorated with a brass plaque that has an English section of basic biographical information, and a Latin section of original poetry eulogizing her as a beloved mother, pious woman, and 'so great a gift'. This Element reinscribes the importance of this epitaph when it was commissioned, created, and put into place.

The Shakespeare family occupies five gravesites on the chancel steps at Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon. Anne Shakespeare's grave is the only one commemorated with a brass plaque and an epitaph in original Latin poetry, eulogizing her as a beloved mother, pious woman, and 'so great a gift'. For nearly four hundred years, this epitaph has remained largely unreadable to visitors, enabling a long history of undervaluing Anne's significant maternal role in the Shakespeare family. Anne Shakespeare's Epitaph offers a new reading of the content and the related material conditions and interpersonal connections behind this text. It provides new evidence about the identity of the engraver and suggests several possible scenarios for how the Shakespeare family came to memorialize Anne as a cherished maternal figure. This Element reinscribes the original significance of Anne's epitaph, and reclaims it as an important Shakespearean text that offers traces of a lost documentary record.