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A Shakespeare Timeline Summary Chart
Year Life Works1 Events & Publications2
1564
Shakespeare Born Christopher Marlowe born
John Hawkins second voyage to New World
Galileo Galilei born
John Calvin dies
The Peace of Troyes
1565-1581
1567(?) Richard Burbage, the greatest tragedian of the age, who would eventually portray Hamlet, Lear, Othello and all Shakespeare's great parts born
1576 James Burbage (father of Richard) obtains a 21 year lease and permission to build The Theatre in Shoreditch
1577 The Curtain, a rival theater near The Theatre, opens in Finbury
1565 Golding's translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses (1-4)
1566 Gascoigne's The Supposes
1567 Thomas Nashe born
1571 Tirso de Molina born
1572 Thomas Dekker born
1572 John Donne & Ben Jonson born
1577 Holinshed publishes The Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland, Shakespeare's primary source for the history plays
1579 John Fletcher born
1580 Thomas Middleton born
1580 Montaigne's Essais published
1582 Shakespeare Married Hakluyt's Dievers Voyages Touching the Discovery of America
1583 Birth of daughter Susanna
The Queen's Company is formed in London
1585 Birth of twins, Judith and Hamnet 1586 Mary Queen of Scots tried for treason
1587(?)-1592 Departure from Stratford
Establishment in London as an actor/playwright The Comedy of Errors
Titus Andronicus
The Taming of the Shrew
Henry VI, 1,2,3
Richard III 1587 Mary Queen of Scots executed
1587 Marlowe's Tamburlaine
1588 Defeat of the Armada
1588 Greene's Pandosto
1588 Marlowe's Dr. Faustus
1590 Spenser's Faerie Queen (1-3)
1590 Marlowe's The Jew of Malta
1591 Sidney'sAstrophil and Stella
1592 Robert Greene dies
1592 Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy
1593 Preferment sought through aristocratic connections - dedicates Venus and Lucrece to Henry Wriothsley, Earl of Southampton - possibly the youth of the Sonnets 1593 Venus and Adonis
Begins writing the Sonnets, probably completed by c.1597 or earlier
Two Gentlemen of Verona
Love's Labour's Lost 1593-94 Theaters closed by plague
1593 Marlowe dies
1594 Founding member of the Lord Chamberlain's Men 1594 The Rape of Lucrece
1594-1596 The Lyrical masterpieces
Prosperity and recognition as the leading London playwright.
1596 John Shakespeare reapplies successfully for a coat of arms
1596 Hamnet Shakespeare dies at age 11
Midsummer Night's Dream
Romeo and Juliet
Richard II
Merchant of Venice 1594 Greene's Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay
1594 Marlowe's Edward II
1595 Thomas Kyd dies
1595 Sidney's An Apologia for Poetrie
1595 Sir Walter Raleigh explores the Orinoco
1596 Spenser's Faerie Queen (4-6)
1596 George Peele dies.
1597-1599 Artistic Maturity
Purchases New Place, Stratford with other significant investments
1599 The Globe Theater built on Bankside from the timbers of The Theatre. Shakespeare is a shareholder and receives about 10% of the profits
Henry IV,1,2
The Merry Wives of Windsor
As You Like It
Much Ado About Nothing
Henry V
Julius Caesar 1597 Bacon's Essays, Civil and Moral
1598 Phillip II of Spain dies
1598 Francis Meres Palladis Tamia
1598 John Florio's A World of Words (English-Italian dictionary)
1598 Ben Jonson 's Every Man in his Humour
1599 Essex sent to Ireland and fails, is arrested on return
1599 Edmund Spenser dies
1600-1608 The Period of the Great Tragedies & Problem Plays
1600 The Fortune Theater opens
1601 Shakespeare's father dies
1603 The Lord Chamberlain's Men become The King's Men
who perform at court more than any other company
1607 Susanna Shakespeare married Dr. John Hall
1608 The King's Men begin playing at the Blackfriars
1608 Shakespeare's mother dies
Twelfth Night
Hamlet
Troilus & Cressida
Alls Well That Ends Well
Measure for Measure
Othello
King Lear
Macbeth
Antony and Clepatra
Coriolanus
Timon of Athens 1600 Kemp's Nine Daies Wonder
1600 Dekker's Shoemaker's Holiday
1601 Essex rebels against Elizabeth, fails and is executed
1601 Thomas Nashe dies
1603 Elizabeth dies, James VI of Scotland becomes James I of England
1603 Sir Walter Raleigh arrested, tried and imprisoned
1603 The plagueonce again ravages London
1604 Marston's The Malcontent
1605 The Gunpowder Plot - Guy Fawkes and accomplices arrested
1605 Bacon's The Advancement of Learning
1606 Ben Jonson's Volpone
1607 Tourneur (?) The Revenger's Tragedy
1607 The founding of Jamestown
1609-1611 Period of the Romances
1609 Publication of the Sonnets Pericles Prince of Tyre
Cymbeline
The Winter's Tale
The Tempest 1609 Beaumont & Fletcher The Knight of the Burning Pestle
1610 Prince Henry created Prince of Wales
Ben Jonson The Alchemist
1612-1616 Shakespeare probably retires from London life to Stratford
Works on collaborations with John Fletcher
1616 Judith Shakespeare married Thomas Quiney
March 1616 Shakespeare apparently ill revises his will
April 23, 1616 Shakespeare dies and is burried at Holy trinity Church, Stratford
Henry VIII
The Two Noble Kinsmen
Cardenio 1612 Henry Prince of Wales dies
1612 Webster's The White Devil
1613 Francis Bacon becomes attorney general
1614 Jonson's Bartholomew Fayre
1614 Webster's Duchess of Malfi
1614 Sir Walter Raleigh's History of the World
1616 Francis Beaumont dies
1616 Ben Jonson's Workes published in folio
1623 Publication of Shakespeare's First Folio
The dates given for plays, of course, are only approximate. The actual composition date is rarely know for certain. The list of Shakespeare's works given in column three is in very rough approximate order of composition. There are significant disagreements among scholars about the actual order of composition and in most cases no firm dates. Works listed in column four are usually by date of publication. The Spanish Tragedy, for instance, was probably composed around 1586, but not published until 1592.
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