The Shakespeare Code

Why IS Falstaff fat?

He  was originally called Sir John Oldcastle – till the Cobham Family complained to Queen Elizabeth. Oldcastle was their ancestor – and Shakespeare – in the pay of the Earl of Essex – was sending him up.

(Essex and the Cobham family were mortal enemies.  Essex nick-named Lord Cobham ‘The Sycophant’)

Oldcastle was a Lollard – a proto-Protestant who died for his faith.  It’s hardly likely that he would be a con-man and a boozer.

Similarly with the historical Sir John Falstaff – who the character was next named….

He was a coward, but not, as far as we know, a bon-vivant….

John Aubrey records how Shakespeare would sometimes base his characters on real people – and The Shakespeare Code firmly believes that this is the case with Fat Knight.

It believes that William Beeston – Thomas Nashe’s Mr. A[is Lapis – was the model for Falstaff – and that he lived at Posbrook Farm in Titchfield.

To read ‘Why Falstaff is Fat’, please click: HERE

And to read ‘The Strange Case of Mr. Apis Lapis’, please click: HERE