Shakespeare · 1613
The Globe burns during Henry VIII
A cannon shot in a history play set the thatch alight in 1613 — theatre as fireworks, and the surname tied to Southwark spectacle.
Draft entry · awaiting review
On 29 June 1613 the Globe's thatched roof caught fire during a performance of Henry VIII (listed in period reports under titles such as All Is True). Stage artillery used for special effects embers landed on straw; within an hour the playhouse was ash. No one died, but the building was lost until the company rebuilt in brick the following year.
The episode belongs to legend as much as to fire office detail: Shakespeare had long invested in the Globe; his retirement to Stratford was underway, yet London audiences still associated his name with the Rose and the Fortune as well as this round wooden O. The blaze is a useful story on this page — risk, spectacle and the fragility of the very stages that made his surname audible.
More stories of Shakespeare
- Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & TragediesHow two fellow actors saved half the canon from script loss and put the surname on the title page of English literature's most consequential single volume.
- Holy Trinity and the grave curseStratford burial, ledger stone and the rhymed warning against moving his bones — parish fact meets tourist folklore.