Anonymous
[Sir Edward Dering?]
PHILANDER KING OF THRACE
SCENARIO
1627–1628
This work survives in what Joseph Quincy Adams terms "an author's plot"–a partial outline of a Stuart tragicomedy that might have been intended to persuade an acting company to advance money to the author to write the play itself. (See "The Author-Plot of an Early Seventeenth-Century Play," The Library, 4th series, 26.1 [1945]: 17-27, which includes a full transcript.) The document is a manuscript, now in the Folger Shakespeare Library. The catalog lists this MS as "Scenario of a play set in Thrace and Macedon" (Folger MS X.d.206, microfilm Fo 4030), names Sir Edward Dering, Bart., as the possible author (on the basis of the handwriting), and dates the work c. 1630. The MS consists of 12 leaves, of which only the first three are used. The first page is a list of 28 characters, of whom more than half do not appear in the plot proper; all of these appear to have been invented by the author. Pages 2 and 3 are given over to geographical notes from John Speed, A Prospect of the Most Famous Parts of the World (which indicates a date after 1627)–names of rivers, mountains, cities, in Thrace and Macedon, plus some notes on Thracian culture. These fail to clarify the political and military ambiguities of the outline. The other three pages summarize the plot of the first three acts of the play, scene by scene.
In re: the Folger MS now entitled "Scenario of a play set in Thrace and Macedon" (Folger MS X.d.206), Laetitia Yeandle of the Folger writes relevant to attribution of playwright:
When I recatalogued X.d.206 I introduced no question-marks or 'probablies' or 'possiblies' into my entry, so in the late seventies I seem not to have had any doubt that the manuscript was not only in the hand of Sir Edward Dering but also composed by him. On looking at it again I looked at the corrections and think they are the kind an author might make. Two people who have looked at it were doubtful that the plot was drawn up by a professional playwright. By the 4th act it would have been clear if the play was going to be a tragi-comedy or a tragedy. I am not an historian of the drama. I can only say I have no doubt about the handwriting. I am not aware of any errors in J. Q. Adams's transcript but I have never checked it with the original.
n.b.Adams's work was ultimately checked against this original for the following notes.
a synoptic, alphabetical character list
ADRADEMNON
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
ADRAPSUS
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
ANDRISCUS
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
ARISTOCLES
A Thracian soldier and courtier, Suavina's secret lover, banished by Philander. Apparently ignoring the advice of his supposed father Euphrastes to take part in the war between the Epirots and Achaeans, he makes his way to Macedon, joins the Macedonian army, and is the hero of a battle against an enemy who seems from the sequel to be the Thracians. The King of Macedon honors him, but when Salohcin and Philander make peace they also agree to banish Aristocles from both countries. He persuades Corintha to mediate with Philander on his behalf, and wins the latter's pardon. Alhough Suavina takes this a sign of betrayal, and allows Salohcin to gain her promise of love, she is undeceived by Corintha, and reunited with Aristocles, who undertakes to disengage her from Salohcin in some nonviolent way. The jealous King of Macedon banishes him, and recruits Phonops to murder him; when the assassin and two henchmen attack him in a retired grove he kills the underlings, learns from Phonops that it is Salohcin who has laid the plot, and orders Phonops to report to his employer that Aristocles is dead. He disguises himself as Philocles, a cast-off soldier, and sends Suavina a letter to inform her of the change. In this disguise, he is recruited by Phonops to help kill Ascania, and persuades the villain that she should be seized and thrown into a chasm on the coast. But the place of death is also a secret entrance to the cave of the Sibyl, with whom Aristocles places the queen for safe-keeping.
ASCANIA
Wife of Salochin, she is aggrieved by her husband's passion for Suavina. She is kidnapped by Phonops and by Aristocles disguised as Philocles, who pretends to throw her, bound and hooded, into a chasm, but instead leaves her with the Sibyl for safekeeping.
BAALPHOENIX
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
BABBLE
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
BELORA
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
B[ ]LISSA
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
CORINTHA
Daughter of Salohcin. She attracts the love of Philander, and uses it to win a pardon for her friend Aristocles, telling Philander that only if Aristocles will woo her on the king's behalf will she be won. This success makes Suavina jealous, and drives her for a time into the arms of Salohcin, but Corintha tells Suavina that she is only using Aristocles to test the depth of Philander's love.
DOLPHUS
A villain, engaged by Phonops to help in the murders of Ascania and Aristocles, along with Panascaeus. But when the three attack Aristocles the latter kills him.
DULCILLA
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
EUPHRASTES
Supposed father of Aristocles, and counselor of Philander. He advises the banished Aristocles to seek his fortune in the war between the Epirots and the Achaeans.
FUTILIA
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
NIMIAS
An idle lover. None of his actions are recounted in the surviving plot.
PAENELAENA
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
PANASCAEUS
A villain, engaged by Phonops to help in the murders of Ascania and Aristocles, along with Dolphus. But when the three attack Aristocles the latter kills him.
PANASCRUS
Alternate name for Panascaeus.
PHILABEL
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
PHILANDER
King of Thrace, he discusses with his sister Suavina the war in which Thrace is currently involved (apparently against the Macedonians). He tells his counselor Euphrastes that he will not allow his sister Suavina to marry anyone but a "present K[ing]." When he discovers the secret love between Suavina and Aristocles he banishes the latter from Thrace. He meets Salohcin and they conclude a treaty of peace; when he learns that Aristocles has fought on the other side he persuades Salohcin that the young warrior should be banished from both countries. During the celebration following the accord, he and Salohcin's daughter Corintha are mutually smitten. She asks him to pardon Aristocles, and is successful. But she is cold to his amorous suit, and tells him that to succeed he must persuade Aristocles to plead his case. Jealous of the young hero, but bound by his promise to Corintha, Philander gets Salohcin to carry out the latter's earlier agreement to banish Aristocles.
PHILOCLES
A cast-off soldier, actually Aristocles in disguise; he is recruited by Phonops to help murder Ascania, and after the two have seized and bound her undertakes to throw her into a seaside chasm, but actually deposits her safely in the care of the Sibyl.
PHONOPS
"A begging cavalier," this play's Bosola. He discovers Suavina and Aristocles together, and reveals their love to Philander. He is engaged by Salohcin to murder both the King's wife Ascania and his Thracian rival Aristocles. He recruits Dolphus and Pandarus to help him. When the three attack Aristocles, however, the two underlings are killed, and Phonops, pleading for mercy, is persuaded to reveal Salohcin as the architect of the plot, and to tell the king that Aristocles has been killed. Still responsible for killing Ascania, he recruits an unemployed soldier, Philocles (Aristocles in disguise) to help. They seize the queen, and Philocles undertakes to throw her alive into a "hollow" by the sea shore, there to drown and disappear.
PHILOGYN
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
PSEUDANAX
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
SALOHCIN [sic]
King of Macedon. He learns of Articles' valor, and honors him before the army. But when the king and Philander meet and conclude a treaty of peace, they agree to banish Aristocles from both countries. Salohcin falls in love with Suavina, and takes advantage of her jealousy at Corintha's apparent conquest of Aristocles to win from her a promise of love. First, however, he must get rid of his wife, Ascania, and suborns Phonops to murder her, and also to dispose of his rival Aristocles.
SCODRA
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
SUAVINA
Sister of Philander, she is distressed by the war. She is secretly in love with Aristocles. At the peace parley, Salohcin, the King of Macedon, falls in love with her. She interprets Corintha's intercession with Philander on behalf of Aristocles as a sign of betrayal, and becomes jealous. Wooed by Salohcin, she agrees to be his, especially when he tells her that his wife Ascania is ill. But Corintha's assurance that she loves Philander but is using her friendship with Aristocles to test the King relieves her jealousy, and she and Aristocles are joyously reunited. Her promise to Salohcin is now the problem; it is agreed that Aristocles will find a way to break it off, though without bloodshed. When Aristocles is banished for a second time, he tells her by letter of his plan to remain in Macedon disguised as Philocles.
TER[D]ER
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
TROADA
Listed in the dramatis personae. Characteristics and actions not given in the surviving plot.
VASCO
A captain. None of his actions are recounted in the surviving plot.