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Early modern life

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Fireworks in the early modern world
Shakespeare and Beyond

Fireworks in the early modern world

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Shakespeare & Beyond

Explore fireworks in our collection, which include illustrations from extravagant public spectacles and technical manuals with instructions for making your own.

Folger Finds: Anne of Cleves' gift to Henry VIII
Shakespeare and Beyond

Folger Finds: Anne of Cleves' gift to Henry VIII

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Shakespeare & Beyond

Explore a uniquely inscribed Book of Hours presented to Henry VIII by his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves.

The Women Who Served the Queens of Henry VIII
Shakespeare and Beyond

The Women Who Served the Queens of Henry VIII

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Who were the ladies-in-waiting to each of Henry VIII’s six wives and what were their lives like? An excerpt from Nicola Clark’s The Waiting Game looks at these overlooked but influential figures.

Women who changed history
Shakespeare and Beyond

Women who changed history

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Shakespeare & Beyond

We’re celebrating Women’s History Month with Shakespeare Unlimited podcast interviews and blog posts about women who have changed history, from the early modern world forward.

Shakespeare's Daughter
Shakespeare and Beyond

Shakespeare's Daughter

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In an excerpt from Grace Tiffany’s imaginative novel, The Owl Was a Baker’s Daughter, we meet Judith Shakespeare at age 61, a midwife-apothecary in war-torn 17th-century England on the run to avoid arrest for witchcraft.

Esther Inglis meet Taylor Swift
Shakespeare and Beyond

Esther Inglis meet Taylor Swift

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Ashley Buchanan Heather Wolfe

Go behind the scenes of our exhibition, Little Books, Big Gifts: The Artistry of Esther Inglis. 400 years after her death, Inglis “can still make the whole place shimmer.”

Grimoires and games
Shakespeare and Beyond

Grimoires and games

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Ashley Buchanan

Immerse yourself in the magic of the Folger and the early modern world with our new game “A Night at the Library” paired with recipes for two conjuring cocktails to enhance playing.

Folger Finds: New Year's Gift Rolls of Elizabeth I and Henry VIII
Shakespeare and Beyond

Folger Finds: New Year's Gift Rolls of Elizabeth I and Henry VIII

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Shakespeare & Beyond

In early modern England, New Year’s Day was celebrated with a long-standing custom of giving gifts to the monarch. Each gift was carefully recorded on “gift rolls.” What were the top gifts in 1539 and 1585?

Buds, Bugs, and Birds in the Manuscripts of Esther Inglis
Shakespeare and Beyond

Buds, Bugs, and Birds in the Manuscripts of Esther Inglis

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Georgianna Ziegler

Flowers, bugs, birds, frogs—all and more are found in the manuscripts of Esther Inglis (1570?–1624) now on display in Little Books, Big Gifts, a special Folger exhibition highlighting her artistry with pen and brush.

Holiday Festivities and Elizabethan Theater
Shakespeare and Beyond

Holiday Festivities and Elizabethan Theater

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Shakespeare & Beyond

Erika T. Lin studies early modern holidays and her work has yielded some surprising revelations—not only about the festivities themselves, but about the relationship between holidays and what we now think of as “theater.”

Alchemy, aqua vitae, and Mixology: How alchemy gave us liquor
Shakespeare and Beyond

Alchemy, aqua vitae, and Mixology: How alchemy gave us liquor

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Author
Ashley Buchanan

Without alchemy there would be no mixology. No cocktails, no spirits, no liqueurs, no essences! Dive into the history of alchemy and distillation, with two cocktail recipes.

High spirits: Alchemy in Elizabethan England
Shakespeare and Beyond

High spirits: Alchemy in Elizabethan England

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Author
Jennifer Rampling

Jennifer Rampling, a Princeton history professor and author of The Experimental Fire: Inventing English Alchemy, 1300–1700, explores alchemy in Shakespeare’s England.

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