in Albovine, King of the Lombards — Davenant, William
Metadata
Play
Albovine, King of the Lombards
Author
Davenant, William
Year (catalogued)
1629
First performance
1628
Decade
1620s
Genre
Tragedy
Play type
Unacted (?); Professional (?)
Company
Unacted
Speech prefix(es)
Frollo. | Frol.
Words
191
Characters
1024
Typicality
0.39 (cosine to cluster centroid)
TCP id
A19881
BritDrama no.
2179
Cluster
Cluster 16 — Errand servants & brief parts
Important excerpts
Passages from this character's speech that contain the most distinguishing words for Cluster 16 (nat, ningle, chould, numps, terry, dery…). Matches are highlighted.
thick walls of men. Conrad. Long live Albouine, King of the Lom bards! Conrad. Live Rhodolinda, Queen of the Lom bards! You sirrah! d'ye get the Kings officer With child? Not by mine, Sir. Nay, Captain, do not look, as if y'had drunk Vinegar. You must, or go, or—stay Sir— That's a favour, Signior. The King is light enough himself:
Full speech
Your Troops (Sir) are so divided into Mixed files, that to the City you do march Between thick walls of men. Conrad. Long live Albouine, King of the Lom bards! Conrad. Live Rhodolinda, Queen of the Lom bards! You sirrah! d'ye get the Kings officer With child? Not by mine, Sir. Nay, Captain, do not look, as if y'had drunk Vinegar. You must, or go, or—stay Sir— That's a favour, Signior. The King is light enough himself: he needs No Torches. With the Queen. Expound your Riddle, Sir. Excuse me, sir, not I. Signior Cunymond Has all the voice at Court. We know, Sir, when, And where, a certain Duchess, Sir; You copulate with Titles, you. The Heralds are your Bawds. But we must know, how much you would re ceiue In price of your activity? Or beget Cripples, to people and Hospital? He sits Like a Witch, sailing in a sive. I, 'tis it: he has them growing on his Temples here—They'll shortly be as big As Turnips. Look! it has found the hid ̄ treasure then, which Made it walk; for the Ghost hath bought it self New clothes.
Plot summary
Plot — Albovine, King of the Lombards
Before the start of the action, King Albovine killed a vanquished king and took his daughter Rhodolinda prisoner; another prisoner of war, Paradine, has risen to be his favourite. Albovine marries Rhodolinda, but at the wedding banquet he drunkenly forces her to drink from a cup made of her father’s skull. She responds by refusing to consummate the marriage. Hermegild, who has a grudge against Paradine, encourages Albovine to make advances to Paradine’s wife, Valdaura, but then arranges for Rhodolinda to witness the encounter and tells her that Albovine is promiscuous. She swears revenge and promises to take Hermegild as her second husband if he will help her. Valdaura spends every night away from her nuptial bed, claiming that Rhodolinda requires her overnight attendance. A court lady, Thesina, offers to arrange an opportunity for the frustrated Paradine to sleep with his own wife. The following morning, however, he learns that his nocturnal partner was Rhodolinda. She tells hirn of Valdaura’s adultery and demands that he ki}} Albovine, or be denounced as a rapist. Hermegild sees to it that Valdaura eavesdrops on the meeting, arouses her jealousy, and gives her a slow-acting poison with which to kill her husband; his plan is to ensure that Paradine kills Albovine before the poison takes effect. Yaidaura pretends to adetintster the poison and goads Paradine into killing her; but she dies affirming that the pyisoning was only a bluff. At Hermiegild’s instigation. Paradine |is mt to believe that Albovine 1626 knows of his night with Rhodolinda, cuckolded him with Valdaura, and is trying to have him killed. He goes to assassinate Albovine, but decides at the last moment that they should talk things over first. It emerges that Albovine did not know of Rhodolinda’s adultery and did not succeed in seducing Valdaura. In despair, he asks Paradine to kill him, and falls on his own sword when Paradine refuses. Rhodolinda tries to kiss Paradine, but he bites her lips off, then kills both her and Hermegild. The Governor of Verona orders that he be kept alive to explain what has happened. In the sub-plot, the war veteran Grimold makes prolonged efforts to shame Albovine into paying his extensive arrears of wages, and is ultimately successful.