Early Modern Drama · Character Archetypes

BAPTISTA

in The Wonder of A Kingdom — Dekker, Thomas

Metadata

PlayThe Wonder of A Kingdom
AuthorDekker, Thomas
Year (catalogued)1636
First performance1631
Decade1630s
GenreComedy
Play typeAdult Professional
CompanyPrince Charles's Men (first) (?)
Speech prefix(es)Bap. | Bapt.
Words379
Characters1992
Typicality0.22 (cosine to cluster centroid)
TCP idA20093
BritDrama no.2017
ClusterCluster 20 — Conjurers, witches & physicians

Important excerpts

No keyword-matching excerpt could be extracted (the cluster label doesn't share vocabulary with this character's speech).

Full speech

At whose life shoot you? Sir, you do exercise your violence; Upon a man, stabbed to the heart with wounds; You see him sinking, and you set your foot Upon his head, to kill him with two death's; Trample not thus on a poor banished man. Lower thou canst not fallen. Then never play the Lover; Death! for a woman, I'de be fleade alive, Could I but find one constant: i'st such a matter For you then to put on a Doctors-gown, And his flat velvet-Cap, and speak the gibbering Of and Apothecary. And dying for her, You venture bravely, all women over you grave will pray that they so kind a man may have, As to die for'em; say your banishment Had born you hence, what hells of discontent, Had racked your soul for her as hers for you? Should you but faint, well might you seem untrue, Where this attempt your loyalty shall approve, Who ventures farthest wins a Ladies-love. Friend I protest, So rarely counterfeit, as if a painter Should draw a Doctor: were I sick my self, And met you with and urinal in my hand, I'de cast it at your head, unless you cast The water for me, come, all's passing well; Love which makes pale the cheeks, gives you complexion, Fit for a sallow Frenchman. For a Doctours-man, You see I'm fitted, foot by foot I'll walk, and meet all dangers sent against your breast. I have herd the thunder aimed at your life. Now that you see his vengeance apt to fallen, Fly from it. By fair, and free access, Open your dangers to your Mistress eyes, Where she stark mad, so she be mad for love, You'll bring her to her wits, if wisely now You put her intoth' way; Gold bared with locks, Is best being stolen; steal her then. For one friend to keep door for another, is the office now amongst gallants, common as the Law; I'll be your por ter Sir. Madam you'll spoil, Unless you join with us in the safe plot Of our escape. At the Court gate, I see a Iebbit already, to hang's both; Death! the Duke beats at the door. For one Baptista. Fair, with a prosperous gale. How, to be safe?

Plot summary

Plot — The Wonder of A Kingdom
The Duke of Florence has betrothed his daughter, Fiametta, to the Prince of Pisa, and, to facilitate the political marriage, banished her lover, Angelo. Fiametta sickens for her absent love, and he returns to court disguised as a French doctor, offering the Duke his services to save her life. He diagnoses sexual frustration, and proposes a cure which requires the patient to drink a potion made from the beloved’s powdered heart: she will then hate him. In order to obtain the key ingredient, Angelo must be murdered. Angelo reveals his presence to Fiametta, but she insists on identifying him to her father, in the expectation that the Duke will relent. Angelo passes this off as an insane delusion, then flees to sanctuary. He is found and brought to court with a friar. He seems to reject Fiametta, and she agrees to marry Pisa the following day, but asks for the friar to hear her confession overnight. In fact, he secretly marries her to Angelo, pre-empting Pisa; the Duke and Prince are annoyed, but recognize there is nothing to be done about it. In the sub-plot, Lord Vanni has amorous inclinations younger than his physical age, and sends a love-letter and jewel to the chaste Alphonsina Neri. Meanwhile, Alphonsina’s brother Tibaldo has fallen sick for love of Vanni’s wife Dariene. He asks Alphonsina to accept Vanni’s advances, and Vanni duly excuses himself from Dariene’s bed. Tibaldo has arranged for himself to be present disguised as Alphonsina’s sister, and offers himself as an alternative, ‘female’ bedfellow for Dariene. His plan is aborted when he learns that Vanni’s daughter Alisandra loves Trebatio and Trebatio’s son. When Vanni pays his nocturnal visit, he is scared off by Trebatio’s lute-playing, then caught by his wife and blamed for the adultery he never committed. Alphonsina and Tibaldo marry Trebatio and Alisandra. In the third plot, the hospitable Jacomo has built a house in which to entertain his guests: his uncle, who is suspected of getting rich through supernatural agency, gave him a deathbed injunction to spend his inheritance virtuously. Torrenti envies Jacomo his new house, and plans a magnificent lifestyle of his own; but whereas Jacomo entertains the poor and needy, Torrenti is only interested in luxury and guests of a high social standing. When his brother arrives, ragged and dirty after escaping from slavery in a Turkish galley, Torrenti is appalled and turns him away. He entertains the Duke with a lavishness that bankrupts him. War…