The Lamentable and Tragical History
OF
TITUS ANDRONICUS
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YOU noble minds and famous martial knights,
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That in defence of native country fights,
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Give ear to me, that ten years fought for Rome,
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Yet reap'd disgrace at my returning home.
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In Rome I liv'd in fame full threescore years,
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My name beloved was by all my peers,
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Full five and twenty valiant sons I had,
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Whose forward virtues made their father glad.
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For when Rome's foes their warlike forces felt,
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Against them still my sons and I were sent;
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Against the Goths full ten years weary war,
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We spent receiving many a bloody scar.
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Just two and twenty of my sons were slain,
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Before we did return to Rome again,
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Of five and twenty sons I brought but three
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Alive, the stately towers of Rome to see.
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The Emperor did make the Queen his wife,
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Which bred in Rome debate and deadly strife:
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The Moor with her two sons did grow so proud,
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That none like them in Rome might be allow'd.
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The Moor so pleased this new Empress' eye,
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That she consented to him secretly,
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For to abuse her husband's marriage-bed,
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And in time a Black-a-Moor she bred.
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Then she, whose thoughts to murder was inclin'd,
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Consented with the Moor with bloody mind,
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Against myself, my kin, and all my friends,
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In cruel sort to bring them to their ends.
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When wars were done, I conquest home did bring,
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And did present my prisoners to the king;
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The Queen of Goths, her son, and eke a Moor,
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Who did such murders, like was none before.
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So when in age I thought to live in peace,
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Both care and grief began then to encrease;
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Amongst my sons I had one daughter bright,
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Which joy'd and pleased best my aged sight
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My Lavinia was betrothed then,
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To Caesar's son, a young and noble man;
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Who in a hunting, by the Emperor's wife,
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And her two sons, bereaved was of life.
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He being slain, was cast in cruel wise,
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Into a darksome den from light of skies,
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The cruel Moor did come that way as then,
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With my three sons, who fell into the den.
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The Moor then fetch'd the Emperor with speed,
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For to accuse them of that barbarous deed;
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And when my sons within the den was found,
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In wrongful prison they were cast and bound.
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But now behold, what wounded most my mind,
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The empress's two sons, of tygers kind,
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My daughter ravished without remorse,
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And took away her honour quite, by force.
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When they had tasted of so sweet a flower,
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Fearing this sweet should turn to be a sower,
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They cut her tongue, whereby she could not tell.
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How this dishonour unto her befel.
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Then both her hands they basely cut off quite,
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Whereby their wickedness she could not write,
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Nor with a needle on her sampler sow,
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The bloody workers of her dismal woe.
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My brother Marcus found her in a wood,
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Staining the grassy ground with purple blood,
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That trickled from her stumps and handless arms,
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No tongue at all she had to tell her harms.
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But when I saw her in that woeful case,
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With tears of blood I wet my aged face,
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For my Lavinia I lamented more,
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Than for my two and twenty sons before.
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When as I saw she could not write or speak,
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With grief my aged heart began to break;
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We spread a heap of sand upon the ground,
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Whereby the bloody tyrants out we found.
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For with a staff, without the help of hand,
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She writ these words upon the plat of sand;
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The lustful sons of the proud empress,
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Are doers of this hateful wickedness,
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I tore the milk-white hairs from off my head,
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I curs'd the hour wherein I first was bred;
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I wish'd they had that fought for country's fame,
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In cradle rock'd had first been stricken lame.
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The Moor delighting still in villainy,
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Did say, to set my sons from prison free,
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I should unto the king my right-hand give,
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And then my three imprisoned sons should live.
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The Moor I caus'd to strike it off with speed,
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Whereat I grieved not to see it bleed.
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But for my sons would willingly impart,
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And for their ransom send my bleeding heart.
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But as my life did linger thus in vain,
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They sent to me my bootless hand again,
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And therewithal the heads of my three sons,
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Which fill'd my dying heart with fresher groans.
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Then past relief I up and down did go,
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And with my tears writ in the dust my woe,
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I shot my arrows towards heaven high,
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And for revenge to hell did often cry.
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The Empress thinking then that I was mad,
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Like furies she and both her sons were glad,
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So nam'd Revenge, and Rape, and Murder, they
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To undermine and hear what I would say.
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I fed their foolish veins a little space,
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Until my friends did find a secret place,
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Where both her sons unto a post were bound,
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And just revenge in cruel sort was found.
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I cut their throats, my daughter held the pan
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Betwixt her stumps. wherein the blood it ran,
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And then I ground their bones to powder small,
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And made a paste for pies strait therewithal.
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Then with their flesh I made two mighty pies,
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And at the banquet serv'd in stately wise:
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Before the Empress I sat this loathsome meat,
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So of her sons own flesh she well did eat.
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Myself bereav'd my daughter then of life,
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The Empress too I slew with bloody knife,
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And stabb'd the Emperor immediately,
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And then myself; even so did TITUS die.
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Then this revenge against the Moor was found,
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Alive they set him half into the ground,
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Wherein he stood untill such time he starv'd,
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And so God send all murderers may be serv'd.
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