Henry IV

Written no later than 1597, Henry IV, Part I, sometimes written as 1 Henry IV, is the second play in Shakespeare's Henriad, consisting of four history dramas—Richard II, 1 Henry IV, 2 Henry IV and Henry V. Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part I begins with Hotspur's (Harry Percy's) battle at Homildon against Archibald, Earl of Douglas around 1402. The play ends where the next part of the drama picks up, the defeat of the rebels (Hotspur and others against the title King) at Shrewsbury in mid-1403. While critics appreciate the play for its interesting accounts of historic events, many are most fascinated with the relationship between two of the most famous characters in Shakespeare's history canon: Prince Hal and Sir John Falstaff, the fat knight. The characters are often situated around what is known as the Oldcastle controversy, where scholars believe that the comic character Falstaff was first referred to as "Oldcastle" in the play's early performances. Oldcastle would have been a risky choice for Shakespeare, as the fat knight would have been named after John Oldcastle, a famous Protestant martyr with powerful relatives living in England during the time who would probably have reason to be angry at the treatment of their ancestor's name.