John Heminges (sometimes spelled Hemminge or Hemings) (c. 1556 - 1630) was an English Renaissance actor. Most famous now as one of the editors of Shakespeare's 1623 First Folio, Heminges served in his time as an actor and financial manager for the King's Men.
Heminges was born in Droitwich Spa, Worcestershire in 1556. Sent to London as an apprentice at age twelve, he was presented to the Grocers' Company, becoming a freeman in 1587. In London, he...
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John Heminges (sometimes spelled Hemminge or Hemings) (c. 1556 - 1630) was an English Renaissance actor. Most famous now as one of the editors of Shakespeare's 1623 First Folio, Heminges served in his time as an actor and financial manager for the King's Men.
Heminges was born in Droitwich Spa, Worcestershire in 1556. Sent to London as an apprentice at age twelve, he was presented to the Grocers' Company, becoming a freeman in 1587. In London, he lived in the parish of St Mary Aldermanbury, at which church he served as a sidesman. He married in 1588; Alexander Chalmers originated the now-accepted argument that his wife was the widow of William Knel, an actor with the Queen's Men who had been killed in a fight with a fellow actor. His association with theatre had certainly begun by 1593; records from that year show Heminges and Augustine Phillips, another future King's Man, in the touring company of Lord Strange's Men. By the next year he and Phillips had joined the Lord Chamberlain's...
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