Shakespeare’s Lost Playhouse

Now under a supermarket

“Shakespeare and His Contemporaries,” 1851, by John Faed. Where exactly was the theater in which Shakespeare’s plays first appeared? Public Domain

With its round amphitheater, The Globe is the most famous playhouse associated with William Shakespeare. But long before Shakespeare or his plays appeared at the Globe, another forgotten stage was the Bard’s temporary home.

It is even possible that the first purpose-built stage to house Shakespeare was at a playhouse that stood a mile south of the London Thames at the Newington Butts juncture. Rather than round, the playhouse would have been relatively small and rectangular—a conversion of an existing commercial building.