Mary Shakespeare Mary Shakespeare Mary Shakespeare, née Arden, (c. 1537–1608) was the mother of William Shakespeare. She was the daughter of Wilmcote gentleman farmer Robert Arden, a cadet of the Arden family prominent in Warwickshire since before the Norman Conquest. She was the youngest of eight daughters, and when her father died in 1556 she inherited land at Snitterfield and Wilmcote from her father as a dowry. The house was left to her stepmother Agnes Hill. Richard Shakespeare, the father of John Shakespeare, was a tenant farmer on land owned by her father in Snitterfield. As the daughter of Richard's landlord, she
The Maiden with the Rose on her Forehead chest, sewing. Jealous, they burned her all over with a hot iron and told the prince that she was a mulatta they had bought to run errands. When the prince went to the fair, he asked her what she wanted; she asked for a talisman. When he brought it, he was curious and hid to learn what she would do; she poured out her story to the talisman, and the prince burned his wife and mother-in-law as they had burned his niece and turned them out of his home. The Maiden with the Rose on her Forehead The Maiden with