Shakespeare in performance works were plundered for these scenes. Among the drolls taken from Shakespeare were "Bottom the Weaver" (Bottom's scenes from "A Midsummer Night's Dream") and "The Grave-makers" (the gravedigger's scene from "Hamlet"). At the Restoration in 1660, Shakespeare's plays were divided between the two newly licensed companies: the King's Company of Thomas Killigrew and the Duke's Men of William Davenant. The licensing system prevailed for two centuries; from 1660 to 1843, only two main companies regularly presented Shakespeare in London. Davenant, who had known early-Stuart actors such as John Lowin and Joseph Taylor, was the main figure establishing some continuity with
A Midsummer Night's Dream (Mendelssohn) Midsummer Night's Dream" in 1842, 16 years after he wrote the Overture. It was written to a commission from King Frederick William IV of Prussia. Mendelssohn was by then the music director of the King's Academy of the Arts and of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra. A successful presentation of Sophocles' "Antigone" on 28 October 1841 at the New Palace in Potsdam, with music by Mendelssohn (Op. 55) led to the King asking him for more such music, to plays he especially enjoyed. "A Midsummer Night's Dream" was produced on 14 October 1843, also at Potsdam. The producer was Ludwig Tieck.