How to read this Shakespeare family tree
Read the Shakespeare family tree from the top down, one generation to a row, with the years of each marriage on the line between the couple. The dates come from the register of Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon, which records baptisms and burials. William was baptised on 26 April 1564, and his birthday of 23 April is a tradition.6
A portrait is a likeness
Three people on the Shakespeare family tree have a likeness in the public domain.
A silhouette has none
No likeness is known for the other twenty-two.
A double frame is the centre
William is the centre of the chart.
A line down is a child
Hamnet and Judith hang from one point, as twins.
John Shakespeare and Mary Arden
The Shakespeare family tree starts with two farmers. Richard Shakespeare of Snitterfield was dead by 1561. Robert Arden farmed his own land at Wilmcote and died in 1556, and his daughter Mary Arden was born in about 1537.5
John Shakespeare worked in Stratford as a glover and rose through the town offices to alderman in 1565 and high bailiff, the office equal to mayor, in 1568. No record of his wedding survives, and it is placed in about 1557 from the first baptism in 1558.5
From the late 1570s John was in debt and mortgaged Mary’s inherited land. A grant of arms came in 1596, probably at William’s request. John was buried on 8 September 1601 and Mary in 1608.51
William and his seven brothers and sisters
John and Mary had eight children, the widest row of the Shakespeare family tree, and William was the third and the eldest son. Joan died in infancy, Margaret at four months and Anne at seven in 1579.51
Three brothers grew up. Gilbert died in 1612 and Richard in 1613. Edmund, the youngest, became an actor in London and was buried at Southwark in 1607, aged 27.15
The second Joan was the only sister to grow up and the only one of the eight to outlive William. She married William Hart, and her descendants are living today.1
William and Anne Hathaway
Anne Hathaway came from Shottery.1 Her father Richard Hathaway died in 1581 and left her ten marks, to be paid on her wedding day. His will names her Agnes.7
They married in November 1582, when William was 18 and Anne about 26. The licence issued at Worcester names the bride Anne Whateley, which Stanley Wells and most scholars read as a clerk’s error.7 Her gravestone gives her age at death as 67, so she was born in 1555 or 1556.7
William ShakespeareEngraved by Martin Droeshout for the First Folio, 1623.
Susanna, Hamnet and Judith
Susanna was baptised on 26 May 1583, and the twins Hamnet and Judith on 2 February 1585.89 Few records survive from 1585 to 1592, the lost years before William is found in London.6
Hamnet was buried on 11 August 1596, aged eleven, and no record gives the cause.7 He was the only son, so the name could not pass down. The Hamlet family tree draws the family of the play whose title is so close to his name.
The next year William bought New Place, a large house in Stratford.6 Anne was probably based in Stratford while he worked in London.7
The marriages of Susanna and Judith
Susanna married John Hall, a Stratford physician, on 5 June 1607, and their only child, Elizabeth, was baptised in February 1608.8 In 1613 the Halls won a suit for slander against John Lane.82
Judith married Thomas Quiney, a vintner, on 10 February 1616, and within weeks Quiney confessed to fathering a child with Margaret Wheeler.9 William changed his will on 25 March. He left most of the estate, New Place included, to Susanna, gave Judith money on terms that kept it from her husband, and left Anne the second best bed.97
He died on 23 April 1616 and was buried in Holy Trinity two days later.6 Judith’s three sons all died young. Shakespeare Quiney lived six months, and Richard and Thomas died unmarried early in 1639.9
Elizabeth Hall and the end of the direct line
After 1639 the Shakespeare family tree rested on Elizabeth Hall and her aunt Judith. Elizabeth married Thomas Nash on 22 April 1626, and after his death in 1647 she inherited New Place.83
On 5 June 1649, weeks before Susanna died, she married John Barnard of Abington, near Northampton, who was knighted in 1661.10 Judith died in 1662, at 77, and Elizabeth became the last descendant of William. She had no children by either husband and died on 17 February 1670.109
With her death the direct line of William Shakespeare came to an end, and the Henley Street houses passed to the Harts.3
How this Shakespeare family tree was drawn
The Birthplace Trust publishes a printable Shakespeare family tree for schools.4 This chart adds each baptism and burial, the husbands of the daughters and granddaughter, and a source for every person, and it opens in the editor. The spouses of his brothers and sisters are named in notes only.
The guide to genograms for family history shows how to draw a family from a parish register, with a source beside each date.
Questions about the Shakespeare family tree
Whether Shakespeare has living descendants
He has none in the direct line, which ended with his granddaughter Elizabeth Hall in 1670. His sister Joan Hart has living descendants.31
How many children Shakespeare had
Three, Susanna and the twins Hamnet and Judith, and only Hamnet died young.6
How to use the Shakespeare family tree in a class
The PNG and the PDF carry the portrait credits and the list of sources. A free account opens the chart in the editor.
People and sources
A page of its own lists all 25 people on the chart, each with a short note and the sources for it, and the ten numbered sources this article cites. It also gives the credits of the portraits and this page as a reference in the APA, MLA, Chicago and Harvard styles, ready to copy.