payment page
Merchant of Syracusa, plead no more.
I am not partial to infringe our laws.
The enmity and discord which of late
Sprung from the rancorous outrage of your duke
To merchants, our well-dealing countrymen,
Who, wanting guilders to redeem their lives,
Have sealed his rigorous statutes with their bloods,
Excludes all pity from our threat’ning looks.
For since the mortal and intestine jars
’Twixt thy seditious countrymen and us,
It hath in solemn synods been decreed,
Both by the Syracusians and ourselves,
To admit no traffic to our adverse towns. (1.1.3–15)
As the play opens, the Duke of Ephesus has taken the old man Egeon captive, and he delivers this speech in which he declares the reason for the arrest. Apparently, a recent event in Syracuse has caused tense relations between that city and Ephesus. The duke of Syracuse seems to have persecuted some Ephesian merchants who had brought their wares to sell in his city. Following this incident, the two cities agreed to ban all travel between them, with the additional stipulation that anyone who’s caught disregarding the ban will be subject to serious punishment. Thus, anyone from Ephesus caught in Syracuse can be arrested and executed, and the same goes for anyone from Syracuse caught in Ephesus. As the Duke of Ephesus indicates from the outset, he is a stickler for rules. For that reason, he insists that there’s no reason for Egeon to continue pleading; he will suffer to the full extent of the law.
Like many of Shakespeare’s comedies, The Comedy of Errors begins with a serious threat that indicates the possibility of a tragic end. In this case, the Duke’s rigorous application of Ephesian law means that Egeon must die. However, as he will soon explain upon hearing the tragic story of how Egeon’s family has been broken apart, there is one way for the merchant to save himself. Egeon’s execution will be deferred until the end of the day. If by sundown he can raise ten thousand marks, then he can ransom his own freedom and leave Ephesus alive. However, if he can’t get sufficient funds together, then he must submit to the executioner. Egeon laments that he knows no one in Ephesus who would be able to help him. But even as he succumbs to despair, the audience sees in the Duke’s provision not just the possibility but the probability of a happy outcome. Egeon departs from the play as the first scene ends, but the threat of his execution will loom over the ensuing action. That said, given the comic chaos that ensues for the next four acts, most audience members will entirely forget about Egeon until he appears at the play’s end.
There’s nothing situate under heaven’s eye
But hath his bound in earth, in sea, in sky.
The beasts, the fishes, and the wingèd fowls
Are their males’ subjects and at their controls.
Man, more divine, the master of all these,
Lord of the wide world and wild wat’ry seas,
Endued with intellectual sense and souls,
Of more preeminence than fish and fowls,
Are masters to their females, and their lords.
Then let your will attend on their accords. (2.1.16–25)
As act 2 opens, Adriana is fuming that her husband, Antipholus of Ephesus, is late for the midday meal. She laments that men enjoy so much liberty, while women have to stay at home. Responding to this complaint, her sister Luciana declares that it’s just the proper way of things for men to enjoy more liberties than women, and she encourages her sister to work on being more subservient. Adriana finds such a suggestion offensive, and when Luciana tells her that Antipholus should be “the bridle of [her] will,” Adriana replies tartly: “There’s none but asses will be bridled so” (2.1.13–14). To this, Luciana responds in turn with the lines quoted here. In a series of starry-eyed couplets that reflect her naïveté as an unmarried woman, she explains why it is that men rightfully have authority over women. Luciana begins by asserting that it’s natural for there to be a limit to freedom. All creatures have their “bound,” she says, “in earth, in sea, in sky.” She then claims that the males of all animal species enjoy authority, and the case is the same with humans. The only difference is that “man” is “more divine” than other creatures and hence is rightfully “the master of all”—women included.
In making this argument about the righteousness of male authority over women, Luciana is drawing on biblical precedent. Specifically, her words echo those of Paul the Apostle, who is attributed with having written the Epistle to the Ephesians in the New Testament of the Bible. In that book, Paul emphasizes the general importance of domestic authority, such that wives should obey their husbands, servants should obey their masters, and children should obey their parents. With particular regard to wives, he makes the following provision: “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church” (Ephesians 5:22–23). It’s worth noting that Luciana’s logic echoes that expressed in these lines. Paul compares the hierarchical relationship between a man and his wife to that between God and a believer. He then makes a similar comparison to the hierarchy between Christ and the Church. Luciana likewise implies that because males of every species have authority over their females, and because humans are the supreme species on earth, then it’s all the more righteous that they should command authority over women.
I am an ass, indeed; you may prove it by my long ears.—I have served him from the hour of my nativity to this instant, and have nothing at his hands for my service by blows. When I am cold, he heats me with beating; when I am warm, he cools me with beating. I am waked with it when I sleep, raised with it when I sit, driven out of doors with it when I go from home, welcomed home with it when I return. Nay, I bear it on my shoulders as a beggar wont her brat, and I think when he hath lamed me, I shall beg with it from door to door. (4.4.32–43)
Compared to the relationship Antipholus of Syracuse has with his Dromio, the relationship between their Ephesian counterparts is considerably more violent. Dromio of Ephesus frequently complains of the harsh treatment dished out by his master as well as his wife. In act 4, having reached the end of his rope, Dromio E. confronts his master about his extreme cruelty. Antipholus E. replies that violence is the only thing to which his bondsman will respond: “Thou art sensible in nothing but blows, and so is an ass” (4.4.30–31). It is in answer to this charge that Dromio E. speaks the words quoted here. He assents to his master’s characterization of him as an ass. However, this assent is clearly meant ironically, since Dromio E. is effectively made into an ass when his master beats him. The bitter tone he adopts in these lines emphasizes his sense of injustice at being treated so harshly by a man he has served “from the hour of my nativity to this instant.” We might think that such extended service should have forged a relationship closer to brotherhood than bondage. However, the only thanks Dromio has gotten for his service is “blows.”
Significantly, the association between Dromio and an ass may be read as an allusion to the biblical story of Balaam’s ass, recounted in Numbers 22:21–34. That story tells of how a diviner named Balaam was riding along on his ass one day, on his way to curse the Israelites. The animal suddenly stopped, seemingly frightened, and when Balaam compelled her to keep moving, she resisted. What Balaam couldn’t see, however, was that the ass had stopped because her way had been barred by an angel. The angel wielded a terrible sword, and the ass, alarmed, sought to escape. After Balaam had beaten the ass three times, the angel endowed the animal with the power of speech. Addressing her rider, she asked, “What have I done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me these three times?” (Numbers 22:28). When Balaam insisted that the ass had mocked him, the animal asked: “Am I not thine ass, upon which thou hast ridden ever since I was thine unto this day?” (Numbers 22:30). The angel then revealed himself to Balaam, who, now chastened, repented his sin of violence. Dromio reenacts this biblical scene with his master, though it’s notable that Antipholus isn’t similarly chastened.
Not know my voice! O time’s extremity,
Hast thou so cracked and splitted my poor tongue
In seven short years that here my only son
Knows not my feeble key of untuned cares?
Though now this grainèd face of mine be hid
In sap-consuming winter’s drizzled snow,
And all the conduits of my blood froze up,
Yet hath my night of life some memory,
My wasting lamps some fading glimmer left,
My dull deaf ears a little use to hear.
All these old witnesses—I cannot err—
Tell me thou art my son Antipholus. (5.1.318–29)
About halfway through act 5, the Duke of Ephesus appears with Egeon in tow. They are heading to the execution grounds where the Syracusan merchant is scheduled to die at sundown. The last time we saw Egeon was in the play’s opening scene, where the Duke first arrested him and sentenced him to death. For many in the audience, the comic chaos of the intervening action has all but wiped Egeon from memory—that is, until he reappears in this final scene. Of course, at this point in the play, we recall Egeon’s story and, knowing that the two Antipholuses are his long-lost sons, we anticipate the reunion to come and, by extension, his freedom from bondage. Egeon initiates the reunion when, standing on the sidelines, he thinks he recognizes the son who left him seven years prior on a quest to find his missing mother and brother. As it turns out, he’s recognized the wrong son. Thus, when he addresses Antipholus of Ephesus, the younger man genuinely doesn’t recognize the older man’s voice. The lack of mutual recognition pains Egeon, who responds with the speech quoted here.
Egeon’s speech begins with a lament about his old age. Using the poetic technique known as apostrophe, he addresses the abstract notion of time, marveling that “time’s extremity” could have caused him to change so drastically in seven years that his own son wouldn’t recognize him. He notes that his voice has grown feeble and cracked, and that his rough and leathery face has sprouted a white beard. But these changes notwithstanding, Egeon goes on to assert that even if he’s aged beyond recognition, he, at least, can still recognize his own son. He speech therefore ends with a renewed insistence that the man he’s addressing “art my son Antipholus.” And so it is! Thus marks the beginning of family reunion that concludes the play. Shortly after this speech, Antipholus of Syracuse enters the scene, and the “comedy of errors” comes to an end. The Antipholuses recognize each other as well as their father, and, even more miraculously, Emilia the Abbess recognizes Egeon as her long-lost husband. Finally, the joyful atmosphere inspires the Duke to free Egeon while foregoing his ransom—an act that symbolically affirms the significance of familial belonging.
DROMIO OF EPHESUS Methinks you are my glass, and not my brother.
I see by you I am a sweet-faced youth.
Will you walk in to see their gossiping?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE Not I, sir. You are my elder.
DROMIO OF EPHESUS That’s a question. How shall we try it?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE We’ll draw cuts for the signior.
Till then, lead thou first.
DROMIO OF EPHESUS Nay, then, thus:
We came into the world like brother and brother,
And now let’s go hand in hand, not one before another. (5.1.430–40)
In the long scene that makes up act 5, all the confusion of the day’s many misidentifications gets cleared up. This same scene also stages the miraculous reunion between Egeon, his wife, and their twin sons. As the play arrives at its final moments, the audience may note how odd it is that neither Antipholus seems particularly excited about seeing the other. It’s especially surprising that Antipholus of Syracuse doesn’t celebrate the family reunion, given that he has been on a seven-year quest to find his missing brother and mother. Moreover, at the beginning of the play he seemed existentially lost and depressed by the fruitlessness of his search. Why, then, doesn’t he make a point of commemorating the successful end to his quest? The answer isn’t clear, but one possibility may lie in the fact that Shakespeare gives the all-important final lines not to the Antipholuses, but to the Dromios, whose closing exchange is quoted here.
The twin Dromios have been separated from each other for as long as the two Antipholuses whom they have served their entire lives. As we have seen throughout the play, despite being servants, the Dromios are both cheerful fellows whose presence has consistently ensured that otherwise frustrating events resolve merrily. Whereas the Antipholuses are both prone to agitation and violence, the Dromios turn every misfortune into an opportunity for a joke. Though this fact occasionally riles their masters even more, it’s the servants who are the comic engine of the play. As such, they are the ones who symbolically guarantee the comic ending promised by the play’s title. To honor this function, Shakespeare devotes the final moments to the Dromios’ mutual recognition and reunion. In contrast to the Antipholuses, who never formally embrace as brothers, the play’s moving final couplet finds the Dromios joining hands and marking the start of a new life together.
