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Gold Chain
In act 3, scene 1, we learn that Antipholus of Ephesus has commissioned his friend Angelo to make a gold chain that he plans to give to his wife, Adriana, as a symbol of his love for her. However, when the mix-up between the two Antipholuses results in a comic standoff in which the Ephesian Antipholus is denied entry to his own house, he changes his mind. Instead of giving the chain to his wife, he will give it to a Courtesan. As he asks Angelo to go fetch the chain and deliver it to him, he reflects that the object will now serve as a symbol of spite: “That chain will I bestow— / Be it for nothing but to spite my wife— / Upon mine hostess [at the Porpentine]” (3.1.166–68). Yet the gold chain gets comically misdirected when Angelo delivers it to the wrong Antipholus, turning it into a token of misidentification. At this point, it also becomes a symbol of debt, since when Antipholus of Ephesus refuses to pay Angelo for the chain he never received, he’s sent to debtors’ prison. Only at the play’s end does its original symbolism get restored, when Antipholus of Ephesus recovers it, pays for it, and bestows it upon his wife.
End of Rope
At the top of act 4, and still furious about being locked out of his own house, Antipholus of Ephesus gives his Dromio some money to go “buy a rope’s end” (4.1.16) As he explains, he plans to use the rope to beat every member of his household: “That will I bestow / Among my wife and her confederates / For locking me out of my doors today” (4.1.16–18). In this way, the end of rope he orders stands as a symbol of Antipholus E.’s rage and proneness to violence. However, as with the other objects in the play, the rope end gets caught up in the confusion of the day. Thus, when Dromio of Syracuse shows up shortly after the Ephesian Dromio has departed, he suffers abuse from Antipholus E. for having failed to buy the rope. Then, several scenes later, after Antipholus E. has been arrested for unpaid debt and sent Dromio S. for a purse full of gold to post bail, Dromio E. shows up with the long-awaited rope end. But now Antipholus E. has need of money, not of a rope—and, thinking that his Dromio spent a fortune on such a useless object, he takes the end and uses it to beat his bondsman.
Antipholus of Ephesus’s Money Purse
Like many of the objects that appear in the play, the purse of money that belongs to Antipholus of Ephesus symbolically tracks the confusion that erupts from misidentification. In act 4, Angelo calls for the arrest of Antipholus of Ephesus, who refuses to pay the goldsmith for the chain he commissioned but never received. As he’s bound and dragged off to debtors’ prison, Antipholus E. asks the Syracusan Dromio—whom he mistakes for his own Dromio—to go home and fetch a purse of money from his wife. The money is meant to be used to post Antipholus E.’s bail. However, in the chaos of misidentifications, Dromio S. misdelivers the purse to Antipholus S., who then directs his focus toward finding a ship they can take out of Ephesus. In this way, the bail money transforms into a windfall that can be used to buy passage to the next destination of the Syracusans’ quest. Of course, their plan to skip town gets scuttled, and in the end, when the family is miraculously reunited and all the confusion clears away, Antipholus of Syracuse returns the purse to its rightful owner. Now back in Antipholus of Ephesus’s possession, he offers it to the Duke as payment for Egeon’s ransom. In the end, then, its original purpose as bail money is restored.
