INDEX: Why Claudius, not Feng? What's in a name?
Why did Shakespeare (or some unknown predecessor or collaborator) name Hamlet’s uncle Claudius (a Roman name! un-Danish!) and make him a Christian—but unrepentant—sinner? In Saxo Grammaticus’ history (1208? Latin trans.1514), it's uncle Feng; In Belleforest’s 1572 French translation, Fengon. A Feng by any other name would smell as sweet? [THE INDEX WILL APPEAR BELOW, RIGHT ABOVE "NOTES," AS NEW INSTALLMENTS IN THE SERIES ARE POSTED...] On Shakespeare’s name-choices, Rhodri Lewis jokingly noted, “I don’t know, maybe he liked the sound?” [1] What We Talk About When We Talk About Claudius: Shakespeare’s Claudius [2] points to Rome by way of - two emperors, Claudius I and II, but also to - two characters named Claudius in Chaucer’s “The Physician’s Tale,” and to - a villain named “Claudas” in the Arthurian legends. Rome’s origin story has Romulus kill twin brother Remus, like Cain-Abel (or Claudius-King Hamlet). And Rome urged Spain to use its Armada to invade England in