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Master of the Revels was an office within the British royal household that originally had minor responsibilities for overseeing royal festivities. Over time, however, the office grew in power to become responsible for stage censorship.The history of the Revels Office has an interesting place in that of the English stage. Among the expenses of the royal Wardrobe we find provision made for tunicae and viseres ( shirts and hats) in 1347 for the Christmas ludi ( plays) of Edward III; during the reign of King Henry VII, payments are also recorded for various forms of court revels; and it became regular, apparently, to appoint a special functionary, called Master of the Revels, to superintend the royal festivities, quite distinct from the Lord of Misrule.
In Henry VII's time he seems to have been a minor official of the household. In Henry VIII's court, however, the post became more important, and an officer of the Wardrobe was permanently employed to act under the Master of the Revels. With the patent given to John Farlyon in 1534 as Yeoman of the Revels , what may be considered as an independent office of the Revels (within the general sphere of the Lord Chamberlain) came into being; and in 1544Events April 11 Battle of Ceresole French forces under the Comte d'Enghien defeat Imperial forces under the Marques Del Vasto near Turin. May Emperor Charles V again invades eastern France June 19 August 18 Imperial siege of St. Dizier in eastern France J Sir Thomas Cawarden received a patent as Master of the Revels, he being the first to become head of an independent office. Soon after his appointment, the office and its stores were transferred to a dissolved DominicanThe Dominican Order (its formal name, the Order of Preachers is less common in English; a member is referred as a blackfriar founded by Saint Dominic in the early 13th century, is one of the great orders of mendicant friars that revolutionized religious l monasteryA monastery is the habitation of monks. Originally: a hermit's cell. Christian monasteries are also called abbey, priory, charterhouse, friary, and preceptory The habitation of nuns is also called a convent. The communal life of a monastery is called ceno at Blackfriars, having previously been housed at Warwick Inn in the city, the London CharterhouseThe London Charterhouse was set up as a Carthusian monastery in 1371 by Walter de Manny, in Smithfield to the north west of the City of London. It was set up near a 1348 plague pit where many victims of the Black Death were buried. The twenty-five monks e, and then at the prioryA priory is a monastery governed by a prior or prioress. An alien priory is a priory which is dependent on a foreign mother house, and an alien priory cell was a residence of two or three monks dependent on a foreign mother house but sent to exploit a dis of St. John of Jerusalem in ClerkenwellClerkenwell (pronounced "clarkenwell") is a place in London, England in the southermost part of the London Borough of Islington. Clerkenwell has a long history. It took its name from the Clerk's Well in Farringdon Lane. In the Middle Ages, the London Pari, to which a return was made after Cawarden's death.
Sir Thomas Benger succeeded Cawarden, and Edmund Tylney followed him ( 1579Events January 6 The Union of Atrecht united the southern Netherlands under the Duke of Parma, governor in the name of king Philip II of Spain. January 23 The Union of Utrecht united the northern Netherlands in a confederation called the United Provinces.- 1610); it was the appointment of the latter's nephew, Sir George Buck, as deputy-master, with the reversion to the mastership, which led to so much repining on the part of the dramatist, John Lyly, who was himself a candidate. Under Tylney, the functions of Master of the Revels gradually became extended to a general censorship of the stage, which in 1624 was put directly in the hands of the Lord Chamberlain, thus leading to the licensing act of 1737.
