Rose

The discovery of the remains of the Rose playhouse in 1989 was of outstanding significance in three ways:
(i) It provided the first tangible, irrefutable evidence ever seen of the physical form of a sixteenth century, open-roofed London playhouse. Two hundred years of scholarly speculation and theorisation had to be re-examined in the light of the hard facts revealed in 1989.
(ii) It marked a new sensitivity on the part of archaeologists who, only a few years earlier, might have gone straight through such ‘modern’ foundations to reach Saxon and Roman levels. Archaeologists now tend to examine the whole history of a site (their investigation in 1990 of an 1850s Lambeth music hall was another ‘first’).
(iii) It ignited the interest of the general public as well as theatre historians and theatre professions to a degree that made the preservation of the remains a matter of not less than national concern. The fact that emotion is the most potent single force driving conservation movements was never more dramaticaly demonstrated.

The discovery and its aftermath may be said to have caused many experts to look again at their assumptions and it should certainly have made professional conservators re-examine their guiding philosophies. But, in the end, it is expertise and not emotion that must be harnessed to get things done and the challenges were impressively taken up.

After lengthy public discussion and negotiation with the site owners (the discovery having been inconveniently made in the course of a major redevelopment) the remains were preserved in a special viewing chamber within a new office building. Due to unstable site conditions a temporary covering was laid over the Rose site and conditions below this are constantly monitored by English Heritage. The Rose Theatre Trust, however, hopes to raise sufficient funds to remove the covering, complete the excavation of the site (one third remains untouched) and create a permanent display.

This is not the place to offer a scholarly description, but it may be said that the outline of the theatre, as built in 1587 and as extended in 1592, were revealed and the form of the stage in both phases is also known with some certainty. Important finds made during the excavation are now held at the Museum of London.

The fact that the Rose, uniquely among the Bankside playhouses, enjoys vivid documentation in the Henslowe papers at Dulwich College, makes the interpretation of the remains less conjectural than might otherwise have been the case.