The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Preface
• Publisher's Notice
• Introduction
• Tamburlaine the Great. In Two Parts.
• Tamburlaine the Great, Part Tbe First.
• The Prologue.
• Persons Represented. 1
• Tamburlaine the Great. Part the First.: Act the First.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Act the Second.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene III.
• Scene IV.
• Scene V.
• Scene VI.
• Scene VII.
• Act the Third.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene III.
• Act the Fourth.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene III.
• Scene IV.
• Act the Fifth.
• Scene I.
• Tamburlaine the Great. Part the Second
• Prologue.
• Persons Represented.
• Tamburlaine the Great. Part the Second: Act the First.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene II.
• Act the Second.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene III.
• Scene IV.
• Act the Third.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene III.
• Scene IV.
• Scene V.
• Act the Fourth.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene III.
• Scene IV.
• Act the Fifth.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene III.
• The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus.
• Persons Represented.
• The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus.
• Scene I.
• Scene II.
• Scene III.
• Scene IV.
• Scene V.
• Scene VI. 1
• Scene VII.
• Scene VIII.
• Scene IX.
• Scene X.
• Scene XI.
• Scene XII.
• Scene XIII.
• Scene XIV.
• Scene XV.
• Scene XVI.
• Appendix to Dr. Faustus.
• Ballad of Faustus.

SCENE II.

EnterTamburlaine, Techelles, Theridamas, Usum-casane, Zekocrate, Anippe, two Moors drawingBajazethin a cage, and his Wife following him.

Tamb.

• Bring out my footstool.
• [BAJAZETH is taken out of the cage.

Baj.

• Ye holy priests of heavenly Mahomet,
• That, sacrificing, slice and cut your flesh,
• Staining his altars with your purple blood;
• Make Heaven to frown and every fixèd star
• To suck up poison from the moorish fens,
• And pour it1 in this glorious2 tyrant's throat!

Tamb.

• The chiefest god, first mover of that sphere,
• Enchased with thousands ever-shining lamps,
• Will sooner burn the glorious frame of Heaven,

  10

• Than it should3 so conspire my overthrow.
• But, villain! thou that wishest this to me,
• Fall prostrate on the low disdainful earth,
• And be the footstool of great Tamburlaine,
• That I may rise into my royal throne.

Baj.

• First shall thou rip my bowels with thy sword,
• And sacrifice my soul to death and hell,
• Before I yield to such a slavery.

Tamb.

• Base villain, vassal, slave to Tamburlaine!
• Unworthy to embrace or touch the ground,

  20

• That bears the honour of my royal weight;
• Stoop, villain, stoop! — Stoop! for so he bids
• That may command thee piecemeal to be torn,
• Or scattered like the lofty cedar trees
• Struck with the voice of thundering Jupiter.

Baj.

• Then, as I look down to the damnèed fiends,
• Fiends look on me! and thou, dread god of hell,
• With ebon sceptre strike this hateful earth,
• And make it swallow both of us at once!
• [TAMBURLAINE gets up on him to his chair.

Tamb.

• Now clear the triple region of the air,

  30

• And let the Majesty of Heaven behold
• Their scourge and terror tread on emperors.
• Smile stars, that reigned at my nativity,
• And dim the brightness of your1 neighbour lamps!
• Disdain to borrow light of Cynthia!
• For I, the chiefest lamp of all the earth,
• First rising in the East with mild aspèct,
• But fixèd now in the Meridian line,
• Will send up fire to your turning spheres,
• And cause the sun to borrow light of you.

  40

• My sword struck fire from his coat of steel,
• Even in Bithynia, when I took this Turk;
• As when a fiery exhalation,
• Wrapt in the bowels of a freezing cloud
• Fighting for passage, make[s] the welkin crack,
• And casts a flash of lightning to the earth:
• But ere I march to wealthy Persia,
• Or leave Damascus and the Egyptian fields,
• As was the fame of Clymene's brain-sick son,
• That almost brent the axle-tree of heaven,

  50

• So shall our swords, our lances, and our shot
• Fill all the air with fiery meteors:
• Then when the sky shall wax as red as blood
• It shall be said I made it red myself,
• To make me think of nought but blood and war.

Zab.

• Unworthy king, that by thy cruelty
• Unlawfully usurp'st the Persian seat,
• Dar'st thou that never saw an emperor,
• Before thou met my husband in the field,
• Being thy captive, thus abuse his state,

  60

• Keeping his kingly body in a cage,
• That roofs of gold and sun-bright palaces
• Should have prepared to entertain his grace?
• And treading him beneath thy loathsome feet,
• Whose feet the kings of Africa have kissed.

Tech.

• You must devise some torment worse, my lord,
• To make these captives rein their lavish tongues.

Tamb.

• Zenocrate, look better to your slave.

Zeno.

• She is my handmaid's slave, and she shall look
• That these abuses flow not from1 her tongue:

  70

• Chide her, Anippe.

Anip.

• Let these be warnings for you then, my slave,
• How you abuse the person of the king;
• Or else I swear to have you whipt, stark-naked.

Baj.

• Great Tamburlaine, great in my overthrow,
• Ambitious pride shall make thee fall as low,
• For treading on the back of Bajazeth,
• That should be horsèd on four mighty kings.

Tamb.

• Thy names, and titles, and thy dignities
• Are fled from Bajazeth and remain with me,

  80

• That will maintain it 'gainst a world of kings.
• Put him in again.
• [They put him into the cage.

Baj.

• Is this a place for mighty Bajazeth?
• Confusion light on him that helps thee thus!

Tamb.

• There, whiles he lives, shall Bajazeth be kept;
• And, where I go, be thus in triumph drawn;
• And thou, his wife, shalt2 feed him with the scraps
• My servitors shall bring thee from my board;
• For he that gives him other food than this,
• Shall sit by him and starve to death himself;

  90

• This is my mind and I will have it so.
• Not all the kings and emperors of the earth,
• If they would lay their crowns before my feet,
• Shall ransom him, or take him from his cage.
• The ages that shall talk of Tamburlaine,
• Even from this day to Plato's wondrous year,1
• Shall talk how I have handled Bajazeth;
• These Moors, that drew him from Bithynia,
• To fair Damascus, where we now remain,
• Shall lead him with us wheresoe'er we go.

  100

• Techelles, and my loving followers,
• Now may we see Damascus' lofty towers,
• Like to the shadows of Pyramides,
• That with their beauties grace2 the Memphian fields:
• The golden stature3 of their feathered bird
• That spreads her wings upon the city's walls
• Shall not defend it from our battering shot:
• The townsmen mask in silk and cloth of gold,
• And every house is as a treasury:
• The men, the treasure, and the town is ours.

  110

Ther.

• Your tents of white now pitched before the gates,
• And gentle flags of amity displayed,
• I doubt not but the governor will yield,
• Offering Damascus to your majesty.

Tamb.

• So shall he have his life and all the rest:
• But if he stay until the bloody flag
• Be once advanced on my vermilion tent,
• He dies, and those that kept us out so long.
• And when they see us march in black array,
• With mournful streamers hanging down their heads,

  120

• Were in that city all the world contained,
• Not one should 'scape, but perish by our swords.

Zeno.

• Yet would you have some pity for my sake,
• Because it is my country, and my father's.

Tamb.

• Not for the world, Zenocrate; I've sworn.
• Come; bring in the Turk.
• [Exeunt.

[1]So 4to. — Omitted in 8vo.

[2]Boastful

[3]So 410. — 8vo. “should it.”

[1]Old copies “their.”

[1]So 4to. — 8vo, “in.”

[2]So 4to. — 8vo. “shal.”

[1]See Plato's Timacvs, p. 39.

[2]Old copies, “grac'd.”

[3]The word “statue” is often written “stature.” See Nares' Glossary