Come, my masters. The duchess, I tell you, expects performance of your
promises.
Spirits from the deep, I command you to rise and speak.
Come on, spirits. Rise up. Talk to us.
spirits
rise
speak
Bolingbroke, the conjurer, speaks with theatrical authority — elaborate, rhythmic, built for effect. His invocation of night and time is genuinely atmospheric. Watch for how professional his performance is, even as a trap is being set around him.
Master Hume, we are therefore provided. Will her ladyship behold and
hear our exorcisms?
Dark powers, I summon you to reveal what is hidden and speak what is unknown.
Dark powers, come. Tell us the truth.
dark forces
reveal truth
Ay, what else? Fear you not her courage.
Spirits from the deep, I command you to rise and speak.
Come on, spirits. Rise up. Talk to us.
spirits
rise
speak
I have heard her reported to be a woman of an invincible spirit. But it
shall be convenient, Master Hume, that you be by her aloft while we be
busy below; and so, I pray you go, in God’s name, and leave us.
Dark powers, I summon you to reveal what is hidden and speak what is unknown.
Dark powers, come. Tell us the truth.
dark forces
reveal truth
Well said, my masters; and welcome all. To this gear, the sooner the
better.
Tell me, spirits, what does the future hold for Eleanor and Humphrey?
What do the spirits say? What's my future?
tell me
what's coming?
Patience, good lady; wizards know their times.
Deep night, dark night, the silent of the night,
The time of night when Troy was set on fire,
The time when screech-owls cry and ban-dogs howl,
And spirits walk and ghosts break up their graves;
That time best fits the work we have in hand.
Madam, sit you and fear not. Whom we raise
We will make fast within a hallowed verge.
Dark powers, I summon you to reveal what is hidden and speak what is unknown.
Dark powers, come. Tell us the truth.
dark forces
reveal truth
York's aside quoting the Latin oracle given to Pyrrhus — 'Aio te, Aeacida, Romanos vincere posse' — points to the oldest problem with prophecy: the grammar can be reversed. 'You can conquer the Romans' and 'the Romans can conquer you' are identical in Latin word order. Shakespeare knew this tradition well and used it throughout his history plays. The spirit's prophecy about Henry and the duke is exactly this kind of oracle: whether Henry deposes the duke or the duke deposes Henry depends entirely on where you place the emphasis. Eleanor hears hope; a more suspicious reader hears doom. This ambiguity is not a bug in the supernatural machinery — it's the entire point. Prophecy in Shakespeare almost always comes true, but never quite the way the listener expected.
_Adsum_.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
Asnath,
By the eternal God, whose name and power
Thou tremblest at, answer that I shall ask;
For till thou speak thou shalt not pass from hence.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
Ask what thou wilt. That I had said and done!
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
The duke yet lives that Henry shall depose,
But him outlive and die a violent death.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
By water shall he die and take his end.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
Let him shun castles.
Safer shall he be upon the sandy plains
Than where castles mounted stand.
Have done, for more I hardly can endure.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
Descend to darkness and the burning lake!
False fiend, avoid!
Dark powers, I summon you to reveal what is hidden and speak what is unknown.
Dark powers, come. Tell us the truth.
dark forces
reveal truth
Lay hands upon these traitors and their trash.
Beldam, I think we watched you at an inch.
What, madam, are you there? The King and commonweal
Are deeply indebted for this piece of pains.
My Lord Protector will, I doubt it not,
See you well guerdoned for these good deserts.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
The Globe Theatre had trapdoors in the stage floor that allowed actors to appear and disappear — the 'hellmouth' through which spirits could ascend. Thunder effects were achieved by rolling cannonballs backstage or beating drums. The conjuring scene in 1-4 would have deployed all of these: Margery Jourdain prostrate on the stage, a circle drawn in chalk, thunder cracking, and then the Spirit rising through the trap. Eleanor watching from above in the gallery added a visual dimension — a woman looking down on her own doom, literally elevated above the action she's caused. Then the doors burst open and the whole theatrical apparatus collapses into farce. It's one of the most technically complex scenes in the play.
Not half so bad as thine to England’s king,
Injurious duke, that threatest where’s no cause.
Tell me, spirits, what does the future hold for Eleanor and Humphrey?
What do the spirits say? What's my future?
tell me
what's coming?
True, madam, none at all. What call you this?
Away with them! Let them be clapped up close
And kept asunder.—You, madam, shall with us.—
Stafford, take her to thee.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
Lord Buckingham, methinks you watched her well.
A pretty plot, well chosen to build upon!
Now, pray, my lord, let’s see the devil’s writ.
What have we here?
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
The historical Eleanor Cobham was tried for witchcraft, treason, and necromancy in 1441 — all charges directly mirrored in the play. Margery Jourdain (the 'witch of Eye') was burned at Smithfield. Roger Bolingbroke was hanged, drawn, and quartered. Two priests, Thomas Southwell and John Home, were imprisoned; Southwell died in the Tower. Eleanor herself was sentenced to public penance on three consecutive days — walking barefoot in a white sheet through London's streets, carrying a candle — then imprisoned for the rest of her life, first on the Isle of Man, then in Wales. She died in 1452. Shakespeare compresses the timeline and sharpens the irony, but the historical facts are nearly as dramatic as the play.
Your Grace shall give me leave, my Lord of York,
To be the post, in hope of his reward.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
At your pleasure, my good lord.
[Speech in context of witchcraft ritual]
[Modern version]
[Emotional core]
The Reckoning
The scene has the atmosphere of a trap closing, because it is. The prophecies themselves are genuinely oracular — deliberately ambiguous — and York immediately recognizes them as useless to the conspirators while valuable as evidence against Eleanor. What the scene does brilliantly is make the spirit's words land differently depending on who is listening: to Eleanor they are hope; to us they are doom; to York they are a gift. The darkness and thunder effects on the Elizabethan stage would have been visually spectacular — and then immediately collapsed into farce as officers burst in.
If this happened today…
An executive's spouse hires a 'corporate intelligence' firm to do a séance-equivalent: consult a dark-web oracle about what's going to happen to the CEO, the company's chief rival, and the CFO. She pays a fortune for deliberately vague AI-generated predictions. The whole session is being recorded by agents working for the rivals who hired the intelligence firm in the first place. The moment she asks her final question, the door gets kicked in and everyone's arrested. The recordings go straight to the board.