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Globe Theatre Fire: How "Henry VIII" Burned It Down
- What: A performance of Shakespeare’s Henry VIII at the Globe Theatre ended in a fire when a stage cannon ignited the thatched roof.
- Where: The Globe Theatre in London, England.
- When: 1613, during the early modern period.
In London in 1613, a performance of Shakespeare’s Henry VIII ended with the Globe Theatre on fire. The cause was not a riot, a lightning strike, or sabotage. It was a stage cannon used for a theatrical effect.
How the Globe Theatre Fire Started
During the play, the company fired the cannon to mark a ceremonial moment. Wadding from the shot, or possibly sparks from the blast, reached the Globe’s thatched roof. The roof caught fire. The blaze spread quickly through the open-air wooden playhouse, and the building was soon lost.
The destruction was dramatic, but the known facts are fairly plain. Contemporary accounts agree that the fire began during Henry VIII and that the cannon effect triggered it. One letter written soon after the event described how the blaze moved from the roof through the structure with alarming speed. The Globe, built largely of timber and topped in part with thatch, was especially vulnerable once fire took hold.
Stage Cannons and Renaissance Theater
What makes the incident striking is how ordinary the cause was within the world of Renaissance theater. Companies relied on practical effects to create spectacle: sound, smoke, costumes, trapdoors, machinery, and, in this case, gunpowder. The same appetite for vivid performance that drew crowds also carried real physical risk. The Globe fire was not just an accident at a Shakespeare play. It was a clear example of how early modern entertainment depended on effects that were impressive, but not especially forgiving.
There is at least one often-repeated detail from the aftermath: according to a contemporary report, a man whose breeches caught fire put them out with a bottle of ale. That anecdote appears in a near-contemporary source, but the central fact does not depend on it. The theater burned, and the company lost its playhouse.
The Globe Rebuilt in 1614
The story did not end there. The Globe was rebuilt the next year, in 1614, on the same site. But the original 1613 fire remains one of the clearest, most concrete collisions between Shakespeare’s stagecraft and physical reality: during Henry VIII at the Globe in London, a live cannon effect ignited the thatch roof and burned the theater to the ground.
Did You Know?
The Globe was rebuilt on the same site in 1614.
