This illuminating work sets out to show that Julius Caesar was the first play performed at the new Globe Theatre on June 12, 1599. Drawing on many areas of expertise which are rarely allied in Shakespeare scholarship to such an extent, including biblical, liturgical, social and theatrical history, Sohmer sheds new light not only on Julius Caesar but on a variety of accepted beliefs. These include: why Hamlet was not crowned king when his father died; why Brutus would not swear to murder Caesar; why the Elizabethan authorities retained the Julian calendar; and why the orthodox dates of the first composition of both Twelfth Night and Hamlet can be called into question.