King John · Characters
Character guide
Key figures in King John by William Shakespeare.
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King John
major
Also known as John, King John Hubert, King John Sirrah, King John Nay, King John Ay, King John O, King John Silence, King John Why, King John Bear, King John Bedlam, King John Coz, King John Cousin, King John Doth Arthur, King John From henceforth, King John In us, King John Death, King John France
John opens the play already crowned and already contested: France demands he hand England to his young nephew Arthur, and his mother Elinor privately admits his possession matters more than his right. Blunt, imperious, and quick to convert defiance into war, he treats diplomacy as a prelude to force. His disputed title is the engine of every alliance, siege, and betrayal that follows, and his uneasy conscience makes him the play's most watchable knot of power and fear.
Philip Faulconbridge (the Bastard)
major
Also known as Bastard, Richard, Philip, Plantagenet, young Plantagenet, sir Richard, good Philip, Bastard Hubert, Bastard The French, Bastard The Dauphin, Bastard Philip, Bastard Ha, Bastard Go, Bastard Bell, Bastard Brother, Bastard James Gurney, Bastard Saint George
Summoned to court over a petty inheritance dispute, he cheerfully concedes he is likely Richard the Lionheart's bastard son, and Elinor claims him as her grandchild on the spot. Newly knighted and newly landless, he mocks the hollow rituals of rank even as he learns to climb them, promising to study the 'sweet poison' of flattery without quite practicing it. His running commentary gives the audience its clearest eyes, and his loyalty to John will be tested as the political ground shifts.
Arthur, Duke of Bretagne
major
Also known as Young Arthur, Arthur Hubert, Arthur O, Arthur Alas, Arthur God, Arthur Good morrow, Arthur Plantagenet, Arthur of Bretagne
France champions Arthur's claim to England against his uncle John, and his mother Constance wages his cause with a ferocity that sometimes overwhelms the boy himself. Caught between Elinor's cool offers of plums and Constance's furious grief, he wishes aloud he were 'low laid in my grave' rather than the object of such strife. His youth and legal right are the moral fault line of the early play, and the question of what John will do with him hangs over every scene.
Constance
major
Also known as the Lady Constance, Lady Constance, Constance O, Constance O Lewis, ambitious Constance, Constance Ay, Constance Lo
Constance has staked everything on Arthur's claim, and she spars with Elinor in public with a fury that shocks even the kings trying to negotiate around her. She calls Elinor a 'canker'd grandam' and a 'monstrous injurer of heaven and earth,' insisting her son's tears are heaven's bribes for justice. Her refusal to be temperate makes her both the conscience and the liability of the French alliance, and her grief will drive the play's emotional weather well past the battlefield.
Queen Elinor
supporting
Also known as Elinor, Elinor Son, Elinor Nay
Elinor opens the play needling John about 'borrow'd majesty' and admitting, in an aside only heaven and her son may hear, that his strong possession matters more than his right. She recognizes the Bastard as 'the very spirit of Plantagenet' and draws him into the family, and she trades barbs with Constance over Arthur with a coldness that makes her a formidable adversary. Her shrewdness and her buried guilt shape John's early strategy, and her eventual absence will leave his position dangerously exposed.
Hubert de Burgh
supporting
Also known as Hubert Lords, Hubert Peace, Hubert O, Hubert Old men, Arthur Hubert, Lord Bigot, Bigot
When the lords press John to free Arthur, John instead commits the boy's youth to Hubert's 'direction,' a charge the watching Pembroke reads as a death warrant. Hubert's troubled eye and closed manner make the court suspect him, yet when alone with Arthur he swears he will not harm the child for all the world's wealth. His divided loyalty between his king's orders and his own mercy places him at the moral center of the play's middle acts.
Lewis the Dauphin
supporting
Also known as Lewis, Lewis Nay, Lewis Before Angiers, Lewis Outside, Lewis Well, Lewis Strong reasons, the Dauphin, Dauphin, noble Dauphin, O noble Dauphin
Lewis commands the French army that lands to enforce Arthur's claim, then returns at Pandulph's urging to press a holy war against an excommunicated John. He is a young prince of ceremony and appetite — he has the rebel lords' oath copied out and kept, and he promises them the purse of rich prosperity — yet he can be moved to genuine admiration, as when Salisbury's reluctant tears astonish him more than burning meteors. His campaign is the engine of the play's second half, forcing England to confront what it has done to itself.
King Philip of France
supporting
Also known as Philip, King Philip England, King Philip Brother of England, King Philip Peace, King Philip O, King Philip Patience, King Philip of France, King Philip Lewis, Austria King Philip
Philip opens the play as the champion of legitimacy, sending Chatillon to demand that John hand the crown to his nephew Arthur, and backing the demand with the proud control of fierce and bloody war. But his conscience is a weathervane: when Pandulph threatens excommunication, Philip protests that he may disjoin his hand but not his faith — and lets the legate's curse do what no English army could. His quick peace with John and equally quick reversal expose how little the war was ever about Arthur.
Cardinal Pandulph
supporting
Also known as Pandulph, Pandulph Lady, Enter Pandulph, The Cardinal Pandulph, Pandulph The Dauphin
Pandulph arrives as a mediator and leaves as a recruiter: he negotiates the marriage that ends the siege of Angiers, then turns on France the moment John defies Rome, declaring all form formless and order orderless save what is opposite to England's love. His weapon is the curse — a mother's curse on her revolting son — and he knows exactly how to make Philip choose between his oath and his soul. He matters because he shows that the play's wars are never really settled by armies; they are settled by whoever can most credibly threaten damnation.
Earl of Salisbury
supporting
Also known as Salisbury, Lord Salisbury, Salisbury The Count Melun, Salisbury Wounded, Salisbury Sir Richard, Salisbury O
Salisbury is a loyal nobleman who becomes the play's most articulate reluctant rebel, swearing faith to the Dauphin while grieving that he must draw this metal from his side to be a widow-maker against his own country. He reads John's guilty face at Arthur's death and names it foul play, breaking openly with the crown. His divided loyalty — honourable rescue crying out upon the name of Salisbury even as he follows unacquainted colours — makes him the human measure of how thoroughly England has wounded itself.
Earl of Pembroke
minor
Also known as Pembroke, Pembroke Bigot, Pembroke There
An English lord who pressures John to crown Arthur.
Robert Faulconbridge
minor
Also known as Robert, old sir Robert, sir Robert, Robert Faulconbridge
The legitimate son of Sir Robert Faulconbridge, who disputes his brother's inheritance.
Lady Faulconbridge
minor
Also known as Lady Faulconbridge Sir Robert, Lady Faulconbridge King Richard Cœur-de-lion
Mother of the Bastard and Robert, who reveals the Bastard's true parentage.
Blanch of Spain
minor
Also known as the Lady Blanch of Spain, Lady Blanch, the Lady Blanch
John's niece, married to the Dauphin to seal a peace treaty.
Prince Henry
minor
Also known as Prince Henry
John's son, who becomes king after John's death.
Count Melun
minor
Also known as Melun, Melun Fly, The Count Melun
A French nobleman who warns the English rebels of the Dauphin's treachery.
Peter of Pomfret
minor
Also known as Peter, Peter of Pomfret
A prophet who predicts John's downfall and is executed.
Duke of Austria
minor
Also known as Austria, Austria Peace
An ally of France who wears the lion's skin of Richard the Lionheart.
James Gurney
minor
Also known as James Gurney, Gurney, James
A servant to Lady Faulconbridge.
Geffrey
minor
Also known as Geffrey
John's deceased elder brother, father of Arthur.
