Murder in Shakespeare's England

Fascination with murder is not a modern phenomenon. People in the past were just as interested in extreme violence and homicide as people nowadays. In seventeenth-century England all excessive and gratuitous violence was condemned and prosecuted, with murderers being categorized as particularly wicked. The courtrooms where murderers were tried were packed and crowds attended their execution. Ballads about notorious cases and prints reflected the huge interest such cases generated. Yet, in a...