Anne was a farmer's daughter from the country - Shottery, where the cottage is located, is about a mile from Stratford. She was considerably older than Shakespeare she was 26 to his 18 and already pregnant when they married. Their first child, Susanna, was born six months after the wedding.
And the marriage took place in a hurry, without posting the banns - an essential part of English custom and law - and required a special licence from the bishop. So a shotgun wedding then? Well, that's one theory. Another is that, at the time of their wedding in , Anne was probably socially more well established than Shakespeare. Contrary to later stories that suggested her age made her a spinster in our modern sense , she was the average age for brides of the time and an eligible young woman.
Her father, a yeoman farmer meaning he owned his land or held a long lease on it had died the year before, leaving her a small inheritance that would be hers when she married.
By that time, John Shakespeare had fallen on hard times, had been prosecuted for illegal trading and had withdrawn from public life. William Shakespeare could just as easily have pursued Anne, the older woman of property, as vice versa. And, as far as the pregnancy is concerned, it was not uncommon for betrothed couples to take part in an old British ceremony known as a handfasting the expression "tying the knot" comes from this.
A handfasting was a pre-marriage commitment and it was not uncommon for brides to arrive at their church wedding, a year later, already in the family way. It's a widely known story that Shakespeare ran off to make his fortune in London, leaving Anne with his family in Stratford-upon-Avon. It's unlikely, though, that he left to escape a loveless marriage he had been trapped into with an older woman. By the time he left for London, he and Anne had already had three children.
And, in the end, he returned to live out his retirement with her in Stratford-upon-Avon He saw his daughter Susanna married to a prominent doctor, enjoyed the birth of his first grandchild, took part in local politics and left Anne a very rich widow.
Find out more about the Hathaway family heirlooms at the cottage: Hathaway Family Artifacts on Display.
Help keep Shakespeare's story alive. More like this. The largest chimney was used for cooking. It also has visible timber framing, typical of vernacular Tudor architecture. After the death of Anne's father, the farm was inherited by her brother, Bartholomew, and was passed down the Hathaway family until in that year financial problems forced them to sell Hewland's Farm, though retaining the house.
The Hathaways remained in ownership until , when the daughter of the family Mary Baker, sold the house to the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. Her, son William Baker, was allowed to occupy part of the house rent free for the rest of his life in return for custodian duties, and remained until his death in The house was known as Hewlands Farm in Shakespeare's day and had more than of land attached to it; to call it a cottage is really a misnomer, as it is much larger than the term usually means.
As in many houses of the period, it has multiple chimneys to spread the heat evenly throughout the house during winter. The largest chimney was used for cooking. It also has visible timber framing, typical of vernacular Tudor architecture. After the death of Hathaway's father, the cottage was owned by her brother Bartholomew, and was passed down the Hathaway family until , when financial problems forced them to sell it.
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