Event Comment: The date of the first performance is not certainly known, but Pepys, on 2 July, saw Part II, stating that 2 July was the premiere of Part I and the opening of the Duke's Company's new theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields. Downes (Roscius Anglicanus, pp. 20-21): His [Davenant's] Company Rehears'd the First and Second Part of the Siege of Rhodes...at Pothecaries-Hall: And in Spring 1662 [1661], Open'd his House with the said Plays, having new Scenes and Decorations, being the first that e're were Introduc'd in England....All Parts being Justly and Excellently Perform'd; it continu'd Acting 12 Days without Interruption with great Applause. Downes, p. 34: I must not forget my self, being Listed for an Acotr in Sir William Davenant's Company in Lincolns-Inn-Fields: The very first Day of opening the House there, with the Siege of Rhodes, being to Act Haly; (The King, Duke of York, and all the Nobility in the House, and the first time the King was in a Publick Theatre). The sight of that August presence, spoil'd me for an Actor too. HMC, 10th Report, Appendix, Part IV, p. 21: @For the Siege of Rhodes all say@It is an everlasting play@Though they wonder now Roxalana is gon@What shift it makes to hold out so long@For when the second part took, butt for Bully@The first did not satisfie so fully.@ [Presumably this verse was written after Mrs Davenport left the stage, in 1662(?).

Event Comment: At Oxford in the morning A Mad World My Masters was played; in the afternoon, The Merry Milkmaids of Islington. According to Richard Walden (Io Ruminans, 1662) Anne Gibbs played Harebrain's Wife in the former, A Lady in the latter

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: My wife and I by coach to The Duke's house, where we say The Unfortunate Lovers; but I know not whether I am grown more curious than I was or no, but I was not much pleased with it, though I know not where to lay the fault, unless it was that the house was very empty, by reason of a new play at the other house. Yet here was my Lady Castlemaine in a box. In An Elegy on the Death of Edward Angel, 1673, two lines suggest that Angel acted Friskin: @Adieu, dear Friskin: Unfort'nate Lover weep,@Your mirth is fled, and now i' th' Grave must sleep.

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. This performance is on L. C. list, 5@139, p. 125. See also Nicoll, Restoration Drama, p. 346. Pepys, Diary: But, Lord! how it went against my heart to go away from the very door of the Duke's play-house, and my Lady Castlemayne's coach, and many great coaches there, to see The Siege of Rhodes. I was very near making a forfait, but I did command myself

Event Comment: The Duke's Company. Pepys, Diary: Carried The. and my wife to the Duke of York's house, to Macbeth,...and I to the Duke of York's house and saw the last two acts.... This day The. Turner shewed me at the play my Lady Portman, who has grown out of my knowledge