was the subject of an earlier tragedy (the socalled Ur-
Hamlet), now lost, possibly by Thomas KYD. The play con-
tains melodramatic elements common to other Eliza-
bethan and Jacobean revenge tragedies, such as the ghost
of the murder victim and the real or feigned madness of
the hero, but the complexity of the character of Hamlet
himself sets it apart from its fellows; the play has evoked
generations of critical speculation and the title role re-
mains perhaps the supreme challenge for an English-
speaking tragic actor.
Hampton Court Conference (1604) A Church confer-
ence convened at Hampton Court Palace under the presi-
dency of James I for the purpose of considering the
demands of the Puritans embodied in the Millenary Peti-
tion of 1603. This petition, so called on account of its pur-
portedly having 1000 supporters in the ministry, objected
to a number of rites and ceremonies practiced by the
Church of England. John RAINOLDS was the leading
spokesman for the Puritans, and the archbishop of Can-
terbury, Richard Bancroft (1544–1610), led the bishops’
side. Few concessions were made to the Puritans, and
James, who maintained that the logic of their position
meant “no bishop, no king,” lent his support to the bish-
ops. He did however back Rainolds’s suggestion that a new
English translation of the Bible should be made; a strong
panel of theologians and scholars was set up to undertake
the work, which was published in 1611 as the Authorized
Version or King James Bible (see also BIBLE, TRANSLATIONS
OF).
Hampton Court Palace A palace built on the north
bank of the River Thames, 14 miles (23 km) upstream
from central London. Construction began at the behest of
Cardinal WOLSEYin 1515. The palace later passed into the
hands of HENRY VIII, who made numerous alterations to it
and adopted it as his favorite residence. Although the
palace was built very much in the English TUDOR STYLE,
with red-brick turreted battlements and Gothic motifs, it
also includes many features reminiscent of the Italian Re-
naissance, with terracotta medallions (c. 1521) by the Tus-
can sculptor Giovanni da Maiano adorning the gateways
and much classically derived decoration. The Great Hall,
for instance, combines Renaissance-style carvings and
gilding with a traditional open timber roof, while the rest
of the palace is laid out in the symmetrical fashion favored
by the Italians.
Further reading: Simon Thurley, Hampton Court: A
Social and Architectural History (New Haven, Conn.: Yale
University Press for the Paul Mellon Center, 2003).
Handl, Jacob (Jacobus Gallus, Jacob le Coq) (1550–
1591) Slovenian composer and monk
Born in Ribnica near Ljubljana, Handl went to Austria in
the mid-1560s. In 1574 he was a singer in the chapel of
Emperor Maximilian II in Vienna. After leaving there
(1575) he traveled through Austria, Bohemia, Silesia, and
Moravia, becoming choirmaster to the bishop of Olomouc
(1579). By mid-1586 he was cantor at the church of St. Jan
na Brzehu in Prague, where he remained until his death.
Handl was prolific in his composition of Masses, motets,
German songs, and secular works, many of which show
the influence of Flemish, French, or Italian composers.
Criticized during his lifetime for the complexity of his
music, he included in his four-volume Opus musicum
(1586–91) two pieces scored for 24 voices. He was some-
times referred to as “the Bohemian Palestrina.”Hanseatic League A league of northern European and
Baltic trading towns formed in the 13th century under the
leadership of Lübeck. The word Hanse is Middle High
German for “fellowship,” and the league was an associa-
tion to enforce a common commercial code in an area over
which no single prince could impose an effective set of
laws to govern trade. Despite the opposition of the Danish
kings in the 14th century, the merchants of the Hanse
combined successfully in political and commercial initia-
tives until the rise of Dutch maritime power, which, with
Burgundian encouragement, broke their monopoly of the
Baltic trade. Their trading counters extended across Eu-
rope from London to Novgorod, and their wealth, privi-
leges, and prestige, if not their political power, survived in
a number of places well into the 16th century.
Further reading: Philippe Dollinger, The German
Hansa, transl. and ed. D. S. Ault and S. H. Steinberg (Lon-
don: Macmillan, 1970; repr. Routledge, 1999).Hapsburg, house of The German princely family that
took its name from Hapsburg Castle in Switzerland and
supplied sovereigns of the Holy Roman Empire, Austria,
Spain, Hungary, and Bohemia. Werner I, the first Count
Hapsburg, died in 1096. The first Hapsburg to be elected
Holy Roman Emperor (1273) was Rudolf I (1218–91);
subsequent Hapsburgs ruled the empire from 1298 to
1308 and from 1438 to 1740, with successive generations
enlarging their domains by diplomacy, conquest, and mar-
riage. In 1477 the marriage of FREDERICK III’s heir, Maxim-
ilian (I) to Mary, heiress of CHARLES THE BOLDof Burgundy,
added the Netherlands to the Hapsburg territories. Maxi-
milian’s grandson, CHARLES V, also inherited Spain from
his mother Joanna, daughter of FERDINAND II AND ISABELLA
I. After Charles V’s reign one branch of the family ruled
Spain, the Netherlands, and the New World territories; the
other branch held the imperial title and ruled the family’s
German lands. The death of Charles II of Spain in 1700
ended the Spanish Hapsburg line. The direct male line in
Germany ended with the death of Emperor Charles VI in- His daughter, Maria Theresa, married Francis of
Lorraine and the Hapsburg-Lorraine family continued as
emperors until the Holy Roman Empire was abolished in
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