WorksheetsMacbeth: Historical Context
Total questions: 20
Worksheet time: 15mins
Shakespeare's Macbeth
is a fictional character that Shakespeare invented
a real people and real events mixed with invented people and events
an accurate representation of Medieval Scottish history
Where and when does Macbeth take place?
Elizabethan England
Medieval Scotland
Jacobean Scotland
Shakesperean England
How long was the real Macbeth a king for?
Four days
Four Weeks
Four Months
Fourteen years
Where and when was Macbeth written and first performed?
Elizabethan England
Jacobean England
Medieval Scotland
Elizabethan England
Which words do we call a country which is ruled by a king, queen or emperor? There is more than one correct answer.
A Republic
A democracy
A monarchy
A kingdom
Who or what was at the top of the Great Chain of Being?
God
The King
The Pope
The witches
What did some people believe would happen if you upset the Great Chain of Being by carrying out a violent act such as killing a king?
You would go to hell and burn forever
You would gain great power and become the new king
You would upset the balance of nature and strange and terrible events would occur such as animals eating one another
You would cause the king to come back and haunt you as a ghost
According to The Divine Rights of Kings, who decided who should be the king?
The King's father
Voted for by the people
The church
God
What was the problem England faced when Elizabeth 1st died?
They had lost her crown
She did not have any children to replace her as queen
Her children battled over who should be king
Her sister wanted to be Queen
What was the solution was found to Elizabeth 1st lack of children to take her place as the monarch of England?
England became a republic
Macbeth became the King
James VI King of Scotland also became the King of England
Shakespeare held a competition between King Richard III, King Lear and King Arthur
What was King James VI of Scotland's new title?
King James 1st of England
King James 1st of Wales
King James IV of Ireland
King James VI of Scotland
Who was obsessed with witches wrote and published a book on Daemonology to explain his ideas about the supernatural?
William Shakespeare
King James I
Queen Elizabeth 1st
King Macbeth
What was The Gunpowder Plot?
An attempt to smuggle gunpowder into Britain from Europe
The story about how gunpowder was made
The attempt to blow up the King James 1st's palace
The attempt to blow up the English parliament and King James I
Who was caught as part of the Gunpowder Plot and put to death as a result? Models of him are still burnt on November 5th every year in Britain.
Macbeth
Duncan
Guy Fawkes
William Shakespeare
Which of the following were women allowed to do in the early 1600s?
Act on stage
Vote
Get a divorce
Be put on trial as a witch and executed
At least how many women were executed for the accusation that they were witches between 1600 and 1735
Around 10
Around 100
Around 1000
Around 10,000
Shakespeare's plays King Lear, Hamlet and Macbeth all have something in common. They are all:
Tragedies
History plays
Comedies
Horror stories
Witches are real creatures.
True
False
Don't know
Don't be silly
Is it right that Scotland should apologise to the women who were killed for being witches hundreds of years ago? Should a museum be built about them? Explain your answer.
Why do you think Shakespeare might have written Macbeth?
