The Cauldron and the Threat of the "Other" in Shakespeare's <i>Macbeth</i>, Middleton's <i>The Witch</i>, and Marlowe's <i>The Jew of Malta</i>

Abstract

As a theatrical element, the cauldron is perhaps most famously associated with the witches in Shakespeare’s Macbeth (c.1606) and Middleton’s The Witch (c.1613-1616). However, this essay proposes that the cauldron in the early modern theatre is not merely a physical signifier, or even an innate trope, of witchcraft. For example, Marlowe’s The Jew of Malta (c.1590) effectively utilises cauldrons for symbolic and dramatic effect, even though these cauldrons are not explicitly suggestive of witchcraft or magic. Marlowe’s cauldrons are instead the murderous tools, and ultimately the divine punishment, of Barabas – a Jew. This essay will demonstrate that the cauldron signifies the threat of the associated characters through a threefold symbolism: firstly, because the cauldron was so integral to life and sustenance as one of the primary cooking vessels in the early modern household, there was a perpetual, underlying threat if it were to be misused; secondly, the long-established iconography of the cauldron serves to emphasise the connection between the user, Hell, and the Devil, and thereby the user’s evil nature; and thirdly, the cauldron is a distinctly feminine object and is accordingly used for either emasculation or misogyny. In this way, the cauldron suggests an implicit link between Judaism and witchcraft in that both, by association with the object of the cauldron, are demonic, villainous, and dangerous to early modern Christian society.