In England during the first half of the sixteenth century there was a repetition of the inter-influence between the still flourishing forms of medieval drama and the new classical models which we have noted on the Continent. The early Renaissance in the reign of Henry VIII awakened an interest in Seneca; and the fragment of an English play introducing Lucrece has suggested to Mr. Chambers the possibility of an essay at Senecan tragedy thirty years before "Gorboduc." The main force of the humanistic influence seems, however, to have been in the direction of comedy. The drama was no longer confined to popular open-air presentations, but found a place at court, in the halls of noblemen, and especially at the schools and universities, where the comedies of Plautus and Terence and imitations both in Latin and English were frequently acted. The influence of the classical plays themselves and of the neo-Latin school and the controversial dramas of the Continent upon English moralities and interludes was extensive and distinct. This led to a multiplication and confusion of dramatic types out of which comedy emerged in such plays as "Gammer Gurton's Needle" and "Ralph Roister Doister." In Latin, but not in English, we can trace a similar movement toward tragedy. We hear of a "Dido" written by Ritwyse, master of St. Paul's, and performed by his pupils some time in the decade preceding 1532. "Absalon," written by Thomas Watson probably in the following decade, was highly praised by Roger Ascham, and, if it be identical with the play now in manuscript in the British Museum, is an example of biblical drama along Senecan lines. A non-extant "Jephthes" by Christopherson (1546), the "Archipropheta," with a romantic love episode and a clown, written by Grimald and acted at Oxford in 1547, and his "Christus Redivivus" published in 1543 as a "comoedia tragica," all belong to the same mixed species. A representative of the controversial drama appears in John Foxe's "Christus Triumphans" about 1550, which drew much from the famous "Pammachius," already translated by Bale and acted at Oxford to the great scandal of Gardiner. Of plays in the vernacular we hear of a few called tragedies, but the term was used without any exactness, and no extant play has any just claim to the title. Ten tragedies and comedies are attributed by Bale to Ralph Radcliffe, a pedagogue, who in 1538 opened a theatre in his schoolhouse and gave plays before the 'plebs.' Some of these were certainly in Latin, but some may have been in English, and the titles are interesting as emphasizing again the prevailing humanistic influences. Of the tragedies, two, "The Burning of Sodom" and "The Delivery of Susannah," are on biblical themes evidently chosen for the purpose of edification; the third, "The Condemnation of John Huss," suggests the controversial type. Of the comedies, four have biblical themes, while three, "Patient Griselda," "Meliboeus," and "Titus and Gisippus," indicate the growing search for secular and even romantic themes. In this confusion of many species of drama, created by a mixture of medieval and humanistic influences, there is at least no clear evidence of any English tragedy on Senecan lines before "Gorboduc." Of the development of the moralities toward tragedy, of which signs are not lacking, we get the clearest examples in plays a little later, which will be treated in the next chapter.