400-Year Mystery Solved: Shakespeare's 'Missing' London House Found

The Chandos portrait of William Shakespeare (attributed to John Taylor, c.1611), overlaid on the 1668 Blackfriars precinct plan

April

/ 2026

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For centuries, the exact whereabouts of William Shakespeare's only known London property has been one of the most tantalizing unsolved puzzles in literary history. Now, a discovery by a King's College London scholar has pinpointed the precise location of the house the Bard purchased in the Blackfriars district in 1613, potentially rewriting the narrative of his final years. The find, made possible by a previously unknown 17th-century floorplan, not only confirms the exact address but also reveals the property's size and layout for the first time.

The discovery was made by Professor Lucy Munro, Professor of Shakespeare and Early Modern Literature at King's College London, while conducting research for a wider project in the archives. It has long been known that Shakespeare owned property within the Blackfriars precinct, an area that was once home to a major 13th-century Dominican friary. However, its exact location had remained stubbornly uncertain. A dark-blue City of London plaque at 5 St Andrew's Hill, erected in 2013, states only that Shakespeare "purchased lodgings in the Blackfriars Gatehouse located near this site" - the phrase "near this site" itself a testament to four centuries of historical uncertainty.

Professor Lucy Munro, Professor of Shakespeare and Early Modern Literature at King's College London. (King's College London)

Professor Munro's research has changed all that. By uncovering three overlooked documents - two from The London Archives and one from The National Archives - she has been able to map the property with precision. The key piece of evidence is a detailed plan of part of the Blackfriars precinct drawn up in 1668, shortly after the Great Fire of London, which confirms the precise location and size of Shakespeare's house.

The Floorplan That Solved a 400-Year Mystery

The 1668 plan, held at The London Archives (reference CLC/522/MS14570/001), reveals that Shakespeare's house stood across what is now the eastern end of Ireland Yard, the foot of Burgon Street, and parts of the late-nineteenth-century buildings at 5 Burgon Street and 5 St Andrew's Hill. This means the existing blue plaque is not merely "near" the site of Shakespeare's London house, it is, in fact, on the exact spot.

Property plan of the parish of St Ann Blackfriars, drawn up in 1668, which confirmed the precise location of Shakespeare's house. (King's College London / The London Archives, City of London Corporation)

While the section of the property that spanned the "Great Gate" of the old friary does not appear on the post-fire plan - likely because it had no foundations - the remaining part measured approximately 45 feet from east to west, and between 13 and 15 feet from north to south. The building was substantial enough that by 1645, it had been divided into two separate houses. Its surroundings included other converted friary buildings and, possibly, a nearby tavern known as the Sign of the Cock - a pub called The Cockpit still stands on the site today.

"This discovery throws into question the narrative that Shakespeare simply retired to Stratford and spent no more time in the city," stated Professor Munro in a press release from King's College London. "It has sometimes been thought that he bought his Blackfriars property merely as an investment, but we don't know that this is true, or that he never used it for himself."

Rewriting the Narrative of Shakespeare's Final Years

The traditional view holds that Shakespeare retired from his London theatre career not long after purchasing the Blackfriars house in 1613, returning to his family home in Stratford-upon-Avon to live as a gentleman. However, the size and location of the newly mapped property suggest he may have spent considerably more time in London during his later years than previously believed.

The house was conveniently situated close to his workplace at the Blackfriars theatre. Historical records confirm that Shakespeare continued working in London after the purchase, co-authoring the play Two Noble Kinsmen with John Fletcher later in 1613, and he is also recorded as visiting London in November 1614. "After all, he could have bought an investment property anywhere in London, but this house was close to his workplace at the Blackfriars theatre," Professor Munro added. "This new evidence that the Blackfriars house was quite substantial makes it not inconceivable that some of it may have been written in this very property."

Dr Will Tosh, Director of Education at Shakespeare's Globe, praised the discovery warmly, saying:

"Professor Munro's fantastic discovery proves there's no replacement for human graft in the archive, and our reward for her hard work is a dazzling new sense of Shakespeare the London writer. She's helped us to understand how much the city meant to our greatest ever dramatist, as a professional and personal home."

The Property's Fate: From Shakespeare to the Great Fire

The additional documents uncovered by Professor Munro also trace the later history of the property in detail. It remained in the possession of Shakespeare's descendants until 1665, when it was sold by his granddaughter, Elizabeth Hall Nash Barnard - the daughter of Shakespeare's eldest daughter, Susanna. The documents reveal, for the first time, precisely how and when the property left the family's hands, and how much it was sold for.

Tragically, just one year after the sale, the house was destroyed in the Great Fire of London of 1666, a fate shared by countless other buildings across the city. Over the past century, the site has been occupied by a succession of businesses, including a printing company, manufacturers of printing inks, carpet wholesalers, and eventually apartment conversions. Professor Munro described the moment of discovery with evident excitement: "I was doing research as part of a wider project and couldn't believe it when I realised what I was looking at — the floorplan of Shakespeare's Blackfriars house. It had been assumed that there wasn't much more evidence to gather about it, so research on it has laid dormant for a while."

The full details of Professor Munro's research were published in the Times Literary Supplement on 17 April 2026. The finding adds a compelling new chapter to our understanding of Shakespeare's life in London, and raises the tantalising possibility that some of the greatest works in the English literary canon may have been written in a house that stood on a quiet Blackfriars street, now finally identified after more than 400 years.

Top image: The Chandos portrait of William Shakespeare (attributed to John Taylor, c.1611), overlaid on the 1668 Blackfriars precinct plan. Source: King's College London

By Gary Manners

References

Munro, L. 2026. Shakespeare's 'missing' London house mapped with new discovery. King's College London. Available at: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/news/shakespeares-missing-london-house-mapped-with-new-discovery-1

Mansfield, I. 2026. Mystery solved: Shakespeare's Blackfriars house located at last. Available at: https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/mystery-solved-shakespeares-blackfriars-house-located-at-last-88958/

Munro, L. 2026. A man of property: Discovering exactly what Shakespeare owned. Times Literary Supplement. Available at: Discovering exactly what Shakespeare owned | Essay | The TLS