history plays. Shakespeare's Histories might be more accurately called the "English history plays." These plays dramatize historical events from English history as early as the reign of King John and as late as Henry VIII. In addition to these two, Shakespeare wrote eight plays covering the continuous period of history between the reigns of Richard II and Richard III. The so-called first tetralogy, apparently written in the early 1590s, deals with the later part of the struggle and includes Henry VI, parts one, two & three and Richard III. The second tetralogy, finished in 1599 and including Richard II, Henry IV, Part 1, Henry IV, Part 2 and Henry V, is frequently called the Henriad after its protagonist Prince Hal, the future Henry V. Shakespeare himself alludes to the recognition of history as an established theatrical genre in Hamlet when Polonius announces the arrival of "the best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history...". Several of Shakespeare's other plays listed as tragedies in the First Folio, however, could be classified as history plays according to a broader, more generalized definition. Plays such as Julius Caesar and Antony and Cleopatra depict historical events from classical antiquity, for example, while King Lear and Cymbeline dramatize the history of ancient Britain and Macbeth depicts the historical events not of medieval England but rather of medieval Scotland. A consistent theme in historical drama of both Shakespeare and his English contemporaries revolves around questions of who had legitimate claim to participate in the affairs of the state. Shakespeare's history plays are considered the defining works of the genre. Later playwrights of history plays would either follow his stylistic model or at least have an acute awareness of their stylistic differences with Shakespearean histories. Restoration and Eighteenth Century Following the Restoration, the English History as a genre lost much of the momentum that they had gained during the Tudor and Stuart eras. Even the most esteemed genre of English Renaissance theatre, tragedy (to which the history genre had been closely tied from the beginning), had fallen out of style in favor of tragicomedy and comedy. Nevertheless, English playwrights produced numerous plays depicting historical events outside of England including William Davenant's The Siege of Rhodes, John Dryden's The Indian Queen and The Indian Emperor, Elkanah Settle's The Empress of Morocco. Productions of history plays often had an intentionally revivalist character. For example, adaptations of Shakespeare's