On November 8, 1623, Edward Blount and Isaac Jaggard obtained formal license to print "Mr. William Shakespeere's Comedyes, Histories, and Tragedyes, soe many of the said copies as are not formerly entered to other men." This is the description-entry in The Stationers' Registers of what is now known as the First Folio (1623), designated in the textual notes of this edition F1. Julius Cæsar is one of the plays "not formerly entered,"[17] and it was first printed, so far as is known, in this famous volume. It is more correctly printed than perhaps any other play in the First Folio and, as the editors of the Cambridge Shakespeare suggest, "may perhaps have been (as the preface falsely implied that all were[18]) printed from the original manuscript of the author."[19] It stands between Timon of Athens and Macbeth, two very badly printed plays. The running title is The Tragedie of xxiv Julius Cæsar, but in the "Catalogve of the seuerall Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies contained in this Volume," the title is given as The Life and Death of Julius Cæsar.

xxiv

The Second Folio, F2 (1632), the Third Folio, F3 (1663, 1664), and the Fourth Folio, F4 (1685), show few variants in the text of Julius Cæsar and none of importance.

 The Quarto of 1691

The Quarto of 1691

In 1691 Julius Cæsar appeared in quarto form. This Quarto contained one famous text variant, 'hath' for 'path' in II, i, 83. Though the Folio text here offers difficulties, and modern editors have suggested many emendations, no one has been inclined to accept the commonplace reading of the Quarto.

 Rowe's Editions

Rowe's Editions

In the Folios and in the Quarto of 1691 the play is divided into acts, but not into scenes, though the first act is headed Actus Primus, Scæna Prima. The first systematic division into scenes was made by Nicholas Rowe, poet laureate to George I, in the edition which he issued in six octavo volumes in 1709. In this edition Rowe, an experienced playwright, marked the entrances and exits of the characters and introduced many stage directions and the list of dramatis personæ which has been the basis for all later lists. A second edition in eight volumes was published in 1714. Rowe followed very closely the text of the Fourth Folio, but modernized spelling, punctuation, and occasionally grammar. These are the first critical editions of Shakespeare's plays.

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