When was William Shakespeare born?

  William Shakespeare, was born in 1564. That is fact. The exact date though, is quite something else!

  Stratfordians will tell you, at the drop of a hat, that he was born on the 23 of April!  Why, well because in Shakespeare's day, a baby was christened usually two days after birth, so, had Shakespeare been born on the 23rd, this would have brought the christening date up to the 25th!  But wait!  Shakespeare was christened on the 26th!  The 25th is St Mark's Day, a day of bad luck for the English, where no one was christened, no one was married, and, no one was buried, because of the bad luck involved, for, were you to sit in the porch of your local church at 11 pm on St Mark's Eve, towards you, you would see coming, the cadavers and the rotting flesh of those who were to die in the first six months of the coming year. (April was England's second month!, the first day of the New Year then, was Lady Day 25th of March, and the first of the English quarter days). Should you remain in the church porch into the 25th St Mark's Day, toward you would come the coffins and the cadavers of those to die in the latter months of the year. So, Shakespeare was therefore christened a day later, on the 26th! Why, is it so important, for him to be born on the 23rd? Well, that is St George's Day! The national saint of England! So what better day for your national poet and playwright to be born on, than that of your national saint!