Thomas Jordan (poet)

Thomas Jordan (c. 1612–1685) was an English poet, playwright and actor, born possibly in London or Eynsham in Oxfordshire about 1612 or 1614.

Jordan was a boy actor in the King's Revels Company, which played at the Salisbury Court and Fortune theatres, and continued with the company as an adult. He is known to have performed the part of Lepida, the mother of Messalina, in Thomas Rawlins's Messalina (published in 1640) some time between 1634 and 1636. In 1637, Jordan published his earliest known work, Poeticall Varieties, or Variety of Fancies, which shows his theatrical background. It was dedicated to John Ford of Gray's Inn, a cousin of John Ford the dramatist. His connection with the King's Revels Company ceased in 1636, and his activities in the late 1630s are not known. Lynn Hulse suggests as "an attractive possibility" that he may then have been attached to the Werburgh Street Theatre in Dublin. Details that support an Irish connection include a commendatory verse signed "T.I." in one of the plays of James Shirley, the Werburgh Street house dramatist, and the dedication of Jordan's miscellany Sacred Poems (1640) to James Ussher, archbishop of Armagh and primate of all Ireland. By 1641 he was acting with the King's Company at their playhouse in Clerkenwell. His second comedy, "Youths Figaries", was written for the troupe that year and was "publikely Acted 19. days together, with extraordinary Applause" (published in 1657 as The Walks of Islington and Hogsdon, a title which refers to the many taverns frequented in the course of the play).

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