1600 in literature

The year 1600 in literature involved some significant events.

Events

• January 1 – The Admiral's Men perform Dekker's The Shoemaker's Holiday at Court.
• March 6 – George Carey, Lord Hunsdon, the Lord Chamberlain of England, entertains the Flemish ambassador Ludowic Verreyken at Hunsdon House in the Blackfriars district of London. The entertainment includes a performance of Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1 by the Lord Chamberlain's Men.
• September – Richard Burbage leases the disused Blackfriars Theatre to Henry Evans and Nathaniel Giles for £40 per year. Evans and Giles use the space for the performances of the Children of the Chapel. Giles drafts Solomon Pavy, age ten, into his acting troupe.
• September 8 – Jack Drum's Entertainment is entered in the Stationers' Register. The character of Brabant Senior represents Ben Jonson, thus continuing the War of the Theatres.
• Juan Ruiz de Alarcón begins his studies at the University of Salamanca.
• Tirso de Molina joins the Order of Mercy.
• Hortensio Félix Paravicino joins the Trinitarian Order.
• Robert Shirley returns from Persia.
• Philip Henslowe lends William Haughton ten shillings "to release him out of the Clink".
• The last performances of the Chester miracle plays occur in 1600.

New books

• Fabritio Caroso – Nobiltà de dame
• "Moderata Fonte" (pseudonym) – The Worth of Women: Wherein is Clearly Revealed Their Nobility and Their Superiority to Men
• William Gilbert & Aaron Dowling - De Magnete, Magneticisque Corporibus, et de Magno Magnete Tellure
• Robert Jones – The First Book of Songs and Airs
• Thomas Rowlands – The Letting of Humour's Blood in the Head-Vein

New drama

• Anonymous
  • Look About You published
  • The Maid's Metamorphosis
  • The Weakest Goeth to the Wall published
  • The Wisdom of Doctor Dodypoll
• Henry Chettle & John Day – The Blind Beggar of Bethnal Green, Part 1 (Parts 2 and 3, by Day and William Haughton, lost)
• Thomas Dekker – Old Fortunatus published
• Thomas Heywood – Edward IV, Parts 1 and 2 published
• (Thomas Heywood (attr.) and others?) – Edward IV (published)
• Ben Jonson – Cynthia's Revels
• Thomas Dekker, John Marston, and William Haughton – The Spanish Moor's Tragedy
• John Marston – Jack Drum's Entertainment
• Thomas Nashe – Summer's Last Will and Testament published
• William Shakespeare – Henry IV, Part 2, The Merchant of Venice, Henry V, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Much Ado About Nothing published

Poetry

• England's Helicon (anthology) – including work by Edmund Spenser, Michael Drayton, Thomas Lodge, Philip Sidney and others
• Gervase Markham – The Tears of the Beloved
• Thomas Middleton – The Ghost of Lucrece

Births

• January 1 – Friedrich Spanheim, Calvinist writer (died 1649)
• January 17 – Pedro Calderón de la Barca, dramatist (died 1681)
• February 2 – Gabriel Naudé, librarian and scholar (died 1653)
• October 5 – Thomas Goodwin, English theologian (died 1680)
• November – John Ogilby, Scottish translator (died 1676)
• November 19 – Leo Aitzema, Dutch historian (died 1669)
• date unknown
  • Martin de Barcos, French Jansenist theologian (died 1678)
  • Bihari, Hindi poet (died 1663)
  • Hermann Busenbaum, German Jesuit theologian (died 1668)
  • Marin le Roy de Gomberville, French poet and novelist (died 1674)
  • Peter Heylin, English ecclesiastical writer (died 1662)
  • William Prynne, polemicist (died 1669)
  • Adriaan Vlacq, publisher (died 1667)
  • Brian Walton, Bishop of Chester, compiler of "Polyglot Bible" (died 1661)
• probable
  • Piaras Feiritéar, poet
  • Richard Flecknoe, dramatist and poet

Deaths

• January 23 - John Case, English commentator on Aristotle
• February 15 – José de Acosta, Spanish naturalist (born 1539)
• April – Thomas Deloney, novelist and balladist (born 1543)
• May 18 – Fulvio Orsini, Italian historian (born 1529)
• June 25 – David Chytraeus, German theologian and historian (born 1530)
• October 12 – Luis Molina, Spanish Jesuit writer (born 1535)
• November 3 – Richard Hooker, theologian (born 1554)
• November 23 or 24 - Balthasar Russow, Estonian chronicler
• date unknown
  • Bâkî, Turkish poet (born 1526)
  • Mustafa Selaniki, chronicler
• probable
  • Robert Garnier, poet
  • Thomas Nashe, satirist and pamphleteer
  • Robert Wilson, dramatist