[1] There is no uniformity in the spelling of this name. The oldest records of the family give it as Shakspere. In the poet's will it is spelled Shakspeare, and is so signed by him. Whenever he and his friend Ben Jonson caused it to be printed, they spelled it Shakespeare. In this form we find it in almost every book of that period where it appears at all. And so we have it on his wife's tombstone. The probabilities are, that the later spelling was the one most approved by the poet himself, as giving more correctly the usual pronunciation.