Is honor worth dying for? In Henry IV, Part One, one of the main points we see Shakespeare trying to make is the idea of ​​honor and the meaning of It. We will analyze what honor meant in Shakespeare's time, connecting and comparing it to what honor meant and represented in the play, and see if any of the characters fulfill honor according to that time. I will focus on four specific characters in the play; King Henry, Prince Harry, Hotspur and Falstaff. For each of these characters “honor” had a different meaning from each other, they all interpret it differently. I also want to consider what honor means today and which of these characters are the most honorable. During Shakespeare's time in the Middle Ages, honor was something only important people had; named people, for them this was very important; it was like a lifestyle. According to the Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages, honor had a double meaning, one of which was “I would rather die honored than live without honor”. Many people today may still feel the same way, but back then we can see that people died for honor, in war, in love, or anything else. We also see in this period another meaning of honor «but honor was also an office, a position, and the privileges that derived from it, as in Rome where there was talk of the "career of honors", cursus honorum, the hierarchy of high offices state” (Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages). Honor could have been represented by what you had, how you had it, and how you got it. Both of these meanings refer to the play Henry IV, Part One. We see how King Henry feels guilty and immoral for taking the crown from Richard II, Prince Hal feels that honor is a virtue, and… middle of paper… “Henry IV: From Satirist to Satirical Ass . " Aeolian harps: literary essays in honor of Maurice Browning Cramer. Ed. Donna G. Fricke and Douglas C. Fricke. Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green University Press, 1976. 81-93. Rpt. in Shakespearean criticism. Ed. Lynn M. Zott. vol. 69. Detroit: Gale, 2003. Literature Resource Center. Network. 5 May 2014 "War in Shakespeare's works." Shakespearean criticism. Ed. Michelle Lee. vol. 88. Detroit: Gale, 2005. Literature Resource Center. Network. May 5, 2014.Scheckner, Peter. “Roth's Falstaff: Transgressive Humor in the Sabbath Theatre.” The Midwest Quarterly 46.3 (2005): 220+. Literary Resource Center. Network. May 4, 2014.Shakespeare, William, Stephen Jay. Greenblatt, Walter Cohen, Jean E. Howard, Katharine Eisaman Maus, and Andrew Gurr. The Norton Shakespeare: based on the Oxford edition. 2nd ed. New York: W. W. Norton, 1997. Print.