Beatrice is not Antonio's daughter!

why do loads of people on here think that she is??

there is a reason for her not being antonio's daughter, and it is a very imoportant part to analysing her character.

beatrice has no parents or guardians, which means:

a) she can be more independent than hero.

b) she has the freedom to express her feelings openly to people in the play

c) she has the freedom to openly insult Benedick in front of everyone

and d) she doesn't have the pressure to find a husband, unlike Hero, who was encouraged in marrying young

is that enough reasons???
reply and we can have an online discussion! (me=neek, i know)

yeah you are right, when i studied this play i thought she was his daughter but as soon as i finished the play i though it was impossible for her to be his daughter or else he will attempt to control her!!!!!!!

thank god some people have sense! good on you!
the logic is all there, i mean, it really is essential if you are studying Beatrice. which i must say, studying beatrice is very important when doing much ado about nothing.

I knew that from the beginning. It actually really annoys me when people say that Beatrice is Antonio's daughter. It's obviously not true because there are no connections whatsoever between the two of them throughout the play. Plus, isn't Leonarto's *neice* (the non-dead Hero who married Claudio) supposedly Antonio's only daughter?

I think the confusion here, really, is not at fault of the readers. It's just simply the way Shakespeare wrote the end of the play out. When I first read it, I also assumed Beatrice was Antonio's daughter, because I knew that Beatrice was Hero's cousin and Leonato was arranging for Claudio to marry Hero's cousin. One would naturally assume that cousin was the same person, and it wasn't until the end that I realized that the "cousin" who was supposed to look just as fair as Hero was not, in fact, Beatrice, but just a made up character. I feel like there should be a better way to write this sequence out, or that Shakespeare should have at least made it very clear that Beatrice and the Hero-like cousin were not the same.

Isn't 'cousin' often used in Shakespearean plays to mean 'close friend', in the way that we sometimes call our parents' friends 'aunt'/'uncle' even though we aren't related?

Glad someone brought that up. The part about Antonio's daughter had confused me on the first reading too, because one think that if Beatrice is his daughter any other daughter would have been introduced by now. Of course, she just doesn't exist.

Of course, since as Kelby mentioned, cousin was used more loosely then, what does that tell us about her position and why she is so different than Hero?

I'm not sure that "cousin" ever refers to just a close friend/friend of the family. I'm pretty sure that it always indicates blood ties, but you're right that the modern definition as "the son or daughter of my aunt/uncle" is far more precise than "cousin" is in older literature or in other (older) languages. I'm not sure if Shakespeare specifically uses it either way.

Ya You're right
I guess Beatrice's parents have never appeared throughout the play
That gives rise to Beatrice's image as an independent and rebellious (against social standards on women)
But anyway, it's not a very controversial point indeed

Love these comments! I've been on a six month quest to fully "get" Bea. Hero and Claudio are so much more predictable. Like Luciano and Bianca in "Shrew." Since we are rewriting the play as a musical called "BAM!" we have Beatrice addressing Leonardo as "uncle" and never discuss her parents.