Yorick is a fictional character in William Shakespeare's play Hamlet.

He is the dead court jester whose skull is exhumed by the

gravedigger in Act 5, Scene 1, of the play. The sight of Yorick's skull
evokes a monologue from Prince Hamlet on mortality:
Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest, of most
excellent fancy; he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and
now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! My gorge rises at it. Here
hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your
gibes now? Your gambols? Your songs? Your flashes of merriment,
that were wont to set the table on a roar? (Hamlet, V.i)
The opening words are very commonly misquoted as "Alas, poor
Yorick! I knew him well."
It has often been suggested that Shakespeare intended his audience
to connect Yorick with the Elizabethan comedian Richard Tarlton, a
star performer of the pre-Shakespearian stage, who had been dead
for around the same time as Yorick in the play.[1]
The contrast between Yorick as "a fellow of infinite jest, of most
excellent fancy" and his grim remains is a variation on the theme of
earthly vanity (cf. Vanitas): death being unavoidable, the things of this
life are inconsequential.
This theme of Memento mori ('Remember you shall die') is common
in 16th- and 17th-century painting, appearing in art throughout
Europe. Images of Mary Magdalene regularly showed her
contemplating a skull. It is also a very common motif in 15th- and
16th-century British portraiture.
A more direct comparison is with pictures of playful children or young
men, who are often depicted looking at a skull as a sign of the
transience of life. It was also a familiar motif in emblem books and
tombs.
Hamlet meditating upon the skull of Yorick has become the most
lasting embodiment of this idea, and has been depicted by later

artists as a continuation of the Vanitas tradition.

The name Yorick has most often been interpreted as an attempt to
render a Scandinavian forename: usually either "Erick" or "Jrg", a
form of the name George.[2] The name "Rorik" has also been
suggested, since it appears in Saxo Grammaticus, one of
Shakespeare's source texts, as the name of the queen's father. There
has been no agreement about which name is most likely.[3]