I’ve been meaning to respond to this for some time:

Besides, in Rosse’s speech, the true hero of the battle in Fife is unnamed, referred to only as “Bellona’s bridegroom.”

But, wait – Fife. Fife is an important place in the play. Why? Because Macduff is the Thane of Fife.

Which means that it is Macduff who has captured Cawdor, turned back the Norwayan king, and won not only the battle but a huge sum of ransom from the enemy forces.

He’s talking about Macbeth, and if you read the scene in question, you’ll see two men, each of whom describes a battle. The first was fought by Macbeth. The second was fought by “Bellona’s bridegroom,” a reference to Mars, the Roman god of war. The question is – Is Bellona’s bridegroom meant to refer to Macbeth? Conventional wisdom says yes, but the Master of Verona says no, and his argument is worth reading. But let’s take a closer look.

I can see where, looking strictly at the text, you can make a case that Bellona’s bridegroom can’t be Macbeth. But assuming it’s Macduff is a bit of an overreach, and I think it would be a good time to revisit the distinction between a strong production concept and a close textual analysis. It seems to me there are three possibilities:

1. The two men are describing the same battle. It would not be unusual for Shakespeare, having written two accounts of the same battle, to have used them both. If Macdonwald is the Thane of Cawdor and the Norwayan lord refers to Norway himself, the two descriptions could be of the same battle. This seems unlikely, but I wanted to throw it out there all the same.

2. The two men are describing different battles, and Bellona’s bridegroom is Macbeth. This is troubling, for the reasons described by the Master of Verona. Also, Bellona’s bridegroom is described as having personally confronted Cawdor, and in the next scene, Macbeth seems unaware that anything is amiss with the wayward Thane:

By Sinel’s death I know I am Thane of Glamis;
But how of Cawdor? the Thane of Cawdor lives,
A prosperous gentleman;

So if Bellona’s bridegroom really is Macbeth, whether we have one battle or two, Shakespeare’s got some ‘splainin’ to do.

3. The two men are describing different battles, and Bellona’s bridegroom is not Macbeth. This makes sense dramatically, if the purpose of the scene was to show how Macbeth becomes the Thane of Cawdor. The description of the second battle shows how the title of Cawdor becomes available and the first battle demonstrates Macbeth’s deserving of it. It also would explain how Macbeth is unaware of Cawdor’s defeat. But then who is Bellona’s bridegroom? I like the idea that it’s Macduff, and it may have been Shakespeare’s intention, but it’s not in the text. Neither is there any textual strife between Macduff and Duncan. But it’s a brilliant production concept, and I think it would work well on stage.

So none of the solutions turn out to be particularly satisfying. My guess (and a guess it is) is that there were two battles and Bellona’s bridegroom is Macbeth. I think Shakespeare just didn’t notice or didn’t care about the errors and inconsistencies. Those who wish to argue that a genius of Shakespeare’s caliber would never make such an error need only to look at the opening moments of the original version of the scene in question, where Shakespeare clearly indicates a “bleeding Captain” in the stage directions, but when Duncan asks “What bloody man is this?”, Malcolm replies:

This is the Sergeant…

Clearly, we are putting way more thought into this than Shakespeare did.