Quote:
Originally Posted by Anglika  More context would help, but it probably means that something (a light/an arrow/ a stone) fell onto the roof of a house. The roof is made of straw or reeds. This is called "thatch". |
You are quite right, that is what it means. Context? It is a quote from a letter by Sir Henry Wotten written in 1613, in which he gives an account of the Globe Theatre burning down. Cannons were used for special effects, and some 'stuff' from one of them set fire to the thatch.
'... Now King Henry making a Masque at the Cardinal Wolsey's house, and certain cannons being shot off at his entry, some of the paper or other stuff, wherewith one of them was stopped,
did light on the thatch, where being thought at first but idle smoak, and their eyes more attentive to the show, it kindled inwardly, and ran round like a train, consuming within less than an hour the whole house to the very ground. '
Shakespeare's novel 
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