In Hamlet, who is the father of Prince Hamlet?

In Hamlet, the father of Prince Hamlet is King Hamlet. He is the recently deceased King of Denmark and appears to his son as a ghost, revealing that Claudius murdered him while he slept by pouring poison into his ear.

King Hamlet’s death drives the entire revenge plot. Claudius, Hamlet’s uncle, takes the throne and quickly marries Gertrude, Hamlet’s mother. Hamlet is horrified both by the murder and by what he sees as his mother’s hasty remarriage.

A common mix-up is confusing King Hamlet with Claudius. Claudius is Hamlet’s uncle, stepfather, and successor—not his biological father. The older king is also sometimes called “Old Hamlet” to distinguish him from Prince Hamlet, who shares his name.

The character reflects older Scandinavian revenge legends, especially the story of Amleth recorded by Saxo Grammaticus. Shakespeare transformed those materials into the tragedy first performed around the turn of the seventeenth century.