Sir Brian Vickers, an authority on Shakespeare at the Institute of English Studies at the University of London, found that a comparison of phrases in The Reign of King Edward III with early works by Shakespeare "proves conclusively" that the bard wrote it in collaboration with Thomas Kyd, a popular contemporary playwright, the newspaper says.

Vickers used the software called Pl@giarism to compare the text from the play, which was anonymously published in 1595, when Shakespeare was 32 years old, with other plays of the period. He found that there were 200 matches of "linguistic fingerprints" -- phrases of three of more words -- between the play and works by Shakespeare published before 1596. Likewise, there were a large number of matches in other scenes of the play with works by Kyd, The Times says.

A portrait painted 400 years ago and kept anonymously in an Irish home for much of the time since is now believed to be the only painting of William Shakespeare created during his lifetime.

The image reveals a wealthy Shakespeare of high social status, contradicting the popular view of a struggling playwright of humble status, according to Stanley Wells, a professor who chairs London's Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. Wells, a distinguished Shakespeare scholar, arranged for three years of research and scientific testing which confirmed it was painted around 1610, when Shakespeare would have been 46 years old. "A rather young looking 46, it has to be said," Wells said. Shakespeare died in 1616.

The Cobbe portrait -- named after the Irish family that owns the painting -- shows Shakespeare with rosy cheeks, a full head of hair, and a reddish brown beard. The most common portrait of Shakespeare is a gray image showing a bald Bard with a small mustache and beard, and bags under his eyes. The identity of the man in the portrait was lost over the centuries -- until Alec Cobbe saw a portrait from Washington's Folger Shakespeare Library. That painting, which fell into disfavor as a Shakespeare portrait about 70 years ago, turned out to be one of four copies of Cobbe's portrait.

The portrait "shows a man wearing expensive costuming, including a very beautifully painted ruff of Italian lacework which would have been very expensive," Wells said. "It establishes, for me, that Shakespeare in his later years was a rather wealthy, a rather well affluent member of aristocratic circles in the society of his time," Wells said.