The War of the Theatres is the name commonly applied to a controversy from the later Elizabethan theatre; Thomas Dekker termed it the Poetomachia.Because of an actual ban on satire in prose and verse publications in 1599 (the so-called Bishops' Ban), the satirical urge has no other remaining outlet than the stage.

The resulting controversy, which unfolds between 1599 and 1602, involves the playwright Ben Jonson on one side, and his rivals John Marston and Thomas Dekker (with Thomas Middleton as an ancillary combatant) on the other.

The role Shakespeare plays in the conflict, if any, has long been a topic of dispute among scholars.