[1] In the edition of Madrid, 1573, 18mo, we are told, “La Propaladia estava prohibida en estos reynos, años avia”; and Martinez de la Rosa (Obras, Paris, 1827, 12mo, Tom. II. p. 382) says that this prohibition was laid soon after 1520, and not removed till August, 1573. The period is important; but I suspect the authority of Martinez de la Rosa for its termination is merely the permission to print an edition, which is dated 21 Aug., 1573; an edition, too, which is, after all, expurgated severely.

[2] These are in the “Catálogo” of L. F. Moratin, Nos. 57 and 63, Obras, Madrid, 1830, 8vo, Tom. I. Parte I.

[3] The fate of this long heroic and romantic drama of Gil Vicente, in Spanish, is somewhat singular. It was forbidden by the Inquisition, we are told, as early as the Index Expurgatorius of 1549 [1559?]; but it was not printed at all till 1562, and not separately till 1586. By the Index of Lisbon, 1624, it is permitted, if expurgated, and there is an edition of it of that year at Lisbon. As it was never printed in Spain, the prohibition there must have related chiefly to its representation. Barbosa, Bib. Lusitana, Tom. II. p. 384.

[4] The account of this ceremony, and the facts concerning the dramas in question, are given by Sandoval, “Historia de Carlos V.,” (Anvers, 1681, fol. Tom. I. p. 619, Lib. XVI., § 13), and are of some consequence in the history of the Spanish drama.

[5] It was printed in 1523, and a sufficient extract from it is to be found in Moratin, Catálogo, No. 36.

[6] A specimen of the Mysteries of the age of Charles V. may be found in an extremely rare volume, entitled, in its three parts, “Triaca del Alma,” “Triaca de Amor,” and “Triaca de Tristes”;—or Medley for the Soul, for Love, and for Sadness. Its author was Marcelo de Lebrixa, son of the famous scholar Antonio; and the dedication and conclusion of the first part imply that it was composed when the author was forty years old,—after the death of his father, which happened in 1522, and during the reign of the Emperor, which ended in 1556. The first part, to which I particularly allude, consists of a Mystery on the Incarnation, in above eight thousand short verses. It has no other action than such as consists in the appearance of the angel Gabriel to the Madonna, bringing Reason with him in the shape of a woman, and followed by another angel, who leads in the Seven Virtues;—the whole piece being made up out of their successive discourses and exhortations, and ending with a sort of summary, by Reason and by the author, in favor of a pious life. Certainly, so slight a structure, with little merit in its verses, could do nothing to advance the drama of the sixteenth century. It was, however, intended for representation. “It was written,” says its author, “for the praise and solemnization of the Festival of Our Lady’s Incarnation; so that it may be acted as a play [la puedan por farça representar] by devout nuns in their convents, since no men appear in it, but only angels and young damsels.”

The second part of this singular volume, which is more poetical than the first, is against human, and in favor of Divine love; and the third, which is very long, consists of a series of consolations deemed suitable for the different forms of human sorrow and care;—these two parts being necessarily didactic in their character. Each of the three is addressed to a member of the great family of Alva, to which their author seems to have been attached; and the whole is called by him Triaca; a word which means Treacle, or Antidote, but which Lebrixa says he uses in the sense of Ensalada,—Salad or Medley. The volume, taken as a whole, is as strongly marked with the spirit of the age that produced it as the contemporary Cancioneros Generales, and its poetical merit is much like theirs.

[7] Moratin, Catálogo, No. 35, and ante, Vol. I. p. 503.

[8] Oliva died in 1533; but his translations were not printed till 1585.

[9] This extremely curious drama, of which I know no copy, except the one kindly lent to me by M. H. Ternaux-Compans of Paris, is entitled “Egloga nuevamente composta por Juan de Paris, en la qual se introducen cinco personas: un Escudero llamado Estacio, y un Hermitaño, y una Moça, y un Diablo, y dos Pastores, uno llamado Vicente y el otro Cremon” (1536). It is in black letter, small quarto, 12 leaves, without name of place or printer; but, I suppose, printed at Zaragoza, or Medina del Campo.

[10]

[11]

[12] As another copy of this play can be found, I suppose, only by some rare accident, I give the original of the passage in the text, with its original pointing. It is the opening of the first scene:—

“Una Farça a Manera de Tragedia,” in prose and partly pastoral, was printed at Valencia, anonymously, in 1537, and seems to have resembled this one in some particulars. It is mentioned in Aribau, “Biblioteca de Autores Españoles,” 1846, Tom. II. p. 193, note.

[13] “Comedia llamada Vidriana, compuesta por Jaume de Huete agora nuevamente,” etc., sm. 4to, black letter, 18 leaves, without year, place, or printer. It has ten interlocutors, and ends with an apology in Latin, that the author cannot write like Mena,—Juan de Mena I suppose,—though I know not why he should have been selected, as the piece is evidently in the manner of Naharro.

[14] Another drama, from the same volume with the last two. Moratin (Catálogo, No. 47) had found it noticed in the Index Expurgatorius of Valladolid, 1559, and assigns it, at a venture, to the year 1531, but he never saw it. Its title is “Comedia intitulada Tesorina, la materia de la qual es unos amores de un penado por una Señora y otras personas adherentes. Hecha nuevamente por Jaume de Huete. Pero si por ser su natural lengua Aragonesa, no fuere por muy cendrados terminos, quanto a este merece perdon.” Small 4to, black letter, 15 leaves, no year, place, or printer. It has ten interlocutors, and is throughout an imitation of Naharro, who is mentioned in some mean Latin lines at the end, where the author expresses the hope that his Muse may be tolerated, “quamvis non Torris digna Naharro venit.”

[15] “Comedia intitulada Radiana, compuesta por Agostin Ortiz,” small 4to, black letter, 12 leaves, no year, place, or printer. It is in five jornadas, and has ten personages,—a favorite number apparently. It comes from the volume above alluded to, which contains besides:—1. A poor prose story, interspersed with dialogue, on the tale of Mirrha, taken chiefly from Ovid. It is called “La Tragedia de Mirrha,” and its author is the Bachiller Villalon. It was printed at Medina del Campo, 1536, por Pedro Toraus, small 4to, black letter. 2. An eclogue somewhat in the manner of Juan de la Enzina, for a Nacimiento. It is called a Farza,—“El Farza siguiente hizo Pero Lopez Ranjel,” etc. It is short, filling only 4 ff., and contains three villancicos. On the title-page is a coarse wood-cut of the manger, with Bethlehem in the background. 3. A short, dull farce, entitled “Jacinta”;—not the Jacinta of Naharro. These three, together with the four previously noticed, are, I believe, known to exist only in the copy I have used from the library of M. H. Ternaux-Compans.

[16] It is known that he was certainly dead as early as that year, because the edition of his “Comedias” then published at Valencia, by his friend Timoneda, contains, at the end of the “Engaños,” a sonnet on his death by Francisco Ledesma. The last, and, indeed, almost the only, date we have about him, is that of his acting in the cathedral at Segovia in 1558; of which we have a distinct account in the learned and elaborate History of Segovia, by Diego de Colmenares, (Segovia, 1627, fol., p. 516), where he says, that, on a stage erected between the choirs, “Lope de Rueda, a well-known actor [famoso comediante] of that age represented an entertaining play [gustosa comedia].”

[17] The well-known passage about Lope de Rueda, in Cervantes’s Prólogo to his own plays, is of more consequence than all the rest that remains concerning him. Every thing, however, is collected in Navarrete, “Vida de Cervantes,” pp. 255-260; and in Casiano Pellicer, “Orígen de la Comedia y del Histrionismo en España,” Madrid, 1804, 12mo, Tom. II. pp. 72-84.

[18] “Las Quatro Comedias y Dos Coloquios Pastorales del excelente poeta y gracioso representante, Lope de Rueda,” etc., impresas en Sevilla, 1576, 8vo,—contains his principal works, with the “Diálogo sobre la Invencion de las Calzas que se usan agora.” From the Epistola prefixed to it by Juan de Timoneda, I infer that he made alterations in the manuscripts, as Lope de Rueda left them; but not, probably, any of much consequence. Of the “Deleytoso,” printed at Valencia, 1577, I have never been able to see more than the very ample extracts given by Moratin, amounting to six Pasos and a Coloquio. The first edition of the Quatro Comedias, etc., was 1567, at Valencia; the last at Logroño, 1588.

[19] This is the Rufian of the old Spanish dramas and stories,—parcel rowdy, parcel bully, and wholly knave;—a different personage from the Rufian of recent times, who is the elder Alcahuete or pander.

[20] It may be worth noticing, that both the “Armelina” and the “Eufemia” open with scenes of calling up a lazy young man from bed, in the early morning, much like the first in the “Nubes” of Aristophanes.

[21] Troico, it should be observed, is a woman in disguise.

[22] This superstition about Tuesday as an unlucky day is not unfrequent in the old Spanish drama:—

Lope de Vega, El Cuerdo en su Casa, Acto II. Comedias, Madrid, 1615, 4to, Tom. VI. f. 112. a.

[23] Rivers in the North of Spain, often mentioned in Spanish poetry, especially the first of them.

[24]

Las Quatro Comedias, etc., de Lope de Rueda, Sevilla, 1576, 8vo.

[25] This I infer from the fact, that, at the end of the edition of the Comedias and Coloquios, 1576, there is a “Tabla de los pasos graciosos que se pueden sacar de las presentes Comedias y Coloquios y poner en otras obras.” Indeed, paso meant a passage. Pasos were, however, undoubtedly sometimes written as separate works by Lope de Rueda, and were not called entremeses till Timoneda gave them the name. Still, they may have been earlier used as such, or as introductions to the longer dramas.

[26] There is a Glosa printed at the end of the Comedias; but it is not of much value. The passage preserved by Cervantes is in his “Baños de Argel,” near the end.

[27]

I do not know that this dialogue is printed anywhere but at the end of the edition of the Comedias, 1576. It refers evidently to the broad-bottomed stuffed hose, then coming into fashion; such as the daughter of Sancho, in her vanity, when she heard her father was governor of Barrataria, wanted to see him wear; and such as Don Carlos, according to the account of Thuanus, wore, when he used to hide in their strange recesses the pistols that alarmed Philip II.;—“caligis, quæ amplissimæ de more gentis in usu sunt.” They were forbidden by a royal ordinance in 1623. See D. Quixote, (Parte II. c. 50), with two amusing stories told in the notes of Pellicer, and Thuani Historiarum, Lib. XLI., at the beginning.

[28] Comedias, Prólogo.

[29] “Auditores, no hagais sino comer, y dad la vuelta á la plaza.”

[30] In the fifth escena of the “Eufemia,” the place changes, when Valiano comes in. Indeed, it is evident that Lope de Rueda did not know the meaning of the word scene, or did not employ it aright.

[31] The first traces of these simples, who were afterwards expanded into the graciosos, is to be found in the parvos of Gil Vicente.

[32] Cervantes, in the Prólogo already cited, calls him “el gran Lope de Rueda,” and, when speaking of the Spanish Comedias, treats him as “el primero que en España las sacó de mantillas y las puso en toldo y vistió de gala y apariencia.” This was in 1615; and Cervantes spoke from his own knowledge and memory. In 1620, in the Prólogo to the thirteenth volume of his Comedias, (Madrid, 4to), Lope de Vega says, “Las comedias no eran mas antiguas que Rueda, á quien oyeron muchos, que hoy viven.”

[33] Ximeno, Escritores de Valencia, Tom. I. p. 72, and Fuster, Biblioteca Valenciana, Tom. I. p. 161.

[34] In the Prologue to the Cornelia, one of the speakers says that one of the principal personages of the piece lives in Valencia, “in this house which you see,” he adds, pointing the spectators picturesquely, and no doubt with comic effect, to some house they could all see. A similar jest about another of the personages is repeated a little farther on.

[35] “Con privilegio. Comedia llamada Cornelia, nuevamente compuesta, por Juan de Timoneda. Es muy sentida, graciosa, y vozijada. Año 1559.” 8vo.

[36] It is in the twelfth scene. “Es el mas agudo rapaz del mundo, y es hermano de Lazarillo de Tórmes, el que tuvo trezientos y cincuenta amos.”

[37] “Con privilegio. La Comedia de los Menennos, traduzida por Juan Timoneda, y puesta en gracioso estilo y elegantes sentencias. Año 1559.” 8vo.

[38]

L. F. Moratin, Obras, Madrid, 1830, 8vo, Tom. I. p. 648.

[39] This Paso—true to the manners of the times, as we can see from a similar scene in the “Diablo Cojuelo,” Tranco VI.—is reprinted by L. F. Moratin, (Obras, 8vo, Madrid, 1830, Tom. I. Parte II. p. 644), who gives (Parte I. Catálogo, Nos. 95, 96, 106-118) the best account of all the works of Timoneda. The habit of singing popular poetry of all kinds in the streets has been common, from the days of the Archpriest Hita (Copla 1488) to our own times. I have often listened to it, and possess many of the ballads and other verses still paid for by an alms as they were in this Paso of Timoneda.

In one of the plays of Cervantes,—that of “Pedro de Urdemalas,”—the hero is introduced enacting the part of a blind beggar, and advertising himself by his chant, just as the beggar in Timoneda does:—

The lines in the original are not consecutive, but those I have selected are as follows:—

Comedias, Madrid, 1615, 4to, f. 207.

[40] C. Pellicer, Orígen de la Comedia, Tom. I. p. 111; Tom. II. p. 18; with L. F. Moratin, Obras, Tom. I. Parte II. p. 638, and his Catálogo, Nos. 100, 104, and 105.

[41] C. Pellicer, Orígen, Tom. I. p. 116; Tom. II. p. 30.

[42] Navarrete, Vida de Cervantes, p. 410.

[43] L. F. Moratin, Obras, Tom. I. Parte I., Catálogo, Nos. 132-139, 142-145, 147, and 150. Martinez de la Rosa, Obras, Paris, 1827, 12mo, Tom. II. pp. 167, etc.

[44] “El Saco de Roma” is reprinted in Ochoa, Teatro Español, Paris, 1838, 8vo, Tom. I. p. 251.

[45] “El Infamador” is reprinted in Ochoa, Tom. I. p. 264.

[46] One of the plays, not represented in the Huerta de Doña Elvira, is represented “en el Corral de Don Juan,” and another in the Atarazanas,—Arsenal, or Ropewalks. None of them, I suppose, appeared on a public theatre.

[47] These two pieces are in “Obras de Joachim Romero de Zepeda, Vezino de Badajoz,” (Sevilla, 1582, 4to, ff. 130 and 118), and are reprinted by Ochoa. The opening of the second jornada of the Metamorfosea may be cited for its pleasant and graceful tone of poetry,—lyrical, however, rather than dramatic,—and its air of the olden time. Other authors living in Seville at about the same period are mentioned by La Cueva in his “Exemplar Poético” (Sedano, Parnaso Español, Tom. VIII. p. 60):—

who adds that there were otros muchos, many more;—but they are all lost. Some of them, from his account, wrote in the manner of the ancients; and perhaps Malara and Megia are the persons he refers to.

[48] See L. F. Moratin, Catálogo, No. 84.

[49] L. F. Moratin, Catálogo, Nos. 140, 141, 146, 148, 149; with Martinez de la Rosa, Obras, Tom. II. pp. 153-167. The play of Andres Rey de Artieda, on the “Lovers of Teruel,” 1581, belongs to this period and place. Ximeno, Tom. I. p. 263; Fuster, Tom. I. p. 212.

[50] The translation of Boscan from Euripides was never published, though it is included in the permission to print that poet’s works, given by Charles V. to Boscan’s widow, 18 Feb., 1543, prefixed to the first edition of his Works, which appeared that year at Barcelona.

[51] L. F. Moratin, Catálogo, Nos. 86 and 87.

[52] Pellicer, Biblioteca de Traductores Españoles, Tom. II. pp. 145, etc.

[53] Sedano’s “Parnaso Español” (Tom. VI., 1772) contains both the dramas of Bermudez, with notices of his life.

[54] The “Castro” of Ferreira, one of the most pure and beautiful compositions in the Portuguese language, is found in his “Poemas” (Lisboa, 1771, 12mo, Tom. I. pp. 123, etc.). Its author died of the plague at Lisbon, in 1569, only forty-one years old.

[55] Don Quixote, Parte I. c. 48.

[56] They first appeared in Sedano’s “Parnaso Español,” Tom. VI., 1772. All the needful explanations about them are in Sedano, Moratin, and Martinez de la Rosa. The “Philis” has not been found.

[57] It seems probable that a considerable number of dramas belonging to the period between Lope de Rueda and Lope de Vega, or between 1560 and 1590, could even now be collected, whose names have not yet been given to the public; but it is not likely that they would add any thing important to our knowledge of the real character or progress of the drama at that time. Aribau, Biblioteca, Tom. II. pp. 163, 225, notes.

[58] The two brotherhoods were the Cofradía de la Sagrada Pasion, established 1565, and the Cofradía de la Soledad, established 1567. The accounts of the early beginnings of the theatre at Madrid are awkwardly enough given by C. Pellicer in his “Orígen de la Comedia en España.” But they can be found so well nowhere else. See Tom. I. pp. 43-77.

[59] C. Pellicer, Orígen, Tom. I. p. 83.

[60] Ibid., p. 56.

[61] Philosophia Antigua Poetica de A. L. Pinciano, Madrid, 1596, 4to, p. 128. Cisneros was a famous actor of the time of Philip II., about whom Don Carlos had a quarrel with Cardinal Espinosa. Cabrera, Felipe II., Madrid, 1619, folio, p. 470. He flourished 1579-86. C. Pellicer, Orígen, Tom. I. pp. 60, 61.

[62] Obras del M. Fr. Luis de Leon, (Madrid, 1804-16, 6 tom. 8vo, Tom. V. p. 292), where, writing from his prison, he speaks of “those who in the ministry of a tribunal so holy have wreaked the vengeance of their own passions upon me.” Elsewhere he repeats the same accusation against his enemies.

[63] Obras, Tom. V. p. i. and p. 5.

[64] A poetical version of Solomon’s Song was made, not long afterwards, by the famous Arias Montano, on the same principle. When it was first published I do not know; but it may be found in Faber’s “Floresta,” No. 717, and parts of it are beautiful. Montano died in 1598.

[65] Villanueva (Vida, Lóndres, 1825, 8vo, Tom. I. p. 340) says that all the papers relating to the inquisitorial process against Luis de Leon, including admirable answers of the accused, were found, in 1813, in the archives of the tribunal of Valladolid, but were not printed for want of means. They must be very curious documents.

[66] Luis de Leon, Obras, Tom. V. pp. 258-280.

[67] Ibid., Tom. V. p. 281.

[68] Ibid., Tom. III. and IV.

[69] This sermon is in Book First of the treatise. Obras, Tom. III. pp. 160-214.

[70] Obras, Tom. III. pp. 342, 343. This beautiful passage may well be compared to his more beautiful ode, entitled “Noche Serena,” to which it has an obvious resemblance.

[71] Ibid., Tom. IV.

[72] Ibid., Tom. I. and II.

[73] Obras, Tom. VI. p. 2.

[74] The materials for the life of Luis de Leon are to be gathered from the notices of him in the curious MS. of Pacheco, published, Semanario Pintoresco, 1844, p. 374;—those in N. Antonio, Bib. Nova, ad verb.;—in Sedano, Parnaso Español, Tom. V.;—and in the Preface to a collection of his poetry, published at Valencia by Mayans y Siscar, 1761; the last being also found in Mayans y Siscar, “Cartas de Varios Autores” (Valencia, 1773, 12mo, Tom. IV. pp. 398, etc.). His birthplace has been by some supposed to have been Belmonte in La Mancha, or else Madrid. But Pacheco, who is a sufficient authority, gives that honor to Granada, and settles the date of Luis de Leon’s birth at 1528, though it is more commonly given as of 1526 or 1527; adding a description of his person, and the singular fact, not elsewhere noticed, that he amused himself with the art of painting, and succeeded in his own portrait.

[75] The poems of Luis de Leon fill the last volume of his Works; but there are several among them that are probably spurious.

[76] In noticing the Hebrew temperament of Luis de Leon, I am reminded of one of his contemporaries, who possessed in some respects a kindred spirit, and whose fate was even more strange and unhappy. I refer to Juan Pinto Delgado, a Portuguese Jew, who lived long in Spain, embraced the Christian religion, was reconverted to the faith of his fathers, fled from the terrors of the Inquisition to France, and died there about the year 1590. In 1627, a volume of his works, containing narrative poems on Queen Esther and on Ruth, free versions from the Lamentations of Jeremiah in the old national quintillas, and sonnets and other short pieces, generally in the Italian manner, was published at Rouen in France, and dedicated to Cardinal Richelieu, then the all-powerful minister of Louis XIII. They are full of the bitter and sorrowful feelings of his exile, and parts of them are written, not only with tenderness, but in a sweet and pure versification. The Hebrew spirit of the author, whose proper name is Moseh Delgado, breaks through constantly, as might be expected. Barbosa, Biblioteca, Tom. II. p. 722. Amador de los Rios, Judios de España, Madrid, 1848, 8vo, p. 500.

[77] It is the eleventh of Luis de Leon’s Odes, and may well bear a comparison with that of Horace (Lib. I. Carm. 15) which suggested it.

[78] It is in quintillas in the original; but that stanza, I think, can never, in English, be made flowing and easy as it is in Spanish. I have, therefore, used in this translation a freedom greater than I have generally permitted to myself, in order to approach, if possible, the bold outline of the original thought. It begins thus:—

Obras de Luis de Leon, Madrid, 1816, Tom. VI. p. 42.

[79] In 1837, D. José de Castro y Orozco produced on the stage at Madrid a drama, entitled “Fray Luis de Leon,” in which the hero, whose name it bears, is represented as renouncing the world and entering a cloister, in consequence of a disappointment in love. Diego de Mendoza is also one of the principal personages in the same drama, which is written in a pleasing style, and has some poetical merit, notwithstanding its unhappy subject and plot.