62 The following is the commencement of this romance:—
64 The subjoined passage forms the latter part of this romance.
65 Such, for example, is the following ludicrous description of Hector’s funeral.
Any person who in those times was capable of making redondilla verses, must have found it very easy to produce such romances as this.
67 No vale las coplas de la Sarabanda, is a proverb of precisely the same signification as—No vale las coplas de Calainos, according to Sarmiento. See the remark, page 55. The two proverbs have probably been confounded, for the romance of Calainos is not in coplas.
68 The following is one of those pieces which may be regarded as untranslatable.
A piece, which is a companion to the above, commences thus:
The fiction on which this second song is founded must, notwithstanding its native beauty, appear a very absurd fancy to the naturalist, as it describes a nightingale wooing a turtle dove.
69 “Fizo assaz buenas canciones,” says the Marquis of Santillana, in his antiquated Spanish, speaking of his grandfather. The remaining notices which he gives of the origin of Spanish poetry communicate nothing, in addition to what has been already mentioned, on those things respecting which it is most desirable to be informed.
70 See Velasquez, according to Dieze, page 302.
71 See Sarmiento, page 345.
72 See the observations of Sarmiento, page 352.
73 An extract made from this treatise of the Marquis of Villena by Gregorio Mayans, may be found in the Origines de la lengua Española, tom. ii. pag. 321. The whole work probably exists in manuscript in Spanish libraries.
74 Tanto es el provecho, que viene desta dotrina a la vida civil, quitando ocio y ocupando los generosos ingenios en tan honesta investigacion, que las otras naciones desearon y procuraron haver entre si escuela desta dotrina, y por esso fue ampliada por el mundo en diversas partes.—The measure of this sonorous period will not be overlooked.
75 Temporum iniquitate sublimi virtute superata, honorem vitæ ac bonum nomen fallacibus delinimentis omnibus, quæ magnam quamque fortunam velut pedissequi comitantur, præferebat, says, in allusion to him, Nicolas Antonio, who at the same time refers to the Chronicles, from which he had drawn his information respecting the Marquis of Santillana.
76 This elegy is inserted along with other poems by the Marquis in all the editions of the Cancionero general, immediately after the spiritual poems. No complete collection of the works of this celebrated man has yet been printed.
77 That the Marquis had read Dante can scarcely be doubted, for he quotes him in this poem:—
78 Thus the two following stanzas are crowded with the names of authors, ancient and modern, with the view of shewing the loss which Spanish literature had sustained by the death of Villena.
79 Stanzas, like the following, deserve to be extracted from this work, as they are calculated to shew what might have been expected of the Marquis of Santillana, had he cultivated his talent for poetry under more favourable circumstances.
80 Don Alvaro de Luna begins to speak in the first stanzas:—
81 There is a singular pedantry, with a happy turn of versification, in a song which commences thus:—
82 It commences thus:
In this way the Gozate is repeated through a series of stanzas.
83 Dieze, in his remarks on Velasquez, erroneously refers to the publication of Gregorio Mayans, for the proverbs in verse; but only the original proverbs, without versification, (refranes que dicen las viejas tras el huego) as collected by the Marquis, are given in the second volume of that work, p. 179. The greater part deserve to be better known, but many of them are unintelligible to foreigners.
84 See the note, page 24.
85 E que cosa es la poesia, que en nuestra vulgar (there is something equivocal here, for this term was not vernacular in the Castilian language) llamamos gaya sciencia, sino un fingimiento de cosas utiles, è veladas con muy fermosa cobertura, compuestas, distinguidas, escondidas, por certo cuento, peso, è medida.
86 He appeals to St. Isidore, whom he cites as a guarantee for this origin of poetry:—Isidro Cartaginès, santo Arzobispo Hispalense, assi lo pruebra y testifica, e quiere, que el primero que fizo rythmos y cantó en metro hay sido Moysen, y despues Joshue, David, Salomon, y Job.
87 Honestæ conditionis, says Nicolas Antonio, speaking of his family.
88 Only the supplement to this poem is contained in the Cancionero general. The poem itself was probably too long to be included in that collection. However, in the editions of the collected works of Mena (for instance, that which I have now before me, intitled—Todas las obras del famosissimo poeta Juan de Mena, &c. Anveres, 1552, 8º) which Dieze notices, it fills the greater portion of the volume, and is accompanied by a copious commentary by Fernan Nuñez.
89 The emphatic praise bestowed on this poem in Dieze’s observations on Velasquez, (page 168), according to which Juan de Mena “maintains to his advantage a comparison with all the poets of all ages,” is sufficient to prove Dieze’s deficiency in sound criticism.
90 The second stanza contains the theme, but it is very imperfectly expressed:—
91 Mena, politely enough, solicits permission of Fortune to read her a lesson:
Then, in well turned antitheses, he allows her a sort of regularity which contradicts itself:—
92 Providence appears as a most beautiful young woman:—
93 In the fourth stanza a patriotic flight seems to promise the recurrence of similar passages:
On another occasion the author addresses an invocation to his native city Cordova:
94 From the following stanzas the degree of talent possessed by Juan de Mena for the poetical description of natural objects, without allegory, may be fairly estimated.
95 When the poet, in his ideal world, sees Don Alvaro, by a singular fancy he pretends not to know him, in order that he may question his guide (Providence) respecting him, in imitation of a similar passage in Homer:—
Among other things Providence replies:—
96 For instance, the word longevo in the verses quoted above.
97 The opening stanzas may be regarded as a poetic preface or dedication; but they gain nothing by that.
98 This poem is not to be found in the Cancionero general, but it is included in the Obras, mentioned in the note, page 92. Juan de Mena gave it the absurd title of Calamicleos, compounded from the latin calamitas and the Greek κλεος. It was afterwards called, simply, La Coronacion.
99 Most of these questions were not very difficult to answer; for instance, the following, which is preceded by three introductory stanzas in a very courtly style:—
100 The poem commences thus:—
101 Nicolas Antonio, whom Dieze follows in his remarks on Velasquez, is the authority for these notices.
102 In the beginning of the sixteenth century, Spanish books were printed in Seville by German printers. At the end of an edition, probably the first, of the proverbs collected by the Marquis of Santillana, (see page 88,) are the following words, which Mayans y Siscar has reprinted:—Aqui se acaben los refranes—imprimidos en la muy noble y leal civdad de Sevilla por Jacobo Comberger, Aleman, año 1508.
103 On this subject Nicolas Antonio’s Bib. Hisp. vet. lib. x. cap. 6. may be compared with Velasquez and Dieze, page 165.
104 To this number they amount in the old folio edition, printed with gothic characters, which forms one of the literary curiosities of the library of Gottingen. Dieze, in his observations on Velasquez, page 177, gives a particular account of this, as well as of the succeeding editions of the Cancionero general.
105 With this spiritual composition, the Cancionero general commences. The reader will have enough in the first stanza:—
106 This silly conceit, which consists only of eight lines, commences thus:—
107 The Ave begins thus:—
108 In the third strophe he thus addresses king Ferdinand:—
109 A new edition of Jorge Manrique’s Coplas, with glosses or poetic paraphrases by various authors, appeared at Madrid in 1779.
The following are the two first strophes, and the rhythmic structure of the rest is not less beautiful.
110 For instance, the following passage from a song by Juan de Mena:—
Or:—
Such plays of words are to be found throughout the whole Cancionero.
111 The commencement of one of his songs, the two first strophes of which are subjoined, is exceedingly beautiful; but in the sequel the lyric spark is extinguished by pedantry.
It would be absurd to attempt the translation of many of the specimens which are necessary to the illustration of this work; and with respect to these lines the tender breathing of the poetry would be entirely lost in a literal version.
112 Reason, like a talkative person, commences the dialogue, and has also the last word; she thus addresses her opponent:—
113 He is particularly successful in expressing with old Spanish plainness the emotions of passion; as for instance in the following concluding strophes of a farewell song.
114 What a picturesque storm of passion appears under the antiquated garb of the following stanzas! and with what a fantastic play of words are they interspersed!
115 The following are the first and second strophes of this song. Love is here a hell, in which the thoughts burn.
116 This curious composition begins like a testamentary arrangement, and then immediately takes a poetic turn:—
117 The following is by a poet named Tapia.