FESTIVAL, IMAGE AND POETIC VISION IN FELIPE III’S SPAINS

By

Mark Evan Davis

A DISSERTATION

Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

Hispanic Cultural Studies—Doctor of Philosophy

2015

ABSTRACT

FESTIVAL, IMAGE AND POETIC VISION IN FELIPE III’S SPAINS

By

Mark Evan Davis

In this dissertation, I examine the artistic development and political aspects of works that have received little scholarly attention: epic poems commemorating some of the most important festival events of Felipe III of Spain’s reign (1598-1621). I argue these works are worthy of greater critical consideration than they have so far received, both for their artistic quality and for their substantive reflection of the culture and politics of their era.

My interpretative strategy begins with a look at the performative tradition of Spanish political festivals and their iconography from the medieval period. Then, taking an interdisciplinary approach encompassing literature, history and visual culture, I trace the development of the specific imagery of three magnificent occasions and compare it to poetic representations of those events. I pay special attention to the way various poets, including Lope de Vega and Francisco López de Zárate, reflect and incorporate chivalric, classical, sacred and other forms of discourse into their own poetic vision.

The visions expressed in these poems, contrary to general opinion, are less calculated to serve as royal propaganda than to further other purposes. Artistic ambition is especially evident in Zárate’s use of innovative baroque language to transform the raw imagery of striking courtly spectacles into something otherworldly. The poets’ political aims range from authorial self-promotion to expressing the interests of various politically influential figures other than the king. What may be most interesting about these pieces in this respect, however, is that the poets also sound notes which are not always in perfect harmony with the tunes being called in the capital, thereby reflecting fissures in the political order of the day. Copyright by MARK EVAN DAVIS 2015

Dedicated to Audrey L. Davis, from whom I inherited a small fragment of her critical spirit, interest in Spanish and above all, a devotion to reading and the life of the mind.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES vii

Introduction 1 The purpose of this study 4 My approach 7 Felipe III and his royal festivals 9 Festival epics 12 General outlines of the study 13

Chapter 1 18 The development of the Spanish royal festival and its imagery 18 The politics, forms and functions of royal festivals 18 Old and new: tradition and novelty 33 Fictional fiestas 36 Aragonese developments 39 Fernando de Antequera’s coronation 41 The Fiestas of 1428 45 Alfonso V of Aragon’s Italian triumph 51 The last Trastamaras and royal prestige 54 The Emperor Carlos V’s classical triumphs 57 Felipe II and heraldic imagery 59 The language of festive imagery 61

Chapter 2 63 Courtly splendor, propaganda and heroic poetic form 63 Introduction 63 Epic form and festival writing 74 Historical context and festival imagery 1598-99 82 Aguilar and his poema relación in epic form 86 Lope’s Fiestas de Denia 103 The festival epics of 1598-1599 112

Chapter 3 115 The Duke of Lerma’s temple of fame: politics and poetry in Francisco López de Zárate’s 115 Fiestas en la traslacion (1617) The valido and government by celebration 115 Lerma’s festival of himself 121 Traditional celebration, baroque excess and novelty 129 Interpreting ephemeral events 141 Publishing on the festival of 1617 142 Francisco López de Zárate and his poetry 144 Fiestas en la traslacion and the Baroque 149 Fiestas en la traslacion and baroque desengaño 156

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“La pompa en que deidad ostenta el suelo”: López de Zárate’s poetic liminal 163 space Zárate’s Temple of Fame 166 Neoplatonism and the power of poetry 173

Chapter 4 182 Performance, Portuguese national memory and Castelbranco’s Triumpho del Monarcha 182 (1619) Introduction 182 The importance of the King’s presence 183 The Iberian Union and frustrated Portuguese national aspirations 186 Felipe III and his Portuguese kingdom 194 Portuguese literary patriotism in the Philippine period 196 Portugal celebrates the return of its king 203 The imagery and events of 1619 206 Writing the Jornada de Lisboa 215 Castelbranco’s life and poetic reputation 224 The Triumpho del Monarcha as autonomist epic 230 Castelbranco’s allegorical dream sequence 231 The Triumpho as Castelbranco’s celebration of Portuguese history 236 A prophecy of Portugal’s return to glory 241 Epilogue: Matos de Sá’s “Elegía a la partida de su Magestad” 246

Conclusions 249 Nostalgic festival images 249 The poet’s vision 253 Epilogue 259

APPENDIX 262

WORKS CITED 300

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1.1 Arco de los pintores—detail 263

Figure 1.2 Carro de los sastres 264

Figure 1.3 Triumphal car “Lavrea Calloana” 265

Figure 1.4 Tournoi 266

Figure 1.5 Juego de cañas en la Plaza Mayor de Madrid 267

Figure 1.6 Wheel of Fortune 268

Figure 1.7 Griffon 268

Figure 1.8 Revue des heaumes 269

Figure 1.9 De Charles d’Austriche Empereur V 270

Figure 2.1 Figura dos corpos celestes 271

Figure 2.2 Giostra di carosello a cavallo 272

Figure 2.3 Carosel fait à la Place Royalle à Paris le V VI VII avril M DC XII 273

Figure 2.4 Lonja de Valencia 274

Figure 2.5 La expulsión en el puerto de Denia 274

Figure 3.1 Duke of Lerma on Horseback 275

Figure 3.2 Palacio del duque de Lerma 276

Figure 3.3 Lerma 277

Figure 3.4 Archbishop Cristóbal Rojas y Sandoval 278

Figure 3.5 Façade of Collegial Church of San Pedro with Sandoval arms 279

Figure 3.6 Altar del convento de San Agustín 280

Figure 3.7 Altar del convento de Santo Domingo 281

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Figure 3.8 Caccia di tori—detail 282

Figure 3.9 Composition of Serpents and Saucissons 283

Figure 3.10 Rocket effects 283

Figure 3.11 Another dainty fixed wheel—detail 284

Figure 3.12 Surgere quae rutilo spectas incendia coelo Fernandi succendit amor 285

Figure 3.13 St. George and the Dragon 286

Figure 3.14 His auspiciis vincula rerum Mare laxauit, nec iam terris Vltima Thule est 287

Figure 3.15 Fiat firmamentum 288

Figure 3.16 F. D. Valades inventor—detail 289

Figure 4.1 Et Dilaterauit Leone[m] Quasi Hoedum 290

Figure 4.2 Omne quod est in Mundo 291

Figure 4.3 Haec est victoria 292

Figure 4.4 Evropa prima pars terrae in forma virginis 293

Figure 4.5 Desembarcacion de Sv M. en Lisboa 294

Figure 4.6 Arco de los flamencos—detail 295

Figure 4.7 Arco de los plateros del arbol de los reyes de Portugal 296

Figure 4.8 Arco de los alemanes—detail 297

Figure 4.9 Desembarcacion de Sv M. en Lisboa—detail 298

Figure 4.10 Neptvno sternente fretvm, et felicibvs avstris pvlsvs abit pelago boreas 299

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Introduction

The object of this study is a small selection of long, narrative poems written in the heroic style to commemorate some of the most notable festive occasions of the reign of Felipe III of Spain (1598-1621).

To say that these works, which I will call festival epics, have been overlooked by modern scholars would be something of an understatement. Though other aspects of splendid, early-modern celebrations have been picked up and studied carefully in recent years, especially by historians, these poems have generally not been given a great deal of notice—critical attention from literary scholars has been especially scarce. Even when critics have focused on them, more often than not their observations have been of the negative variety. Festival epics have been dismissed for several reasons, including their presumed lack of literary merit, the transitory nature of the events they depict and the money-oriented motivations of their authors.

José Ares Montes makes a detailed attempt to review a number of the more outstanding occasional poems dedicated to Felipe III’s royal entry into Lisbon of 1619. His judgment of the quality of the entirety of this writing is harsh, if not entirely consistent. On the one hand, according to the critic,

“entre estos productos poéticos, monótonos por repetidos, no existe ni una sola obra de primera categoría” (15). On the other, he sets Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo Castelbranco’s Triumpho del

Monarcha Philippo Tercero en la felicissima entrada de Lisboa above the rest, saying Castelbranco uses his resources as an epic poet “con brillantez” (16). While he does not explicitly admit Castelbranco’s poem into that “primera categoría”, neither does he have anything bad to say about the poem.

Moreover, though none of the festival epics could really be considered their authors’ best works, they were composed by poets who were almost universally regarded as among the best, like

Francisco López de Zárate, Castelbranco and Félix Lope de Vega. This makes the argument against occasional literature for its low quality relatively easy to discard. Literature in other genres is generally

1 judged on its better examples, rather than the large number of lower-quality texts that inevitably make their way into the public. The same principle should apply to occasional pieces.

The next two kinds of critiques are a bit stronger.

In his appraisal of the same festival epic by Castelbranco, José Maria da Costa e Silva provides one of the more succinct expressions of the problem of writing about ephemeral occasions. Costa e Silva warns poets that an occasional work “vai perdendo o interesse á proporção, que ellas vam esquecendo” and goes on to add that Castelbranco’s Triumpho del Monarcha was also doomed to oblivion because it exalted the visit of a foreign usurper (221). Though he refers only to the Portuguese poet’s work on

Felipe III’s entry into Lisbon in 1619, other critics commonly apply similar reasoning when dismissing other festival works. This argument is a little more difficult to answer briefly, so I will come back to it below.

Fernando R. de la Flor’s argument about festivals and the pecuniary interests of authors who write about them is interesting in more than one respect.

Todo el marco del ámbito celebrativo pudo ser leído como suspensión, sin apenas

consecuencias, de los ritmos de la cotidianeidad y válvula de escape para presiones

sociales que ocurrían en otro campo, pero también un espacio donde mercenarios de la

cultura, escritores-criados (para emplear el término acuñado por José Simón Díaz)

desembarcaban con sus producciones ajustadas a los mundos de valores de los

comitentes, con el expreso deseo de una legitimación de su mundo de valores. (460-1)

Flor is not mistaken when he suggests that writers who represented political festivals in Spain’s

Golden Age were, in a sense, mercenaries. And without a doubt they were usually asked to (and did) produce flattering works designed to burnish the image of the king, or whichever other noble potentate was behind any given event. Yet, politically interested writing was hardly limited to the sphere of occasional works. Few authors of any note in the 16th and 17th centuries had the kind of resources they

2 would need to write with no thought for a sponsor’s generosity. Most prominent writers of the Spanish

Golden Age, from Lope de Vega to Francisco de Quevedo, were frequently called on to produce

“mercenary” works. Where they vary is in the particular degree of paid flattery they produce in any given work. Even poems that seemed to be produced for the author’s own esthetic pleasure, like Luis de

Góngora’s Soledades, were in fact also aimed at pleasing a wealthy and powerful patron, like the Conde de Niebla. When approaching any work of early modern Spanish festival literature, the reader should of course be conscious of the fact that the degree of material interest of the author is likely to be higher than in, say, a lyric piece or a comedia written for the popular theater. Nevertheless, a higher degree of political engagement does not necessarily lead to inferior poetry.

Costa e Silva’s argument that festival literature is doomed to obscurity because of the ephemeral nature of the celebratory occasions themselves is best answered by another aspect of the passage cited from Flor. In general terms, with the exception of his assertion about the propagandistic aims of the authors of festival literature, Flor makes an interesting attempt to turn the usual thinking about early modern Iberian political festivals—thinking typified by Costa e Silva—on its head. Flor claims that rather than thinking of the pomp and circumstance of a festival as serving ephemeral political ends, we should think of festivals as substantive occasions which do more than express political ideas. On one hand, festival activity in and of itself actually constitutes politics, rather than representing them. On the other, it also allows for social expression and is an escape valve for social pressures (463). Moreover, given that normal, everyday time is suspended within fiestas, there are some additional consequences that should inform our evaluation of the so-called writer-servants Flor mentions and the texts they composed. If a festival is a time of suspension of the rhythm of the day-to-day, to allow a bit of the eternal or extra-quotidian in, by extension it could also be said that a festival, particularly a political festival, is meant to connect the ephemeral to the eternal. After all, public festivals were meant, at least

3 in part, to reaffirm the mythical location and time of the regime, the Church and the whole of the kingdom.

The purpose of this study

The principal purposes of this study are two-fold: first to expand on the notion of the importance of festival occasions and second to reappraise the significance of the poetry based on those important occasions. If ephemeral fiestas represent an interruption of the everyday with the eternal and mythical, it is only natural that the literature written about festivals can and sometimes does reach beyond the limits of the temporary occasion and the political concerns wrapped up in it to express broader, more interesting ideas. Another way of looking at the purpose of this study is to say my intention is to relate the meanings behind the fleeting, temporary, performative aspects of early modern political festivals, especially their imagery, to the discourses and meanings of the lasting language of the poetic works produced to commemorate such festivals.

I focus my attention on longer poetic works precisely because their purpose is to go beyond those of the standard festival relaciones or prose accounts in a couple of ways. The relaciones are generally limited to recreating the sensory effects of a festival for those not present, or recording them in the form of a relatively simple written token or souvenir for its sponsors and/or honorees (Watanabe-

O'Kelly, Early Modern Festival Book 6). By contrast, though festival epics also aim to memorialize events and usually entail some description, their purposes also include attaining the heft and tone of heroic poetry. Poets generally heighten the dignity and significance of the occasions they write about by connecting the discourses or symbolic elements of celebratory events to larger or broader literary fields of meaning.

The poets considered here tap into a number of discourses, both written and visual, to attain this dignifying effect. Very often, all the poets need do is refer to the symbolism of the festival events themselves, drawing on the design of celebratory occasions, re-presenting it and adding their own

4 interpretation or commentary on its significance. Such symbolism often includes the astral or celestial imagery of the Dantesque school of political allegory, which had been a common ingredient in event design since at least the 15th century. As Teófilo Ruiz has shown, popular romances of chivalry, such as

Amadís de Gaula were another source frequently exploited in festival symbolism. Writers would take advantage of such imagery also, in a creative dialog between the two worlds of fictional invention, the literary imagination and the festival representation.

Another recurrent and useful symbolic resource both for festival organizers and poets was classical mythology. This discourse offered several advantages. First, it was understood no one really believed in classical deities anymore, so comparing political figures to them allowed the poet to suggest the divine qualities of the powerful without straying into blasphemy by comparing human beings to

Christian figures understood to be truly divine. Second, stories from the classical gods and heroes were familiar already to many readers and could be used as a kind of symbolic shorthand to quickly suggest or allude to complex ideas. Moreover, from antiquity itself there was already a centuries-long authorial tradition of adapting or adjusting classical stories to produce new variations in form and meaning, making this imagery a flexible metaphorical language.

It should be noticed there was a complex back-and-forth exchange of traditional fictional imagery, festival representation and festival writing. Festival organizers might take the image of an enchanted castle from a romance of chivalry and build a painted wooden representation of it as the backdrop for a joust, for example. Then, a festival poet could seize on this image and use it to add depth to his account of the affair, by extending its description in a new and original allegorical direction.

Moreover, though festival poets were more or less obliged to at least refer to some important elements of the celebrations they wrote about, they need not limit themselves to close description of the existing imagery. They could and did introduce images and discourse from outside the occasional

5 context. I regard this as the source of the poetic vision that gives festival epics their liveliness and interest.

Historical vision is one of the more prominent of such extra-festive elements. The authors of some of the texts I analyze, particularly the later pieces, Fiestas en la traslacion, by Francisco López de

Zárate, and Castelbranco’s Triumpho del Monarcha introduce a peculiar form of historical discourse that bears some consideration. Mark Thurner has referred to this discourse as “Book of Kings historiography” and explains it is a form of historical summary in which the author typifies and periodizes the flow of past events according to the personalities or characters of a succession of kings or princes (34). I explore the manner in which authors deploy this discourse to dignify their works and expand their contextual horizons. Additional purposes or effects this discourse produces include providing flattering comparisons to the dedicatee of the poem and, once again, raising the profile or importance of the poet by displaying his erudition. In addition, the use of historical examples can be a way to construct a

“mirror of princes,” a text whose purpose is at least partially to instruct the prince on how he should behave, to either live up to or exceed his forebears. Moreover, the focus on historical development is a way of approaching if not nationalist themes, then at the very least a national perspective.

As we will see, another extra-festive element writers might incorporate into their poetry was prophetic discourse. This aspect tended simultaneously to flatter the honoree of a poem and to heighten the importance of the author and his work, of course. It also opened up a temporal door through which the author might extend the scope of his work from the past through the present and into the future.

Above all, the goal of this study is to underline the importance and power of the added poetic value or dimension that selected authors developed through their festival epics. In this dimension, poets combined their reflections on royal occasions with the extra-festive elements I have just described. I call this their poetic vision. It ranges from relatively brief flights of fancy rooted firmly in the concrete

6 imagery of festive occasions to full-fledged dream sequences in which the author mixes widely disparate discourses, from the sacred and the celestial to the historical and profane.

An examination of this kind of festival writing makes clear there is often much more to occasional poetry than an escritor-criado’s simple flattery. In fact, there is more to them than merely recounting festival activity in a way that is pleasing to their sponsors. If the political needs and desires of sponsors always establish boundaries that the poet cannot exceed, within those boundaries there is substantial room for maneuver and poets can and do in fact write not only to please the political figures of the day, but also to please festival audiences in general—which varied considerably, depending on the occasion. Finally, and not insignificantly, the authors also write to please themselves.

As I examine festival literature with the general purpose of reconsidering this neglected subgenre in mind, I also intend to advance inquiry in a couple of related areas. In recent years, there has been something of a resurgence in interest in panegyric or encomiastic literature, like Góngora’s

Panegírico al duque de Lerma, which has been examined at length by authors of various articles collected by Juan Matas Caballero and his colleagues in their El duque de Lerma: Poder y literatura en el

Siglo de Oro (2011). For all the reasons just summarized, festival epics are intimately associated with panegyric literature and an examination of this peculiar subgenre will cast some light on Golden Age encomium generally. In addition, since these poems take the epic form, this study also has something to say about early modern heroic poetry in Spain.

My approach

Since my goal is essentially to interpret the meanings of three great political festivals and their literature, I naturally start with a couple of hermeneutic lines of inquiry. To begin with, I take a careful look at the historical context that helped shape three great political fiestas and their overall thematic trends. Naturally, this leads directly into the question of the more specific meanings of the different performative activities making up these royal festivals—at least for the elite audiences involved. As a

7 result, it could be said I take a new historicist approach to interpreting these texts, whether performed or composed, which is to say I elucidate them by examining the historical context in which each was produced. I also take some time to discuss the purpose and parameters of the introduction of novel or fresh material into what were perennial patterns.

Also important for my purposes is the relationship between the interests of patrons and/or festival organizers and those of the author. What additional or discrepant messages beyond the limits of mere propaganda could and did poets inscribe in their more imaginative works?

In order to begin to formulate an answer to that question, I first have to develop some background on the general importance, composition and meaning of the kind of festivals I have in mind, elite, festivals of political celebration.1 I refer almost entirely to events designed and carried out to make public celebrations of the movements of and notable events in the lives of important personages in or around the royal family, including marriages or state functions.2 These occasions might last anywhere

from several days to many months and include a number of distinct spectacular component activities.

Such components might be processions, martial displays such as jousts, masques, masses and/or plays.

This brief list is by no means exhaustive. Festivals for state visits often included political ceremonies of various kinds, including the surrender of the keys to a city and their return to local authorities, a review of triumphal arches or other ephemeral architecture erected for the occasion, or even formal sessions of governmental bodies. It must be noted, however, that the character of public festivals was almost always mixed and their components did not necessarily vary strictly in accordance with the type of occasion being celebrated. Corpus Christi, for example, although essentially religious in nature, was also a political event, especially in the post-Tridentine era. Apart from the participation of political notables

1 Though they are not without interest, I exclude funerary occasions. 2 According to Teófilo Ruiz’ typology these are “noncalendrical” festivals. Ruiz’ definition of the category is especially useful for my purposes, as it includes occasions of royal entries or visits, events pertaining to the life cycle of the royal family (or, by extension, other great noble families) and religious celebrations not related to the regular liturgical calendar. There will be much more to say about festival typologies in Chapter 1.

8 at all levels, it also included many of the same elements as civil festivals (Arellano 197-201). Some elements, such as bullfights, were common no matter what the cause for or type of celebration. These similarities between different types of festivals point to what Fernando de la Flor has called the, “sacro- political” nature of such events (457).

Inasmuch as the festival activities are affairs in which one or several sectors of society and/or their representatives participate in public representations of one kind or another, they must be considered performative. I use this term in the same way as anthropologist Victor Turner does: to designate both theatrical and para-theatrical social drama in which social groups set aside a special liminal space, defined as connected to but outside the normal, everyday world, and then act out pressing social concerns. This way of looking at festival activity leads, once again, to the interpretation of celebratory games and other activities as episodes whose meaning must be unpacked through the careful consideration of their surrounding circumstances.

I then follow with an examination of the lives, works and literary environments of prominent authors of festival epics. Finally, I engage in a hermeneutic interpretation of the poem within these broader contextual arenas. This includes a look at the relationships between the poetic themes and

those of the larger festival environment.

Felipe III and his royal festivals

One reason to focus on the reign of Felipe III of Spain is that this king earned a reputation as a

particularly passionate lover of visual spectacle, including state festivals on an unprecedented scale for

his time. His predecessors Carlos V and Felipe II had assiduously developed the tradition of public

festivals to present and re-present themselves in politically favorable lights long before Felipe III was

born (Ruiz). Still, during Felipe III’s reign the tradition of political festivals became even more elaborate.

In fact, Felipe’s valido (favorite and chief minister), the Duke of Lerma, was well aware of Felipe’s

9 predilection and made sure to provide a constant stream of such entertainments in order to cement his close relationship with the king and through it his hold on power (Bouza Álvarez 115).

There are more reasons to focus especially on Felipe III’s reign for an examination of festival literature. Like his father, Felipe III ruled over the most extensive collection of crowns—or composite monarchy—in Spanish history, dying in 1621 just before the political and economic decline of Spain would start to become manifest in more concrete ways. Felipe III’s administration still exerted effective control over Catalonia, which would attempt to break away under his successor, Felipe IV, in 1638, and

Portugal, which initiated its ultimately successful War of Restoration in 1640.

At the same time, it was becoming increasingly obvious that the Spanish Empire was under serious strain. Felipe III was forced to face budgetary limitations early and often in his reign. Felipe II had essentially left his son with empty state coffers and a combination of limited revenue streams and profligate spending meant the government’s ability to exert itself forcefully was limited throughout El

Pío’s years as head of state. This led the King and his advisors to a more peace-loving strategy than might have otherwise suited the regime. The long truce with England and the rebels in Flanders was as much a measure of Spain’s limited ability to exercise its hegemony as its benignity.

In his class-based analysis, José Antonio Maravall argues convincingly that the increased emphasis on the development of spectacular entertainments, like elaborate festivals, was to a large extent a propagandistic strategy designed to distract both the elite and the masses from the increasing hollowness of the Spanish hegemonic image of power and glory (Cultura del barroco). I would add to that the notion that the virtual world of celebration also offered a compensatory dimension to life in which festival participants could live out dreams of triumph and glory that were not attainable in everyday life. It may be this is one reason why political festivals were so important to Felipe III and his valido: spectacular celebrations were a way to live a more gratifying, idealized existence than was readily available in the day-to-day arena of earthly politics.

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Aside from that, celebratory events were also a field of competition where different subgroups could represent themselves in an idealized version of society and vie with one another for different kinds of honors, including political ones.

Festivals also had other important political properties during this period. A number of historians have written on the power of spectacle to form and propagate the royal image, spread propaganda and reinforce the monarchy.3 This strategy was important for and employed in the context of what Sir John

Elliott has called the composite monarchy of 17th-century Spain (A Europe of Composite Monarchies).

This is to say that in practical terms the Spanish empire the Habsburgs ruled was a loosely-knit collection of separate kingdoms. In legal terms, they were effectively united only, as if accidentally, through the person of the king. The king, of course, belonged to all his subjects, all his kingdoms, at least morally. But in practice, Felipe III was a permanent resident of Castile and was generally regarded as such in his other dominions. This led to the political problem of his presence in and his ability to supervise, demand allegiance or exert effective control in each of the other constituent “Spains” of the Empire. From the perspective of the crown, festivals were especially important because they made the king present both materially (at least in Europe) and symbolically.

Festivals were also important, as I will attempt to show, from the perspective of the king’s subjects, too, as his presence during great occasions gave locals, including poets and their sponsors, a chance to communicate their concerns to him. This transmission of messages might happen formally, as for example when the Portuguese Cortes exchanged oaths of fealty with Felipe III in 1619, or informally through the messages encoded directly and indirectly in festival books, including poetic works. Even where no evident or deliberate message can be perceived, however, as we will see, it was still an important advantage for locals to be able to establish themselves, even if only temporarily, as the center of the Spanish world by hosting—and being seen to host—their sovereign during a visit.

3 See, for example, Roy Strong’s Art and Power: Renaissance Festivals 1450-1650 (1973), Fernando Bouza’s “Retórica da imagem real” (1989) and Francesc Massip Bonet’s La monarquía en escena (2003).

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Festival epics

Felipe III’s reign seems to have been an especially important period for the composition of

substantial poetic works dedicated to public festivals. Lots of prose accounts or relaciones were

produced both before and after Felipe III’s reign, and innumerable shorter, less-extensive poetic works

as well. But ambitious, heroic poems devoted to festivals were more notable during Felipe III’s reign

than either before or after.

As Ruiz has shown, festivals were not merely locations for the recreation and transmission of

princely propaganda; they were also “places of contestation between political forces within the realm”

(36). I examine festival literature in the same light. It must be conceded that contestation of the powers that be is much harder to do in print than in the less-restrained Bakhtinian environment of popular celebration. Given increasingly effective and extensive use of censorship of during the period, it was easier to identify and proscribe controversial material in print or on the stage than it was in the street.

Nevertheless, as I have already suggested, poets could and did seek to do more than just toe the official line and they found several ways of doing so. To the extent they did set out to invest their poetry with their own vision or ideas, we can consider festival poetry a kind of dialog.

Poets always had to select the specific elements of or material on the occasions they wrote about; they need not and indeed often could not represent every triumphal arch with the same level of detail and interest. Selective description, then, could be said to be the first level of artistic license a poet might take.

On another level, the gift of adulation, like religious devotion, was a kind of Maussian gift, which is to say it implied a beneficent response from the power (or divinity) to whom it was offered. Giving loyalty to the king was to enter into a compact by which the poet offered allegiance in exchange for the great man’s “grace” or promise to exercise his authority well (Curcio-Nagy 21). One way in which the ambivalence of the festival exchange becomes evident in festival poetry, then, is in the poet’s play for

12 royal favor. As an example, several authors have noted Félix Lope de Vega seems to have been using his artfulness in Fiestas de Denia as part of an ultimately unsuccessful campaign to acquire a court position as official chronicler.4

Another strategy poets employed for adapting their works to their own agendas was simply to

shift their focus to interests other than those of the noble patron. As part of this process, I explore the

extent to which poets can be said to be reinscribing their imagery, even in ways that tended towards

partial diversion of royal or other official messages. The most outstanding example is the way

Castelbranco redirects his poetic vision in a way calculated to express and heighten Portuguese

nationalist sentiment, despite the work’s supposed purpose of celebrating Felipe III on his visit to Lisbon.

Ultimately, the poet does celebrate Felipe himself, but in a way that celebrates Portugal and the

Portuguese more than it does the King and Spain. The triumph offered to Philip III is meant to perform loyalty only on the most superficial level. It is also meant to represent, or rather to perform, Portuguese claims to national sovereignty, reassert claims of legal limitations on the king's power, assert exceptionalism, and draw the king's attention and favor in response, both in general and material terms.

Castelbranco’s work serves as a means of introducing outside images and material with elements of the festival itself thereby forging a cohesive Portuguese vision which is recorded for posterity in the eternal language of poetry.

General outlines of the study

I begin with a brief exploration of the early modern political festival as an important institution with both expressive and consequential interactive social consequences. This examination includes attention to the various elements most typical of public festivals in the period between the 1400 and

1600—from bullfights to fireworks. I then look into the relationships between the festivals themselves and the kinds of imagery or messages commonly associated with them through time. Since I approach

4 For more, see Elizabeth Wright’s Pilgrimage to Patronage (2001). See also Maria Grazia Profeti’s introduction to the Fiestas de Denia (2004) and Marcella Trambaioli’s “Las dobles bodas reales de 1599” (2007).

13 festivals as particularly complex, even “totalizing” cultural texts, I make an effort to point out a variety of ways festival organizers used similar symbols to express different ideas through time, distinguishing between the specific meanings each organizer had in mind when using commonplace images or language (Díez Borque 225).

While establishing some of the more important constant aspects of the developing symbolic tradition, I also examine the role that innovation played in royal festivals. The artists and writers who collaborated on the development of the occasions and represented them in writing were, of course, trying to cast their subjects in a kind of eternal role and show how he embodied a traditional hero. But at the same time, they knew their work would be better received if they could show their patrons and their audiences that the specific instance of the occasion was particularly important and their protagonist(s) were unique in their perfections. Authors also attempted to promote themselves and set themselves apart from courtly competitors through the quality of their own work.

In Chapter 2, I first set the stage with a careful examination of the political context and significance of the long, elaborate series of celebratory events of 1598-1599, when Spain and its allies celebrated both the accession of the new King, Felipe III, and his wedding to Margarita of Austria. I am interested not just in the general political setting, but also the somewhat narrower context for the various groups of the elite that collaborated to produce the extravagant fiestas in the eastern realms of the Peninsula, especially in Valencia and in Denia, coastal seat of the rising Francisco de Sandoval y

Rojas.

I then consider two long poetic works written to commemorate these events. The first, Gaspar

Aguilar’s Fiestas nupciales que la ciudad y reino de Valencia han hecho al casamiento del rey don Felipe

III con doña Margarita de Austria, was dedicated to the author’s patron, the Viscount of Chelva. It is a not untypical account the author admits was originally intended to be a prose relación. This becomes clear in its later cantos, when the poetry loses most of its higher-sounding language and purpose.

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Nevertheless, the first part of the poem follows some of what was by this time established convention from classical models, such as the invocation of the muses and the mixture of classical and other allegorical characters into the action. This kind of mechanism will also become evident in other works in this study. Then, Aguilar composes a long verse account of the games associated with the festivals, lavishing particular detail on the martial prowess of his patron and his patron’s peers.

The second text I will analyze in this chapter is Félix Lope de Vega’s Fiestas de Denia, in which he covers part of the same material as Aguilar. The text includes some of these same elements that

Aguilar’s does, but as might be expected from a poet of Lope’s caliber, his poetry is far more fluid and lucid and the work is altogether much more ambitious (and successful) than Aguilar’s. I note some of the specific ways Lope seems to be using his panegyric talents in this text to angle for high influence at court. He dedicates it to Catalina de Zúñiga, vicereine of Naples and sister of the aforementioned

Francisco de Sandoval y Rojas, Felipe’s valido, who would soon become Duke of Lerma. In addition to the usual epic elements, with which he represents the king and other men and their festive activities, he also introduces a dreamlike, amatory discourse, which he tends to deploy when representing the ladies of the court. Lope’s rhetorical strategies, though aimed at his own political advancement, also show that authors could and did take such occasional poems seriously and apply their artistic abilities to them and that even poetry whose political purpose was more or less mundane could nevertheless take wing and add something more to an occasion than simple rhymed narration.

Then, in Chapter 3, I turn to the splendid celebrations centered on the rededication of the

Collegial Church of San Pedro, in Francisco de Sandoval y Rojas’ ducal seat of Lerma. This occasion coincided with the period of the Duke’s most feverish pursuit of a cardinalate, which Sandoval intended to be the capstone and a sort of retirement plan leaving him a suitable position when he retired from politics. Despite the putatively religious nature of the affair, as we will see, the festival and its events

15 make more sense when considered a kind of festive exclamation point placed at the end of the Duke of

Lerma’s long dominion over Spanish political life.

After a careful look at the performative events sponsored by the Duke and his friends and family on this remarkably opulent occasion, I turn to a consideration of Francisco López de Zárate’s Fiestas en la traslacion del Santissimo Sacramento. This piece is interesting for several reasons. First, the author begins his poem with an extraordinarily long allegorical / cosmological vision or dream sequence with

Spanish imperialist overtones not immediately obvious in other poems of this type. Second, the cosmological or mythological introduction leads into remarkable extended descriptions of the ephemeral displays of the festival, including its fireworks and comedias. These passages are integrated into the narration in such a way as to link the celebrations to external cosmological and/or mythological discourses with political and philosophical implications. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the poem is Zárate’s use of passages on performative events to subtly call the significance of earthly life into question. Given the poet’s connections to the Duke of Lerma’s regime, his tendency to gently undermine the significance of political glory is especially intriguing.

Finally, in the fourth and last chapter, I turn to a consideration of Castelbranco’s Triumpho del

Monarcha, written in celebration of Felipe III’s much anticipated and long delayed state visit to his

Portuguese dominions in 1619. In general terms, I show how Portuguese national sentiment permeated the environment in which the celebrations were conceived and carried out. Many of the events and much of the imagery of the occasion were similar to other Iberian entries in the specific ways the glorified Felipe III. However, they were motivated less by delight in the Felipe’s qualities as a ruler than happiness to at last have the sovereign on Portuguese soil after a long absence.

This nationalist context and Portuguese literary currents of the era deeply affect the way

Castelbranco’s poem is written and how it should be interpreted. The poet’s selection and use of patriotic historical and celestial discourses are quite distinct for these and other reasons. Though the

16 festival was intended to celebrate the king’s arrival, much of the material Castelbranco presents is aimed at glorifying the Lusitanian kingdom and its people, especially the local elite. In this, Triumpho del

Monarcha is not unique: similar rhetorical movements are notable in previous festival pieces as well.

Nor is it out of the ordinary that Castelbranco essentially treats Felipe III as a demigod. His use of an initial dream sequence and other fanciful poetic departures from the day-to-day world are not far removed from Zárate’s techniques, either. What is more remarkable is that the Portuguese poet makes a rhetorical maneuver which could be described not as subversive, but somewhat perverse: he appropriates the figure of the King for Portugal and goes on to represent the festival of the King’s entry into Lisbon in 1619 as a full-throated expression of Portuguese nationalist passion.

As we will see, Castelbranco’s redirection of celebratory energies from praise of the king to glorification of the nation is just one of the more evident departures from the propagandistic norms that poets of Felipe III’s Spain can and do make in their festival epics. Again, the authors studied here do not set out to oppose or detract from the official powers of the day. However, in general they devote too much poetic talent to their works to be satisfied with a simple paean to the powers that be or a flat narration of the events they are called upon to describe. They invest considerable invention or poetic vision into their works and the results make for surprisingly rewarding reading, even centuries after the memory of the specific occasions they wrote for have faded away.

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Chapter 1 The development of the Spanish royal festival and its imagery

The politics, forms and functions of royal festivals

The general object of this study is deceptively easy to specify: occasional poetry in the octava

real form published to commemorate major royal festivals in the era of Felipe III (r. 1598-1621). There is a rather small corpus of these longer, substantial poems, most of which are either epic in form or have significant epic elements. The term “epic poetry” is not entirely unproblematic, and further below I will have more to say about it. However, the notion of a royal festival as an operative concept is much more complicated, so I will focus first on establishing its general outline as a social institution in Spain, its forms, characteristics and fields of meaning. Royal festivals in Spain were already somewhat complex in the late medieval period, when written records of festivals first began to turn up and to become more elaborate. But the notion became particularly complicated by the time of Felipe’s accession. Moreover, it would be fair to say that participation in and/or observation of festive events of many kinds, which were held for many reasons, was no small part of Felipe III’s exercise of kingly power and duty, from the beginning of his reign until his death.

If political festivals were already complex in the 15th century, by the mannerist and baroque eras

of the 17th century, they had become so elaborate that it is difficult for a modern scholar of the phenomenon to define a festival by its function, component parts, what day it falls on, its religious character (or lack thereof) or by the name it is commonly given. A pair of brief examples should suffice to make this point. In the next chapter, I will maintain that Felipe and his sister’s double-wedding feast in the kingdom of Valencia (1598-1599) was not so much a private rite of passage as an international, political one. Given the dynastic implications of marriage in the age of rising princely absolutism, it may perhaps require no great stretch of the imagination to consider this royal wedding a political event. But in chapter three I will also argue that celebration of the Translation of the Holy Sacrament to the main

18 church (Iglesia Mayor) of Lerma, also known as the “Fiestas de Lerma” (1617), can only really be understood not in religious terms, but rather as a political occasion. In fact, the liturgical aspect of this event, although obviously present, goes almost entirely unmentioned, even by those pious Christian participants who write about it, such as Francisco López de Zárate.

Though a number of scholars have made helpful attempts to classify royal festivals by their components, purposes or dates of observance, the usefulness of all these typologies is limited. To be sure, each author defines the parameters of his inquiry according to his or her own particular interests, thereby limiting the application of any taxonomy. Beyond that, however, the complexity of the rich tangle of political, religious, cosmological and personal symbols and messages incorporated into early modern festivals also makes it difficult to establish a simple principle or set of criteria for categorizing them. Another dimension is the profusion of festival events. The steady increase in published written accounts makes it seem that festivals grow in number exponentially from about 1400. When faced with such an embarrassment of riches, anyone seeking to categorize events must almost inevitably select just a significant few as determined by somewhat arbitrary criteria. Despite the limited applicability of any of these categorization schemes, it may be useful to examine a few examples in order to give an outline of the dimensions of the problem.

In his La monarquía en escena, Francesc Massip Bonet attempts to classify the festivals he is most interested in, those marking royal entries into cities, by the specific symbolic motifs present in some of their component activities. For example, he argues (convincingly) that other authors have exaggerated the humanistic or renaissance character of the triumph organized to welcome Alfonso V of

Aragon into Naples in 1443 (93). Massip points out that if one considers the type of carriage the hero rode on in the procession and his representation as an Arthurian hero in one of the entremeses staged for the event, among other things, features of a long-established medieval tradition are actually more prominent than any classicist elements (95-6). As far as it goes, Massip’s analysis is perfectly effective.

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But it is not clear how it might be applied to other occasions outside the official royal entries he focuses on because Massip has, in general terms, excluded other kinds of festivals. His omission, for example, of material from Corpus Christi festivals is not based on symbolic content; in fact oftentimes the only things differentiating Corpus processions from royal entry processions are the details of order and precedence. In Spain, especially in the Counter-Reformation period, publicly celebrating Corpus— highlighting, as it did, the importance of transubstantiation—was central to establishing the kingdom’s

Catholic bona fides. Furthermore, since the monarchy’s presentation of its own legitimacy was deliberately associated with that of the Roman Church, the royal family often participated in Corpus processions in order to show its devotion and, perhaps, to suggest a semi-divine status. As a result,

Corpus could be said to be almost as political as a royal entry. Given that, Massip’s decision to use elements of content as a method of categorization, while defensible, must be seen as somewhat arbitrary since it can only work if he leaves out events of a similar order.

José Manuel Nieto Soria’s scheme for classifying ceremonial events is clearer and more rigorous—he organizes his work by specific royal functions that might or might not be part of an overarching festival framework.1 Nieto does consider events like royal weddings and the ritual

pageantry of royal entries, but narrows his focus to specific political practices which amount to what one

could describe as structural-functional generalities. He outlines or summarizes the political effect of

entries as propagandistic efforts to legitimize this or that ruler, but he does not describe any specific

entry in great detail and only rarely attempts to interpret the symbolism of specific elements of any

particular occasion. As an example of the political uses of ceremony, Nieto refers to the way Enrique IV

arranged a royal entry into Zamora for his daughter Juana during the rebellion of the nobles in 1465. He

even mentions that she was escorted into the city under the royal palio in order to reinforce her status

1 He also, very sensibly, narrows the scope of his study geographically and chronologically to Trastamaran Castile.

20 as legitimate heir to the throne (124).2 But this is the only detail for which the author provides a political context and interpretation.3 Moreover, looking in a very general way at ceremonial practices rather than festival occasions as a whole seems to exclude hermeneutic depth from Nieto’s analysis. Though juramentos (the ritual swearing of fealty) or audiencias reales (occasions in which the king presided over judicial proceedings) could be and were in fact included amongst many other components of royal festivals, again, Nieto’s functionalist treatment of these political events provides little in the way of deeper political exegesis of any specific event, nor even the full range of possible variations in meaning.

In the same way, while Nieto does mention the fact that entries were an opportunity for other political actors to enter into dialogue with the sovereign, he offers no examples of the political perspective of participants other than royalty (132).

For his part, Teófilo Ruiz divides medieval and early modern Spanish festivals into two broad

categories: calendrical and non-calendrical (A King Travels 36-7). Calendrical festivals correspond largely

to the liturgical calendar and include regular festive cycles like Advent-Christmas-Epiphany and Carnival-

Lent-Easter. Notable birthday celebrations, like the king’s, might also be included in this category. Non-

calendrical festivals include any celebration not tied necessarily to any particular day, such as a royal

wedding, the beatification of a local saint or a military victory. The advantage of this system of typology

is that it is all-inclusive; there is almost no festivity that cannot be conceived of as either calendrical or

not. I say “almost” because, in fact, it is possible to conceive of events—even many of them—that are

both calendrical and non-calendrical. Ruiz himself discusses one such occasion at length when he lays

out his system: Felipe II’s visit to Tortosa over the Christmas season of 1585-86 (37-46). As the king’s

2 The palio was a kind of canopy, usually made of a brocade or other rich material, raised on poles and carried over the king’s head during a procession. It might also be raised over the host or other holy relics or figures on some occasions. 3 Nieto makes no mention, either, of the rebel nobles’ attempt to stage a countervailing royal ceremony that same year, the Farce of Ávila, in which an effigy of Enrique IV was dethroned and his crown offered to his brother, Alfonso. This episode underlines the potential symbolic power of political ceremony (or at least its intended power) and its extension into political theater, in a broader sense. For a deeper examination of this episode, see Angus Mackay’s “Ritual and Propaganda” (1985).

21 entry coincided with the yuletide season the city authorities mixed elements of the traditional annual religious and civic festivities—masses and a representation of the battle to reconquer the city from the

Moors—with others usually reserved for special political occasions, such as a procession of river barges and nautical jousting (46).

If I suggest there are a lot of festivals that do not fit neatly into either of Ruiz’ extremely broad categories, like Christmas in Tortosa in 1585, it is not to dismiss Ruiz’ typology altogether; his system is certainly no more questionable than any other. Moreover, it may be the most successful to the extent that it is the least restrictive. In allowing the broadest, most flexible possible categories, Ruiz’ typology errs the least by minimizing attempts to shoehorn extremely complex cultural phenomena into taxonomical pigeonholes. Ruiz recognizes quite openly that it may be impossible to adequately reduce festivals to a traceable, categorized sequence of discreet types of events with readily identifiable purposes and messages. Rather, he characterizes festivals as, “complicated and unpredictable performances open to a multiplicity of readings” (8).

Though he does not cite Marcel Mauss on this point, Ruiz seems to recognize that medieval and early modern Spanish royal festivals are total social facts, as defined by the French sociologist in his celebrated study of the institution of gift-giving and its social implications, The Gift.4 The standard rendering of the French “fait” as the English “fact” is a little unfortunate; though “fait” does have a meaning similar to common use of the English “fact”, Mauss uses the word in a sociological context to mean a “construct” or “phenomenon”. The qualifier “total” designates occasions that “involve the totality of society and its institutions”; including its, “juridical, economic, religious, and even aesthetic” aspects in one complex social institution. Mauss also points out that the total social fact is “political and domestic at the same time” (78). To put it another way, what he is really referring to are not mere facts, but complex convergences or configurations of social institutions and practices which are united in an

4 Massip does cite Mauss on total social facts in passing (Monarquía en escena 23), but does not develop the idea at length.

22 event or series of events given order and meaning by social custom, such as the exchange of gifts and contractual relationships.

Mauss develops the concept of total social fact in connection with Native American and other

“primitive” ethnic groups, but asserts that it can be applied even better to, “the festival-cum-market of the Indo-European world” (79). Though the market characteristics generally do not fall within the scope of this study, even the most superficial examination of Spanish royal festivals shows they can indeed be considered total social facts on every level mentioned by Mauss. No single element or component of a royal festival can be said to involve every participant in every festival the same way. Yet these events and all their components weave strands of virtually all the social institutions of the era into a network that takes in masses of people, directly and indirectly.

This can be seen very clearly in one of the examples mentioned above, the double royal wedding of 1598-1599 involving Felipe III, his bride Margarita of Austria, his sister Isabel Clara Eugenia and her husband, Archduke Albert of Austria. The wedding mass itself took place by proxy in November of 1598 in Ferrara, Italy, through which Margarita and Albert were passing on their way to join their spouses in Spain. To confirm the unions, wedding masses were repeated in Valencia months later, where all the contracting parties were physically present together. There were many other celebrations presented not just to Margarita and Albert, but also to Felipe and Isabel along their separate paths to and through the various realms, towns and cities in Spain and Italy. Obviously, the wedding ceremonies themselves, inherently both civil and religious affairs, changed family or “domestic” relationships between the brides and grooms. They also had a political dimension, cementing the political alliance between the Spanish and Austrian branches of the House of Habsburg. The festive events surrounding the wedding had other political consequences as well: they were organized by the Marqués de Denia,

Francisco de Sandoval y Rojas, and their success helped him solidify his position as the monarch’s favorite and chief minister. The festival may also have contributed to Felipe’s decision to make Rojas

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Duke of Lerma (I will refer to him as such from now on). The series of celebrations involved travel to numerous sites within the kingdom and also served as pretexts for ritual, legal exchanges between

Felipe and his Valencian subjects in which Felipe recognized local rights or fueros in exchange for

expressions of loyalty, both solemn and ludic.

In fact, we could say that the dimensions of the festival when taken as a whole extended far

beyond Spain’s borders. Margarita’s travel through Italy was no less politically significant than Felipe’s

progress through Spain; as Felipe’s wife-to-be, where and how she was received in Italy reflected on

Spain’s relationships with Italian political figures of the day. None of those figures was more important than Pope Clement VIII, who officiated the royal proxy weddings at Ferrara. Clement had retaken direct rule of the papal fief of Ferrara from the d’Este family less than a year before Margarita’s arrival. This

“devolution” of Ferrara to the Papal States was not uncontroversial; in fact, it was contrary to both

Spanish and Austrian interests. In principle, the previous rulers of Ferrara had the moral backing of both the Habsburg sovereigns. Had they chosen to, both Spain and Austria could well have gone to war with

Clement and his allies (especially France) over the issue (Mitchell 21).5 In this context, then, the fact that

Clement administered the oaths at the ceremonies in Ferrara can be interpreted as more than just a special papal blessing or honor offered to the Habsburgs—it also signals Spain’s and Austria’s explicit recognition of papal rule in Ferrara.6

A look at Maussian gifts of the festival events provides a simple way of illustrating the economic

aspect of the festival as a total social fact. Some of the more symbolic gifts offered to the king in 1598-

99 clearly fell into the realm of the aesthetic, such as triumphal arches and other ephemeral artistic

5 The real risk of Spanish intervention may have been limited for several reasons. Clement led the negotiations by which France and Spain signed the Peace of Vervins in May of 1598. Bonner Mitchell says that Felipe II was, “ill- informed” and was not eager for a confrontation anyway (21). Mitchell does not explain why or how Felipe II was badly counseled, but if he were already invested in ongoing talks with France, it seems unlikely “el rey prudente” would lurch into an expensive Italian imbroglio that would upset or possibly ruin them. Moreover, by midsummer of the same year Felipe must have been at least partially incapacitated by the illness that would end his life in mid- September. 6 Clement also honored Margarita by awarding her the prestigious Golden Rose after the wedding.

24 works.7 Yet if their symbolic value could not be reduced to figures, the costs of their construction could, and the various authors of the many accounts (relaciones) describing the festival often spell out the enormous economic resources dedicated to the celebrations in monetary terms.

If royal festivals, when examined as total social facts, can be regarded as multifaceted, intricate and having far-reaching implications for multiple elements in society, this observation leads to another question about the nature of festive occasions, or rather another way of looking at them: what purpose or function(s) do they serve?

The more obvious reasons for celebrating are no less relevant for being unsubtle. Regular liturgical events like Easter could no more go unobserved than could significant rites of passage like a royal wedding. Yet, they need not be celebrated as splendidly as they were during Felipe III’s reign—and in fact had not been so elaborate previously. As Ruiz puts it, “the late Middle Ages and the early modern period saw an exponential increase in the number of festivals, in their complexity, and in the amount of display and solemnity attached to them” (A King Travels 52). So perhaps a better question about the purpose of elaborate festivals would be: why did early modern Spain devote enormous resources and incorporate so many disparate people, both individuals and groups, into such extravagant celebratory events?

Certainly it would not be entirely unreasonable to hypothesize that the development of elaborate occasions corresponded to popular tastes: the more splendorous a festive occasion, the more entertaining and therefore attractive it was. Referring primarily to the upper classes, Ruiz points out that feasts and other celebrations, “provided a welcome refuge from the social chaos and carnage of late medieval and early modern warfare” (A King Travels 53). They also allowed a happy escape from the

7 The central observation Mauss makes on gifts is generally held to be that gifts are rarely truly free; rather, they typically bind the receiver of the gift to the giver in a web of social obligations. The obligation to repay a gift may be informal or more regimented, expected in kind or, more often, asymmetrical.

25 sheer drudgery of ordinary existence for all classes, especially the common folk. On the simplest of levels, the sponsors of big events often provided free food and drink to the people, among other things.

Maravall’s seminal work on the culture of the baroque era takes the idea of entertainment as a

point of departure but he extends and deepens it, going beyond the superficial notion that festivals are

mere fun to argue for a political interpretation of artistic expression in general. For him, the purpose of

festivals was not so much to entertain the people of the early modern era as to distract them from the

crisis of Golden-Age Spanish society. According to Maravall, the astonishing novelty and brilliance of

celebrations made them “un divertimiento que aturde a los que mandan y a los que obedecen y que a

éstos hace creer y a los otros les crea la ilusión de que aún queda riqueza y poder” (487). Further,

Maravall maintains that festivals and other spectacles, such as theatrical events, were more or less

deliberately promoted amongst—if not foisted upon—the masses by the upper classes in order to

secure their attachment to a deeply conservative, aristocratic regime whose interests were in fact

diametrically opposed to those of the people. Extravagant spectacles allowed the dominant classes to

use every “resorte de eficaz acción psicológica” (468) to convince the lowborn that “la potestad divina y

la potestad civil que amparaba y honraba a la primera en la tierra quedaban parejamente sublimadas”

(484).

It would be difficult to argue against the notion that the rich and powerful, especially the Royal

House, took advantage of baroque spectacle—both actively and passively—to further their own propagandistic aims. The king and his advisors could and did expect local notables all over Spain to bend over backwards and spend a lot of money to welcome, lodge, entertain and sing the glories of the court whenever it visited. And the authorities, of course, were always poised to censor or punish any lèse- majesté they might encounter. Nevertheless, recent scholarship has attempted to show the phenomena in question to be more complicated than Maravall suggests. As J.H. Elliott, has noted, “recent historical writing… has been less impressed by the effectiveness of monarchical power in early modern Europe

26 than by its limitations”, and has “cast doubt on what was previously taken for granted: the transforming power of the state” (Power and Propaganda in the Spain of Philip IV 145).8

For one thing, I would argue it is not safe to assume, as Maravall seems to do, that the upper

(and middle) classes in Spain were always united and harmonious in their interests. Their propagandistic maneuvers were not necessarily always aimed at the downtrodden masses, nor is it safe to assume they were working towards the same political goals. On the contrary, the specific interests of each party to the total social fact varied considerably, of course, and tended to inform their contributions to and mode of taking part in royal spectacles. For example, to celebrate Felipe III’s arrival in Lisbon in 1619, the guild of painters of Lisbon sponsored a triumphal arch proudly touting painting as the “queen of arts” (Figure 1.1). Meanwhile, the German merchants of the city commissioned not only a triumphal arch but also dozens of temporary statues to celebrate the historical glories of the Holy Roman Empire.

Each display did contain flattering images of the King, of course—the painters represented him posing for a portrait and the German merchants made references to his dynastic connection to the Empire. But royal propaganda was a decidedly lower priority than promotion of their own organizations and memberships; by far the more notable images and textual references, both in quantitative and artistic terms are those dedicated to painters and Germans. All this is to say nothing of the outright contrariness, if not resistance, exhibited by some local authorities when negotiating with the crown to arrange festivities for a royal visit of one kind or another. Ruiz discusses several such occasions connected with Felipe II’s rather unhappy visit to the Crown of Aragon in 1585-1586, where he was often received with underwhelming enthusiasm, especially by municipal authorities jealous of traditional Aragonese privileges and suspicious of Castilian domination (A King Travels 152).

There is another reason Fernando R. de la Flor has argued it is a mistake to conceive early modern festivals only as entertainments, or as he aptly puts it, to reduce one’s analysis of festive

8 The emphasis is Elliott’s. It should be noted that in the article where he makes this statement, Elliott goes on to argue it is important not to underestimate the manipulative powers of the early modern state, either.

27 occasions to the simplistic formula, “el rey se divierte; también se divierte el pueblo” (464). There is little reason to believe the “masses”, as Maravall calls them, were any more uniform or harmonious as a class than their social betters, nor that they would all understand and interpret festival imagery and messages the same way. More importantly, it is unlikely they all passively absorbed any message offered to them.

While it may not be unfair to presume the non-aristocratic public generally did enjoy the spectacle and diversion of festival occasions, it is not safe to assume the public was all uniformly taken in by or prepared to swallow the propagandistic pabulum it was dished out, however well-presented it may have been. Since the overwhelming majority of simple folk was not in a position to produce or publish its reaction to official culture, scholars of our time have little direct access to how different subgroups of the commoners responded. Nevertheless, the simple fact that Spaniards of the early modern era lived hundreds of years ago is no justification for supposing they were all any less critical in their appreciation of propaganda than they are today. Society and media surely have gone through revolutionary changes since the 17th century, but it does not follow that the human mind has passed through a constant

process of evolution leading to a leap in the power of critical faculties. One need look no further than

the popularity of Cervantes’ brilliant parody of the common conventions of chivalric discourse in Don

Quijote or the subversive cynicism of Lazarillo de Tormes and other picaresque works to see that at least a small portion of the early modern public was too self-aware or skeptical to fall blindly into the traps of royal or any other propagandists.

If it is too simplistic to conceive of the purpose of early modern spectacle to the transmission of elite propaganda, we are left to discover a more satisfying explanation. Fernando de la Flor offers a helpful perspective when he states that, “el espectáculo demanda su reconstrucción inquisitiva, y nunca la aceptación pasiva de sus efectos imaginarios. El rito, la ceremonia, el fasto, 'produce' lo político, no es expresión de aquél. Lo hace por las vías de la creación y de la ilustración de lo que antes de ello no existe, el investimiento [sic] lo es en acciones que tienen como tiempo único aquél de su realización"

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(461). This approach is useful in two ways. First, it shifts the focus to the idea that festivals are political not only in terms of messaging but also in a substantive and dynamic way. Not only do early modern festivals have real social consequences, like any total social fact, but they can be considered one form of embodiment or materialization of politics and other social relations. Second, it directs our attention to the performative quality of festive occasions and their components.

Some of the simplest examples of the materialization of politics in royal festivals are those portions of political rites or ceremonies which can be considered speech acts. J. L. Austin defines speech acts as those linguistic statements whose purpose is not to refer to or represent real conditions but rather to alter or create them—generally social conditions—merely by uttering words (7). When Felipe

III swears to uphold Portugal’s ancient privileges and rights before the assembled nobles and ecclesiastics of the kingdom in 1619, the very act of pronouncing the oath constitutes the production of the political bond between the Habsburg sovereign and his Portuguese subjects. The purpose and effect of the reciprocal oath of loyalty the Portuguese take in public recognition of their kings is the same.

Apart from “speech act”, Austin also introduces the term “performative” (101) later in his How to Do Things with Words (7).9 Austin’s notion of performance is limited—in effect he uses the term as a mere synonym for speech act. But the fact that the idea is taken up by other authors, such as Victor

Turner, and developed into a much more elaborate field of study points to a higher level of complexity in the relationship between saying things and making them real. In general, the notion of performance has been extended to include social rituals and artistic, social or public representations whose purpose is not only to change social reality, but to display or express social problems, movements or ideals. As

Victor Turner puts it, “The many-leveled or tiered structure of a major ritual or drama, each level having many sectors, makes of these genres flexible and nuanced instruments capable of carrying and communicating many messages at once” ( Anthropology of Performance 24) . Furthermore, according to

9 In the field of inquiry that sprung up based on Austin’s work, authors who respond to or further develop the notion have generally adopted the term “speech act”.

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Turner, social ritual or performance is not limited to a scripted expression, rather its “full meaning emerges from the union of script with actors and audience at a given moment in a group's ongoing social process” (24). Understanding social performance, then, is an interpretive process that must take into account a variety of actors or participants as well as the context of the performance. Turner also points out it is useful to think of social performance as a special place, a liminal space, which is to say social performance is carried out conceptually and symbolically in a place either on the margins or outside the boundaries of normal daily activity. This makes it possible to do more than represent social questions, structures and issues in performance—the liminal space of performance becomes a place where social issues are not only expressed but also negotiated or at least worked on, if not worked out

(25).

There will be more to say about Turner and performance in festival contexts below. But for the moment, it may be useful to simply lay out one extended example to illustrate. Martial games and/or displays are but one of many possible examples of how festivals provide a social space in which to perform important the political and social issues of the day in the sense set out by Turner. These elements were common in public political celebrations from the late middle ages onward, such as those held by Miguel Lucas de Iranzo, Constable of Castile (?–1473).

When describing the various festivities held in celebration of the birth of Don Miguel Lucas’ first child in 1465 in the Relacion de los fechos del señor Miguel Lucas de Iranzo, his anonymous chronicler enters into a brief but colorful description of a mock cavalry skirmish put on for the affair. The playful confrontation was between two teams of riders; the first, the Christians, was led by Iranzo’s brother, the

Comendador de Montizón, the other side was dressed as and playing the Moors, though all the riders were in fact Christians. The author identifies Fernando de Villafañe as the leader of the “Moors” and adds that he and his troops were disguised with “barbas postizas” (263). The opposing groups of riders,

30

“andovieron corriendo, y dando gritos por todas las calles”, after which they dismounted and joined the

Constable and the rest of his guests for dancing in the Castle of Jaén (263).

Antonio Giménez Cruz, citing Johan Huizinga and his Autumn of the Middle Ages, interprets this event as one of many cultural occasions of the late middle ages that, “señalan la erosión del ideal caballeresco,” through popular parody of traditional elite military display (99). But, while the general point about the deterioration of chivalric culture may be applicable to late medieval Spain in important ways, a closer look shows this particular example does not support Giménez’ assertion that the event was parody very well. As Giménez himself points out, Miguel Lucas de Iranzo’s seigneury in and around

Jaén was at the time regarded as a, “baluarte fronterizo con el reino de Granada”, which was still in the hands of the Muslims (86). Again, as Giménez notes, Iranzo was in his origins a rather lowly hidalgo

whose meteoric rise to the office of Constable owed more to the capriciousness of King Enrique IV than

to Iranzo’s merits for the job of leading Castile’s armies—a problem of social status that the great nobles of the kingdom never let the Constable forget (86). As a result, while both the Constable and his chronicler naturally understood the difference between real battle and a festive simulation, they nevertheless had reasons to take these and other military games seriously.10 First, Iranzo could be

required to fight with real Moors at any time, as in fact he did on more than one occasion. Given this,

the game in this case can be regarded as not just a celebratory phenomenon but also a kind of ritualized

practice for actual combat. Second, leaving aside the fact that Iranzo’s credentials as a warrior had been

established in part through his expertise in tourneys, there is no indication that this warlike play can be

regarded as a parody of any kind, popular or otherwise. Fernando de Villafañe and the participants on

this occasion, including Iranzo’s brother, the Comendador de Montizón, are identified as “caballeros”.11

10 In another of his important works, Homo Ludens, Huizinga points out that at times nothing is so serious as a game. 11 In his Crónica de Enrique IV, Alonso de Palencia identifies one Fernando de Villafañe as a knight who took possession of the Fortress of Guadaíra in the name of the king in 1477 and was later named castellan (alcaide)

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More importantly, though it could be argued Don Miguel Lucas and his brother were not really of sufficiently noble lineage to be considered appropriate choices for their offices, that does not mean that they did not see and / or attempt to present themselves as such.12 In fact, the very purpose of the chronicler’s detailed attention to ceremony, festivity and games seems to be to answer aristocratic disdain by representing Iranzo as a great, courtly lord.

All of this is to point out how crucial it was for a great lord to give his theoretical status practical effect by performing it, by participating in public rites or sponsoring celebrations, festivals and games.

Sponsoring the mock combat in celebration of his daughter’s birth in 1465 (amongst other events) displayed Iranzo publicly in his role both as a Castilian general and as a cultured leader. The fact that

Iranzo hired a chronicler to record performative activities, which comprise about a third of the text of the Relacion de los fechos, shows his desire to publicize his fame and glory beyond the confines of Jaén and his own time. The mock battle also gave the men of his provincial court a chance to play their social roles as loyal retainers. Better still, they had an opportunity at a star turn before their lord, the people of

Jaén and one another in the role of knightly, crusading warriors.

Though I cannot agree with Giménez’ interpretation of the specific episode mentioned here, it is notable that he does at least attribute a socio-political meaning to it. If Giménez’ explanation of the significance of the mock battle differs from mine, it is no doubt because he does not attempt to interpret the festival activity in its own rhetorical terms as a performance. Rather, Giménez uses the text as an illustration of Huizinga’s more general theoretical framework on the historical period in western

Europe and in the light of dismissive views of Iranzo expressed by chroniclers more sympathetic to the interests of the higher aristocracy. This shows the importance of adopting a detailed, contextual

(483). It is possible this is another man of the same name, but his activity on behalf of Enrique IV in Andalusia at the same time suggests the two knights are one and the same. 12 Huizinga himself asserts that in medieval society commoners were much more likely to imitate their social betters than to engage them in class conflict. See his Waning of the Middle Ages, 115.

32 approach to the interpretation of the performative aspect of festivals and close reading of the texts associated with them.

As already suggested, this example is merely meant to initiate a discussion of the performative aspect of festivals, not to exhaust the topic. I will return to the issue of the interpretation of performance later. For the time being my goal is merely to suggest the importance of interpretation of festival activities as sociocultural expression or rhetoric. Further on it will be necessary to expand on

Turner’s ideas on rites of passage and how performance may be used not just to express social realities, but also to reflect on them and even to explore resolutions to sociocultural conflict.

Old and new: tradition and novelty

I have alluded above to the development and flowering of more sumptuous political festivals

over the course of the 15th and 16th centuries. Throughout the period between about 1400 and 1600, from the waning of the Middle Ages to the full waxing of the Renaissance, festive forms increase in every possible dimension: frequency, length, variety of content, elaborateness of design, geographical expanse and complexity of mise-en-scène.

The growth in form and frequency accompanies gradual shifts, sometimes dramatic, sometimes more subtle, in the thematic expression embodied in the celebratory activities. Given the usually sketchy and always very partial accounts the historical records have left behind, these qualitative features are especially difficult to discern or interpret in earlier occasions, making it sometimes difficult to trace subsequent developments. In very general terms it is possible to identify general trends or outlines; however, it is important to remember that in a very real sense all festivals were unique. While nearly all festivals were based on at least some recognizable traditional forms or components, nearly all also introduced some degree of novelty or some unusual qualities.

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To take one simple example, the display of fancy clothing was very much an integral part of all festive occasions.13 People of all stations put on their finest for most special occasions, but for noble

festivalgoers in the late middle ages and early modern period, it was especially important to mark their

status by outdoing the other peers in elegant, even extravagant sartorial display at all different sorts of

occasions. In fact, though European nobles of the medieval and early modern periods were all known to

use clothing to express their “privilegiada categoría”, Spaniards in particular, “llegaron a extremos

insuperables” (Bernis 7).14 Teófilo Ruiz has noted that apart from using clothing as an arena in which to

compete with others in matters of taste and opulence, clothing’s colors and forms can also be

considered a highly coded expressive medium (Fiestas de Valladolid 258). José Damián González Arce’s

commentary on sumptuary laws in Spain shows how deeply class distinctions were inscribed in clothing,

as well: the powerful—especially the royal house—found it necessary to attempt to use the law to

protect their exclusive rights to a regal appearance periodically from the time of Alfonso the X until well

into the early modern period (133-41). However, though fashionable clothing was an important category

of activity or play in celebratory occasions throughout the medieval and early-modern periods, fashions themselves, of course, were not constant at all. In fact, both men and women changed the specific qualities and features of their clothing all the time, often at great expense and in ways calculated solely to surprise and delight onlookers and, if possible, to outshine their peers.

Other elements of festival activities, from processional floats (carros or rocas) to music and

dance can be looked at the same way; though there is a riot of variation in specific symbolic and other

elements over time, there are also some very general themes or fields of symbolic action or

13 Huizinga makes an interesting argument that costume is an important kind of agonistic play which diminishes somewhat in importance in the West after 1800 (Homo Ludens 192-4). 14 As a measure of the importance attributed to dress, even the Auto das Cortes qve fez el Rey Nosso Senhor nesta Cidade de LIsboa a 18 de Iulho de 1619, the Portuguese Parliament’s official account of their oath of allegiance to Felipe III—essentially a legal document—contains a minute description of what each participant wore.

34 representation that remain relatively stable over time from very early in the written records of Iberian celebratory events. Evidence of these themes becomes most evident, as I have said, in the 15th century.

Yet, obviously, Spanish royal festivals were not invented in the 15th century; they are at least as old as the various Spanish crowns they celebrate. If one considers that many festival elements are linked to court ceremony or ritual, then it is possible to trace their inspiration back to Byzantine and other more ancient traditions, as Álvaro Fernández de Córdova Miralles does in his study of the court of Isabel

I (213). However, it is important to remember that festivals and courtly ceremony are not exactly the same thing, even though the former could and did include the latter, especially as festivals become more elaborate and agglutinative, subsuming any number of component occasions which might have previously been considered separate. It is easier to trace courtly ritual and procedure back to mentions of ceremonial manuals adopted by the various monarchs and their courts than it is to discover comparable documentary evidence of ludic traditions in Spain before 1400. Though there may be many brief references to such events in early medieval chronicles, these historical sources generally offer little more than a simple mention of important occasions—there are very few precise accounts of the component elements of royal festivals, especially in Castile.

Massip has compiled a useful compendium of substantial references and selected passages pertaining to royal entries in his Monarquía en escena (187-333). My own criteria for selecting important festive elements might be somewhat broader than Massip’s. For example, the first episode he mentions is a sentence taken from Chapter 30 of the Chronicle of James I on the “alegría” expressed by the inhabitants of Huesca when the king arrived in the city, ca. 1227 (Monarquía en escena 187). He leaves out the fact that a delegation of leading citizens rode out to meet Jaume before he got to the gates, a gesture that was not politically insignificant, especially given the active state of war then existing between Jaume and some of his rebellious subjects (Chronicle of James I 63-4). Nevertheless, Massip’s timeline does reach further back into the documented history of Iberian festival traditions than most.

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There are several interesting 13th and 14th-century sources to mention, but first a word about early

Castilian festival accounts is in order.

Fictional fiestas

Traditional historical sources on early Castilian festivals are much more sparse than in Aragon,

leading scholars generally to begin their examination of the phenomenon in Castile one hundred years

(or more) after comparable events in Aragon. Massip’s first reference to Castilian occasions, for

example, is his mention of Alfonso XI’s coronation in 1332. The earliest occasion Ruiz really analyzes in-

depth takes place just a few years earlier: Alfonso XI’s entrance into Seville in 1327. Laura Carbó’s

examination of Castilian celebratory occasions is more typical, beginning with several 15th-century occasions involving Álvaro de Luna during his service to Juan II.

There are more elaborate passages on early Castilian festivals, however, in historical fiction— specifically in literary works as early as the 13th-century epic poems Cantar de mio Cid and the Poema de

Fernán González. Naturally, the depictions of festival behavior in these works cannot be taken as ordinary historical data; while it may be safe to presume that the poems at times represent events that did really take place, their authors could not have witnessed them, since they were writing between one hundred and some three hundred years after the events represented. More to the point, the authors were unlikely to have cleaved scrupulously to credible historical descriptions when composing their verse. Their task was not to produce accurate and unbiased reportage but rather to use their imagination to represent weddings and diplomatic encounters rhetorically, to advance their literary purposes. Nevertheless, festival passages from these poems can provide a useful perspective for two reasons. First, it is likely that the poets imagined and represented festivals very much like similar celebrations—not of times gone by, but rather of their own era. In their efforts to lionize the heroes of their epics, they may well have exaggerated some aspects and downplayed others, but in a general way

36 each author attempts to maintain at least a vague sense of historical verisimilitude in some areas.15

Second, even if these poetic portraits were based largely on invention, these representations are useful for what they reveal about the way their authors imagined or thought about these occasions, especially given the importance the epic voice will have both in inspiring and in representing royal revels later on.16

Though it was probably written fifty years or more after the Cantar de mio Cid, I prefer to begin

with the Poema de Fernán González. The chapter that concerns us, number XXVIII, Count Fernán’s

wedding to Doña Sancha, is brief but in some ways more pertinent than the longer passages in the

Cantar de mio Cid. 17 Though the passage is short, extending only from stanza 691 through 693, it does describe some important elements of a Castilian royal wedding of the author’s time—between 1250 and

1270. Of course the poet mentions the “bendiçiones” uniting the count with his bride, but he pays little

attention to the liturgical element and seems much more interested in the non-religious aspects of the

event. The specific description comes in stanza 692, whose first three verses are devoted to the games

of military prowess the young men engaged in. These included: throwing lances at tablados, or wooden

scaffoldings, for the knights; board games for the squires and bullfights for the officials of the royal hunt

or monteros. The final verse of the stanza mentions that, “avía ay muchas çítulas e muchos vïoleros” but

says nothing about dancing, nor any kind of staged entertainment (Lihani 98).

The activities introduced by this description fall into three rough categories of component

events: rites and ceremony, games of valor and forms of performative entertainment. The poet stresses

the religious nature of the rite by specifying that the count and his bride “bendiçion prendieron”, but as

with all weddings, the ceremony can be presumed to have had its civil and personal or familial side, as

15 Since festive behavior, unlike battlefield prowess, was not really central to each epic hero’s characterization as such, it seems logical to suppose its general contours constituted one of the areas less susceptible to wholesale invention. That is to say that, while it is impossible to say that poetic representations of these celebrations were accurate in any specific content, it is likely they conformed in a general way to the kinds of content present in 13th- century Castilian festive occasions. 16 In fact, many of these observations on historical fiction apply almost as well to traditional historical sources like the chronicles. Most medieval chroniclers can hardly be considered impartial observers nor can they always be said to be more reliable than poets with regard to specifics. 17 The chapter divisions are provided by the editor, John Lihani.

37 well. In this case, performative entertainment is limited to board games and music, but all categories of components will include other forms, often more elaborate ones, in other texts.

The other two stanzas in the chapter, 691 and 693, do more to establish how the poet conceived of the celebration’s implications than to describe it. That is, these stanzas set out the political significance and social context of the occasion. At the end of the passage, the poet declares, “Dos bodas que non una castellanos fazían”. The first was the union between Count Fernán and the Infanta Sancha, and the other the celebration, “por su señor que cobrado avían” (98). This is a reference to the general delight of the Castilian public in having recovered their leader, who had been imprisoned by the bride’s father in Navarre until just before the wedding. This leads us to the social implications of this passage.

On the one hand, the poet tends to suggest broad popular participation by saying that, “todos grandes e chicos muy grand gozo fizieron” at the wedding feast in Stanza 691 (98). But on the other, really the occasion is represented almost entirely as a courtly event. Though the author seems to intimate all

Castilians rejoice, he nevertheless gives no specific indication the common folk actually took part in the wedding feast. Rather, the “chicos” seem to be represented symbolically by their lord to the point that their (re-) union with him is confused with his wedding to Sancha of Navarre. This too is a feature of festival narratives that will be repeated; the participation of the lower orders will constantly be implied or assumed, but is almost never described with any care.18

The author of the Cantar de Mío Cid also represents a similar rite of passage, specifically the marriage of the Cid’s daughters to the Infantes of Carrión. This episode follows the same general outlines as Fernán González’ but is represented with more detail. The poet also mentions the fact that the festivities lasted fifteen days—a metric that subsequent authors will also use to suggest the importance or scope of festive occasions (2251).

18 It could be argued that “grandes e chicos” refers not to social station but to age. Even if that is so, however, the general point I am making still obtains, as will be seen in multiple occasions further on.

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More significant, in my view, is the addition of another important dimension which is often associated with royal occasions—the ceremonial / festive receptions and farewells accorded to important noble personages. For example, the poet describes the episode when the Cid sends his faithful retainer Álbar Fáñez to coordinate Doña Jimena’s and his daughters’ first voyage from Castile to

Valencia in great detail. The account includes a narration not just of the celebration proper, but a long passage on the ladies’ progress and the activities of their honor guard. The length and detail the poet devotes to this passage suggest that already by the 13th century festive occasions were not limited to

the ceremonial climax of a reception or procession and emphasize the political importance accorded to

the movements of highborn personages. This is no doubt related to the itinerant character of medieval

court life.

Another notable feature of this narrative is the description of the fine accessories displayed both

by the men and their horses. This element will become much more important and elaborate later on, as

we will see.

Aragonese developments

The earliest (traditionally accepted) Iberian historical sources with accounts of significant festival

activity come from Aragon. While they are generally comparable in most respects to the outlines of the

fictitious festivals detailed in the CMC, they also show important qualitative or thematic trends that

would become more pronounced over time and which would be repeated in subsequent celebratory

events all over the Iberian Peninsula. Several of these elements are evident in Ramón Muntaner’s

account of Alfonso X of Castile’s visit to the realms of his brother-in-law, Jaume I of Aragon, which took place sometime between 1268 and 1274, most likely towards 1272.19 However, at this stage even

19 As Teófilo Ruiz points out, one of the most important early Aragonese chroniclers, Ramón Muntaner, begins his accounts with events he was likely too young to remember personally, a fact which underlines the shakier distinction between factual and fictional discourse in medieval chronicles mentioned above (A King Travels 222).

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Aragonese chronicles offered relatively little detail on festive components, so it is more useful to leave a discussion of most of these important qualities for later, more elaborate occasions.20

Nevertheless, there is one aspect of this festival that bear further note here—even if it is rather oblique commentary. Muntaner mentions galleys or wooden apparatuses that were wheeled along in carts (46). This celebratory phenomenon will also become quite elaborate and common in later

centuries, but this is an unusually early documentary mention of something like the use of processional

floats in Spain (Figures 1.2 and 1.3). I underline this development not so much because of the

importance of floats as I do to make a general point about tracing the origins of specific festive

behaviors. The early date of this reference to carros or rocas might prompt the question of the ultimate origins of this particular tradition—was the use of primitive floats a Catalan invention, an imitation of

French or Italian practices or a holdover from the Roman tradition? It is difficult to say. A more complete response would be to say that the question is not especially germane to this study.21

Ruiz remarks that attempting to identify central and peripheral cultural influences in the area of

a broad and varied field of European symbolic traditions “would lead only to a tedious, unnecessary, and

unproductive discussion” (A King Travels 66). On the one hand it cannot be denied that outside

influences had profound effects on the forms and fashions of expression present in Spanish festivals. On

the other, if we consider festival activities a kind of language (or Saussurian langue), there are also

20 For detailed discussions of Alfonso X’s visit to Aragon and the relationship between planned activities and fiction, see Massip’s Monarquía en escena, 36-8 and Ruiz’ A King Travels, 222. In addition, an argument could be made that this event was the first well-documented festival occasion showing an Iberian monarch’s use of festival activities to impress or perform his kingly attributes of magnificence and Christian piety in an agonistic way before his peers. 21 The question of the origins of this or that festive element has been much debated by scholars, particularly by historians such as Ruiz, Massip and even Jacob Burckhardt, all of whom tend to argue—at least indirectly—for the peculiar inventiveness or artistic influence of one national group or another and its corresponding medieval courtly center or centers. A number of authors have underlined Burgundian influences in Spanish and other European courtly celebratory forms—see Kristina De Jonge and Bernardo J. García García’s volume El Legado de Borgoña (2010). Each of these authors naturally tends to find the oldest roots in the ground on which he or she has most focused his or her attention; Massip emphasizes Catalonian occasions whereas Burckhardt finds them in Italy. Ruiz is more circumspect, acknowledging that a number of authors writing about Spanish traditions trace their lineage back to Burgundy, Italy and elsewhere while at the same time insisting that at least some important Iberian traditions, such as bullfights, are autochthonous.

40 undeniable traces of a local accent or dialect in the concrete utterances (or parole) of Spanish festivals.

Ruiz argues against a debate on origins mainly for practical reasons: in the end it is impossible to trace the etymology of such diffuse strains of symbolic culture in any definitive way. That is surely true, yet in my view there is a more important reason why such a pursuit is unnecessary and unproductive. If we look on festivals as meaningful cultural exchanges, the etymology of any specific semantic element is of limited interest in and of itself. What really should draw our attention is the meaning its use produces in a given context.

Fernando de Antequera’s coronation

Arguments can be made for the importance of several festival occasions in the century following Alfonso X’s visit to Aragon. Ruiz, as previously mentioned, attributes special significance in

Alfonso XI’s entry into Seville in 1327 (A King Travels 68). However, for my purposes, it is not until the beginning of the 15th century that the most significant leaps in the representational or expressive

dimension of festivals become most evident. Beginning with the accession of Fernando of Antequera as

king of Aragon, for example, there are marked changes in showmanship and the increasing use of

literary tropes and themes to communicate specific messages, especially political ones, through selected

images presented at festival events. In fact, it would be fair to say that during this period festival

organizers begin to weave multiple thematic elements together in a complex way that was

unprecedented. The purpose of this new mode of expression in festivals was generally to glorify the

sovereign or another highborn person by casting him (or occasionally her) in one of several interrelated

but occasionally distinct roles in the drama of courtly and/or public life.

Several authors have theorized that the expansion of Iberian festive occasions during the 15th century—or at least the greater care given to describing and publicizing them through writing—was due in large part to the propagandistic needs of rulers, especially the Trastamaran monarchs in Castile and

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Aragon, to compensate for their weaknesses as rulers.22 In some cases, such as Juan II of Castile, the nature of the weakness was in their limited political talent or ability to control rival magnates. In others, such as Fernando de Antequera’s, their dynastic cases for political legitimacy were more problematic.

Political drama incorporated into festive occasions gave a king and his agents a chance to compensate for any vulnerabilities at the roots of their political claims or status by presenting themselves as covered in flowery, regal praise and pomp. Francesc Massip applies this notion to the case of Ferdinand I of

Aragon and his deliberate use of festivities connected to his coronation in 1414 to put a public seal on his right to wear the crown:

Ferdinand d'Antéquèra, dont l'élection à Caspe s'est forgée au milieu de bien des

controverses, élabore adroitement un programme spectaculaire autour de son

couronnement et de ses solennelles entrées dans les villes de la confédération, bien

décidé à asseoir la légitimité de son avènement et à étouffer par la même occasion, tout

bavardage à ce sujet—car il y en avait. La résolution juridique, l'acceptation

institutionnelle, les prédications justificatrices ne suffisaient pas. Il fallait peser plus

lourdement sur l'esprit de ses sujets et, pour cela, il n'hésita à recourir à la plus efficace

des armes de persuasion: l'image scénique. (Fête du roi 179-80)

For my purposes here, the specific images Fernando uses to present himself on this occasion are especially important. Among the entremeses put on during Fernando I of Aragon’s coronation feast in

1414 is an elaborate piece which was amongst the earliest examples of the conscious casting of the king in a heroic role with cosmic dimensions on the model of Scipio’s Dream or, more directly, Dante’s Divine

22 For more on this, see Ruiz, A King Travels, 54-5 and Nieto’s Ceremonias de la realeza, 120. These authors, as well as Massip, echo Jacob Burckhardt’s argument that the doubtful legitimacy of some Renaissance Italian rulers contributed to their support and promotion of intellectual and artistic talents. See his The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (10).

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Comedy.23 Massip understands this imagery almost entirely in terms of the new-crowned king’s attempt to represent himself in his divine aspect as “paladin de la chrétienté”, as for example when an angel descends from the heavens and prophesies that Fernando will heal the schism in the Church and restore the papacy to Rome (Fête du roi 181). This attempt to underline the king’s divine right to rule and his important role as Christian militant is undeniable. Still, just as in Dante’s masterpiece, there is an additional aspect in the dramatic presentations here that unites religious ideas and politics with the traditional Ptolemaic cosmology of the day.

Fernando had a scaffold built over the entrance to the dining hall and ordered it decorated and painted “de color del çielo”.24 Three wheels, stacked up on each other, were mounted on the platform and the lower two turned in imitation of the heavenly spheres. The wheels supported eight steps or stands (gradas) on which were seated several groups of men dressed as different allegorical figures.

Those on the lowest rungs represented the mortal sins and demons; above them were the virtues,

“prinçipes e profetas e apóstoles”. Men dressed as angels and sang and played “farpas e guitarras e laudes e rabés e hórganos de paño”. The highest wheel, like the Empyrean sphere of the Ptolemaic model of the universe, was immobile. High atop it, “estaban dos niños muy bien guarnidos de paños de oro, e estaba el uno al otro poniendo una corona en la cabeça, a remenbrança de quando Dios coronó a

Sancta María”. When the king entered the hall, the heavens began to turn and the choir struck up a Te

Deum (ed. Massip Bonet, Monarquía en escena 224).

The Te Deum sung for Fernando and the rest of the religious elements obviously support

Massip’s contention that the purpose of the spectacle was the “sacralisation du souverain” (180). But the representation of the cosmos in miniature whose movement is touched off by the arrival of the King

23 The term “entremés” later came to refer metaphorically to the smaller, lighter theatrical vignettes presented between the acts of a longer comedia but here refers to a short piece actually performed between courses at a banquet. 24 From the royal correspondence compiled by Massip, it seems clear that Fernando was deeply involved in the design and preparations for his coronation and the associated celebrations. See Monarquía en escena (220-1).

43 shows that it was also designed to demonstrate in a vivid way the King’s central role in the workings of the world. Not only is Fernando represented as a ruler made legitimate by God, but from the moment of his coronation he assumes a role analogous to the heavenly position of God at the unmoving center of all creation. Further, the use of such cosmic tropes suggests the growing influence of Dantesque imagery in Spanish court circles—a trend that will become evident in poetry at about the same time or slightly before.

There will be cause to refer to Dantesque allegory again, but for the moment there remains one additional note to add to this observation. It should not be forgotten that part of Dante’s genius was his erudite and artful way of assembling and representing centuries of traditional medieval Christian cosmology, doctrine and history. This tradition began, like the Church itself, in late antiquity and involved the gradual syncretic combination of ancient pagan philosophical traditions with scriptural and newer, Christian ideas and practices. The influence of classical knowledge or ideas on medieval Christian thought did not end after the foundation of the Church, but rather exerted itself constantly. Not only were successive generations educated in the classical traditions and texts canonized by the Church, but there were also periodic revivals or reinfusions of classical thought, as for example when the universities began to foster deeper investigation into ancient knowledge or when the Toledan school of translation helped reintroduce mostly forgotten ancient Greek and Latin texts into Western Christendom. For this reason, it is often difficult to separate elements from classical antiquity from “purely” Christian ones in medieval cultural production—considerable overlap is inevitable. This overlap is evident in Dante as well as in other medieval poetry, particularly late medieval texts, and is also apparent in this festive entremés, as indeed it will be apparent in the design of many more celebratory occasions.

Massip explores several other traditional symbolic aspects of this event, such as heraldry and numerology, but most of these are either less pertinent to this study or better expressed on other occasions. An exception comes shortly after the passage cited above, when the chronicler of Fernando’s

44 coronation feast describes what each of the Vices and Virtues was wearing.25 In his narration, the author provides the reader with unusually explicit indications of some common associations or meanings attributed to costume. He focuses mainly on color but also suggests the importance of material and ornamentation, to a lesser extent. Some correspondences are relatively straightforward and might well strike the modern viewer as perfectly conventional. For example, “Largueza” dresses in green, “teniendo en la falda muchos florines e doblas” and “Castidad” is robed in “blanco brocado de oro” (226). On the other hand, there are a few connections that strike the modern reader as less intuitive. “Avariçia”, seems to be associated with the archetypal miser, wearing “ropas viejas remendadas de diversos colores”, “Pereça” is in black, whereas “Muerte” is dressed in “baldreses amarillos justos al cuerpo que paresçía su cuero, e su cabeça era una calavera e un cuero de baldrés toda descarnada sin narizes e sin ojos que paresçia muy fea e muy espantosa” (225). As we will see, future events will use color and costume in similar ways—however, the code of equivalencies will vary from one occasion to another.

Though it seems some correspondences may be obvious and/or relatively constant, it also appears that an artist or festival organizer had a certain degree of freedom to make novel combinations. In this case, for example, the color black is not associated with death but laziness, perhaps because of the association with black bile and, by extension, melancholic indolence. Death, on the other hand, is represented to some extent by the color yellow, but more particularly by the other fearsome qualities of its appearance than by its color.

The Fiestas of 1428

As Francisco Rico has noted, there were a number of interesting occasions in Spain early in the

15th century, but “sólo uno de tales encuentros parece haber pervivido tenazmente en la memoria de todos: en la primavera de 1428” (517). He refers to the series of events sponsored by Juan II of Castile,

25 The chronicler is Álvar García de Santa María and the work in question is his Historia de la vida y echos del muy alto e esclarecido Rey don Fernando el Primero de Aragón. The only extant text is the manuscript held by the Biblioteca Nacional de España. My citations are from Massip’s long and very helpful compilation of extracts from this document, found in his Monarquía en escena (220-7).

45

Juan II of Navarre (later of Aragon) and Enrique of Trastamara, Grand Master of the Order of Santiago and, like his brother, the aforementioned Juan of Navarre, one of the fabled Infantes de Aragón. The celebrations held at Valladolid that year were nominally organized to honor Juan of Navarre and

Enrique’s sister, Leonor, as she passed through Castile on her way to Portugal to take her place there as queen. But in fact, the occasion appears to have been most significant as an arena in which the three high noblemen would attempt to publically outdo one another in the display of chivalrous prowess, courtly magnificence and wit.26 Each of the three great men sponsored one day’s games and a banquet but vied on all three occasions to do the most to present himself as the greatest knightly hero.

The Castilian chroniclers of the occasion, especially Pedro Carrillo de Huete, Juan II of Castile’s falconer, naturally represent the day of games organized by their own sovereign as the greatest of the three. However, the first day, sponsored by Don Enrique was the most interesting for my purposes. In it, the Grand Master provides us with one of the earliest and clearest examples of taking material right out of the conventions of chivalric romance and representing it for the entertainment of the nobles present at a festival.

Enrique had a mock castle built of wood and cloth disguised as masonry. At the top of a bell tower was a golden griffon bearing a flag. A tela, the divider defining opposing sides for jousting, was stretched out between the castle and an arch supported by two more towers (Figure 1.4). The arch bore the inscription: “Este es el arco del pasaje peligroso de la fuerte ventura” (Carrillo de Huete 21). A golden Rueda de la Aventura was set upon a scaffolding next to an ersatz curtain wall. Before Enrique and five knights, dressed in full tournament armor, came out to offer to defend the fortress from all comers, an entremés was presented in which appeared “una diosa ençima de un carro, e doze donzellas con ella, cantando todas, con muchos menestreles”. As knight-contestants approached, horns would sound and a mounted lady and herald would come out to meet them saying: “Cavalleros, ¿qué ventura

26 Chroniclers of the event do not appear to be interested by Leonor’s movements during the festival. Díez de Games does not mention her at all and Carrillo de Huete only does so in passing (24, 28).

46 vos traxo a este tan peligroso passo, que se llama de la fuerte ventura” (Carrillo de Huete 22)? One of the combatants, of course, is Juan of Castile, who is richly attired in silver trim, accompanied by 24 knights and breaks two sturdy lances. The King of Navarre, accompanied by 12 knights, breaks only one lance.

The notion that the ideal of chivalry long outlived its reality in the late medieval period—to the extent it was ever truly reflected in the real life and mores of the people of the Middle Ages–has become a commonplace. As Huizinga says, “In spite of the care taken on all hands to keep up the illusion of chivalry, reality perpetually gives the lie to it, and obliges it to take refuge in the domains of literature and of conversation” (Waning of the Middle Ages 89). Enrique’s theatrical use of mythical characters and tropes clearly inspired by chivalric romance to frame the fictitious combat he sponsored shows that

“festivals” should be added to Huizinga’s list of imaginary domains to which chivalry was exiled. As previously mentioned, Ruiz points out that, with technical changes like the advent of crossbows, 15th- century warfare had become anything but a chivalrous affair (A King Travels 53). But in the exclusive and highly-controlled environment of festive mock-combat, Juan of Castile, Juan of Navarre and the Infante

Enrique could contend with one another by acting out their feats of idealized knightly prowess with no risk of being struck by a plebe’s wayward crossbow bolt. They could also enlist the support of their noble retainers while showing their rivals what they and their retainers were made of.

Moreover, the introduction of the references to fiction made it possible to add an additional layer of meaning or fullness to the performance of chivalric nostalgia, whether or not it was associated with war games. Mock combat had been part of festival behavior since time immemorial, whether of the more formal and exclusive type like the juego de cañas or jousts or less exalted events that might also give the lower classes a chance to participate, such as bullfights or some bohordos.27 One of the

27 The juego de cañas was a game in which groups of four to six (generally aristocratic) horsemen, bearing fake spears made of cane (the cañas) and dressed in Moorish costumes competed with one another in graceful, precision riding (Figure 1.5). A bohordo was another kind of fake spear. “Bohordar” or “el juego de bohordos”

47 most salient characteristics of the fiestas of 1428, then, is the explicit connection of fictional chivalric conceits to festival games. This trend would continue in future festivals; theatrical elements based on chivalric fiction will enliven several different kinds of celebratory occasions, from military games to more strictly civilian affairs, like entremeses or processions.

Also notable on this occasion are references to other aspects of medieval symbolism, such as

the Wheel of Fortune, a trope that would be used and reused in Spanish cultural production throughout

the 15th century, though it would fade in importance thereafter (Figure 1.6). The reference to the griffon of the traditional bestiary is also typical. The traditional properties attributed to animals, both real and mythical, provide a fertile source of symbolic language and images for festival designers or organizers. In fact, the use of bestiary images would continue throughout the Middle Ages and well into the early modern era. To take but one simple example, the figure of the griffon is often used to represent royalty because it combines features of the royal eagle and lion (Figure 1.7). As Massip explains, the griffon

“réunissait en lui les royautés du ciel et de la terre et qu’il symbolisait, selon les bestiaires médiévaux, la

double nature du Christ” and, by extension, of the king in his sacred aspect (Fête du roi 182). No doubt this is why Ferdinand of Antequera and his son Don Enrique both chose to give a griffon a prominent place in important fiestas they sponsored.28

It is also important to underline the use of stagecraft here through the construction and

decoration of the castle and Arco de la Fuerte Ventura. This structure, with its inscription, is an early

generally referred to a competition in which the participants threw their bohordos at a target, usually made of wood. 28 Of course, Don Enrique, unlike his brother and his cousin, was not a king and must have been painfully aware of that at Valladolid. It is possible he used the symbol because it had been favored by his father, or he may have meant to assert his own worthiness, despite his lack of a royal title. Ruiz suggests the invención Enrique displayed at the second day of jousting, in which he bore a placard reading “non es”, expresses his discomfort at the disparity between his status and that of his royal competitors (A King Travels 231). Rico offers a more complex theory which is more obscure but, given the nature of invenciones, may be closer to Enrique’s original intentions. See “Unas coplas” (520 n. 14). For an alternative interpretation of the symbolic value of the griffon, see Angus Mackay’s “Fernando de Antequera y la Virgen Santa María” (1987).

48 precursor of the many much more elaborate arches, castles and other ephemeral architecture that would be part of future festivals, particularly in the 16th and 17th centuries.

After Enrique’s paso de armas, there were two more days of tournaments, the first sponsored by the king of Navarre and the next by Juan of Castile. The chronicles say relatively little about the fighting those days, but do expand on another important festival practice. In the 15th century, it became

popular for courtiers not only to spar in traditional warlike games, but also to compete with others in

more peaceful ways, such as in the composition of invenciones.29 The term invención refers here to “the improvised entremeses, masques, or pageants staged in fancy dress which were a feature of the fiestas, pasos de armas, and tournaments” of the 15th century (Macpherson 11). In general terms, an invención connected a visible symbol with a motto whose relationship to the image was typically less than obvious. The visual component of an invención might take several forms. Costume—including both people’s clothing and their horses’ trappings—was commonly decorated with the emblems of invenciones, which might be encoded in its color, the quality of the material or simply be embroidered upon it. Armor also bore such images, whether embroidered or painted on a shield or, as became common in the latter half of the century, sculpted onto a knight’s elaborate crest. A successful invención would send a coded message to any viewer / reader clever enough to correctly decipher the author’s meaning by juxtaposing the visual and textual stimuli within a given context. The display and decipherment of such messages became an important component event of knightly contests generally

(Figure 1.8).

The form’s reliance on context underlines its essential performativity. When the author of the invención used more conventional or clearer combinations, the meaning might be immediately apparent, and could be represented fairly easily. But the goal seems often to have been to impress the

29 An invención could be one of several related but slightly different things. For example, there was a literary form combining an image called a divisa with en epigram or brief poem, called the letra (Macpherson). Hernando del Castillo collected and published a number of these literary invenciones from the latter part of the 15th century in his Cancionero General. Macpherson later republished these pieces with helpful commentary.

49 reader / viewer with obscure references and as a result it can be difficult to be sure of intended meanings, particularly for a modern reader unable to see the visual text and who is neither immersed in the context nor in the courtly culture of the time. The authors of the few invenciones recorded at the

Fiestas de Valladolid seem to have been fairly successful at making their texts enigmatic. However, Rico has offered a convincing interpretation of Juan of Castile’s invención for his own feast and games, the third day of jousting at Valladolid. Carrillo summarizes it as follows:

Salió el señor Rey a la tela, él e otros doze cavalleros, él como Dios Padre, e los otros,

todos con sus diademas, cada uno con título del santo que era, e con su señal en la

mano cada uno del martirio que avía pasado por Nuestro Señor Dios. E todas sus

cubiertas de los cavallos de grana, e daragas bordadas, e unos rrétolos que dezían:

Lardón. Así que bien entendida la ynvençión.30 (25)

The comparison of the king and his trusted retainers to God and the Apostles is clear enough, but the relationship between the visual conceit and the motto, “lardón”, is a little more obscure. The key lies in the fact that “lardón” was written on a bearer’s “daraga”, a variant of “adarga”, a kind of shield. If the inscription is appended rebus-like to the name of the shield, it gives the phrase, “dará galardón”, a reference to the King’s expectation that he would win recognition (Rico, Unas coplas 520 n. 16). 31

As we will see, such empresas are still to be found on tournament crests as late as 1599, however, both the specific form of the invención and its place in courtly celebrations seem to diminish slightly over the course of the 16th century. Nevertheless, I extend my discussion of invenciones more

because of the importance of their artistic progeny than because of the lasting legacy of 1428 itself—

though that legacy was not inconsiderable. As Ian Macpherson has written:

30 In general, I limit my modernization of orthography to replacing of vocalic “v” and consonantal “u” with “u” and “v”, respectively. 31 One can only speculate on what, specifically, Juan expected as recompense and what for, given the scant detail available to the modern reader. He might have expected a “prize” from an unmentioned mistress, for example. He may have been promising to give out recompense to another. Or, as Ruiz supposes, he may have expected God’s recognition for “méritos y servicios” as king. See Ruiz’ “Fiestas de Valladolid” (260).

50

At their weakest, invenciones demonstrate a fascination with the relationship between

the eye and the ear, with the multiple possibilities offered by the shapes and sounds of

the words we use. At their best, they graphically illustrate the nucleus, and the early

Peninsular origins, of the kind of conceptismo which was to entertain Juan de Valdés,

captivate Gracián, and in the course of the seventeenth century be perfected, in fully

extended and much more subtle form, by Luis de Góngora and Francisco de Quevedo.

(27)

There will be ample evidence in multiple forms of the importance of this taste for clever, performative

interplay between visual and textual elements in celebratory display well beyond the demise of the

invención in its original form. Apart from the 17th-century poetic conceptismo Macpherson spotlights,

one need only consider the nature and popularity of emblemata and the empresas or divisas which were

so often represented on triumphal arches or other ephemeral works of art in festivals from the 16th century onward.

Alfonso V of Aragon’s Italian triumph

The next 15th-century occasion that stands out sharply from the rest is, without a doubt, Alfonso

V of Aragon’s triumphal entry into Naples in 1443, which is significant in part for displaying an increased interest in recreating classical tradition. As previously mentioned, Massip considers that other scholars exaggerate the classical origin of this triumph’s symbolism and he supports this assertion with an extremely detailed analysis which traces the origins of most of the festival imagery back to other medieval sources (Monarquía en escena 91-123). Nevertheless, Massip does concede the entry included some important innovations of a classicist bent; he even suggests it served as an early model for the more clearly classicist Italian triumphs of Carlos V a century later (105). The festival’s organizers represent Alfonso as a conquering classical hero in several ways that hark back to ancient triumphs.

Firstly, they make a breach in the city wall to accommodate his entry, echoing an old Roman tradition

51 meant to suggest that mere stone walls could not resist the monarch. This gesture, while it will never become exactly commonplace, will be repeated in several subsequent events throughout the early modern period, including Fernando el Católico’s entry into the same city in 1507 (94). Secondly, amongst other allegorical floats in the ceremonial procession, the Florentines sponsored a triumphal

“chariot” (carro) bearing an effigy of Julius Caesar, complete with imperial insignia; such as a scepter, a golden orb—referring to his world-wide dominion—and an honor guard of exotic “Ethiopian” horsemen—another reference to the wide range of Alfonso’s territories (105).32 There is another point

of comparison in the triumphal arches erected along the procession route (97).33 There was even a tendency to represent the royal conqueror as divine or at least as a demigod, just as had been the case in the imperial Roman past.34 During an entremés sponsored by the Catalans, the allegorical figure

“Clemencia”, in urging Alfonso to be gentle with his defeated enemies, says she will make him comparable not only to the greatest of men, but also “los ángeles y santos del cielo” (120).35

The entremeses at this occasion bring us to the second significant aspect of the triumph: its explicit formulation as a Maussian gift, that is, an ostensibly free bestowal whose ultimate purpose was actually to oblige the receiver, in this case King Alfonso, to reciprocate. After taking the city, Alfonso had been touring other strategic towns of the region. When the leading citizens of Naples heard he was going to call for an assembly of notables (parlamento), they offered to treat him as a Roman emperor at a triumph in exchange for holding the event in the capital of the kingdom (94). The symbolic content of the aforementioned entremés, in which “Clemencia” and her sister virtues suggest to the King how best to rule, shows particularly clearly that the organizers intended to curry additional benevolence—though

32 Some sources believed the reference to be to Alexander the Great, rather than Caesar, but the classicist effect is the same. See Massip, 105, especially notes 122-3. 33 These were not the more elaborate arches of classical antiquity, nor of later European festivals. Rather, they were relatively simple structures festooned with myrtle and cedar leaves, not unlike arches used in other medieval festivals. Given this, it is really only in their context that these arches can be considered evidence of being based on a classical model. 34 In fact, Massip shows these imperial pretensions were looked on as hubris, if not blasphemous by some of Alfonso’s contemporaries. See Monarquía en escena, 120. 35 Here the term entremés refers only to a brief dramatic presentation.

52 perhaps no specific or concrete rewards—from their new sovereign, as well. “Constancia” exhorts him to stay firm in the defense of Justice, whereas “Magnanimidad”, like “Clemencia” before her, urges

Alfonso to be generous with his defeated enemies (Massip Bonet, Monarquía en escena 120). She makes explicit reference to the dreaded Turks, but it might not be out of place to read this as a plea for clemency for his former Neapolitan enemies, given how recent the cessation of hostilities had been.

Massip would seem to be justified in calling this dramatic presentation a kind of “mirror of princes” in that the rhetorical aim of this drama was much like that of such political manuals (119). In both cases, a subordinate attempts to tell a powerful man how he should conduct himself while covering any implied presumption with a thick layer of flattery. Unlike a political tract, however, the festival entremés is performed in public and the message is sent by the recently conquered to their conqueror. So, the stakes and significance of the maneuver are heightened in Naples, which seems to try to make itself arbiter of its own destiny again—at least rhetorically—at a delicate time. This kind of symbolic legerdemain will also be attempted in many subsequent festivals.

There is one final aspect of Alfonso the Magnanimous’ Neapolitan triumph that deserves a brief mention. According to Massip, there was an unusually well-developed presentation featuring mock combat between Christian warriors and supposed Muslim opponents (109-18).36 As with the same kind of events sponsored with some frequency by Miguel Lucas de Iranzo years later, the infidels were really disguised Christians. The attractiveness of this kind of event was that it combined martial games with

Christian piety, in that the Muslim enemy was always sure to lose and make a very public show of submission to the righteous forces of the Christian host. Such was the case, for example, in an elaborate scene staged by Lucas de Iranzo as part of his court at Jaén’s Christmas celebrations in 1463; in fact, on this occasion the Muslim combatants renounced their faith and were baptized after losing the battle

36 There are some discrepancies in contemporary sources, however, as to whether the enemy fought in these mock skirmishes was Turkish or the traditional Wild or Green Men. See Massip’s Monarquía en escena for a detailed discussion (214-5).

53

(Relacion de los fechos 103-6). The Constable of Castile would not be the only festival sponsor to repeat this kind of entertainment.

The last Trastamaras and royal prestige

Though there were many other notable festive occasions in Spain throughout the 15th century, the next one that merits special attention for my purposes is at the very end of the century. Chroniclers and scholars have generally taken little notice of royal festivals taking place under Juan II’s successor in

Castile, Enrique IV, most likely because it seems Enrique himself was not very interested in such affairs.

That is not to say there never was a festival during his reign, only that he personally, unlike his

Aragonese counterparts, seems to have been involved as little as possible (Fernández de Córdova

Miralles 225).37 As a result, it is difficult to find examples of the kind of political messaging and creative expression I have been focusing on in them. So, I will next concern myself with the celebrations connected to another double royal wedding, this time those of 1496 and 1497, in which Juan and Juana of Castile, son and daughter of Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabel I of Castile, were united with Philip and

Margaret, the children of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I.

Álvaro Fernández de Córdova affirms that Fernando and Isabel undertook a policy of repairing

“el desprestigio en que había caído la autoridad regia” caused in large part by Enrique IV, and his

“descuido de su imagen” (224). The monarchs were concerned with prestige and a better image not for their own sake, but because these qualities were essential to their ability to rule effectively. During his rule, Enrique IV had been overtaken more than once by rebellions of powerful factions amongst the magnates. Indeed, though their side in the war of succession following Enrique’s demise did triumph, afterwards Isabel and Fernando nonetheless found their kingdoms in a fragile political condition and by

37 Of course there are a number of Aragonese royal celebrations during this time, as well, but in general they do not appear to have been as elaborate or well noted as Alfonso the Magnanimous’ triumph, possibly because the eruption of civil war, while not diminishing the need for political festivals, may have reduced the resources that could be brought to bear for celebration. Certainly the fiestas of this period introduce no significant new elements or symbolism which need be examined here. For a list of royal entries and more details, see Massip Bonet, Monarquía en escena (248-52).

54 necessity undertook a long-term project to reestablish the balance of power between the nobility and the monarchy. Another way of putting it would be to say the Catholic monarchs needed to recast themselves in the role of primi inter pares. The spectacular wedding celebrations planned and carried out under the direction of Fernando and Isabel fit right into this policy and “clearly demonstrate their continued exploitation of material signs to send a message about their monarchy and their court”

(Marino 11). The importance of drawing the aristocracy into festive events and thereby, in a sense, binding it to the monarchy is borne out by an anonymous poem, Los altos estados, published to celebrate Juan’s and Margaret’s wedding ceremony. As Nancy Marino writes:

The poem's attention to the significance of the nobility's involvement in the ceremony

and their evident prosperity seems offered as proof of the success of the Catholic

Monarchs' political and social agenda in the 1480s and 1490s, which included an

affirmation of their sovereignty in the kingdom but not at the expense of the high

aristocracy's social and economic prominence. (44)

The details of the weddings themselves and the preparations and celebrations associated with them are not directly relevant to the development of Spanish festival practices. The lavish detail accounts of the ceremony devote to courtly costume, for example, are nothing very new or different.

However, there are a couple of significant novelties that should be mentioned. First, these may be the first such occasions in Spain to be publicized in a popular print format. Obviously, no festivals would be the subject of published accounts before the establishment of the printing press in the 1470s. But even festivals taking place between 1475 and 1496, if recorded at all, were generally described or alluded to in manuscripts. Manuscript accounts were usually in the prose of the chronicles, but occasionally there was a poetic source, such as Jorge Manrique’s mention of the fiestas of 1428 in his famous “Coplas a la muerte de su padre” (Rico, Unas coplas). The double weddings of 1496-97 were included in traditional prose chronicles, but were also published in a peculiar new poetic form—what Pedro M. Cátedra has

55 called historiography in verse (qtd. by Marino 8). Although these accounts took poetic form they had none of the artistic pretensions of literary works; rather they narrated current events and could be considered forerunners of journalistic prose. The weddings were the subject of two anonymous poems—one of which was Los altos estados—written in the copla real form and published in pamphlets.

As Marino points out, the artistic appeal of these pieces was scant, and their publication seems to have been rushed. These poems did contain some historical details on the wedding spectacles not covered in the chronicles, however, and most importantly, they had greater popular and commercial appeal than the chronicles. Poetic accounts of the weddings—even rather weak ones—were much more likely to be published and sold to a broader audience than chronicle entries. It is reasonable to suppose that

Fernando and Isabel, to the extent they influenced the publication of the works, favored them not for their literary value but “to realize the propagandistic potential of the printing press, and [use] it as a tool to transmit their ideology” (Marino 10).

The other aspect of the wedding feasts that bears mention is the documented use of

“lombardas”, a kind of cannon, to produce a farewell salute marking Juana’s departure for Flanders

(Marino 64). This may not be the earliest reference to the use of gunpowder in this way, but it remains an unusually early and unequivocal one.38 At this point in late medieval Spain, there is little to

distinguish the use of gunpowder in a festive salute and its use in battle; we are far from the

development of the techniques that would make fireworks a spectacle in and of themselves. But

methods permitting the creative use of rockets and chemical fires to decorate ephemeral architecture,

mythical figures and even gardens would begin to be developed and codified towards the middle of the

38 The earliest use of gunpowder in Spain is not well documented, especially in a celebratory context. In his description of the King of Navarre’s dramatic entry atop an elaborate float at the festival of Valladolid in 1428, Carrillo writes that the King’s attendants followed “lançando truenos” (25). It seems likely the reference was to the discharge of some kind of firearm, but it is not clear what the phrase meant exactly. Teófilo Ruiz translates it as “making thunder-like noises” (A King Travels 338).

56 following century. At the same time ever more inventive and spectacular displays would be incorporated into Spanish festivals.

The Emperor Carlos V’s classical triumphs

By the end of the 15th century the language of Iberian royal festivals had been established; their significant themes, components and symbolic fields had been introduced and used, sometimes in more spectacular ways and sometimes less, but nearly always to pointed political effect. Over the next hundred years succeeding monarchs and their servants would apply their inventiveness not to the creation of completely novel forms of celebration but rather to the ever more complex, comprehensive or developed variations on what were now traditional forms. That is not to say that the variations ever became monotonous or repetitive. Even if festival organizers had not been careful to delight and surprise their honorees by devising elaborate presentations, a host of unique circumstances shaped the specific ways royal parties and their subjects were represented and/or expressed themselves on different occasions. These circumstances included sociopolitical conditions, artistic fashions, intellectual trends and the particular aims both of monarchs and the communities by which they were feted.

The extravagant and well-documented triumphal entries of Carlos V in Italy provide ample evidence of this point. The representation of Carlos V as conquering Caesar harks back to Fernando the

Magnanimous’ similar depiction at his own Italian triumph—but only to a certain extent. For one thing, the imitation or recreation of the classical forms and styles associated with the ancient Roman tradition of the triumph was much more pronounced by 1535, when Carlos returned to Italy from his military victories over the Moors in and around Tunis. For example, whereas Fernando’s entry into Naples featured ordinary four-wheel, horse-drawn carts, in Messina, Carlos’ allegorical figures of empire and trophies were carried on two-wheeled, Roman-style chariots drawn by costumed children (Checa

Cremades 204).

57

The attention to and reproduction of ancient forms was not carried out just for authenticity’s sake, nor strictly because classicism was becoming fashionable; it also served to underline the particular feats and international pretensions of the Emperor. In his entry into Florence, for instance, Giorgio

Vasari’s design for the arch welcoming Carlos into the city featured “historias de monstrous marinos que combatían a las columnas de Hércules, como símbolo de la conquista de Perú” (Checa Cremades 208).39

Carlos had chosen to portray himself as surpassing the heroic figure of Hercules in selecting the image of

the Pillars of Hercules together with the motto “Plus Ultra” as his personal device (Figure 1.9). The

organizers of his triumphs in several cities obligingly picked up on and used the imagery. In Messina, the

designers took repetition of the notion a step further: not only were two pillars placed outside the

Cathedral, but they also placed two fragments of ancient Roman marbles atop them, one depicting

Hannibal and the other Scipio Africanus, thereby establishing the parallel between Carlos’ African victory

and those of his great Classical forebears (Checa Cremades 205).

Notwithstanding the quantitative and qualitative increase in the use of the images, history and

mythology of Greco-Roman antiquity, it would be a mistake to characterize the thematic range of

Carlos’ festive representations as limited to the classical tropes of the Renaissance (Strong, Art and

Power 76). In fact, as Fernando Checa has pointed out, Carlos used a mixture of related but distinct discourses of power “fundiendo la ideología caballeresca de origen borgoñón con la influencia muy fuerte del intelectualismo erasmiano y el sentido dantesco del Imperio” and then passing, “a partir de victorias tan resonantes como la de Pavía en 1525 y la de Túnez en 1535, a una imagen mítica estructurada en torno a sentimientos clasicistas y romanos, imbuidos de estoicismo” (15). Carlos (and those who sought to flatter him) reached into what was by then a long and deep tradition rich in

39 This representation of Peru as comparable to realms of classical antiquity became a commonplace in early modern Spanish and particularly Spanish colonial works, such as Inca Garcilaso de la Vega’s Comentarios Reales (1617). The allusion to what was at the time the latest military success from the ends of the earth here in one of Carlos’ Italian triumphs served to underline the special daring of the Emperor and the unprecedented grandeur of his now truly universal monarchy, which extended not only far beyond the Pillars of Hercules, but throughout a world unknown to the ancients.

58 multiple symbolic possibilities and chose those elements that best served his interests at the time and in the place of the celebration in question. In Renaissance Italy, classical references were de rigueur, both for reasons of taste or artistic trend and those of local history or legend. In Naples, for example, images of the local river god and the siren Parthenope, associated in myth with the city’s founding, greeted

Carlos at the gate (Checa Cremades 206). However, classicism had not taken the same hold in France when Carlos made his grand entries into Poitiers, Paris and Valenciennes in 1538. As a result, “se prefirió continuar con la tradición medieval de las escenas teatrales a manera de ‘misterio’” (Checa Cremades

213).

Felipe II and heraldic imagery

Another aspect of local variations on festive symbolism is its relationship to the “peculiar estructura del Imperio, una serie de posesiones unidas tan sólo por vínculos personales” to the sovereign (Checa Cremades 15). The Monarchy would occasionally attempt to represent itself as an enduring, solid unit on the model of ancient empires. But at festival representations which, it must be remembered, were by this time generally organized and carried out by city administrators and their local designees, there was an ideological need to stress the personal link between the unique local community and the Emperor while simultaneously recognizing the universal character of his power.

Checa believes this explains the increasingly frequent “aparición en la iconografía carolina de las representaciones de todos los escudos de sus posesiones, en paralelo a la prolija mención de los mismos en tantos documentos oficiales, así como el interés de su corte por las genealogías” (15). Checa traces this practice back to the court of Carlos’ grandfather, Maximilian I, but in fact the use of heraldic imagery was common in medieval political festivals (as well as other places) from all over Europe. Here again, we see the monarchy adapting rather than inventing festival elements to serve the political needs of the moment. Heraldic and genealogical references remain appealing to Spanish monarchs long after

Carlos’ reign and resurface often in subsequent festivals.

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Under Carlos’ son and successor, Felipe II, the use of these kinds of imagery in public celebrations continued and took, as might be expected, some slight but significant turns, according to the political necessities and circumstances of the day. The case of Felipe II’s triumphal entry into Lisbon at Portugal’s incorporation into the Spanish monarchy in 1581 is particularly apropos. Felipe’s claim to the Portuguese throne was not an open-and-shut case—a fact we will examine in more detail in Chapter

Four. For now it is sufficient to say that the question about the legitimacy of Felipe’s inheritance, lingering postwar resentment, strong Portuguese national sentiment and long-standing popular resentment towards Castile, all made it important that Felipe use an effective public relations strategy to solidify political support for the new Iberian Union. His triumph employed the most sophisticated techniques of the day to create such a campaign.

The language of heraldic shields bearing the arms of Felipe’s dominions provided one venue for devising and sending symbolic messages. Fernando Bouza has shown that the specific place Portugal’s arms would have in the graphic representation of Habsburg possessions was considered a political matter of the first order; it was important enough that Felipe, his advisors and the Portuguese, including

Cardinal King Henrique himself (the last of the Aviz line and Felipe’s immediate predecessor), entered into extensive negotiations over it. In the end, on the shield that graced many arches and other displays in Felipe’s triumph, Portugal got a prominent place at the center of the shield, but not half the field, as

Henrique had proposed (Imagen y propaganda 71).40 Portugal was to be represented as no less important than any other realm of the Empire, but no more prominent, either.

Other forms or categories of images were similarly manipulated in order to celebrate Felipe as a political figure at the triumph. Cosmological imagery of the pre-Copernican style, similar to that used by

Fernando de Antequera, reappeared, but was used differently. Here, rather than marking the divine

40 Obviously, Henrique died before this question was settled. But Felipe’s pretensions to succeed childless and celibate Cardinal Henrique were public long before the latter died. Felipe need not have negotiated at all, but as Bouza shows, he was campaigning for as much Portuguese support as possible for his claim prior to Henrique’s death.

60 anointment of the king, it underlined the “dimensión enorme que, entonces, alcanzaba su Imperio, en algunos casos también con alusiones solares” (Bouza 85). These images were incorporated primarily into the artistic descendants of invenciones—emblemata, ingenios and jeroglíficos—which had become even more elaborate and pervasive and were displayed on all sides of the 15 arches erected for Felipe in

Lisbon.

The refined and persistent focus of the triumph’s organizers on forms of visual imagery leads us to consider an important general development in the design of royal festivals—among other cultural manifestations—of the 16th century. The use of visual devices was not entirely new, as we have seen.

Nor, in fact, were many of the specific images represented unprecedented. However, the profusion of varied images, particularly the combination of complex visual symbols of several different orders was novel. For Bouza, this reflected new developments in theoretical reflection on the importance and unique power of visual messages in the Spain of the 16th century—a reflection probably tied both to

rhetorical theory and Counter-Reformation theological responses to Protestant iconoclasm (62-8).

According to the rhetorical theory of the era, images had the peculiar power to impress themselves directly in the memory, without intermediaries, and to remain there (67).41 At the same time, “la literatura católica defendió la eficacia de las [imágenes] atendiendo a la idea atribuida a Aristóteles de que ‘omnis cognitio nostra fiat in imagine et similitudine’” (66). By extension, images of the king and of his qualities or deeds, then, were conceived as particularly effective means of spreading royal fame and encouraging devotion to the Crown.

The language of festive imagery

41 This idea is expounded especially clearly in Mexican Fray Diego Valadés’ Rhetorica Christiana. Valadés’ rhetorical manual for priests was meant to be particularly suited to the evangelization of the Indigenous populations of the New World. For him, the appeal to visual images is not only defined as a fundamental memory device for evangelizing preachers, but also as useful tools for capturing and holding the attention of potential converts and then explaining Christian ideas. Visual symbolism, then, is conceived as particularly apt for spreading the Christian message, as well as royal political propaganda.

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To sum up, between the time when royal festivals in Spain first begin to be mentioned at any length towards the end of the 13th century to the beginning of the 15th, royal festivals do have some

basic, established characteristics that will endure long afterwards. However, they either do not develop

very elaborate forms or components, or at the very least they draw little attention from writers.

Throughout the 15th century, by contrast, there is a great expansion in the components, symbolic content and literary or historical representation suggesting a quantum leap in their political importance.

By the end of Felipe II’s reign at the close of the 16th century, though the basic parameters of festivals in their components have already been established, significant variations in particulars are still possible, and exploited by the Spanish monarchs, their servants and their subjects. To put it another way, as

Victor Turner sees it, “The great genres, ritual, carnival, drama, spectacle, possess in common a temporal structure which interdigitates constant with variable features, and allows a place for spontaneous invention and improvisation in the course of any given performance” (26). The establishment of a traditional framework and ritualistic forms, far from stifling creativity, allows play between tradition and novelty and this play is a rich potential source of meaning.

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Chapter 2 Courtly splendor, propaganda, and heroic poetic form

Como en el cielo impireo se tratasse muchos años atras, de que se hiziesse el mas dichoso casamiento, y fuesse en el tiempo que mas se celebrasse,

Proveyo porque el mundo assi ygualasse con el las fiestas que a su causa huviesse, que la mejor ciudad se las hiziesse, y el ingenio mayor se las contasse.

Y luego la divina providencia mando buscallos desde el Tajo al Nilo, y en el dichoso tiempo de las bodas

Hizieronse las fiestas en Valencia, y Aguilar las contò con tal estilo que fue el contallas la mayor de todas.

Soneto de Don Guillen de Castro (Aguilar, Fiestas nupciales n. pag.)1

Introduction

One of the most significant goals of King Felipe III’s wedding festival of 1598-9 was undoubtedly

to develop and solidify political and financial relations with the Crown of Aragon: the County of

Barcelona, Aragon proper and Valencia. Felipe II had intended for the celebrations to take place in

Barcelona, but they were nevertheless moved to Valencia. Particular attention may have been paid to

the Kingdom of Valencia for political reasons. Relations between the central monarchy and the eastern

realms of the Peninsula were never very good but had been especially sensitive since the Revolt of

Aragon was crushed by Felipe II in 1591. Concentrating travel plans and diplomatic efforts on less-restive

Valencia might have meant running a lower risk of uncomfortable episodes, such as those that had

1 Again, I attempt to minimize modernization of 16th- and 17th-century sources. However; I have replaced the tall version “⌠” with modern “s”, changed consonantal “u” to “v” and vocalic “v” to “u”.

63 plagued El Prudente during his visits to Barcelona and Aragon in the mid-1580s.2 Valencia must have seemed more likely to produce the kind of genuine celebration befitting the new king’s first royal progress. According to Patrick Williams, however, it was really Francisco Sandoval y Rojas who decided on the change in venue (Williams 171). At the time of Felipe III’s accession the future Duke of Lerma was still only Marqués de Denia, a small but significant coastal fortress located about midway between

Alicante and the city of Valencia itself. The Sandovals had lost many of their Castilian estates and titles in the 15th century and as a result Denia was the most significant title still remaining to them. It also made them one of the more prominent noble houses of the Kingdom of Valencia, where the Marqués had been viceroy from 1595 to 1598. Lerma arranged for some of the most elaborate events of the wedding festival to take place in his family seat on the Mediterranean. Though Lerma did induce the king to return to Denia for a second visit in July—despite complaints from some members of the court that its accommodations were substandard—the unprecedented series of lavish spectacles Sandoval had in mind for the new sovereign would involve substantial travel elsewhere in the Kingdom of Valencia. A few more events were planned still later on in Barcelona, Zaragoza and other parts of Aragon, too.

Naturally, the notables of the city of Valencia could not allow Denia to outshine the capital of the realm altogether and made their own events as impressive as they could. The city and kingdom asked a number of celebrated artists and writers, including native son and poet Gaspar Aguilar (1561-1623), to contribute to parts of these affairs.3 As a result, the festivals of 1598-9 were largely—albeit not entirely—Valencian affairs.

2 See Teófilo Ruiz’ A King Travels, for a detailed examination of this singularly un-gratifying series of royal entries, especially Chapter V, pp. 146-92. 3 Though little remembered now, Gaspar Aguilar was well regarded in his day. He was known both for successful comedias and for his poetry, which he wrote mainly in Spanish. He was a member of the Academia de los nocturnos and was especially admired by other notable Valencian writers of his day. However, his reputation was such that he also exchanged signs of public admiration with Lope de Vega, amongst other Spanish literary figures based outside Valencia.

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Another Valencian poet, Guillén de Castro (1569-1631), dedicates a sonnet to Gaspar Aguilar at the opening of the latter poet’s Fiestas nupciales que la ciudad y reino de Valencia han hecho en el felicissimo casamiento del Rey don Phelipe nuestro señor III deste nombre, con doña Margarita de

Austria Reyna y señora nuestra (hereafter referred to as Fiestas nupciales).4 This early modern blurb is not exactly remarkable for the genre; in courteous tones Castro lauds the author, his poem and the city of Valencia. Rather, the specific way Castro underlines the significance of Felipe III’s wedding festival is quite typical of its time and, as a result, an appropriate place to begin to frame a consideration of heroic occasional poetry of Felipe III’s era, like Aguilar’s Fiestas nupciales and Félix Lope de Vega’s Fiestas de

Denia.

Castro claims the “mas dichoso casamiento” had been foreordained many years before in the highest sphere of heaven, the Empyrean.5 Then, the event is subsequently made real or materialized in what is, for the Valencian poet at least, the most fitting possible city, Valencia. Finally, It is recounted by the best possible poet, Gaspar Aguilar, so that the worldly occasion will live up to divine intent. It is hard to imagine a more succinct expression of the Neoplatonist discourse of early modern royal politics—

according to Castro’s poem it is the role of the king and his court to make the ideal material by

embodying on earth all that is best in the heavenly order of the spheres. And then it is the poet’s role to

record and immortalize the particulars in verse.

In a sense, it could be said that the relationship between Platonic ideal and its corresponding

royal materiality is similar to the relationship posited by Victor Turner between a codified ritual or social

drama and an instance of its performance. Both approaches suggest an analogous process of artistic

4 Guillén de Castro y Bellvis was another poet of some repute and a contemporary of Aguilar and Lope. He too was a member of the Academia de los nocturnos. 5 According to traditional Ptolemaic cosmology as adapted to Christian thought, the ninth and highest of the nested spheres that organized the physical and spiritual universe was the Empyrean. This was an unmoving, sacred realm of pure light and/or fire inhabited by God and the angels (Figure 2.1).

65 creation and/or social action: the people of the here and now in the material world produce an event to embody or give currency to a conceptual or abstract form, which can be regarded as akin to a script.

Of course, there are major differences between the early modern perspective and that of performance theorists, cultural critics, anthropologists and other 20th- and 21st-century thinkers, too. For a start, from the etic (or exterior) perspective of modern scholars, actual festival activities are performances or enactments of models or forms pre-established by cultural tradition, rather than by heaven. In contrast, the emic (interior) perspective of Philip III’s contemporaries could never allow that the heavens were a mere cultural construct. Indeed, this is why it would be a deep misunderstanding to dismiss or underplay the importance of festive behavior in Habsburg Spain. If the proposition that the regime was the material projection of divine order is one of the foundation stones of royal ideology, then playing out the royal wedding well was of crucial importance.

Further, in the Neoplatonist conception, while there are correspondences between the perfection of heavenly form and the material world, there is no explicit theorization of how or where these correspondences are established nor how one sphere might influence or change the other, if such modification is possible. Turner, by contrast, elaborates on Arnold van Gennep’s concept of sacred space in rites of passage and sees cultural performance like festivals as opening “privileged spaces and times, set off from the periods and areas reserved for work, food and sleep”. He calls these periods and areas liminal spaces. 6 These “are the scenes of play and experimentation, as much as of solemnity and rules”

(25). This last point is particularly important; liminal spaces (and times), like festival celebrations, being at the edges of the ordinary, have a mixed social nature. They are situated where the ideal and the imaginary meet the social practices and conventions of ordinary time and space. On the one hand, they

6 See Arnold van Gennep’s Les rites de passage, 9-10. Numerous writers have commented on the special character and delimitation of the space and time of performative rites and social theater. For similar but somewhat divergent theoretical views see also Huizinga’s Homo ludens (9), Michel de Certeau’s conception of borders or bridges (127-8), Michel Foucault’s theorization of heterotopias in “Of Other Spaces” and Fernando R. de la Flor’s “Reflexiones sobre la conceptualización de lo efímero” (460-1).

66 constitute the environment where codified and sometimes rigidly traditional rites and ceremonies are performed. On this “side” one might also expect a realistic representation of the way life is, to some degree and in the style accepted as realistic according to the culture in question. On the other, these spaces may also be creative environments, allowing for variation on tradition, innovation or even, on occasion, subversion.

Turner sums up the opportunity afforded to those taking part in activities in the marginal space of social theater as follows.

Just as the subjunctive mood of a verb is used to express supposition, desire,

hypothesis, or possibility, rather than stating actual facts, so do liminality and the

phenomena of liminality dissolve all factual and commonsense systems into their

components and ‘play’ with them in ways never found in nature or in custom, at least at

the level of direct perception.7 (25)

The importance of these spaces opened up at the border between life-as-usually-lived and extra-ordinary time and space is that the momentary proximity of two realms allows for crossings between one and the other. Within the confines of the liminal space fiction, the imaginary and desire become temporarily concrete, physically present—the most “dichoso casamiento” is made real just as the Empyrean decreed. Crossing in the other direction, human beings of mere flesh and blood, like

Felipe and Margarita, project themselves into the realm of myth and fantasy and take on their divine character and importance to an extent which is only theoretical in everyday affairs.

Further, it bears underlining that although the rite nominally driving the production of all the festivities of 1598-9 was, of course, that pertaining to Felipe and Margarita’s passage from the unmarried to the married social condition, the ceremony in which Felipe and Margarita renewed their vows was far from the only significant occasion. The festival as a whole incorporated scores of specific

7 Given the similarities in their approaches to the creative social use of play, especially agonistic, celebratory play and the arts, it is curious that Turner does not cite Huizinga.

67 events and hundreds, if not thousands, of individual participants. The noble participants especially, from local gentry to the most prominent members of the greatest houses of the realm, took part in rites, games and activities that had peculiar meaning and importance from their own perspectives, which more often than not were distinct from that of the royal family. As we shall see, for these revelers too, the liminal space of the festival and its component ludic activity were a stage on which they could live out their dreams of glory, whatever the specific components of these dreams, whether religious, warlike or amorous.

For Turner, the power to play with “commonsense systems” is such that social theater performed in these spaces can do more than merely express social points of view; it can effect real change and resolve sociocultural problems. Turner and others may well have identified a number of cases where this is true, especially in societies very much unlike early modern Spain. But for my purposes, though social changes do result from festival activity, it would be all too easy to overstate their reach. After all, Maravall makes a good point when he asserts that the purpose of celebratory events was to support a profoundly conservative, aristocratic society. In any case, one could hardly expect 17th-century, state-sponsored royal events to allow, much less promote revolutionary social change.

Leaving the Crown itself aside, none of the notable organizers or noble participants in the major events would really have expected or desired major social changes or decisions to be made during festive occasions, either. However, they might and in fact did hope and advocate for tweaking the prevailing system to improve their own particular circumstances within the fixed structure of the established social order. They pursued such minor change with varying degrees of subtlety and achieved different degrees of success. I have already discussed, for example, the Duke of Lerma’s political interest in putting on a good show for Felipe and his bride. As I will attempt to show below, a number of political

68 actors may have attempted to work the liminal space of Felipe’s wedding festival to their advantage in various ways. Whether they were successful or not is less clear.

I would argue that much of the ”play” in early-modern Spanish festivals is better understood as

Freudian wish-fulfillment rather than political advocacy. That is to say that for many of the noble festival participants, their turn on the festival stage, the moment when they represented themselves as perfect knights crossing into the realm of the sublime, was the pinnacle of their glory as social beings, regardless of whether their concrete condition after the festival changed or not.

That a good festival performance was its own reward is especially understandable when we remember that what might now be considered superficial entertainment was truly important in early modern courtly society. This is not to diminish the importance of genuine material triumphs, such as appointment to a lucrative office, the acquisition of rich estates or distinguishing oneself in battle. In fact, to some extent concrete recognition may well have depended on nobles’ sponsorship of, and/or performance in festival events. At least in the early days of Felipe III’s reign, one of the proven means of drawing royal attention to oneself was to either sponsor or perform exceptionally well in a festival tourney or other event.8 Nevertheless, it would be difficult to prove a direct causal link between, say, winning a prize for costume in a tourney and concrete royal favors granted later on. More importantly, festivity was not the most important arena for securing royal grace to oneself. Even for Lerma, it could hardly be said his position was secured by the successful organization of the wedding festival alone. He formed a solid relationship with Prince Felipe over the course of years of personal service which began before the latter ascended the throne. Moreover, not every courtier could reasonably expect to be recognized and rewarded in a significant way for his performance in, for example, a juego de cañas. Yet, even a knight whose political ambitions were modest might nonetheless borrow a better’s horse and

8 See Adolfo Carrasco’s “La construcción problemática del yo nobiliario en el siglo XVII” and Teresa Ferrer Valls’ “De los medios para mejorar estado” for interesting discussions of the importance and implications of noble participation in festive occasions.

69 take out a crushing loan in order to dress well for a festival tourney, simply because it was one of the prescribed ways for such a man to demonstrate his social station. Or, as Adolfo Carrasco Martínez says, such exertions were part of the “cursus honorum cortesano” (61).

To take this idea one step further, we might even say with Fernando de la Flor that the noble class participating public celebrations like those surrounding the royal weddings

alcanza una suerte de paroxismo en su visibilidad en su comunicabilidad, y diríamos

también que en su existencia misma. Los arcana imperio, los misterios de lo Político

tienen su realización única y expresiva en los rituales en que estos encarnan, cobrando

cuerpo y realidad factual y perceptiva, al modo mismo en que el misterio máximo del

cristianismo–la Eucaristía—tiene sólo existencia en el interior–y sólo en el—de la

estructura ritualizada que lo produce, sin que pueda verdaderamente decirse que está

en otra parte que allí mismo.9 (463)

At least within its own frame of reference, then, ritual or celebratory activity might not only represent political, religious and other non-material ideals, but actually constitute them. By extension, such occasions might often also be experienced as richer, more satisfying and more meaningful than everyday experience. Indeed, at least for the more comfortable classes with disposable funds and leisure time, a festival might be considered more than a welcome interruption of a “real”, daily life; in effect in its Platonic way, it was more real than the humdrum routine of ordinary existence.

If we take the reality and significance of festival occasions as a point of departure, the importance of the poetic work written to represent these events comes into focus. From the perspective of the nobleman, the interest in sponsoring the production of a commemorative literary work is obvious. Such a piece would justly immortalize one of the most significant occasions of his life. The author’s economic interest in being commissioned to write the work is no less clear. Still, to reduce the

9 De la Flor seems to be referring mostly to the monarch, but the point can be extended to lower powers as well.

70 production of such texts to a simple quid pro quo exchange of flattery for commission income does not quite do justice to the writers or their work.

Since the exaltation of the romantic figure of the artist in the 19th century, modern readers have

in general had little use for literary art openly placed at the disposal of political authority, particularly if

the piece in question were commissioned directly by such a figure. Yet, politically neutral or disengaged

writing was not really possible at the turn of the 17th century, at least not if a writer meant to make his art a profession. As Isabel Enciso Alonso-Muñumer puts it, “el artista o escritor de fines del XVI y comienzos del XVII necesitaba entrar al servicio de un noble influyente para poder adquirir reconocimiento” (48).10 Recognition could come in several forms other than direct payoffs, including

political cover or protection from rival writers and/or their political networks. Even a successful author

from a good family who was well known for criticizing courtly life, like Francisco de Quevedo, could not

resist seeking the promotion and advantages that could only be provided by a powerful patron (Enciso

Alonso-Muñumer 48).11 For writers from less illustrious backgrounds, like Lope de Vega and Gaspar

Aguilar, the need for patronage was all the greater.12 To establish a beneficial relationship, the author

would, at a minimum, have to dedicate notable works to his patron. On occasion, he might even have to

write a piece entirely dedicated to outright flattery of his protector.

10 The emphasis is the author’s. 11 Quevedo’s rival and equally distinguished poet, Luis de Góngora y Argote, devoted one of his most ambitious poems to the praise of Francisco de Sandoval y Rojas, Felipe III’s valido. In his “El Panegírico al duque de Lerma: Trascendencia de un modelo gongorino (1617-1705)”, Jesús Ponce Cárdenas argues Góngora’s heroic panegyric served as a model for subsequent poetic flattery by reintroducing a classical model which had fallen into disuse. Góngora’s great influence may well have boosted this literary trend, and some of the finer points of Góngora’s classical models were probably novel for his time. Nevertheless, given the relatively late date of the poem’s composition and distribution (after 1615), Ponce may be going a bit too far with his assertion that this poem would make Góngora the inventor of “una manera nueva de exaltar las glorias de la aristocracia barroca” (71). 12 Aguilar, as the son of a pasamanero—a kind of merchant of lace, ribbons and/or other sartorial embellishments—was of humble origins. He fell out with his family over his marriage to Luisa de Peralta and though he had some notable literary successes, particularly on the lively Valencian theater scene of his day, he depended on his service as secretary to various prominent Valencian noblemen for survival. Lope de Vega was of a similarly undistinguished family, being the son of an embroiderer, but achieved much greater fame and fortune through his writing. See Elizabeth Wright’s Pilgrimage to Patronage for the seminal account of Lope’s strategies for parlaying literary success into ever greater social distinction.

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Apart from that, again, given that festival events were fundamentally important for most noble participants, it is no surprise that writers were expected to produce glowing accounts of ceremonial entries or triumphal marriage celebrations. Writing an epic poem based on these occasions was not necessarily to be considered indulgence in overblown sycophancy but rather according due dignity to a significant social event. An account of a patron’s participation in a major royal celebration fell somewhere between two poles of obsequiousness: slavish devotion on one hand and disinterested freedom on the other. At a minimum the author certainly had to dedicate the work to his patron (or intended patron) and place emphasis on how well the great man or woman and his/her associates came off. But he was not limited to that—he had the freedom to address and portray others, too. In fact, it

could be said that the author had the obligation to expand the field of people and events he took into

the scope of his work. The author’s task was not merely to make a patron and his or her performance

look good, but also to magnify the occasion: the greater the scene the more important the actor’s role

would appear. Finally, it was in the author’s more general interests to make as much as he could of the

occasion and his poem. Being a recognized interpreter of a grand occasion and producing a well-

regarded work also served to heighten the author’s renown and help him reach a greater readership.

This is why works of political flattery, such as Lope’s La Dragontea, Luis de Góngora’s Panegírico al duque de Lerma and Aguilar’s Fiestas nupciales were regarded as among these authors’ most important in the authors’ own time.

The mission of the courtly writer of occasional literature, then, can be understood as holding up a kind of “magic mirror” to the festival experience, to use Turner’s terminology. The magic of this mirror is its ability to distort or re-present ordinary experience as an extraordinary image. Turner uses the mirror metaphor to add additional depth to his concept of liminal spaces and to describe performative experiences directly, but not however, to refer to the artistic representation of such events.

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Nevertheless, I propose to extend the application of the notion beyond festival performance itself to the literature produced to reflect upon occasional activity and those taking part in it.

“Heterotopia” is the term Foucault coins to refer to his own notion of spaces where real sites

“are simultaneously represented, contested and inverted” outside the normal order of things (24). For my purposes here, Turner’s conception of liminal spaces is sufficient, but Foucault does add a useful observation on one of the possible functions of heterotopias, or the performative uses of liminal spaces:

“their role is to create a space that is other, another real space, as perfect, as meticulous, as well arranged as ours is messy, ill constructed and jumbled” (27). Just as a joust was a game devised to represent combat as something purer, more orderly and more beautiful than it really was, occasional writing about a joust was meant to further refine and purify the image of the game, much the way the second lens of a telescope further sharpens and amplifies the image of a distant object before it reaches the observer’s eye. However, in most cases, the author was not composing historiography in verse nor any other form of chronicle. A poet had greater freedom than a lens, of course, to select specific images and adjust them to fit his purpose. The writer might discard jarring or discordant elements, as for example if the king had to be carried onto the lists in a litter because of a painful flare-up of gout. He might also help perfect and extend the image of the event or its sponsor through intertextual references or analogy to classical mythology.

Needless to say, it was never the purpose of occasional literature to focus on events which might cast a negative light on one’s patron, but on the contrary, to project an image that would magnify and glorify both. This positive re-presentation came after an initial structuring of the public theater of the festival already designed to cast the same parties in a positive light. In this way, we could consider the composition of festival literature as analogous to a process of distillation by which the utopian, nostalgic or mythic images produced during the festival were clarified and made doubly intense through poetic treatment.

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Epic form and festival writing

According to the literary tastes of the dawn of the 17th century, the epic form was the very best

poetic treatment a writer could give to important events and personages. As we have seen, festival

accounts become relatively commonplace by the end of the middle ages. Yet, festival writing is typically

in prose, whether taking the form of a chronicler’s manuscript or a printed pliego suelto. Shorter poems,

like the coplas published for the royal weddings of 1496-7 are not uncommon, but the composition of a full-fledged heroic poem seems to have been something of a novelty in 1599.13 Though unusual, this development was by no means illogical. The epic form was uniquely attractive both to poets and more especially to the upper classes of festivalgoers and readers for reasons perhaps best summed up by

Maxime Chevalier.

La epopeya moderna ocupó preeminente lugar en la cultura española del Siglo de Oro.

Por corresponder al triunfante nacionalismo español del siglo XVI, por satisfacer el

anhelo de ver celebradas en versos las hazañas de capitanes y conquistadores, gustó a

un extenso público en el que debieron de predominar los caballeros. Por la materia

histórica que trataba interesó a los cronistas de España y de América. Por el valor

reconocido al género, por la abundancia de recursos retóricos que manejaba, por la

cantidad de sentencias que ofrecía apasionó al público de los doctos. Así se explica el

prestigio de que gozaron en los últimos decenios de siglo XVI y los primeros del siglo

siguiente no sólo La Araucana y las epopeyas de Lope, sino también otros poemas hoy

tan olvidados como La segunda parte de Orlando de Nicolás Espinosa, el Carlo Famoso

13 As was often the case in literary fashion, Italy may well have been the birthplace of this subgenre. At the beginning of the 16th century Simon de Luere of Venice published an interesting chapbook called El triumpho et honore fatto al christianissimo re di Franza quando entro nella citta de Blessi to mark François I of France’s triumphal entry into Blois (1515). The pamphlet was only four pages long but was illustrated with two woodcuts and the text was composed of thirty stanzas of ottava rima. There may well have been other early examples, but they do not appear to be either abundant or voluminous before the end of the 16th century, at least not in Spain.

74

de Luis Zapata, La Austríada de Juan Rufo o El León de España de Pedro de la Vecilla

Castellanos. (126)

Epic poetry had several things going for it. It was high-sounding by its nature and therefore

tended to elevate the subject matter and characters represented. Those subjects were often figures

and/or deeds of great historical, political or religious significance. The seriousness and importance of

poetic subject matter made it possible for discriminating Golden Age readers to admire poetry written in

this genre even though they might spurn it in others. On the one hand, “frente a juego tan insustancial

como la lírica, los hombres cultos y serios arrugaban el ceño” (Chevalier 124). On the other, epics celebrated unimpeachable examples of the grandest possible stately and historical deeds, whether of the semi-legendary past, or of the present.14

The epic focus on warlike prowess is connected to another of its obvious advantages for a

certain segment of the early-modern Spanish reading public: epic was a genre with special appeal for a

noble and masculine readership. As we will see below, however, this rule was not necessarily absolute in

the case of festival poetry. Partial exceptions notwithstanding, it is fair to say that poets writing heroic

works based on festivals were generally aiming for a male readership and further, that this informed

their decisions on where to focus their poetic attention and how to represent festival participants and

their sponsors.

As Chevalier says, these heroic representations also tended to gratify an incipient form of

nationalism which was on the rise in early modern Spain. Elizabeth Davis expands on this theme in her

examination of some of the better-known examples of early modern Spanish epic poetry, including Juan

Rufo’s La Austríada, Lope de Vega’s Jerusalén conquistada and the most influential of all, Alonso de

Ercilla’s La Araucana. Davis sees these epics as offering

14 On the debates about the advisability of composing epic poetry about recent events and/or heroes, see Wright (24-5) and Davis (2-3).

75

advantageous self-justifying strategies to the pro-Castilian upper echelon of the Iberian

Peninsula that attempted to narrate its history and its agenda in the face of abiding

pressure from both the peninsular semiperiphery and the periphery. Not only could the

epic effectively incorporate and mobilize the myths of imperial culture, it could also

draw on the prophecies and genealogies that were conventions of Greek and Roman

epic to link the Castilian monarchy to a remote past, and, thus, manufacture the illusion

of permanence. All epic shares this feature: part of its fiction is a backward gaze in

search of validating legends. Epic shares this strategy with the nation-state and with

some incipient form of national consciousness at least as far back as the Renaissance.

(12)

Though Davis’ general view is well argued, as we will see, the poetic voices of the festival epics examined in this study complicate this scheme considerably. Again, I will not argue that these poems were in any way deliberately subversive of the Habsburg monarchy. Further, festival epics tend to reinforce Davis’ point on the use of appeals to the mythic past to sustain claims of the permanence of the Spanish elite into the present and future. However, this epic subgenre was at times—though not always—more representative of the perspectives of the various components of what Davis calls the

“peninsular semiperiphery” and local elites than the centralizing perspective of dominant Castile. As a result, it is not always helpful to read them as narrative attempts to push back against pressures from the imperial margins. Sometimes they can better be understood as expressions of those very pressures, though they were always contained within the bounds dictated by political discretion. Moreover, the abundant historical and mythical elements, the genealogies and other conventions Davis so rightly highlights, will not always lend themselves to the service of Castilian national consciousness, at least not exclusively.

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Davis’ mention of the textual strategies of epic poetry generated in classical literature and revived in the early modern period brings us to another important aspect of epic poetry: its formal conventions. Frank Pierce remarks that there is so much variation in the thematic and other compositional ingredients of Golden Age epic that its formal aspects are the only reliable, uniform markers allowing identification of the genre (222). These stable characteristics included the octava real stanza and rhyme scheme, which had supplanted arte mayor as the standard for serious poetry in Spain by the second quarter of the 16th century.15 A few other notable markers of the renaissance epic form adopted from classical models were the division of the work into cantos, an invocation of the muses at the beginning of the work and the detailed listing of participants in combat.16 Often the narration also

included fantastical or allegorical passages, perhaps in the form of a dream sequence or other

supernatural events, such as the councils of the gods in Luiz Vaz de Camões’ Os Lusíadas.

The details of these conventions are less important than the effect their use produced. The

inclusion of fashionable classical or Italian features in a poem sent unmistakable signals to the reader

about the gravity of the poet, his work and the events and characters they portrayed. These elements

15 The Oxford Dictionary of the Renaissance places the implantation of the octava real (sometimes called octava rima or octava heróica) in Spain at exactly 1526, when Juan Boscán adopted the Italian ottava rima at Venetian Ambassador Andrea Navagiero’s behest (Boscà I D'Almugàver, Joan, or (Castilian) Juan Boscán). For a more general view, see also Frank Pierce’s La poesía épica del siglo de oro (222-4). The Dictionary further mentions that there was already a similar lyric form in Catalonia, making it relatively easy for Boscán to adapt the Italian one successfully (Octava real). Octave forms, however, were not unfamiliar to poets in other parts of Spain, although they had fallen out of fashion by the late 15th century. Arte mayor, the previous standard for serious poetry, was somewhat variable in length of verse, but by the middle of the 15th century was typically based on a stanza of eight verses, sometimes hendecasyllabic, as was the octava real. The major differences between arte mayor and octava real were in the rhyme scheme and the invariability of the hendecasyllabic meter in the latter. 16 The proper classification of epic poems has been a topic of lively discussion since the genre’s revival in the 16th century. In his prologue to Lope’s La Dragontea (1598), for example, Francisco de Borja, Prince of Esquilache, divides heroic poetry, a “nombre genérico”, into three subcategories. The first is heroic poetry proper, a subgenre modeled on Homer and Vergil and focusing strictly on the heroes of the essential action. The second category, which Esquilache calls “épico” groups parodies treating low or fantastic characters and “cosas muy humildes” in mock heroic style, as in Homer’s Batrachomyomachia. The third category he calls “mixto” because it mixes proper heroic characters with “personas desiguales”, as Ludovico Ariosto does in his Orlando furioso (La Dragontea 122-3). Esquilache himself declares the debate too voluminous for summary, so there is no particular reason to take his classification as definitive. However, his division by the quality of the characters is an interesting aristocratic reading. For Davis’ modern reading, including her division of early modern Spanish epics between those considered historical and those regarded as “novelesque or fantastic”, see Myth and Identity pp. 4-5. For a similar, but slightly less precisely defined attempt at a thematic system of classification, see Pierce (220-1).

77 were no small part of the dignity and attraction of the genre. Indeed, no other form of writing could,

“presentar escenas devotas o majestuosas con la solemnidad descriptiva, con la elocuencia panegírica que son propias de la épica” (Pierce 221).

As I have suggested, epic poetry was not always considered a natural way to shape a festival account. Though the form offered the advantages I have mentioned, composing heroic poetry on a festival theme also entailed some difficulties for the poet. First among these was that, although festive occasions might be taken as really important, they were not real in the same way that bloody historical battles were. One result was that there was a general lack of risk or menace to the hero(es) of festival poems and this often made it hard for the author to raise the level of suspense or dramatic tension in the events he was narrating. In the same way, though some authors did manage, it was not always easy for the poet to introduce the kind of epic enemy into his work that might help to define the hero(es) by contrast. Moreover, the encomiastic necessity of including and praising a great number of noble Spanish festivalgoers and the heavenly cities in which they dwelled, tended to force the poet to maintain a relentlessly positive tone and to really reach to differentiate between a seemingly infinite variety of uniformly brilliant virtues in his descriptions. Apart from the obvious risk of monotony this caused, it could also easily make it even harder to define characters in a genre that even at its best tended to underemphasize character development. In fact, poets generally did not even attempt to maintain an

Aristotelian unity of hero. While they invariably paid due respect to the king, they also gave the hero’s treatment to their patrons, his family and associates and any number of other luminaries of the day.

Finally, there was another characteristic of classical epic that was problematic for the authors of

Golden Age festival epics. For some critics and authors, especially influential Torquato Tasso and his followers, it was essential that the poet place the action of the epic in that chronological sweet spot which was, “di secolo non molto remoto, né molto prossimo a la memoria di noi ch'ora viviamo” (Tasso

15). On the one hand, a subject from the too-distant past would be difficult for the contemporary reader

78 to understand. On the other, a poet writing about current events and the living ran a significant risk of getting things wrong. The weightiness and meaning of events can only be accurately judged from some distance, so a poet attempting to rush the first draft of history to press might well end up producing a work worthy of only the most fleeting interest, or worse, one that was contradicted by subsequent events or additional accounts.

Moreover, writing about living people, particularly the kind of powerful people most likely to make good characters in an epic poem, opened the author up to political pressures or even reprisals from a number of different critical readers. The poet would be under some level of pressure to produce a work that would be pleasing to his or her patron, of course. Beyond that, poetic license or tolerance for looseness with the facts was routine when the subject of the poem was safely placed hundreds of years in the past. But inaccurate representation of fresh historical events was another matter and not as easily forgiven. Yet, as Mercedes Blanco points out, such inaccuracy was inherent in the poet’s craft (16).

Further, interested parties and political rivals might attempt to frustrate or punish the author for any

perceived slight or misrepresentation. This problem was not limited to festival epics, of course; Lope

faced all these negative consequences—to one degree or another—for his La Dragontea, published in

1598 to celebrate the Spanish victory over Sir Francis Drake just two years before.17 Since the very purpose of festival epics was to celebrate the deeds of living people, the challenge was always particularly acute in the case of these texts. Moreover, such poems were usually published as quickly after the occasions they recounted as possible.

The poets considered in this study employed several different strategies in an effort to overcome the challenges posed by the epic form. Nevertheless, I will focus here on some techniques

17 See Chapter 1 of Elizabeth Wright’s Pilgrimage to Patronage for a detailed discussion of what she sees as Lope’s failed attempt to use this poem to appeal to authorities for an official post as royal chronicler. In the introductory study to his edition of La Dragontea, Antonio Sánchez Jiménez responds that though Lope did not obtain the court position he wanted, he did receive notable recognition and support from Lerma and his network of relations and clients, including employment as secretary to the Marqués de Sarria, Lerma’s nephew and son of the powerful Conde de Lemos (49).

79 which seem to present themselves naturally, as they occurred to multiple authors facing similar issues or were even traditional aspects of the genre. I will reserve comment on more idiosyncratic or particular authorial methods for my discussion of each individual poet. All these techniques met with differing degrees of success, depending on the occasion and/or the skill of the poet.

One common method of dealing with the problem of potential monotony and the lack of an organizing mission against an epic enemy was to place considerable emphasis on movement. Since the time The Odyssey was composed at least, recounting the adventures inherent in a voyage of outsize proportions had been a traditional organizing motif in epic poetry and since all the royal occasions under consideration here involved substantial courtly travel, this was a natural way to introduce variety in atmosphere, if nothing else. Occasionally, it could serve as the foundation for something more, as I will show in subsequent chapters.

In an attempt to overcome the tedium of repeating nearly identical laudatory passages on the valor of all the knights and the virginal beauty of all the maidens attending an event, authors also introduced a great deal of amplification and variation in heavenly imagery and praise. In this they acted much as Dante had done in his Il Paradiso. The great Florentine poet’s depiction of heaven may be the most challenging part of his Divina commedia to appreciate precisely because, like the festival poet, he must make all the blessed saints and all the heavenly locales, from the moon to the Empyrean sphere, appear to be equally just, beautiful and good.18 Yet he must somehow also make them distinct in their specific degrees of blissful perfection. No doubt this is why festival epics—to say nothing of courtly poetry generally as well as festival imagery itself—often adopt Dantesque imagery and/or descriptive strategies.

18 In fact, the problem of the lower perfection of the lower spheres is one that Dante confronts directly as soon as he reaches the nearest heavenly sphere, that of the moon, the abode of those who have not been constant in their vows. When one of the souls inhabiting this sphere, Piccarda, is asked if she has no desire to ascend to a loftier sphere, she responds that “la nostra volontà quieta / virtù di carità, che fa volerne sol quell ch’avemo” (Il Paradiso I:70-1).

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Another frequent strategy was common to the festival epic and other panegyric forms from classical times through the early modern period: the poet could heighten the prestige of characters by referring to their high status and ancestry rather than actual heroic deeds, which led often to detailed disquisitions on lineage and heraldic symbolism. A major advantage to this method was that it did not matter if the figure in question had real accomplishments to extoll, but it was also a logical extension of the hierarchical ideology of power of the times. A couple of additional techniques from the classical rhetorical tradition were hyperbole and flattering comparisons to a variety of mythological, legendary or religious figures (Blanco 32). Along these same lines, an author might also introduce historical events which had taken place long before the occasion in question to elaborate on the importance of a festival participant or his family. This meant violating the Aristotelian precept of the unity of time in epic poetry, but allowed the author to gratify particularly important noble festivalgoers, introduce some variety and, crucially, some solid verisimilitude into the poem.

Finally, to develop the notion of genealogical and historical discourse, it bears noting that writers of festival epic were very much aware of the connection between the ephemeral present and the mythic eternal, as well as the historical past. To one degree or another, all these writers dignified their works and the personages represented in them by taking advantage of every opportunity to play up the correspondence between the fleeting quality of the occasion and the timeless spheres of ideal

Platonist reality. Another way of looking at it would be to say that poets used epic form to overcome any thinness or superficiality in the subject matter of their writing by using historical and prophetical elements to establish a kind of narrative bridge linking nostalgia for a mythic past to a utopian future.

Moreover, this kind of diachronic material also provided another politically expressive outlet or opening for some poets: historical references could serve as exempla for the illustration of moral or political lessons. This brings us to the rhetorical strategy known as exemplarity. John Keller defines an exemplum as, “a short narrative, primarily in prose, but sometimes in verse, whose moralization, or

81 lesson, is stated clearly” and which may “stem from any source”, including fables, biblical parable or

“any kind of brief narrative” (39). In festival epics, however, we are less concerned with the wider range of possible sources. In these poems, the authors focus on the specific kind history examined by Nancy

Marino in her study of Francisco de Castilla’s Práctica de las virtudes, wherein, “history provides examples of leaders whose ethical ideals and political accomplishments should be studied and imitated to ensure future success” (36). Moreover, these historical examples are typically taken from notable dynastic figures, the lives and virtues (or vices) of royal or noble forebears. This allows the poet to link virtuous behavior in the past to the present not only through its moral beauty, but also through the standard operating principle of political legitimacy of the day: heredity or legacy.

As we will see, not all authors use historical or genealogical examples in order to explicitly illustrate a political moral or judgment. Such references might also merely serve as a way to play lineage to best advantage. Nevertheless, the poets studied here took an epic view of festival time and represented its passage in a way that not only memorialized the past but underlined its quality as a model for the present and possibly for the future. As Blanco says, “habían conciliado la historia con el poema, y la grandeza con lo nuevo, lo vivo y lo actual. Puesto que tan altos fines se habían alcanzado entonces, también podían lograrse ahora" (32). Moreover, as Davis suggests rather obliquely, one of the purposes of epic poetry is to connect the past and present to the future, in that it draws on “prophecies and genealogies” and other discursive elements marked by time. The purpose of these references is to link the political regime of the present “to a remote past, and, thus, manufacture the illusion of permanence” which, though Davis does not say so explicitly, will presumably extend itself far into the future (12).

Historical context and festival imagery 1598-99

A poetic bridge between nostalgic appreciation of the past and idealized hopes for the future was the perfect expression of where noble festivalgoers, including the king and his favorite, found

82 themselves in 1598-1599. The events of 1598-1599 were really much more than a wedding celebration.

As already mentioned, the king’s travel to the eastern reaches of the Peninsula had several layers of political implications, not the least of which were the official ceremonies whereby his subjects and local notables officially declared their loyalty to Felipe as king for the first time.

Felipe III (1578-1621) had just ascended to the throne at his father Felipe II’s death in

September of 1598. Not only did the period of sober mourning for Felipe II’s death officially end with the renewal of vows in Valencia, but the new king was still a young man, a figure whose vigor contrasted sharply with that of his father at the careworn end of a very long reign which ended in tension, if not crisis.19 Hopes were fresh as the new period seemed full of great promise for almost everyone. To those who had been closest to El Prudente, of course, the prospect of change probably seemed less promising,

but for everyone else the succession seemed to offer new opportunities. Anticipation was especially

high amongst those who had been dissatisfied, who felt underappreciated or whose ambitions had been

frustrated in one way or another during Felipe II’s long domination of the monarchy’s affairs (r. 1554-

1598).

The disaffected included a significant fraction of the nobles of the realm, because Felipe II had

largely excluded them from the effective levers of power. Like many monarchs, Felipe II found that

charging noblemen with high office and responsibility could be problematic for two reasons. Ideology

notwithstanding, illustrious ancestry often did not guarantee administrative, financial or military

competence, to say the least. Further, delegating power to the highborn could sometimes give potential

rivals or troublemakers the wherewithal to make themselves difficult or embarrassing, if not dangerous.

In theory, the government of the Empire operated through its official Councils—like the Council

of Indies, the Council of War or the various Councils of Portugal, the Kingdom of Naples or any other of

the Empire’s constituent parts. And again, in theory the king controlled membership of the Councils and

19 Of course Felipe II’s reign had started in a very similar way; he replaced an exhausted Carlos V on the throne at the height of his youthful vigor.

83 could appoint whichever noblemen he pleased. But in fact, within the Councils, incompetence, rivalries and the thicket of contradictory interests and opinions led regularly to gridlock, or even worse, to outcomes contrary to royal interests (Feros, Lerma y Olivares 202).

As a result, Felipe II had often found it necessary to adopt extraordinary measures to get around the official bureaucracy and difficult nobles. The most novel method adopted by Felipe II was to micromanage—Felipe insisted on personally reading and annotating documents on all the vital functions of government. This was so onerous a process at times that El rey prudente was accused of ruling more as chief clerk than monarch. Another strategy was to work through less formal ad hoc juntas whose members were selected from among those most loyal to the king himself. As had been the case for centuries, the king sometimes found the most capable and loyal were, unlike the grandees, those most dependent on him for their positions: those of undistinguished lineage (Feros, Lerma y Olivares 202).

Another more traditional technique was to work through carefully-selected favorites, some of whom were of more aristocratic extraction, some of whom were not. The problem with naming a valido was that it invariably generated fierce resentment amongst the less-favored nobility. Such resentment had led to extraordinarily destructive infighting since the time of Juan II of Castile’s reliance on Álvaro de

Luna. Felipe mitigated these difficulties by quietly changing ministers on occasion and, more importantly, by making a very public show of arguing against the evils of privados, even when he was most reliant on them (Feros, Kingship and Favoritism 44). This strategy seems to have been reasonably effective in the sense that Felipe II developed a reputation as being impervious to the destructive wiles of would-be validos. Nevertheless, by the beginning of the younger Felipe’s reign, it was clear to noblemen with ambition that they had mostly been excluded from effective influence over matters of state and deprived of the attendant mercedes or royal recognition.

For the ambitious Spanish elite, especially young noblemen of Felipe III’s generation, the passing of wary Felipe II and the advent of his son—who was reputed to be pious, but intellectually

84 unremarkable—signaled a momentous opportunity. If they played their cards right and successfully captured the young king’s attention and benevolence, they might hope to return to the perks and prerogatives of their class’ medieval age of maximum glory. In effect, Lerma was showing them the way

(Profeti 21). By developing his deep personal relationship with his prince, carefully pleasing him with entertainments and showing himself willing and able to take on the cares of governing, he managed to rapidly recover the prestige and fortune his family had lost over the course of the 15th and 16th

centuries.20

The ancient Golden Age that early modern Spanish nobles pined for was surely the end of the middle ages—the 15th century. Up until the time when Isabel I of Castile and Fernando II of Aragon

began to assiduously coax the high nobility back into the fold, at least, this was the time when they were

at their most prosperous and powerful, the era when kingdoms rose and fell depending on what the

aristocratic houses said and did. It was also, as we have seen, the age when the high nobility began to dedicate considerable attention to maintaining the increasingly hollow illusion of its military and chivalric role in society, while all the while really making much more notable advances in courtly behavior and splendor. These two effects became especially evident in literature and in celebratory contexts from that time forward, so it could have been no surprise if in the festival of 1598-1599 the themes emerged again in terms comparable to those of the 15th century.

And emerge they did. The overriding central theme at the heart of the action in 1598-1599 was one of nostalgic remembrance of the heyday of chivalrous glory and a utopic expectation of its happy return in the future. Alexandre Cioranescu uses his own version of the mirror metaphor to capture the essential underlying conceptual operation of this peculiar admixture of nostalgia and utopic thinking:

20 The founder of the noble house, Diego Gómez de Sandoval, got his most notable Castilian titles through his service to Fernando I of Aragon between 1412 and 1426. Under Juan II of Castile, association with Aragon became a liability. Sandoval loyally backed the losing side in the struggle between Aragonese and Castilianist factions and was stripped of his titles. The material effects of the family’s disgrace extended through Felipe II’s reign. Though the Sandovals were partially rehabilitated by Isabel and Fernando, they continued to be relatively poor and obscure until Felipe III’s succession. See Williams’ Great Favourite, Chap. 1 for more details.

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“Quant aux utopistes modernes, c’est dans un miroir qu’ils lisent l’avenir et ils y trouvent, projetés à l’envers, vers l’avant, les effets de l’âge d’or disparu, qui deviennent sous cet angle nouveau la cause de l’âge d’or à venir" (55).

This is not to say that other forms of festival imagery or themes which had been developed over

the preceding centuries were entirely absent. When Felipe III and his sister, Isabel Clara Eugenia, tour

Valencia to examine the ephemeral triumphal arches erected in their honor, classical references and

allegorical figures are present. For example, one arch features a weeping Alexander the Great who

complains that his glories pale by comparison to Felipe’s (Gauna 141). Nevertheless, the frequency and

elaborateness of the references are both quantitatively and qualitatively much reduced compared to,

for example, Carlos V’s entries into Italian cities some sixty years earlier. The relaciones show that the processions, martial games and other entertainments which dominated the festival were much more given to detailed descriptions of the spectacular attire of the courtiers, their invenciones and, to a lesser extent, their performance in martial games. Overall, given the focus on costume, color, courtly display and in a minor way, on agonistic play, the resulting impression is reminiscent of nothing so much as chronicle accounts of the fiestas of 1428.

As we will see, the poetry commemorating these occasions, particularly as it is composed to please noble patrons, is calculated to express and support this mission to reset courtly norms and re- establish the prominence, privileges and prosperity of the aristocracy. In addition, the poets undertake to establish a fruitful relationship with the new king’s privado and / or his relations, whom they hope will lead not only the gente de calidad but also artists like themselves to a new Golden Age.

Aguilar and his poema relación in epic form

Henri Mérimée’s L’Art dramatique à Valencia depuis les origines jusqu’au commencement du

XVIIIe siècle (1913) was not the first early 20th-century critical essay to take detailed note of the works of

Gaspar Aguilar, but it was one of the most comprehensive and influential. He and other authors since his

86 time have focused in no small part on the Valencian poet’s peculiar social circumstances in their interpretations of what might be described a somewhat bifurcated body of work—I will return to the notion of bifurcation momentarily.

Aguilar was born into a family of well-off merchants. His decision to make writing his profession was risky, given that up until his time, writing fiction was generally assumed to be an amateur affair and a suitable pursuit primarily for nobles wealthy enough to be able to devote unremunerated time and effort to an artistic pursuit—when they had nothing more serious to do. It was nothing short of remarkable that though Aguilar had almost no resources of his own, especially after falling out with his father, and only modest assistance from patrons, he nevertheless managed to scrape by financially and make a better-than-modest name for himself in literary circles. He eked out his means mainly by becoming what José Simón Díaz has called an “escritor-criado” (Los escritores-criados).21 At the same time, his literary reputation and services as secretary to at least two important noble families made it possible for him to establish and maintain good relations with a number of powerful men, including his patron in later life, the Duke of Gandía—head of the House of Borja. His status as a founding member of the celebrated Academia de los nocturnos, a gathering of prominent Valencian writers, also gave him occasion to rub elbows with a number of noble intellectuals like Gaspar Mercader, Guillén de Castro and

Luis Ferrer de Cardona.22

21 The purpose of Simón Díaz’ “Los escritores-criados en la época de los Austrias” is to cast a critical eye on the notion that most early modern Spanish writers entered into the service of a noble house or sought a position at court in order to earn a living. He does show there was more than one survival strategy available to non-noble writers, most of whom got the greater part of their income from an ecclesiastical appointment of some kind. Aguilar, however, fits squarely into the mold of the stereotypical “escritor-criado”. 22 Mercader was also a member of the Academia de los nocturnos and seems to have had a warm relationship with Aguilar. Aguilar features his festive exploits, both with the sword and with the pen, in Cantos II and IV of the Fiestas nupciales. Mercader inserted Aguilar’s “Fábula de Júpiter y Europa” into his own Prado de Valencia (1600). Luis Ferrer de Cardona (1568-1642) was son of the Governor General of Valencia, Don Jaime Ferrer, and brother in law to the Vizconde de Chelva, who was a prominent figure in the fiestas of 1598-1599, as we will see further ahead. On his father’s death he succeeded him as Governor and later served as Lieutenant of the Kingdom for many years under Felipe III. Felipe IV named Don Luis Captain General of Valencia in 1641, but the Valencian died just a year later. Cervantes includes him in his Viage del Parnaso and Lope lauds him in El laurel de Apolo. It is not

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I call Aguilar’s work “bifurcated” because several authors have noted distinctly different orientations between his theatrical and other works. Most contemporary readers have concentrated on

Aguilar’s theatrical pieces, though only a handful have survived. No doubt this is because they seem to speak much more clearly to the interests and world-view of the middle-class audiences Aguilar generally wrote plays for. In general, critics agree that Aguilar’s comedias reflect his point of view from the middle of the rigid class structure of early modern Spain. Mérimée, for example, says of Aguilar that “l’humilité de sa naissance et de ses goûts a influé en premier lieu sur le choix des sujets qu’il a traités. Comme d’autres vont, pour les faire revivre, vers les actions mémorables, il a préféré quant à lui des épisodes que la renommée n’avait point publiés” (496). For Mérimée, Aguilar’s down-to-earth origins as a commoner lead him to focus on everyday experiences in his plays, whereas other dramatists of his generation would presumably choose more unusual or noteworthy—and less realistic—topics. For their part, Juan José Sánchez Escobar, Josep Sirera and Juan Carlos Garrot Zambrana argue that there is a subtle but perceptible critical quality in Aguilar’s representation of the way cynical economic interests drive wealthy characters, particularly noble ones, in his comedias.23

The extent to which these characterizations are true of Aguilar’s dramatic works falls outside the scope of this study; however, it is safe to say they are utterly inapplicable to his major poetic works, like the Fiestas nupciales.24 The more substantial of these pieces, such as the occasional poem, Fiestas que la

clear which of his written works earned him his high reputation, as only two, brief published poems have survived. See Martí Grajales for more information (231-5). 23 For more on this, see Sirera’s “El poder de los criados” (2002), Garrot Zambrana’s “Nobleza, fortuna y limpieza de sangre” (1999), Sánchez Escobar’s “Gaspar de Aguilar: El proceso de construcción de una dramaturia inorgánica” (1981), Cañas Murillo’s “Gaspar Aguilar: Estado actual de sus estudios” (1980) and Carreres de Calatayud’s “La poesía de Gaspar Aguilar” (1951). 24 Fewer critics have commented on Aguilar’s poetry than on his comedias, most likely because of the sharp drop in interest in occasional, panegyric and heroic poetry in the 20th century, and nearly all choose to specialize or focus on just one genre. Early critics, like Mérimée and Francisco Carreres de Calatayud, who have commented both on the Valencian author’s poetry and his theater seem sometimes to find it difficult to reconcile the earthier dramatist with the more courtly epic poet. Mérimée’s solution is to portray Aguilar as a precociously romantic artistic figure who did a workman’s job producing the commissioned pieces that would keep his large family fed while taking more artistic license with his plays. Though this argument seems at times to be founded as much on the critic’s fancy as on documentary sources, it is not unreasonable.

88 insigne ciudad de Valencia ha hecho por la Beatificacion del Santo Fray Luys Bertran (1608), and the epic

Expulsión de los moros de España (1610), are all clearly written to express and support an aristocratic point of view unreservedly. The former poem coincided with a comedia also composed by Aguilar to

commemorate the festival of Luis Bertrán’s beatification, for both of which Aguilar was paid by the city

of Valencia (Martí Grajales 27).25 Though it is not clear who, if anyone, commissioned the Expulsión de los moros, it was dedicated to Lerma and also written in response to the great political issue of the day.

As Manuel Ruiz Lagos points out in his preliminary study of the 1999 edition of the book, the expulsion of the Moriscos had only been decreed in 1609 and was still very much under way by the time Aguilar published his poem defending and supporting the measure in July of the following year (46). This poem must therefore also be understood as very much consonant with the interests and ideals of the noblemen and government officials of the realm, whether directly underwritten by them or not. Given their political import, there could be no breath of commonplace topics or subversive perspectives in

Aguilar’s grander poetic works.

In fact, in the case of the Fiestas nupciales perhaps even more than in others, Aguilar’s poetic task is to focus on the pseudo-heroic exploits of the noble participants in the royal fiestas and magnify them. Rather than expressing his own vision, the imagery he produces is calculated to intensify the flattering notions that will be most pleasing to the attendant aristocracy and record or memorialize them, not to take a place amongst the immortal works of literature. Fiestas nupciales’ is a commemorative or occasional poem directed to the elite, especially Aguilar’s patron, the Vizconde de

Chelva—to whom the poem is dedicated—and his associates. In this respect, it could be said to be more of a relación en verso than a genuine epic poem. Aguilar acknowledges as much in the dedication of the poem, where he reveals that Chelva ordered him to write the work in verse. At the same time however,

25 Sirera makes an interesting argument about this comedia, however, showing quite convincingly that Aguilar seems to exhibit unusual sympathy for day laborers who attempt to organize in the face of stiff resistance from landlords. See his “Mercaderes, campesinos y jornaleros” (358).

89 the poet also confesses he finds himself in a peculiar predicament as a writer. Because he had to leave out some important details when composing his poetry, a thing which “aunque no esta del todo reprovada, no esta del todo admitida”, his work cannot be considered history (n. pag.).

It may be useful to insert an additional word here about the readership Aguilar was attempting to appeal to in Fiestas nupciales. Obviously, his first concern is always to please his patron and sponsors.

But no doubt he and his publisher, Pedro Patricio Mey, also hoped to sell copies of the book to others, as well. Maria Grazia Profeti’s observation on the readership for Lope’s Fiestas de Denia is equally applicable to Aguilar: the authors and their publishers were aiming for “un doble destinatario: la nobleza que había participado en los festejos, que compraría el libro como recuerdo de días tan importantes… y el lector o el intelectual que quería estar al tanto de los acontecimientos” (15). Since the double wedding was the signal social event of the turn of the century and marked the transition to a new reign, it is not hard to imagine that anyone who could afford to buy a book might well want to own a copy, whether as a token of the great occasion or to find out what the great and powerful were wearing and doing behind the veil of highborn exclusivity. This intended audience, then, would include even the non- noble social strata, like merchants, letrados and the clergy, who by this time probably composed a majority of the total number of book owners, when taken together (Prieto Bernabé 175-325).26

Furthermore, the author and distributors could look forward to selling the work not only within the

Kingdom of Valencia, but all over the Peninsula (Dexeus 80).

Aguilar’s careful use of epic form to establish the dignity of the poem is perhaps his most

obvious strategy for pleasing a broad readership, including the aristocracy, particularly those whose

activity he represents in the poem. The work is divided into four substantial cantos of between 76 and

104 stanzas in octava real. Each canto is organized chronologically, recounting the royal party’s journey

26 José Manuel Prieto Bernabé’s study, Lectura y lectores centers on Madrid, but the patterns he identifies are likely general across the Iberian Peninsula during the Golden Age. It should also be noted that his data are to some degree conjectural, since there is insufficient reliable statistical data available. Despite the difficulty of obtaining data, the scope and rigor of his study are remarkable.

90 through the Kingdom of Valencia in a series of related highlight events, most of them involving colorful, if lengthy processions. Canto I begins the work with a representation of the king’s triumphal entry into

Denia and the subsequent martial exercises sponsored by Lerma. The second Canto covers the queen’s arrival in the Kingdom and the confirmation of vows in the Cathedral at Valencia, whereas the third offers an extended portrayal of additional war games, including a joust sponsored by Felipe III himself.

Finally, Canto IV recounts still more processions, combat and a banquet and sarao, or courtly dance,

where the ladies are featured.

In addition to the dividing the poem into cantos, Aguilar marks the work as epic by introducing it

in the traditional Virgilian manner. He starts by declaring whose arms he will sing—those of Felipe, of

course—and appealing to his muses for their inspiration. This being a Valencian show from start to finish, the muses are actually nymphs of the river Turia (1). The poet then launches into a fantastical scene in which Jupiter calls the god of matrimony, Hymeneo, to heaven and then orders him to descend to earth and give Margarita “al fuerte Ioven con rostro affable” (3). Hymeneo carries out his mission at

once, even officiating an imaginary exchange of vows between Felipe and Margarita in heaven. Rather than return immediately to heaven after this, however, the god stays on to narrate the first two cantos, telling Felipe that, “aunque viste la pompa y el trofeo / con que todos quisieron agradarte, / yo la quiero contar, porque esta glor [sic] de los ojos se passe a la memoria” (7). This conceit is an indirect way for

Aguilar to introduce his purpose for writing into the text.27

There are less overtly formal aspects of the epic style, as well. The most evident is the author’s

constant focus on masculine pursuits, especially combat games and their attendant processions and

invenciones, to which the poet returns over and over. Canto III offers the clearest example of Aguilar’s

predilection. Like cantos I & II, this section of the poem also begins with a fantastical passage relying on

a classical mythological commonplace; the goddess Fama proclaims the glories of the occasion and the

27 It also underlines Aguilar’s adherence to the early modern operating theory of the relationship between ephemeral experience, as perceived in life, and its immortalization through writing.

91 city of Valencia to the world. After just nine stanzas of this introduction, however, Aguilar fills the remaining 92 stanzas of the canto with back-to-back narrations of a juego de alcancías, a joust or tourney, and finally a juego de cañas.28

As part of the process of narrating these events, Aguilar deploys the epic strategy of making long

lists of each noble combatant involved in each simulated skirmish. In fact, Aguilar is always more

detailed in this listing than he is in narrating any action. The juego de alcancías is one of the briefer

examples; Aguilar devotes ten stanzas to the noble riders and their attire and then closes the episode

with only four stanzas on the game itself (74-8).

Occasionally the poet also uses the technique of expanding on a particularly important or powerful figure by alluding more or less briefly to his family’s glorious heritage. Most often such genealogical / historical commentary is largely if not entirely legendary, as in the case of Aguilar’s short passage praising the Rojas Sandoval family near the beginning of his account of the royal party’s arrival in Denia. Aguilar identifies Lerma as “descendiente legitimo de vn hombre / que Sando se llamo, y valio al Infante, / y assi de Sandoval se formo el nombre” (9). The Infante referred to here is Felipe’s semi- legendary forebear, Don Pelayo, defender of the Christian polity after the Muslim conquest of the

Peninsula and founder of the kingdom of Asturias. The apocryphal story promoted by Lerma and his family was that they descended from one Sando Cuervo, who in defending Don Pelayo from a horde of

Muslim enemies earned the sobriquet “Valedor”—later shortened to the simple “-val” (García García,

Apostillas históricas 59). In order to flatter the man who was already obviously destined to be the new king’s valido, Aguilar uses wordplay on his family name to suggest the history of Pelayo and Sando is

28 The juego de alcancías was similar to the juego de cañas, except that instead of throwing cane spears the combatants lobbed small clay balls or pots at one another. These balls might be empty, as on this occasion, or they might be filled with different substances, such as ashes, flowers or perfumed water. This spectacle was Spanish in origin, but was also popular in other Western European festivals by the 16th century. In Italy it was called the giostra dei caroselli and in France it was known as a carrousel. Though the juegos in Valencia seem to have been relatively simple, as the 17th century progressed this kind of event sometimes became more elaborate and might include additional artistic elements, from allegorical floats to music (Figures 2.2 and 2.3).

92 repeating itself in the relationship between Lerma and Felipe III: “Ninguno pues se admire ni se assombre / de que en valor a todos se adelante, / pues a ser valedor como conviene, / le obliga el vale que en el nombre tiene” (9).29 Again, Lerma seems to have promoted these notions, so as we will see,

Aguilar is not the only author to take them up and use them.

As the conceits of Aguilar’s poem go, this wordplay in praise of Lerma is neither the worst nor

the best, but it in any case it could not be described as remarkably graceful or apt. At best we might use

it as evidence of Aguilar’s workmanship, rather than his artistic excellence. This is not to say Aguilar was

not capable of artistic excellence; a number of Aguilar’s more celebrated contemporaries, including Lope

and Cervantes, praised his comedias both privately and in print (Martí Grajales 19). Mérimée observes

that in the case of Aguilar’s theatrical works at least, “l’artiste chez lui, corrigeait l’artisan” (507).30

Aguilar’s comedias notwithstanding, and as important as Fiestas nupciales was considered by its author and his contemporaries, the poem cannot be qualified as a compelling work of literature. Of course there are a few well-written passages in the work, such as Aguilar’s representation of the city of

Valencia when decked out in colorful hangings to greet Margarita: “amanecio cubierta toda / de fina seda, y de brocado fino, / que para celebrar tan grande boda / esta grandeza y magestad convino” (37).

Aguilar treats the city as if it were the bride herself. Apart from occasionally clever images such as this one, however, Fiestas nupciales is not especially rich in language or invention.

29 It is tempting to read a kind of exemplarity into the literary notion of the historical collaboration between the king and the heir of Sando, but I would argue it is not exactly the same thing. Historical exemplarity is generally employed as a rhetorical device to urge virtuous behavior on the prince. Here the poet does not really advocate or attempt to modify the king’s behavior, but rather flatters a courtier by suggesting there is a kind of Platonic correspondence or natural recurrence in his close relationship to the sovereign. 30 One notable example would be Aguilar’s version of the “poderoso señor es don dinero” topos, which is at the heart of one of his more successful comedias, “La fuerça del interés”. Conniving criado Grisanto explains the mysterious power of greed to his master, Marqués Ludovico, saying in part: “Con el en cosas de amores / los que merecen ningunos / alcançan muchos favores, / con el engañan algunos / criados a sus Señores” (A8r). After a deliciously ironic soliloquy on this theme which updates and extends the traditional motif of the corrupting power of money, Grisanto embarks on a series of complicated schemes by which he will defraud his master of a large sum of money and then use it to seduce Emilia, the woman Ludovico loves.

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One general reason for the artistic weakness of the poem is surely that Aguilar rushed to produce and publish it as quickly as possible. As we’ve seen, the events surrounding the wedding festival began in late 1598, but the piece was commissioned by Valencian authorities, including the city’s jurados or municipal councilors (Martí Grajales 26). So naturally Aguilar takes up his narration with

Felipe’s and Isabel Clara Eugenia’s arrival in the Kingdom on or around the 22nd of January, 1599. The

king and queen leave Valencia for the return to Castile via Aragon at the end of July, 1599, but the last

event Aguilar writes about is the sarao at the Lonja de Valencia taking place on the 25th of April. The dates on the Viceroy’s license to publish and censor’s approval, the 17th and 19th of July, 1599, respectively, suggest that Aguilar decided to leave out the last three months of festival activities in

Valencia, complete the poem and apply for publication in just under three months. No doubt he and his sponsors were determined to distribute and sell the account while the memory of the royal visit was still fresh.

This brings us to another important factor which might help explain the literary limits of

Aguilar’s festival epic: the perishable nature of occasional and political works like the Fiestas nupciales.

Mérimée expresses deep respect for the quality of this and Aguilar’s other occasional poems, but is right when he points out that they, “représentent des édifices réguliers, coquets, construits sans négligence par un ouvrier attentif; il n'y manque que les fondements, je veux dire un sujet capable de soutenir l'édifice" (496). As art, Fiestas nupciales really does not stand the test of time. But again, this work

should really be considered a relación en verso.

As a result, the reader often has the impression that Aguilar has applied a rather thin veneer of

epic form to an essentially different kind of text. The very first image the poet offers, in fact, is a

particular case in point. In his Virgilian opening praise of the king, Aguilar describes Spain as, “como

hydra en ser del mundo espanto,”. Aguilar extends the metaphor in a way intended to praise the new

king by suggesting a parallel with the classical myth of the twelve labors of Hercules; specifically, the

94 story of when Hercules cuts off the Hydra’s head and seven more grow up to replace it. In Fiestas nupciales, when Felipe II, head of the Spanish body politic, is “removed”, he is replaced not by seven new heads, but by “una cabeça que por siete vale”—his son, Felipe III (1). To compare Felipe and his country to a classical monster is not exactly lèse majesté, but it is an odd way to start off a paean to king and country.

The poet’s effort to project his own narrative voice through mythical figures like Hymeneo and

Fama is also a little awkward at times. In the case of Hymeneo, the narrator of the poem seems to strain when addressing the king in the familiar “tú” form. The use of “tú” is not entirely illogical; Hymeneo’s divinity technically gives him standing to treat Felipe at least as an equal. Nevertheless, since the author intends to stress Felipe’s own semi-divine status as monarch, the familiarity sounds a little off-key, especially when the poem is covering an event which tends to underline the king’s majesty or social distance from his subjects. A ready example comes when Hymeneo refers to Felipe’s walk on the beach at Denia: “despues que con tan grande pompa y fuerte / te passeaste por la playa un poco / a vista de tu pueblo, que de verte / casi de muy contento estava loco” (14). More importantly, most of the time

Felipe’s presence at and view of the festival activities is purely notional. Aguilar does remark on his appearance and physical movements at the beginning of the poem, but later he effectively disappears into a serene and princely remove. The mentions of what “tú viste” after that point are somewhat jarring as a result.

Perhaps sensing the discrepancy, Aguilar’s Hymeneo seems to have a harder time treating the queen in a familiar way. When Margarita makes her spectacular entry into Valencia, he uses the more formal and accustomed way of referring to her: “era de oro el sillon, y de oro fino / tambien bordada la gualdrapa bella, / donde su Magestad mostrando vino / en qualquier de sus joyas una estrella” (61).

It is likely that Aguilar adopted this device—using a classical deity to mouth his narration—in order to solve one of the problems of adapting a festival account to the heroic form: the issue of

95 maintaining a unitary hero. As I say, the use of the mythological narrator stratagem is not altogether successful. Aguilar seems to be unable to sustain the fiction and it is almost a relief when Hymeneo takes his leave at the end of the second canto. He introduces Fama to pick up the narration in Canto III, but Fama’s voice fades away after only a few stanzas. There are no further such narrators and the poet’s voice emerges unhindered until the end of the poem from that point forward.

The obvious hero of the work could more logically have been the King himself, since it is his journey that organizes and gives meaning to the epic voyage of the narration. But if having a god address the King in a familiar way is a little odd, making him the protagonist of the poem would have been far riskier. For Aguilar to make Felipe the main character, he would presumably have to compose dialogue and specific behaviors and actions that the poet had no access to. And inventing them could have drawn critical scrutiny. Nevertheless, there is a more compelling reason: while the fiesta certainly was centered on the King’s wedding, the poem was really sponsored by the Valencian notables to glorify the city, the kingdom and its noble citizens. This is more likely the reason the poet does not seize on

Felipe himself as a central figure.

If the poet’s voice becomes clearer and more regular after the departure of Fama, that does not mean there is a unitary point of view insofar as the personages depicted are concerned—no such focus is ever sustained on any single figure, no matter how important.

The King and Lerma do get their respective moments in the sun, of course. Aguilar expresses due respect for Felipe and Sandoval primarily at the beginning of the poem, where he represents them with panegyric imagery which had become standard by Aguilar’s time. Besides the genealogical / historical discourse already mentioned in Lerma’s case, there is a great deal of comparison to classical figures, whether mythological or historical. For example, Aguilar refers to the King as “Neptuno en agua, en tierra Marte” as he embarks on a ride on a galley off the coast of Denia (13).

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Celestial imagery of the Dantesque type is abundant when referring to august personages, too, although it is not limited to the King and Lerma. Aguilar commonly uses such imagery when describing processions, even when focusing on the lesser nobility. The most notable example of this discourse comes when Aguilar describes the sensory overload of seeing all the nobles in their brilliant finery assembled for the procession to welcome Margarita to Valencia:

Quando passo el concurso peregrino

de Príncipes y grandes, al momento

quedo pasmado el cielo crystalino,

tal fuego sin calor, sin fuerça el viento.

El agua que se mueve de contino

sin rastro ni señal de movimiento,

la tierra cuya fuerça es tan notoria

temblo con el gran peso desta gloria. (60)

But solar imagery, which Felipe II had developed and used steadily to represent and promote the universal power of the Spanish house of Habsburg, is used much more selectively by the poet (Tanner

223). It applies to the king and other members of the royal family, of course, as when Aguilar refers to the Infanta Isabel Clara Eugenia, bringing “la luz del día” to Denia (10). Interestingly, Lerma, as a

rhetorical mark of his importance and closeness to Felipe III, gets similar treatment. Aguilar refers to him

as “estrella que del cielo vino, / y en el Oriente del imperio sale / tan clara que delante del sol bive / con

la divina luz que del recive” (9).

But after the beginning of the first canto, the poet’s attention shifts to others, primarily to the

noble elite of the Kingdom of Valencia. The first among these peers is Aguilar’s patron, Jaime Ceferino

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Ladrón de Pallás, VIII Vizconde de Chelva.31 Chelva had made Aguilar his secretary, so it was natural for

the poet to dedicate his work to his master, signing the dedication “criado de V.S.” (n. pag.). Aguilar also

says he writes for Chelva because the Vizconde, “no pudo gustar de las fiestas que se hizieron en el

casamiento del Rey nuestro señor, por estar ocupado assi en hazerlas, como en prevenir muchas cosas,

para que se hiziessen” (n. pag.). 32 Aguilar declares the purpose of his poem to be the same as the ostensible goal of nearly all festival books: to extend news of the celebration to those who are otherwise unable to view them. But as we will see, Don Jaime certainly seems to have been able to find ways to take part in and enjoy the festivities. It is more precise to say Aguilar is writing to record and memorialize the celebration for its participants and interested members of the general public.

In addition to being Aguilar’s dedicatee, Chelva figures prominently in the action of the poem. In

Canto I he is featured as mantenedor of the first tourney narrated in the poem, that which took place shortly after Felipe’s arrival in Denia.33 He is next mentioned as one of the more outstanding dressers in

Margarita’s triumphal procession through the city of Valencia in Canto II, stands out in the juego de alcancías, according to Aguilar, and has the honor of serving as the king’s mayordomo for the royal joust in Canto IV.34

Logically, Chelva is represented on all these occasions as an ideal knight: a man of ferocious warlike talents but whose quality is visible mainly through the gallant image he projects through his courtly dress and gestures. The stanza dedicated to the pomp of his entry into the arena for the juego de alcancías shows this clearly.

31 Authors combine several variants of Chelva’s Christian names when referring to him, including “Jayme”, “Jaume”, “Zeferino” and “Severino”. I use the variant preferred by Onofre Esquerdo in his Nobiliario valenciano. 32 As I say, the jurados of Valencia pay Aguilar for his work, so it is not entirely clear who the more important sponsor of the work might be. Nevertheless, the interests of the nobleman and the city council were close enough in this case that there is probably no need to attempt to untangle them. Chelva was married to Doña Francisca de Ferrer, daughter of the Governor or Portanveus of the Kingdom, Don Jaime Ferrer. 33 The mantenedor and his select team of companions assumed the honorary role of defending the lists against a team or teams of challengers. 34 I have been unable to find a source that spells out the specific role played by the mayordomo in a tourney. However, the context suggests Chelva took the king’s place in the ceremonial procession that preceded the event. By the 17th century royal protocol seems not to allow for the king to participate directly in a joust.

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El Vizconde de Chelva entro luzido

con brio y ademan gallardo y fiero,

al fuego de su pecho parecido

en yr tan reluciente, y tan ligero.

Fue su quadrilla tal, que ha merecido

dexar gravada en laminas de azero

su fama, que a las otras se adelanta,

por el valor de aquel que la levanta. (75)

It is important to note that the appearance of gallantry here is treated as more significant than actual military performance. Again, Aguilar focuses much more closely on the ceremony surrounding events than on actual combat exercises. In fact, Aguilar does not even name the winners of the first martial event, the tourney in Denia.35 No doubt it would have been a little dangerous to emphasize

humiliating defeat amongst the powerful combatants. Aguilar avoids that trap in a couple of ways. First,

he declares whole groups of participants winners for their impressive efforts, as at the conclusion of the

royal tourney in Canto IV: “todos juntos lo tuvieron todo, / y cada qual tambien todo lo tuvo / Por esso

no me aplico ni acomodo / a referir quien mas galan anduvo” (125). But the poet’s primary method of

finessing the issue seems to be to deemphasize combat performance altogether. That way he need not

single out many winners and is not obliged to name any losers.

The downside of these poetic tactics for avoiding political problems is that the poem lacks the

dramatic tension that the inclusion of a good epic enemy would entail. It also has little of the satisfaction

or resolution victory over a fierce antagonist might bring to the piece. Aguilar does narrate one passage

with a safely identifiable enemy: one of the entertainments Lerma has prepared for the king is a mock

Turkish attack on a replica fortress in Denia. Yet even in this sequence, Aguilar attenuates the character

35 It is possible the poet had less information on or access to the event in Denia than to occasions in Valencia.

99 of the enemy by making it clear all the way through that the action is faked and that the Turks are really

Spaniards. And here again, Aguilar crowns everyone—defender and challenger—with the same victor’s laurels, saying “en la porfia el vencedor ganava / la gloria quel vencido no perdia” (15).

The poet does offer at least a little detail in his narration of some of the martial encounters between Spaniards. His account of the first tourney in Valencia is the longest and most colorful, consisting of five stanzas and including a brief passage which is probably the nearest Aguilar’s poem comes to the blood-pumping action of classical epic:

Levantan luego las espadas fieras.

y en el punto infelice que las baxan

las manoplas, las golas, las cimeras

descomponen, destruyen, desencaxan.

Y las que por su mal quedan enteras,

mas que las otras sufren y trabajan,

pues de los golpes nace en ellas fuego,

que de espanto de oydas muere luego.

Nevertheless, despite the heat of the contest as he portrays it, Aguilar names no winners or losers here either.

To return to the Vizconde de Chelva, Aguilar also narrates a triumph for Chelva’s team in the juego de cañas, which he says was “la mejor de las quadrillas / segun el parecer del mundo entero / que entro de dos en dos en la carrera / mas ygual, mas hermosa, y mas ligera” (95). What is interesting about this passage is that it underlines Aguilar’s focus on the aesthetic side of the festival events. The criteria used for judging the team’s performance—coordination, beauty and speed—are almost unrelated to the exchange of blows. This probably goes even further than political expediency in explaining the predominance of processions, costume and invenciones in Aguilar’s narrative.

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Another related reason may be that although the most influential and powerful participants were always sure to project an impressive image, they did not always take prizes commensurate with their political importance. For example, in his account of the first tourney in Valencia, Aguilar does describe other competitors’ entries, including that of Don Juan de Villarrasa, Señor of Albalat, who takes the prize for use of a lance. But Albalat gets little attention from Aguilar apart from brief mentions, possibly because of his lack of connection to the poet, but more likely due to the relative obscurity of his title.36

Aguilar’s detailed descriptions of Chelva’s costume and empresa for the tourney in Denia are typical and recall the festival accounts of years earlier in their emphasis on crest symbolism and sartorial splendor. The poet tells us the Vizconde “salio gallardo… con una tigre puesta en la cimera, / la qual templo la furia y el veneno, / porque su hijo le sirvio de freno” (18). His clothes are “de terciopelo azul con chapería” and cut in the German style. The tent he puts up is also of blue velvet—a combination of rich fabric and color which predominates throughout the festival, from Denia until the sarao at the Lonja de Valencia. Suárez de Figueroa’s explanation that “se sirven tambien estos torneantes del color azul, que significa pensamiento elevado” (315v) may help explain why noblemen frequently choose this color for their livery and other festive finery—no fewer than eleven times in the events described by Aguilar.

Of course, Chelva is not the only man making a great show of elegance and wit. Aguilar describes at least a dozen noble contenders’ dress and invenciones at each of the events for which prizes were offered, the tourneys, juego de alcancías and juego de cañas. The form of the poetry is distinct from the invenciones of the 1470s recorded in the Cancionero general, but the spirit is the same. In fact, the empresa used by Don Diego Borja at the tourney in Denia might have been plucked straight from the pages of that very Cancionero. It depicted a noria, or waterwheel with one vessel raising water up the

36 Though only a vizconde in 1598, Chelva held one of the oldest and most prominent titles in the Kingdom of Valencia. The vizcondado was made egregio by Juan II of Aragon, giving the titleholders a distinction comparable to that of grande de España within the Crown of Aragon. Only the Marquesado of Denia was older (Esquerdo 85).

101 wheel and another empty one on its way down (Aguilar 20). The image was associated with an idea summed up succinctly by the Conde de Haro in his mote from the 1470s: “los llenos de males, míos, / d’esperança, los vazíos” (Macpherson 56).37 The reference to a man unlucky in love is so familiar by

1599 that Aguilar does not bother to explain the meaning.

There is one further aspect of the Fiestas nupciales that bears mention. In addition to praising the king and the powerful members of the local nobility, Aguilar shows that he is aware of the need to make his patria or homeland look good, as well. He does this using several different techniques, including, as we have seen, focusing his attention heavily on the local elite and its excellent qualities.

Aguilar’s Valencian boosterism also relies on the selective representation of the very glories of the city and kingdom that so impress the king and his party. The poet uses classical comparisons to highlight the historical importance of some of these elements, just as he does when praising some of the kingdom’s prominent men. According to Aguilar, the palatial Lonja de Valencia (Figure 2.4) where the final sarao is held is more impressive than the Roman Capitol (127). He also refers to the city’s legendary founding by Scipio to protect Roman interests from “el Saguntino estrago” (25).

But Aguilar’s task is more to celebrate the extraordinary splendor of the festival activities than to praise the kingdom’s historical legacy or everyday advantages and he does so repeatedly, attempting to show that Valencia’s festival places it in a class all its own. Hymeneo claims the occasion has had no historical precedent because it outshines famous festivals of the past: “fue la fiesta mayor y el mayor gozo / que tuvo en Alemaña Federico”. It outdoes the ancients, too: “no fueron tales fiestas ni tan bellas

/ las que por cautivar gente contraria / hizo Dario eclipsando las estrellas / con su resplandeciente luminaria, / ni las de Augusto Cesar” (12). To give us an idea of a specific way Valencia showed its quality, Aguilar recounts how: “la gran ciudad como dessea / que a qualquiera nacion quede notoria, / rematò su contento y alegría con un serao” of unparalleled extravagance, where “dozientos platos

37 In fact, not one but two of the empresas contained in the Cancionero general are based on the image of the noria, those numbered 24 and 36 by Macpherson.

102 llenos huvo enteros / de confitura” and “dos fuentes grandes de oro puro” (126-7). Finally, the world must revere Valencia because it is the place where the blessed event took place. At the opening of

Canto III, Fama blows her trumpet and calls on everyone from Turkey to China to take note that “El

Monarcha mayor que al mundo allana” has married “bella Margarita” in the city by the Turia (71).

A related strategy involves emphasizing the surprise and delight of the visiting outsiders,

especially the king himself, at the wonders of the Kingdom and the festival events prepared and carried

out by the Valencians. As Lisa Voigt has pointed out, “while seventeenth-century royal entries have traditionally been understood to provoke—or to try to provoke—the public’s admiration for all-powerful sovereigns”, it may be more useful to observe the way that representations of these events reflect on

“precisely the reverse effect: the amazement of the King and his court before the visible grandeur of the city and the festival” (27). Aguilar’s poem gives its best evidence that he is employing this kind of rhetorical strategy in the introduction to Canto IV, saying: “las gentes con respeto y con decoro / viendo su Magestad se suspendian, / y assi en sus bellos ojos como espejos / pudieron ver la fiesta desde lejos”

(105). This artful turn of phrase reveals more than the simple fact that it is important the king be impressed; it just as important that he be seen to be impressed because the locals derive much of their enjoyment from seeing their glory reflected back on themselves. This idea goes to the importance of the festival book, too, which is composed after all to reflect the splendor of the festival back on its more prominent participants—and also, perhaps, on the citizens of the realm.

We will return to the issue of Valencian patriotism at the end of this chapter.

Lope’s Fiestas de Denia

Though a number of authors cite both Aguilar and Lope de Vega as having written important works on the festival of 1598-1599, few of them compare the two works in any detail. One notable exception is Valencian philologist Francisco Carreres de Calatayud, who not only considers Aguilar’s

Fiestas nupciales “un hermoso poema” but is even prepared to go so far as to suggest Aguilar

103 sometimes outshines El Fénix, at least in the beauty or lightness of one image or another (149). This rather exaggerated assertion strikes me as founded more in Valencian patriotism than in careful appraisal of the quality of the two works, but in any case Carreres’ personal taste and preference really are not particularly germane for my purposes here. Still, one of the other, more concrete points of

Carreres’ comparison provides a good point from which to embark on an examination of Lope’s Fiestas de Denia.

Carreres begins by noting that whereas Aguilar devotes 70 octaves to events in Denia, Lope, who makes them the subject of his entire poem, writes 184. For Carreres, this contributes lightness and concision to Aguilar’s style. As an example, Carreres cites the fact that where Aguilar recounts the entry of Don Juan and Don Diego Borja in the tourney at Denia, together with a brief word on their invenciones, in just ten verses, Lope uses five stanzas or forty verses to cover the same material.

There is another way of looking at this, however. If one focuses solely on this comparison within

the confines of one event in Denia, it is true that Aguilar is much briefer. However, if we compare both

poems as whole entities, the prize for concision would have to be awarded to Lope, precisely because he

does confine himself to events in Denia. He is able to cover these festivities in just two cantos, the first

containing 112 octaves and the second 86. More importantly, it must be noted that the impression of

lightness that Carreres claims for Aguilar is not a simple function of brevity or the number of verses

devoted to a single activity. In fact, though it is true Aguilar writes relatively briefly on each event he

covers, he covers many of them, and these occasions are so much alike that he cannot help producing a

repetitive text. Nothing will weigh descriptive poetry down so much as repetition, no matter how brief a

work may be.

A quick summary of the organization of Lope’s poem helps to reveal why his focus on Denia

helps to keep it moving and make it more easily digestible for the reader. The narrower focus in time

and geography makes it easier for the poet to introduce variety and moderate the pace. After

104 addressing his dedicatee, Doña Catalina de Zúñiga, vicereine of Naples, Lope offers a detailed description of the processional entry into Denia, including a remarkably substantial passage on the ladies accompanying Isabel Clara Eugenia. Then, he describes Felipe’s tour of the fortress and the port before launching into a fantastical scene in which Proteus prophesies great victories to come for Felipe and the Spanish. The canto ends with Lope’s version of the simulated Turkish attack on the mock

Spanish fortress on the beach. The first two thirds of the second canto cover a lively tourney, with its attendant invenciones. There is then a royal excursion which includes a fake pirate attack before the

poem concludes with the royal party’s departure for Valencia.

Like Aguilar, Lope will have to struggle a little to make all the costumes and invenciones at a joust both distinctive and equal in their astonishing richness. But whereas Aguilar has set himself the task of doing so on three such occasions, Lope only does it once. This relieves Lope of some of the pressure of forcing a lot of material into the shortest possible text, so he can take a bit more time and use a few more verses to make his poetic narration clearer and more effective. To return to the entry of

Juan and Diego de Borja cited by Carreres, it is Don Diego who reuses the noria device mentioned above.

Aguilar’s four verses on this say: “Don Diego, a quien lo bueno siempre agrada / truxo una empresa de las mas altivas, / pues de agua manantial un pozo era, / con una herrada dentro, y otra fuera”. Lope devotes an entire stanza to the same man’s entry: 38

Don Diego Mercader viene a su lado,

bizarro de armas, plumas y de empresa,

con ademán gallardo al son templado

de Marte, que por hijo le confiesa;

en el penacho un pozo fabricado,

38 Aguilar identifies this man as Don Diego Borja, whereas Lope says he is Diego Mercader. The most comprehensive chronicle of these events is Felipe de Gauna’s Fiestas celebradas en Valencia, but Gauna merely incorporates a passage of Aguilar’s text into his own to cover this event, so it is not clear which poet is mistaken.

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en que la fuerza de su pena espresa;

una herrada en el agua y otra en alto,

con sobra de pesar y de bien falto. (114)

As I said before, this empresa was a cliché by 1599, so it was not necessarily a bad decision on Aguilar’s part not to explain its meaning. Nevertheless, the fact that Lope does not skip over that detail in a rush to make yet another mention of yet another nobleman reduces the density of the passage and makes his poem easier to follow.

Moreover, such scenes—which were surely much more interesting for 17th-century readers than for modern ones—are somewhat buoyed in Lope by their juxtaposition with episodes with more action, like the pirate attack. Lope seems to have an instinct for varying the pacing in his poem in a way that keeps the reader’s attention and facilitates concentration. In Fiestas nupciales by contrast, the processions are so frequent they seem to blend into one another and to drown out the vivid, but short action sequences.

The reader or audience to which each poet devoted his work seems to have determined the scope of his poem to some extent and may also be related to how much each man felt he had to cover and the style in which he wrote. Aguilar was working under more constraints. As we have seen, the

Valencian poet was sponsored by the jurados of the capital of the realm and also had to consider the interests of his employer, Don Jaime. In effect, he could not narrow the focus of his poem to the events in Denia without offending his patrons, nor could he leave Denia out for fear of falling afoul of the rising political star of the era, the Duke of Lerma. There is no documentary evidence proving anyone sponsored or commissioned Lope’s Fiestas de Denia (Profeti 22). Nevertheless, it seems unlikely that he would have been undertaken the work without at least some encouragement from a patron. The most likely candidate(s) for a sponsor would have been Lope’s then-employer, Pedro Fernández de Castro,

Marqués de Sarria, son of powerful Fernando Ruiz de Castro y Andrade, Conde de Lemos and Viceroy of

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Naples. Sarria was intimately tied to Lerma, through his wife, the Duke’s daughter, and his mother,

Lerma’s sister, Catalina de Zúñiga y Sandoval.

Lope’s dedication of the poem to Catalina de Zúñiga was most likely calculated to please his master, and also possibly to make a play for greater future favors from the king’s privado and/or his family (Wright). It is not clear why Lope chooses his employer’s mother as dedicatee rather than the

Marqués himself or another member of the family, but the fact that he does so (or is asked to do so) does seem to inform how he writes. Like Aguilar, Lope realizes that the heroic form is the most appropriate for the narration of the grand occasion. But he modifies this form, picking and choosing or adapting the conventions of the genre to suit his reader, as he imagines her.

The very first sign of Lope’s flexible interpretation of epic form comes in the initial declaration of the object of his “song” and invocation of the muses at the beginning of the poem. Lope does not sing of arms and men, but “del valor divino vuestro, / ínclita, generosa Catalina”. However, Lope recognizes almost immediately that he cannot really cover Catalina’s virtues here—there will have to be another poem about Catalina as subject. Instead, this time the Vicereine will have to be satisfied to be treated as the muse inspiring Lope’s poem (75). Lope uses yet another interesting rhetorical innovation related to the Vicereine as his intended audience: he occasionally interrupts his own narration with an amatory aside directed to Catalina (Profeti 28). There are several examples throughout the poem, but the clearest comes at the end of the poem when Lope, using his own voice as poetic narrator, assumes the pose of a jealous, abandoned lover, claiming her absence (due to illness) has his, “alma y vida descompuestas” and alleging that as a result of the abandon he “sólo fui, llorando, peregrino” while everyone else was enjoying the fiestas (129).

This brings us to one of the more striking differences between Lope’s festival epic and Aguilar’s: women have a much more prominent place in Fiestas de Denia. The only substantial attempt Aguilar makes to describe their participation in Fiestas nupciales is in his description of their costumes for the

107 very last event depicted in the poem, the sarao at the Lonja de Valencia (Aguilar, Fiestas nupciales 128-

34). Further, even on this occasion the ladies have to compete with their noble husbands for the poet’s attention. By contrast, the very first substantial description of a significant event in Lope’s poem is the entrance of Isabel Clara Eugenia and the other ladies. No doubt Lope suspected the Vicereine would find this long passage highlighting the grace and beauty of the great ladies of the realm more interesting than descriptions of the gentlemen’s attire.

Given the conditions of its production, this passage is remarkably engaging. The poet faced a problem similar to that I already mentioned in connection with representing the glories of the contestants in masculine games of war. Lope has to list all the ladies, of course and make all of them sound both extremely beautiful and uniquely so without boring the reader by repeating himself. Lope accomplishes this using a couple of unusual and effective strategies that he reserves almost entirely for this passage and his description of the women. The first technique is natural enough: he adopts an amatory tone and imagery reminiscent of the medieval tradition of the prado or locus amoenus of

courtly love (Profeti 26). The other approach involves extensive personification of the natural

environment—flowers throw themselves at ladies’ feet and trees bow down in homage. Both

techniques are featured in the characterization of the arrival of the first of the ladies, after the Infanta

herself, which sets the tone and pattern for the descriptions that follow after.

Allí la antigua madre se remoza

y los viejos cabellos reverdece,

mirando doña Juana de Mendoza

el campo, que mirándole florece;

el cuerpo, gracia y bizarría que goza

de nueva primavera le parece;

y rompiendo los céspedes del prado

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quedó de clavellinas esmaltado.

To keep the reader’s interest up, Lope introduces variations with the arrival of each new paragon of loveliness; when Doña Juana de la Cerda passes by, “el viento con los pájaros se acuerda, / en concertados números cantando”. The overall effect is almost dreamlike; the ladies enter into the poet’s imaginary meadow and their beauty sparks the world around them to come alive.

Lope employs other methods when minor modifications begin to lose their impact, or when he comes to a description of someone very important or powerful, especially if she is related to Catalina.

For example, at the approach of the Vicereine’s sister-in-law, Lerma’s wife, the poet exclaims that poetry is powerless to represent her; “primero es bien que a número resuma / las luces que se esconden del aurora” (81). On another occasion, Lope uses wordplay on a lady’s name to change gears. The

Condesa de Niebla’s name inspires Lope to write, “no fue esta Niebla de tiniebla, sino de luz que al sol igualar puedo” (81).

This is not to say that Lope leaves the men out—far from it. Though Lope’s attention to the women is notable, in general terms the poem still focuses much more on the men. We have already seen that Lope devotes substantial attention and artistry to his description of the gala costumes and invenciones of the joust in Denia, for example. And in some ways it could be said that his depiction of combat is closer to the classical epic tradition than the short shrift such elements generally receive from

Aguilar. Lope’s narration of the mock battle with the Turks on the beach at Denia, for example, draws the reader into the action—for a relatively long time and effectively. He carefully specifies that the battle is faked from the start, but before long is narrating the events of the fierce fighting as if they were real. The following action-packed passage, made up almost entirely of verbs, is emblematic of the poet’s power to invest even an ersatz conflict with genuine emotion.

Entran y salen mangas, llegan, tiran,

ganan, pierden, están, mudan, espantan;

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ya los del fuerte salen y retiran,

matan, defienden, corren, adelantan;

la parte flaca los cristianos miran,

toneles traen y cañones plantan,

juega la artillería, el furor crece,

responde el mar y el campo se estremece. (103)

Immediately after this climactic moment, Lope reassures the reader by repeating that there are no real victims. Yet he also makes it clear that the resourcefulness, organization and Christian valor of the

Spanish combatants, whether pretending to be Turks or not, is real enough to be a credit to all the participants. Above all, his use of the quality of this action means Lope has an easier time approaching epic standards of action and movement.

Lope’s skillful use of sensorial language also helps to liven his narration, particularly as it applies to the men and their warlike activities. When the soldiers of the Valencian coastal guard pass for the king’s review, it is perhaps no surprise that Lope notes: “suenan cajas, armas reverberan” while the

“aceros” of the mens’ swords shine brightly (86). His combination of sound and sight becomes more interesting, however, when he mixes in classical allusion to describe the scene as a special galera fitted out by the Duke of Lerma fires off a salute to the king and the Fortress of Denia responds in kind.

Con gruesas piezas, versos y esmeriles,

con su castillo Denia les responde,

y el cielo, el humo denso y los sutiles

aires del mar, por largo tiempo esconde;

tiemblan en ellas los gigantes viles,

que, sepultados, no presumen donde

tales rayos se forjan, y imaginan

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que de nuevo los dioses los fulminan

Lope refers to the temporary obscurity caused by the dense clouds of smoke to heighten the use of

auditory stimuli. The roar of the guns is such that the earth and sea tremble—the poet thereby invokes not only sight and sound but the tactile senses. Moreover, the temporary blindness leads the poet (and the reader) to imagine more vividly the awe-inspiring mythological forces behind the smoke. They are not merely guns, but “gigantes viles” with whom Lope associates Vulcan at his tectonic forge, where

Jupiter’s lightning bolts are made.

This kind of narration aside, Lope adapts passages focusing on masculine, warlike contests to make them as relevant to Catalina as he can. When he recounts the tourney in Canto II, for example,

Lope does take note of and praise all the most important noblemen, including Aguilar’s patron, the

Vizconde de Chelva and mantenedor of the contest. But he also singles out Catalina’s sons for special praise, underlining the prizes awarded to them by the judges at the end of the combat. Again, Aguilar omits any mention of winners on this occasion.

Lope also uses praise of Denia, the place where all the festivities he narrates take place, in a way that seems designed to please Catalina. At the beginning of the poem he starts by introducing a nostalgic note, emphasizing that Denia is the traditional Sandoval family seat and Catalina’s childhood home (76). At the same time he mentions the legendary origins of the Sandovals in almost exactly the same terms that Aguilar does. Further on, Lope underlines that, while it is not a big city, Denia is “de buenos edificios, / ancho de calles y de vista hermoso, / que daba todo de su celo indicios” (Figure 2.5).

The poet then suggests the quality of the “pirámides altos, el coloso” of the festival display make the town worthy of comparison to ancient Egypt (76). Later, Lope describes the classical and medieval historical images of one of the triumphal arches erected in Felipe’s honor; one painting depicts the town’s legendary founder, the Roman goddess Diana and another portrays legendary founder of the

House of Sandoval, Sando Cuervo (89). Other than some brief references to the king as heir to the

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Christian, Gothic and Imperial traditions, there are no other significant or sustained references to the heritage or historical importance of any other great noble houses in Fiestas de Denia.

In this way it becomes apparent that Lope’s use of local historical / legendary references and local points of pride is quite different from Aguilar’s: it cannot be qualified as patriotic. Rather, he uses these references to flatter the Rojas Sandoval family as a family, not as Valencians. Praise for Denia is not praise for the Kingdom of Valencia, but for Lerma, his sister and their relations.

The festival epics of 1598-1599

Now that I have laid out the principal differences between Aguilar’s and Lope’s festival epics, it may be useful to reflect briefly on the more fundamental similarities between the two pieces. In general terms, both poems are designed less to celebrate the royal weddings than to celebrate the festival performance of some of the great nobles involved in the events. Both authors are trying to reach two audiences. One readership is the growing general public—or at least that growing segment of the general public with the wherewithal to purchase a book. More directly the poets are aiming at a select, highborn population, particularly their aristocratic sponsors. These aristocrats are slightly different in the case of each author: Lope is attempting to please Lerma’s family through the Duke’s sister, Catalina, whereas Aguilar is trying to curry additional favor with his master, the Vizconde of Chelva and also gratify the city authorities of Valencia.

This last point brings up an important matter—the question of Valencian patriotism. I have deliberately avoided using the word “nationalism” because there is really just the palest of hints in

Aguilar’s Fiestas nupciales of something we could call Valencian patriotism. There is no such thing, no matter how incipient or tentative in Lope’s Fiestas de Denia. In fact, his poem comes closer to giving signs of Spanish nationalism than Valencian particularism: after the mock defeat of the Muslim raiders in the siege on the beach, the participants raise a rousing cry of “ ¡Viva España, viva!” (105). Still, it would

112 be a distortion to represent this relatively minor detail as delivering an important part of Lope’s message in Fiestas de Denia.

Aguilar’s repeated accent on the special qualities of the most prominent Valencian nobles, their special creativity and extravagance in the fiestas and the excellent qualities of Valencia in general is more aptly described as patriotism. I have suggested above that there would be signs in festival epics that tend to complicate Elizabeth Davis’ notion that epic generally serves to offer rhetorical resistance to centrifugal forces from the semi-periphery of the Spanish empire. These Valencian examples, especially

Aguilar’s poem, do complicate the scenario to the extent that the poets really do not focus on Spanish national pride in any sustained or significant way. Rather, they emphasize the local notables of the

Kingdom of Valencia, to a large extent, and center on their interests. We could say at least of Aguilar that though he does not sing an identifiable Valencian national hero, at least he does turn his attention on his homeland rather than reinforcing the connection to the Empire centered on Castile.

Still, the emphasis is not on the country as such but on its titled elite both in Lope and in Aguilar.

In order to please their noble audience, each poet uses his work as a liminal space in which to reproduce and sharpen the image of a return to an aristocratic Golden Age. They direct themselves to slightly different audiences and achieve different degrees of artistic success, of course. Aguilar places more emphasis on the imagined return to masculine, chivalric glories and focuses more tightly on the

Valencian elite. Lope covers those angles as well, but is more careful to appeal to idealized courtly ladies as well and to direct his panegyric more narrowly towards the rising Sandoval clan. Part of his strategy is the use of a poetic voice which is more personal and perhaps better suited to capture the benevolence of a highborn lady.

Both these poetic mirrors have limited purposes. They seek to immortalize the names and noble qualities of their patrons (or potential patrons), and to show off the authors’ poetic prowess. They certainly also serve to inform and entertain a general reading public. But there is more to them than

113 that. If the festival itself has the purpose of making the utopic world of chivalric nobility real, if only virtually and in a limited time and space, the epic poetry written to represent the occasions also aims to perpetuate the conservative, unchanging Platonist image of that world.

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Chapter 3 The Duke of Lerma’s temple of fame: politics and poetry in Francisco López de Zárate’s

Fiestas en la traslacion (1617)

Congratulando a Marte, celebraron La suerte que le cupo de los dias, Fiestas, que las Olimpicas borraron. O tu, que adviertes, finge fantasias, Mira, quanto los sueños te dictaron, Recopila indigestas alegrías, Y animalas despues en tus ideas, Que yo te ofrezco mas, si mas deseas

Francisco López de Zárate, Fiestas en la traslacion, 146.

The valido and government by celebration

I have argued that the wedding festival of 1598-1599 was about a number of different important

sociopolitical issues above and beyond the marital union of Felipe III and Margarita of Austria: renewed

alliances, the hopeful inauguration of a young king’s reign and the martial glories of the flower of

Spanish nobility are just a few of the themes explored in those events. The celebrations in Valencia,

however, also performed or made manifest the more particular rites of passage of Francisco Sandoval y

Rojas, his political dependents and his family. If it had not been clear beforehand, by the conclusion of

the celebrations, Francisco de Sandoval y Rojas unquestionably had a seat at the head of the highest of

political tables. And these events would be just the first of multiple extravagant occasions the Duke of

Lerma would organize to extend and express his privileged position with Felipe III and assure his own

political preeminence. As we will see, throughout the first two decades of the 17th century, Lerma’s lavish celebrations marked the more significant life events and political vagaries not just of the royal family, but also those of the House of Sandoval. A long series of stately fiestas culminated in the privado’s farewell performative event, held in Lerma itself in 1617.

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In 1599, the Marqués de Denia was transformed almost overnight by the absolute confidence of

the new King from a courtly hanger-on struggling to bear up under crushing debt into the Duke of Lerma

and the unrivalled master of the Spanish political, economic and social world.1 Lerma’s supremacy was

such that the Duke’s orders were to be treated as if coming directly from the King—Felipe himself issued cédulas certifying this extraordinary arrangement not once, but three times (Williams, Great Favourite

104).

Sandoval steadily accumulated ever higher titles, offices and income, for himself, his sons and their children. As he arranged for these distinctions, he also created a network of political influence of unprecedented dimensions. On one hand, the unmistakable aura of royal favor and the promise of future success made it easy for Lerma to advance a policy of astute political marriages for his children, their children and other relatives. This campaign came to full fruition in 1617, by which time three of the

Duke’s five children and his eldest grandson had secured ducal coronets of their own and “Lerma and his immediate kin held or shared in the five richest aristocratic titles in Spain” (Williams, Great Favourite

177). On the other hand, Lerma took command of the apparatus of royal patronage. From his position on these commanding heights, he arranged to place members of his family and his hechuras—men owing their fortune and allegiance entirely to the Duke—into influential positions. He then showered them with benefices, enabling them to climb to his side at the highest reaches of society and government.2 Working through this network of clients and well-placed relatives, Lerma was able to monitor and largely control the Monarchy’s activities and policies.

1 For a brief summary of the fortunes of the House of Sandoval Rojas see Chapter 2, note 20. 2 One of the most prominent of Lerma’s hechuras was Rodrigo Calderón, whom Santiago Martínez Hernández has aptly dubbed “the favourite’s favourite”. Lerma found him useful and loyal and so entrusted him with one of the most powerful positions at court: Secretary of the King’s Chamber. This situation implied an intimate relationship with the King and was of crucial strategic significance, as in effect it was impossible to gain access to either the valido or the King without first going through Calderón. He rose alongside Lerma to the pinnacle of wealth and power and as he did so extended his own more modest network of influence, also becoming a political and literary patron in his own right. Among the beneficiaries of his patronage was poet Francisco López de Zárate. Calderón’s wit and administrative effectiveness endeared him to the King, who conferred on him the titles of Conde de la Oliva and then Marqués de Siete Iglesias, together with other important honors and distinctions. However, his

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Essentially, Lerma reigned openly in the King’s place(Figure 3.1). His only concession to hierarchical propriety was to occasionally proclaim that all he did was in service to the King. Ministerial rule of this kind had been considered taboo in Spain since the mid-fifteenth century, especially after the establishment of a regime founded on the relatively strong, personal monarchy of Isabel I and Fernando

II. Young Felipe III’s own father, Felipe II, was one of many early modern Spanish political thinkers worried that investing total control in a single, plenipotentiary valido would inevitably weaken the

Monarchy and lead Spain back to the destructive factional struggles of the late Trastamaran middle ages—the specter of privado Álvaro de Luna’s dominion over Juan II of Castile and the chaos that marked his reign was ever present in Spanish political memory. Near the end of Felipe II’s reign, when his advisors apprised him of the (then) Marqués of Denia’s growing hold over the prince, the King was concerned enough to attempt to extricate his son from Sandoval’s influence by sending Sandoval to

Valencia as Viceroy (1595-1597).

In the face of such maneuvers, and given his long experience at court, Lerma must have been well aware of the risks inherent in seeking and being granted the kind of exclusive royal favor he was cultivating with Felipe III. He was doubtless cognizant of the envy and resistance that were generally expressed by other courtiers when one or another amongst them managed to distinguish him or herself to a high degree. At any rate, the historical example of Álvaro de Luna, who had been beheaded publicly in Valladolid after his fall in 1453, was surely instructive. Accordingly, Lerma employed several effective tactics for solidifying, expanding and perpetuating his power once it was established.

relatively low origins, high-handed manner and shameless use of his position to amass an astonishing fortune in gifts and bribes made him many powerful enemies. Moreover, his patron Lerma’s enemies found it easier to strike at Calderón than to go after the duke himself. In 1612 Calderón was only saved from utter disgrace by Lerma’s insistence he be sent on a diplomatic mission to Flanders, effectively removing him from court until some of the political heat dissipated. By 1619, however, with Lerma in retirement, Calderón was left without a protector. Calderón was arrested on charges ranging from embezzlement to murder, found guilty and executed in 1621. For more, wee Martínez Hernández’ Rodrigo Calderón, la sombra del valido (2009).

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As Patrick Williams has shown, Lerma’s overall strategy involved restricting access to the King in

part by keeping him moving and in part by surrounding the royal family almost entirely with his own

people.

Keenly aware that his position depended on his control over Philip, Lerma was always

determined to control access to him, and he did this by isolating him, both within his

palaces and outside them. He held the major offices in the king's household himself and

appointed relatives and henchmen (hechuras) to the lesser posts. (Travels of Philip III

381)

Lerma’s reach extended even to the household of the one member of the royal family who was most inimical to him; he had his wife, Catalina de la Cerda, appointed camarera mayor to Queen Margarita.

After his wife’s death, Lerma arranged for his sister, Catalina de Zúñiga, to replace her.3 Furthermore,

Sandoval attempted to perpetuate his family’s influence over the royal house by having himself named tutor (ayo) and chief of staff (mayordomo mayor) to Prince Felipe (the future Felipe IV) until he was ready to pass those posts along to his own son and heir, Cristóbal de Sandoval y Rojas, Duke of Uceda

(García García, Retirada de Lerma 686).

Another of Lerma’s methods for maintaining his own closeness—both physical and emotional— to Felipe while keeping outsiders at a safe distance was to keep the King on the move, generally from one entertainment and/or hunting lodge to another. Between 1608 and 1610, for example, Felipe spent only half his time in Madrid (Williams, Travels of Philip III 394). Perhaps the most extreme measure of this kind Lerma took was to arrange for the transfer of the imperial capital to Valladolid between 1601

3 This is the same Condesa de Lemos to whom Lope de Vega had dedicated his Fiestas de Denia. Margarita took umbrage at Lerma’s interference in her private household’s composition and became concerned about his obvious hold over her husband. At first she was careful of the tight bond between her husband and Lerma, working subtly behind the scenes to support the duke’s critics to the extent she could. For example, she quietly collaborated with those of Lerma’s opponents who attacked Sandoval’s protégé, Rodrigo Calderón. By 1611, however, Margarita was confident enough in the solidity of her own position with the King to speak out openly and directly against Lerma. It was a great relief to Lerma when she died in October of the same year, shortly after giving birth to the Infante Alonso. For more details, see Williams’ Great Favourite, 110, 136 and especially 168.

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and 1606. The practice of tactical remove was effective for several reasons. Above all, it kept the King

amused and away from politics. Felipe was an especially enthusiastic huntsman, even for his time and

class, so the longer Lerma kept the King happily employed chasing deer, the more gratified Felipe was to

his minister. During these frequent escapes from the cares of governing the King was dependent on

Lerma and his associates for information and advice on affairs of state. Simultaneously, in practical

terms Felipe was unavailable to anyone outside Lerma’s network.

Another way Lerma could keep the King happily distracted from mundane affairs of state was

through a cycle of constant celebrations. Felipe had a famous fondness for the arts and festival events of

all kinds. Lerma surely learned of this predilection before Felipe ascended the throne, but if he had not

realized the power such events had over the young King beforehand, then the success of the occasions

of 1598-1599 left no doubt. There was nothing like a good party to keep the King busy and happy. And if

the King was well occupied in festivals, so was the rest of the Spanish political elite. As Williams puts it,

Lerma “dominó la corte durante dos décadas basando su estrategia de poder en el control y

manipulación de las fiestas que eran expresión de la propia vida cortesana” (Estilo nuevo 176).

Lerma himself managed all royal festivities, both within the palace walls and without, and made

sure that there were plenty of them. If we limit ourselves just to the public events important enough to

be memorialized in print, in the eighteen years between Felipe’s accession and 1617 there were more

than a score of especially elaborate occasions—many of which, like the royal weddings of 1598-1599 consisted of numerous component events (Alenda y Mira 109-85). Not only did Lerma make sure these celebrations were frequent and varied, but the Sandovals themselves often took starring roles in them.

In 1612, for example, King Felipe and his daughter, Ana Mauricia, presided as padrinos at the double weddings allying the powerful Enríquez family with Lerma’s; Juan Alonso Enríquez de Cabrera y Colonna

(the future ninth Almirante of Castile) married Lerma’s granddaughter, Luisa de Sandoval y Padilla while his younger sister, Feliche Enríquez, exchanged vows with Lerma’s grandson and namesake, Francisco de

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Sandoval y Rojas II, Duke of Cea. After this, the double betrothal of the royal houses of France and Spain

was announced; Felipe III’s beloved daughter, Ana Mauricia, was to be Louis XIII’s bride while Prince

Felipe of Asturias would marry the King of France’s sister, Isabel. A string of joyous events ensued. Later that year Louis’ extraordinary ambassador, the Duke of Mayenne, was fêted sumptuously in Madrid both before and after the negotiation and ceremonial publication of the marriage agreement, all of which was done under the watchful eye of the Duke of Lerma.

All this is to say nothing of the more private, palace affairs, also coordinated by Lerma. Elizabeth

Wright has justly qualified the magnificent public events connected to Felipe’s wedding festival as

“epoch making”. The impact of the extravagant new style of private celebratory events may have been less evident in that audiences were usually smaller and more select, but it was no less important. It would be hard to put a number to such occasions, so perhaps their significance is best approached in qualitative terms. Even intimate palace productions involved elaborate scenery, costume, music, dance and scripts from the greatest artistic and literary figures of the day. Some palace theatrical productions, especially those composed by celebrated authors such as Lope de Vega or Antonio Mira de Amescua, had a broader influence as they went on directly to more popular success in the commercial theaters after their introduction at court. But even those that did not go straight to the corrales had profound indirect effects on Golden Age culture and society because “they mark the beginning of a new royal interest in the drama which enabled the court theatre of the seventeenth century to be created”

(Shergold 245). Moreover, what Williams has dubbed an “estilo nuevo de grandeza”, the new extravagance in courtly display, performance and propaganda, provided the noble patrons of the day with a stage on which to perform their power and importance and to distinguish themselves in the courtly virtues of taste, magnificence and liberality (Estilo nuevo 175). No patron of the arts was more influential or distinguished than the Duke of Lerma. As we will see, Lerma intended his sponsorship of

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the spectacular fiestas of 1617 to be the culmination of nearly twenty years of powerful showmanship and to enshrine his reputation in the public memory for all time.

Lerma’s festival of himself

Teresa Ferrer Valls has aptly called the lavish affair of October and November, 1617 sponsored by Francisco de Sandoval y Rojas in his freshly rebuilt ducal seat at Lerma as the Duke’s “canto del cisne”

(Práctica escénica cortesana 142). Though Lerma’s eclipse was not complete until his departure from court in October of 1618, historians generally agree the celebrations of the previous year marked the final flash of brilliant courtly display before the swift decline of Lerma’s mastery over Spanish politics.

Scholars differ somewhat, however, on the specific significance of Lerma’s farewell performative occasion and the manner and timing of his subsequent political demise. The more traditional point of view, expressed by Antonio Feros, amongst others, suggests that while the King had begun to lose confidence in Lerma beforehand, the fiestas of 1617 marked a transition to a year-long period in which

“Lerma’s personal standing changed radically, ultimately creating the conditions for his fall” (Kingship and Favoritism 241). Patrick Williams offers a similar, but slightly different perspective, suggesting that rather than being forced out, Lerma had spent the years between roughly 1612 and 1618 negotiating with Felipe for permission to retire into a religious life, something the Duke had long fervently desired to make the capstone of his career. Seen from this angle, the fiestas were a “solemn and generous farewell to public life. They also marked the climactic point in Lerma’s relationship with the King, at once a celebration and an ending” (Great Favourite 229).

It may never be possible to definitively determine which of these interpretations of events is more precisely true, especially since Felipe and Lerma seem to have had a very close relationship both on political and personal levels. When they disagreed or were unhappy with one another, it was generally in neither’s interests to allow more than the faintest breath of discord to become public.

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Conflict between the two men, to the extent it was manifested openly at all, tended to be expressed in

passive-aggressive terms.4

Nevertheless, the extraordinary attention and care Lerma devoted to preparing and carrying out the events of the fall of 1617 highlight their special significance to the Duke. The imagery and messages or themes making up the component festival events also suggest that even among the many unusual entertainments organized by Lerma, the fiestas of Lerma in 1617 were uniquely important.5 Moreover, the context would seem to support Williams’ argument that Lerma had been planning a withdrawal into religious life for some time and intended the occasion of 1617 to be, if not a final adieu to the political world, at least a signal of his impending permanent transition to the ecclesiastical state.

More importantly, these fiestas provided a venue or liminal space for the expressive culmination of the Duke’s renovation and exaltation of the “cabeça de Estado de la Casa de Sandoval”

(Herrera 5v). The duke intended to make the hamlet that gave his title its name, the small, undistinguished estate of Lerma, into a symbolic Sandoval capital of matchless splendor.6 This career-

long project comprised two phases; first a concerted construction effort to build a magnificent

monument to the Duke and his family. Then, the prominence of the House of Sandoval would be socially

recognized or enacted in extravagant performative events, the lavish ceremonies and celebrations to be

4 Williams provides a couple of examples of these subtle exchanges between the King and his minister in his The Great Favourite. Lerma’s public declaration in 1607 of his intent to withdraw from court and join the Jeronimites was probably best understood as an effective (if perhaps childish) means of maneuvering the King into expressing his support at a time when the Duke’s enemies had successfully undermined Lerma through some of his associates (139-41). For his part, Felipe pointedly retained and publicly supported Lerma’s enemy Fray Luis de Aliaga as royal confessor in the face of the valido’s pressures to have him replaced (168). 5 Because of its special importance and because it marks the end of an era, I will refer to this occasion as “the Fiestas de Lerma”. However, these events were not the first of their kind in the villa. The King had stopped briefly in the town several times and the Duke had held an earlier celebration there in 1613. 6Lerma could not have been important to Sandoval for its population or wealth. Besides its attractive hunting facilities for the King, it was mainly significant to Sandoval for its location. First, the town’s proximity to Burgos suited Sandoval’s desire to return the center of gravity of his family’s landholdings to more prestigious Old Castile after years of “exile” in the Kingdom of Valencia. In addition, Lerma was also conveniently located in the middle of the rest of his Castilian estates (Williams, Travels of Philip III).

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held in 1617. Viewed in this way, the opulent celebrations of 1617 are less a swan song than an

apotheosis.

In 1613 Felipe granted Sandoval’s request to raise Lerma, a villa with about a thousand inhabitants, to the status of ciudad. The program of architectural improvement and landscaping also began in earnest that year and, though the Duke had devoted considerable attention and resources to other building efforts, the work undertaken in Lerma was unparalleled in its scale.7 Sandoval refurbished the Dominican convent of San Blas and coordinated (and funded) development of no fewer than four other monasteries and convents, several of which were connected to members of his family. These institutions included one founded by his sister, Leonor, another by his daughter-in-law, Mariana de

Padilla Manrique, and a third by Mariana’s mother. He improved the gardens and hunting grounds around the town, enlarged and beautified the main square and transformed the old castle into a splendid new palace with four towers (Figure 3.2).8 The result was more than just "el mayor complejo palacial nobiliario de España", it was the largest construction project undertaken by any individual in

Europe to that time (García García, Retirada de Lerma 194).

The new ducal palace was a visual highlight; when the complex was viewed from the floodplain of the Arlanza river, it formed a kind of eastern bookend to the string of impressive edifices lined up on the ridge above (Figure 3.3). The western bookend was Lerma’s principal church of San Pedro Apóstol,

and it was this reconsecrated temple that would serve as the central focus of the extravaganza Sandoval

had in mind for inaugurating his great project.

The process of San Pedro’s opulent renovation had begun shortly after Sandoval’s rise to the

valimiento, between 1603 and 1607 when the pope acceded to Lerma’s request and raised the church

to collegiate status. The Vatican endowed Lerma’s own basilica of St. Peter with an abbot reporting

7 Lerma had also spent a fortune building or rebuilding grand palaces and ecclesiastical edifices in Valladolid and Madrid. 8 This was one of Lerma’s characteristic usurpations of royal prerogative: protocol typically limited ducal palaces to no more than two towers (Williams, Great Favourite 192).

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directly to Rome, canons and chaplains, along with other distinctions to be funded by the Duke.9

Further, the abbot was allowed to wear a miter and carry a crozier (Herrera 17v). In effect, Lerma’s

church was raised to the dignity of a diocesan seat, despite the minor population center it served.10 The building’s renovation gave it a new physical condition commensurate with its ecclesiastical promotion.

As a crowning signal of the church’s importance to Sandoval, he had the remains of his beloved uncle and mentor, Cristóbal de Rojas Sandoval, archbishop of Seville, translated to Lerma, placing them in their own chapel underneath a life-size statue of the prelate cast in gilded bronze (Figure 3.4). By the renovation’s completion, sympathetic chroniclers like Pedro de Herrera could reasonably compare the church to urban cathedrals in size and beauty (18v). Moreover, anyone observing the way the church was festooned inside and out with the Sandoval arms (Figure 3.5) could be forgiven for wondering to whose veneration the church was really dedicated: St. Peter’s or the Duke of Lerma’s.

In a sense, Lerma’s utter lack of economic or strategic importance made it a perfect place for

Sandoval to compose a lasting tribute to himself and to his lineage. The town was a kind of blank page or canvas on which he might write or paint whatever he pleased—notably in the lasting medium of architecture. In addition, the memory of the villa’s previous insignificance could only highlight the extraordinary power and magnificence Sandoval exercised in remaking his ducal seat as he conceived it.

The simple village that had sprung up around the medieval fortress on the Arlanza was becoming a sophisticated image carved in stone representing the grandeur of Francisco Sandoval y Rojas and his family. The new Lerma was less a town than “the visual expression of the duke's ambition to be not only the greatest nobleman in Spain but also the greatest patron of the Church” (Williams, Great Favourite

193).

9 Pedro de Herrera claims the concession was made by Pope Paul V in 1607 (17v). Williams, however, puts the date at 1603 and attributes it to Clement VIII (Great Favourite 190). 10 In fact, Sandoval lobbied for Lerma be made a diocese, but Rome did not indulge him on this particular point (García García, Retirada de Lerma 695).

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Given Sandoval’s years of wildly successful rule by entertainment, it was only natural that the

construction project should dovetail into a program of spectacular festivities. Since the contracts for the

reconstruction of Lerma had all specified completion by 1617, it is likely Sandoval had contemplated

making the elaborate fiestas the crowning moment of the entire process from the start. In any case,

whether it occurred to him early on or later, the climax of the duke’s monument to himself was the 1617

shift from the more concrete language of masonry into the flashier, ephemeral language of the

celebratory arts.

In fact, the elaborate construction undertaken at Lerma, though presumably built to make it a

lasting statement, could be looked at as one more especially extravagant form of festive display.

Sandoval doubtless intended the religious communities he had moved to or founded in Lerma to stay

indefinitely. Yet, a reading of the definitive account of the festival commissioned by Sandoval, Herrera’s

Translación del Santissimo, makes it hard to avoid the conclusion that the collegiate church and the new

palace, at least, were developed more than anything to set an adequately attractive stage for the

spectacle of the fiestas.11 In previous festivals, enormous amounts of time and treasure were devoted to the construction and decoration of ephemeral triumphal arches of painted wood, plaster and wax. In

1617 Lerma outshone them all by making permanent structures of brick and mortar an integral part of a fleeting occasion.

We have already seen that San Pedro Apóstol was beautified in part to give a dignified final resting place to Archbishop Cristóbal de Rojas Sandoval—and in part to provide a lot of broad, flat

surfaces on which to emblazon the Sandoval Rojas arms. Aside from that, its primary connection to the

Fiestas de Lerma was to serve as an appropriate pretext for celebration. There can be no doubt that the

Duke’s underlying aims in putting on his great show were political, and on purely political occasions, if a

11 A pair of other prose accounts of the festival have survived, including the published relaciones of Francisco Fernández de Caso, Miguel Riberio’s text in Latin and some manuscripts based on Herrera. However, Herrera is the only author whom Lerma himself asked to publish his account. For more details, see Manuel Cornejo’s “Lope de Vega y las fiestas de Lerma de 1617” (180).

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reason were necessary at all, virtually any was sufficient to underpin the most elaborate conceivable

festivities. But as he prepared his ducal seat for presentation, Sandoval was also deeply involved in his

campaign for a cardinal’s hat—an ambition he had cherished for several years but that would not be

realized until the following year.12 In 1617, then, an ecclesiastical celebration was an especially apropos pretext for the lavish affair.

The patronage Sandoval extended to the various convents in Lerma and of which he made such a show was almost certainly calculated to impress the Vatican as much as anyone else. But the translation of the Host to San Pedro Apóstol provided an especially appropriate basis for the celebration

Sandoval had in mind, as it allowed him to demonstrate his quasi-pastoral devotion to the primary church of his family seat. Moreover, here, in the temple at the heart of his Duchy of Lerma, he was able to preside over a series of religious occasions gathering together the most distinguished peers of the realm, starting with the royal family.

Just as he does for the other improvements carried out at Lerma, Herrera provides a minute description of the renovated church, from the height of its three naves, to its two grand organs and even the colors of the balustrades and balconies—the blue and gold of the Sandoval family crest, naturally

(18v-20v). Even more importantly, he also narrates the procession in which the Host is ceremonially carried to San Pedro Apóstol in some detail. That is to say, the passage highlights the sumptuous altars and other decorations layered onto the major buildings located along the path of the procession, including San Pedro, the ducal palace and the various monastic houses.13 Herrera is careful to credit the

Sandoval clan for sponsoring each splendid installation, declaring at the end of this part that “no huvo

12 Sandoval had given signals from early on in his valimiento that he aspired to a religious retirement. His quiet but persistent negotiations for elevation to the cardinalate date from at least 1616, probably earlier. They paid off shortly after the Fiestas de Lerma when the Holy See announced the fulfillment of Lerma’s dream in the Consistory of March 26, 1618. He was installed as Cardinal-Priest of San Sisto three years later, in 1621, and ordained a priest the year after that. 13 Elaborately-decorated temporary altars were to liturgical celebrations what triumphal arches were to royal entries. They were generally just as costly and sometimes reached the same size and proportions as lay ephemeral architecture. I know of no artwork representing the altars of the Fiestas de Lerma, but there are contemporary engravings of many such structures from Valencia (Figures 3.6 and 3.7).

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cosa alguna de composicion de Altares, calles, plaças, en todo lo que anduvo la Procession, que no

fuesse del Duque, o su hijo, o de lo que han dado a Monasterios de fundaciones suyas” (24v). Herrera’s remarks on the actual movement of people during the procession itself, however, are much briefer; he provides little more than a list of participants which fills about one and a half folios. As brief as it is, this list is a veritable who’s who of courtly figures, particularly those with high Church office and/or ties to the Sandoval family.

Herrera’s coverage of masses during the Fiestas de Lerma is sketchy in the same way. He records each of the sacraments the King attends, mentioning the celebrants and usually naming the preacher responsible for delivering the sermon.14 Nevertheless, though the clerics invited to preach at each mass were famous for their oratory, the chronicler rarely says more than a word or two about the content of their sermons.15 Herrera’s terseness on these events is curious; though he does register all of them, they are not emphasized in any way. It is hard to say exactly why, but these occasions may have been soft- pedaled because they were not quite special enough. After all, Felipe III, who earned his sobriquet “the

Pious” through punctilious, even obsessive observance of religious ceremony, seemed to be going to mass constantly. Moreover, in Lerma the Eucharist was offered so frequently that a mass featuring a famous preacher was not enough to distinguish one special day from another. The mass for the anniversary of Queen Margarita’s death, the feast of St. Teresa of Ávila and those celebrated for the octave of San Pedro’s reconstruction are virtually indistinguishable from one another, at least as they are described by Herrera. These were religious activities, but uniform in their composition and

14 Felipe actually attended religious services two or three times a day during his stay in Lerma. Herrera seems to mention every mass, but usually gives only a few, scattered comments on celebrations he considers important and no details on others. 15 To the extent that he highlights any sermons, Herrera favors those that flatter Sandoval by touching on the construction of new church buildings. An interesting exception is Fray Hortensio Félix Paravicino’s address on noble patronage of churches. Herrera does mention the Trinitarian, who was one of the more celebrated preachers of his time. But he says nothing about the topic of his sermon. Paravicino seems to have made a politely veiled but pointed critique of the great and powerful who build solely for their own vainglory. See Francis Cerdan’s “El sermón de Paravicino en la dedicación del temple de Lerma (1617)” (2011).

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insufficiently focused on Sandoval himself and therefore could not serve as good frameworks for

showcasing the great man’s importance.

It seems clear that Sandoval and his chronicler are much more interested in the striking tableau

the duke put up for the occasion than in the participants or even the sacramental proceedings

themselves.

As for the new ducal palace, at the very beginning of his relación, Herrera advances Sandoval’s

claim that the renovations of the building were not meant for the benefit of the duke himself, but rather

“para tener en ella comodo recebimiento y habitacion de las personas Reales”, presumably for the

entertaining Sandoval would do there in 1617 (1v). Herrera’s assertion about the reason for renovation

is almost certainly meant partially to cover Sandoval’s arrogance at having undertaken a building project

even more ambitious than those of many royal houses. On the other hand, despite the enormous

resources the Duke poured into Lerma, he seems never to have really intended to make it much more

than a showplace. After his definitive departure from court at the end of 1618, he retired not to Lerma

but to Valladolid, a city which he had favored for some time—not least by moving the capital there

temporarily—and where he had also established the Sandoval family pantheon at the monastery church

of San Pablo. Given this, the notion that the palace at Lerma was intended mainly to please and impress

royal guests is not difficult to credit.

Perhaps the clearest example of an architectural feature of the Lerma complex designed

specifically to make for a good show, however, was its despeñadero de toros—an elaborate structure

Sandoval had installed just off the main square facing the new palace. Herrera describes the apparatus as

Una puerta, por donde abriendose a tiempos, quando se corren toros, entran a cierta

trampa, de que es forçoso despeñarse en muchos estados de altura: y tal es la

disposicion del precipicio, que no pueden detenerse, hasta llegar al primer braço del rio,

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que iva regando prados, y faldas de cuestas al pie del Palacio, y galeria, formando

riberas agradables entre arboledas deleytosas. (10r)

One can only speculate as to how any bulls surviving the initial drop felt about the view of the delightful

groves along the riverbank. Of course, by the moral standards of the day there was no shame in hurling

a hapless animal to its death without even affording it the opportunity to defend itself in the ring. On

the contrary, Lerma was pleased with himself for having invented this complicated trick and the King himself was said to be especially amused by the spectacle (Williams, Estilo nuevo 187). I will return to the significance of this feature of the Fiestas de Lerma shortly.

Traditional celebration, baroque excess and novelty

We have already seen how liturgical observances gave structure to the daily calendar of activities at the Fiestas de Lerma. Masses and processions were, of course, among the most traditional possible events and part of any special Spanish occasion. But Sandoval meant to make his festival something much more than just any Spanish celebration. While such time-honored components of festivals formed the basis for the Fiestas de Lerma, the events of 1617 were nevertheless supposed to stand out as unique in their splendor. One strategy available to the duke for increasing his festivals’ splash was quantitative: not only would he set a big stage by renovating a lot of churches, but he would make sure a lot of masses were said in them during the time he had his captive courtly audience.

Between Felipe’s arrival in Lerma on October 4 and his departure on the 18th, Herrera records no fewer

than twenty-one separate religious occasions, including two processions, several vespers services, a gala

dinner for the clergy and a visit to a nearby hermitage.

The same technique was also applied to the most Spanish of traditional festival activities:

bullfighting. No festival could be without this elemental diversion for, as Herrera puts it, “fiesta de toros

saca de tino, para no hazer diferencia entre lo penoso, y alegre” (37r). Moreover, a good bullfight was—

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in theory—an especially appropriate arena for the agonistic play of highborn gentlemen, as Araceli

Guillaume-Alonso explains.

El alarde del noble en público, ante los suyos y ante un amplio abanico de espectadores,

la puesta en escena de toda su persona en medio del coso, altivo, gallardo, lujosamente

ataviado, hábil jinete que domina su corcel sin perder la compostura, la capa terciada al

hombro y la espada, la lanza o el rejón en la mano a la espera de la acometida del toro,

funcionan como una exaltación de todo el grupo social al que pertenece: la nobleza. El

enfrentamiento de ese noble en combate singular con el toro tiene un aliciente

particular también para los miembros de su propio linaje, despertando admiración y

envidia tanto entre los linajes allegados o rivales como entre el vulgo.16 (311)

As at any important aristocratic function, it was only natural that there should be several bullfighting

occasions in the Fiestas de Lerma. And in fact there were six days and/or nights of corridas for the men

of the court. The first events took place between October 11th and 13th, and then there were more a week later from the 18th through the 20th. On the 12th, 13th and 19th, the bullfights were paired with the

more serene, courtly exercise of the juego de cañas.

Despite the symbolic importance of corridas, however, Herrera treats them much like the

religious ceremonies discussed above; they are registered, but not discussed at any length, as if their

purpose in the festival were merely to ensure the host had touched all the bases. In fact, it is not even

clear that Herrera catalogs all the corridas. For example, at the beginning of his entry on the activities of

Thursday the nineteenth, he mentions vaguely that the gentlemen “anduvieron con rejones el dia

16 The singular importance of this ritual combat for noblemen is even clearer when a courtly, European occasion like the Fiestas de Lerma is contrasted with a similar event in the colonial American context. The participation of the lower classes gets little attention in the Peninsular context; chroniclers and poets focus almost entirely on the doings of noble Europeans. However, in his Fiestas de Lima por el nacimiento del Príncipe Baltasar Carlos (1632), poet Rodrigo de Carvajal y Robles expresses a mixture of aristocratic disdain and perplexed delight over what for him is the freakish spectacle of a corrida sponsored by and featuring the city’s free people of African descent (93- 6).

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passado” but says nothing further on the previous day’s event (67r). Moreover, the first full bullfighting event, on Thursday the 12th, is reduced to a kind of prelude to the later juego de cañas. Herrera limits his comments to: “se corrieron, y despeñaron tres toros, esperandose las cañas” (38r).

Herrera provides much more detail on the juego de cañas later that same night, which was sponsored by Sandoval’s second son, Diego Gómez de Sandoval y Rojas, Conde de Saldaña. The narration begins with Herrera devoting a whole folio, front and back, to a minute description of the expensive costumes Saldaña had made up and then presented to all the noble participants as gifts.

Herrera specifies the number of the Conde’s servants and what instruments his hired musicians played.

He then describes how the wagons bearing supplies were decorated and even includes the pack animals and their fancy trappings. After this comes a simple list of the participating aristocrats, in order of their entry into the square in pairs. Finally, the chronicler provides a half page on the juego itself, but can only wrap up the description by declaring it a success not so much for the action of the participants, but “por la gala de tan costosas libreas conformes, y tantos buenos hombres de acavallo” (39v). The action of the final skirmish is interrupted twice; first in the middle with “otro toro, parando en el despeñadero” and finally when “desmandadamente saliò un toro” which is dispatched by the timely intervention of the

Marqués de Velada, with an assist from Sandoval’s grandson, the Duke of Cea.17

There are several telling points to be gleaned from this narration. For a start, the fact that the bullfight was regarded as a way to kill a little time before the juego de cañas underlines two developments. First, the two events, treated as separate and distinct in the fiestas of 1598-1599, are now somewhat confused. Second, the more refined spectacle of the cañas is clearly considered a more important event at Lerma.

The more traditional combat with a bull is treated as relatively uninteresting in and of itself. As

Guillaume-Alonso notes, Herrera is not the only festival writer to pay scant attention to tauromachy:

17 It is possible this was a genuine and dangerous escape, but by 1617 similar incidents seem to happen regularly at courtly festivals. At Lerma, there are not one but two such rogue bulls put down.

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though bullfights were ever-present, “las menciones de su celebración son a menudo escuetas,

reduciéndose a un mero ‘se corrieron toros’ o ‘se corrieron toros y cañas’” (296). Absent any explicit explanation from the author(s), one can only speculate on the reasons.18 However, they are likely similar to those that led Herrera to limit his commentary on the many masses celebrated at Lerma. Precisely because of their popularity in Spain, bullfights were somewhat commonplace events. After all, they were even featured at plebeian functions. While an important, or even a necessary element at any festival worthy of the name, they were not sufficient to set Sandoval’s fiestas apart and therefore did not merit careful development in Herrera’s relación—or any other.

Another likely reason for the lack of focus on bullfighting is what seems to be a generalized de-

emphasis of agonistic play in the Fiestas de Lerma, especially amongst the higher aristocracy and more

particularly as regards martial events. If one of the underlying themes of the fiestas that began Felipe

III’s reign was a return to the aristocratic glory days of 15th-century chivalry, there is a decided turn away from that kind of imagery and towards more extravagant, aestheticized spectacle in 1617.

Whereas, for example, tourneys were a highlight of the fiestas in Valencia, there are none at

Lerma. In fact, the only related event is a court ballet imitating a joust which puts the final touch on the night of palace masques—sponsored by the Duke’s son-in-law and nephew, the Conde de Lemos—on

Tuesday, Oct. 17th. Nor are there any of the invenciones that featured so prominently in 1598-1599, where noblemen competed with one another in wit and striking dress. The nearest thing to the old-style tourney with its elaborate crests, mottoes and best-dressed contest is Saldaña’s colorful juego de cañas.

Yet despite the superficial resemblance of this event to its old-style equivalents, there is a fundamental shift evident in the newer occasion’s significance. At Lerma, the fancy clothes are essentially livery presented to the peers by the privado’s second son. It is hard to imagine a clearer example of a

18 Guillaume-Alonso offers several possible explanations for chroniclers’ disinterest, but does not offer a definitive solution. In my view her most convincing idea is summed up in the form of the question: “¿[se] daba por hecho que era algo tan suficientemente conocido y repetitivo que era superfluo dar detalles?” (297).

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Maussian gift: these rich costumes were undoubtedly of great monetary value, but were nevertheless a

kind of uniform publicly marking all the great gentlemen-participants who accepted and wore them as having taken places within the sphere of influence of the great and generous House of Sandoval.

The taurine elements that do receive special mention in Herrera’s account are, often as not, similar to Saldaña’s cañas in that their connection to the traditional form and meaning of such events is tenuous, if not notional. Rather than an event where noblemen strive to set themselves apart in the art of wielding a lance against a fierce foe, they become a kind of filler activity designed to keep spectators occupied as they wait for something more important to happen. In still more telling cases, facing a bull is less about noble virtue than circus-style showmanship. The bull’s demise becomes a novel kind of spectacle in which the brute is either lit up with streaming fireworks before being run through the city

(encohetado) or he is simply dropped through the despeñadero (Figure 3.8).

This reduced emphasis on displays of fighting prowess at major festivals may have had some relationship to a generational change. After all, Felipe had been twenty years old in 1598, but was now just months from turning forty. Despite the fact that the King was showing few signs of diminished interest in hunting, the general political direction of his reign had shifted decidedly from an initial period characterized by an aggressive attitude to a more cautious approach in which Spain sought to establish and preserve the peace—or the period John Elliott has dubbed the Pax Hispanica.19 I will come back to

the question of Felipe and Lerma’s policy of peacemaking further on. But to address the case at hand

more directly, whatever the King’s tastes may have been, Sandoval’s years of preoccupation with

chivalric-style combat were an indistinct and distant memory by 1617: the valido was now sixty-four and

19 This change probably had less to do with any mellowing on the part of the King and his privado than to the constraints imposed on Spanish policy by years of financial mismanagement, unfortunate mishaps, political missteps and the hostile action of other powers. There is an ample bibliography on 17th-century Spanish peace policy and international relations, beginning with Sir John H. Elliott’s Imperial Spain 1469-1716 (1964). Also useful are Paul C. Allen’s Philip III and the Pax Hispanica, 1598-1621 (2000) and Bernardo J. García García’s La pax hispánica: política exterior del Duque de Lerma (1996).

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actively seeking to dedicate the remainder of his life’s work to the Church. Though warlike exercises

need not be excluded, they could hardly take center stage in the Fiestas de Lerma.

All that notwithstanding, there is a more general reason for the relative disinterest in martial

games at Lerma: the rise of the baroque taste for the surprising and novel in Spanish artistic life—

especially at court. Another way to look at this is to regard it as the second of Lerma’s great techniques

for making his festival noteworthy. I suggested the first of Lerma’s strategies was quantitative: the

proliferation of selected kinds of events, like masses and bullfights. The use of an innovative artifice like

the despeñadero or a jousting dance is indicative of a qualitative strategy to set the Fiestas de Lerma above the rest by raising the bar in terms of “largueza, y ostentación de liberalidad” (Herrera 68v). This strategy is most evident in the artistic, performative events which Sandoval had made his specialty: sumptuously staged comedias, elaborate masques, richly decorated carros, and what was perhaps the

greatest novelty of the day: extravagant fireworks.

What was remarkable about the Fiestas is not so much the invention of the kinds of events

making them up, but rather the spectacular quality of their production. Of the five comedias put on at

Lerma, Herrera highlights two: a piece by Luis Vélez de Guevara called El caballero del Sol and the Conde de Lemos’ La casa confusa.20 What seems to make these two works stand out is their authorship and staging. Herrera does not neglect the dramatic elements of these plays altogether; he lauds Lemos’

“propiedad de lenguaje, y afectos”, for example (43r). He also outlines their plots and mentions both remarkable roles and the actors who play them, such as Don Mateo Montero, who played his part “con

20 There is some disagreement as to the authorship and identity of this play, which has not survived—at least not under the title La casa confusa. Herrera does not explicitly attribute authorship to Lemos. Shergold ventures no opinion on who wrote the work (257). A. Paz y Meliá believes it is a piece the Conde mentions working on in some of his correspondence between 1613 and 1620; however, Paz provides no evidence (3). Ferrer Valls cites chronicler Francisco Fernández de Caso’s specific declaration when making her attribution to Lemos (Práctica escénica cortesana 139). For his part, Bernardo García thinks this piece was actually Mira de Amescua’s El palacio confuso, an argument not without merit, since the dramatist was in the service of the Conde de Lemos at the time and had been engaged to design and write for many of the other courtly activities at Lerma (Fiestas de Lerma 236). Still, in the face of Fernández Caso’s direct attribution, García’s case must be considered circumstantial at best. Nevertheless, without a copy of the text itself, there is room for doubt, especially in view of the fact that authorship is frequently confused with ownership in early modern discussions of plays.

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tan estremada gracia, que se tuvo por el primer hombre della, cosa mas estimable, por ser un hidalgo

principal Cortesano” (32v). Nevertheless, Herrera really focuses his attention and praises on the plays’

material support; especially the complicated scenery, sets, costumes, music and other physical aspects

of the more elaborate of the two plays, El caballero del sol. Even when Herrera recounts parts of the action of the play, he seems to do so primarily to highlight the extraordinary effect that the play’s setting and its spectacular trappings produced.

The importance of stagecraft is apparent from the very beginning of Herrera’s narration of the comedia, as he gives a minute description of the unusual placement and construction of the theater.

Fue el sitio del teatro à la falda de la cuesta, ò decension del Palacio, en paraje de su

esquina Oriental, entre las primeras carreras de arboles à una, y otra parte del agua.

Fundaronse dos tablados, margenandola por ambas riberas, llegavan à estar dentro

della, en que (à manera de muelle) entravan algo superiores, cogiendo medio el braço

del rio, que en quieta corriente imperceptible, passava entre los dos con desembaraço.

(29v)

A careful description of the stage, royal box, other seats and the canopies over the outdoor theater space follows. A few words about the general theme and plotlines then introduce a detailed description of the first set decoration to appear: a real, functional sailboat “con jarcias, velas, y estandartes” whose only apparent purpose is to open the play by carrying the hero, the eponymous Caballero del Sol, to the stage from out on the Arlanza (30v-31r).

Perhaps the most remarkable example of the focus on stagecraft comes when Herrera recounts the transition from the first jornada to the second. The chronicler first offers a couple of lines to explaining that the lords of the court of Naples decide to resort to arms to determine which of them will marry the princess of the realm. But this leads directly into another detailed description of the lavish theatrical production.

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Esperavase el sucesso de la pendencia, à que dos à dos querían dar principio, y à este

tiempo de repente se movio todo el teatro, pareciendo, en lugar de torres y castillos

montañas asperissimas, nubes que llovieron, granizando con estrepito, entre algunos

relámpagos, y truenos. Vianse por honduras, y quiebras de las pequeñas, fuentes,

cuevas, y diversas aberturas. (32r)

Ferrer Valls regards this as the first recorded complete change of scenery in a comedia (Práctica escénica

cortesana 16). Even if it were not the first such change, however, it would still be notable for its

extraordinary mechanical complexity, especially given its outdoor setting on the riverbank.

The manipulation and mingling of the natural environment with construction and imaginative

performance in this case is especially emblematic of the breathtaking scope and ambition of Sandoval’s

spectacular project. Moreover, Ferrer points out that in this unusual liminal space, the border between

the imaginary and the real worlds is blurred in a Turnerian way: “el espacio escénico se prolonga así al

máximo, integrando el río, buscando una indeterminación, una falta de identidad, que facilite esa

continuidad entre espacio real y ficticio, entre vida y representación” (Ferrer Valls, Práctica escénica

cortesana 25).

The masques at Lerma—sponsored by Lemos—are striking in a similar but slightly different way; their artistic ambition is more interesting than their location. By early in Felipe III’s reign, masques had evolved from relatively straightforward costume balls into multifaceted events where something akin to a dramatic entremés preceded a court dance or even a simple procession. By the turn of the 17th century, the transformation was most evident in the staging of the theatrical elements which, in addition to splendid costumes, now also might include triumphal carros with mythological, historical or allegorical figures; dramatic roles for selected members of the court and even elaborate stage machinery (Shergold 248-9). But while Lemos’ artistic designer and dramatist, Antonio Mira de

Amescua, did some work to adapt the patio of the Ducal Palace to its purpose as a stage and dance

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floor, the setting was not the most notable development. Rather, the masques are remarkable for their

number and their structural relationship to one another.

The night of Tuesday, October 17th is a kind of spectacular finale; though the Prince of Asturias

and a number of other important visitors would stay several days longer, this is the last evening of

entertainment before the King’s departure for more hunting at La Ventosilla. Altogether there are seven

separate masques, each with its own identifiable theme and performative characteristics; however,

what is most unusual is that Mira de Amescua decides to “articular los espectáculos a través de un hilo

argumental que los organice funcionalmente” (Ferrer Valls, Práctica escénica cortesana 137). At the

beginning of the evening, the allegorical character Fama descends on a cloud and introduces seven

characters representing the different Castilian pueblos making up the Sandoval estate. Each town,

speaking in verse composed by Mira de Amescua, presents one of the masques in celebration of the

festival. First Tudela offers a rustic dance in celebration of the King’s wise decision to expel the Moriscos

from Spain. The towns of Gumiel and Santa María del Campo offer more fantastical interludes, including

sumptuous processions of triumphal carros representing the “sueños y fantasmas de la noche”, the classical underworld and Noah’s ark. Melgar’s contribution is a Battle of the Cranes and Pygmies, with a long satirical dialog concluding in a well-choreographed comic standoff between the two warring parties.21 Finally, Lerma itself brings the celebration to a conclusion with the tourney-ballet mentioned

previously and Fama’s recitation of an encomiastic poem congratulating Felipe for placing his trust in so

perfect a servant as the Duke of Lerma. Then, with a blast from her trumpet, Fama is whisked away on

her cloud (Herrera 61v). Any one of these seven lavish events would be enough for Sandoval to boast

about the splendor of the Fiestas de Lerma. The fact that there are not only seven of them, but that they

were all coordinated, if rather loosely, only adds to the extraordinary character of the occasion.

21 Herrera claims there was a mix of real birds and imitations and further alleges that the animals were so well- trained and the human dancers so convincing that spectators could hardly distinguish between them (59r). The dwarves playing pygmies imitated the mannerisms and dress of different nations, including the “Tudesco, Turco, Frances, Hungaro, Castellano antiguo, Villano, Portugues”, adding a political dimension to the play (Herrera 58r).

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The fireworks offered at Lerma, like the masques, stood apart from those at other occasions for

their ambition, invention and dramatic effect. Like the other elements of festive events, fiery spectacle

was not uncommon in Spanish festival prior to 1617. Bonfires and luminarias—decorative lamps or other lights placed in windows, on balconies and in other publicly visible places during periods of celebration—were a centuries-old tradition and are mentioned frequently in the celebratory literature.

All over Europe, accounts of spectacles featuring the use of gunpowder effects are laconic before the

1540s. Spain was no exception: there are only the barest of mentions of fireworks before celebration of

Felipe II’s marriage to Maria of Portugal in 1543. However, fuller descriptions begin to become more frequent and more substantial by that time (Varey 619).22 The increased mentions in chronicles and relaciones went hand-in-hand with advances in technical mastery. By the mid-16th century it was possible to add pyrotechnic effects to simple narrative or dramatic interludes, as when a harpy dropped from the sky to do battle with Hercules on Toledo’s Plaza del Ayuntamiento in 1565, after which both figures burned to ashes (Varey 622). By the early 17th century, both improved pyrotechnics and the use of cables made more sophisticated effects possible. For example, Hercules and the Hydra were suspended high above Segovia for a fiery battle taking place entirely in the air in 1613 (Varey 623).23 But at Lerma, fireworks become something more than a brilliant dramatic interlude. They are an elaborate

22 There are few notable scholarly studies of recreational fireworks in Spain other than those of J. E. Varey and Maravall, whom I will cite below. However, there are a few authors on early modern spectacle who offer useful observations on the general European context. Simon Werrett’s Fireworks briefly traces the historical development of fireworks spectacles, starting with 14th-century Italian religious spectacles and then follows their spread throughout western Europe by the end of the 16th century (1-33). Alan Brock’s early A History of Fireworks (1949) favors developments in Great Britain, but makes the general point that fireworks were becoming a form of entertainment in and of themselves by 1540 all over Europe (30). Helen Watanabe-O’Kelly’s “Firework Displays, Firework Dramas and Illuminations” is most useful for specialists in German court spectacles, but its general approach, connecting fireworks to theatrical presentations, military games and technical treatises on fireworks is helpful in other contexts as well. Philip Butterworth offers a similar perspective on some Jacobean events in his “Royal Firework Theater: the Fort Holding”. Kevin Salatino’s Incendiary Art focuses on the representation of fireworks in the visual arts. As an art historian, Salatino draws mainly on works from the Netherlands, Italy and France, most likely because of the relative bounty of pertinent early-modern engravings produced in these countries. Nevertheless, his critical approach to the representation and interpretation of fireworks is extremely helpful. 23 This kind of cable system was also used at Lerma in 1617 for some effects (Herrera 17r).

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and costly spectacle on an unheard-of scale. In the same way Lemos’ masques are more than just

costume balls, the fuegos sponsored by Sandoval’s cousin (once removed), the Marqués de la Hinojosa,

are much more than artful displays of burning gunpowder. Hinojosa’s strategies for making his display

extraordinary mirrored Lerma’s own overall festival strategies in that he overwhelmed festivalgoers’

senses both with the quantity and the quality of his production.

Hinojosa paid for an uncommon number of expensive and fanciful flammable devices.24 One way of measuring their volume is in terms of duration. Elaborate pyrotechnics were the main attractions on not one but two nights: Friday, October 6th and Monday, Oct. 9th. Moreover, Herrera informs us that

on the 6th, the first of five different parts of the show alone lasted half an hour (15r). Sheer number of

rockets and other devices is another indicator. Herrera does not attempt to provide a total number for

either occasion, but does claim that a single pyramid lit up on the 9th was composed of more than six thousand rockets (28r). The program that night was more notable for the quantity of rockets and the variety of their specific forms than the previous occasion. Another way Herrera quantifies is to register the variety of kinds of devices by typing the effects they produce. He describes around seven different kinds: from what we might call sparklers today to thundering “tronadores” and spinning wheels resembling suns or sunflowers. Perhaps the most complex are the different rockets, which were used to imitate treetops (copas de árbol) or more impressive still, those that wrapped several rockets within another (Figures 3.9 and 3.10). These compound rockets formed “muchos granos lucidissimos, que sueltos vagantes, discurrian con ordenado desconcierto“ (28r-28v).

24 Hinojosa likely made this costly contribution to the Fiestas de Lerma in an attempt to work his way back into royal graces. Lerma had his kinsman Hinojosa installed as Governor General of Milan in 1612 and entrusted him with the crucial mission of managing Spanish affairs in northern Italy during the Monferrato succession crisis. The Duke of Monferrato’s death without issue pitted Spain and its clients, on one hand, against Felipe III’s brother in law, Carlo Emanuele I of Savoy and his sometime allies, France and Venice, on the other. Most at the Spanish court regarded Hinojosa’s stinging loss of the artillery battery at Asti and approval of the unfavorable peace signed at the same city as criminal incompetence. He was recalled to Madrid, ordered to stand trial in 1616 and probably only escaped unscathed because of Lerma’s protection. Bernardo García notes the irony that a man whom gunnery had failed spectacularly in battle should triumph so notably with the deployment of recreational pyrotechnics in 1617 (Fiestas de Lerma 223). Moreover, one of the more prominent spectators at Lerma was Carlo Emanuele’s son (and Felipe’s nephew), Prince Filiberto, Prior of the Order of San Juan.

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But, as with other festival events, it is the artistic and novel use of the medium that really set the

fireworks at the Fiestas de Lerma apart. Kevin Salatino divides early modern fireworks displays into

three useful categories: aerial shows, tableaux and theatrical presentations (11). The aerial variety are

the kind of events we are accustomed to today; rockets of different types are launched up into the air

where they explode and form different patterns as their contents burn up. The tableaux are static

scenes featuring fiery devices that stay in one place where they shoot out flames until they burn up or

out, like the sunflower wheels mentioned above (Figure 3.11). Theater presentations add action and

sometimes simple plot development to the tableaux(Figures 3.12 and 3.13). Characteristically, the

Fiestas de Lerma featured all three types of presentations and were especially notable for the more

complex, theatrical variety.

The program on October 6th began with a combination aerial and tableau episode: a massive barrage of rockets rose from a kind of artificial glade made up of rocket-launching apparatuses cleverly disguised as trees. The “trees” were centered around a water wheel (noria) which spewed fire as it turned, instead of water. Next, a theatrical piece: a procession of triumphal floats (carros) glided through the square. The first bore sculptures of Mars, Neptune, Jupiter and Fortuna, with the god Amor high atop them all, symbolizing Sandoval’s love of the King. Jets of flame shot out of the floats on all sides, including some from the wagon wheels, until eventually all the carros were entirely consumed. In a touch that blurred the lines between fireworks spectacle, procession and masque, this part of the program was accompanied by music. Next, a mechanical warship (galeota) emerged, complete with mechanical oarsmen, floating on a simulated sea of undulating fabric (Figure 3.14). To general delight, the ship went down in a sea of flame, taking all hands with it. Then there was another fiery procession, this time on the peculiar theme of the triumph of Pluto and Proserpina. The lights paradoxically adorned shadowy figures from the classical underworld and other mythological characters, such as Tantalus,

Sisyphus and, of course, Prometheus. Hinojosa’s fiery spectacle not only embraced and included all

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three of the typical early modern categories of pyrotechnic display, but combined and extended them in

a novel way that maximized their impact.

Interpreting ephemeral events

Herrera seems to let himself get a little carried away with the brilliant imagery of the fireworks.

His prose, which rarely departs from the workmanlike in other passages, approaches the poetic at times

as he describes, for example, the fading away of some of the rockets, “formando al fenecer tremulos

penachos enramados” (28r). This suggests the peculiar power that pyrotechnic spectacles had over early

modern Spanish festivalgoers, especially participants at aristocratic affairs like the Fiestas de Lerma. In

some ways fireworks shows, above any others, were the most emblematic components of baroque

celebrations like the Fiestas de Lerma. As Fernando Bouza puts it, fireworks were the

espectáculos visuais nos quais as grandes cortes do Barroco procuravam ver-se a si

mesmas, reconhecendo-se, ordenadas e brilhantes, numa ardente agitação. E tal como

acontece nos artificiosos fogos de festas, também os grandes espectáculos de corte se

esgotavam em si mesmos, no regozijo perante uma realidade que, com toda a ordem e

previsão, tinha sido planeada como faustosa mas efémera. (Memória visual 7)

Maravall is surely correct in attributing a large part of the attraction and importance of pyrotechnic spectacles to their ability to make the economic and political prestige of those that produced them manifest in (literally) the flashiest possible way. According to Maravall, fireworks shows met all the requirements of successful baroque splendor: they were novel, ingenious, surprising and fleeting. They embodied the baroque ideals of artificiality, difficulty and “gasto en trabajo humano y dinero”, if only for a very short period of time. Because of their rarity, brevity and expense, by their very nature they were a “muestra muy adecuada del esplendor de quien los ordenaba” and “un espectáculo adecuado para desplegarse ante el asombro popular” (491).

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This line of thinking leads us back to Maravall’s general socio-economic theory of baroque artistic expression, according to which, as we have seen, a lavish occasion was “un divertimiento que aturde a los que mandan y a los que obedecen y que a éstos hace creer y a los otros les crea la ilusión de que aún queda riqueza y poder” (487). The artistry and splendor on display in Lerma were clearly calculated to produce a halo effect around the aristocrat who had up to that point been the prime mover of the Spanish state. Without a doubt the opulence of many elaborate events of 1617 was meant to reinforce Sandoval’s image of effectively limitless power and wealth. Just as clearly, the spectacular building program was meant to literally enshrine his family name and extend its fame. In the same way, his inclusion of his sons and his in-laws and their contributions to the festivities can be understood as expressing Lerma’s desire to consolidate and perpetuate his achievements even after his exit from the political stage.

Nevertheless, there was more to the Fiestas de Lerma than can be gleaned from Maravall-style analysis. For one thing, in the 1617 event there is little evidence of a substantial audience of commoners. The occasion was courtly in nature and most of the components significant enough to bear mention in Herrera took place in enclosed spaces from which the common folk were effectively excluded. Sandoval’s purpose was not to illustrate the King’s magnificence to the people. The idea really was not to perform the authority of the state, nor even his own. Rather, it could better be said that with the celebrations at Lerma, Sandoval meant to put an exclamation point at the end of his political life. His goal was to live out his own dream of the perfect restitution of his House and its glory for all ages. And he meant to play this role out on an exclusive, aristocratic stage—an environment he had amplified and extended tremendously for himself, if not created, during his nearly twenty-year reign.

Publishing on the festival of 1617

A modern observer might well wonder why Lerma devoted such tremendous resources to staging his triumph in fleeting occasions like festival performances. After all, these celebrations were

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just as perishable as they were glorious. For the moment, I leave aside the fact that Sandoval also spent a great deal of time and treasure on more permanent monuments, such as the many churches he built because, as I have argued, these efforts seem to have been almost secondary to the Duke. I would propose two explanations: one based on Turner’s ideas of social performance and the other based on the concept of fame as it was understood in early modern Spain.

Bouza’s is as succinct and effective an expression of the Turnerian notion of the importance of an individual instance of performance as any.

A sua condição de efémera era capaz de deiar uma recordação indelével na memória

dos espectadores, pois as imagens concretas em que se baseava, ainda que se

mantivessem expostas durante muito pouco tempo, davam forma actual a ideias e

tópicos já conhecidos, os quais, por outro lado, acabavam por sair reforçados pelo facto

de terem sido materializados da maneira mais persuasiva que se possa pensar. No

entanto, e pondo de lado a sua própria apoteose, a visão do efémero surtia grande

parte do seu efeito porque contava com um prévio referente figurado que, transmitido

pelos livros de emblemas, viria a ser reconhecido graças à sua inclusão no aparato da

festa. (Memória visual 15)

Though Bouza focuses here on printed emblemata, the basic idea is applicable to any traditional source of imagery or cultural representation, whether literary or not. The cultural model or script might come equally well from romances of chivalry, Church tradition or from classical mythology. In his typically baroque celebrations, Lerma, of course, assembled and deployed or enacted pieces from far and wide in

1617.

Moreover, Lerma seems to have understood that apart from the power of performance to actualize or materialize tradition, a really splendid occasion could be uniquely effective in spreading a prominent sponsor’s name across time and space. By the early modern period the key to a festival’s

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ability to make its sponsor famous was that it could be reproduced and broadcast through the mass-

production of the printed word.

As a patron of the literary arts, Sandoval had long relied on chroniclers, playwrights and poets to get the word out about his qualities and accomplishments, as well as those of his family. The Fiestas de

Lerma would be no exception. The simplest example is Herrera’s relación, which derived its authority from having been specifically commissioned and approved by Sandoval, who then had it sent to important figures who had been absent from the festivities, such as the Viceroy and Vicereine of

Flanders, Archduke Albert and the Infanta Isabel Clara Eugenia (Herrera n.p.). Comedias were also a possible means of promotion. Not only did successful occasional plays, like Vélez’ El caballero del sol, often go on to further performance elsewhere, but grand festivals sometimes provided playwrights with the germ of a story for new works. For example, though Lope de Vega probably did not attend the

Fiestas de Lerma, he wrote several plays referring to it, including Los ramilletes de Madrid and La burgalesa de Lerma (Cornejo 191).25

In the literary and political culture of the day, however, poetry—especially heroic poetry—was

the most refined and prestigious medium of written communication. For the Fiestas de Lerma to have

the maximum impact, then, they should be written up in the form of a festival epic. Herrera’s account

recorded the events faithfully, according to the wishes of the Duke. However, only a poet could really do

justice to the events, not as they took place, but as they were conceived, in the realm of the imaginary,

the virtual or the higher spheres of the cosmos. The prose relaciones on the fiestas represented the

literal reality of events as they appeared to the senses, but poetry could make the additional step into

the beyond and represent the events as they should be understood.

Francisco López de Zárate and his poetry

25 There is some uncertainty as to whether Lope went to Lerma in 1617 or not. See Cornejo for a summary of the arguments for and against the proposition.

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The project of memorializing the Fiestas de Lerma in verse was undertaken by widely-respected poet Francisco López de Zárate, an employee of the Council of State (Consejo de Estado) who got his job through Lerma’s right-hand man, Rodrigo Calderón, Marqués de Siete Iglesias.26 As might be expected from a writer so close to the regime, Zárate’s work maintains a laudatory tone throughout, always presenting the duke and his festival in a positive light. Moreover, the basic purpose of the poem seems to be to capture the images Lerma intended to present in the Fiestas, and then to heighten, deepen and extend them.

Nevertheless, the poet also invested a great deal of his own imagination and invention into the poem. Zárate took the occasion seriously, and understood he was expected to produce a poem that would please the powerful. But he also took himself very seriously as a poet and was prepared to take his art beyond a mere retelling of events, and beyond mere flattery. In this his approach was not unlike that of other poets of his time, even the more celebrated artistic figures of the Golden Age. As Mercedes

Blanco has pointed out in her analysis of Luis de Góngora’s own encomiastic work dedicated to the Duke of Lerma, Panegírico al Duque de Lerma, “Los poetas de la Edad Moderna escriben poesía circunstancial y encomiástica porque se sienten, con mayor o menor buena fe y entusiasta voluntad, implicados en la tarea de dar sentido, a la vez inmediato y perdurable, a los grandes intereses colectivos, y a los poderosos” (15).

But if giving meaning to the interests of the state and the powerful was a necessary purpose of an encomiastic poem, that did not mean Zárate had to limit himself to this mission. He could and did go

26 Documents on Zárate’s life and career are scarce. In the mid-20th century contributors to La Rioja literary journal Berceo uncovered a few tangential details, but little more. Nicolás Antonio’s Bibliotheca hispana nova includes a one-page biography, but is short on details (438). Antonio’s text serves as the foundation for several brief 19th- century summaries, including the two-paragraph “Noticias” in Manuel Josef Quintana’s Poesías selectas castellanas (354), a slightly more expansive piece by Eustaquio Fernández de Navarrete in Semanario pintoresco español (81-4) and an entry in Cayetano de la Barrera’s Catálogo del teatro antiguo español (222-5). Earlier authors tend to fill in the gaps in the documentary evidence with conjecture, some of which is represented as fact. Quintana makes the fanciful assertion that Zárate came to be called the “Caballero de la Rosa” because of his good hygiene, a notion repeated by Barrera but debunked by Bartolomé José Gallardo (Ensayo col. 536). María Teresa González de Garay’s thorough, critical appraisal in her Introducción a la obra poética de Francisco López de Zárate is helpful and carefully distinguishes between speculation and established fact.

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on to add some of his own interests above and beyond the basic purpose. As a courtly poet taken with

the up-and-coming baroque aesthetics of his time, the poetic project Zárate takes on in this work takes him further afield, artistically speaking, than Sandoval may have had in mind. That is to say that Zárate’s

Fiestas en la traslacion del Santissimo Sacramento, a la Iglesia Mayor de Lerma, though unquestionably meant to celebrate the great occasion of the Fiestas de Lerma and their sponsor, also shows that Zárate has his own poetic agenda.27 A principal item on that agenda is underlining the power of poetry over the human mind and, by extension, the power of poets to immortalize the memory of the fleeting, imaginary world of the celebration. More subtly, Zárate also expresses his own mistrust of the material, earthly world. For Zárate, as orderly, durable and beautiful as the world might seem, it is ultimately as evanescent as the rockets that burst so brilliantly over the Arlanza in 1617.

It is not clear who, if anyone, asked Francisco López de Zárate to write his Fiestas en la

traslacion. It may well have been that the occasion itself was enough to inspire him. Nevertheless, it is

more logical to suppose that someone connected to the Duke of Lerma prompted Zárate to undertake

the project.28 One possible candidate is Juan Manuel Pérez de Guzmán, VIII Duke of Medina Sidonia and a famous literary patron. Medina Sidonia was attached to the House of Sandoval through his wife,

Juana, the Duke of Lerma’s second daughter, but does not appear to have been present at the Fiestas de

Lerma. Zárate dedicated his first published volume, Varias poesías (1619), which included his festival poem, to Medina Sidonia, but there is no direct evidence to show he wrote the festival poem with

Guzmán in mind.29 In any case, it seems unlikely the poet would have devoted his time to such a substantial poem without some hope of official approval and remuneration; it is a major work

27 I will refer to the poem from now on with the abbreviated title Fiestas en la traslacion. 28 José Labrador Herráiz asserts that Zárate was official poet of the occasion, but cites no evidence (898). 29 In 1947 José Simón Díaz combined both original collections of Zárate’s poems, Varias poesías (1619) and the volume Zárate himself knew as Obras varias de Francisco López de Zárate (1651). The latter volume contained many new works, but some poems from the former were repeated, including “Fiestas en la traslacion”. Simón Díaz suppressed these redundancies and issued the resulting compilation in two volumes as Obras varias de Francisco López de Zárate. This slightly confusing title notwithstanding, unless otherwise noted, I refer to Simón Díaz’ edition of Zárate’s works. Fiestas en la traslacion was republished by itself sometime in the 18th century, though it was misattributed to Lope de Vega and the date of publication was falsified as 1612 (Alenda y Mira 188).

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composed of 233 highly polished octaves, which surely required a heavy investment in time and effort

from the poet.

Zárate would almost certainly have needed financial support as much or more than a patron’s

recognition and moral support. As I mentioned, the poet did have a coveted clerical job in the offices of

the powerful Consejo de Estado; however, it was not an exalted position and his pay would not have

been especially generous. Moreover, Zárate had made himself a reputation for scrupulous probity which

contrasted sharply with other men close to the Lerma regime, including his spectacularly corrupt patron,

Rodrigo Calderón.30 If Zárate lived up to this reputation as rigidly as his contemporaries suggest, then he probably did not take advantage of the opportunities for earning any extra-official supplementary income his position might have allowed. Zárate’s contemporary Alonso López de Haro sums up the disparity between the poet’s artistic and social prominence and his economic condition in his Nobiliario genealogico de los reyes y titulos de España. The poet from Logroño is a “varon bien conocido en nuestra edad por su grande ingenio y heroicos versos, cuyas muchas partes confiessa su poca fortuna, y las respeta, y como reconoce, no pudiendo igualarlas; con ser en estremo inferior a ellas”.

On the poet’s parentage, López de Haro goes on to say rather vaguely that the poet’s

“descendencia es de Hortun Sanz de Salzedo señor de las casas de Ayala y Salzedo” (123).31 But while

López de Zárate’s pedigree may have been more notable than Gaspar Aguilar’s, it was still relatively modest. Though an hidalgo, he belonged to an untitled branch of the family settled in provincial

30 Barrera asserts that Zárate’s “austera rigidez de principios” would have led him to leave the court, “á no detenerle el consejo leal de algunos amigos, y la necesidad de atender á su subsistencia” (222). Here Barrera may be embellishing the truth a little. Antonio says Zárate was of modest means and honest character, but it is not clear what sources Barrera had for the more romantic specifics in his account. 31 López de Haro suggests most noble Zárates were descended from this semi-legendary figure, which he ties directly to the more prominent (in his day) Ortiz de Zárate line. But he makes no attempt to offer a specific connection or to develop the genealogy of the López de Zárate side of the family. In fact, apart from this enigmatic mention, he does not state explicitly how the López de Zárate and Ortiz de Zárate clans are related. See the “Zárate” section of his Segunda parte del nobiliario genealogico de los reyes y titulos de España (507-11).

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Logroño.32 Zárate’s father, Rodrigo, had made a comfortable living as a merchant of some importance in that city where he was appointed regidor perpetuo by the administration of Felipe II (González de Garay

48-9). If the heading to his 1591 will and testament is to be believed, the Crown’s confidence in Rodrigo was later extended even further: he was at some point made official supplier to the army in Zaragoza

(proveedor del ejército) and one of the King’s ceremonial gatekeepers or porteros de cadena.33 He was successful enough to provide his two sons, Francisco and Diego, with an education and to find adequate placements for his four daughters, one of whom married while the other three took the veil (González de Garay 50). Further, Francisco was able to continue his legal studies at Salamanca between 1599 and the early years of the new century (González de Garay 51-2).34 But it seems Rodrigo López de Zárate

either could not or would not supply a lot of material support to Francisco, most likely a segundón, once

his son had come of age.

After leaving Salamanca, Zárate initially started out in the military profession, which took him

around the Peninsula and possibly abroad for a time, as well.35 The young poet’s career really got going,

however, when he made the crucial contact with the Marqués de Siete Iglesias through a relative who

32 Garay and others have noted the uncertainty resulting from the loss of the López de Zárate children’s birth certificates. Still, it seems brother Diego was older than Francisco. It was Diego who first inherited an entailed estate (mayorazgo) from an uncle of the same name. He seems to have left it to Francisco by 1619, together with the patronage of a chaplaincy in the town church of their father’s (and uncle’s) native Ocón (Zamora Mendoza 168). 33 20th-century researchers focus on archival materials available in Logroño. They seem to have been unaware of Rodrigo López de Zárate’s connection to Zaragoza and his will and testament, recorded there in 1591. The manuscript is number C.24 D.13 of the Almodóvar collection at the Archivo Histórico Nacional (Simancas). I have not reviewed the document itself, as its content is not directly related to this study. However, the archivist’s description offers enough specific detail to make it clear the man in question was the poet’s father and that he had attained the positions I have cited. 34 Garay notes that while there is a record of Zárate’s enrollment in canon law courses between 1598 and 1600, the records that would have shown his graduation have been lost (Obra poética 51-2). 35 Antonio mentions Zárate’s military service and travel briefly, but says nothing about travel abroad. Modern critics, especially Lope Toledo, have based some speculation on travel in Italy and elsewhere on what they presume is the autobiographical quality of Zárate’s “Silva a la ciudad de Logroño”. This poem does tempt the reader to identify the poet with his narrator; nevertheless, the author himself does not represent the work as anything but fiction, so it is not clear which details might correspond to the poet’s life, if any.

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had previously entered Rodrigo Calderón’s service (Barrera 222). His own service to Siete Iglesias and eventual transfer to the government post gave the poet a much-needed source of regular income.

Perhaps just as important as the salary was the access Zárate’s position gave him to the social circles of the literary elite in the capital. Juan Pérez de Guzmán’s dictum that Felipe III had “una verdadera academia literaria dentro de palacio” surely exaggerates the number of authors finding direct employment in the royal administration (314). Nevertheless, while state employment may not have placed Zárate in a community of writers within the bureaucracy itself, it did mean residency in Madrid, and that put Zárate right at the heart of the most influential Spanish literary salons, academias and contests of his time. Through the academia sponsored by Sebastián Francisco de Medrano, for example,

Zárate crossed paths with a number of the greatest talents of the Siglo de Oro, including Lope de Vega,

Mira de Amescua, Juan Ruiz de Alarcón, Tirso de Molina, Francisco de Quevedo and many more (Rey

Hazas 662). Moreover, Zárate seems to have maintained good artistic and social relationships with the other poets, studiously avoiding the rivalries and disputes that rose up amongst them.

Zárate did very well in the poetic contests—justas poéticas or certámenes—that did so much to make poetic reputations in the early modern period. He had an especially good year in 1622, taking honors in each of the contests sponsored by the Jesuits in honor of the canonization of Saints Ignatius and Francis Xavier and also second prize in the prestigious annual justas in honor of San Isidro, patron of

Madrid, in which he competed successfully against the likes of Mira de Amescua, Juan de Jáuregui, Tirso de Molina and young Pedro Calderón de la Barca (Lope Toledo 238-9).36

Fiestas en la traslacion and the Baroque

36 Lope Toledo underlines the importance of taking second place in poetic contests by citing the famous passage of El Quijote (II:18) in which Don Quijote explains to Don Lorenzo that first prize in a certamen is generally awarded for the character of the winning poet, whereas second prize goes to the author of the better poem. First prize in the San Isidro competition of 1622 went to Lope de Vega, by then one of the grand old men of Spanish letters, and also the event’s organizer (239).

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In early-modern encomium it is often difficult to determine the sincerity of the conventionally

affectionate language used by clients to express their appreciation for their patrons. The job Siete

Iglesias arranged for Zárate was certainly important enough to justify some poetic flattery, as the

position must have sustained the poet for some years, even while the Sandoval faction was losing its

grip on power.37 All that notwithstanding, there is reason to believe Zárate’s regard for Calderón and his family went beyond the polite gratitude to be expected of a powerful man’s client. After Zárate’s benefactor’s arrest and imprisonment in 1619 and even after Calderón’s execution two years later, the poet still wrote sonnets dedicated to Don Rodrigo, a son lost in the Palatinate campaign (1620-1622), and the Marqués’ grandson.38 If López de Zárate sent some of these poems to console grieving father

Rodrigo, already in prison, it would have been a tender gesture to a man who could no longer offer the poet any further advantage. On the other hand, if the poems were composed after Siete Iglesias’ death, it could be considered an even more disinterested expression of the poet’s regard for the Calderón family.

María Teresa González de Garay theorizes that Zárate’s attachment to his patron was such that

Calderón’s demise would lead to changes in the poet’s later work: “con este golpe de la fortuna, Zárate comenzará a analizar el comportamiento del hombre y a ver la vida con ojos totalmente barrocos” (59).

For Garay, Calderón’s death and, presumably the loss of the government job he had acquired through

Siete Iglesias, is a deep desengaño that will mean not just a shift in Zárate’s lifestyle but also in his perspective on life. This change in attitude would, in turn, prompt Zárate to express the pessimism and moralization so typical of his era in his poetry—much along the same lines as his (now) more celebrated

37 The are no known records showing when exactly Zárate’s employment with the Council of State began and ended. Given his association with Lerma’s regime, it seems likely Zárate resigned or was dismissed sometime between Lerma’s fall in 1618 and Felipe IV’s accession in 1621. But there is no definitive evidence to say. 38 These poems are entitled; “En el Sepulcro del Vailio Don Miguel Calderon, hijo de D. Rodrigo”, “Al Marques de Siete Iglesias Don Rodrigo Calderon en su sepulcro”, “Al Sepulcro del Marques de Siete Iglesias, que erigio su Primogenito el Conde de la Oliva” and “En muerte de un nieto suyo, hijo del Conde de la Oliva” and are found in the second volume of José Simón Díaz’ edition of Zárate’s works, entitled Obras varias de Francisco López de Zárate (123-6).

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contemporary, Francisco de Quevedo. This is an entirely reasonable hypothesis and it is true that

Zárate’s later works, especially those composed after his health began to fail, reveal a sometimes dark

outlook.39 Nevertheless, it is not clear how sharply the change in his political situation affected Zárate’s writing nor how early in the poet’s career. The style and thematic content of Fiestas en la traslacion, composed and published before Siete Iglesias’ arrest, already show Zárate to be keeping up with the baroque artistic developments and poetic concerns of his day.

As I mentioned, Zárate maintained warm relationships with the other notable poets of his time, even those whose artistic and personal differences erupted into sometimes acrimonious public disputes, such as Góngora, Lope de Vega and their followers. Cervantes praises Zárate directly or indirectly in several of his works, especially in his Los trabajos de Persiles y Sigismunda (González de Garay 22).40

Stylistically speaking, Zárate also established himself in a kind of neutral middle ground. Or, as Garay would have it, Zárate was a kind of “paradigmatic” or standard poet of his time, inasmuch as he achieved a difficult balance, “entre gongoristas y antigongorinos, entre lopistas y antilopistas, entre

Quevedo y Gracián” (Lengua y teoría poéticas 37). Baltasar Gracián, an admirer of López de Zárate’s who cites his works several times in his Agudeza y arte de ingenio, puts it more pithily, describing Zárate as

“culto aunque no oculto” (246).41

39 The Duke of Frías recounts an anecdote encapsulating Zárate’s reputation both for wittiness and a gloomy disposition in his Deleyte de la discrecion y facil escuela de la agudeza (1764). According to Frías, one day Zárate and Felipe IV’s powerful privado, the Conde-duque de Olivares, met during a drive around the Prado de Madrid. Olivares, referring to Zárate’s notorious cheerlessness, asked the poet when the world would end. Replied Zárate: “cuando V. Excelencia mande, señor Excelentissimo” (156). 40 In Persiles y Sigismunda, the Poeta tells a tale of a miraculous museum containing portraits not of famous figures of the past, but great authors of the future. There, his Poema heroico de la invencion de la Cruz por el Emperador Constantino Magno (1648) will earn Zárate a place of honor right next to Torquato Tasso (331). 41 A less benevolent critic might say Zárate was a kind of middle-brow poet. Though generally respectful, Iravedra’s commentary on Zárate leaves an unmistakable impression that Don Francisco belonged to a decidedly lower class of poets: “Sin tener la espontaneidad de un Lope de Vega, ni la virtud de arrebato poético brillante de un Góngora- -¡cómo iba a tenerlo, Señor, si hablamos de dos ‘únicos’!—es un valor equilibrado y noble el de su poesía que a veces hace que nuestra sensibilidad se detenga para reconocer la inspiración y el logro” (410).

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Like many of his contemporaries, Zárate was no doubt affected by Góngora’s Fábula de Polifemo

y Galatea and his unfinished Soledades, both circulating as manuscripts by 1614.42 Garay goes so far as to assert that Fiestas en la traslacion “vendría a ser el Polifemo de López de Zárate”, both formally and thematically (Obra poética 307). Formally, both poems are composed in octava real. However, in my view, the case for an overall thematic similarity is difficult to sustain; after all, Zárate’s poem, though not a simple relación en verso, as I will argue below, is nonetheless a narration based on the Fiestas de

Lerma. Góngora’s Polifemo is an entirely fictional retelling of an already frequent poetic topic

(previously alluded to by Garcilaso de la Vega and Lope de Vega, amongst others) from an uncommon new artistic point of view.43

In any case, the stylistic similarities between Zárate’s occasional piece and Góngora’s elaborate, longer works are many. These features include ornate, highly figurative language; creative and often paradoxical literary conceits (conceptos); striking metaphors; and curious, even obscure cultural references or allusions.

Gongorist poetic techniques are found throughout the poem. For example, though Herrera and others give short shrift to the bullfights, Zárate highlights them, hyperbolically describing the ferocious beasts from the Duero as “haziendo polvo de las piedras duras” and, like Medusa, having the power to freeze with their glare (135-6). But this poetic inventiveness stands out especially in passages of the

Fiestas en la traslacion where Zárate describes the most baroque of all spectacles: fireworks displays.

Octave 117, the penultimate of the passage describing the second night of Hinojosa’s fireworks, is illustrative.

42 These works were not published until several years after the author’s death in 1627. 43 Thematically Fiestas en la traslacion bears a greater resemblance to Soledades than it does to Polifemo. It is true that Góngora’s Soledades celebrates an idyllic setting which is diametrically opposed to the corrupt and artificial world of the court, whereas Zárate’s poem serves—generally—to exalt that very same courtly world. But in this way, both poems revolve around representations of courtly life; one by affirming it in a literal way, the other expressing a more critical view by contrast. Perhaps more importantly, both poems narrate a progression through striking series of vivid sensory events or tableaux.

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En campo de oro fuentes de cristales,

Riberas de açuzenas, y claveles

Arreboles componen naturales,

Hecho el fuego, ya lenguas, ya pinzeles:

No los movio tan variamente yguales,

Queriendo retratar a Chipre Apeles,

Vese en la gran union de los colores,

Florecer llamas, encenderse flores.

Formally, Zárate crafts his heroic octaves according to standard practice: each stanza as a whole works to a single purpose—which in this case is to develop the metaphor by which bursts of fireworks in the night sky are compared to a painted landscape adorned with flowers. The stanza’s significance is summed up in the last two verses. He often divides hendecasyllables into two parts (or three), as seen here in the first verse and more especially in the last, where the semantic division also serves to highlight the striking chiasmus that brings the octave to a close.

Stanza 96, this time taken from Zárate’s narration of the first night of fireworks, offers good examples of the typically Gongorist accumulation of figurative language and indirect or even arcane cultural allusions. This passage describes the last throes of the image of Pluto, who is going up in flames at the end of his triumphal procession.

Cayò, mas con estrepito de fiera;

Y como reforçada en su elemento,

A imitación del hijo de la tierra;

Con nueva llama, dominò mas viento:

Ya el suelo participa de la guerra,

Incendioso se eleva [a]l firmamento:

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Buelan de llamas por el ayre montes,

Derramando Cocitos, Flegetontes.44 (111)

The first element tending to obscure the passage is the omission of the subject of the stanza. In

the previous octave the poet identifies “La sierpe Rey” as the central figure and begins the narration of

his / her consumption by flames and fall to the ground. But here she / he is referred to only obliquely by

the feminine ending of “reforçada” and the logical connection of the continued description of the

figure’s fall.45 The typically Gongorist use of hyperbaton in verses four and seven also makes their syntax

difficult to follow. But the most complicated aspect of the octave is the use of difficult classical allusions.

In verses two, three and four the poet compares his Pluto to an unnamed “hijo de la tierra”. This is

probably a reference to Typhon, son of the Earth goddess Terra. As a monstrous divinity associated both

with powerful storms and fiery Mount Etna, he makes an especially apropos reference in this context.46

When illustrating the paradoxical liquid gush of fire with a watery metaphor, Zárate offers a bit more clarity by referring to the rivers of the underworld, Phlegethon and Cocytus, by name. Nevertheless, to understand the allusion requires some knowledge of the geography of Pluto’s domain.

Clearly Zárate has embraced the difficult or culterano poetic style of the Spanish Baroque—at least in Fiestas en la traslacion. In his introduction to the “Égloga amorosa” Zárate explains—perhaps somewhat tongue-in-cheek—that he favors an elevated style (estilo algo realzado) in that early poem too, because “a los oydos de nuestra edad suenan las cosas faciles, y menores como baxas: quizá porque se atiende mas a las vozes, que a la sustancia” (11-2). González de Garay believes that despite his light tone, Zárate here reveals how he conceives of the reader to whom he generally addresses his writing: he

44 There is an error of transcription in Simón Díaz’ edition, replacing “al” with “el” in verse five of this octave. The addition of the preposition makes a substantial difference in the meaning, so I have changed the word back to its original form according to the 1619 edition (Varias poesías 48r). 45 Evidently Pluto, classical ruler of the underworld, is represented as a serpent king by conflation with the Christian devil. 46 Typhon was sometimes depicted as a serpent from the waist down, or having many serpents as arms, which may also have contributed to his usefulness as a reference here.

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wants to please a public with the higher, cultivated tastes of the era, like the aristocratic attendees at

Lerma (Lengua y teoría poéticas 38-9). The complexity of his earlier, longer works, like the “Égloga

amorosa”, his silvas and especially his Fiestas en la traslacion certainly seem to support the idea that

Zárate aims for a sophisticated audience. Luisa Iravedra sees López de Zárate as reaching for the same

readership as Góngora especially in the Fiestas en la traslacion, which she describes as that work “donde

verdaderamente destaca la influencia del cordobés y del barroco pleno” (405).47

It could be argued that Zárate went a little too far in the culterano direction or that Fiestas en la traslacion’s sophistication undermines its comprehensibility. This may have been a significant risk given that one of the purposes of the poem was surely to please the Duke of Lerma and to provide him with a text that would heighten the prestige of his great event. According to the anonymous epigrapher of a manuscript copy of the Panegírico al Duque de Lerma, Góngora left this major work unfinished after getting a less-than-stellar review from its dedicatee. Lerma’s reaction to the poem was reportedly that it was all very good, “pero que no [lo] entendia” (Carreira 19).48 One indication that either Zárate or his publisher were aware that textual complexity might have tended to obscure the meaning of the Fiestas en la traslacion is the fact that it was felt necessary to print marginal notes identifying each event the poet was narrating. It should be remembered at this point that Herrera also wrote for those not present in Lerma but needed no such notes in his relación covering the same material. This is the first signal to the critical reader that Fiestas en la traslacion and Herrera’s book, Translacion del Santissimo

Sacramento, though both based on the Fiestas de Lerma, are fundamentally two different kinds of texts.

That is to say that, though various scholars have asserted Zárate’s poem is essentially a relación en

47All his figurative complexity notwithstanding, Zárate is not as difficult to read as Góngora. A glance at Góngora’s representation of fireworks in Soledades illustrates this point: “El día / cedió al sacro Volcán de errante fuego, / a la torre de luces coronada / que el templo ilustra, y a los aires vanos / artificiosamente da exhalada / luminosas de pólvora saetas, / purpúreos no cometas” (1.645-51) In his edition of the poem, John Beverley explains Góngora is referring to the effects created by fireworks set off around a village church tower. Though unmistakably in the same style, Zárate’s syntax and allusions generally seem transparent by comparison to Góngora’s (102n). 48 Mercedes Blanco points out that this story must be read with a critical eye since the manuscript source is unsigned and the anecdote “bien podría ser invento de quienes gustaban de exagerar la oscuridad del poeta” (12).

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verso, Zárate conceives of his own poem as something quite different than a mere chronicle.49 We will encounter more indications further along that this text is conceived by its author as an important poem in its own right.

Fiestas en la traslacion and baroque desengaño

Its relative difficulty aside, Fiestas en la traslacion is perhaps most remarkable for the way

Zárate takes advantage of the performative nature of the festival to articulate an apt expression of the baroque preoccupation with the confusion of the real world with that of imagination, fiction, dream and theatrical invention. This is one of the deeper ways that Zárate’s poem can be said to stand above mere reportage and to take on an artistic character all its own. He does narrate those celebratory events that were most notable at Lerma and he does feature those that the Duke himself might have wished to have emphasized, like the extravagant fireworks and the more outstanding comedias. But he also uses poetic language in a way that adds a philosophical and moral dimension to the text which is not present in an ordinary prose account, like Herrera’s relación. In short, López de Zárate takes the raw impressions of the festival activities and weaves them into something new, something expressing his own baroque vision of the significance of the Fiestas de Lerma.

A good place to begin to approach this vision is the section on fireworks from which I cited previously. This is an arresting passage in several ways, beginning with its subject matter. Though, as I have already pointed out, fireworks spectacles can be considered especially emblematic of the aesthetics of early modern festivals, they seem to have inspired only passing poetic interest. Góngora includes vivid descriptions of fireworks both in Soledades and his Panegírico al duque de Lerma;

49 Historians are especially prone to take the poem as if it were a relación; in fact, Bernardo García’s “Las fiestas de Lerma de 1617” is based almost entirely on his reading of the poem as a historical source on a par with Herrera’s Translacion del Santissimo. However, literary scholars from Manuel Cornejo to Teresa Ferrer also repeatedly refer to the poem as a relación. Even González de Garay, who dedicates chapter three of her Introducción a la obra poética de Francisco López de Zárate to a very helpful literary description of the poem concludes at the end of her study that the poem “es una Fuente histórica del mayor interés, junto con las Relaciones en prosa” (307).

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however, these passages are as brief as they are colorful—no more than a stanza or two.50 This is perhaps unsurprising since Góngora was not focusing on celebratory events in his poetry. Yet even in their poems devoted to singing the praises of festival activity, Gaspar Aguilar and Lope de Vega make only brief, rather uninspired references to the fireworks at Denia.51 Zárate, by contrast, devotes 41 octaves to them in Fiestas en la traslacion—about one sixth of the whole poem. The Riojan poet clearly

warms to the topic and takes his treatment of the pyrotechnics to a high level of poetic art.

Zárate’s use of paradox, striking juxtapositions, antithesis, contrasts and uncommon sensual

evocations in this passage goes beyond a simple predilection for the kind of baroque linguistic ornament

discussed previously. From the metaphor by which the Empyrean sphere decides to manifest itself in the

sublunar world “por gozar de si, en objetos” in stanza 77 through the final image of the passage in which

“varios tornasoles” form ribbons of suns and “liquidas estrellas” in octave 118, the accumulation of

descriptive variations and extensions of such devices produces a general impression that stays with the

reader (120). The repeated and detailed descriptions of these fiery events which are at once real and

unreal, both based on physical experience and the products of the most ephemeral artifice possible,

gives the reader an overwhelming sense of vivid, dreamlike unreality. Or rather, it may be more useful

to look on the events narrated in the poem not as unreal, but as taking place in their own liminal reality;

as Maravall says, “hay que darse cuenta—lo que no sé si siempre se ha hecho así—de toda la fuerza y

plenitud que posee el sueño: es como otro plano de realidad” (409).

In stanza 117, cited above, the symbolic associations are so unusual as to approach the

hallucinatory. The night sky is lit up with so much fire it seems a field of gold and at first Zárate likens the

liquid properties of the bursts of burning powder to crystalline fountains on that field. Then, he

compares their colorful explosions to lilies and carnations. The surprising characterizations of the

50 The passages in question are Soledades 1.646-58 and octave LXII of the Panegírico al duque de Lerma. 51 In Fiestas de Denia Lope devotes just one octave to pyrotechnics, Canto I, verses 505-12 (92). Aguilar’s Fiestas nupciales touches on them in only three verses (12).

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pyrotechnic devices do not stop there; in the last five verses of the octave the fire itself assumes the

human capacities of speech and painting (metonymically, as lenguas and pinzeles), which it uses to depict fiery flowers, or flowery fireballs (120).

As Zárate represents it, the essential element of the spectacle, fire, is not merely mixed with the other elements, but contrary to its own nature, it often behaves as if it were one of them. Hence, in stanza 96, already cited above, burning Pluto, like storm-bringer Typhon, surges up—even after seemingly dying down—“con nueva llama” and dominates “mas viento”. Mountains, made not of earth but of flame, fly through the air. Zárate remarks on the fluidity of flames frequently and this stanza is no exception. The mountains of fire are described as spilling out otherworldly rivers. And it is not only fire that usurps the properties of the other elements. The “suelo”, or earth, rises up in flames as well (111).

This contradictory, even impossible mix of elements is the very poetic paradigm of primordial chaos

(Hesse 422).

As we have seen, López de Zárate is a man generally inclined to sober, philosophical reflection.

His initial reaction to the pyrotechnic world in which the basic elements of matter cannot be relied upon to behave as they are supposed to is often one of wonder and delight—as is fitting for the Duke of

Lerma’s celebratory occasion. Yet sometimes, as might be expected from such a serious poet, he takes a moral step back and reflects more critically on the meaning of the spectacles he witnesses, expressing judgments more in keeping with the disillusionment of his times.

The moment when the carro representing the Triumph of Amor goes up in flames is too tempting a symbolic target for Zárate to pass up. This event is captured in stanza 84.

Arrojava el amor contra los cielos

En fuego, lluvia, tempestad de flechas;

Y alguno dixo, amores son, y celos:

Viendolas tan fogosas, y deshechas:

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Y todas imitando a los desvelos,

Y a las siempre fantasticas sospechas;

Ceniza fueron, quando mas tronaron;

En esto triunfos del amor pararon. (106-7)

Expressions of disregard for romantic love or amor loco are a commonplace by Zárate’s time, of course, as is the association of amatory passion with heat and fire. Nevertheless, Zárate’s development of these tropes is especially clever, considering the context. His focus on the illusory and fleeting qualities of the pyrotechnic “flechas” deftly shifts emphasis from the heat of fiery emotion itself at the beginning of the octave to the final “ceniza”, the wasted remains of a brilliant but vain blaze which, like all burning human attachments in the world, has now expired.

To fully appreciate its significance to Zárate, it should be remembered that this float was not meant to represent the victory of romantic, personal love over adversity, but the triumph of the Duke of

Lerma’s friendship with and political devotion to the King (Herrera 15r-v). When the poet refers to

Amor’s triumph being reduced to ashes, then, he is probably also alluding to the end of the Duke of

Lerma’s love affair with Felipe III. The poet does not come right out and say he is commenting on the vagaries of affairs of state or the vanity of political relationships—that would have been both unwise and stylistically over simple. However, he is almost certainly writing this in 1618 when it is already impossible to avoid the conclusion that Lerma and his supporters—like Rodrigo Calderón and López de

Zárate himself—are losing royal favor and on their way out. In any case, as subtle as it is, this octave is a clear enough early expression of the bitter disillusionment González de Garay sees as characteristic mainly of Zárate’s later works.

It is important to distinguish between simple disappointment or even trickery and the more

complex, peculiar phenomenon commonly referred to as desengaño in the Baroque. Poetic desengaño

has its roots in and is conceptually related to the classical vanitas tradition which essentially despairs of

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the lack of substance of earthly life and leads to a reflective or stoical melancholia (Vives-Ferrándiz 54).

But while desengaño as it is understood in the Baroque may be rooted in vanitas and / or a certain contempt for the world, there is more to it than that. First, desengaño departs from the realization that life is not just vanity but essentially a trick or engaño—it is illusory in its nature, like a dream, a fiction, or a play. Real lives and genuine selves are not the fictional roles mortals know and play in the world. To put it in Neoplatonist terms, these mortal “lives” are but the insubstantial shadows of their eternal forms, which have their real, ideal existence beyond the realm of ordinary existence, in God’s mind.

Baroque authors often sought to show their audiences the truth of this—rather than simply telling them—by using metatheatrical devices on the theory that “by calling attention to the play’s own theatricality, the audience realizes the fictional nature of its own reality and, therefore, hopefully, will strive for that which is truly real” (Gómez 101). Maravall extends and clarifies this last point: “si la idea de que el mundo es teatro, sueño, ficción—respecto a una trascendente esencia—el desengaño a que nos lleva a aprehender tal verdad no opera tampoco postulando una renuncia o exigiéndola de quien la reconoce” (410). The desengañado individual of the Baroque should not respond by sinking into an ineffectual state of hopelessness, but rather seek to live or act out his role in accordance with the highest transcendent principles: natural law and Christian morality.52 After all, this life may be no more than a dream, but one’s success in the next life, the one that really counts, will depend on one’s behavior on Earth.

The one passage in the poem where the poet uses the word “desengaño” really does not rise to the level of expressing baroque desengaño as just outlined. Zárate narrates the fall of a toro despeñado,

52 Calderón de la Barca’s famous Segismundo from La vida es sueño may be considered the clearest example of such a desengañado hero. Not only does he overcome his desengaño and eventually learn to play his role in life according to his legal, familial and religious duties, but he also attempts to convince his audience—the Polish court—to take what they have seen in the play as a lesson (3.3224-31). See Jorge Brioso’s “¿Cómo hacer cosas con los enigmas?: La vida es sueño o el drama del desengaño” (66), Chapter 7 of Maravall’s Cultura del barroco, “Conceptos fundamentales de la estructura mundana de la vida” (352-414) and especially Fernando Gómez “Inverting Plato’s Allegory of the Cave” (100-1).

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a bull being tricked into hurling himself to his death, in stanza 172 (142). But there is no trace there of a

metatheatrical dimension, nor does the poet derive any human lesson from the spectacle. For that kind

of development we must turn to the dramatic fireworks presentations.

If the incineration of the Triumph of Amor leads López de Zárate to express disillusionment with

love and politics, his reaction to the burning of the Triumph of Pluto is a still broader and fuller

expression of baroque mistrust of worldly appearances. This idea takes the form of a moral warning to

the reader in stanza 99, where Zárate sums up the burning of some of the figures portrayed on and

around the float devoted to the King of the Underworld and his court. In stanza 90 Zárate has explained

these characters include Prometheus, Ixion and Tantalus, all three of whom are condemned to special

suffering in the afterlife.53 Now Zárate narrates how these figures are consigned to the flames.

En el fin, los presentes se recrean,

De aquellos; para exe[m]plo atormentados,

Y parece; que aun ellos lo dessean;

En tanta pena estavan figurados.

Arden, como oprimidos se menean

Los monstruos con mo[n]tañas fulminados,

y en ellos, todo altivo pensamiento,

O sobervios mortales, escarmiento!54 (112-3)

The first thing to notice about this passage is that the border between the real events of the festival as the poet narrates them, on one hand, and the made-up experiences of the fictional characters depicted in the festival, on the other, becomes porous. The characters here, their feelings and what they

53 For the crime of sharing the power of fire with mortals, Prometheus was condemned to have his entrails eaten repeatedly by an eagle. Ixion was bound to a burning wheel and Tantalus made to stand forever just out of reach of tempting food and water. According to Herrera and López de Zárate, all these scenes were depicted in the pyrotechnic tableaux at Lerma (109). 54 The insertions of the “m” in verse 2 and the “n” in verse 6 are Simón Díaz’.

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do are acknowledged to be imaginary, but are represented as just as important as any other diegetic level of the narrative. Like Lope at his liveliest in recounting the fake Turkish attack in his Fiestas de

Denia, Zárate occasionally mentions that the subjects of his descriptions are fictional or, in this case,

“figurados”. Nevertheless, their experiences or activities—as the poet imagines them—are invested with the vividness of real life. In this case the suffering mythical creatures are represented as no less human than anyone else at the fiesta. The torment they feel is so intense that it induces them to shudder and ultimately, like the protagonists of an auto de fe, to welcome a flaming death as release.

Another important feature of the passage is the way López de Zárate highlights the passage’s theatricality by emphasizing the presence and enjoyment of the spectators: the members of the audience “se recrean” while watching the “atormentados” burn. More importantly, for Zárate there is more to this scene than simple entertainment—both the spectators and his reader are supposed to draw a lesson in life from it. This is why he foregrounds the didactic purpose of the octave or underlines the example to mortals, not once but twice, in verses two and eight.

But of course, there can be no better example of the theatrical quality of reality than a comedia.

Shortly after his account of the fireworks, López de Zárate turns to the performance of El caballero del sol. Zárate cannot help but be moved to comment on the metamorphosis of the stage and its decorations between scenes: “Transformaronse en plantas las arenas; / En paramo desierto lo poblado;

/ Muralla en sierra, en arboles almenas, / Todo en la soledad desfigurado” (130). The skillful stagecraft is impressive in its effects, of course, but for the poet it is more than that. This spectacle prompts a philosophical or moralistic reaction and one of the clearest expressions of baroque desengaño in the poem. For Zárate, this abrupt and convincing transformation of the scenery is an example of how even the mightiest cities, such as Troy and Carthage, must inevitably fall, leaving only ruins and burial mounds behind. To underscore the immateriality of human life, those who remain behind to witness the

“estragos” of time are not even people, but the ever-changing waters of the sea, which pull back and

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look on from afar (131). The message here is not substantially different from Zárate’s previous

expressions of the idea in the fireworks passage; however, the tone is strikingly bleak. One cannot take

Zárate’s poem as subversive in its overall approach. Nevertheless, It is hard to imagine the Duke of

Lerma or anyone in his entourage approving this kind of representation of a key element of the great

celebratory event.

“La pompa en que deidad ostenta el suelo”: López de Zárate’s poetic liminal space

Zárate’s narration of the play and the aforementioned additional variation on the desengaño

theme, being more or less to be expected, are not the most interesting aspects of the passage following

the fireworks. What is more unusual is the poet’s peculiar transition from the second night of

pyrotechnics to the following day’s theatrical entertainment, Vélez de Guevara’s El caballero del sol.

Here Zárate, in another clear departure from the general model of a relación en verso, uses the addition

of mythical or allegorical figures to add a layer of pure invention to his work. The magical world created

in this interlude will then serve as a space where the poet can develop further interpretation or

meaning. If the festival itself can be said to be a performative or theatrical representation of the world,

the creation of this additional poetic dimension gives the poet a meta-festival space which he can

populate not just with the figures and notions narrated directly from the celebratory activities, but also

others, including allegorical characters he has made up.

As we have seen, Aguilar uses mythical figures like Hymeneo and Fama in a rather transparent

(and sometimes awkward) attempt to patch together the different events he narrates. Lope de Vega

relies more on a single, courtly narrative voice but does introduce one fanciful episode into his Fiestas

de Denia: the scene where Proteus’ voice is heard to prophesy a bright future for Felipe III and his subjects while the King and his party enjoy an excursion to a grotto near Denia (96-8). However, El Fénix attenuates this disruption to the verisimilitude of his narration by slyly suggesting he heard the story from unnamed others and adding the disclaimer “yo no sé si es fabuloso” (96). Zárate goes further,

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showing no compunction about using fantastical scenes drawn completely from his own fancy. He does

not even feel compelled to mark them as products of his own imagination, they merely flow logically

into and out of the narration.

Like Herrera, Zárate begins his shift from a narration of the fireworks to that of the comedia by

describing the physical environs, from the newly improved gardens to the broad, flat bank of the river

where the theater had been constructed for Vélez de Guevara’s comedia. Poet Zárate, however, invests

his descriptions with a good deal more life than chronicler Herrera. The river Arlanza becomes a natural

link from the park to the play and Zárate makes the most of the logical connection not only by

incorporating the personified river—Padre Arlança—into the drama, but by making him a kind of divine

stage manager for the coming event.

The night before the play begins, Zárate’s poetic narrator says he can see the shape of Padre

Arlança, who “el Teatro sale a ver de su ribera” (121). At this point it would seem the poet is merely

using a metaphor to refer to the alterations that had been made to the Arlanza’s channel in order to

accommodate the half-in-the-water position of the stage. But immediately afterwards it becomes clear

Zárate is referring to a character because the poet describes him as “de obas vestido, y cañas coronado”

(122). Any lingering doubt is removed when the river god raises himself half out of the water and speaks to the denizens of his domain. He first commands the waves: “Suspended, por oy solo, la corriente”.

Padre Arlança continues to set the scene for the play by making the elements propitious for the next day’s event over the next 15 stanzas, 16 in all (stanzas 121-35).55 Those who are directly under his dominion, like the waters, he gently commands. Recognizing that to ask the waters to be still is to make them act against their nature, he offers some compensation: “Sereys espejos, donde mire el cielo / La pompa, en que deidad ostenta el suelo” (122). The stars are told to usurp “gloria agena, en los efetos; /

Viento aclara, luz siembra, nuves hiende” (123). Other, more potent entities must be persuaded to lend

55 This transitional passage seems especially long when one considers that the narration of the action of the play itself is only slightly longer, at 19 octaves (136-54).

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their powers for the sheer pleasure of doing it. The moon, “Nocturno Sol”, who has the power to “hazer

de tierra mar, y de mar tierra” he asks to turn the riverside to “cristal pacifico” and then to make the

Castilian countryside “represente grandezas de Bretaña, / y Napoles” (123). Then Padre Arlança,

“aviendose adornado de colores” makes the surroundings irresistible to the sun, “por las aguas

esparziendo flores” and awaits its coming the next day (124).

This scene then leads seamlessly to an account of the comedia itself. The King takes his seat, a

throne paradoxically mounted “firme” over the waters of the Arlanza (125). As the peers of the realm

take their places on and around the stage, Padre Arlança notes, “a mi ribera se reduze España” (125). He

falls silent, returns to his riverbed and “cruzando los braços sobre el pecho, / suspenso” awaits the

beginning of the show, along with everyone else (126). His daughters, the river nymphs, then sing and

dance for their father and the audience. This is Zárate’s way of blending his dreamlike mythical interlude

into a description of the music and ballet that open up the afternoon’s theatrical entertainment (127).

Although, as Iravedra says, this passage may be one of the most artistically successful of the

poem, “con un gran movimiento, color y hasta sonido,” the Padre Arlança sequence does very little to

advance the narration of the Fiestas de Lerma (406). What it does is introduce a new dreamlike,

Maravallian “plano de realidad”. In this poetic liminal realm, Zárate can do a couple of interesting things.

He can introduce several different layers or levels of fiction, from his summary of the play’s plot to

commentary on the quality of the acting and the special effects all the way up to the intervention of

Padre Arlança and the other divinities. Further, the poet can use this space to bring together entities

from other disparate planes of reality so they can interact with one another. It is not craftsmen who

divert the course of the river and set up a stage for a play, but the very forces of nature who not only

take part in the comedia, but also in effect produce and even direct it in some ways.

This dream sequence could be interpreted as another hyperbolic technique for praising the engineering marvels of the play—the stage on the river and the elaborate changes of scenery. Although

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it is that, it is less another celebration of showmanship than the poet’s way of investing the play with a

kind of cosmic significance. For one thing, López de Zárate foregrounds the presence of the King and the high nobility in the theater—a theater which has been placed firmly over the border between two worlds: dry land and the waters. He also highlights their symbolic significance as a body by asserting they represent the whole of Spain. More importantly, Zárate explicitly credits the stars and other divine forces of the heavens for the shifting appearances surrounding the play—it is they who make the scenery appear to be Naples and Britain. Moreover, these modified appearances even include the physical conditions of the play’s natural setting. The moon changes land for water and the stars split clouds open. Presumably, the deidades can do this because they are only altering the shadow appearances of the earthly sphere far below. The “pompa” or splendor of the play—and by extension the festival as a whole—is an earthly mirror in which the divine can look down and admire a reflection of itself. In this poetic realm, theatrical invention is made miraculous reality. Human performance and artifice become manifestations of celestial forces. Not only that, but nature contradicts itself, taking on impossible characteristics at the direction of the cosmic powers.

Zárate’s Temple of Fame

As curious as the Padre Arlança passage is, it is not the most notable transitional interval of its kind. More important by far is the opening scene, an extended narration of a dream in which the poet encounters the goddess Fama, her temple and the celebrated figures within it. The unusual length of this passage hints at its significance: it encompasses 64 of the total 233 octaves, over a quarter of the poem. But its real importance can only be measured in qualitative terms, including its structural and conceptual purposes. Most importantly, this episode, just like the Padre Arlança passage, also serves as a vehicle for introducing extra-festive content into the poem. In this case, Zárate will use the poetic dimension he opens up at the beginning of Fiestas en la traslacion for two purposes. In part, he fills this plane of reality with the kind of panegyric that might be expected by the Lerma faction. But he also

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expresses sophisticated learning, metaphysical points and broaches artistic themes that make this

festival epic a substantial poetic work.

Wasting no words on prologue, the first stanzas transport the poet and the reader directly to

the dream world of the Temple of Fame. In the first octave, Zárate uses astrological references to

establish the general time frame for the composition of the poem as the winter of 1617-1618.56 In the next stanza, the poet is overtaken by sleep and immediately thereafter he says “en region me hallè clara, y serena” where he finds himself before a castle that fills the sky, “el Templo de la fama, / Donde el oro le llueve, o se derrama”. He describes the building as “transparente, / Deposito de hazañas inmortales; Que hazen co[n] luz, de marmoles cristales” (74).57 Inside, the poet is overcome

(suspendime) by the galleries of images of “varones , que en sombras nos afrentan” (75).

In several respects, Zárate’s fantastical opening is perfectly consistent with the heroic / political poetic tradition I mentioned in Chapter 2. To begin with, the use of astrology to set an approximate date is a strategy going back at least to Petrarch, who begins his Trionfi with a similar passage. In Spanish letters, Diego de Burgos uses this device in his Triunfo del marqués de Santillana (1458), as does Juan de la Encina in his Triunfo de la fama (ca. 1496).58 The topos of an opening dream sequence itself traces its origins through the same sources and is also a commonplace in encomiastic literature from antiquity up through López de Zárate and beyond.59 Through his standard use of form, then, Zárate’s poem must have seemed to be just what Lerma and/or his supporters had ordered.

56 The dates suggested by López de Zárate’s zodiacal references, between Sagittarius (November 23rd – December 22nd) and Aquarius (January 21st – February 19th), do not correspond to the Fiestas de Lerma themselves. The celebrations took place between the first and twenty-first of October, 1617, which would put them at the end of the tropical month of Libra (September 24th – October 23rd). It is possible the poet mixed up his star signs or did not think there was any need for precision. Still, in other passages Zárate seems acutely conscious of timing. It is more likely, then, that the poet is deliberately referring not to the dates of the festival itself, but to the period several weeks later when he was inspired to compose his poem. This is also logical given that his narration starts with the dream sequence representing his creative process. 57 The correction is Simón Díaz’. 58 Even Góngora starts his Soledades in this way. 59 Cicero’s Dream of Scipio is probably the most obvious classical example. The tradition was continuous, but gained particular popularity in Spain amongst 15th-century poets of the Dantesque allegorical school, such as

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The “Templo de la Fama” conceit, too, was a longstanding tradition in encomiastic literature by

López de Zárate’s time.60 Alfonso Guerrero’s Palacio de la fama y historia de las guerras de Ytalia (1530),

written to praise Carlos V for his successes in Italy, may have served as something of a model for

Zárate’s version, inasmuch as the later poet seems to pick up a few details from the Portuguese jurist.61

Guerrero’s palacio is “todo de fino diamante”, very large and “mas relumbrante que sol ni que Estrella”.

The Emperor is located in a “sala fulgente muy bella” surrounded by a host of other virtuous men— kings, warriors and writers (b iii r).62

López de Zárate, like other authors, does change things slightly in his poem to suit himself. For

one thing, he is more explicit than previous authors about the appearance of the figures and how their

ranks are organized. The celebrated men are sculpted, “unos de bulto, y otros de relieve” in “oro leve”

(75), forming what Zárate sometimes calls a “simulacro” (82). Each is identifiable by “indicios de

insignias, y despojos” and placed, like the remains of a saint, in a kind of “relicario” (82). They are then

arranged hierarchically, sometimes according to lineage and other times by degree of virtue, so that the

Francisco Imperial. Diego de Burgos opens his Triunfo del Marqués with such a dream as well, as does Juan de la Encina in his Triunfo de fama and Alfonso Guerrero in his Palacio de la fama y historia de las guerras de Ytalia: con la Coronacion de su Magestad (1530). 60 The notion probably begins with Ovid’s House of Rumor in Metamorphoses (182-5). The “Triumph of Fame” in Petrarch’s Trionfi is an important influence in the medieval allegorical representation of Fame, although in this work the virtuous do not gather in a temple but in a procession. The temple idea is further elaborated in Spain in several panegyric works. In Burgos’ Triunfo del marqués de Santillana, the Petrarchan host of virtuous men meets in a kind of garden-cum-amphitheater (28). Juan de la Encina adds interesting features in his “Triunfo de la Fama”, such as galleries with representations of “muchas estorias” and special emphasis on Spanish heroes. Naturally, the most prominent figures in Encina’s house were the monarchs of his time, Fernando II of Aragon and especially Isabel I of Castile, whose throne “estava entre todos el más relumbrado” (53). Curiously, despite their apparent influence, María Rosa Lida de Malkiel makes only the barest of mentions of Petrarch’s Trionfi and Juan de la Encina in her otherwise exhaustive study of the subject, La idea de la fama en la Edad Media castellana (280). 61 Alfonso Guerrero was Portuguese by birth but lived and wrote in the Kingdom of Naples. He is best known for his legal works in Latin but also composed a few political pieces in Spanish, including the Palacio de la fama. 62 There are also interesting parallels between these temples of Fame and other kinds of works. The fanciful castles of some romances of chivalry have points in common. The Castle of the Soul in Teresa of Ávila’s Las moradas (1588) has some notable similar features, like walls “de diamante u muy claro cristal” (5). Both Teresa and Zárate explore analogies between their allegorical buildings and the faculties of the mind. Nevertheless, given the very different natures of the texts in question, I leave consideration of the romances and religious allegory out.

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best of men are more prominent than the merely notorious. Caligula, for example, is used as a negative

example and placed “en puesto menos eminente; / por la parte que tuvo de tirano” (76).63

Another point of difference is that in most previous versions, the poet meets Fama and/or other figures in a dream and then the goddess leads him to her palace or castle. Zárate launches directly into a review of the famous men and only encounters Fama later. When he does turn his attention to her it is indirectly, through her mysterious voice and so he does not immediately describe her in any detail.

Before examining Fama, it seems appropriate to have a look at the heroes inhabiting the Templo de la

Fama.

Each writer, from Petrarch to Zárate, makes a slightly different selection of great men to populate his House of Fame, according to the political necessities of the moment and the poet’s own tastes and personal predilections. As a result, the choices made as to which figures to feature and which to leave out can say a lot about a given author, as can the way selected heroes are represented, of course.

The inclusion of champions of the classical and biblical traditions was typical, and Zárate does not omit them entirely, but he generally gives the ancients only the briefest of mentions. One curious exception to this rule is the first hero the poet describes: Pompey the Great. It is a little unusual to give

Pompey, the defeated enemy of Julius Caesar, pride of place over Caesar himself. However, in the moral summation at the end of octave 9, the poet establishes that in his Temple of Fame, “aventajan los buenos a los Reyes”. Pompey’s prominent place in the Temple is compensation for his ignominious betrayal and unjust death in Egypt (78). In his temple dream Zárate will spend very little time praising

63The features of this imaginary construct suggest that the Temple could be understood as an example of the memory palaces of the artificial memory tradition that Frances Yates has explored in her seminal study, The Art of Memory (1966). There are even some suggestive parallels between the occult properties of Zárate’s Temple and magical aspects of some of the more eccentric imaginary edifices Yates examines, such as Giulio Camillo’s Memory Theater. However, since there is no clear reference to the rhetorical function and use of such mnemonic devices in Fiestas en la traslacion, it will be simpler and clearer to approach the Temple in a more general Neoplatonic context, below.

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famous kings—except for Felipe III, naturally. Zárate will focus primarily on their heroic servants, figures

that—like the Duke of Lerma—may be less exalted than royalty but are nonetheless paragons of martial

virtue and dedication to the state.64

For his Temple, López de Zárate selects primarily heroes of the foundation, expansion and preservation of the Spanish Empire.65 He begins with figures associated with the conquest and securing

of the various foreign Spanish dominions. After mentioning Pompey, he next praises the roles of

Prospero and Fabrizio Colonna and Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba in keeping Naples and other parts of

Italy under Spanish control (77). The poet goes on to praise Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, the Iron Duke of Alba, responsible for suppressing rebellion in Flanders, service in Italy and the conquest of Portugal

(78). Logically, he turns next to the contributions of heroes of the Portuguese Asian Empire, Afonso de

Alburquerque and Duarte Pacheco—both of whom, incidentally, died penniless and unappreciated despite their great deeds. Then, the poet mentions a hero of the New World, Hernán Cortés, “tan radiante en valor, como en azero” (79). Finally, Zárate turns back to the Iberian Peninsula for a brief tribute to Alonso Pérez de Guzmán’s legendary sacrifice of his own son in order to defend Tarifa (80).66

In this selection and representation of heroes, Zárate’s festival epic conforms very well to Elizabeth

Davis’ interpretation of other epic works as “self-justifying” pieces meant to support the ideology of the

Castilian imperialist center.

64 It is hard to say for sure, but this rhetorical strategy may have been partly inspired by a perceived mistreatment of the Duke of Lerma by an ungrateful king and country. In any case, it helps set the stage for Fama’s later disquisition on the greater glories of peacemakers, about which there will be more to say below. 65 Bernardo García opines that Zárate selects the great men he showcases in order to please the grandees present in Lerma by mentioning heroes connected to their houses (Fiestas de Lerma 207). This is a reasonable proposition and is surely true in some cases. However, it should be noted that by 1617 the Sandovals were related by blood and marriage to many of the great houses of Spain. In addition, some of the figures Zárate highlights, such as Hernán Cortés and Duarte Pacheco, are difficult to relate back to the attendees of the Fiestas de Lerma. As a result, it is more reasonable to suppose that imperial pride motivated the poet’s selection. 66 Zárate spells out a few words entirely in capital letters to give them special emphasis, such as Lerma’s legendary ancestor, “SANDO” and “CONSTANTINO”, protagonist of another of the poet’s major works. The Guzmán family also receives this distinction. This was probably due to the poet’s quest for the patronage of the Duke of Medina Sidonia, head of the House of Guzmán at the time Varias poesías was going to press. Zárate dedicated the volume to Medina Sidonia, who was later said to have granted his approval to the tune of one gold corona for every verse in the book (Barrera 222).

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As Zárate returns to the heart of the Empire, Castile, and gets closer to the figures he really

means to glorify, the poet is ever more dazzled by the intensity of their brilliance, which in this realm of

dreams is represented literally as a series of bright lights—their shining example “imitava a la luz de los espejos, dexandose llevar de resplandores” (80). Like Aguilar and Lope before him, López de Zárate pays homage to Pelayo and Sando as precursors of the greatest heroes of all: Felipe III and his faithful minister, the Duke of Lerma, whose simulacra inhabit the “mejor relicario de la fama, / absorto en luz”

(81-2).

But the poet’s tribute to Lerma and his King goes further than placing them in the highest reliquary in his imaginary temple. After the tour through the galleries of the glorious, Zárate goes on to explain how Lerma “por meritos suyos” earned his place at the side of Felipe, to whom the heavens have imparted “celeste calidad” (84). The poet, like Lerma himself, is careful to attribute greater glory to the King than to Sandoval. Nevertheless, Felipe remains essentially a godlike, distant figurehead. When the two men are not treated as one, the details Fama relates pertain to the Duke rather than the King.

To return to the goddess Fama herself: she continues this passage with a long monologue explaining how Sandoval has overcome a difficult youth, the vagaries of fickle Fortune and the jealousy of others through the constant application of virtue; “si bien dilataron su victoria / La fortuna con modo lisonjero, / Y la inbidia con premio cauteloso: / Triunfô dellas con pecho generoso” (86).

Though he cannot see her, the poet knows the enigmatic Fama by her voice. Her words inspire

Zárate to join raise his voice in a song of praise, too, so he asks the goddess to let him “copiar de sus anales / exemplos, que haga[n] hombres inmortales” (88).67 Fama agrees and then, over the next fifteen octaves (40-54) pronounces an eloquent paean to Felipe and Lerma’s strategy of avoiding or swiftly ending war. Fama points out that while most rulers win fame through “estragos de ciudades, / y assolacion de Reynos,” the Pax Hispanica is a “politica Christiana” (89). Lerma’s policy is a “nuevo modo

67 The correction is Simón Díaz’.

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de triunfar” which has benefitted countless thousands not just in Spain, but from Britain to the Danube,

by way of Belgium, France and Rome (90). Fama makes special mention of “vitorias en Italia suspendidas”—no doubt putting the best possible face on the war with Savoy over the Succession of

Monferrato (1613-1617) which had ended recently in the humiliating Spanish recognition of the Second

Treaty of Asti (1615). As Jesús Ponce Cárdenas remarks about classical and early modern panegyric: “si no se puede elogiar al emperador por sus hazañas guerreras, habrá que hacerlo por sus acciones en la paz” (75).

Then the goddess turns to the question of the Muslim threat. If Felipe and Lerma are reluctant to spill Christian blood, they are firm when confronting “al Moro fiero”, whether he be Asian, Ottoman or Morisco (96). In an oblique reference to the expulsion of the Moriscos (1609-1614), Fama compares

Felipe and Lerma to responsible shepherds who separate “del ganado luzido el sospechoso” (95).

This kind of use of the allegorical figure of Fama was hardly unprecedented. We have already seen how Aguilar uses the figures of Hymeneo and Fama in his Fiestas nupciales to organize his narration of the events of 1598-1599. Aguilar’s Fama also pronounces some general praise for the King.

However, Zárate makes a more skillful and ambitious use of his fanciful figures than does Aguilar. The

Valencian’s gods’ primary function is to mouth the poet’s own retelling of festival events in order to establish narrative logic within the confines of the epic model. Zárate’s Fama does not narrate any of the celebratory events. Rather, she introduces and concludes the poem and serves as a vehicle for introducing extradiegetical material into the work. The essential role of the goddess Fama in Fiestas en la traslacion is to pronounce a political eulogy for the privado as he prepares to leave public life, a discourse that could not logically make its way into the poem without her intervention.

Another significant departure from previous narrative models should also be emphasized here.

López de Zárate’s uses his dream of Fama to define the spatial and temporal dimension in which the whole of the poem and the activities it represents take place. Zárate’s choice of Fama as an organizing

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figure may not be unusual, but it is especially apt, given the valedictory role in which Mira de Amescua

had cast her at the end of the Fiestas: hers was the very last voice heard at the Conde de Lemos’ night of

masques. We hear from Fama at the conclusion of Zárate’s poem, too; however, the author also assigns

her the additional task of beginning the poem, in the guise of the muse whom the poet invokes. Since

Fama both begins and ends the poem, the poet’s dream gives the work a circular structure. It could even

be said that by using this technique Zárate encloses the festival—and his representation of it—in this

almost surreal circular world of fantasy and dreams. All the Maravallian planes of reality represented in

the Fiestas—from the sublime procession of the Host to the ridiculous Battle of the Pygmies and

Cranes—are nested into the starry sphere of Zárate’s trancelike poem.

Neoplatonism and the power of poetry

This brings us to the philosophical underpinnings of Zárate’s poem. The most salient features of

Fiestas en la traslacion examined so far should be understood as ordered and sustained by a

Neoplatonist worldview. In general terms, poetic Neoplatonism is nothing really unusual by 1617, as

different strains of Neoplatonist philosophy had influenced European intellectual and literary circles

from the fathers of the Church in late antiquity all the way up through Zárate’s contemporaries.

Neoplatonist thought affected or influenced broader Western European philosophy at large repeatedly

and in different ways at different times, in the same way we have seen with other aspects of Classical

culture. And just as with those other aspects of Classical culture, influential renaissance thinkers such as

Marsilio Ficino and León Hebreo give Neoplatonism a fresh look and new impetus in the early modern

period. This impetus will have profound effects on Spanish letters by the end of the 16th century.

Neoplatonism probably owes the longevity of its importance in the West—over one thousand years by some counts—to a certain degree of doctrinal elasticity. Rather than a well-defined set of specific tenets, the term “Neoplatonism” designates a broad current of interrelated but distinct streams of thought which are loosely organized around general Platonic principles. The abstraction of Platonic

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thought gives it an agglutinative capacity which, coupled with a lack of strict and narrow precepts,

makes a lot of variation possible. Moreover, these characteristics also facilitate the incorporation of

other forms of knowledge or metaphysical notions more or less harmoniously into the overarching

system.68

An initial example of such a flexible fundamental principle that has sparked a good deal of critical interest is that of Platonic love. The idea of Platonic love is not to be confused here with non- sexual affection, as the term is commonly used today. Rather, it is conceived as the force which impels all creation, especially enlightened human beings, to contemplate and seek union with truth and beauty.

This is the central, unifying idea of León Hebreo’s Diálogos de amor, which Marcelino Menéndez Pelayo identifies as the most important Neoplatonist esthetic influence on the lyric poetry of the Spanish

Golden Age (Ideas Estéticas 7-110). Hebreo uses this principle to explain just about every aspect of the physical and spiritual worlds. For instance, he incorporates the pre-Copernican model of the heavens into his amorous version of the Platonic cosmos by establishing mystical correspondences between the seven principal celestial bodies of his time (the Moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter and

Saturn) and the reproductive organs and generative powers of the male human body (brain, penis, testicles, heart, kidneys, liver and spleen, respectively). This is one of the more extreme Neoplatonist attempts to unite different orders of metaphysical reality by reading ever more elaborate allegorical parallels into them. Happily, as influential as Hebreo was, Spanish poets do not follow him in this peculiar anatomical direction. Nevertheless, as we will see momentarily, Hebreo was not the only renaissance writer to conflate disparate bodies of knowledge, from the medical to the astrological, and insert them into the wider framework of the Neoplatonist cosmos (67). Moreover, Menéndez Pelayo is right to underline the general influence of Hebreo’s work, as more recent literary critics have shown

68 See Pauliina Remes’ Neoplatonism (2008) for a thorough, concise and very readable summary of the major tenets of Neoplatonism and a critical history of its development in major philosophers of late Antiquity. She also provides helpful suggestions for further reading and some notes on early modern developments.

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repeatedly how early modern writers, Cervantes in particular, owe something of their treatment of love

to Hebreo and his formulation of Platonic love.69

All that notwithstanding, there is no sign of Platonic love in Fiestas en la traslacion. In fact, one of the ways Zárate’s poetic Neoplatonism distinguishes itself from other variants is that he will express or develop it around three other interrelated principles. The first of these central notions is that of a top-down, hierarchical universe wherein the divine, eternal unity or “One” at the top emanates—or to use the technical philosophical term, progresses—downwards from a universal Intellect or Soul into the lower, more material realms below. The second crucial feature of the system for my purposes is its exaltation of Platonic idealism. This idealism complements the hierarchical principle, associating materiality or perceptible substance with the morally and physically low, on one hand, and ethereal or astral superiority with the cosmic moral high ground, on the other. Pauliina Remes explains that the

Neoplatonist universe is “not only a graded reality, but a hierarchy that reaches from what is absolutely one to the varied manifold of the perceptible universe. This hierarchy displays an increasing intensity of unity and goodness the higher one gets in the hierarchy, and conversely an increasing variety, complexity and deficiency towards the lower levels of the ladder of reality” (7-8). Here it bears mention that in most renaissance Neoplatonism classical principles are restated in Christian terms.70 The One is understood to be the everlasting and omnipotent God at the higher reaches heaven, of course, whereas the lower realm is furthest from the good and consequently more susceptible to the powers of darkness

69 Chapter VI of Menéndez y Pelayo’s Historia de las ideas estéticas en España is a good place to start. See also Américo Castro’s El pensamiento de Cervantes (142-8). Other pieces on Cervantes are Clark Colahan’s “Sigismunda, Mary and Athene: Cervantes and Neoplatonic Hieroglyphics” (1996), Francisco Larubia-Prado’s “Consideraciones sobre el influjo neoplatónico en el Persiles” (1986) and Gabriella Rosucci’s “Corrientes platónicas y neoplatónicas en la Galatea” (1995). Lee Gallo has examined Platonic love in La Celestina (1986 and 1987), whereas Guillermo Serés addresses it in a sonnet by Quevedo in “’Si hija de mi amor mi muerte fuese’: Tradiciones y sentido” (2004). More recently Vicente Lledó-Guillem departs from the notion of Platonic love and examines a Neoplatonist hierarchy of vernacular languages in his “Neoplatonism, Averroism and Heidegger in Juan de Valdés’ Diálogo de la lengua” (2010). 70 Though Hebreo was Jewish, his system can only be considered a partial exception to the rule. While he, Ficino, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola and other esoteric Neoplatonists never abandoned their professed faiths—as they understood them—they all borrowed freely from various religious traditions, each nesting cabbalism, Hermetism and/or classical pagan notions into their overarching systems as they saw fit.

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and error(Figure 3.15).71 The third important principle is that of the interconnectedness of metaphysical reality and the human mind or soul—to which I will return after first exploring the manifestations of the first two notions in Fiestas en la traslacion.

We have already seen how Neoplatonism informs Zárate’s poem in important ways. One of the more obvious examples is the Padre Arlança interlude: the notion that the waters of the river will be

“espejos, donde mire el cielo / La pompa, en que deidad ostenta el suelo” is an artful poetic restatement of the longstanding Neoplatonic idea that the sensible realm of the world, though we humans experience it as real, is actually no more than an image of the higher reaches of Platonic ideals or Forms

(122). Furthermore, “Forms are mirrored in and by something that does not properly exist, namely matter” (Remes 82). This is why Zarate’s gods and planets, looking on from their more perfect seats of power on high, are able to rearrange the physical conditions of the earthly play and festival space below.

In a similar way, Christianized Neoplatonism underlies Zárate’s expression of baroque desengaño.

Observers (and readers) of Pluto’s fall, for example, are meant to understand their own earthly lives are no more real than his; however, they are also supposed to understand that the way they play out their parts in the material play of life will have real consequences in the ethereal spheres of real existence in the next life.

Zárate’s description of the way he experiences his tour of the Temple of Fame provides an added dimension to his representation of the relationship between the ordinary mortal world and the nobler upper reaches of the cosmos.72 Rather than take the distant perspective of higher powers looking

down on creation, as he does in the Padre Arlança episode, in this passage the perspective is the human

71 See Augusta Espantoso de Foley’s “Las ciencias ocultas, la teología y la técnica dramática en algunas comedias de Juan Ruiz de Alarcón” for an interesting discussion of how the Devil’s power, witchcraft and the other dark arts were supposed to be limited to the lower, perceptual reaches of the world (321-4). 72 The poet clearly represents the narrative voice as his own throughout the poem, but makes this especially plain in this dream sequence for reasons that will soon become apparent.

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poet’s as his dream of the Temple raises him to a higher plane of reality, above the sensory realm of

mortals.

Here in the Temple, the poet has trouble—or claims to have trouble—representing what he sees

and hears in the base terms of the lower, sensual world. The poet calls this difficulty “suspension de

entendimiento”: a form of astonishment brought on by the dazzling reality he is confronting and which

results in a kind of verbal perplexity (83). He can only manage to express his experience in a confused

language comparable to the paradoxical baroque figures he uses to describe the celestial spectacle of

the fireworks. The “simulacros” he sees in the Temple, though made of “Mudos metales,” have “labios

eloquentes” and shine with “ocultos resplandores”. The poet begins stanza 26 by noting “Valiome mas

la vista, que el oydo”, yet in the rest of the stanza his impressions are composed almost entirely of

auditory references. Zárate is transfixed, “como a vozes de intrumento,” or “Al eco dulce de agradable

acento” (82-3). In a further example, when Fama concludes a peroration on the glories of the churches

Lerma has built, Zárate represents her voice as a mysteriously resonant “Parlera nuve, bosque

so[nor]oso” (97).73

Lest the reader make the mistake of attributing the difficulty of recounting this peculiar episode to delusion, Zárate insists on its reality repeatedly. The images he sees are not mere stone statues, but living, idealized beings with supernatural qualities in accordance with their heavenly position and

“virtudes preeminentes”. As the poet, in his state of suspensión, gazes at the King and the Duke of

Lerma, Fama reassures him that although they are mute they are alive and “los que piensas son”. She then goes on to say “Verdad es no ilusion, o fantasia” (83).What could superficially appear to be a garbled representation of the sensory world is in fact the poetic portrait of transcendent reality.

Zárate’s mentions of “fantasia” and “entendimiento” taken together with other references throughout the poem refer to the psychology developed by natural and medical thinkers to his time. By

73 Simón Díaz’ edition contains a slight transcription error here, substituting “soronoso” for the original “sonoroso”.

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the 15th century, Western philosophers had developed a theoretical model of thought which

corresponded to the organization and subdivision of the brain into “vesicles”, or chambers, as they were

then understood (Figure 3.16). Perceptions from the various sense organs entered the brain at the front and were combined there in the vesicle corresponding to the faculty of common sense. From there, they were converted into the basic unit of thought: images. The vesicle or faculty of the brain that performed

this operation was, of course, the imagination. However, this was not what is generally thought of as

imagination today. The creative power to invent or make up one’s own subjective images or ideas

independent of the senses and the external world was called fantasy (or phantasy), and it was housed

in its own vesicle as well. Fantasy might modify or substitute for sensory images. From there, selected

ideas would be introduced into the posterior vesicles for consideration by the higher functions of

understanding, or intelligence. Finally, in the last chamber, ideas from all the previous sources would be

stored in the memory.

It should be noted that this theoretical model of human cognition is hierarchized in a way very

reminiscent of the Neoplatonist model of the cosmos. In fact, the two theoretical ladders of concepts

were so similar that they were conflated from early on in the development of Neoplatonism. Just as with

the model of thought, the realm of the senses is at the bottom of the Neoplatonist universe, whereas at

the top, just beneath the divine First Principle, there was the World Soul or Intellect—with slightly

different metaphysical properties and functions depending on the specific strain of Neoplatonism in

question. At the very highest level, memory corresponds to the eternal One. Moreover, in influential

Plotinus’ thought, each individual human soul was mystically linked to the universal World Soul. It is a

short step from this point to the third general principle of the philosophy mentioned above: that the

individual soul or psyche participates mysteriously in the World Soul. Or, to extend the notion, the

human mind can be said to be a microcosm of the universal Intellect.

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The application and significance of this principle are seen in Fama, her cosmic role and the

poet’s relationship to the goddess. To begin with Fama’s importance, María Rosa Lida de Malkiel has

pointed out that whereas medieval thinkers were divided as to whether fame was something to be

sought out or better to be shunned, from the Renaissance forward, Castilian society places new value on

fame because it offers victory over oblivion.74 Through fame, people—especially influential men like the

Duke of Lerma—have the power to cheat death and attain eternal honor by ensconcing themselves in collective memory forever (Idea de la fama 9).

Zárate attributes this kind of power to Fama in a couple of different poetic ways. Most simply, he gives her the divine ability to place the deserving directly into the heavens, or to raise their “alabança en firmamento”—as, for example, when we learn at the end of the poem that Felipe III is already destined for rebirth as a star (164). But Fama can and does often make those she favors immortal through others. The King and Lerma, for example, are glorified “en labios”, or through the voices of multitudes. More to the point for our purposes here, Fama also works through writers, or the “heroycas plumas, que conciven / Mas alto, pensamientos inmortales, / Y assi morir no dexan al que cantan: /

Porque eternas Piramides levantan” (96).

In this way, Zárate’s poet is conceived as Fama’s earthly deputy, or better still, we can say his role on earth is analogous to the part she plays at the cosmic level. This is why Fama plucks a feather from her own wing and offers it to the poet as a quill, saying "Salga de ti el espiritu profano, / Y governada tu ignorancia en arte; / La TRASLACION mas soberana escrives / Que en la memoria de los ombres vive." (97). Fama confers a power analogous to her own on the poet. He may not be able to lift

74 The model of Petrarch’s Trionfi is influential in promoting this way of thinking. In the fourth of the six triumphs represented in this seminal work, Fame defeats Death. Petrarch goes on to represent Time overcoming Fame, however. Then, in the ultimate victory Eternity triumphs over Time. These last two developments seem to be forgotten later on, at least in encomiastic works like Fiestas en la traslacion, so that by the late Renaissance Fame reigns supreme.

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Lerma and his Fiestas directly up to the Firmament, but he can raise a written monument or “piramide”

to him. And this writing will live on in the collective memory forever.

Note that one of the metaphysical consequences of this equivalence is that the poet can use his

art, like Fama’s divine power, to reach above the confused lower realm of perception and directly into

the higher realms of the soul, both human and universal. Moreover, if his poetry invests Zárate with the

divine power to translate the Duke and his fiestas to the heavens, it stands to reason that the poet

himself also deserves eternal renown. Fama spells this out to the poet in stanza 62.

Escrive a LERMA Corte, y a Castilla,

A España, a Italia, al Orbe reduzido

A ciudad, en grandeza; en nombre, villa:

Que tanta accion te librarà de olvido:

Tu verso de los siglos maravilla

Sera con voz de bronzes repetido,

Pues en sus Fastos lo pondra la Fama:

Donde ni llega senectud, ni llama. (98)

This octave encapsulates several of the most pertinent aspects of the poem. Fiestas en la traslacion is at its most basic an occasional poem written, as all such texts were, to glorify a powerful patron, the Duke of Lerma, through the marvelous celebration he sponsors. But the poet makes his work much more than a basic panegyric. He sees the fiestas as his baroque contemporaries saw all kinds of other “planos de realidad”, like theatrical performances: a festival is a kind of para-theatrical representation of life and the world. Accordingly, he does not make his festival poem a chronicle, but rather an expression of his vision of the significance of the dreamlike fiestas. As Zárate does so, he also reflects philosophically on the senses, the power of poetry to transcend them and lasting fame not just of the Duke, but also the poet who sings his praises. If life is a fiesta, the fiesta is a dream. But for López

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de Zárate the real dreamer, the man whose vision will be developed in his poetic world is not the host and organizer of the occasion, but rather the poet himself.

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Chapter 4 Performance, Portuguese national memory and Castelbranco’s Triumpho del Monarcha

(1619)

Estas memorias de pasadas glorias Piden vuestra presencia, y la dessean, Y es conveniente bien, que estas memorias Templadas con presentes glorias sean.

Vasco Mousinho Quevedo Castelbranco, Triumpho del Monarcha, 15r.

Introduction

In 1613, with the Duke of Lerma, the Marqués de Siete Iglesias and their associates still at the helm of the Spanish ship of state, a group of deeply dissatisfied Portuguese gentlemen (fidalgos) made an extraordinary gesture in Madrid. They formed an unofficial committee or junta and determined to persuade the King to publicly commit himself to making a long-promised and long-delayed state visit to

Portugal. They believed the greatest impediment to the royal entrada was the Duke of Lerma’s hostility to Portuguese interests, so they attempted to get around the official channels of communication, then dominated by Lerma loyalists. Believing they had a better chance with Lerma’s most prominent critic, they asked Royal Confessor Fray Luis de Aliaga to arrange a private audience with the King, away from the hostile influence of unsympathetic ministers, such as Rodrigo Calderón (García do Valle 25v).

Initially, Aliaga said he would be glad to pass the request along and said he was sure the King would agree.

But Fray Luis was mistaken, in part because of the specific demands the fidalgos intended to put forward. Apart from forcing a public and credible commitment from the King, the fidalgos wished to clarify a couple of additional points. Portugal would be willing to collect funds to cover royal travel costs.

However, the gentlemen echoed concerns expressed earlier by the Câmara or Senado (city council) of

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Lisbon asserting that monies should be paid directly to the King—not to his government—and then only

once he was actually in Portugal (Megiani 113).

The implied accusation of deception and corruption on the part of Lerma’s government was clear. From the perspective of those in power in Madrid, the fidalgos’ attitude was worse than merely impertinent. For one thing, the gentlemen’s junta had no legally-constituted representative power on which to base an attempt to negotiate with the King—the fidalgos had publicly attempted to make an end-run around the established authorities. However, as they would soon learn, Lerma was still close to the King. Moreover, their conditional offer of payment had an air of extortion about it.1 This prompted a swift and firm reaction. In the middle of the night, the members of the junta were ordered to leave court immediately, to a distance of at least 20 leagues. In addition, they were to stay at least the same distance from Portugal and none was to get any closer than 20 leagues to any other member of the group. Before complying, the Portuguese negotiated a brief extension and then stated “the only hope left for them and for the kingdom was to wait for better times and for a change of those who controlled power and the king's grace” (Feros 230). The banishment only lasted a few months—the Conde de

Castel-Melhor, the group’s leader, was back in Madrid by the end of September (Labrador Arroyo, Casa real portuguesa 845).2 Nevertheless, being exiled, especially very suddenly, was considered a drastic measure and it caused something of a public scandal (García do Valle 25r).

The importance of the King’s presence

This affair was not especially consequential in and of itself; it was merely one scene in a years- long drama consisting of constant and increasingly unhappy exchanges between the Crown and

Portuguese notables related to Felipe III’s obligation to attend to his Lusitanian realm personally. The

1 The Portuguese reluctance to hand over the money was not without foundation. The Crown had been collecting special payments to cover travel to Portugal for years without ever making a serious effort to actually go. 2 Sources are not entirely clear about the membership of the junta, but agree that Francisco Luís de Lencastre, comendador mayor of the Order of Avis and António de Mascarenhas, dean of the Royal Chapel of Portugal, were among them. See Félix Labrador Arroyo “La casa real portuguesa (1598-1621)” and Pedro García do Valle’s letter to the Conde de Gondomar dated July 10, 1613 ( (25r-26r).

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very fact that it was just one example of such a long back-and-forth, however, highlights the significance of the royal entrada for the Portuguese and illustrates important elements of their political point of view regarding the two decades of tense relations between the Crown and Portugal during Felipe III’s reign.

For one thing, the affair of the fidalgos highlights the deep suspicion the Portuguese felt for the

Duke of Lerma and his supporters. They seemed to cherish the (perhaps naïve) notion that if only they could pry good Felipe out of Lerma’s grip, the King could not fail to see reason and was bound to satisfy

Portuguese claims on his attention and good graces. For another, the episode reveals these claims arose from a deep sense of national injury amongst the Portuguese which had been developing for many years. Above all, for the Portuguese the only satisfactory redress for that injury would be the physical presence of the King in Portugal. A royal visit was (perhaps also somewhat naively) considered essential for the health and welfare of the Portuguese body politic, particularly for its commercial and noble elites. As a result, the Portuguese were prepared to do almost anything, from collecting special taxes to trying to manipulate and subvert government channels in Madrid, to get Felipe to Lisbon.

It seemed the longer the King was away, the more the Portuguese became fixated on his presence as a point of national honor. The King and only the King could grant Portugal a couple of things it desperately desired. In the first place, there were some material benefits that could only be distributed by the King, such as palace offices and honors. Less directly, it should be remembered that the presence not just of the King but also his court was an important part of the economic life of the country, especially in the capital. Without the presence of the King, there were few grand courtly events to be supplied: few opulent banquets requiring provisions and few masques for which to commission scripts, extravagant costumes and scenery.

But the materiality of what has been called “the economy of royal grace” was not the only nor even the most substantial measure of the significance of the King’s presence. On a level that was no less important for being symbolic, only the King—even a king who had been born somewhere else—could

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provide visible recognition of the kingdom’s value and well-being. This was a function of the prevailing

political philosophy from the medieval era as examined by Ernst Kantorowicz’ in his The King’s Two

Bodies (1957). Just as St. Paul had defined Christ’s relationship to the Church as analogous to that between the head and the rest of the body, so in Christian Europe political philosophers generally held the King was head of the mystical body of the state. To refer to a metaphor that was still a commonplace in 1619, a state without a king was a body without a head, subject to paralysis, indirection, lack of purpose and personality and almost certainly doomed to eventual decline and decay.

To look at it from another, more Turnerian point of view, we could say that early modern

Portuguese politics is a series of social dramas, or fleeting public scenes in which various social interests or segments are represented publicly by actors who “tell a story, usually of human conflict, by means of dialogue and action” (27). According to the ideology of the day, the king was an essential character in every social drama of any real importance. As Bouza puts it, being king in an early modern context means playing a role in accordance with the different natures or norms of the different realms or provinces ruled by the sovereign (Retórica da imagem real 10).

Fernando de la Flor takes this line of thinking further, declaring that in the Hispanic early modern era can be thought of as “el momento climático de la emergencia de un verdadero 'Estado- teatro'" (462). Political life can be usefully thought of as a series of performances featuring the king and any number of other actors. But while these social dramas feature the king, they are not always about him and him alone. As the head of the body politic, he is a necessary character. However, he is not necessarily the protagonist or main character of every drama. Rather than considering that pomp and circumstance serve the interests of the king, “en realidad, lo que ocurre con este mundo es que es el poder el que asiste y sirve a la ritualidad” (463).

It is clear to see how and why the other political actors on the Portuguese stage were so distressed by the extended absence of their kings: without the star, the show could not go on in any

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meaningful sense. Stand-ins like the viceroys did not have the mystical stature to effectively take the king’s place—especially if they were not members of the royal family.3 In order for the rites, rituals and

ceremonies of Portuguese political life to recover their meaning, the King must return to his Lusitanian

kingdom.

The Iberian Union and frustrated Portuguese national aspirations

In a sense, the pressure on the King not just to go to Portugal, but to act decisively to address

Portuguese grievances and satisfy Portuguese national pride had begun building long before Felipe III’s

birth.4 For this reason, to fully appreciate the context and meaning of the occasions of 1619 a somewhat

lengthy summary of key aspects of the historical relationship between Spain and Portugal is necessary.

In 1580 Felipe II assumed the throne of Portugal, thereby fulfilling the centuries-old dream of

reuniting the whole of ancient Hispania under the aegis of one monarchy. But the Habsburg succession

was not met with universal acclaim and approval in Portugal, to put it mildly. For many Portuguese the

kingdom’s incorporation into the Habsburg monarchy brought fears of national obliteration. Annexation

would mean domination not only by an alien polity, but absorption into the country’s greatest rival.

From its very political origins, Portugal had defined itself largely in terms of two missions or

goals. The first, of course, was the struggle against Islam. The sense of religious and national purpose

connected to the fight against Muslims led the Portuguese to push the southern border of the kingdom

to the Strait of Gibraltar by 1300. Afterwards, Portuguese crusading energies would be directed to

imperial expansion abroad, first in Africa and then later towards Asia and the Americas.

3 In 1583, Felipe II appointed his able son-in-law and nephew, Archduke Albert VII of Austria (1559-1621), the first post-Tomar viceroy of Portugal. After 1593, the office passed to a string of Portuguese noblemen and prelates who were often viewed as having little impact in Madrid. Prominent politician Diego Silva y Mendoza (1564-1630), viceroy from 1615 until 1622, was a very different case. For the Portuguese, if he was influential at court it was for all the wrong reasons. He was close to Lerma and had proposed new legal means of making the Kingdom contribute more to government coffers. Moreover, though he was naturalized Portuguese and granted the Portuguese title Marqués de Alenquer, the Portuguese always regarded him as Castilian. His appointment only drove the Portuguese to more insistent complaints. 4 Felipe III of Spain was known as Filipe II in Portugal, a detail that many Portuguese writers insist on in order to highlight the distinctness of the kingdom, even when it was ruled by the Spanish Crown. However, in order to avoid confusion, I will use Spanish numeration and spelling only.

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The other great leitmotiv of Portuguese political history was its resistance to the dominance of

its larger, richer and more powerful peninsular neighbor, Castile—or its predecessors, the Kingdoms of

Asturias, Galicia and León.5 This resistance had, in a sense, given birth to Portugal itself when Afonso

Henriques effectively declared Portuguese independence from Castile and León in 1139 and made the

House of Burgundy the first royal dynasty of Portugal.

In 1383 Fernando I of Portugal’s death without male issue touched off a succession and dynastic crisis which very nearly ended the kingdom’s brief history of independence. The crown was set to pass to Fernando’s only living daughter, Beatriz; however, she had married Juan I of Castile. Rather than accept a return to the Castilian fold, a Portuguese army composed largely of members of the lower nobility and commoners, led by skillful general Nuno Álvares Pereira, defeated a larger Castilian army at

Aljubarrota in 1385. Fernando’s illegitimate brother, João I, Grand Master of the military Order of Avis, was made king and founder of a new royal line.

Matrimonial links between the two Iberian kingdoms continued to keep both ruling families closely intertwined for the next two hundred years—often uncomfortably so. At a moment when Castile was divided and the new regime of Isabel I of Castile and Fernando II of Aragon was not yet fully established, Afonso V of Portugal made a bid to use marriage politics to Portuguese advantage. He took

Enrique IV of Castile’s only daughter, Juana (commonly reputed to be illegitimate) as his wife, declared

Isabel I a usurper and invaded Castile in the name of his bride. Afonso’s failure may not have been inevitable; however, it is significant that even a divided Castile was ultimately strong enough to beat back the Portuguese attack. In the thicket of political and family relations which both divided and united the Portuguese and Castilians, it was generally the former who ran the greater risk of losing their way.

And in fact, the Portuguese did lose the high-stakes game of political intermarriage to Castile as a result of the dynastic crises of the mid-1500s.

5 The successor Spanish state—after the union with Aragon and Navarre—was also regarded by the Portuguese as essentially another incarnation of Castile.

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In 1554 Prince João Manuel of Portugal, the last survivor of King João III’s nine legitimate

children, died at a singularly inopportune time. For one thing, he preceded his father in death by three

years. More importantly, he was very nearly the last of his family line. João III and patriotic Portuguese

had watched with growing dismay as one after another of João Manuel’s older brothers sickened and

died while still small children. When the Prince fell seriously ill, then, it looked very much like Spanish

candidates might have an excellent chance to inherit and absorb the neighboring kingdom. However,

the Prince did not leave Portugal altogether without hope. His wife, Juana de Austria (Carlos I of Spain’s

daughter), gave birth to a son, Sebastião I, eighteen days after João Manuel’s death, narrowly saving the

House of Avis. Sebastião earned his sobriquet, “o desejado” mainly because for patriotic Portuguese, the

survival of Portugal as an independent kingdom with a character and institutions all its own depended on only-child Sebastião’s successful accession.

It was no small blow then, that Sebastião’s passionate pursuit of the first Portuguese national mission, that of glorious victory over Muslim enemies, should have led to the utter loss of the second—

maintaining independence from Spain. Against his advisors’ counsel, devout young Sebastião

determined to mount a crusade against the Turkish-backed government of Morocco. He gathered a

mercenary army, enlisted the support a large body of Portuguese noblemen, and set out for Morocco in

1578. A much larger Moroccan army crushed the Portuguese outside Alcácer Quibir later that same

year. For Portugal, the defeat was nothing short of calamity. King Sebastião himself perished together

with the flower of Portuguese nobility.6 Not only were survivors captured and ransomed back to their

families at ruinous cost, but O Desejado died unmarried and childless, setting off another dynastic crisis.

6 There were eyewitness accounts of Sebastião’s fall in battle, but the remains Felipe II later claimed to have recovered were not sufficient to make a clear identification. This slight room for doubt gave rise to the millenarian, nationalist fantasy known as Sebastianism, according to which Sebastião had not really died and would eventually return to reclaim the throne and restore the Kingdom. In the late 16th and early 17th centuries several opportunists attempted to make use of popular Sebastianism, less to actually claim the throne of Portugal than to profit off the doubt they managed to stir up. There are many studies of Sebastianism. Earlier works include J. P. Oliveira Martins’ História de Portugal (1887 70-84), J. Lucio d’Azevedo’s A Evolução do Sebastianismo (1918) and Robert Ricard’s “La cloche de Velilla et le mouvement sébastianiste au Portugal” (1954). More recently Diogo Ramada Curto has connected Sebastianism to popular mystical thinking in general in his “O Bastião! O Bastião!” (1993).

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Sebastião’s great uncle Henrique inherited the throne, in keeping with Portuguese custom. However,

this was no more than a temporary solution, as Henrique was already an old man and, more to the point

from a dynastic perspective, as a Cardinal of the Roman Church he neither had nor could produce a

legitimate heir of his own.7

Henrique chose not to name a successor before his death, and all lines traceable through the traditional principle of male primogeniture were now extinct. It would be up to the junta of five governors Henrique established in his will to sort through the competing claims and declare a new monarch. They would choose between four prominent descendants of Sebastião’s great-grandfather,

Manuel I: Ranuccio Farnese, later Duke of Parma; Catarina, Duchess of Braganza; António, Prior of Crato and Felipe II of Spain.8 None of these pretenders had an irrefutable claim.9 Felipe II’s claim, as son of

Manuel I’s eldest daughter, was not necessarily the most convincing from the point of view of the traditional legal principles of Portuguese succession. However his publicists, treasury and army were by far the most persuasive.

António attempted to invoke the precedent set by João I—another illegitimate leader of a military order who had rallied the Portuguese to defeat a Spanish candidate for kingship. But Felipe II was careful to ensure history did not repeat itself by separating the Portuguese nobility of his day from the Prior of Crato. He managed this in part through careful persuasion. The general social opprobrium directed towards illegitimate offspring was far from inconsiderable, particularly amongst the higher

7 Henrique asked Rome to release him from his vows so could attempt to produce an heir, but the Pope, at that time aligned with the Habsburgs, refused. 8 The Priory of Crato was the most prominent Portuguese house of the military Order of St. John of Malta (the Knights Hospitallers). 9 Farnese had a good claim, being grandson of Manuel I’s youngest son, Duarte I, Duke of Guimarães. Though Ranuccio would have inherited through his mother, Maria de Guimarães, she was the eldest of Duarte’s children. But Ranuccio’s father, Alessandro Farnese, was governor of the Spanish Netherlands from 1578. The family tactfully declined to press a claim in competition with that of their overlord. Catarina, Duarte I of Guimarães’ younger daughter, was a serious contender, but in the end her inability to match Felipe’s campaign tactics made her bid unsuccessful—until 1640, when it was recognized posthumously and her grandson, João IV, was declared king of a restored, independent Portuguese monarchy. Unlike the other claimants, António’s lineage passed directly through male descendants of Manuel I; however, he was disqualified as the illegitimate son of a New Christian mother.

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nobility. Some of the aristocrats of the realm simply could not abide the idea of calling António king,

particularly as he made more populist appeals to the lower strata of Portuguese society. Moreover, as

Fernando Bouza has shown, El Rey Prudente made a concerted effort to woo the Portuguese using the

most sophisticated literary and visual media of the 16th century, including the symbolism of coats of arms, commemorative medals and hieroglyphics, emblems or devices of all kinds (Retórica da imagem real). Where the exercise of soft or symbolic power was not sufficient, Felipe made generous offers of money and honors. This kind of material assistance was extremely tempting to those noble families who had exhausted their fortunes paying to recover captured members of the ill-fated Moroccan expedition.

Through his clever ambassador, Cristóvão de Moura, Felipe II made assurances he would always respect and honor the distinct character and legal identity of Portugal. He and his advocates promised that the

Iberian Union would help shore up Portugal’s strained finances, both public and private. The rest of the

Spanish Empire would assist Portugal in maintaining its expensive overseas defenses and facilitate trade relations between Portugal, the other Spanish realms—including the Spanish colonies in the Americas— and even boost commerce with foreign powers.

If Felipe II’s initial strategy of bribery, persuasion and legal argument seemed to be a success in preparing his way, his final victory would not be achieved completely without force of arms. Henrique’s junta of governors was inclined to recognize the Spanish claim, but was also aware naming Felipe king would be profoundly unpopular. Fearing adverse public reaction, they attempted to defer their final pronouncement. After six months of waiting, the King of Spain’s patience ran out: an army led by the

Duke of Alba crossed the border at Elvas on June 18, 1580. In response, António, in Santarém, had himself proclaimed king and determined not to give up without a fight. Dom António struggled bravely, but had little material support. His army was made up mostly of hastily-trained volunteers who could not stand up to Alba’s veteran professionals, so the Prior was soon forced into exile. Nevertheless, as

Rafael Valladares has shown, the violence of the campaign to secure Spanish control of the country was

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not as slight as later representations would have had it (Conquista de Lisboa). Thousands died, mainly on the Portuguese side, and the war was not completely over until 1583, when the Spanish managed to eliminate António’s last Portuguese refuge in the Azores. Felipe himself remarked on the necessity of employing both peaceful and military tactics to win his Portuguese prize: “Yo lo heredé, yo lo compré— yo lo conquisté, para quitar dudas!” (Qtd. in Oliveira Martins 109).

After Alba had the mainland under control, Felipe decided to visit his new dominion personally.

By April of 1581 Felipe was prepared to have himself declared king by the Portuguese Cortes at Tomar and had for all intents and purposes established the so-called Iberian Union. A splendid triumphal festival was organized in Lisbon to welcome the new monarch.

Still, popular participation in António’s armed resistance made it clear that more than a few

Portuguese, particularly those of the lower classes, feared the Spanish accession could only mean subordination to Castile. The union of the crowns clearly diminished Portugal’s independence and international standing. Moreover, since it was in part predicated on centuries of resistance to its larger and more powerful neighbor, the formation of the Iberian Union seemed to undermine not only

Portuguese national pride but also Portugal’s very sense of national identity. A central challenge, then, for both the King and his new subjects was to make, in effect, a nearly impossible but necessary bargain.

To soothe Portuguese sensibilities and minimize the shock and violence of the new arrangement, King and subjects must deny the undeniable and reassure one another that Portugal was still a distinct political entity in the same way it had been before. In exchange, Portuguese citizens must show their dedication to and affection for the Spanish monarchy.

The first Habsburg ruler of Portugal did what he could to allay his new subjects’ trepidations.

The way he did so would have deep consequences for his heir’s relationship with the Kingdom afterwards. Leaving the unpleasantness of the ongoing war with António aside, Felipe decided that to head off further fuss and bloodshed, he would represent himself not as a vengeful conqueror, but

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strictly as the lawful heir to the throne. This tack gave the Portuguese the opportunity to play the role of willing subjects rather than chastened rebels. For the Portuguese there were two advantages in accepting this sort of legal fiction. First, viewed from this angle, the events of 1580 could be considered less a humiliating defeat for Portugal than a natural, normal succession of Portuguese monarchs.

Second, taking a positive attitude might maximize Portuguese chances of receiving concessions from the new king, rather than punishment.

In Tomar, as the three Portuguese Estates swore allegiance to Felipe II, El Prudente swore before the Cortes to uphold Portugal’s traditions, privileges and statutes, effectively promising it would never lose its prized autonomy. The written agreement, the Statutes of Tomar, included a number of detailed additional concessions designed to reassure the Portuguese of the dignity and status of the realm. For example, viceroys were to be either members of the royal family or Portuguese and the Crown was not to impose new taxes without the approval of the Portuguese Cortes. One of the more interesting articles of the Statutes of Tomar for my purposes here specified that future heirs to the Crown of Portugal should be brought up in Portugal and spend as much time there as possible. This requirement underlined the importance the Portuguese placed on future kings’ attachment to the Kingdom and established the king’s physical presence as the measure of that attachment.

Significantly, during his visit to Portugal Felipe II took pains to extend his stay in his new realm and to make sure he saw and was seen by as many of his new subjects as possible. He remained in

Portugal for almost a year and a half, until 1583, when pressing matters back in Madrid made it impossible for him to delay his return there any longer. Though the initial reaction to the triumph in

Lisbon was reported to be muted amongst a shocked and somewhat resentful public, the fact that Felipe had made an effort to show good faith would not soon be forgotten in Portugal. For Portuguese observers, Felipe II was setting important precedents.

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The royal promises made in Tomar were no doubt undertaken sincerely, for the most part.10

They were in keeping with the traditional agglutinative ideology of Spanish state construction which

resulted in what J. H. Elliott has called the composite monarchy of the House of Austria (A Europe of

Composite Monarchies). Since the joining of the crowns of Castile and Aragon in the persons of

Fernando and Isabel, Spanish monarchs had been careful to preserve the historical fueros or peculiar legal statutes of each of their newly acquired realms—at least nominally—by adding their realms together as a series of inherited personal dependencies of the kings and queens, rather than fusing them together in a way that would integrate them by law and custom into a truly unitary state. This way of compiling once-independent polities into the Habsburg monarchy had the advantage of minimizing short-term, local resistance to the monarchy, but also made the process of central decision-making both administratively difficult and politically fraught, especially in the long term. The Portuguese case was an outstanding example. Tomar did have the immediate political benefit of calming Portuguese national passions and making the Habsburg dynasty acceptable in the Kingdom, if not popular. But some points of the agreement would prove impractical, if not impossible, to sustain. Moreover, each failure by the

Habsburg monarchs to comply with one or another of the terms of the Statutes of Tomar, whether it was a realistic expectation or not, would engender and / or intensify Portuguese frustration.

The first commitment to be obviously broken was that of raising heirs in Portugal (Vázquez

Cuesta 66). Felipe II attributed Prince Diego’s absence in Portugal to fragile health, suggesting that making the journey to Portugal from Madrid was too dangerous. This was understandable, especially given that Don Diego did in fact sicken and die while his father was still in Lisbon.11 However, this lapse in fulfilling the Tomar agreement would set something of a precedent, also. Subsequent Princes of

Asturias, including the future Felipe III, would also stay in Madrid.

10 As testament to Felipe II’s sincere regard for Portugal, El Prudente left instructions for his son, Felipe III, in an addendum to his will directing the younger king to favor the Portuguese (Labrador Arroyo, A jornada real 415). 11 The Cortes swore allegiance to the next heir apparent, the future Felipe III, in Lisbon in 1583.

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This did not initially become a point of great contention because of the collaborative

relationship Felipe II had built up during his stay at court in Lisbon. He even renovated the palace (Paço da Ribeira) and appointed new members of the Portuguese royal household, suggesting Portugal might expect continued grace and attention from the monarchy. In fact, there were strategic reasons to think the King might seriously consider moving the capital to Lisbon permanently, as the Portuguese fervently desired. Aside from the fact that Lisbon was widely regarded as a splendid city, it had strategic advantages. By the 1580s, there was relative quiet in Italy and the Mediterranean, but struggles with

France, Britain and the Netherlands were heating up. Portugal, with its Atlantic access, would make an excellent staging area for future maritime maneuvers. After El Prudente’s return to Madrid, however, such speculation was put off.

Over the next fifteen years of Felipe II’s reign Portugal’s financial and military problems slowly mounted, as in fact they did all over the Spanish Empire. In general terms the Portuguese seemed to trust that the King had not forgotten them altogether, an impression that was heightened by the importance and influence the King seemed to attribute to Cristóvão de Moura as a key advisor and minister. Nevertheless, Felipe II’s protracted absence started to become a source of anxiety, particularly for the elite inclined to support Madrid (Labrador Arroyo, A jornada real 413). Portuguese noblemen began to abandon the court in Lisbon, since there was little hope of any consequential political activity there and even less of the kind of royal patronage and favor that kept the noble classes wealthy and busy.

Felipe III and his Portuguese kingdom

Just as it was for the nobles participating in the celebratory events of 1598-99 in Valencia, Felipe

III’s accession in 1598 was a time of new hope and optimism for the elite in Portugal, too. The royal officials Felipe II had left behind to manage the transition, including Moura, were acutely conscious that some royal attention to Portugal was overdue and hopeful they could persuade the new monarch to

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provide it. The celebration of young Felipe III’s marriage somewhere in Aragon had been in planning for

some time even before his father died, so it was understood he would go east first. However, a lot of

influential figures, both in Portugal and in Madrid, were saying the next thing the new King ought to do

after his return was to go west to Portugal, even as early as 1600.

Yet it soon emerged that the Duke of Lerma, the new king’s influential privado, was an adherent

of a new group which Portuguese notables regarded as “castelhanista” because they felt the King should

concentrate first and foremost on Castilian affairs. For the Castilianists, the King was less at the head of

the monarchy than its core. Therefore, he must not become distracted by peripheral affairs but first be

concerned with “regenerar Castela, que era o coração da Monarquia e, sem a qual, toda a Monarquia

estava enferma” (Labrador Arroyo, A jornada real 418). The entrada of 1600 was canceled. In addition, the Portuguese and other non-Castilians began to have difficulty gaining access to the King. Moura and his allies learned to regard Lerma as a powerful enemy of Portugal. Nevertheless, they gamely continued to press and prepare for a visit in 1602. The Consejo de Estado and the King issued several statements confirming the need to go to Portugal to head off growing discontent. When again the jornada did not materialize, the Portuguese started to get ready for 1603. But much to their dismay, not only did the

King fail to visit Portugal that year, but he returned instead to Valencia. He was needed there to call up the Valencian Corts in order to confirm a number of the privileges and benefices he had conferred on

Lerma, including a lucrative tuna-fishing concession (Williams 94).

A Sisyphean process of earnest Portuguese entreaty, solemn negotiation, painstaking preparation and ultimate disillusionment was repeated and drawn out over the following fifteen years.

Occasionally the excuses coming from Madrid were perfectly understandable, as for example in 1611 when the King’s grief over losing his beloved wife Margarita made travel unthinkable. But as often as not, the reasons for delay struck the Portuguese as unserious, if not downright cynical. Over time, the lack of royal presence came to be interpreted in Portugal as active contempt, rather than neglect.

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Portuguese sentiment hardened from frustration into bitterness. As the Conde de Ficalho put it in 1603,

“los portugueses an entrado en sospecha y desconfianza de que por tenerlos v. md. en poco no los

favorece con su real p[re]sencia y les parece que aquel reino se há reducido a provincia como si hubiera

sido conquistado” (Qtd. in Labrador Arroyo, A jornada real 431). Being deprived of the monarch’s presence for a long period of time was sufficient to wear away the carefully-constructed image Felipe II and his supporters had created of a wholly independent kingdom of Portugal. The King’s long absence alone showed he could not be considered Portuguese. Moreover, as long as an absentee wore the crown, Portugal was as good as dominated by a foreign power.

Portuguese literary patriotism in the Philippine period

For Félix Labrador Arroyo, the first and sharpest of the series of disappointments over the

Portuguese jornada in 1602-03 intensified a sense of the fruitlessness of Portuguese national institutions and a feeling that the court and Kingdom were falling into decay. This in turn prompted the publication of a spate of literary works in Portugal that “procurava manifestar publicamente a importância de Lisboa e o lugar central que ocupava na estrutura política filipina e a sua situação geo-estratégica privilegiada como capital do império” (A jornada real 431). Seen this way, the patriotic Portuguese literature of the early 1600s was a kind of psychological compensation for the repeated frustrations of the country’s nationalist pretensions in the Philippine era—especially the desire for the King’s return to Lisbon.

Another way of putting it would be to say that, just as chivalry had retreated to the virtual world of literature in an age that could no longer sustain it, so Portuguese national aspirations retreated to the printed page from an unfavorable political reality in the early 1600s.

Most of the works Labrador Arroyo cites as examples, however, were produced not before but after the long-anticipated royal visit to Portugal, making them hard to explain in terms of Portuguese

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disappointment over the King’s constant postponement of travel plans between 1600 and 1619.12 I will

address this point at the end of this chapter.

Moreover, Portuguese patriotism was not invented in 1580; in fact, it was an identifiable cultural current with notable manifestations not only in literature, such as Camões’ Os Lusíadas (1572), but also in the visual arts before the formation of the Dual Monarchy. Sylvie Deswarte-Rosa has traced the development of several patriotic themes related to Portugal and Lisbon through early modern engravings and other illustrations, primarily of the 16th century (Histoire mythique et images). One

group of such images represents Portugal as venerable for its great antiquity. Deswarte-Rosa cites examples from Francisco de Holanda’s De Aetatibus Mundi Imagines (1545), like the artist’s

representation of Ulysses’ legendary founding of Lisbon (100-1). Holanda places this detail below his depiction of biblical hero Samson in order to associate Portuguese antiquity with biblical chronology

(Figure 4.1). Another way Holanda suggests Portuguese importance in the same work is by highlighting the westward progress of imperial hegemony through the ages, from Babylon to Rome via Egypt and

Greece, ever closer to the westernmost extreme of Europe—Portugal (Figures 4.2 and 4.3). Portugal’s westernmost position in Europe is represented as placing it at the highest point of Christendom in figurative maps that represented Europe as Regina Mundi. The idea behind this image was medieval, but it gained new currency in the middle of the 16th century, when Austrian Johannes Putsch produced a simplified, more attractive version to celebrate Habsburg hegemony in Europe (Figure 4.4). If the Iberian

Peninsula corresponds to the head of the European body composed of Christian kingdoms, then it is only natural for a patriotic Portuguese poet like Bernarda Ferreira de Lacerda to address Portugal as, “tu mi patrio reyno Lusitano, / Que de muchos de Europa eres corona” (1v).

12 The works in question are Luís Mendes de Vasconcelos’ Do sítio de Lisboa (1608), Frey Nicolao de Oliveira’s Livro das Grandezas de Lisboa (1620) and the first of Manuel Severim de Faria’s Discursos varios políticos (1624). Given the late date of the latter works, it may be more reasonable to suppose that Felipe III’s appearance in Portugal in 1619 gave new impetus to the Portuguese desire to make Lisbon the Spanish capital.

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All this notwithstanding, Portuguese greatness is not the primary focus of the 16th-century images and texts examined by Deswarte-Rosa. Holanda places his material on Portugal in details half- hidden below the main images. Further, whatever the Portuguese take on Europa Regina, the original imagery was from elsewhere.

There is, as Labrador Arroyo suggests, a real increase in intensity and frequency of the literary expression of Portuguese national pride later, during the exasperating period of Habsburg neglect. This notion is developed and defended at some length by other scholars prior to Labrador Arroyo, most notably Hernâni Cidade in his A Literatura Autonomista sob os Filipes (ca. 1940).

Until Cidade’s work, scholarly interest in the politics and letters of Portugal during the Habsburg interlude had been limited, initially, perhaps because the length and bitterness of the Portuguese War of

Restoration (1640-68). The relationship between Portugal and its powerful neighbor would continue to be delicate even after Felipe IV of Spain formally renounced claims to Portugal in 1668. Moreover, as was the case elsewhere, Portuguese literary criticism was marked by nationalist passions throughout the

19th and into the 20th centuries. Consequently, as A.M. Hespanha (1989), Ronald Cueto (1992) and others have noted, for some time Portuguese scholars seem to have been reluctant to look very deeply into what was generally considered a dark period of alien occupation and repression, when nothing of any patriotic interest could possibly have been written.

Cidade shows that in fact it is impossible to really understand much of the literary production in

Portugal between 1580 and 1640 without taking it as intensely patriotic. In fact, Cidade argues, "não houve época de mais exaltado orgulho nacional" than the Philippine period (27). Naturally, Portuguese writers of the Iberian Union confronted substantial limits in the specific ways nationalist sentiment could express itself. It was impossible to print an outright anti-Habsburg manifesto nor to advocate openly for, say, the House of Braganza’s right to the throne. But short of those extremes, there were a number of alternative rhetorical strategies for expressing national pride. Cidade describes the general

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thrust of the themes of this literature as “autonomist” to make clear that what he is referring to are

works emphasizing the unique and prominent character of Portugal within the accepted political regime

of the House of Austria’s dominions. These authors conceived of the new political arrangement between

Portugal and Spain as the Dual Monarchy, rather than the Iberian Union.

Cidade divides autonomist works into helpful categories defined by genre, theme or rhetorical

strategy. For example, the Portuguese national mission of having a civilizing influence, especially in Asia,

inspires a number of pious news accounts (relações) of the heroic deeds of Portuguese missionaries in

India and Japan. Another common genre is the linguistic commentary, such as Duarte Nunes de Leão’s

Origem da Língoa Portuguesa (1606). Cidade notes that many of authors get carried away with their

national pride and make exaggerated claims about the superior intrinsic nature of Portuguese, often

because of its supposedly closer resemblance to Classical Latin. Leão’s tone is more moderate; rather

than declaring Portuguese better than other languages he merely defends it as equal in dignity and

sophistication to any other language (106).13

Cidade names three more distinct but interrelated groupings that are of special interest for this study: epic poetry, historical works in prose and what Cidade calls “a literatura da esperança utópica”.

The third of these categories is really more a kind of discourse identifiable in different types of texts, especially chronicles or religious tracts. For Cidade this is a mystical strand of writing expressing a belief that the Portuguese are God’s chosen servants and destined for a providential role in the ultimate triumph of Christianity. Cidade cites as an example the passage in Frei Bernardo de Brito’s Chronica de

13 For Cidade this is a significant assertion given the power and attraction of Spanish during the late medieval and early modern periods in Portugal. Most authors, even such national heroes as Luis de Camões, author of the Portuguese national epic Os Lusíadas, often wrote in Spanish as well as Portuguese. Some, like Jorge de Montemor, alias Montemayor, published exclusively in Spanish. Cidade is not concerned: “foi perfeitamente compatível o bilinguismo cortesanesco, tanto como o humanismo das escolas superiores, com a tendência de acentuar a fisionomia espiritual da Nação, assim nos sentimentos que exaltavam a consciência colectiva, como na expressão linguística” (27). However, Pilar Vázquez Cuesta argues that Spanish cultural imperialism had profound effects on early modern Portuguese letters, including the suffocation of its nascent national theater. For more, see her A língua e a cultura portuguesas no tempo dos Filipes (1988).

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Cister (1620) where God appears to Afonso Henriques and in a long dialogue with the Portuguese king, promises he will never be far from his side and that the Portuguese king’s descendants will triumph over all.14

Brito (1569-1617) was named official chronicler of Portugal (cronista-mor) in 1614, but by that time had already published several volumes in addition to his Crónica de Cister that exemplify tendencies in the autonomist writing of his era, including his Elogios dos Reis de Portugal (1603), which included Felipe II and Felipe III and was illustrated with engravings. The first volume of Brito’s monumental Monarchia Lusitana went to print in 1597 and the second in 1609. The purpose of this series of books, as its title suggests, was to recount the full history of Portugal through its rulers. For Frei

Bernardo, however, the beginning of the story was the creation of the world, followed shortly thereafter by the founding of the Portuguese city of Setúbal by Noah’s grandson Tubal.15 Cidade exposes the

peculiar, willful form of credulity that led early modern Portuguese writers to seize on the phonetic

coincidence to attribute the modern Portuguese place name to an ancient Hebrew patriarch (88).

However, for our purposes here the sometimes fanciful specifics of Brito’s mix of legend and scripture

are less important than two essentially rhetorical characteristics touching on his method and the scope

of this work. First, for Brito and other Portuguese writers of his time the foundations of Portugal are

biblical and connected directly to God’s purpose in creating the world and guiding its subsequent

development through time. Second, Portuguese national history is conceived as, structured by and

recounted through a long succession of mostly autochthonous monarchs.

14 The legend of Afonso Henriques’ apparition had sprung up by the 15th century. What was new about Brito’s version was the detail and its extended messianic discourse (Cidade 162). 15 Brito only got as far as the founder of the first Portuguese dynasty, Conde Henrique de Borgonha when he died. His Cistercian brothers António Brandão and other successors continued writing supplemental volumes until well into the 18th century.

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A similar purpose is evident in the most notable epic poems produced in the Portugal of the

early seventeenth century.16 The list of most important works identified by Cidade begins with a work befitting the aftermath of Alcácer Quibir: Luís Pereira Brandão’s A Elegíada (1588), which laments

Sebastião I’s fall.17 By the middle of Felipe III’s reign, however, epic poets are singing the past glories of

Portuguese triumphs, as in Francisco Rodrigues Lobo’s O Condestabre de Portugal (1609), about Dom

Nuno Alvares Pereira, the hero of Aljubarrota, and Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo Castelbranco’s Affonso

Africano, poema heroico da presa d’Arzilla, e Tanger, which recounts Afonso V’s Moroccan victories

(1611).18 As Cidade notes, taken together, the heroic poetry of Portugal in the early 1600s is clearly directed towards the exaltation of the nation. In fact, Cidade goes so far as to suggest Portuguese epic under Felipe III may (unconsciously at least) “obedece a secreta directriz que de longe venha preparando a restituição de Portugal aos Portugueses, evitando que a comunidade de certos interesses políticos, transitórios—e discutíveis—se convertesse em comunidade definitiva de interesses espirituais” (58).

The question of a secret directive aside, all three of these “types” of autonomist writing do show a thematic similarity that leads them to overlap considerably. In keeping with the historiographical standards of the time, the historical texts differ from epic poetry mainly in their prose format, rather than in their attention to verifiable sources and documentary evidence. And authors often insert the

16 Cidade’s list extends to the Restoration in 1640, but I confine myself to works produced before 1619. 17 Brandão was a knight of the Ordem de Cristo from a prominent family of Oporto. He was captured at Alcácer Quibir and began to write his magnum opus while imprisoned in Morocco. His dates of birth and death are unknown. 18 Lobo (1580-1622) was one of the most widely-respected Portuguese writers of his generation. Lope de Vega spoke well of him, as did many other Iberian writers of the day. His family was based in Leiria and described as nobles of converso origin. Apart from his heroic Condestabre, he was known for bucolic works, such as his Églogas (1605), a three-part pastoral novel called A Primavera (1608, 1614), and his Côrte na Aldeia, e Noites de Inverno (1619). In its way, this last work is just as patriotic as the Condestabre. In it, Lobo represents an idealized group of philosophically-inclined gentlemen who gather at a rural estate to form their own idyllic alternative to the now- quiet court of the capital. The work includes an extended celebration of the Portuguese language. In fact, Lobo made a point of writing in Portuguese, unlike most of his contemporaries. I will provide some background on Castelbranco further on.

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utopian or messianic passages Cidade refers to into both epics and histories, such the history of the

Cistercian order by Brito.

It bears noting that there was another important type or genre of early modern Portuguese

writing that Cidade does not consider: sermons. Well-known sermonizers often published pieces they regarded as particularly significant for the well-being of the faithful and, as João Francisco Marques has shown, the topics of these works were often as political as they were religious (A Parenética Portuguesa e a Dominação Filipina). Moreover, because priests could shelter themselves in the Church to some extent, they had an unusual degree of freedom to express themselves, which they often did in autonomist ways, including the adoption of messianic or mystical discourse stressing the special status and civilizing mission of God’s Portuguese servants.

This overlap between different kinds of texts is not coincidental, but rather springs from a fundamental characteristic they all share: the kind of utopian nostalgia defined by Cioranescu. It is as if, seeing little in the present to satisfy their national self-regard, Portuguese authors look back into the past through a magic mirror that magnifies the heroic, sometimes legendary deeds of their royal forebears. Then, through prophetic discourse, they often project that more gratifying image forward into a Golden Age to come. The prediction of a return to Portuguese preeminence is not always explicit, but almost always at least implicit, if in no other way than in the fact that so much positive attention is lavished on precisely those figures of the past, like Afonso Henriques, Nuno Álvares Pereira and Afonso

V, who were most associated with Portuguese resistance to Castile.

For Pilar Vázquez Cuesta, the Portuguese literature of the Philippine era is an area of cultural production that tends to stray from nationalist defense mechanism into overcompensation. The inevitable losing comparison between subordinate Portugal and the splendor of the Spanish court and cultural life of the Siglo de Oro deepens a Portuguese “complex de inferioridade nacional que começara a aparecer no period pre-filipino, gerando como compensação psicológica a ridícula oca fanfarronice de

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que a partir de então se acusa em Espanha os Portugueses” (76). As an example of the Spanish

accusations, Vázquez cites a passage from one of Lope de Vega’s comedias in which he satirizes the vainglory of a Portuguese fidalgo who declares “me fundo / en que ben sou Portugal / que sou más que todo el mundo” (76).19

By Felipe III’s reign then, the Portuguese generally have earned a reputation for insisting publicly

and constantly on the exceptional character of their country and its people. As we will see, the praise of

the wonders of Portugal—the history of its valorous kings and other noblemen, its geographical

advantages, its ancient civilization and the exemplary religious character of its people—is the most

natural source of imagery for Portugal’s representation of itself to the King whenever he might at last

visit his Lusitanian realm.

Portugal celebrates the return of its king

In the context of a third of a century of royal abandonment, Lerma’s departure from court at the

end of 1618 should have been seized upon by the Portuguese as the providential opportunity the exiled

Portuguese fidalgos had wished for five long years before. Not only was perceived enemy Lerma out of

their way, but the King seemed to be turning to a sympathetic figure, Luis de Aliaga, a firm proponent of

a more active royal role in the management of affairs of state, especially in Portugal. Above all, assuming

that Lerma had been the greatest obstacle, with his departure suddenly the way was clear for the King

to go to Portugal.

By this time, however, many Portuguese had already been led down the garden path so many

times that they no longer believed the entrada would ever really happen. Some even took the

announcement as a kind of joke and made fun of it (Soares 418). Still, in January of 1619, when they received notification from the King of his intentions, the viceregal authorities and the Câmara of Lisbon dutifully initiated the usual preliminary measures. But It was nevertheless considered something of a

19 Vázquez takes the quote from a secondary source without identifying the original comedia.

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surprise when the news came from Madrid several months later that the King really was getting ready to

depart for Portugal (F. R. Silva 278). Preparatory efforts had to be redoubled and in the Câmara, which

had taken the lead on royal visits for many years, members began to worry they would not be able to

finish their arrangements in time.

Planning was hampered by more than the short timelines. The last royal occasion of note to be

held in Portugal had been Felipe II’s triumph nearly forty years before. Moreover, though Portuguese

royal entries had become more elaborate in the 16th century, just as they had elsewhere in Europe, even

then they had not attained the same level of polish and magnificence that Spanish occasions had.20 On

top of that, the repeated failure of the Avis dynasty to produce heirs had also diminished the number of

opportunities for the Portuguese court to develop festival practices for royal weddings (Alves 50). In the

end, Felipe II took his own court architect and other staff to raise his 1581 Lisbon entry up to Habsburg

standards—a solution which was not available in 1619. The Portuguese would not be able to recreate

the kind of spectacle typified by the Fiestas de Lerma and would have to find another way to make their

occasion memorable.

The entrada of 1619 would have to be substantially different anyway because its purpose was

poles apart from the courtly agenda of the Duke of Lerma two years earlier. Lerma’s aims were to

entertain the royal family while making an ostentatious display of his wealth and power before exiting

the political stage. In 1619, the entry was organized by Portuguese political authorities and meant to do

several very different things at once. The royal tour was supposed to provide venues for some essential

political transactions, or speech acts, such as oaths of fidelity between the Prince of Asturias and the

Portuguese Estates. On a more general level, the idea was to introduce the King to Portugal and ritually

20 In his Fastigimia (ca. 1607), Tomé Pinheiro da Veiga (1570-1656) gives a witty and detailed description of the festive occasions he attended while in Valladolid in 1605-06. His bemused perplexity at the customs and behavior of the Castilian elite and wonderment at the extraordinary opulence and inventiveness on display, express what must have been common sentiments amongst Portuguese nobles who had been exposed to the extravagant festivals of Felipe III’s court.

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cement his relationship to the realm. Above all, the festival occasions were to make sure the King was

observed by his Portuguese subjects as present in the kingdom, where he would recognize its greatness

in a palpable way.

As we have seen, scholarship on festivals such as Felipe III’s entry into Lisbon has traditionally focused on the observation that these events and their associated literature functioned as royal propaganda and served to distract the masses with spectacular, but largely frivolous entertainment. It certainly is impossible to deny that the Spanish monarchy intended public festivals to serve these purposes and that they did effectively allow the King “to manifest himself at his most magnificent in the sight of his subjects” (Strong, Splendour at Court 21). There is some evidence of such intentions in the records of the negotiations Felipe III’s advisors undertook with the Câmara to assure that the king would be received in a style commensurate with his dignity (F. R. Silva 271). Nevertheless, there were at least two more levels of meaning in any royal entry that were especially evident in Portugal in 1619.

Apart from staging the King’s power, Felipe’s royal visit to Portugal was meant to demonstrate that he and his heir were formally taking possession of the realm. Clifford Geertz colorfully explains that royal visits “locate the society's center and affirm its connection with transcendent things by stamping a territory with ritual signs of dominance. When kings journey around the countryside, making appearances, attending fêtes, conferring honors, exchanging gifts, or defying rivals, they mark it, like some wolf or tiger spreading his scent through his territory, as almost physically part of them” (Geertz,

Centers, Kings, and Charisma 16). Without a doubt, this was one of the more important purposes of the voyage from the King’s point of view, particularly as he had received a number of pointed warnings that

Portugal was on the verge of rebellion. If he did not stamp ritual signs of his dominance into the

Kingdom, there was a real risk he might lose it.

Still, as helpful as Geertz’ point is in general terms, it should not be forgotten that it was the

Portuguese, not the King, who had spent more than fifteen years insisting that it was Felipe’s duty to

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mark his Lusitanian territory. His subjects had resorted to every strategy they could think of short of

armed insurrection to persuade him to visit Portugal. Clearly, there was a burning desire at least among

some Portuguese to have themselves located at the center and to affirm their own connection with

transcendent things. It is equally clear that the only conceivable way to establish that connection was

through the King’s physical participation in a series of public performative events. In a very real sense,

the Portuguese agenda for the festival of 1619 was to establish a kind of national ownership over Felipe

III, to mark Felipe as belonging to Portugal, even as he was invited to mark Portugal as his territory.

Like Lerma in 1617, the organizers of the Portuguese jornada proposed to surprise and delight

the King. But rather than doing so in the service of the interests of one noble house, the purpose in

Portugal was to introduce the King to the more substantial qualities and historical greatness of the

whole kingdom and its people. To this end, an exclusive, aristocratic audience was not sufficient—

Felipe’s introduction to the Lusitanian kingdom would have to be as public as possible. It was crucial that

the King not only perceive Portuguese importance but also that he be seen to observe and acknowledge

it. In this way, to a large extent the festival is more about the people who create it and their pride in

their kingdom than the king who rules it.21

The imagery and events of 1619

The Portuguese did arrange some entertainments and spectacles—as really they could not fail

to do. However, these events were few, nowhere near as esthetically developed or extravagant as

similar occasions at court in Spain and as often as not were small affairs. The Duke of Aveiro invited

Felipe to do some hunting during a stay at the Duke’s estate in Azeitão (Lavanha 72v) and the King

thoroughly enjoyed a successful day’s fishing on the Coina river nearby (F. R. Silva 288). In Lisbon there were three days of bullfights in the plaza in front of the Palace, over which the Prince of Asturias

21 It should be noted also that, whereas the Fiestas de Lerma had been organized and financed through the Duke himself, his family and hechuras, the 1619 entrada was designed and paid for through a variety of public entities from around the country: the câmaras or councils of the major cities of Portugal, centrally coordinated by the Lisbon council.

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presided and a number of noblemen distinguished themselves on horseback (Lavanha 71r). However, there were no cañas or tourneys of any kind. When the King arrived at Almada, from which it was possible to see Lisbon just across the Tagus, there were luminarias and a cannonade fired off in the city to welcome him. Though the luminarias lasted for three nights and João Baptista Lavanha, official chronicler of the jornada, said Lisbon’s many hills seemed to be afire, there was nothing remotely comparable to Hinojosa’s fireworks (7r). Unlike Saldaña’s, the masques of the Portuguese entry were relatively simple affairs, mostly held by and for commoners (F. R. Silva 282).

Perhaps the clearest example of the qualitative differences between spectacle in Lerma and events in Portugal was in the area of theatrical presentations. Though historical accounts mention several comedias, few have generated lasting interest, and only two survived in published form (F. R.

Silva 295).22 The most notable survival is the Tragicomedia del Rei D. Manuel, Conquistador do Oriente, performed by the students of the Jesuit Colégio de Santo Antão in Lisbon and composed by their

Rhetoric Master, Padre António de Sousa. This piece was less about King Manuel himself than the imperial adventures of the founders and defenders of the Portuguese Empire. These events are recounted in such minute detail that the play had hundreds of parts and took two days to be performed in full.

In his dedication to the King, the anonymous author of a pamphlet describing the play, informs him that the idea behind the retelling of Portugal’s imperial history was to flatter the King by celebrating

“o descobrime[n]to & conquista do Orie[n]te, & algu[m]as outras felicidades do serenissimo Rey D.

Manoel vosso bisavo, a que[m] V. Magestade igualme[n]te no valor das empreças & conquistas, & no amor & benignidade aos vassalos tãto ao vivo representa, q[ue] nos parece gozamos de sua Real presença” (Tragicomedia intitulada el rey don Manuel n. pag.).23 Behind this polite, rhetorical claim to

22 I will comment on Jacinto Cordeiro’s Comedia de la entrada del Rey em [sic] Portugal later. The texts of Sor Violante do Céu’s Comedia de Santa Engracia and Manuel Gallegos’ Entrada de Felipe en Portugal have been lost. 23 The addition of the omitted letters is mine.

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be congratulating the king for being as glorious a ruler as his great-grandfather, however, it is possible to

make out other designs. First, as was typical of early modern Jesuit theater, the work seemed to have a

didactic purpose: to teach the King—and possibly the students of the Colégio—about the past glories of

Portugal.

Beyond that, there was yet another, subtler but no less important point. Lisa Voigt perceptively points out that this text (among others connected with the 1619 entrada) seems to be composed and published in order to “spread the fame of Portuguese grandeur” as far and wide as possible (25). That is why, though the Tragicomedia was not open to the public, it nevertheless became a public highlight of the festival through its retelling in writing. In 1620, the year after the previously-mentioned pamphlet,

João Sardinha Mimoso published a volume of more than 350 pages featuring extremely detailed descriptions of the costumes, scenery, dances, and citing many of the words both spoken and sung by the various historical and allegorical characters of what Father Mimoso claimed was “la mas grandiosa cosa que en este Reyno se hizo a su Magestad” (125v). Like most of those who wrote about the events of 1619, Mimoso and the anonymous pamphleteer both wrote in Spanish, specifically declaring they did so “pera em toda Espanha se conhecer a perfeição Portugueza’’ (Mimoso n. pag.). This play was worthy of being remembered not for its dramatic quality, nor for the renown of its author, not even for the splendor of its staging, but because it would serve to extend Portugal’s fame internationally.

The other more notable components of the 1619 festival were also public occasions that served largely as pretexts for everyone to celebrate the local and national communities and emphasize their personal connections to the crown. The way fortress-town Elvas celebrated Felipe’s arrival across the border on May 9th, 1619 set the pattern that would be followed by almost all the places the royal party

visited (F. R. Silva). On the evening of their arrival in town the King and his family viewed a triumphal arch built at the entrance to the city and listened to a welcoming speech. Since it was late, the travelers retired to a local Dominican house for dinner and much-needed rest. The full official welcome took place

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the next day, when the king was given a proper procession beneath the palio, citizens stood at their doors singing and throwing flowers and the authorities made speeches and ceremonially surrendered the keys of the city to the King. Local notables and officials of the Portuguese court met the King in Elvas and formally kissed his hand in obeisance. There were three days and nights of dancing, luminarias and other typical celebratory activity, such as gifts of local manufactures and products.

Very few of the more noteworthy events before arrival in Lisbon fell out of the general pattern sketched out in Elvas. There were a couple of exceptions, however, in regional center Évora. At arrival, the King was shown a series of frescoes displaying local history and hagiography. A few days later, the royal party attended an auto de fe in which 124 sinners were judged and where eight women and four men were committed to the flames. Even these unusual features served the same aims, however, as the more common processions and hand-kissing. Felipe presided over the maintenance of the religious order of the Kingdom at the auto, and acknowledged local identity and tradition in publicly showing his appreciation for the frescoes.

The main stage of the jornada, however, was the capital city; there the full flower of Portuguese pride could unfold. The nature and purpose of the events featured in Lisbon differed from those taking place elsewhere more by their scale and execution than in their nature or purpose. These occasions were public political drama and imagery highlighting Portuguese national virtues. Those demonstrated by the acts of the kings predominated. Moreover, the size and style of events were raised to a new level befitting the Kingdom’s metropolis.

The anticipation of events in Lisbon was heightened by a month-long delay. Organizers in the capital needed more time to put final touches on the spectacles there so, while the King was still in

Montemor-o-Novo the Câmara sent word requesting additional time. The royal cortège extended its stays in Almada, across the Tagus from the capital, and Belém, a few miles downriver from Lisbon. These locations were close enough to Lisbon to allow for a steady stream of dignitaries to make their way to

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Felipe and kiss his hand. The King held a series of audiences, legal hearings and other official activities

lasting the better part of three weeks. These meetings were occasionally interrupted by religious

celebrations, such as fireworks on the Feast of St. John the Baptist and pious trips to sanctuaries of

different kinds.

One exception to the King’s exclusion from Lisbon made the theatrical character of events very

plain. This was his “secret” visit to the city on May 30th for the Feast of Corpus Christi. The King could

hardly miss such an important event, but it came before the city was otherwise ready for him. So, it was

decided he, his children and the Princess of Asturias would make a surreptitious day-trip to Lisbon just

for the event. But it was very much an open secret. The night before the procession, town criers warned

Lisbon’s citizens to stay away from the landing and the Paço da Ribeira.24 After the splendid procession,

by the time the royal party boarded its brigantine for the trip back to Almada, an enormous crowd had

gathered hoping for a glimpse of the King (Sá 6v). The polite fiction of secrecy was the perfect solution— the King did his pious, civic duty in observing the extravagant Portuguese spectacle, but because his attendance was unofficial there was no need to have his formal entry ready and the craftsmen could continue their work.

This public make-believe of the secret visit gave the craftsmen and artists of the realm more time to develop the real showpieces of the jornada: thirty-five large, richly decorated triumphal arches

which were going up in prominent places all over the city. The Câmara organized and financed this

display by asking each of the various corporate bodies of the citizenry to sponsor a temporary arch

adorned with elaborate sculpture, painting and architectural ornaments. Each was emblazoned with

historical and allegorical representations, including emblems or devices relating to the sponsoring

organization, the city, the kingdom and the King. In this way, the city fathers assured indirectly that the

24 The Paço da Ribeira was the royal palace overlooking the banks of the Tagus which Felipe II had renovated during his stay.

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decorations would give a representative vision of Portuguese society—albeit one slanted towards its

wealthier and more powerful sectors.

The sponsoring groups included a few devotional or church groups, like the Familiares del Santo

Oficio. and the Oficiales de la Bandera de San Jorge. But most participating organizations were

professional guilds. More than a score of associations put up arches, from wax workers and coopers to

tailors and shoemakers. Chronicler Lavanha made thirteen of these arches, chosen from the more

impressive examples, subjects of the detailed engravings illustrating his Viage de la Catholica Real

Magestad (1623), the definitive account of the whole festival. Of these thirteen select arches, six were

commissioned by some of the more prosperous trade associations, such as the goldsmiths and jewelers,

the money minters (monederos) and the painters.

The most elaborate arches, however, were those offered by the wealthy national merchant

guilds of the city; including the Italians, Germans, English and, most prominently, the Portuguese

hombres de negocios.25 These groups were rich enough to fund especially opulent examples and also had an important financial interest in promoting themselves to the city and the King. Shortly after arriving in the capital, Felipe confirmed the rights of these groups to continue their commerce and residency. Naturally, the Arco de los Hombres de Negocios de Lisboa had pride of place. It was the first installation the King would see as he made his way into the city from the landing on the Terreiro do

Paço—the broad, flat plaza located between the quay and the city proper (Figure 4.5).26

The arches and temporary statuary surrounding them were stationary, of course, but were nevertheless conceived of in a dynamic way, as theatrical pieces that set the scenes where the King and

25 Claude B. Stuczynski explores the interesting idea that this group was composed largely of the converted Jews of the city, or that at least it was perceived that way by most people of the time. See his “Negotiated Relationships: Jesuits and Portuguese Conversos—a Reassessment” (2014). 26 The Terreiro do Paço was the most important public square in the heart of the city in the 17th century. It was located on the Tagus between the Aduana or Alfândega building, the Casa da India, the Royal Palace and the wall of the city. The King disembarked there on a richly appointed dock, which had been specially constructed for the event, and then had to cross the square on his way into the city.

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other political figures of the entrada would enact the national drama of the festival. The clearest

example of such a set piece is undoubtedly the Arco de los Flamencos. On the center of the main façade,

the artists decorated it with the conventional image of classical gorgon Discordia to represent the state

of division that then obtained in the Spanish Netherlands. Discordia stood physically dividing the coats

of arms of the nine provinces still loyal to Spain on one side, and the eight rebellious provinces on the

other (Figure 4.6). When Felipe approached the arch, a hidden mechanism miraculously drew the symbols of all the provinces together, hiding the figure of the monster.

In most cases, such special effects were not needed to get the idea across. All that was really important was that the Portuguese standing by see Felipe play out his public role of King of Portugal. It

was a relatively simple role for Felipe, he merely needed to examine and acknowledge the messages his

subjects were sending through the imagery of the triumph. The King seems to have been well aware of the purpose of the festival and to have made a real effort to gratify his Portuguese subjects. For one thing, the King complied scrupulously with Portuguese royal protocol, rather than the Burgundian and

Castilian practices he had been brought up with.27 Also, though It was customary to dispose of the temporary arches and statuary right after the king’s official reception in the city, Felipe ordered them to be left up an extra day so that he and others would have time to properly review and appreciate all of them.

The Portuguese gave every sign of being genuinely thrilled to welcome the King. Nevertheless, it is fair to say that, in general terms, Felipe was received by his Portuguese subjects very pointedly as primarily the ruler of Portugal and the Portuguese Empire. For the Portuguese, that Felipe was king of

27 Some of the more notable differences were very slight but significant variations in when and in front of whom the king might wear his hat or dismount from his horse. In a more consequential concession, Felipe even placed his life in Portuguese hands, to a degree, when he forged a face-saving compromise resolving a dispute between his personal guard and that of the Paço da Ribeira. Under Portuguese custom, the local honor guard was to take charge of the King’s household needs and security. The King’s own servants and bodyguards were shocked by the notion and objected strenuously. The King decided that his own servants would continue to attend to his person, but the Portuguese would take charge of palace security. Everyone was satisfied, especially the Portuguese.

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Leon, Castile and other territories was incidental; the important thing was that he was their sovereign, the king who belonged to them. He was the head and heart of their body politic, the saintly but long- absent husband who might need a little persuasion to return dutifully to his beautiful and rightful spouse. One of the clearer expressions of the Portuguese claim of a kind of ownership over the King comes from a sermon preached by Frei Simão da Luz in Lisbon on April 27, 1619, several months before the royal arrival. Frei Simão tells the Portuguese faithful that although all kingdoms subject to Felipe can consider themselves as naturally connected to him, “nenhum tanto à boca chea, como o nosso Portugal, porque da nossa nação Portugueza tem com excesso mais parte, que de nenhuma das outras, & assim fica sendo mais nosso natural, & mais nosso, que das demais nações” (10).

Most of the messages sent to Felipe during the entrada centered on these general ideas.

Sometimes they were expressed directly, for example, when in his welcome address to Felipe Dr. Inácio

Ferreira described Lisbon as, “feita quasi viuva” by the king’s extended absence (Lavanha 32r). But more often than not the arguments were made in slightly more subtle language, some of which was typical of royal festivals generally and some of which was more characteristic of the specific conditions of Portugal in 1619. Among the more typical discourse there was naturally a lot of extravagant praise of the King— as a solar figure, defender of the faith, an invincible warrior, etc. But as Helen Watanabe-O’Kelly observes, “panegyric often has the aim of praising the prince for a quality that one hopes he will develop;” therefore encomium can be considered a kind of, “dialogue between the praiser and the praised” (11).

On their triumphal arch, for instance, the Oficiales de la Bandera de San Jorge depict Afonso

Henriques, the founder of the independent kingdom of Portugal, offering a kingly crown and his sword to Felipe III, who is represented as a classical military hero. The corresponding epigram reads, “Esta corona ganada para vos con mi espada, i cõ el valor de mis vassallos resplandecera dignamente en vuestra cabeça” (Lavanha 37r). The compliment is obviously meant to flatter Felipe, but it also subtly

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suggests that he is expected to live up to the accomplishments of his predecessors. The text also manages to bundle in some praise of the Portuguese people.

In a similar way, all sorts of festival works referred to the glorious—and often semi-mythical— deeds and virtues of Felipe’s ancestors, the kings of Portugal. The silversmiths’ arch was not really an arch at all, but rather large panel made of the metal they were famous for working. Its imagery was especially representative of the thematics of the festival. The panel depicted a simplified family tree of the kings of Portugal, pared down to just the eighteen men who had sat upon the Portuguese throne before Felipe III, from Afonso Henriques to Felipe II (Figure 4.7). The kings were grouped chronologically in a vague way, without precise definitions of the specific generational and familial relationships between them. Although its presentation was unusually striking, given the precious metal it was made of, the imagery of this tableau was typical; most all of the arches and other ephemeral works composed for the festival favored representations that recalled and glorified Portuguese royal history in one way or another.

This discourse served several purposes. Historical comparison could be read as a kind of exemplarity designed for the King: an espejo de príncipes using glorious examples to serve the didactic purpose of illustrating how Felipe should and should not behave as king. It could also be read as a simple attempt to inform Felipe about the Portuguese past. It might equally be a rhetorical attempt to represent Felipe’s Portuguese roots as perhaps being more solid and enduring than they really were.

There will be more to say about historical-mythic discourse below. However, at this point it is important to stress one more essential purpose of the representations of historical Portuguese episodes and figures. These images were also intended for Portuguese spectators, especially those who were already perfectly familiar with them. To paraphrase Clifford Geertz, they were a form of story the

Portuguese told themselves about themselves—repeatedly—to celebrate a shared national past and the

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qualities or virtues Portuguese people shared as members of the community.28 This being the case, it

can be said that the Portuguese participants in the festival of Felipe III’s triumphal entry were

performing much more than a loyal welcome ceremony for the king. They were also performing

Portuguese identity.

Writing the Jornada de Lisboa

Given its long postponement, the outpouring of emotion it provoked and the momentous

significance attributed to Felipe III’s visit during his life, it is no wonder it inspired the composition of

more than a score of commemorative written texts. Jacobo Sanz Hermida identifies no fewer than

twenty-four published works on the jornada, including prose relaciones, official documents, and poetic

works both major and minor. He names another dozen unpublished manuscripts, several comedias and five published sermons, as well (Un viaje conflictivo). Sanz Hermida’s study is extremely careful and wide-ranging; however, because he seems to limit himself to works available in Spanish, even his catalog is probably not absolutely inclusive.

The volume and variety of these works are indicative not only of the consequence of the King’s visit itself but also the significance of recording, replaying and transmitting what the King saw in Portugal to as wide a public as possible. This purpose was accomplished through several types of texts, all of which contain substantial ekphrastic passages. This is to say that the authors of the 1619 Festival accounts tend to always include more or less detailed verbal descriptions of non-verbal art objects, such as the triumphal arches and the images festooning and surrounding them.

Most publications were straightforward relaciones, the Golden Age equivalent of journalistic prose, written to precisely replay and publicize some part of what the King saw in Portugal, or at least what he was meant to see. These works were composed and distributed by at least three different kinds

28 I refer here to Geertz’ celebrated essay on the Balinese cockfight, in which he shows that performative occasions of all kinds—even cockfights—can be considered social self-portraits insofar as their interpretation reveals one or more aspects of the cultural milieu in which they are produced (Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures 444).

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of groups. First, there were Spaniards eager to share the glory of their king’s affairs with the Spanish

reading public. A larger number of Portuguese authors wished to do the same from their angle, the most

notable being João Baptista Lavanha with his detailed and lavishly illustrated festival book, Viage de la

Catholica Real Magestad.29 Finally, a small number of mostly briefer, partial accounts were published by foreign communities, such as the German and English merchants, who wished to publicize their own impressive contributions to the festivities. Most relaciones were, logically, written in Spanish prose to assure a wider audience than might be comfortable reading Portuguese.30

More relevant to this study is another, more select group of texts that take literary form. Rather than making up a simple category, these works together formed a kind of continuum or fell on a scale between simple, descriptive relaciones en verso on one end, and texts with greater literary pretensions, on the other.

At the less-sophisticated end of the spectrum we find works like Sevillian Francisco de Arce’s

Fiestas reales de Lisboa, desde que el Rey Nuestro Señor entrò, hasta que salio (1619). This pamphlet groups the poet’s descriptions of some of the festival attractions into nine “loas” written in the ballad

(romance) form. Arce’s poetry is somewhat labored and uneven, so it is perhaps unsurprising that he interrupts the poems with a prose narration of slightly more than fifteen pages. It is clear that Arce is not aiming for high art from the beginning, however, so the introduction of the prose passage, if

29 Lavanha (ca. 1550-1624) was a remarkably erudite and influential figure. He so impressed Felipe II with his promise in the fields of cosmology, cartography and engineering that the King sent him back to Madrid in 1582 as one of the first instructors at the new Academia de Matemáticas y Arquitectura. El Prudente made him engenheiro-mor of Portugal in 1586 and cosmógrafo-mor ten years later. Felipe III honored him in several ways, not least by personally intervening to clear his way to becoming a knight of the Order of Christ despite having Jewish ancestry. El pío also named him mathematics tutor to the future Felipe IV and gave him the additional title of cronista-mor in 1618. 30 A few texts were also published in one or more other languages to extend publicity more broadly. For example, the English merchants of Lisbon had a chapbooks featuring their arch published in Spanish, Portuguese and English. The Spanish text, Maravilloso insigne y costoso arco, o Puerta que los Ingleses han hecho en el Pilouriño viejo, por donde ha de entrar su Magestad en Lisboa (n.d.) was translated into English and published as The Triumphant and Sumptuous Arch erected by the Company of English Marchants residing in Lisbone, upon the Spanish Kings entry made thereinto (1619). The Portuguese version, Porta e Arco Triunfal que a Naçaõ Ingresa Ordenou ao Recebimento, e Entrada em Lisboa da S.C.R.M. del Rei Filippe III de Espanha, e II de Portugal, o Anno de 1619 was a different text altogether (1619).

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anything, improves the text. Ana Paula Torres Megiani points out that Arce’s relación has a uniquely

popular perspective (249). The author, a relatively lowly notary or escribano, either does not care to

comment on the more high-prestige events or, more likely, does not have access to them.31 Like most other writers, he does provide detailed descriptions of some of the triumphal arches. What really distinguishes Arce’s account from others, though, is his commentary on the entertainments of regular folk, such as interactions amongst the spectators at the King’s arrival, a bullfight and popular dances.

Francisco Matos de Sá’s Entrada y triumpho que la ciudad de Lisboa hizo a la C. R. M. del Rey D.

Phelipe Tercero de las Españas, y Segundo de Portugal (1620) is a great improvement over Arce in the style and fluency of its verse. However, as Marica Benatti observes, “il poema non aggiungeva nulla di nuovo all’interpretazione dell’evento, limitandosi a redigere un altisonante panegirico dell’incontro tra il sovrano e la città, oltre a una rimata descrizione degli archi trionfali” (271). Apart from the higher quality of his composition, however, Matos de Sá’s poem is noticeably different from Arce’s in one other significant aspect, as well: its patriotic Portuguese perspective.32 The “altisonante panegirico” Benatti refers to, while it does extend to the King, of course, is mostly focused on the Portuguese and their beautiful triumphal arches.

Much the same can be said of Francisco Rodrigues Lobo’s La Iornada que la Magestad Catholica del Rey Don Phelippe III. de las Hespañas hizo a su Reyno de Portugal; y el Triumpho, y pompa con que le recibió la insigne Ciudad de Lisboa en el año de 1619 (1623). Lobo dedicates the first nine of his fifty-six occasional ballads (romances) to the preliminaries, including the Portuguese people’s eager anticipation of the King’s arrival and the King’s visits to Elvas, Évora and the other Portuguese towns. But he devotes

31 What little is known of Arce today can only be gathered from the claims he makes in the front matter of his two surviving publications. Nicolás Antonio lists these two works as the Fiestas reales de Lisboa and La perla, (1624) an account of Felipe IV’s visit to Seville (403). Bartolomé Gallardo identifies Arce as being from Seville without citing a source (Col. 1330). 32 Machado specifies that Sá was a nobleman from Freixo de Espada à Cinto, not far from the Castilian border, and attributes two further volumes of devotional poetry to him, both published in 1620 (196-7).

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the lion’s share of his attention—from Romance XX through Romance LIIII—to a minute description of

all the capital’s thirty-five triumphal arches.

Rodrigues Lobo (1580-1621) saves one of the more splendid ephemeral constructs for last: the

Arch of the Germans and the surrounding statues, which represented more than twenty figures from

the history of the Austrian Habsburgs and the Holy Roman Empire. To describe this presentation in all its

glory, the poet devotes the whole of Romances LII, LIII and LIIII to it, 352 verses altogether. In Romance

LII, Lobo sketches out the general dimensions or the arches and surrounding statuary and names the principal components, including the identities of the towns, noblemen and the provinces depicted on the ephemeral architecture. Then, in Romance LIII and LIIII, the way the poet relates the physical appearance of the artwork approaches the ekphrastic ideal of enargeia. Murray Krieger defines enargeia as the highest state of ekphrasis, in which words, “yield so vivid a description that they—dare we say literally?—place the represented object before the reader’s (hearer’s) inner eye” (8). Lobo’s representation of two paintings adorning the lower part of the seaward façade of the arch is a typical example (Figure 4.8).

El primero de los dos

A que el mar està mirando

Tiene una muger antigua

El rostro palido y largo.

Coronada de Castillos

A que los solares rayos

Los hacen resplandecer

Sus almenas matizando.

En el segundo se muestra

Un viejo desnudo, y cano

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Sobre una Concha marina

Con el Tridente azerado.

Enfrente estaba la Luna

Que con rayos argentados

En sus plateadas canas

Hazia vislumbres varios. (86v-87r)

The author explains briefly that the first figure is Cybele, and the second is Neptune before embarking

on an equally detailed description of the frieze above these paintings.

The urge to carefully record and approve so many pieces of the ephemeral architecture of the

festival, even the foreign merchants’, is a function of the poet’s patriotism. Lobo means to overwhelm

the reader with the accumulated detail of the “fabrica altiva / Desta admirable grandeza, / Deste triunfo

immortal, / Destas celebradas fiestas” in Lisbon (3r). His purpose of celebrating the nation is even

clearer at the end of the work, where the author finds himself “Hablando a su Magestad”—now Felipe

IV—directly and openly about both the strategic and aesthetic advantages of Lisbon.33 Lobo urges the

King not to delay his permanent return to the city on the Tagus given its “nuevos edificios / Mas arrogantes, mas altos” and the “fieles bassallos” that built them. Finally, the poet asserts that if he were based in Portugal the King could not fail to triumph over the “vil barbaro rebelde, / Y del sobervio

Othomano” (92r-92v).

The same objective—and more—is evident in one of the more curious commemorative works of the entrada, Portuguese dramatist Jacinto Cordeiro’s first published work, entitled Comedia de la entrada del Rey em [sic] Portugal (1621).34 As José Ares Montes points out, the work is “un producto

33 Felipe III died on March 31, 1621 and Lobo followed in November of the following year. La Iornada got final approval for publication in March of 1623, but the initial license was issued in November, 1621 (n.p.). Though Lobo probably began composing his poems in 1619, he would have had a lot of time to polish and alter them thereafter. 34 There is some uncertainty about Cordeiro’s year of birth. The Comedia de la entrada was published in 1621. Diogo Barbosa Machado’s Bibliotheca Lusitana places the author’s birth in 1606, which would have made him

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híbrido de comedia noticiera y comedia de enredo” with anti-Castilian and, of course, Portuguese

nationalist overtones.35 The comedy of errors surrounding the love interests of the play is forgettable and only serves as a thin disguise cast carelessly over the news reportage. This dramatic camouflage slips off in the second jornada, when some of the characters in the play who are waiting for a procession to begin decide to pass the time by competing with one another to present the most detailed description of the triumphal arches.

What is perhaps most interesting about the work is Cordeiro’s use of the figure of the King as a character. In the first jornada, Felipe and the Duke of Uceda stand on a balcony overlooking the splendors of the city and discuss the outstanding character of the Portuguese. Even Uceda, son of former Castilianist privado Lerma, must recognize that Lisbon “Llevar el lauro mereçe / de las Ciudades de España”. The King responds: “Ansi duque me pareçe / por mi Corona Real / de agradecer tanto amor

/ y hazerle en todo favor / al Reyno de Portugal” (6r). This is one of the passages that lead Lisa Voigt to the observation already discussed in Chapter Two that the purpose of festival accounts is often less to represent the kingdom’s reaction to royal magnificence than to dramatize the local community’s “effect on the Spanish visitors, and particularly its success in eliciting the King’s goodwill” (24). To take Voigt’s analysis one step further, we could say that in Cordeiro’s play, the importance accorded to the King’s simple act of appreciating the festival makes explicit what is merely implicit in other festival texts. The festival of 1619 itself is a dramatization of the greatness of the Kingdom in which the King is cast in the role of Portugal’s greatest admirer.

The last of the long poetic works to be written on the jornada was Gregório de São Martim’s El triumpho mas famoso que hizo Lisboa a la entrada del Rey Don Phelippe Tercero d’España y Segundo de

fifteen years old at that time, and presumably thirteen or fourteen when he wrote the play (462). José Ares Montes thinks this chronology improbable (33). Cordeiro had modest success as a dramatist, writing mainly in Spanish, but did well also in his native Portuguese after the Braganza Restoration in 1640. He died in 1646. 35 To support the claim of anti-Castilianism, Ares Montes points out that Cordeiro emphasizes the crushing character of the Portuguese victory over Castile at the battle of Aljubarrota.

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Portugal (1624).36 São Martim’s poem responds to previous works. His piece was published a full year

after Lavanha’s Viage de la Catholica Real Magestad, three years after Felipe III’s death and a full five

after the entrada itself. It also followed the publication of the first major poetic work on the events—

Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo Castelbranco’s Triumpho del Monarcha Philippo Tercero en la Felicissima

Entrada de Lisboa (1619) —by more than four years.37 We will get back to Castelbranco’s poem shortly.

That the author took his time in developing his poem is evident in its formal characteristics, length and exhaustive detail. The Triumpho mas famoso takes the dignified heroic form, being organized in seven cantos of between 56 and 239 stanzas in octava rima each, for a total of 7,464 verses. São

Martim claims his purpose in writing is to correct the omissions of previous writers, none of whom recount “por extenso lo que yo relato, qual convenia para tanta grandeza: y ansi por servir a la patria, y eternizar su nombre, y los memorables hechos de mis naturales, trabaje por alcãçar todo lo que he podido” (n.p.). It is true that São Martim not only describes many of the triumphal arches of the celebration in fine detail, but also describes events not covered by previous poets. Like Castelbranco before him, he weaves highlights of Portuguese history into his narration. Moreover, São Martim adds the proceedings of the Cortes (Canto VI) and the death of Felipe III in 1621 (Canto VII). São Martim’s aspiration to produce a definitive, all-inclusive festival work in the epic form places his Triumpho mas

36 Even less is known about São Martim than about other minor Portuguese poets of the era. Machado notes that he was born in Lisbon, though he cannot say in what year. Machado goes on to say São Martim’s wife was Lope de Vega’s niece, but he does not name her. The poet published three volumes of poetry that Machado identifies. Most of his works were occasional; the last was published in 1642 to celebrate João IV’s accession to the Portuguese throne. 37 The full composition and spelling of this author’s name has never been standardized. On his published works, different spellings of the family names Mousinho and Quevedo are the most frequent: Mausinho, Mouzinho, Mauzinho, Cabedo, Quebedo and Queuedo. Fewer texts add “Castelbranco, Castellobranco or Castelo Branco”. Nicolás Antonio devotes two separate entries to him, apparently believing Vasco Mousinho de Castelbranco and Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo were two different authors (322). Somewhat arbitrarily, I have selected the inclusive form and modern spelling preferred by María Vitalina Leal de Matos, author of a useful general critique of the poet’s work (1998). My preference for this version is due in part to the fact that it can be handily reduced to “Castelbranco”, rather than “Quevedo”, thereby avoiding any possible confusion of the Portuguese poet with more celebrated Spaniard Francisco de Quevedo. There appears to be no consensus, however, not even in the present day, probably due to the poet’s obscurity. A number of recent scholars—including Luís Gomes and Manuel dos Santos Rodrigues—refer to the poet as “Quevedo”.

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famoso at the more self-consciously artistic end of the range of occasional works based on the 1619

jornada.

São Martim’s talent as a poet, however, does not give him the means to fulfill his ambition. The

sheer volume of description, the inevitable repetition and the difficulty of successfully relating disparate

kinds of material to one another cause the same kinds of problems for São Martim as they did for

Gaspar Aguilar in the Fiestas nupciales. The text of El triumpho mas famoso is heavy with reiteration and

the poet often transitions from one matter to another without a clear guiding principle or design.38

The poet makes another claim regarding his improvements over previous poets’ works on the jornada which will eventually lead us to the weakness at the heart of his festival epic. São Martim asserts he has a more straightforward poetic voice than his contemporaries.39 He defines himself in

opposition to unworthy poets who, “gastando el tiempo en fabulas, y amores profanos, destruyen con sus profanidades a las Ciudades, Villas, y Aldeas, de donde los mochachos aprenden tanta multitud de cantares perversos, y mundanos” (n.p.). The poet mentions the fictional hero Amadís de Gaula, and so seems to be referring in part to romances of chivalry, which were often criticized by anyone with pretensions of literary taste. However, he also cites the character Ruggiero as an example of deplorable poetic excess. São Martim suggests the celebrated figure from the more fanciful epic tradition of

Boiardo and Ariosto is undignified or even harmful because he represents the introduction of obviously fictional, fantastic and / or mythological elements into what should be serious works of art. This is something the poet affirms he will avoid: “para mi historia no es hermoso / Traer qual otros Poetas

38 São Martim’s tone and style, marked by frequent moral exhortations and a general lack of subtlety, do not help. Ares Montes’ judgment that São Martim is “machacón, retórico y escaso poeta” is harsh, but not unjustified (24). 39 In fact, São Martim repeats the notion that competing poets are envious of his more elevated style so often that it weighs his poem down. Octave 7 of Canto I offers an especially clumsy example. São Martim represents his contemporaries’ envy as a dragon in the previous stanza and then needlessly extends the metaphor without really deepening or developing it: “El veneno de esta brava sierpe / Con infernales rabias siempre brama, / Es muy peor que la terrible hierpe, / Tanto fuego de si enciende y llama: / Maltrata mas que el mas agudo esterpe, / Y do llega qual Bibora lo inflama, / Haziendo variar los no entendidos / Que para la maldad son muy sabidos” (2r).

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fingimiento / De fantasticas a las de visiones / Por ilustrar sus vanas intenciones” (19v).40 As Elizabeth

Davis has shown (among others), in the early modern era there is a divide between poets and critics who prefer the lively and inventive novelesque or fastastic epic—in Ariosto’s style—and purists who favor the higher-minded “épica culta” of Tasso and his followers (4). São Martim, then, aligns himself with the latter group.

Unfortunately for São Martim, however, a comparison to Tasso does not favor the Portuguese occasional poet. In the case of Tasso’s masterwork, Gerusalemme Liberata, any limits the poet may have imposed on his own fancy are compensated for—at least to some extent—by the elevation and scope of his subject matter. By contrast, São Martim’s subject, Felipe III’s jornada in Portugal, as important as it was in the political context of 1619, really was not on the same level of momentousness as the retaking of the Holy City from the Muslims. Indeed, as we have seen, an occasional poem by its very nature would tend to fail Tasso’s test for the selection of an appropriate heroic theme because its subject matter is too recent to avoid colliding with living memory. To make Felipe’s triumphal entry into a poem of more than passing interest would require a fertile poetic imagination, a poet with a broad and deep enough vision of the occasion to connect it to larger issues and the poetic talent necessary to overcome the difficulties.

Leaving the limits of his artistic talent aside, São Martim, having ruled out introducing an imaginative or fantastical dimension to his poem, could not be the kind of poet to make a success of the festival epic. In the end, for all the ekphrastic and other detail he includes, the poet’s unwillingness or inability to engage the world of poetic fancy or produce his own vision means he is unable to engage the reader’s imagination. Though his poem may be far longer and somewhat broader in scope and ambition than others, it nevertheless remains relentlessly flat throughout.

40 Ares Montes points out that São Martim’s criticism of the use of fantastical characters and dream sequences “no le impide echar mano del sueño premonitorio y de la aparición de un anciano, que resulta ser el Tiempo, y hasta de Apolo, que le augura fama perdurable” (24).

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In a context where São Martim is competing with a number of other poets for literary attention, it seems likely his criticism of fanciful poetry is directed at the only other festival poet working in the epic form: Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo Castelbranco, author of the first and most notable of the longer festival poems. As we will see, Castelbranco not only indulges extensively in the kind of poetic fancy São

Martim scorns, but was also capable of using it to make his festival epic, the Triumpho del Monarcha a remarkable work. In fact, if one compares the two poets in terms of artistic skill and technique,

Castelbranco stands much taller than São Martim, especially in light of the positive reception given to his earlier epic poems, Discurso sobre a vida, e morte, de Santa Isabel Rainha de Portugal (1596) and

Affonso Africano, mentioned previously (1611). The fact that the Câmara de Lisboa asked Castelbranco to write the Triumpho del Monarcha is a clear signal that in general the poets’ contemporaries regarded

Castelbranco as one of the more prominent and accomplished of the era (J. M. Silva 221). Given all this, it is hard to avoid the suspicion that São Martim’s invective against the envy of other poets may well be born of his own wounded pride or jealousy.

Castelbranco’s life and poetic reputation

Writing in the 19th-century, critic José Maria da Costa e Silva remarks that the early modern

Portuguese were especially bad record-keepers and as a result there is little reliable documentary material available on the lives of the writers of the period—not even in parochial registers of births and deaths (219). Documents about Castelbranco are especially scarce—no one can even be sure of the dates of his birth and death—although it is generally supposed he was born between 1560 and 1580.

There is no consensus on the date of his death, but it must have been in or after 1627, the date associated with his last known written work. One thing that the few readily-available sources generally agree on is that he was widely respected by his peers.

The first notable source on Castelbranco is his contemporary Jacinto Cordeiro. In his Elogio de

Poetas Lusitanos (1631), Cordeiro comments briefly on significant Portuguese authors Lope de Vega had

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omitted from his Laurel de Apolo. Cordeiro devotes an octave to Castelbranco, starting with an allusion

to the author’s greatest success, the “valiente” epic Affonso Africano, the foundation of Castelbranco’s

status as “Camões segundo en muchas opiniones”. Cordeiro then goes on to lament the way a lack of

patronage made life difficult for Castelbranco (126).

Apart from a list of publications, Nicolás Antonio adds just one biographical detail—which is

available from the title pages of the poet’s works—that Castelbranco is from Setúbal (322).41 Machado does not name his sources, but adds a few fresh points: the poet’s father was called Francisco Mousinho and Castelbranco spoke Italian well (777). His capacity for writing in Spanish and Latin were already

evident in his published poetry. As late as 1826, romantic writer, politician and critic João Baptista de

Almeida Garrett has little to say about Castelbranco’s life, but is still praising the beauty of “esse tão mal

avaliado Affonso Africano” (17). Almeida Garrett goes on to assert it was a better poem than more popular works like Francisco de Sá de Meneses‘ “hyperborea e campanuda Malaca” (1634) and Gabriel

Pereira Castro’s “quixotica e sesquipedal Ulyssea” of 1636 (17-8).

Influential writer and literary historian Costa e Silva (1788-1854) does not set out to either add or take anything away from the portrait of Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo Castelbranco as a man. But his commentary on the poet’s work has an important, if ambivalent, effect on the modern understanding of

Castelbranco’s importance in Portuguese letters.

One notable aspect of Costa e Silva’s criticism on Castelbranco is what it does not include. Costa e Silva says he is unable to find a copy of the poet’s Discurso sobre a vida, e morte, de Santa Isabel

Rainha de Portugal & outras varias Rimas. He confesses he does not regret missing Castelbranco’s elegy to the saintly Queen, but does say he would have liked to have a look at the Várias Rimas, so as to be

41 Apart from the Triumpho del Monarcha, just two works were published by Castelbranco during his lifetime: the previously mentioned Santa Isabel Rainha and his Affonso Africano. Antonio includes an additional, unfinished piece in his list of works, Dialogos de Varia Doutrina (1627), but it remained in manuscript form until Rubém Amaral edited and incorporated it into his Emblemática Lusitana e os Emblemas de Vasco Mousinho de Castelbranco (2005).

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able to assess the poet’s lyrical work (238-9). The critic does not mention Castelbranco’s then- unpublished manuscript, Diálogos de Varia Doutrina of 1627 and probably made no effort to read it. By omitting these works, Costa e Silva misses not only a fair part of the author’s lyrical work, but also

Castelbranco’s contributions to emblematic literature in Portugal.

Castelbranco includes fifty brief poetic texts in Santa Isabel Rainha which are meant to accompany well-known images from two famous European books of emblemata: Pierio Valeriano’s

Hieroglyphica (1556) and Claude Paradin’s Devises heroïques (1557).42 There are twenty-one such captions in the Diálogos de Vária Doutrina which are based on scenes from the Aeneid and Ovid’s

Metamorphoses. Despite the fact that Castelbranco appears to be the first author to adapt popular emblems for a Portuguese readership, critics—including Costa e Silva—show little interest in these works until late in the 20th century.43 There will be more on Castelbranco’s use of emblematic imagery further ahead.

Costa e Silva’s evaluation of Castelbranco’s better-known works is equivocal. On the positive side, Costa e Silva takes the poet very seriously and, on the whole, expresses great admiration for

Affonso Africano. Costa e Silva, like São Martim before him, has little taste for allegorical or mystical material in verse, of which there is quite a bit in Castelbranco’s best-known poem. But the critic acknowledges nonetheless that it is “obra de grande merecimento, apesar dessas malaventuradas

42 No engravings are included with Castelbranco’s texts. Rubém Amaral, noting the deterioration of typography in Portugal in the late 16th century, theorizes that the author and his publisher could not afford to reproduce the graphics (37). 43 One of the earlier studies of this aspect of Castelbranco’s work is Teresa Maria Reis Calado Tavares’ master’s thesis, entitled “Os Emblemas de Vasco Mousinho Quevedo de Castelbranco” (1988). Ten years later, in her brief, general review of Castelbranco’s life and works, Matos finds evidence of Castelbranco’s fascination with emblems in the imagery of his other works, specifically in the rest of his Várias Rimas¸ Rubém Amaral makes two contributions in his Emblemática Lusitana, a compilation of emblematic poems from Várias Rimas and Diálogos de Vária doutrina (first published in 2000). Amaral matches Castelbranco’s captions with the corresponding illustrations from other emblematic works that most likely inspired the Portuguese author. Amaral also extends Matos’ line of thinking by exploring correspondences between emblematic images and passages in Santa Isabel Rainha. Most recently, Luís Gomes has studied Castelbranco’s emblems and their relationship to other texts by the poet, including his religious sonnets. See his “Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo Castelo Branco: Emblems in Portuguese” (2008) and “Emblemática nos Sonetos Religiosos de Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo Castelo Branco” (2010).

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alegorias” (241). The primary criterion on which he bases his approval is revelatory of the nationalist

direction Portuguese criticism was taking by the time Costa e Silva was writing in the mid-1850s. Affonso

Africano has real merit because “o assumpto deste Poema é a Conquista de Arzila, e Tanger por El-Rei D.

Affonso V., assumpto na verdade bem escolhido, e em que ha todo o grandioso, e interesse nacional,

que se exige para uma Epopeia” (241).

While Costa e Silva devotes a lot of attention to Castelbranco’s Triumpho del Monarcha—unlike

his contemporaries—he also applies the same nationalist criterion to his judgment of this work and finds it wanting. Though he does allow “se observam trechos que abonam o muito merecimento poetico do

Author,” ultimately Costa e Silva cannot find any specific points in the whole of the poem to admire. The fault is not in the author’s poetry exactly, but rather in the poet’s lack of nationalist foresight, or his inability to express national pride in the way it would be understood by future generations, such as

Costa e Silva’s. For example, Costa e Silva objects to Castelbranco’s use of the word “restituida” to describe the Portuguese crown’s unification with Castile in 1580. As the critic notes; “restitue-se o que se rouba, ou que se usurpa, mas Portugal não foi usurpado, ou roubado a Castella. Uma parte foi cedida pelo Rei D. Affonso VI. a sua filha D. Theresa, o resto conquistado aos Mouros pela espada dos nossos

Reis, e o esforço dos nossos antepassados” (239). Most of Costa e Silva’s commentary on the poem is like this: pointed disagreements with one or another of the political details. On a more general level,

Costa e Silva criticizes Castelbranco’s decision to accept the Câmara de Lisboa’s commission and write not only about a perishable topic—a political festival—but more importantly, an occasion celebrating “o jugo Hespanhol”. For Costa e Silva, the work has justly fallen into oblivion because “só algum Portuguez degenerado, e partidista da usurpação: que felizmente eram mui raros, podia achar prazer lendo os louvores dos seus inimigos, e vendo a pintura dos obsequios, tributados, não de coração, áquelle que disputava a corôa, e o sceptro ao Rei legitimo” (221). In a word, two centuries after the Braganza

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Restoration, when 19th-century Portuguese national pride looks back on the Philippine era it can no longer recognize itself in 17th-century autonomism.

From this point forward there was a later tendency to even broader misunderstanding of

Castelbranco and his poetry evident in Domingo García Peres’ Catálogo razonado biográfio y bibliográfico de los autores portugueses que escribieron en castellano (1890). Peres generally has good things to say about the quality of the poet’s work and is interested enough to do some well-intentioned, if not entirely trustworthy investigation into Castelbranco’s life. Unable to find the poet’s birth records, he supposes Castelbranco was illegitimate. He then interviews unnamed members of the Cabedo /

Quevedo branch of the poet’s family and also consults unspecified genealogical sources and finds his suspicions confirmed. More to the point for my purposes, Peres judges that Castelbranco was a

“sectario entusiasta (antes y después d la emancipación del reino) del partido español, contra la opinion de sus afines” (475).44 To support this conclusion, Peres makes two arguments based more on psychological speculation than the evidence. First, he asserts Castelbranco must have harbored resentment towards his countrymen for having been treated as a bastard. Second, he notes the poet

“llegó á castellanizar el apellido de Cavedo en Quevedo” (475).45

There are several problems with Peres’ speculation, but the weaknesses in his assertions about

Castelbranco’s identification with Castile and repudiation of his native Portugal are the most significant.

For a start, the curious variations in spelling of the Cavedo / Cabedo / Quevedo family name can hardly

serve as reliable evidence of the poet’s affinity for all things Spanish, given that by Castelbranco’s day

44 It is certainly possible Castelbranco lived until after the Restoration of 1640, but if Peres has a reason to suppose the poet lived that long, he does not say what it is. Since the poet’s last known work, the unfinished Dialogos de varia doutrina, dates from 1627, it is equally possible he died right around that time. 45 Peres knows better than to base his argument on Castelbranco’s decision to write the Triumpho del Monarcha in Spanish. As we have seen, most Portuguese authors of the era wrote in both Spanish and Portuguese, and were logically motivated to choose Spanish for their occasional pieces on the Festival of 1619. Castelbranco’s decision to do the same in the Triumpho del Monarcha says nothing about his national feelings.

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neither firm naming conventions nor standardized orthography had not been established in Portugal—

nor in Spain, for that matter.

By the 20th century, literary critics are prepared to take a fresh look back on Castelbranco within the context of his times and begin to reveal his anti-patriotic reputation as unfounded. As we have seen,

Cidade places the author’s work in a prominent position squarely within the autonomist tradition of the

Philippine era. Vázquez notes that Castelbranco’s contemporaries, even poets with unquestioned nationalist credentials, such as Rodrigues Lobo and Cordeiro, compose adulatory occasional poetry in

Spanish, just like Castelbranco (88, 90-1).

Manuel dos Santos Rodrigues goes the furthest to debunk Peres’ theories, first by undermining the psychological motivation for Castelbranco’s supposed Castilian affinity: the resentment he felt for being treated as illegitimate. Rodrigues points out that in fact, by Peres’ own findings, Castelbranco was not himself illegitimate.46 More importantly, Rodrigues cites concrete textual evidence from the poet’s work clearly showing his devotion to the land of his birth—even a willingness to push the limits of permissible discourse under the Habsburg monarchy’s dominion. The critic notes that Castelbranco refers to the pain of the losses at Alcácer Quibir in all his major works, even those not directly pertaining to the historical context of 1578, including both Santa Isabel Rainha and the Triumpho del Monarcha (7).

Moreover, Rodrigues discovers and reproduces six stanzas of Affonso Africano that did not make it into the published version. This passage of the poem concerns Teodósio de Braganza, Catarina de Braganza’s young son and heir, who had been captured at Alcácer Quibir and was held in Morocco until Felipe II ransomed him back. Castelbranco suggests Teodósio is the rightful heir to the kingdom but that he declined to advance his claim out of a sense of obligation to the man who freed him from captivity (8-9).

It is not known whether these stanzas were edited out because the author was told to remove them by censors or if he did so out of his own political prudence. In any case, though questioning the Habsburgs’

46 Rather, it was Castelbranco’s father who was the illegitimate son of a clergyman, and even he was later made legitimate (Rodrigues 4). Unfortunately, neither Peres nor Rodrigues name their sources on this.

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right to the Portuguese throne was beyond the pale, Castelbranco came close enough to doing so to

make it clear he was by no means a Philippine partisan and was no less patriotic than any other

Portuguese poet of his time.

The Triumpho del Monarcha as autonomist epic

Although Costa e Silva, Peres and others point to the Triumpho del Monarcha as their principal proof of Castelbranco’s Spanish leanings, a careful reading of the poem, taking the context into account, reveals it in fact is a remarkably articulate, even fulsome autonomist representation of an event that the

Portuguese of the time understood to be their own patriotic triumph. It is true that Castelbranco does indulge in the extravagant panegyric conventions of the early modern era and flatters Felipe III. But it is also true that the overall effect of the piece is more to heap encomium on the Portuguese than on their

King.

What makes Castelbranco’s poem stand out from similar works like Lobo’s Jornada is his

rhetorical method and its ties to higher poetic aspirations. Rather than carefully recording and

reproducing the sensory effects of the festival components in fine, ekphrastic detail, as Cordeiro and

Matos de Sá do, Castelbranco’s technique is to express his poetic vision of the whole of the occasion

through the kind of fanciful allegory so roundly denounced by São Martim. Though Castelbranco

naturally uses some description of the ephemeral artwork of the festival and also some visual elements

originating from his own imagination, on the whole the work is not tied down in the verbal reproduction

of concrete visual stimuli. Freeing himself from the weight of descriptive detail makes it possible for the

poet to launch into the kind of Neoplatonist realm of symbolic understanding and high allegory favored

by López de Zárate in his Fiestas en la traslacion. Unshackling his poetic voice from the minutiae

facilitates Castelbranco’s introduction of action and makes it possible to follow movement where other

authors remain focused on the static imagery of the arches. The flexibility of this approach also allows

the author to relate or introduce extra-festive elements to his narration with relative ease. The result is

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an occasional work with an unusually ambitious scope in which Castelbranco, rather than trying to place

the reader at the scene in Lisbon, will attempt to communicate the importance and significance of the

events within an expanded context. In fact, this context assumes the grandest possible scale both

spatially and temporally: it encompasses the Portuguese global empire from Asia to Brazil and the

Portuguese national experience from the days of the Kingdom’s origins through the challenges of the

present and towards what the poet suggests must surely be a brighter future.

Castelbranco’s allegorical dream sequence

Referring to Jacinto Cordeiro’s festival comedia of 1619, Jaime Cruz-Ortiz has remarked that “el verdadero protagonista de La entrada del Rey es la entrada y no el Rey" (99). Something very similar can be said of Castelbranco’s Triumpho del Monarcha: it is less about the Monarch than about the Triumph.

This is immediately evident from the poem’s dedication, its structure and the elements the author selects for its content. Castlebranco dedicates the work not to the King, but to his sponsor, the Câmara de Lisboa, and its President, João Furtado de Mendonça. The work is divided into six cantos of between

60 and 71 octaves of which only the last concerns the physical presence of the King and his family directly. The first two cantos are devoted entirely to an allegorical dream sequence and Canto III relates the preparations made for the royal visit. Cantos IV and V recount the Câmara’s last supervisory tour of the arches and other festive installations in Lisbon, just before the King’s arrival.

The dream sequence that begins the poem does not leave Felipe out altogether; in fact, the way the author represents him here leads historian Megiani to the understandable but mistaken conclusion that the poem is “uma obra extensa de exaltação ao rei” (252).

The poem begins with the ascent of the poetic point of view to the “empyreo assiento cristalino,

/ Que en tiempo fabricò la eterna Essencia”, where he and the reader witness an emotional exchange in which saintly Kings Afonso Henriques and Sebastião I intercede with the Creator (2v). Afonso implores

God to hear the voice of his “fiel rebaño”, the Portuguese, “que su Rey te pide” after suffering long years

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of “aspero castigo” in Felipe’s absence (6v). God agrees that the Portuguese have now paid enough for

their pride and the time has come to relent. He sends an angel to speak to the King through a dream.

The poetic point of view descends once more to the earthly sphere, where images of royalty

appear before Felipe’s inner eye: the ever vigilant and far-sighted eagle, the lion and even an Egyptian

scepter with an open eye atop it (8v-9r). The King is compared first to Atlas for his ability to bear up

under the weight of his responsibilities and then to biblical kings Saul, Solomon and David, for the

virtues needed in a good monarch. At this point, it is easy to see how Megiani might assert that the

purpose of this discourse is to flatter the King.

However, the specific way that Castelbranco compares Felipe III to the great Hebrew kings

attenuates any tendency toward hyperbole in praise of the man who wears the crown. Greatness is not

inherent in Felipe himself; rather, notes the poet, “Que quando el Cielo al mu[n]do un Rey destina, / Le

inspira la virtud con que domina” (9v). Furthermore, in the octave immediately following this one,

Castelbranco seems to aim an oblique critique at the King as a fallible ruler. He notes that a king is only

mortal and must delegate some responsibilities to others and take advice from able counselors. When

these servants give good advice, “dichoso aquel que rige”; on the other hand, “Errando estos, la culpa es del que elige” (9v). After the angel transmits his message, the King wonders to himself if he has been choosing royal officials “en premio del commun merecimento / O si à ojo, y no à peso voy criando /

Ministros” (10r). The most sensible way to read this is as a carefully veiled reproach directed at Felipe for having misplaced his trust in the Duke of Lerma and other Castilianists.

By contrast, in Canto II, after Felipe wakes up he shares the content of his dream with an infinitely superior minister, “un perfeto amigo” and “Aquel, que mas perfectos sus Mayores / Haze, siendo por ellos tan perfeto”: friend of Portugal, Fray Luis de Aliaga. Here the figure of Aliaga, like Uceda in Cordeiro’s comedia, serves to support and intensify the King’s positive impulse regarding Portugal, saying “si alguno os merece mas presente, / Reyno de tanta soledad indino, / Es Portugal en cosas

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excelente, / Que le hazen sobre todos peregrino” (14v). This reassurance, in part, moves the King to

dispel all doubts and confront the Castilianists who argue against the entrada. Portugal’s antagonists are represented as a harpy, covered in “Cerastas, culebras, sierpres crudas” who is ultimately banished by an eagle representing royal providence.

It is true that Felipe is exalted here, to the extent that he appears as a semi-divine figure and that the happiness of his Lusitanian realm hangs on his decision whether to visit Portugal or not.

Nevertheless, the King’s role in El Triumpho del Monarcha is actually somewhat limited. For one thing,

Castelbranco represents Felipe and his ministers as good or evil only to the extent that they hinder or promote the King’s travel to marvelous Portugal. In fact, even Castelbranco’s Felipe judges himself largely based on this criterion and comes to the realization that he has made a mistake in allowing his faithless servants to come between him and his greatest subjects. We see, then, that if Castelbranco expands Felipe ’s part in the drama in some ways, overall it is comparable to the one Cordeiro writes for him in the Comedia de la entrada del Rey: his primary function is to express his appreciation for Portugal and its people.

Another aspect of the first two cantos which bears examination is the poet’s visual imagery.

Specifically, I refer to the way Castelbranco uses imaginary or fantastic elements to represent the political context surrounding the entrada.

Since all of the material covered in the first third of the poem comes out of the poet’s imagination, it would clearly make little sense to try to understand its imagery as ekphrastic in the way other poets’ festival works were. The visual images are strong and numerous, but they do not describe works of the plastic arts associated with the festival. As Krieger—amongst others—has noted, ekphrastic writing need not be limited to detailed description of real works of art. In fact, some of the more prominent examples of ekphrasis from the classical tradition, like Homer’s description of Achilles’ shield in book XVIII of The Iliad, do not describe real works of art, but imaginary ones. Nevertheless,

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Castelbranco’s description of imaginary objects also fails to reach a the level of detail commonly

associated with ekphrasis. Rather, Castelbranco incorporates imagery by invoking it with a simple

mention. In order to do this, he refers constantly to highly conventional notions whose meanings and

general outlines are sure to be already formed in the reader’s mind, like the aforementioned eagle that

drives away the fury of Castilianist envy. Castelbranco provides just one visual detail about the bird:

“Corona de oro trae en la cabeça, / Real Providencia escrive en la corona” (31v). This feature deserves specific mention where the rest of the animal does not because it is the only one that differs from the wholly commonplace notions about eagles in the Western literary tradition stretching from Antiquity through the medieval bestiaries right up to Castelbranco’s day. Most of the rest of Castelbranco’s imagery, like that of many of his peers, comes to early modern Iberian culture from such classical mythological and other earlier literary sources, largely by way of the Dantesque school of political poetry. The first cantos of the Triumpho del Monarcha are especially rich in cosmic or astral imagery taken from the politico-literary tradition of such works as Scipio’s Dream, Juan de Mena’s Laberinto de

Fortuna or even López de Zárate’s previous festival epic, Fiestas en la traslacion.

It might be tempting to regard Castelbranco’s imagery as akin to that of the popular early- modern emblemata he worked to promote and disseminate in Portugal. Matos generates considerable scholarly investigation into Castelbranco’s use of emblematic images by pointing out that the poet’s lyrical pieces tend either to use common emblematic images or to at least give poetic imagery in general some of the same characteristics as emblems, such as “sentido previamente determinado, intenção didáctica e feição alegórica” (423). There is in fact at least one example of Castelbranco’s use of typical emblematic imagery in the Triumpho in his invocation of the muses. The poet asks them to give “arrime a la yedra” in the way that a stone edifice or statue supports a climbing vine (2r). This image is probably taken from Paradin and is such a handy way to refer to a poet’s need for support and inspiration that

Castelbranco here reuses it, after having made it the first of the emblems in his Santa Isabel Rainha e

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Várias Rimas.47 Nevertheless, such clear and specific examples of emblematic correspondences are few

and far between in the Triumpho del Monarcha. Moreover, in my view, Matos’ criteria are not sufficient to distinguish emblems from other forms of early modern literary imagery, nearly all of which are often highly conventional, allegorical and intended to teach or make a point in some way. Though Matos and some subsequent critics make some pertinent observations on a few of the poet’s other works, it is not useful to look on the imagery of the Triumpho del Monarcha in this way.

That the generic conventions of the Triumpho are Neoplatonist is clear in several ways. First, these two cantos concern the communication of two souls with the heavenly spheres, the author’s and the king’s. Each is visited with a divine vision with political implications—God the father himself informs both the poet and the king he has decided the Portuguese should be graced with a royal visit.48 The primacy of poetic vision over the sight of the senses is obvious, as the serene celestial imagery the poet uses to describe his own progress through the spheres of the planets can only come from his internal understanding of the higher realms of the cosmos. Castelbranco’s adscription to the Platonic theory of internal, intellectual understanding of reality is evident in his treatment of King Felipe’s response to his dream in which the angel announces God’s decision in favor of the royal progress. As he wakes, Felipe,

“De nuevo queda un poco imaginando,” and wonders, “Si fué vision, si fantasia, o sueño, / Si pensamiento de su proprio dueño” (11v). The King’s dream is divinely inspired, but it is intellection carried out within the mind.

Moreover, for Plato, as for Neoplatonist poets from the middle ages through Dante and into the early modern period, the voyage to the heavens is, “a fundamental stage in the philosophical or spiritual quest for divine truths,” and, “the visible splendors of the sky are equivalent to the sensual, corporeal delights of the beloved,” or divine, which draw the mind to the highest possible understanding (Cornish

47 See Amaral’s helpful illustration and notes on “Emblema I” (70). 48 Castelbranco does not describe the king’s dream directly because the poet is “present” when God instructs an angel to communicate to Felipe through a dream and therefore knows what the king will be told.

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23). Castelbranco refers directly to this idea with the first five verses of Canto I, Stanza 7, “En quanto los celestes Orbes gyran / Con ordinario curso, y movimiento / Los astros felicisimos, que spiran /

Triumphos altos à vuestro pensamiento / Materia, à que mis spiritus aspiran” (2r).

The use of this allegorical dimension serves the author’s greater poetic and political interests in several ways. First, the cosmic or celestial imagery allows the author to raise the tone of the poem, marking it as aspiring to the same level of seriousness as important religious and political works, like

Mena’s Laberinto and even Dante’s Paradiso. This rhetorical maneuver also sends a clear message to the reader about the transcendent, even sublime importance of Felipe’s journey to Portugal. Castelbranco’s portrayal of Felipe as the instrument of God’s providence tends to flatter the king, of course. But just as with other images associated with the festival that glorify the sovereign, this compliment can also be read as an expression of high expectations on the part of the king’s Portuguese subjects.

It is significant that the overriding impression Castelbranco’s allegorical vision of the king’s dream leaves in the reader is the notion that the Portuguese are a topic of the greatest importance in heaven. Moreover, since the poet embraces an immense, all-encompassing Neoplatonist perspective, he can and does integrate commentary on matters that otherwise fall outside the limits of the festival itself, such as the Portuguese perspective on the constitution of the Spanish monarchy and the King’s use and abuse of court favorites or ministers. These earthly political questions are what most modern readers would consider current events, that is, perishable everyday occurrences. But by connecting them allegorically to the higher spheres and the divine, Castelbranco makes them matters of universal and enduring concern.

The Triumpho as Castelbranco’s celebration of Portuguese history

In Cantos III - V, Castelbranco focuses on the physical preparations for the festival in Lisbon itself. The narrative point of view of the Triumpho returns to earth, as does the nature of the imagery the author uses. In this stage of the poem’s development, the notion of ekphrasis could have become

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more pertinent, as the poet does refer to works of the plastic arts and performances associated with the entrada. Nevertheless, Castelbranco’s descriptions of events and objects in Lisbon remain far from enargeia. Here again, Castelbranco usually represents only the barest sketch of items he mentions—just enough information to help an informed reader identify what he is referring to and follow along on his poetic movement through the city. As often as not, the elements he uses to effect this identification are not visual characteristics or descriptions. Most of the heroes of the Portuguese imperial expansion, for example, are identified by name or by a brief statement of their most notable achievements.

This is not to say that Castelbranco merely enumerates or lists the different spectacles sponsored by the city and its denizens. The author selects and represents only those pieces he thinks most pertinent to his purposes. Unlike the authors of the prose relaciones de fiestas produced for the occasion, he only mentions a few of the triumphal arches and even then spends no time describing them in any detail—not even the impressive Arco de los Hombres de Negocio de Lisboa. Castelbranco does mention it in Canto IV, but limits himself to making a formulaic comment on its beauty; “Iamas otro

Archimedes celebrado / Igual compuso” (36r) and then moves on to what are, for him, more interesting things.

With few exceptions, what typically moves Castelbranco to write about a figure is its capacity to serve as a touchstone that will lead to a discussion of the great virtues, acts and movements of the kings and heroes of Portugal’s epic past. Yet, even when an installation or work of art does earn the poet’s notice, its specific visual appearance often does not bear careful description. Castelbranco devotes his poetic energy to describing what cannot be adequately or very convincingly represented in the plastic arts: historical movement, the passage of time and high concepts or elaborate interpretation.

These principles are well illustrated by Castelbranco’s treatment of the many statues placed in and near the Terreiro do Paço square. Unlike Lobo, Castelbranco touches on none of the fine attractions built by the Germans, neither the elaborate arch on the square, nor the statuary; he is clearly

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uninterested in glorifying representations of another nation, whatever its commercial importance. On

the other hand, Castelbranco does work in other nearby statues, those lining a temporary lane leading

away from the Arco de los Hombres de Negocios, which portray the twelve most prominent ancient

cities of Portugal as alluring “donzellas”. Castelbranco’s treatment of the twelve damsels is among the

most clearly ekphrastic of the poem in that he largely limits himself to directly describing what he can

see of each figure. Each damsel bears the coat of arms of her city and an emblem or two symbolizing the

most characteristic historical or physical features of the corresponding town. Brief epigrams in

Portuguese verse are also engraved at the base of each statue. The poet simply records most of these

typical or identifying features. Lamego, for example, is associated both on its statue and in the Triumpho

with olive oil, for which it was well known (45v). But Castelbranco keeps visual description to a minimum—limiting himself largely to representing the emblematic arms of each settlement. Even in this case where he is at his most ekphrastic, Castelbranco devotes his poetry more to verbal than to visual description. It must also be said that these passages may be the least inventive of the poem, as the author paraphrases the Portuguese epigrams very closely in Spanish. Occasionally, however, the author adds a brief etymology of a city’s name, as, for example, with Leiria, which Castelbranco informs the reader derives from “Laberia” (46r). There is but one telling exception—the poet grants special attention to Lisbon, “aquella insigne triumphadora / Ciudad desse larguisimo Oceàno [sic], / Cuyo Occidente mas que clara Aurora / Hermosea la luz del Soberano” (45r).

The figures that really capture Castelbranco’s imagination are those of the great men of the

Portuguese empire. The generals and governors of imperial expansion follow the Arco de los Hombres de Negocios in the King’s planned tour and after that the Arco de los Plateros inspires Castelbranco to expand on the lives and virtues of the kings of Portugal. Castelbranco devotes more time and artistry to his verses on the Portuguese heroes or, “Varones en el gesto sublimados” (36r), but here the degree of ekphrastic correspondence or visual description is lower than in the passages on the damsels. In fact, in

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many cases the ekphrastic connection between the statue and Castelbranco’s text is reduced to the

simple anaphora, “Este,” which Castelbranco uses to signal that he will now discuss the historical deeds

of the man depicted in another figure. The identification of the man in question and the representation

of his accomplishments are generally unrelated to any visual feature of the statues. Rather, the poet

introduces this kind of information from other sources, historical accounts or stories whose only

connection to the festival statuary comes through the identity of the figure represented. For example,

Castelbranco identifies Bartolomeu Dias (1450?-1500), discoverer of the Cape of Good Hope (which he called Cabo Tormentório), as, “Este de Promontorio en Promontorio, / De Mar en Mar vagando à vela llena, / A los Reyes, que al cabo Tormentorio / Han dado nombre de esperança buena” (38v).

The visual stimulus from the festival art is not the subject of the poet’s art in any meaningful way but rather prompts the poet’s artful consideration of a topic.49 This principle is even clearer in the long passage Castelbranco devotes to the heroic actions and tragic death of President João Furtado de

Mendonça’s (ca. 1560 - ?) brother André (1558-1611) in the long struggle to establish Goa as a permanent colony. There is no statue commemorating this man; though he was famous in his day, he was presumably more important to Castelbranco’s patron than to anyone else. So, in order to incorporate him into his epic representation of the Portuguese imperial struggle, Castelbranco takes advantage of the statue of Afonso de Alburquerque, the commander—later viceroy—most responsible for the Portuguese victories in the conflicts in which Mendonça’s kinsman served. Once he has mentioned Alburquerque’s accomplishments and opened up the subject of the battle, it is a simple matter for the poet to add a long digression on Mendonça’s heroic exploits and tragic death in India

(41v-43v).

49 In this way, the poetic tour of the festival installations resembles the kind of classical memory palace Frances Yates describes in her Art of Memory. However, the resemblance cannot be considered as more than superficial since the images in Lisbon are not composed or arranged by the author for the purpose of jogging his own memory, but rather by the Portuguese in general to celebrate their collective memory.

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Castelbranco uses the same intertextual method to prolong an epic representation of the

glories—and occasional foibles—of Felipe III’s predecessors on the Portuguese throne (47v-60r). He begins with the briefest of mentions of each king’s presence on the Arco de los Plateros’ depiction of the royal family tree. Then, the author identifies each man with a pertinent epithet and finally launches into an original retelling of the king’s deeds and qualities. He puts special emphasis on each man’s contribution to the advancement of the country, especially military successes over Muslims.

Given the fame of his earlier Affonso Africano, it is not surprising that Castelbranco’s passage on

Afonso V (1432-1481) is especially representative of how he uses Portuguese royal history. Castelbranco

is generous in his treatment of Afonso: he dedicates six full octaves to him and presents him as an ideal

Christian king (52r-53r). The poet begins by noting, of course, that Afonso is known as O Africano and that his exploits make him “justo herdero del Romano” known by the same sobriquet (52r). Then he offers a brief narration of Afonso’s successful campaigns in North Africa. Castelbranco notes Afonso had originally gathered an army to answer Pope Callixtus III’s (r. 1455-1458) call for a new crusade in the

Near East, but that this project was frustrated. Afonso shows his Christian steadfastness because he does not give up his crusading spirit; if he cannot strike in the Holy Land, he will respond by directing his irrepressible energies instead against Larache, Arzila and Tangier. Afonso shows all the greatest qualities of a king; besides having an “animo invencible” and always being clear in his thinking, “Los mejores consejos siempre admite” (52v-53r). In sum, Castelbranco uses his brief account of the life of Afonso V as an exemplary text, summing it up by characterizing Afonso as more a father to the nation than a king and comparing him to the pelican from the medieval bestiary tradition, saying Afonso too was so devoted to his subjects that he would gladly open a wound in his own breast to sustain them with his own blood. The poet tactfully omits any reference to Afonso’s invasion of Castile in 1475.

Both the examples of the royal family tree and those of the Portuguese heroes foreground two more important features of Castelbranco’s poetic enterprise in the Triumpho. The poet’s particular

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attention to the development of patriotic images and events makes clear this is his overriding theme or

project. And finally, the way Castelbranco emphasizes intertextual material unrelated to the basic

sensual information he gathers from the festival he is ostensibly writing about shows that he clearly

does not conceive his role as the mere recording of information on an event. His role as poet is one of

synthesis and interpretation. He provides the basis for this interpretation by drawing in a wide range of

perspectives and discourses from outside the festival context itself, relating the entrada of 1619 both to

the eternal, through the dream sequence, and to the history of Portugal, as understood largely through

the character and heroic acts of the nation’s kings.

A prophecy of Portugal’s return to glory

This discussion brings us to the sixth and final canto of the Triumpho, in which the royal party at last arrives in Lisbon. In this section of the poem Castelbranco, having covered the the cosmic significance of the visit generally in Cantos I & II, the preparations for the entrada in Canto III and related it to the grand sweep of Portuguese history in Cantos IV and V, now focuses—briefly—on the immediate present, the physical presence of the King and his family in Lisbon. Once he has touched down in the concrete world for a momentary description of some festival events, however, the poet once again launches into the realm of his poetic vision, as he so often does. This time Castelbranco’s purpose is to forge a symbolic link between the entrada and a forecast of things to come for king and country. The maneuver has the effect of turning the poet’s gaze from the retrospective to the prospective, from the epic past to the more forward-looking vision in which he extends the joyful present into what should be an equally glorious future for Portugal.

Most of Canto VI concerns a water spectacle that was organized to accompany the royal galley on its way to Lisbon from down the Tagus in Belém. The event’s designers, using chains, skillfully concealed oarsmen and other mechanisms, sent a small fleet of boats and floats disguised as

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mythological sea creatures, such as mermaids and hippocampi, to accompany the King’s galley on its

way upriver (Figure 4.9).

By 1619 aquatic performances were a regular feature of European festivals. As we saw in

Chapter One, a naumachia or simulated battle on the water was not uncommon, but the most typical form of such spectacles was the nautical procession in specially decorated boats—such as the procession of barges assembled for Felipe II’s visit to Tortosa in 1585-86. The limited size and importance of the Arlanza may have curtailed the dimensions of water spectacles at Lerma, nevertheless the special boat and use of the river as a backdrop for El caballero del sol are notable.

Apart from the amphibious assault on the beach fortress and the King’s tour of the special galley already mentioned in Chapter Two, there were several other aquatic events in the Valencian festival of 1598-99.

Shortly after leaving Denia (the first time), the royal party boarded in specially festooned boats for a pleasure cruise across the Albufera—a freshwater lagoon south of Valencia (Gauna 108). The rhetorical comparison between the King as commander of a vast maritime empire and the god of the sea is already a commonplace by this time—even chronicler Felipe de Gauna uses the trope in his relación. When the

King arrives in the capital city, he is greeted with a flotilla in which military oarsmen show off elaborate formations and maneuvers, accompanied by loud music and a cannonade so impressive that “no se tuvo por seguro el gran Neptuno de ver la sobredicha y gran flota de barcos y armada real” (109).

Though it clearly develops out of a longstanding tradition, the Lisbon flotilla is distinct from previous occasions in the direct and elaborate representation of the imagery of the classical gods of the sea. In his poetic extension of the event, Castelbranco exploits this feature to the maximum. In addition, in his interpretation, the Portuguese poet broadens the horizon of the event’s significance through intertextual references that connect the Triumpho not just to previous works of festival poetry, but also to the greatest of all Portuguese national epics, Camões’ Os Lusíadas and its classical forebears.

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Castelbranco begins his account of this occasion by making unusual explicit references to the

artificiality of this clever spectacle, saying, “Imitadas Ballenas, Phocas vanas / Salen con artificio

extraordinario” (58r). However, the author soon leaves any mention of the artificial sea creatures

behind. Within the space of three stanzas, the poet’s imagination has taken flight and the reader is

transported not to Lisbon, but, “al mas profundo assiento / Del Rey de la segunda Monarchia”—to

Neptune’s cavernous palace at the bottom of the sea (58v). At this point, the reader accompanies not a

model cleverly depicting a sea god, but the mythical Triton himself back to Lisbon. Neptune has sent him

there to report back on all the commotion. When Triton tells Neptune how impressive the monarch of

the Portuguese is, the god sends his blessing. Triton summons the divinities of the Deep, who come to

the surface on the Tagus and gently propel the King and his party along the waters to their landing.

Then, all the gods, nymphs and demigods fall silent to hear what the Old Man of the waters, Proteus, will say. He prophesies that Felipe will be lord of his enemies and that God will be at his side (Figure

4.10). The recent Spanish victories in Morocco—at Larache and La Mamora—are but a foretaste of the glorious successes to come: "prendas amables, / De quien se jacta con razon España, / Dignas de otras grandezas mas notables".50 Then the oracle disappears under the waves with a clap of thunder. This thunder coincides with an enormous salute from the guns of Lisbon, which brings the reader back to the plane of reality where Felipe is finally disembarking at the Terreiro do Paço.

Castelbranco’s fanciful narration of the intervention of the watery divinities in the Lisbon flotilla derives ultimately from elements of classical epic. Proteus appears early in the Greek tradition, in

Homer’s Odyssey (Book Four), where he has an important role as oracle. This section of Castelbranco’s

Triumpho also bears a strong resemblance to two passages in the Aeneid where sea gods intervene to calm the waters for the hero (Canto I) and to bear his ships away from dangerous rocks (Canto V). The resemblance is greater still to a passage in Os Lusíadas where Camões’ nymphs lead Portuguese ships

50 La Mamora is now known as Mehdya.

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out of a deadly trap and the author describes Triton in all his monstrous detail (II.19-24). Significantly, there is an additional parallel here at the level of the common patriotic purpose of both Portuguese poets. Through these intertextual links, most of which would have been obvious to educated readers of his era, Castelbranco extends the meaning of the flotilla of 1619 by connecting it to a grander epic context, especially as it pertains to the aquatic gods’ special affection for and attendance upon Portugal and its sovereign.51

But the work that this passage most clearly resembles is Castelbranco’s own Affonso Africano. In the poet’s earlier epic, it is Afonso V’s fleet that perturbs the waters, prompting Neptune to send Triton to investigate. Oceanus, recognizing that the Portuguese have made him more famous than any other body of water, calls all the sea gods to celebrate and support the fleet belonging to “gente em paz, e em guerra tam famosa” as he himself shoulders the burden of the royal galley to help it along its way (35).

Castelbranco does not repeat any part of Affonso Africano word-for-word in his Triumpho del Monarcha.

Nevertheless, the parallels are striking, from the order of appearance of the divinities—Nereus and

Proteus, as eldest, come first in both works—to similar digressions on lovely nymph Galatea’s following amongst the male gods and even nearly identical rhyming lists of nymphs and demigods who participate in the royal flotillas.52

These close parallels show that what Castelbranco has done, essentially, is to substitute Felipe III for Afonso V, the previous victor of Larache.53 Another way to say it would be that the poet rhetorically

51 Castelbranco’s Canto VI also seems to be—in part—a response to the analogous passage of Lope’s festival epic, discussed in Chapters Two and Three. In the Fiestas de Denia, not only do the sea gods lift the king’s ship by the keel to ease its passage, but Proteus prophesies extensively on exactly the same themes as Castelbranco does nearly twenty years later: the seas will smooth the way for Felipe to go forth to defeat the Moors (96-8). 52 In Affonso Africano II.29, Castelbranco includes Callianassa, Spio, Janira, Janassa and Callianira in a long list of nymphs taking part in the welcome accorded Afonso V’s fleet. The octave ends with a simple rhyming list of still more divinities: “Thalia, Panopêa, Jêra, Proto / Aethra, Agâve, Idothea, Mêra, Dôto” (34). In Triumpho, VI.24, the list of mentioned deities includes Doris, Panopéa, Ianassa, Calianira, Calianassa, Mimetris and Ianira, and concludes with: “Mas tiernas en edad con Spio, y Doto / Postreras han venido Iera, y Proto” (60v). 53 Larache was taken by Afonso V and the Portuguese in 1471, but only a few years later was retaken and repopulated by the Moroccans. The Spanish took the town again under Felipe III in 1610 and kept it until 1689, when it passed back to Morocco.

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recasts the Spanish monarch in the role of an exemplary Portuguese king, like Afonso V. Castelbranco does not necessarily believe Felipe actually has the same personal qualities as Afonso; rather, he makes an identification between the two because the characteristics he represents the two men as having in common are the qualities a man playing the king of Portugal ought to have. Again, when choosing a king, God inspires him with the qualities he will need to rule.

This brings us back to the theatrical nature of Felipe III’s entrada of 1619 and the ultimate

purpose of Castelbranco’s retelling of the occasion. In the first three cantos of the Triumpho del

Monarcha, the poet establishes the tone and lofty, extended context that will give special significance to

the drama. Then, in Cantos IV and V Castelbranco and the reader tour the stage and scenery before the

performance. Only at the end, in Canto VI do we finally get an account of the performance itself, which

will make potential meaning actual in the present moment. The King is in place and playing his role,

which makes it possible for everyone else to carry out their own roles, performing Portuguese identity

and connecting the everyday life of the Kingdom to the dream of an everlasting, autonomous Portugal.

The only language really capable of making an adequate representation of the context and the

force and depth of the patriotic meaning of the entrada of 1619 is that of poetry. And Castelbranco’s

Triumpho del Monarcha shows he is an especially apt poet for connecting the occasion to the greater

autonomist themes of his times, even within the conceptual confines imposed by Habsburg censorship.

First, and foremost, Castelbranco was a widely acknowledged master of the most appropriate poetic

form for nationalist discourse: the epic. Moreover, Castelbranco was a skilled and imaginative writer in

the fashionable allegorical, mannerist style. The conventions of this poetry facilitated the author’s

expression of a vision capable not only of incorporating and representing the glories of the events of

1619, but also going beyond simple reportage. The imaginative dimension of Castelbranco’s Triumpho

del Monarcha constituted a broad and deep enough a liminal space to encompass the political, historical

and even the divine. Above all, Castelbranco had the additional advantage of being just as firmly

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committed to a celebration of Portugal as the other patriots who conceived and executed the great

festival ostensibly staged for the King.

Epilogue: Matos de Sá’s “Elegía a la partida de su Magestad”

It is only logical that in the same concluding canto of Castelbranco’s festival epic, in which king

and country are at last making the long-deferred performance representing Portuguese harmony and national purpose, the author should conclude with the prophecy of still happier days to come. Yet, to

Portugal’s bitter disappointment, after the parties were over, after all the expense, excitement and ecstatic celebration had concluded, the King abandoned his Kingdom once more. The Portuguese body

politic was headless once again and the realm returned inevitably to its prior peripheral status.

Felipe III left Portugal to return to Castile in late October of 1619, claiming he could no longer

defer grave matters of state in Madrid. He caught a fever after passing through Badajoz which worsened

as he approached the capital and so was carried into the city on a closed litter on December 4th. The

King recovered enough to live on for another fifteen months, but died at the end of March, 1621 and could never keep his promise to return to Portugal (F. R. Silva 304). From the start of his reign, Felipe IV showed no special interest in or attachment to Portugal and he, after all, had not made the same promise his father had. It seemed the Lusitanian realm was destined yet again to go without its king for a long while.

Francisco Matos de Sá published his “Elegia a la partida de su Magestad” together with his

Entrada de su Magestad in 1620, before Felipe’s death. Whether Sá could already foresee the King’s demise or he was just expressing the momentary disappointment of seeing the King leave, the tone and rhetoric of this poem perfectly reflect what must have been the general feeling of abandonment— perhaps saudades—in Portugal at the King’s departure. The final nineteen verses of the work are especially poignant.

O miserable Reino Lusitano,

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Mil vezes triunfador de mil naciones,

Hasta el remoto Ganges Indiano.

Los mas ocultos clymas, tus varones

Reduzieron a Christo, y en sus muros

Levantaron tus Quinas, y pendones.

Los tuyos hasta agora tan seguros,

Viendo tanto descuydo, y tal flaqueza,

Recelan con razón males futuros.

Que esté tan abatida tu nobleza,

Que viendo tan patentes desengaños

No muestre su valor, y fortaleza?

Que los Turcos y moros mas estraños

Alleguen a tu puerta sin recelo,

Temblando de tu nombre en otros años?

Mas ay que digo yo, si solo el cielo

Es quien puede acudir a tantos males,

Bolviendonos el Rey para consuelo

De tus queridos hijos tan leales.

There is clearly more in this text than a the kind of formulaic, hyperbolic expression of sadness one might expect from any occasional piece written to bid farewell to a departing dignitary. Sá’s poem suggests how hard it is for a Portuguese patriot to understand how the Catholic monarch can resist the charms of a nation of such valiant Christian conquerors. How can such an outstanding, deserving people find itself forced to carry on without its king yet again? The questions the poet asks about this letdown are not rhetorical, he seems to really be struggling for answers. At the end of the poem, all the writer

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can do is invoke God’s providence and, like the junta de fidalgos of 1613, pray for a better day in the future, when the king might return to Portugal and deliver the Kingdom from the many evils it faces.

These lines, in fact, could just as easily have manifested Portuguese national frustration with their absentee Habsburg monarchs before the entrada of 1619 as after. Looked at from the Portuguese nationalist perspective, the glorious, effusive occasions of Felipe III’s jornada seem to be a kind of

glittering dream which interrupted a long, dark, restless night, but only briefly. The Spanish word ilusión

comes closer to expressing the kind of dream I refer to, because though it denotes a false appearance or

unattainable expectation, it can also connote enthusiasm, a fond desire, sincere hope and/or wishful

thinking. Within a year of its making, the shining, hopeful bubble of the festival of 1619—the bright

dream so skillfully portrayed by Castelbranco—has clearly burst. The Portuguese ilusión of a restored kingdom, a body politic made whole again, is shattered once again.

It may be no wonder then that, as we have seen, Portuguese writers returned to writing still more autonomist literature in the 1620s. The feverish, patriotic Portuguese desire for their own king, a faithful and devoted father or spouse to the nation, seemed only to grow stronger the longer the realm was mired in neglect. The all-too-brief interlude of Felipe III’s jornada seems ultimately to have intensified Portuguese discontent by offering the Kingdom little more than a tantalizing glimpse of the splendor it had been missing—and would continue to do without until the Restoration of 1640.

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Conclusions

The Protean prophecy Castelbranco places at the end of his festival epic is in several ways a

good lead-in to some general observations about both the splendid occasions I have examined and the

heroic poems based on them. For one thing, the passage highlights the importance of the festival environment as a liminal space in which there is a two-way traffic between the earthly world on one hand and the realm of fiction, the eternal and imagination on the other.

The Proteus story is at least as old as The Odyssey, in which Greek hero Menelaus forces the Old

Man of the Sea to prophesy for him by holding the god fast despite his frightening power to change into virtually any shape imaginable (Book IV). It was logical, then, for Lope de Vega to choose to embellish his festival epic of the royal visit to the grotto at Denia with a modern take on the story from the ancient

Greek source. What is more interesting, perhaps, is that festival designers in Portugal should decide twenty years later to represent a related episode with their mock-ups, floats and decorated boats, making the myth manifest in their festival performance. More curious still is Castelbranco’s re- fictionalization of the festival performance with his poetic transformation of the festival artifice back into the stuff of legend. This exemplifies the relationship I have been suggesting between festival worlds or representations and the lateral fictional worlds created in the poetry based on those celebrations. If festivals serve to make the mythic eternal or the ideal concrete within the temporary frame of the festival time and space, festival epics serve to mythicize or eternalize those ephemeral occasions, re- establishing the connection between a fleeting performance and its conceptual model.

Nostalgic festival images

The festival plane of reality is a realm where the imaginary, what should be, overtakes and

mingles with physical reality, or what is. Moreover, to the extent that the dreams and fanciful

imaginings of festive invention represent and incorporate images of an idealized past and a hopeful

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future, the liminal space of the fiesta can also be said to be a realm of nostalgia, in the sense Cioranescu

gives the term. The festival is the place where the glorious past of the golden age can not only be

recreated but also extended through the imagination towards a utopian future (55). The figure of

Proteus, one of the oldest of the gods and famed for his power of prophecy, is an especially apt figure to turn up in festival epics for this reason. As a figure he lends himself easily to a poetic representation of the desire to bring a golden image out of the past, into the present and to then project it into the future.

This kind of utopian nostalgia underpins the design of all three of the great fiestas I have examined here.

However, the specific qualities or theme of each image of the past is slightly different on each occasion, according to the point of view and interests—especially political interests—of those who are behind the celebrations.

As we have seen, the royal wedding fiestas and related celebrations of 1598-1599 were centered less on the marital union between Felipe III and his Austrian bride than on the opportunity presented by the advent of a new and younger sovereign. The most notable spectacles performed on the festival stage were born of the nobility’s nostalgia for the days of their greatest chivalric splendor and political importance. The mirror image of this idealized vision of the past was the future power and wealth the highborn hoped to achieve during the new King’s reign.

The organization of the events making up this extensive festival was largely decentralized— there was no coordination between, for example, the Ferrarese who fêted Margarita of Austria’s wedding mass of November 1598, and the city authorities of Almanza who arranged a reception for the

King and his sister around the 21st of January, 1599. For that reason, it could be asserted that on the whole the messages that were sent by the many components of the occasions were indicative of the interests and viewpoints of the entire class of people responsible for arranging them. The most evident members of this class on the Spanish side were the Aragonese, Catalan and Valencian notables of the time, including the various civic authorities and, of course, the noble houses of the Crown of Aragon.

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However, the rest of the flower of Spanish aristocracy also devoted a lot of time and extraordinary

resources to participation in the festival as well.

Given the aristocracy’s shared memory of its 15th-century glory days and the way Felipe II had

politically sidelined many of the great noble houses, especially at the end of his reign, it was little

wonder that much of the celebration turn of the 17th century provided a stage on which the noble participants could represent themselves as perfect knights locked in the kind of honorable, idealized competition that had flourished in the 15th century. On the public plazas, the up-and-coming highborn invoked the past glories of their forebears through the stylized and relatively safe feigned combat in juegos de cañas, tourneys and in mock battles with their peers who were playing the Turks. Off the lists, they vied with one another to play the most magnificent through their invenciones and rich attire.

As the other peers of the realm strove to give the most impressive public performance onstage,

Francisco Gómez de Sandoval y Rojas was in the wings, perfecting the art of managing major royal celebrations and exploiting the hold such events had over the king. He, too, strove to represent himself and his family in a such a way as to improve his position and to bring back the 15th-century glory days of his clan. The festival of 1598-1599 is the first great state occasion where it becomes clear how Sandoval can use royal celebrations as a tool to publicly perform the restoration of his House to the power and wealth it had enjoyed in the days before their fall from grace in Castile—with its attendant loss of titles,

estates and income. The future Duke of Lerma directed a substantial part of the festival’s energy to his

family seat in Denia and ensured that he, his relatives and hechuras contributed to the success of the events held there. He also made sure anyone who wanted to get anywhere with the new government paid proper respect to the king’s new privado, as “valedor” of the new king, the man playing Sando to

Felipe III’s Pelayo. In fact, the role of royal favorite Sandoval was already writing for himself by 1599 was also somewhat of a throwback to the 1400s, the era of Álvaro de Luna and the heyday of noble intervention into affairs of state.

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Lerma’s nostalgia for his family’s princely power and riches was one of the conceptual

wellsprings of the material explored in many of the spectacular events he sponsored or organized during

his nearly twenty years in power. But this theme reached its apogee or culmination in his farewell

extravaganza, the Fiestas de Lerma of 1617. As I have argued, one of the central elements of Lerma’s

festive monument to himself and the Sandovals was the reconstruction and beautification of his ducal

seat in the heart of Castile, including the centerpiece Collegial Church of San Pedro, several monasteries,

and the castle / palace complex, from the town’s central plaza to the surrounding gardens. Apart from that, Lerma’s festival is most notable for its exaltation of the Duke’s talents as a showman, the producer of baroque theatrical and para-theatrical events of unprecedented complexity and ostentation. By all accounts, the Conde de Lemos’ lavish masques, the remarkable comedia, El caballero del Sol, with its complete mechanical change of scenery and the Marqués de la Hinojosa’s spectacular fireworks, though ephemeral occasions, were nevertheless unforgettable and can be considered performative monuments to the Duke and those closest to him.

Lerma’s development of the elaborate “estilo nuevo de grandeza” and deliberate political use of opulent celebratory activities established a legacy that extended beyond his own domination of the court and politics of Felipe III’s reign. Though the Portuguese in general resented Lerma as a

“Castilianist” and inimical to Portuguese interests, they nonetheless did not discard his style of showmanship when finally presented with the opportunity to celebrate a royal entry in 1619. Rather, they adapted the splendor of the budding baroque style and attempted to use it to appropriate the monarch and represent him as belonging to them. By means of this rhetorical strategy, the Lisbon entrada became an expression of Portuguese nostalgia for its golden age and the hope of their return to glory. The run-up to 1619 was a time when the Portuguese were all too aware their independent royal house had been extinguished, the capital of the realm and its court had moved on and the economy and imperial administration were in decline. The festival highlighted and celebrated the rise of the nation

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from a small county living in the shadow of Peninsular hegemon Castile, to its flowering into the first

truly global European imperial power. The Tragicomedia intitulada El Rey Don Manuel was an especially

splashy celebration of Portugal’s era of prominence which also reinforced the ideological connection

between Portuguese pride in having overcome the Moors and its dedication to spreading Catholicism in

its Asian territories. The predominant imagery supporting and extending this festival theme, like much

of the sculpture and the paintings adorning Lisbon’s magnificent triumphal arches, emphasized the

history of the kingdom as recounted through its long—if not uninterrupted—royal line.

But Portuguese nostalgia in the 1619 jornada was not faced solely towards the past. The

mythical water spectacle which accompanied King Felipe III’s galley from Belém to Lisbon was in part an

invocation of a famous passage from Camões’ Lusíadas which linked the significance of the celebration

of the present to a storied past. It was also intended to serve as of an optimistic projection of the utopic

days that could not fail to come once Felipe decided to grace the kingdom with his presence

permanently.

The poet’s vision

If the purpose of occasional literature was to capture, intensify and beautify the images

produced in the festive context and pass them along to a variety of readers, it was only logical for

festival literature to expand along lines analogous to those of the celebrations they represented in

writing. As elsewhere in Europe, in Spain ever more impressive printed materials are produced to preserve the memory and extend the fame of ever more complex occasions. By the 17th century, poets begin to compose more ambitious occasional works alongside the simple ballads (romances) that had been produced largely as news reports until then. In these long heroic pieces which I have dubbed festival epics, some of the leading poets of the day—such as Félix Lope de Vega—are paid to apply their

literary talent and ambition to festival works in a new way.

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The resulting published poems are worthy of serious consideration as literary documents because the authors make the leap from mere description and narration of splendid celebratory events to the realm of poetic imagination. This fanciful plane of existence gives them a space where they can introduce a number of complementary discourses, from the philosophical to the mythical, alongside a narration of the fiesta events. This literary space is based on the liminal space of the festival itself, and so naturally tends to resemble it. However, it is important to keep in mind that the two imaginary realms are not identical. In their poetic worlds, the poets can and do reflect on the themes, imagery and messages projected through the celebrations they recount. However, as they do so, the authors also offer their own individual interpretations of the festivals, their component events and even the themes of the celebrations. Their interpretations or visions sometimes come from an angle which differs substantially from that of the festival organizers. Moreover, the poets may even relate the festival’s events to grander things, like the great movements of history, or even the eternal forces of the cosmos.

This expressive or interpretive vision is not evident in the same degree in all festival epics—it develops gradually and unevenly. The earliest festival epics, such as Félix Lope de Vega’s Fiestas de

Denia and Gaspar Aguilar’s Fiestas nupciales could better be described as workmanlike than visionary.

They were clearly meant to flatter the poets’ highborn sponsors by suggesting their exploits at the famous parties held in honor of Felipe III’s wedding were “epic” in proportions and therefore worthy of being immortalized in a detailed written record. This is why Aguilar especially and Lope, to a slightly lesser extent, focus on listing the participants, describing their attire in excruciating detail and the praising the gallant figures they cut. In these poems, the divergence between the image presented by the festival organizers and the poets’ representation of the events is minimal.

Still, the greater scope of these longer poems gives the poets room to explore larger social and cultural themes performed in celebratory behavior, to reflect on them and to express their own personal interpretations of them. This is something Aguilar does not appear to be moved to do. Lope’s

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poetic additions to the event are hardly his best work, either. Nevertheless, El Fénix does not seem to be capable of limiting himself to writing utterly lifeless encomium or flat narrative. His imagination seems to take wing almost despite itself in a few, select passages, such as those where he fancifully suggests that nature itself comes alive in response to the ravishing beauty of the ladies of the Infanta Isabel Clara

Eugenia’s cortege or the lively simulated combat with the fake Turks on the beach at Denia.

Where Lope’s drift into his own poetic conceit is clearest, however, is in his treatment of the royal excursion to the grotto mentioned above. Here, the poet mixes narration of a real royal outing with the wholly imaginary reference to the classical myth of the Protean prophecy. Lope seems to acknowledge that inserting imaginary material from outside the actual events of the fiestas is an uncommon practice in an occasional poem when he attributes the interlude to an unnamed source and playfully claims “yo no sé si es fabuloso” (96). But the fictional interruption of the narrative flow of the poem has no negative impact in the end, since its ultimate purpose is to repeat and amplify one of the general themes of the celebrations: the hopeful prediction that the new King’s reign will bring a new

Golden Age to Spain, a time when Felipe will at last lead Christianity to a definitive triumph over Islam.

Lope’s festival vision is, in the end, little more than a brief, rhetorical leap into the realm of poetic fancy whose purpose is to express the same utopic nostalgia which underpins the occasion as a whole.

At this point, if I were following a strictly chronological organization, it would be natural to examine Francisco López de Zárate’s Fiestas en la traslacion. However, for reasons I will clarify momentarily, I prefer to turn next to Vasco Mousinho de Quevedo Castelbranco’s Triumpho del

Monarcha of 1619.

The contrast between the tentative steps towards the virtual world of poetic imagination in

Lope and the extensive travel through that realm in Castelbranco’s Triumpho is striking. The Portuguese epic poet does not offer to excuse his invention by attributing it to someone else. In fact, he devotes the first third of his poem entirely to a fictional dream sequence which cannot conceivably be based on the

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physical reality of the festival at all. Moreover, even those passages where the poet does ostensibly

undertake a description of the triumphal arches of Lisbon, such as his treatment of the Silversmiths’

“Arco de los reyes de Portugal”, he devotes much more attention and artistry to incorporating external historical references and expressing his own interpretation of Portuguese history than he does to ekphrastic description of the festival installations themselves.

On the other hand, Castelbranco’s work cleaves almost as closely to the official point of view of the group that commissions his poem—the Câmara de Lisboa—as Lope does to the interests of his patron—the future VII Conde de Lemos. As I have argued, the overarching theme of the 1619

Portuguese festival is the importance of re-centering the Habsburg monarchy on Lisbon and persuading the ruler of the kingdom, Felipe III, to return to his natural place at the head of the Portuguese body politic. Though Castelbranco departs from direct description of the occasion constantly, his ultimate goal is to heighten and crystallize its theme in his poem, while simultaneously singing the praises of his nation. Among many other possible examples, this purpose is clear in the poet’s redirection of the

Proteus prophecy (61v-62r). It is not clear whether or not the artificial figures of the divinities of the deep that led the royal galley to Lisbon included a representation of Proteus. But in any case, the poet’s development of the episode goes beyond any possible material dramatization and uses the fictionalized poetic representation of the Old Man of the Sea to give full-throated expression to the nationalist, nostalgic/utopian purpose of the festival’s organizers. Castelbranco’s Proteus repeats Lope’s forecast of triumph over Muslims but given the general context of the passage, it is understood that the King must stand with the hosts of his virtuous Portuguese subjects at his back in the confrontation with Islam. In its general outline, the overall utopic vision of how the royal triumph of the future will be defined is little changed between Lope’s and Castelbranco’s versions. What is different, however, is the specific identity of the national community the representation of the King is meant to glorify.

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This variable interpretation of a similar episode in the two different poems exemplifies the way

the additional virtual dimension of festival epics makes it possible for poets to exceed the conventional bounds of encomiastic or occasional poetry. This is not to say festival poets engage in Bakhtinian or carnivalesque subversion of the existing order as expressed in official festivities. They resemble more the “official culture” Bakhtin contrasts with the irreverent contrariness of folk celebrations. I choose the word “resemble” deliberately, however, to emphasize that surface appearances can be deceptive.

Castelbranco and the other festival epic poets are all dedicated to meeting the expectations of royal or official praise. However, once they have toed the official line, they then keep going, extending their poetic flights of fancy in sometimes unexpected directions. In Castelbranco’s case, this means that though the poet will dutifully praise the King, Felipe will be exalted less as King of Spain than as the

Portuguese sovereign. The effect is not exactly subversive, but could be considered perverse in the sense that the trajectory of the poet’s panegyric is diverted or turned away from its usual rhetorical destination.

López de Zárate makes an entirely different use of Proteus in his Fiestas en la traslacion, a use which is indicative of a different orientation in his festival epic. Zárate makes only one fleeting reference to the god and even then it has nothing to do with prophecy. Rather, the poet emphasizes Proteus’ nature as a shape-shifter to extol the powers of the festival’s theatrical presentations to transform reality: the poet claims “las varias formas de Proteo” will be exceeded by the inventive artifice of El caballero del sol (133-4). The closest Zárate comes to incorporating a prophecy of greater Spanish political and military triumphs comes from the goddess Fama at the end of the poem, where she announces that Felipe will be raised to the firmament as a star (164). In general, Zárate’s nostalgic epic is a rear-view mirror only, with little or no projection onto the future. This backward temporal orientation is in keeping with the more elegiac purpose of the poem and the occasion on which it was

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based. The Fiestas de Lerma are, after all, meant to celebrate the end of the Duke of Lerma’s long

dominion over affairs of state, rather than the initiation of the next phase of Spanish history.

It is hard to say for sure, but this freedom from the encomiastic need to dwell on the good times

to come may be what gives Zárate’s poem its slightly less sanguine or optimistic tone and the poet’s

more skeptical insistence on the vanity of earthly life. The poet is all too aware that the political faction

surrounding Lerma is on its way out—as indeed he is himself. Even in the midst of a spectacular celebration Zárate has cause to reflect philosophically on the limits of Spanish political fortunes. At the same time, he is freed from concern for the possible political consequences to himself if he represents the Fiestas de Lerma from a greater critical distance. Had it appeared the Duke would still be in command after 1617, it might have been risky to represent his “Triunfo del Amor” as a moral example of baroque desengaño, for example. But on the eve of the Duke’s definitive exit from the political stage, the threat of political reprisal must have seemed faint.

Whether freedom from the threat of political consequences contributes to Zárate’s departure from the official point of view or not, the fact remains that Zárate’s poetic vision of the Fiestas de Lerma departs clearly from the official purposes of the festival on which it is based. That the Riojan poet does so to a much greater degree than Lope is obvious. But his poetic vision is also more divergent from the official line than is Castelbranco’s. Lope, Castelbranco and Zárate all show signs of investing their poetic talents fully in their festival epics. But Zárate’s somewhat contradictory moves towards questioning the solidity and significance of the political life of his patron gives the impression that the poet is more concerned with making a poem to satisfy himself than the other authors.

In any case, the play of poetic vision and festival liminal space makes all these long-neglected literary works worthy of much more critical attention than they have garnered until now. These poems have a lot to offer: from insight into the sociopolitical contexts in which they were produced, to their power to conserve the liveliness of otherwise ephemeral celebratory events and above all the artistry of

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the poets’ language. If celebratory occasions themselves are best regarded as total social facts—

meaningful sociocultural representations involving large sectors of society—then it follows that their

creative interpretation by leading poets of the day is significant. If one recognizes the great importance of festivals in Felipe III’s Spains, it must also be allowed that serious literary depictions and interpretations of these occasions can be equally consequential, if in no other way, then because of their power to express the views of some of the greatest poetic and political figures of their time.

Epilogue

I would like to close with a few more observations on the unusual sub-genre of festival literature

I have examined. The festival epic does not seem to have long survived Felipe III’s passing—at least not within the Spanish possessions of the Iberian Peninsula itself. In 1623 an “Elogio descriptivo a las fiestas que la Majestad del Rey Felipe IIII hizo por su persona en Madrid” commemorates the festival celebrating the engagement of Spanish Infanta María de Austria and Charles Stuart, then Prince of

Wales. This work is first published in Juan Eugenio Hartzenbusch’ collection of Comedias escogidas de

Frey Lope Felix de Vega Carpio, in 1810 and attributed at that point to Juan Ruiz de Alarcón (583-8). The attribution is doubtful, however. It has also been argued the poem was penned by Antonio Mira de

Amescua, but it is so questionable in its quality and versification that it seems more likely to have been the work of an anonymous, less-accomplished poet or might even be a compilation of verses from several different writers. In any case, the text comes nowhere near the level of sophistication and artistry of the works I have considered from Felipe III’s reign. I have been unable to uncover any further published Peninsular festival epics after 1623.

One can only speculate as to why the form died out in Spain—assuming that in fact it did.

Baroque festivals lost none of their importance or impact under the last two Habsburg rulers of the

Iberian peninsula—quite the contrary. In fact, in other areas of festive activity, display, performance and artistic expression seem only to have got more elaborate as baroque artistic currents tended towards

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the Rococo. Moreover, the Spanish taste for epic poetry generally does not seem to have diminished

during the latter half of the 17th century, either. Explaining the disappearance of festival epics might be

an interesting area for further research, although it is likely to be a challenge. It is hard enough to show

the origins and positive motives behind the development of something like a literary subgenre and much

harder still to prove the negative case as to why it did or does not flourish.

A more promising avenue of further investigation would be the development of this kind of text

in the Spanish Colonial context, where it seems to have survived longer—at least until the 1680s.

Though the Spanish kings never traveled to the Americas, there were lots of significant entry occasions:

those of the viceroys, captains general and influential prelates. The Habsburg kings seem to have made a

special effort to make elaborate cycles of celebration—both sacred and profane—a central part of the

Hispanic culture passed along to their colonial dependencies.

These occasions were generally recorded in relaciones and in poetry just like their European

counterparts. Though they, too, have received relatively little attention, some work has already been

done on some of the more prominent festival writings of New Spain, like Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz’

heroic poem Neptuno alegórico and Carlos de Sigüenza y Góngora’s Teatro de virtudes políticas (largely

written in prose), both composed to commemorate the Marqués de la Laguna’s triumphal entry into

Mexico as viceroy in 1680. Less work has been done on other festive occasions, particularly those taking

place outside New Spain.

A number of questions spring to mind when considering festivals and festival literature in the

colonial context. Since, as this study indicates, a careful sociopolitical contextualization is necessary to

fully appreciate complex Golden Age festivals and their literature, it will no doubt be interesting to

examine how the peripheral political location of American political festival sites affects poetic discourse.

As an example, Lisa Voigt has already made intriguing comparisons between nationalism in semi- peripheral Portugal in 1619, and local patriotism in some celebrations of colonial Brazil and Bolivia

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(Imperial Celebrations, Local Triumphs). If the Spanish Crown attempts to export the festival form and

language more-or-less wholesale from the Iberian Peninsula to its dependencies across the Atlantic, how do festival organizers and authors of the New World receive and interpret that language in their

American context? And if, as I have argued, nostalgia is a recurring motif in early modern Spanish festivals, what can and do colonial societies make of that longing for an Iberian past? On a related note, it would be interesting to delve into how local communities express their own nostalgia both in festivities and writing based on them, to the extent that they can. To mention just one more of many other possible inquiries; given that festivals are total social facts, drawing multiple social actors into a performative event in which they represent themselves within the social order of the day, what do the ways American festivals are structured and later represented in writing tell us about the organization of

Spanish colonial society?

Though the Spanish festival epic subgenre as a phenomenon was limited in its geographical and temporal range, it nevertheless appears to be a fruitful subject for further research.

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APPENDIX

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Figure 1.1 Arco de los pintores—detail João Baptista Lavanha, Viage de la Catholica Real Magestad 1622

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Figure 1.2 Carro de los sastres Anonymous 1659

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Figure 1.3 Triumphal car “Lavrea Calloana” Theodoor van Thulden, Pompa introitus onori serenissimi principis Ferdinandi Austriaci / Peter Paul Rubens, illustration 1635

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Figure 1.4 Tournoi Diederich Graminaeus, Beschreibung derer Fürstlicher Güligscher ec. Hochzeit 1587

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Figure 1.5 Juego de cañas en la Plaza Mayor de Madrid Juan de la Corte ca. 1623

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Figure 1.6 Wheel of Fortune Herrad von Landsberg, Hortus deliciarum 12th century

Figure 1.7 Griffon Anonymous, Reysen und Wandershaften durch das Gelobte Land 1481

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Figure 1.8 Revue des heaumes René d’Anjou, Le livre des tournois / Maître du Boèce Flamand, illustration 1488-1489

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Figure 1.9 De Charles d’Austriche Empereur V Barthélémy Aneau, Imagination poétique 1552

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Figure 2.1 Figura dos corpos celestes Bartolomeu Velho 1568

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Figure 2.2 Giostra di carosello a cavallo Anonymous 17th century

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Figure 2.3 Carosel fait à la Place Royalle à Paris le V VI VII avril M DC XII Anonymous ca. 1612

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Figure 2.4 Lonja de Valencia Anonymous 17th century

Figure 2.5 La expulsión en el puerto de Denia Vicente Mostre 1612

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Figure 3.1 Duke of Lerma on Horseback Peter Paul Rubens ca. 1603

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Figure 3.2 Palacio del duque de Lerma Francisco de Mora, architect

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Figure 3.3 Lerma Francisco de Mora, architect

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Figure 3.4 Archbishop Cristóbal Rojas y Sandoval Juan de Arfe, hijo Before 1603

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Figure 3.5 Façade of Collegial Church of San Pedro with Sandoval arms Francisco de Mora, architect

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Figure 3.6 Altar del convento de San Agustín Anonymous 1659

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Figure 3.7 Altar del convento de Santo Domingo Anonymous 1659

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Figure 3.8 Caccia di tori—detail Veduta in prospettiva che dimostra la meta intiera del teatro con la grotta del fiume Sebeto, la figura di esso e della sirena Partenope, con le otto quadriglie, che giostrarono in quella piazza composte di sei cavalieri per ciascheduna col suo mastro di campo ed equipaggio. In occasione delle nozze reali di Carlo II e Marianna di Neoburgo monarchi delle Spagne in Napoli nel di 04 di maggio 1690 Domenico Antonio Parrino 1690

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Figure 3.9 Composition of Serpents and Saucissons Francis Malthus, A Treatise of Artificial Fireworks 1629

Figure 3.10 Rocket effects Francis Malthus, A Treatise of Artificial Fireworks 1629

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Figure 3.11 Another dainty fixed wheel—detail John Babington, Pyrotechnia 1635

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Figure 3.12 Surgere quae rutilo spectas incendia coelo Fernandi succendit amor Peter Paul Rubens 1635-6

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Figure 3.13 St. George and the Dragon John Babington, Pyrotechnia 1635

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Figure 3.14 His auspiciis vincula rerum Mare laxauit, nec iam terris Vltima Thule est Hercules J. Neefs 1636

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Figure 3.15 Fiat firmamentum Francisco de Holanda, De aetatibus mundi imagines 1545

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Figure 3.16 F. D. Valades inventor—detail Fray Diego Valadés, Rhetorica Christiana 1579

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Figure 4.1 Et Dilaterauit Leone[m] Quasi Hoedum Francisco de Holanda, De aetatibus mundi imagines 1545

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Figure 4.2 Omne quod est in Mundo Francisco de Holanda, De aetatibus mundi imagines 1545

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Figure 4.3 Haec est victoria Francisco de Holanda, De aetatibus mundi imagines 1545

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Figure 4.4 Evropa prima pars terrae in forma virginis Johannes Putsch 1537

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Figure 4.5 Desembarcacion de Sv M. en Lisboa João Baptista Lavanha, Viage de la Catholica Real Magestad 1622

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Figure 4.6 Arco de los flamencos—detail João Baptista Lavanha, Viage de la Catholica Real Magestad 1622

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Figure 4.7 Arco de los plateros del arbol de los reyes de Portugal João Baptista Lavanha, Viage de la Catholica Real Magestad 1622

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Figure 4.8 Arco de los alemanes—detail João Baptista Lavanha, Viage de la Catholica Real Magestad 1622

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Figure 4.9 Desembarcacion de Sv M. en Lisboa—detail João Baptista Lavanha, Viage de la Catholica Real Magestad 1622

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Figure 4.10 Neptvno sternente fretvm, et felicibvs avstris pvlsvs abit pelago boreas Theodoor van Thulden, Pompa introitus onori serenissimi principis Ferdinandi Austriaci / Peter Paul Rubens, illustration 1635

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