SOURCE: Stathatos, Constantine Christopher. Introduction to A Critical Edition with Introduction and Notes of Gil Vicente's Floresta de Enganos, pp. 9-63. Chapel Hill, N.C.: The University of North Carolina Press, 1972.

[In the following excerpt, Stathatos discusses the textual and critical history of Floresta de Enganos.]

GIL VICENTE AND THE COURT

For thirty-four years and under the patronage of two successive kings, Manuel I (1495-1521) and John III (1521-1557), Gil Vicente served as purveyor of entertainment for the Portuguese Court. His was not an age of art for art's sake.¹ His entire dramatic career, initiated with the Monólogo do vaqueiro (1502) and concluded with the Floresta de Enganos (1536), was guided by the need to please his patrons. All his plays were written for the Court, and many were expressly designed to celebrate particular festivals. It remains uncertain, however, to what extent the dramatist had to subordinate his art to prescribed requirements. Even if he had to, this was not incompatible with Renaissance practices. Though for a modern dramatist writing to order is not at all the same as writing to please oneself,² some Renaissance artists seem not to have felt that patronage violated their creative spirit: Michelangelo considered beneficial the pressure exerted on him by Giulio de' Medici;³ Ben Jonson never complained against his employer.⁴ Edgar Wind asserts that “as a rule artists prefer patrons who fuss to patrons who do not care.”⁵ Fortunately for Vicente, King Manuel I was a patron who cared and who took pride in encouraging artistic endeavors.⁶ True, the playwright occasionally put his talent in the service of his patron's policies; but there is no reason to suppose that he felt any reluctance to do so or that the policies themselves were repugnant to him. His position at the royal Court was also advantageous to Gil Vicente's theatrical development for another reason: it “enabled him to enrich his scene with large and small devices and properties.”⁷

Such were the circumstances under which the Floresta de Enganos was composed and produced before a courtly audience.

THE HISTORY OF THE FLORESTA DE ENGANOS

According to the rubric that precedes it, the Floresta “foy representada ao muyto alto & poderoso Rey dom Ioam o terceyro deste nome na sua cidade de Euora. Era do Senhor de M.D.XXXVI. Annos.” The colophon informs us that it was “a derradeyra que fez Gil Vicente em seus dias.” There is no indication that it was an occasional piece intended to celebrate some specific event in the life of the Court, though it is a court entertainment. The place and date of its performance, as given in the Copilaçam, have never been questioned by any scholar, unlike those of other Vicentine pieces: it is known that the Court was in residence in Évora from December 1532 till August 1537,⁸ and that Gil Vicente was in that city in August 1535 and remained there till the performance of the Floresta the following year.⁹

The year 1536 proved to be a disastrous one both for the history and the literature of Portugal: it saw the establishment of the Inquisition in Portugal; it was the year of Garcia de Resende's death, and perhaps, though it remains uncertain, of Vicente's; but, above all, it was the year in which Vicente's muse was definitively silenced.¹⁰ Moreover, this same year marks the beginning of the eclipse of the autochthonous Portuguese theater—which was to be succeeded, for a short period of time, by the Italianate theater or Sá de Miranda and Luís de Camões, and then, much more lastingly, by the Spanish comedia.¹¹

Following the establishment of the Inquisition, the first Portuguese writer to suffer the consequences of censorship was Gil Vicente.¹² His work was censored not only in Portugal but also in Spain.¹³ Compared to some of his other plays, the Floresta de Enganos suffered few alterations or mutilations. It is to be understood that real literary censorship did not exist at the time of the dramatist's death,¹⁴ and that any action taken against his work was posthumous: the first Portuguese Index only appeared—in manuscript form—in 1547. Despite the fact that Vicente's work was affected by the Indices of 1551 (Rol dos livros defesos pelo Cardeal-Infante Inquisidor Geral nestes reinos, Évora) and the Cathalogus librorum qui prohibentur hoc anno 1559, Valladolid, the Floresta appeared intact in the Copilaçam of 1562, which was issued only after it had been examined “polos deputados da sancta Inquisiçam.”¹⁵ For the first time, the play appeared in the Catalogo dos livros que se prohibem nestes Reynos e Senhorios de Portugal (Lisbon, 1581). Its second edition, in the Copilaçam of 1586, follows the modifications imposed by this Index; a collation of the two texts shows that five lines were entirely omitted and seven altered; minor omissions and alterations occur also in the rubric, the colophon and a stage direction.¹⁶ In 1624 was published the Index auctorum damnatae memoriae, tum etiam librorum, qui vel simpliciter, vel ad expurgationem usque prohibentur, vel denique jam expurgati permittuntur (Lisbon), in which one reads: “na Comedia Floresta de Enganos, perto do fim, o que da ventura se diz, lease cautamente.”¹⁷ The same warning is repeated in the Index librorum prohibitorum ac expurgandorum novissimus (Madrid, 1747).¹⁸

After its first publication in the Copilaçam de todalas obras de Gil Vicente of 1562, under the personal care of the dramatist's son Luís Vicente, and its second in the Copilaçam of 1586, the Floresta next appeared in the Hamburg edition of 1834: Obras de Gil Vicente, correctas e emendadas pelo cuidado e diligencia de J. V. Barreto Feio e J. G. Monteiro (Officina Typographica de Langhoff), three volumes. This edition was based on a copy of the editio princeps found in the library of the University of Göttingen, but the editors took many liberties with the text.¹⁹ The subsequent editions of 1843 (Lisbon; same editors) and 1852 (Lisbon, Bibliotheca Portugueza ou reproducção dos livros nacionaes escriptos até ao fim do seculo XVIII) are virtually the same as that of Hamburg.²⁰ In more recent times, the Floresta has been included in the following editions of Vicente's complete works: Obras de Gil Vicente, ed. Mendes dos Remédios, three volumes (Coimbra, 1907-1914); Obras completas de Gil Vicente. Reimpressão “fac-similada” da edição de 1562 (Lisbon, 1928); Obras completas, ed. Marques Braga, six volumes (Lisbon, 1942-1944); Obras completas, ed. Álvaro Júlio da Costa Pimpão (Barcelos, 1956); and, without mention of an editor, in Obras completas. Contribuições para o conhecimento das obras de Gil Vicente (Porto, 1965). The Floresta has never been individually or critically edited. There are only passing references to it in Vicentine criticism, which suggests that no critic has found it worthy of his attention.

THE FLORESTA AND THE CRITICS

“The primary understanding of any work of literature,” claims Northrop Frye, “has to be based on an assumption of its unity. However mistaken such an assumption may eventually prove to be, nothing can be done unless we start with it as a heuristic principle.”²¹ The question of unity as the test of literary worth has come to dominate present-day critical methods. Not all literary works, however, lend themselves to the application of the same critical formulas. It may well be that the kind of unity found in one work will not be found in another, but this does not necessarily mean that the first is superior to the second. It simply means that there may be more than one interpretation of the term “unity”. Questioning the validity of our notion of unity, Eugène Vinaver duly remarks that it is “a metaphor traceable as far back as the 16th century, but not beyond, and not entirely valid for the 20th. Our failure to realize this has caused us to overlook the very things that give life and meaning to medieval literary art and to much of our own.”²² Turning to a discussion of the medieval ars poetica, he doubts whether “the implied notion of unity as something which cuts the work off from any other matter would have appealed to any writer of consequence in the last centuries of the Middle Ages;” he adds that by medieval standards, the devices of amplificatio and digressio were not only legitimate but also fundamental.²³ That our idea of unity is the sole basis for assigning literary merits is obviously a questionable proposition. On the other hand, there is no reason to deny that the search for it is a legitimate critical task, provided that one does not insist on applying the same criteria in every case.

The need for this kind of critical flexibility is evident in the case of Vicente's theater as a whole and in that of the Floresta de Enganos in particular. It is doubtful whether this play can withstand the test of the usual critical procedure. Its unity cannot in all fairness be expected to coincide with that of, let us say, Oedipus Rex. But if, instead of pronouncing a hasty judgment, we are willing to view it from a different angle bearing in mind Vinaver's remarks, we may find that there are other elements which compensate for its lack of a close-knit dramatic unity.

As Waldron admirably puts it, “Vicente makes greater demands on his modern readers than most authors; the main essentials for an understanding of his work are a sense of humour and lack of critical preconceptions.”²⁴ If the critic makes no conscientious effort to free himself of critical prejudices before undertaking to evaluate Vicente's work, he will surely do him a great disservice. Unfortunately, the students of Vicente's theater have now and then demonstrated an attitude characterized by lack of objectivity or perception.²⁵ It must be realized that it is faulty logic to judge the playwright in the light of what is now understood by the term “dramatist”. Applying modern dramatic norms—which are after all greatly indebted to the neo-Aristotelian doctrines that became current in the Hispanic world only in the latter part of the sixteenth century²⁶—to Vicente's works, and insisting on evaluating them in terms of what, in our opinion, the playwright did or did not intend to do,²⁷ or what we would have liked him to do rather than what he actually did, will inevitably lead us to a distorted and largely falsified idea of their functional quality.

Critics often tend to forget that Vicente wrote almost exclusively for the stage, and that his plays were generally composed on command and formed integral parts of Court festivals. Their festive quality may account to a rather large extent for the apparent heterogeneity of the elements which the playwright has blended in his art, and this in turn creates an impression of fragmentariness and dramatic incoherence in some cases.

Vicentine scholars seem inclined to agree unanimously on the lack of logic in the structure of the Floresta de Enganos. Count von Schack notes that

la comedia, que lleva el raro título de Floresta de Engaños, es poco notable por el plan, pero superior en algunos rasgos aislados, componiendo una serie de escenas cómicas, llenas de astucia y travesura, aunque sin verdadera unidad dramática, puesto que el lazo, que las une, es sólo la semejanza del asunto y el nombre común a todas ellas.²⁸

For Menéndez y Pelayo it is “una farsa implexa, puesto que combina dos ó tres en una, á la verdad con poco arte.”²⁹ Aubrey Bell commented on the looseness of its structure on several occasions.³⁰ Wickersham Crawford considers the play “a bizarre composition” that “presents a series of deceptions and tricks with little relationship to one another.”³¹ William C. Atkinson calls it an “olla podrida” and adds that “the critic, studying its structure, is forced to the conclusion that ‘o mecanismo teatral, volvidos mais de trinta anos de experiência de representações, nada tinha adiantado’.”³² Álvaro Júlio da Costa Pimpão believes that this play “acusa … a declinação do Autor,”³³ whereas T. P. Waldron refers to many of Vicente's later works—undoubtedly including the Floresta—as not being “strictly plays at all, but diffuse dramatic fantasies, or theatrical reviews.”³⁴ Finally, Laurence Keates regrets that the Floresta is “marred by the admixture of … elements proper to the farsa.”³⁵ Such verdicts are eloquent proof of the scholars' disappointment, which, consciously or unconsciously, stems from their unfulfilled desire to make this play respond to their own notions of dramatic unity.

A few of the critics just cited, as well as a good many others, have sought to account for this lack of a tightly woven structural pattern. With minor variations, their arguments center around the “primitivism” of Gil Vicente's theater in contrast to the “classicism” of the Renaissance. Some scholars contend that the nondramatic quality of his theater should be attributed to his ignorance of the classics.³⁶ This implies that had he known Greek or Roman drama and the dramatic theory of antiquity, he would have oriented his craft in that direction. The validity of this assertion, however, is doubtful. True, Vicente had no direct knowledge of the classical theater. Yet, in about the middle of his career as a dramatist, he might have drawn a few lessons from Torres Naharro's Propalladia (Naples 1517; Seville 1520), and, later, from Sá de Miranda's Italianate play, Os estrangeiros (1528). That he did not adopt the modes of the neo-classical theater may suggest either that he was not interested in it, or that he was unable to cope with its exigencies.³⁷ He may also have felt that neo-classical precepts would have been incompatible with his function as Court entertainer; most likely, he simply had confidence in his own artistic convictions. The fact that Vicente passed into oblivion for so long must be due primarily to his having modeled his work on medieval patterns, at a time when classical forms were so enthusiastically adopted by the rest of Europe.³⁸

At any rate, we should not censure Vicente because he failed to conform to the dictates of a voice which, for one reason or other, did not appeal to him. We should rather realize that what mattered to him was not the book but rather the stage; therefore, the theatrical aspect of his plays should be the primary measure of his worth. As Gino Saviotti argues

A teatralidade não depende só da composição geral. Pode subsistir sem a ajuda de um verdadeiro organismo narrativo, no sentido moderno, da mesma maneira que é possível encontrar-se grande pintura, maravilhosa força cromática num simples friso decorativo, ou num fragmento, que ainda não é quadro.³⁹

For the sake of a better understanding of Vicente's stagecraft, we should also bear in mind that “la visión del espectador tiene otras leyes que la del crítico moroso.”⁴⁰

The lack of fairness in Vicentine criticism has been well diagnosed by Vitorino Nemésio:

Gil Vicente teve de pagar a originalidade do seu génio. Pagou-o com uma espécie de anacronismo pessoal. Ou somos nós que, senhores de uma perspectiva literária já arrumada e nítida, em que os êxitos e os malogros se esclarecem por si, gostaríamos de vê-lo nascido um pouco mais tarde, dar tôda a medida do seu génio numa expressão mais moderna.⁴¹

ANALYSIS OF THE FLORESTA

With such criteria as a basis, I shall attempt an examination of the Floresta de Enganos in the hope of discovering any unity that may exist in its structure. I hope to show also that there exist other qualities which may enhance our vision of this particular play as well as of Gil Vicente's theater in general. The various scenes or episodes, which compose the play, will be first analyzed individually and in the order in which they occur, and their bearing on the play as a whole will then be traced.

The play opens with the entrance of a singular pair of characters, a philosopher and a simpleton, whose primary function is to acquaint the audience with the plot and introduce the first engano. Besides this external function, it must have been designed to incite laughter by its sharp contrast of the two extremes, wisdom and stupidity, and to ferry the audience from the real world of the Court to that of the imagination. As often in Gil Vicente's plays, this prologue is a long one and has the qualities of a play in itself.

Of all Peninsular playwrights of the early sixteenth century, Vicente makes the most varied use of the prologue.⁴² Here the two personages are chained together, a fact which causes distress to the philosopher but does not produce the least feeling of discomfort in the simpleton; it is perhaps a hint that the realm of wisdom and the realm of stupidity are not as widely apart in essence as in appearance. The philosopher complains bitterly of his adverse fortune; his present misfortune has come about as punishment for his eagerness to offer his wise judgment to the services of “los muy antigos romanos,” who, in his own words,

… porque la reprehensión
a todos es enojosa,
…
… me echaron en prisión,
en cárcel muy tenebrosa.
No bastó: mas en depués
daquesto que oído havéis,
…
ataron ansí comigo
este bovo que aquí veis.

(11-20)

In addition to suffering an undeserved penalty, the philosopher repudiates the idea of being in the constant company of a fool, a humiliating and bothersome experience for a man of learning. The fool, on the other hand, appears oblivious to any notion of misfortune; instead, the only interest he expresses lies in the thought of things that would instinctively appeal to a person with a practical, rather than a speculative, turn of mind. He only cares for satisfying his bodily wants: he is presented as gluttonous and lazy:

Dezid, nuestramo, veamos:
¿son mejores de comer
las grajas o los milanos?
Y más ¿sabéis qué yo querría?
Dormir quatro o cinco meses.

(76-80)

In the character of the dunce are embodied the traits which typify the stupid comic personages in early Spanish drama: the dull remarks, with which he continually interrupts the philosopher's mission, his constant references to eating and sleeping, and his actual sleeping on stage. The latter, observes William S. Hendrix, “is paralleled by the philosophical theme that mankind is asleep in this world to better things.”⁴³

What we have here, then, is in essence a confrontation between the world of the spirit and the world of the senses. The two characters, though bound to each other, represent two widely opposite points of view which are comically accentuated in the course of the debate that comprises the entire episode. The contrast culminates when the philosopher expresses envy for the fool's lack of sensitivity:

¡Oh, quien no sintiesse más
de lo malo ni de lo bueno,
de lo suyo y de lo ageno,
de quanto tú sentirás!

(38-41)

While the parvo is meditating on the satisfaction of his physical needs, the philosopher continues to paint his affliction. His fortune has led him ironically from Scylla to Charybdis. For fear of finding a stupid wife he decided never to marry, but now, he finds himself in an even worse situation. Though spared a stupid wife, he is married, in a sense, to the fool:

          Que lo traiga desta suerte
al comer y al cenar,
al dormir y platicar;
esto so pena de muerte
que no lo pueda dexar
hasta el morir.

(21-26)

The figure of the philosopher is basically full of pathos. But the playwright has admirably combined his pathos with the simpleton's tendencies in a highly comic scene; he has not failed to exploit every possibility of adding humor to it, such as situation, characterization and the incoherent quality of the dialogue. Even though most of the time the two characters talk of different things, they appear to debate the same issue.

At last, as soon as the fool falls asleep, the philosopher has the opportunity to carry out his mission, namely to introduce “una fiesta de alegría,” and give a summary of its plot in prose “por ir más declarado.” Before withdrawing from the stage, he also introduces the merchant of the first episode who “pensando d'engañar, / ha de quedar engañado.”⁴⁴ Our play then is introduced from the outset as a fiesta de alegría, something, that is, which is to cause mirth and delight the audience. This, along with the overtones of the introductory scene, reveals the spirit of the playwright's entire undertaking.

The proverb “si queréis matar al cuerdo, / atalde un necio al pie” (44-45)⁴⁵ may have served as the point of departure for the development of the prologue. Vicente's fondness for folk materials is well known. His exploitation of popular wisdom is best illustrated in Inês Pereira (1523), where the proverb “Mais quero asno que me leve que cavalo que me derrube” is at the core of the play—though the myth of the play's composition around this proverb as a test of Vicente's dramatic capabilities is no longer generally accepted.⁴⁶

With the opening of the following picaresque episode, we are transported into a world of fraud and deception which will assert itself repeatedly throughout the play. The pattern on which the theme of deceit unfolds follows faithfully the popular belief that “el que engaña, engañado se halla.”⁴⁷ In this case, deceit is inextricably associated with money. No sooner has the merchant appeared on stage than he engages in a eulogy of money and the omnipotence traditionally ascribed to it:

          Determino de fazer
minhas casas muito bem,
porque quem dinheiro tem
fará tudo o que quiser.

(141-144)

Knowing, however, that he is already doomed to fall victim to his own deceitful designs, we can immediately sense the irony of his statement. These few words of his also suffice to paint a vivid portrait of his character.

His self-confidence—acquired through a long experience of exploiting needy people—blinds him: while his prospective prey describes her wretchedness in the gloomiest possible terms, he does not have the slightest suspicion that under the disguise of a widow hides a poor squire determined to defraud “um ladrão.” This is a kind of play within a play, since, in their effort to dupe each other, both merchant and squire conceal their true selves and act as if they were impersonating other people. The crafty merchant professes to be moved by pity upon hearing of the widow's plight, and takes pains to show that he makes a personal sacrifice before buying her forged bill: “ora, em fim, quero ser tolo sandeu, / e só por vos socorrer” (219-220). The bargain concluded and the widow gone, the merchant tells himself how fortunate he has been in that she was a rather easy prey or, perhaps, he seeks an excuse for his action: “nam-na esfolara eu / s'ela doutra casta fôra” (245-246). Yet his satisfaction over the very favorable termination of the bargain will not last; the widow's servant-girl will soon return to dispel his illusions:

          Mercador, quereis saber?
Bem enganado ficastes,
que a viúva que enganastes
era homem e não molher.
E mais, é vento
êsse seu conhecimento;
êle o assinou e nam mais.
Assi que os dez mil reais
leixai-os no testamento.

(247-255)

Had the scene ended with these words of the môça, it would have been, dramatically, far more appropriate; but the deceived merchant remains on stage to introduce the next episode. One might expect him to react to the bad news, but he does not. His self-critical comment (“crede que quem fôr tirano, / tem seu dinheiro perdido”—256-257) is by no means the reaction of the usurer who has just been swindled of his money. He who speaks here is the actor who has now assumed the role of an objective commentator. So detached is he from his previous role that he can make moral reflections. Thus the barrier which separated play from reality is broken at this point.

Equally unexpected are the last words of the impostor, as he leaves the merchant's upon the conclusion of the fraudulent transaction:

          Nam havia em Portugal,
nos tempos mais ancianos,
tantas maneiras d'enganos,
nem tantos males dum mal.

(238-241)

No matter how much truth this outburst may contain, the fact that it comes from the lips of one who has just deceived renders it highly comic.

Practically everything in this episode contributes to the establishment of the overall comic structure; the interdependence of character and situation is explicit in the deceitful contest between the money-loving merchant and the needy “widow”. Though the usurer has conventionally served as a butt for satire, the manner in which he is treated here is peculiarly Vicentine. He is presented as so self-confident that he cannot, even for a moment, perceive that he is being fooled as to the very identity of his opponent. Disguise is an additional device responsible to a great extent for the general comic atmosphere. So are the asides of the shrewd, outspoken servant-girl.

In the character of the merchant, the playwright is also satirizing an abuse which was not uncommon in his days, that of usury. It seems, however, that his intentions do not go beyond the borderline of humor; he is seeking neither to instruct nor to reform, but is simply interested in the subject as another means of inciting laughter.

The transition to the following episode is made less abrupt by the mention, in the course of the fraudulent bargain, of King Telebano, in whose kingdom the action of the entire play is to unfold. We are more or less warned by this deception as to what we should subsequently expect. Indeed, as we are soon to see, deceit is rampant in Telebano's kingdom.

The world of esthetic reality of the first deceit fades in the background as that of fantasy comes now into focus. The merchant is succeeded on the stage by Cupid, whose expression of pain—amorous this time—echoes those of the philosopher in the prologue and of the feigned widow. The love-stricken Cupid's long lament and the description of his failure to attain the object of his love are profoundly ironic, for one would hardly expect to see Cupid wounded by his own arrows:

          ¿A quién contaré mis quexas,
a quién diré mi tormento?
¿Remedio, por qué te alexas
de ver Amor que solo dexas
neste término momento?

(266-270)

Equally ironic is his claim:

          Los que me pintan ciego,
no es ansí como conviene;
que Amor tantos ojos tiene
como de muertes me ruego.

(276-279)

Erwin Panofsky tells us that as a result of the tendency to interpret allegorically his physical aspects—a tendency first noted in Roman poetry—virtually all representations of Cupid in art and literature, after “Mythographus III”, would have him blind or blindfolded. As blindness was associated with evil, blind Cupid came to be conceived as a diavolo. So precise a significance had his blindness in the fourteenth century, that “his image could be changed from a personification of Divine Love to a personification of illicit Sensuality, and vice versa, by simply adding, or removing, the bandage;” this duality was expressed, in the Renaissance, in the conflict between amor sacro and amor profano.⁴⁸ Vicente seems to conceive his subject in secular rather than in religious terms; by “removing the bandage,” he does not suggest that he eliminates the element of sensuality from Cupid's intentions; he simply renders his caricature of the god more complete: even though Cupid can see perfectly well—otherwise he could hardly be a serious suitor—, he still inflicts upon himself what he was conventionally thought to inflict upon others. The bandage is missing but Cupid behaves as if he still retained it.

Cupid's diction throughout the episode shows him to be a courtly lover; all the fundamental conceits of the courtly code are present: the beloved, Grata Celia, is addressed as “flor del más florido huerto!” (282). Besides being the lover's señora, she is described as indifferent to his attentions, as cruel and ungrateful, and, what is more, as taking pleasure at his suffering: “… bien sé el mal que me quieres, / y los gozos y plazeres / que recibes con mis llagas” (298-300). Furthermore, love is referred to as all-consuming fire, as torment, and as death: “Oh ingrata pecador, / rasga el coraçón esquivo, / que mataste al dios d'amor” (291-293).

A strange world, indeed, has opened before our eyes; a world composed mainly of pagan mythology and a strong dose of courtly matter. Gil Vicente has made an extensive use of courtly love in his theater, although, as T. R. Hart has noted, its use “varies strikingly from play to play.”⁴⁹ In the present case, its use obeys the playwright's desire to control the flight of imagination and bring the action from the purely fantastic plane down closer to that of verifiable reality. Vicente, in other words, has not allowed himself to establish a wholly supernatural world merely for its own sake. What he undoubtedly has sought to do is to maintain and enrich the initially established atmosphere of comedy, to carry out his plan of providing a fiesta de alegría. To this end, he has made Cupid a comic personage by caricaturing him in a variety of ways: he has humanized him, subjecting him to the pains of love, which, ironically, he normally administers himself. What is more, he has transformed him from God of Love to a courtly lover. Finally, he has made him fail in his amorous pursuit, deceived by the very object of his desire.

Unable otherwise, owing to his reductio ad humanum, to overcome the obstacles which hinder the conquest of his desired goal, the most important of which is, needless to mention, Grata Celia's resistance, Cupid decides to resort to deception:

Cúmpleme de usar engaño,
que el engaño no es estraño;
antes se usa cada hora,
y la verdad d'año en año.

(312-315)

His first victim is Apollo himself, whom he first reassures that he is not in love and then persuades that his temple will soon be devastated along with King Telebano's city; and that at the cause of all this is Telebano's daughter, Grata Celia, whom Cupid calumniates as having secretly wrought many evils offensive to the goddesses. Cupid's tale reaches its climax when he makes Apollo believe that the only remedy which can prevent the oncoming disaster lies in the latter's ability to convince King Telebano that he should

          [Llevar] su hija daquí
a aquella serra Minea,
adonde sin ella se vea,
y haga penitencia allí
por que perdonada sea.

(345-349)

…
          Y Grata Celia escondida,
allí sola, desterrada,
salvará también su vida;
pues que siendo oferecida,
será libre y perdonada.

(355-359)

Cupid is naturally aware of his delinquent behavior but he wishes to believe that so long as he succeeds in conquering Grata Celia, the means he employs are justified:

          Yo bien sé que erro ahora,
mas es por sanar un daño.
Perdóname, mi señora,
que el mundo triste dagora
se llama templo d'engaño.

(375-379)

In fact this first engano of his will have the effect of a chain reaction, as deceit follows deceit throughout the rest of the play. A similar pattern of development will be followed later in Tirso's El burlador de Sevilla.⁵⁰ It seems hardly necessary to add that Cupid is in fact a Don Juan though in an embryonic stage. The symptoms of the behavior of both are by and large the same. Selfish pleasure is the motive and the object of their deceptions; both have a warped sense of moral values; like Don Juan, Cupid is the epitome of a corrupt world in which deceit is used “cada hora, / y la verdad d'año en año.”

In the figure of Apollo, pagan mythology is blended with Christian dogma. When King Telebano appears at his temple to pray, Apollo gives him the kind of advice one would expect from an ecclesiastic rather than a pagan god (we are reminded of a similar situation in Alfonso de Valdés' Diálogo de Mercurio y Carón, where the preaching is assigned to Mercurio):

          Vuestra Alteza reze breve
y obre obras de sancto,
que el rezar no monta tanto
como hazer lo que se deve.
El rezar es como flores
y flores las oraciones,
y el fructo, dizen doctores,
las obras son los amores,
y no las buenas razones.

(385-393)

This distinction between works and words, between reality and appearance, is sound Christian doctrine and it occurs elsewhere in Gil Vicente.⁵¹ To have, however, a figure from pagan mythology make use of Christian precepts and preach on the proper kind of Christian conduct, is not only peculiar but deliberately comic: it is in accordance with Vicente's general scheme in this play, of producing comic effects by having the wrong character pronounce the right judgment. We have already seen examples of this technique in the cases of the disguised squire and of Cupid. Celestina's fondness for moral sententiae is a well-known precedent.

To exploit further the possibilities for comedy which his presentation of Apollo offers, Mestre Gil makes him an expert in feminine psychology: informing King Telebano that a member of his household has provoked the implacable wrath of the goddesses Verecinta, Juno, and Pallas, he takes advantage of the opportunity to explain the working of the feminine mind:

Son diesas muy furiosas:
ya sabéis que las mugeres,
quando están más amorosas,
más blandas, más piadosas,
no son menos que crueles;
¿qué harán siendo sañosas?

(420-425)

Apollo's ultimatum marks the beginning of dramatic conflict. King Telebano is confronted with the dilemma which constitutes a topos in literature, sacred as well as profane (cf. the Old Testament story of Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac, which is alluded to by Gil Vicente himself in lines 759-760, and Agamemnon's sacrifice of Iphigenia in Euripides' Iphigenia at Aulis). Despite the obvious similarity in situation between the two, the Biblical and Vicente's story, there is a substantial difference: whereas for Telebano there are alternatives between which he must choose—namely, the destruction of his city or the loss of his daughter—, for Abraham the issue is not one of real choice. He can choose only between obedience and disobedience; his strong commitment to God, however, automatically rules out the second alternative. Moreover, though neither Telebano nor Abraham questions the justness of the command, Telebano chooses very easily for one who is presented with a choice. Yet, for a father who suddenly realizes that he is about to lose his daughter, there is nothing more natural than intolerable pain and lament:

¡Oh graves angustias mías,
lágrimas dell ánima mía!
¡Oh hija de mi alegría!
¿Qué tales serán mis días
fuera de tu compañía?
Quedarás en las montañas,
naquella Minea sierra,
y mis beços y mis canas
mucho en breve serán tierra.

(444-452)

His daughter's appearance and her inquiries as to what has so changed his aspect intensify Telebano's agony, the more so because he cannot disclose to her the cause of it. Instead, he must lead her to her destiny by deceit; he therefore asks her to go on a hunting trip with him, pretending that this will suffice to lessen his grief. He entrusts the administration of his kingdom, during his absence, to the Chief Justice, whom he considers impeccably educated and consistently cuerdo; in fact, in addressing him, the king makes use of the same epithets, sabio y prudente, that Grata Celia had used when referring to her father: this accentuates the good impression he has of his Chief Justice. The playwright has made it highly ironic, however, for subsequent events disprove the king's good opinion of the Justice. The administrative matter arranged, Telebano and his daughter are on their way to the sham hunt which will perhaps (note the intentional change in certainty now) restore him to good humor. Though ignorant of the entire issue, Grata Celia notices with wondering surprise that the farther they go the more apprehensive she becomes.

The playwright demands that we let the king and his daughter go on their way while we stay to witness a new farcical incident. It involves none other than Telebano's temporary replacement, the Chief Justice, and it is an extremely comic elaboration of the motif of the disastrous effect of love on an aged person, of which there are antecedents in Vicente's theater (cf. O velho da horta, the Comédia de Rubena, and O triunfo do inverno). Once again, there is a brusque change of tone: we are made to descend, in a sense, from the level of the sublime to that of the ridiculous. Strangely enough, this scene, which is undeniably the most delightfully funny of the entire play, is omitted in the summary of the plot. For Aubrey Bell, this is an indication that the Floresta is made up of parts composed at different periods of Vicente's dramatic career.⁵² Nevertheless, this particular episode is not as independent as it might appear at first sight: in addition to the fact that it revolves around the same basic note, that of deceit, it is related to the mythological story by virtue of its protagonist, whom King Telebano has personally appointed as his temporary successor in the administration of his kingdom. What takes place in this kingdom, during the king's absence, may serve as an implicit commentary on the king's decision to make this appointment; in effect, this episode proves that Telebano has been fooled in his high esteem for, and confidence in, the integrity and discretion of his Chief Justice. It may be argued, moreover, that this scene counterbalances the emotional effects produced by Telebano's situation, though, at the same time, it creates suspense in the anticipation of its outcome. It also serves to re-enforce the impression of a kingdom dominated by deceit, which was first established in the episode of the usurious merchant; not only the subjects but also the administrators are corrupt. Finally, from a technical point of view, this scene creates the illusion of the duration of Telebano's trip to the mountain.

As the scene opens, the Chief Justice is shown in his study reading in a law book. He is caricatured right from the start: being a jurist, he is supposed to know correct Latin; yet the first words he utters are in macarronic Latin. The refusal of the young girl, who comes to ask for advice on some legal matter, to enter despite his insistence (“Estais agora estudando / só, e eu sam grande já”—502-503), suggests the moral reputation the learned justice enjoys, which apparently is not compatible with King Telebano's high opinion of him. When the girl remarks: “Sabeis quê, senhor Doctor? / Vós pareceis-me travêsso” (513-514), he hastens to respond that he is not to be feared for he is well advanced in age, which, in view of the convention already referred to, confirms that her suspicions are not groundless. She does not trust the way he looks at her, and with reason. His insistence that she enter and her repeated refusals animate the dialogue and accelerate the tempo of the action. Unsuccessful in his effort to weaken her resistance by any other means, the impassioned justice begins to entreat her in a courtly fashion!:

¡Oh, entrad acá, señora,
mi sagrado paraíso!

(522-523)

… ¿qué haré yo, mis flores,
a los ojos matadores
que me cegaron los míos?

(528-530)

¡Oh mi perla preciosa!
No me hagáis entender
que sin vos haya hermosa.

(534-536)

This set of perfectly conventional conceits leaves no room for doubt as to his ulterior motives. The playwright has once more availed himself of this chance to employ the courtly tradition as an instrument of character delineation; he makes the justice ridiculous by having him present himself as a courtly lover. Noteworthy is the girl's realistic reaction:

Quem tal quer
nam havia de ter molher,
e fermosa como a vossa.

(531-533)

Under the overwhelming impact of passion, the justice has become unmindful of his age, his marital status and the responsibilities of his position. In his eagerness to strike an agreement with the girl, he will not hesitate to sacrifice even his professional integrity:

Yo no quiero
de vos plata ni dinero,
mas privar con vos por cierto
en lugar mucho secreto,
por deziros quánto os quiero.
          Yo daré, juro a Dios,
la sentencia en vuesso hecho;
y aunque no tengáis derecho
todo ello saldrá por vos,
y haréis vuesso provecho.

(541-550)

Under these circumstances, and being as astute as she is, the girl pretends to give in and asks him to visit her secretly at night. The justice is too overcome by the prospect of reward to grasp the irony of her words, when she asks with affected innocence: “assoviaes vós bem, meu rei?” (557). His whole attitude makes him an appropriate victim of the pranks that the girl engineers at his expense:

Oh, como hei d'enganar
um doutor que se enganou!
          Alguidar, ora vem cá,
e faremos o formento;
que negro contentamento
o negro doutor terá,
do que lh'há de sair vento.

(563-569)

Her song also foretells, in a more emphatic way, his eventual disillusionment.

Still forgetting that he is not fit for the type of role he has chosen to perform, the justice appears at the girl's door, following her instructions with utmost care. Once inside, he becomes the butt of her constant shafts of ridicule. She dominates him and the entire scene, now with her spontaneous wit, now with well calculated mischievous tricks. Time and again her caustic remarks contradict, point by point, the king's judgment of him (e.g. “Crede que mao é d'achar / um letrado ser discreto”—575-576). The hilariousness of the situation is greatly enhanced by her having him undergo humiliation after humiliation. He, nevertheless, complies, without a trace of objection, with her demands that he whisper, take care not to cough, replace his garments with those of a baker-woman, and finally, that he sift flour. She even offers him a sifting lesson for she is not pleased with his work. During all this ritual, she is careful to rekindle, from time to time, his hopes of attaining the object of his desire. It is the entertainment of such illusions that matters to the justice; as he confesses, it is all for the sake of love:

Paciencia;
porque juro en mi conciencia
que este texto yo no lo entiendo.
Peró si yo estoy cirniendo,
es en loor y reverencia
del amor a que me riendo.
          Estas bueltas no sé yo.
Dulcis amor, qui me vis?
Que no se aprende en París
este lavor en que estó.
¡Oh amor!

(617-627)

His lack of perception, caused by his infatuation which, in turn, is not completely unrelated to his bookish nature, is what renders his pathos ludicrous. His own world is quite incompatible with the world into which his new role has led him, something he failed to realize before stepping out of his study. Furthermore, he is not receptive to any hint at all; otherwise he would have noticed the relevance of the girl's aphorism, even if it is stated in a different context: “em tudo o que fazemos / há mister manhas assaz / segundo o mundo que temos” (610-612).

The scene reaches its climax when the justice becomes the laughing stock of the velha, who mistakes him, initially, for a negro baker-woman and subsequently showers him with epithets which would not normally be encountered in his books. When at last his real identity is revealed to her, she ridicules him, aided by the girl, with such violence that he has to flee as hastily as he can. He will return only to claim his garments, but in this, too, he will be rebuffed. It is still inconceivable to him “que una rapaza de un año / hiziera tan grande engaño / a un doctor hecho en Sena” (738-740); and he resolves to reenter his world and resume his duties (oddly enough, this is the first time that he shows concern for his reputation):

Será más sano
callar hecho tan profano
y olvidar esta guerra,
y irme a juzgar la tierra.

(741-744)

King Telebano then has not only been deceived by his superior, Apollo, but also by his inferior, the justice, who has failed to obey his instructions and to prove worthy of his trust.

All three characters who appear in this scene are superbly drawn; their every word and movement succeeds in creating an extraordinarily fast farcical rhythm. The playwright's masterly handling of contrasting levels of speech merits special attention: he has harmonized the flowery diction of the justice with the speech, full of mockery, of the môça, and the crude and eventually harsh, though in some cases Latinized with humoristic intent, terminology of the velha—which reminds us of the Latin proverb in the mouth of the forneira in the Triunfo do inverno (fo. 182 c). Equally noticeable, from a comic point of view, is of course the justice's attempt to imitate Negro speech.

Beyond this, laughter is also a matter of inappropriateness: in order to enrich the comic tone, Vicente has sought again, and quite effectively, the aid of his favorite technique of occasionally making his characters say and do things which would not normally be expected of them. Most conspicuous for not adhering to any sense of decorum is, apart from the justice's, the case of the velha who cites famous jurists and uses Latin expressions:

          Dizede, Doutor da má-hora,
e falai-me per latim:
que diz o Bártolo aqui?

(674-676)

          No Baldo acharíeis, Doutor,
essa negra amassadura
ou na sagrada Escretura?

(693-695)

          E moça queríeis vós?
E per quam regula, micer,
cuidou vosso parecer
que já a tínheis nas piós?

(702-705)

Another example of this kind of parodic intention of speech is the frade's sermon joyeux at the beginning of the Auto de Mofina Mendes, which is full of famous names jumbled in the context.⁵³

It is the velha also who summarizes the justice's vain ambitions: “Que má-hora cá tornastes, / que tam tarde começastes / a ser doutor e pàdeira” (690-692).

We ought at this point to note that Gil Vicente's satire, like that of fifteenth-century and earlier Peninsular writers⁵⁴ and of the seventeenth-century comedia,⁵⁵ is not political but ethical; it is individuals rather than the institutions themselves which are corrupt. In his caricature of Telebano's Chief Justice, in other words, Vicente does not seek to degrade Justice in general; he simply exposes the abuses of a particular individual. He loses no opportunity to show his repugnance for people who either do what they are not supposed to do, or who do not know what to do. The shipwreck, in the Triunfo do inverno, is caused by the seamen's ignorance and inability to carry out their duties; they have accepted responsibility for the ship but they do not take their responsibility seriously. And then, there is the figure of Justice, in the Frágoa de amor (fos. 154v-155r), hunchbacked and with crooked staff and broken scales—epitomizing the aberrations of individual justices—who asks to be refashioned in the forge before the arrival of the Queen. For Vicente, then, it is not the established social structure that needs to be corrected but the deviations from it.

With Telebano and Grata Celia's arrival at the sierra Minea, we must once again resume our interrupted flight into the world of fantasy, a world not essentially different from that of the foolish old justice, since it, too, is filled with fraud and deception. Cupid's case is identical with that of the Chief Justice, in the sense that he, too, has gone through so much trouble only to see his hopes thwarted. Therefore, and from the same perspective, the episode involving the justice can be said to prefigure Cupid's ultimate rebuff. Awaiting the fruition of his fraudulent plan, Cupid still wears the garb of the courtly lover.

Upon their arrival at the mountain, King Telebano reveals the truth to his daughter and asks to be pardoned for having deceived her against his own will. The unwelcome news fills her with utmost despair:

¡Oh triste yo!
Ya sé quién esto ordenó:
Copido hizo estos daños.
Oh mis tristes quinze años,
mal haya quien los mató.

(761-765)

Saquéisme, padre, la vida
de que fuistes causador.

(771-772)

          Perded manzilla de mí
y matadme, señor padre.

(775-776)

In an effort to console her, Telebano assures her that this is where she will encounter her greatest fortune. No sooner has he departed than Cupid appears to declare his love in courtly rhetoric. In effect, the entire scene between these two characters seems to be an exercise in dulce retórica. Unlike the preceding episodes, the movement of the action is slowed down as the general tone becomes loftier. This portion of the mythological scene is rather like an extended serranilla: Cupid in his courtship of Grata Celia goes basically through the same stages as the lover of such a poem. He is as confident as the merchant was that his reward is near and in accordance with his wishes: “bendito seas engaño / que con tu poder estraño, / todo acabas quanto quieres” (796-798). He wastes no time in pressing his love in mellifluous terms:

          Prefeción de las mugeres,
vos me quitastes la vida
y la tenéis consumida,
y mis bienes y plazeres.
Y viéndoos puesta
en esta brava floresta
y entre estas espessuras,
dexé el cielo a escuras
por ver la claridá vuestra.

(804-812)

Whereas Cupid is wholly absorbed by his highly emotional rhetoric, Grata Celia's mental faculties function perfectly well: when he demands the reward for having served her, she retorts quite logically: “pues vos sois el dios Copido, / que todo amor tiene en sí, / ¿qué amor pedís a mí?” (849-851). Cupid has apparently underestimated her; not only does she refuse to yield to his requests, but she even manages, by means of deception, to reverse the situation and have him chain himself in her place. Once free, she points out the falsity of his love, since true love never deceives, and states categorically: “no quiero escuchar amores, / pues nunca los conocí” (900-901). She proceeds to denounce men and the women who trust them:

          Bendita sea la muger
que de los hombres no fía,
y maldita la que confía
en su dañoso querer;
y bendita
toda muger que se quita
de oír sus dulces engaños.

(902-908)

          Como río furioso
son los hombres, sin descanso;
porque adó corre más manso,
allí está más peligroso,
porque es hondo aquel remanso.

(911-915)

Cupid is made to realize the futility of his elaborate scheme; he blames the overpowering effect of love (the amor vincit omnia motif), and delivers an equally caustic tirade against womankind:

          ¡Oh mugeres, oh mugeres!
Robadoras de las vidas,
crueles, desconocidas,
destruición de plazeres.
Coriosas,
ufanas, desamorosas,
autorizadas, movibles,
y de todo envejosas,
que tienen cosas terribles.

(931-939)

The interplay of deceits is to continue, however, for Cupid has not yet learned his lesson. He will make use of deceit at the expense of a rustic to set himself free. But the playwright will provide a climactically ironic end to the action, by having the master-deceiver victimized a second time by Grata Celia, for the conquest of whom he has given rise to so much confusion. He will even be made to refute what he said earlier against women, saying now:

las mugeres a una mano
ser la prefeción del mundo,
en la tierra el soberano,
en el cielo el bien segundo.

(1053-1056)

To no avail, however. It is obvious that whereas for Grata Celia the mountain has been a kind of Purgatory, from which she will finally be saved, for Cupid it has been a symbol of extreme humiliation and endless adversity.

The comic incident of the shepherd whom Cupid tricks into chaining himself is highly effective, from a theatrical point of view. The shepherd feels he is in love but he does not know with whom, which may imply that he is in love simply with the idea of being in love—like Don Rosvel, in the Comédia do viúvo, who loves both Paula and Melicia but cannot choose between the two.⁵⁶ He can only guess by the strength of his feelings that his beloved must be “a mor senhora / que se criou em Veneza” (981-982). But, unlike Cupid or the Chief Justice, he is fully aware of his place in society: he understands that it is ridiculous for him to be in love especially if his beloved is of such extraordinary beauty:

Em mi tal amor que monta?

(1000)

Que presta a um vilam roim
ir amar tam alta estrêla?
          Eu sam indino pastor,
pobre, vestido de pele.

(1007-1010)

His case contradicts the stilnovist concept, according to which al cor gentil ripara sempre amore: he is quite capable of feeling love, though not perhaps to the same degree that a courtier would, but he realizes that his social position makes it impossible for his love to be returned.

This incident functions, by contrast, as a commentary on Cupid's general attitude. It is, at the same time, Vicente's coup de grâce against the precepts of the courtly code: for although the shepherd feels the pangs of love, he still thinks of his cows; furthermore, in his speech he mingles courtly with rustic imagery:

Um fraco pastor matais
e nam é cousa honesta;
que a cárrega que lançais
à mula que carregais
pesa muito mais que a bêsta.

(1015-1019)

With Cupid still in chains, the play is brought to an end in a manner not unfamiliar to the reader of Vicente's theater: through the intervention of a sort of deus ex machina, Ventura, Grata Celia is united in marriage with the Prince of Greece, who happens to come wandering by with his entourage over the mountain. Nothing in the course of the action leads to such a denouement. In a way, it is comparable to the happy end of the Comédia do viúvo, where the situation is saved by the intervention of an off-stage spectator, King John himself—who performs a function quite similar to that of Ventura in this play as he decides that Don Rosvel should marry Paula—and of Don Rosvel's brother, Don Gilberto, who helps to solve the problem of finding a husband for Melicia. All that happens in this episode is the effect of Cupid's deceitful motives; Grata Celia tricks him twice but only in self-defense. Though hardly convincing, the final marriage may symbolize the “stability of the social order under the sanction of divine law,” as customary in the Spanish plays of the Golden Age.⁵⁷

Ventura's role is a curious blend of go-between and Divine Providence. Most often referred to as Fortuna—though the name Ventura threatened to prevail at one time—she is among the few members of the classical pantheon that remained alive following the decline and fall of ancient Rome, as is shown by the wealth of allusions to her both in medieval and Renaissance literature. She survived into the Christian era because she represented an idea which was as indispensable to the Christian mind as to the pagan.⁵⁸ And “while … the pagan idea managed to keep a fairly large number of devotees, a compromise with Christianity was effected for others, and a genuinely Christian figure was created, retaining the title and the apparatus of the pagan cult.”⁵⁹ Ventura, in this play, seems to be in the service of the Christian God, though she preserves certain characteristics of the older cults, namely her functions as Fortuna Dux and Fortune of Love:

Pongo figura:
dize qualquier criatura—
esto bien lo sabéis vos—
“quizo Dios y la Ventura.”
Primero se nombra Dios,
porque es cosa más segura.
          Yo os guío por acá,
por muy venturosa vía,
por dar nueva alegría
a la reina que aquí está.
De manera
que ella es principal heredera
en la gran Persia Mayor,
y vos, muy alto señor,
no la neguéis de pracera.

(1180-1194)

This mythological episode is the longest in the play and the most intricately wrought. The characters are inextricably enmeshed in a situation sustained mainly through a series of deceits which are causally related to one another. Though basically a romantic story, it is satirical in intention. This is evident in the contrasting nature of the protagonists; Cupid's tireless efforts to attain the favors of his beloved are ridiculously frustrated by Grata Celia's lack of a romantic disposition. There are moments of genuine dramatic intensity, in King Telebano's case, but they are of very short duration and do not in any way destroy the overtones of comedy and burlesque, to which practically everything has been subordinated. Besides, Telebano's affliction is essentially the ultimate result of his ignorance of Cupid's plotting. The second half of the episode constitutes a battle of the sexes, as Cupid and Grata Celia exchange diatribes against each other's sex. In this, too, Cupid is the loser.

An eloquent testimony to the fact that virtually everything has served as a pretext for burlesque is Vicente's treatment of the pagan deities. Apollo and Cupid are stripped of their original attributes and are brought down to earth. What is more, they are made fun of, Apollo by being tricked into becoming an accomplice to Cupid's designs, and, subsequently, by giving a false oracle to Telebano. Cupid is made the constant target of Vicente's satirical shafts. Ventura, though also personified, does not lend herself to comic treatment since, as already mentioned, she still held a respectable place in the medieval mentality by having reconciled herself with Christian dogma.

The element which has most conspicuously suffered Vicente's attack is the courtly love tradition, as reflected in Cupid's pose and linguistic preciosity, which are both made to produce negative results—neutralized by Grata Celia's lack of receptiveness on the one hand, and by the shepherd's admixture of courtly and rustic diction, on the other.

It is in this episode also that the double meaning of the play's title is best revealed. Floresta signifies “den Schauplatz der vom Menschen unberührten Wildnis,” on the one hand, and “die Eigenart des menschlichen Lebens in der Welt,” on the other.⁶⁰ The notion of the forest as a reflection of the world, to which the Duke's words point (“Muchas cosas de no crer / hallo por esta floresta”—1087-1088),⁶¹ has well-known antecedents. The forest held a certain amount of dread, for the medieval man, and was therefore looked upon with an unfavorable eye.⁶² It is precisely the metaphor of the dark forest that Dante employs to express more forcefully his despair about the depravity of the world, or life, in the opening lines of the Inferno:

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita
          mi ritrovai per una selva oscura
          che la diritta via era smarrita.
Ah quanto a dir qual era è cosa dura
          esta selva selvaggia e aspra e forte,
          che nel pensier rinnova la paura!

(I, 1-6)⁶³

The same analogy, forest-world, becomes more explicit in his Convivio:

L'adolescente, che entra ne la selva erronea di questa vita, non saprebbe tenere lo buono cammino, se da li suoi maggiori no li fosse mostrato.⁶⁴

Similarly, before Dante, Rabanus Maurus held that “silva est mundus iste.”⁶⁵

Vicente's vision of this world is identical, as his repeated allusions to its deceitfulness show:

          Nam havia em Portugal,
nos tempos mais ancianos,
tantas maneiras d'enganos,
nem tantos males dum mal.

(238-241)

… el engaño no es estraño;
antes se usa cada hora,
y la verdad d'año en año.

(313-315)

… el mundo triste dagora
se llama templo d'engaño.

(378-379)

… em tudo o que fazemos
há mister manhas assaz
segundo o mundo que temos.

(610-612)

¡Oh, quántos modos d'engaños
ha hí en esta triste vida!

(924-925)

He makes similar reflections in the Auto da festa.⁶⁶

Our scene-by-scene examination of this play leads us inevitably to the conclusion that a close-knit dramatic coherence, as we tend to understand it today, is wanting. This is not to say, however, that the various scenes are entirely disconnected. It is hoped that their relationship, in terms of theme and function, has now been made clear. As in Gil Vicente's theater in general, the scenes, considered individually, pose no problem as to unity. Even Giuseppe Tavani, who otherwise maintains that all of Gil Vicente's plays lack unity, admits that the scenes per se are “drammaticamente perfette.”⁶⁷

The play as a whole exhibits the kind of structure which typifies pageantry. There is a comic superstructure, to which all the elements utilized in this play are made to conform, and which corresponds, as already pointed out, to the playwright's intention of providing a fiesta de alegría. The use of irony, caricature, satire, parody, disguise, etc., has been instrumental in the realization of the playwright's purpose.

With respect to theme, this is fundamentally a play on human folly, and, more precisely, folly which is based on deceit. The comic nature of such a basis is intensified by a sort of mirror effect: whoever consciously attempts to deceive others suffers the consequences of his own deceit. We have, then, a play about the contrast between appearance and reality, a theme which was to find its full expression later in the baroque writers. In what way does Vicente's treatment of it differ from theirs? The baroque writers conceive the world as deceptive; the basis of Calderón's La vida es sueño, for instance, is that things are not what they appear to be; but the question of what is reality is perhaps more explicitly raised in Cervantes' masterpiece, where Don Quijote repeatedly projects his own misunderstanding of reality—as in the episode of the windmills—whereas in the Duke's castle he is presented with a false reality. In the Floresta, however, the distance between appearance and reality is the result of human will, the desire to deceive someone else. Vicente's, then, is not a metaphysical but an ethical point. Many persons are deceived in the play, but all the deceits, with a single exception, are deliberately contrived, and if most of them are successful, it is only because their victims want to be deceived. The usurer, for example, sees an opportunity for profit; his greed leads him to try to deceive the “widow,” and thus he lets himself be deceived in turn. His symptoms are shared by the Chief Justice and Cupid.

Organically linked to the theme of deception is that of love or, at least, of love as desire; in effect, whether oriented toward money—as in the case of the usurious merchant—or toward a woman—which is the case with the Chief Justice and Cupid—desire serves as the point of departure for the various fraudulent intrigues, and is eventually frustrated in all cases. The succession of deceits and counterdeceits follows closely the pattern established by folk wisdom: “Es justa razón engañar al engañador.”⁶⁸ The counterdeceivers, i.e., the disguised squire, the servant girl and Grata Celia, function, though unwittingly, as God's retributive agents. Their case is analogous to those of the Conde Julián, who, in inviting the Moors to Spain to avenge his daughter's dishonor, was carrying out God's will though he thought he acted on his own,⁶⁹ and of the Moors, who, in their victory over the Portuguese in the Battle of Alcázarquivir, served unknowingly to administer divine justice.⁷⁰ In this light, the Prince's words (“Dios tiene limitado / todo aquello que se haze”—1197-1198) acquire special importance, for they may suggest that both the deceits and the ruses which defeat them are part of God's plan to open the eyes of the would-be deceiver, so that deceit does not triumph in the end.

Besides being the motivating force in the complication of the situation, love is also the principal ingredient that has gone into character delineation. The craftiness of the male characters, which is the effect of love, is foiled, in each case, by the shrewdness of the female ones, feigned or real. In many of his plays, Vicente demonstrates an enviable talent in the creation of superbly vivid female characters who dominate the stage. Such is the case here. Psychological insight is not lacking, as can be seen primarily in the cases of the “widow,” of the young girl who makes the justice ridiculous, and even of Grata Celia.

The set of characters that appears in this play is reminiscent of Vicente's earlier works; most of them have appeared at least once before: Cupid in the Frágoa de amor and in the Nau de amores; Apollo in the Templo de Apolo; the usurer in the Barca do inferno; princes from exotic lands are also present in Rubena and in the Nau de amores and have been assigned roles similar to that of the Prince in this play; a duke is among the saved ones in the Barca da Glória; the judge reminds us of the Juiz da Beira and of the figure of the Justiça in the Frágoa; velhas, môças, parvos and shepherds abound in Vicente's theater.

Apart from the characters, nearly everything recognizably Vicentine has been incorporated in the Floresta. If Vicente's theater as a whole is “un cosmos en miniatura,” in Dámaso Alonso's terms,⁷¹ then this play can be looked upon as a reflection in miniature of his theater. A distinctive feature of Vicente's development as a dramatist is precisely that he tends to be cyclic; there is no straight line of development, for he constantly experiments with new possibilities.⁷² Though the chronology of all his plays has not yet been definitively established, one can easily notice that the transitions from subject to subject are rather brusque: from his early pastoral plays he quickly shifts to the farces; later in his career, he returns to the pastoral with the Auto pastoril português and again, much later, with Mofina Mendes. His romantic comedies, begun in 1512 with the Velho da horta, are separated by a variety of plays on other subjects (his last one, Amadis de Gaula, belongs to 1533). He frequently takes up a certain theme and then abandons it, only to come back to it later on.⁷³ The motif of the lecherous old man, for example, was first introduced by Vicente in the Velho da horta; it appeared later in the Comédia de Rubena (1521) and again, for the last time, in the Floresta. Even when he is not writing plays of shepherds—as at the beginning of his career—shepherds still appear in his later plays, including the Floresta, and display comparable features (in this play, the pastor still appears clad in sheepskins, keeps alluding to the things that comprise his world, displays crude mannerisms, misapprehends the situation, and draws attention to his sad condition). The same is true of the fools (cf. the ones in the Barca do inferno, Rubena, Serra da estrêla, Auto da festa, Floresta, etc.). It is because of all this that, as one approaches Vicente's later works, things become more and more complex and not easy to systematize; he seems reluctant to waste anything that may still have dramatic or lyrical potentialities.

It seems hardly necessary to point out that Vicente does not confine himself to any strict notion of historical perspective. The Floresta is indeed an indiscriminate mixture of times, places, and personages: the philosopher had advised the ancient Romans but he is still obedient to the Coleo Romano; the Chief Justice, who studied in Paris, is in the service of the King of Thessaly; the Prince of Gran Grecia is the son of the King of Hungary, and Grata Celia will become Queen of Persia Mayor;⁷⁴ among those in the company of the Prince, is the Consul of Venice. There are also references to Portugal, Peru, to Abraham, the Church fathers, saints, the Spanish language, etc. While roles have been assigned to Apollo and Cupid, there are frequent allusions to the Christian God. Such lack of perspective is a more or less constant feature in Vicente's theater (in the Auto da sibila Casandra, to mention only one, Biblical characters, such as Solomon, Isaiah, Abraham, Moses, appear together with the ancient sibyls Erutea, Peresica, Cimeria, and the Trojan Cassandra), and in consonance with the medieval tradition. “The storied porticos of the cathedrals and the stages of the medieval plays,” writes Joseph Gillet, “are crowded with the worthies of the Bible, those of mythology and legend and of Greek and Roman history, in fraternal confusion.”⁷⁵

The variety of materials interwoven in the Floresta is reconciled in such a manner that it enhances greatly the comic tone, which is established and maintained essentially through a chain of contrasts, contrasts of characters and attitudes, of levels of speech, and of situations. Comedy, moreover, does not prove by any means incompatible with the seriousness of the moral theme. Mestre Gil then has crowned his career as a dramatist with a play which not only does full justice to his opulent artistic genius, but also reflects the efforts of a thirty-four-year long artistic activity. With the Floresta de Enganos the curtain falls to allow for the change of scenery required by the act which is to follow, the comedia of the Spanish Golden Age. The echo of the laughter of the audience in King John III's Court can still be heard.

SOME ANTECEDENTS OF THE FLORESTA

No es el artista un dios que cree de la nada. Lo mismo que hereda un vocabulario y una lengua, hereda un material imaginativo, un lenguaje de la creación artística. Esta cantera sirve indiferentemente al arquitecto genial y al adocenado, pero condiciona las proporciones y traza del edificio.⁷⁶

Gil Vicente's cultural background has been a matter of controversy, but it is generally agreed that his theater had no real predecessors in Portugal.⁷⁷ Because of the absence of documentary evidence concerning the existence of a written theatrical tradition before him, one is forced to admit that it was Vicente who fathered the literary theater in Portugal.⁷⁸ This is not to say, however, that he created it ab ovo,⁷⁹ nor that he was a peculiarly Portuguese phenomenon isolated from general European culture. “La sua cultura,” writes Luciana Stegagno Picchio, “è fruto di una lunga maturazione e in essa intervengono tutti i motivi che hanno formato la grande cultura europea dell'età di mezzo; il suo teatro non è punto di partenza ma, come tutte le grandi creazioni, un punto d'arrivo, una summa nel senso medievale della parola.”⁸⁰

To seek sources which might have inspired Vicente is not to deny him originality, as some of his compatriots seem inclined to believe: by the standards prevalent in his days, originality was not a question of theme but rather of the manner in which the theme was treated, and imitation was in no way to be condemned.⁸¹

Scholars have pointed out a few literary antecedents, of varying degrees of resemblance to the Floresta, with which Vicente may have been familiar, though we should not forget Eugenio Asensio's words that “sólo cuando está atestiguado el hecho histórico de la transmisión o cuando las semejanzas se amontonan, puede afirmarse con cierta seguridad el contacto directo.”⁸²

Georges LeGentil has traced the points of contact between the sixteenth-century French morality Dialogue du fol et du sage and the introductory scene of the Floresta, and also between the Sottie des trompeurs (performed in 1530) and the episode of the merchant.⁸³

The mythological episode has been considered a variant of the story of Cupid and Psyche.⁸⁴ Indeed, there is a good deal of resemblance between them. The first known version of the romance of Cupid and Psyche forms part of Apuleius' Metamorphoses or Asinus Aureus. After Apuleius, the story became very popular and exercised a considerable literary influence. It was imitated by Martianus Capella in the fifth century in his encyclopedia of the seven liberal arts; in the following century, the grammarian Fulgentius Planciades retold it briefly and supplied it with a long allegorical explication in his Mythology. We do not know for certain whether the Metamorphoses was known outside of Italy between the sixth century and the thirteenth; but similarities to the Psyche story have been seen in certain medieval French romances, namely Parténopeus de Blois, the Chevalier au cygne and Huon de Bordeaux, and in a Middle High German poem, Friedrich von Schwaben.⁸⁵ In Italy, there is a late medieval manuscript tradition of the Metamorphoses; the first known manuscript—now in the Laurentian Library in Florence—belongs to the eleventh century; the work was copied at least once in the twelfth century and several times in the thirteenth. It was Giovanni Boccaccio who made Apuleius' novel known.⁸⁶ From his time until the nineteenth century, the Metamorphoses exerted a profound influence and the story of Cupid and Psyche served as inspiration for numerous literary creations.⁸⁷ The first printed edition of Apuleius, by Giovanni Andrea de Bussi, dates from 1469 (Rome).⁸⁸ The first Spanish translation is Diego López de Cortegana's; its first printed edition is without place or date but Menéndez y Pelayo and others locate it in Seville, 1513.⁸⁹ The book was quite popular in Spain during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and was reprinted several times.⁹⁰ The tale of Cupid and Psyche was also separately adapted and imitated by numerous writers, poets and dramatists in particular, ranging from Juan de la Cueva to Lope and Calderón—not to mention later ones.⁹¹ Carolina Michaëlis—who, incidentally, does not mention the influence of this tale on the Floresta—argues that the origin of Vicente's knowledge of it should be sought in Boccaccio rather than in Apuleius.⁹² In addition to writing a copy of the Metamorphoses in his own hand, Boccaccio recapitulated, in condensed form, the Cupid and Psyche romance and gave it an allegorical interpretation, in his Genealogia deorum gentilium (1372), a mythological encyclopedia in Latin prose.⁹³ His treatment of the story differs from Apuleius' in the following respects: “first, the characterization of Psyche's sisters … is omitted. … Second, Psyche's tasks and the miraculous forms of aid given to her to complete them are not described. And third, the part of the Olympian gods in the story is greatly minimized.”⁹⁴ The Genealogia won immediate success and circulated widely, as is shown by the large number of manuscript and printed editions both in Italy and elsewhere; first printed in Venice in 1472, it underwent seven subsequent editions including one in Paris (1511).⁹⁵ For two centuries the Genealogia served as the “central storehouse from which educated men drew their knowledge of the gods.”⁹⁶ Arturo Farinelli affirms that already toward the end of the fourteenth century, Boccaccio's works were introduced to Spain “dove, coi militi, i mercanti, il corteo dei principi, che in Italia s'eran fatta un'appendice di regno, fonte di guai, passano i frutti della coltura italiana, passano i codici, passano i poemi e le storie, passa la scienza vecchia e nuova, immagazzinata nei libri.”⁹⁷ His Latin writings were diffused primarily among ecclesiastics who had a command of Latin.⁹⁸ The fifteenth century saw several imitations and manuscript translations of the Genealogia into Spanish. Among the books of the Marqués de Santillana was Martín de Ávila's translation of it—formerly attributed to Pero Díza de Toledo.⁹⁹ Of this or of one of the other translations “bem pode ser viesse cópia para a Livraria de Afonso V. Porventura por intervenção do Condestável D. Pedro, que apaixonado pelo espírito novo do Renascimento, utilizou amplamente nos seus doutos poemas o estilo dantesco e a obra tôda de Bocácio, que tinha o seu lugar na preciosa livraria dêle.”¹⁰⁰

It is not unlikely, then, that Vicente was familiar with the story of Cupid and Psyche. There is also ample evidence that the story contains elements which have existed in popular tradition; Stith Thompson and other folklorists have recorded several separate motifs and variants, such as: personal offences against gods punished;¹⁰¹ child sacrificed to gain favor of gods (S263.2);¹⁰² father casts daughter forth (S322.1); banishment (exile) as punishment (Q431);¹⁰³ abandonment on mountain (S147); whirlwind carries princess away (R17.1); child of deity visits earth (F31); marriage of mortal and supernatural being (T111);¹⁰⁴ disenchantment (transformation) by breaking tabu (D789.4 and D510 ff);¹⁰⁵ tasks, tests, quests (H900-H1399);¹⁰⁶ animals (extraordinary companions) perform hero's tasks (B571 ff, and F601.1). Jan-Öjvind Swahn has composed a more detailed list of pertinent motifs and sub-types from general folklore and, separately, from Portuguese and Hispanic;¹⁰⁷ they all, however, revolve around the central motifs of (1) the Supernatural Husband, (2) the Marriage, (3) the Breaking of the Tabu, (4) the Search for the Vanished Husband, and (5) the Reunion. Moreover, in the majority of them, as in Apuleius but not as in Vicente's play, the emphasis is on the supernatural or on magic. It should also be noted that most of the aforementioned five general motifs are lacking in the Floresta. It would, therefore, be daring to assume that by piecing together—without any knowledge of the Psyche story itself—these individual folk elements, Vicente succeeded in reconstructing the story to the extent he did. It seems more plausible to argue that he knew the story and blended traditional motifs with it. Popular tradition may also have offered him certain motifs, which, though not directly related to the story of Cupid and Psyche, are recognizable in his version, especially in the second part; the following are among them:

—dragon keeps maiden tied with golden chain;

(B11.10.1)

—deception into allowing oneself to be fettered;

(K713)

—rescue of princess from mountain;

(R111.2.2)

—prince accidentally finds maiden and marries her.

(N711)

Examined in the light of his possible literary sources, Vicente's dramatization of the tale parallels Apuleius' version—or Boccaccio's retelling of it—in several respects; a comparison of the three versions will show that Vicente has retained many of the basic features, such as: the princess Psyche's extraordinary beauty (lines 804-817, 882, 1008); Venus' wrath (in the Floresta it is the wrath of the goddesses Verecinta, Juno and Pallas: 410-414); Cupid's love for Psyche (281 ff); the king's visit to Apollo's temple (380-381); Apollo's advice that the king should take his daugther to a mountain and abandon her there (426-434); the king's despair (the queen's, too, in the two older versions: 444 ff); Psyche's effort to console her father (her parents in the original: 458-468); the king's compliance with the will of the god (747 ff); Psyche abandoned on the mountain; her distress (770-778, 788-791, 837-843); the divine intervention in the end (it is Jupiter who intervenes in Apuleius and Boccaccio, Ventura in Vicente: 1148 ff). The other details of Vicente's version, however, are different, and a large portion of the story is omitted in the Floresta. In the original, Venus' wrath springs from jealousy of Psyche's beauty; in Vicente, the goddesses' wrath is prompted by Grata Celia's reputed evil-doings. In the original, Cupid is sent to Psyche by Venus as an agent of revenge, whereas in the Floresta he pursues Grata Celia for his own sake. Psyche is aware of what awaits her but Grata Celia is not. Psyche is married to, and falls in love with Cupid; Grata Celia rejects Cupid's love and is married to the Prince of Greece. Besides, Vicente has enriched his adaptation of the tale with other elements, namely courtly love, deceitful intrigues, the comic scene of the shepherd, the closing scene with Ventura, etc. His indebtedness to the Psyche story can be seen primarily in the first part of the mythological episode.

Into his adaptation of this tale, Vicente has also interwoven the dramatically most intense scene of the story of Abraham and Isaac. The resemblance of the latter to his version of the story of Cupid and Psyche in situation as well as tone is striking: Telebano's submission to Apollo's command and the profundity of his pain as a father; Grata Celia's initial ignorance of her destiny and her concern for her father's grief; their departure and arrival at the mountain, and her reaction to the disclosure of the bad news, all have their counterparts in the Old Testament story. In this case, the playwright has explicitly revealed the source he has utilized (Telebano: “Como hizo Abrahán, / hago sacreficio de vos”—759-760). To try to establish the exact source of Vicente's knowledge of the story would be superfluous; it was so popular throughout the Middle Ages that it would have been next to impossible for it “to escape the eyes and ears of anybody, however uninterested he might be in it.”¹⁰⁸ Owing principally to its figural quality (Isaac's sacrifice prefigures Christ's), it was extensively referred to in all kinds of religious works and depicted on stained glass, carving, painting and manuscript illumination.¹⁰⁹

The episode of the Chief Justice, finally, bears resemblance to the seventeenth of the Cent nouvelles nouvelles, a major monument of fifteenth-century French literature.¹¹⁰ This work, generally attributed to Antoine de la Sale, must have been compiled between 1456 and 1461. Written to entertain one of the wealthiest and culturally most outstanding court circles in Europe, that of Duke Philip of Burgundy, it soon became very popular: in the first hundred years after its printing in 1486, it went into eleven editions.¹¹¹ The great number of similarities, both in situation and characterization, between its seventeenth story and the scene under discussion in the Floresta makes it clear that Vicente had either read or heard the story: the male protagonist's association with the exercise of law (he is the President of the Chancery Court at Paris, in the French story); cf. lines 472-473; his learning (487-488, 740); his amorous inclinations despite his advanced age and the fact that he is married (515-516, 531-533); his infatuation with a young girl (one of the maids of his own household, in the Cent nouvelles); 702-705, 737-740; the maid's baking bread (588-589); his manner of enticing her (he makes generous propositions); 546-550; her determination not to submit to his advances (567-569); the scene in the room where the maid is sifting flour (in the French story, the old man attacks her); 577 ff; the shrewd ruse she employs in her defense and the manner in which she carries it out (599 ff); her making him disguise himself as a woman and sift flour (600-602); his wife's rebuke (assigned to the old lady in the Floresta): “Ha! maistre, et qu'est cecy? Où sont voz lettres, voz grans honneurs, voz sciences et discrecions?”¹¹² (672-676, 686-688, 690-701).

Vicente's dramatization, besides being more elaborate than the French story, has gained much, in terms of theatricality, by his accentuation of the farcical tone and the introduction of additional motifs, such as the Judge's whistling to gain admission to the maid's house, his Negro jargon, the velha's more extensive and severe verbal attack, and his unsuccessful attempt to recover his clothes.

Here again, we should perhaps add that some of the motifs are traditional. Stith Thompson registers a few which are related either to both the French story and Vicente's adaptation, or to the latter alone:

—disguise of man in woman's dress;

(K1836)

—man in danger of life dressed by hostess as woman and set to baking;

(K521.4.1.2)

—man gulled into giving up his clothes.

(K330.1)

There are also echoes, in the general shape of the Chief Justice episode, of the legend of Aristotle and Phyllis, so widely diffused in medieval and later iconography and writings, and so frequently utilized in sermons for its moralistic potential.¹¹³ The nucleus of the tale—an impassioned wise man beguiled and persuaded by a damsel into letting her ride him on all-fours—is of oriental origin; it occurs both in early Indian stories and in Arabic literature; the application to Aristotle is a later invention of western Europe. Two versions of it, one French, the other German, belong to the first half of the thirteenth century. In its original form, the story served to illustrate the malicious and dangerous powers of women and, of course, the omnipotence of love. Once applied to Aristotle, its didactic potential increased so as to include a lesson about the vanity of pagan learning. Given the medieval cult of Aristotle, it is easy to see how powerful an argument the preachers had at their disposal.¹¹⁴ Since the tale was so widely known, there is little doubt that Vicente had access to it. A written source which may have inspired him is Alfonso Martínez de Toledo's condensed version in the Corbacho,¹¹⁵ several times reprinted in Vicente's lifetime.¹¹⁶ A possible further testimony to Vicente's knowledge of the legend is the final scene of Inês Pereira (1523), where the heroine literally rides on Pero Marques' back.¹¹⁷ That the playwright does in the Floresta something he had done thirteen years earlier in Inês should not be surprising, for, as already pointed out, he often returned to materials he had used before and presented them in a new light. The similarities between this scene of the Floresta and the medieval tale are not so explicit nor so exact as in Inês: the Chief Justice is ridden by the môça only in a metaphorical sense. Unlike Pero Marques, however, the Chief Justice is portrayed as a very learned man indeed, and, like Aristotle, as the king's right hand—it is to him that the king delegates authority during his absence. Also, both the Justice and Aristotle are presented as victims of what the author of the Corbacho calls “loco e desordenado amor.”

Here Vicente seems to have exploited the legend primarily for its comic possibilities, without, of course, failing to show the negative power of untimely love, a theme he had elaborated a quarter of a century before in the Velho da horta. Naturally, the wiser the lover, the greater the ridicule; in this sense, Aristotle's sorry failure prefigures that of the Justice.

Vicente's adroit synthesis in the Floresta of elements from a wide range of sources has produced a play which is both his own and a summa, in the medieval sense of the term. His dependence upon his sources is not servile; he has used them only insofar as they have enabled him to reach his own, often quite different, ends; and when necessary, he has digressed from them. All the ingredients he has borrowed and those he has supplied himself are subordinated to, and unified mainly by the central elements of comedy and satire, and they serve to reinforce the impression of the deceivers' just failure. The Cent nouvelles nouvelles has furnished him the foundation upon which he has developed the Chief Justice episode. His genius has produced three characters so full of life that it is really difficult to decide which is the protagonist, and has led him well beyond the limits of his model, toward the complete ridicule of the Justice. Each line, while bringing the Justice closer to his downfall, heightens the atmosphere of comedy. The same atmosphere, though admittedly subdued, envelops the mythological episode, and is not harmed even by the introduction of the Old Testament story of Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac, since the spectator, or the reader, already knows that the imminent catastrophe has only been contrived by Cupid to aid his plan of conquering Grata Celia. The irony is, however, that Apollo's false oracle is substantiated in the end when Grata Celia finds in the floresta her dicha mayor. Among the major ingredients which the playwright has supplied of his own, apart from the intricate interweaving of deceits, is courtly love or, more accurately, the parody of it, by means of which both the Justice and Cupid are rendered highly comic.

THE LINGUISTIC TEXTURE OF THE FLORESTA

The Floresta de Enganos is one of Gil Vicente's bilingual plays, composed partly in Spanish and partly in Portuguese; if one wishes to take account of a few words and phrases in Latin, macarronic in some cases, it is a trilingual play.¹¹⁸ Problematic though it may appear today, bilingualism must not have obstructed representation in any way. When composing, the playwright did not have posterity or even, presumably, publication in mind; his dramatic activity was confined to a particular time (the first third of the sixteenth century) and a particular place (the “hispanized” Portuguese royal Court). The courtly audience would have had no difficulty in understanding what was said on the stage. For both Vicente and his audience the mixture of the two languages must have appeared natural.¹¹⁹

Albin E. Beau holds that “no se descubren … principios rigurosamente observados y consecuentemente aplicados,” in the distribution of Spanish and Portuguese in Vicente's dramatic production.¹²⁰ In fact there are inconsistencies even within the same play (e.g., Melidonio speaks both Spanish and Portuguese in the Devisa da cidade de Coimbra, 1527). An examination of the linguistic texture of the Floresta will reinforce Beau's view. The major portion of the play is in Spanish. The philosopher and the simpleton of the opening scene speak this language; so do the pagan gods, Apollo and Cupid, King Telebano and his daughter Grata Celia, the Chief Justice of Telebano's kingdom, Ventura, the Prince of Greece and the Duke. With the exception of the first two, all the Spanish-speaking characters are involved in one way or another in the romantic episode which forms the basis of the play's structure; as Paul Teyssier has indicated, Spanish “deviendra dans Gil Vicente la language de la comédie romanesque.”¹²¹ The remaining personages, that is the merchant, the Squire disguised as a widow, the old woman, the shepherd, and the two servant girls, speak Portuguese. In some cases, there may be a combination of explanations for the characters' use of Spanish. Cupid, for instance, may speak Spanish because he is a pagan god,¹²² or because he is caricatured as a courtly lover.¹²³ But why should the Prince and the Duke speak Spanish? First, because they are noblemen (according to Teyssier's principle of linguistic hierarchy, Spanish had come to be “une langue distinguée et noble, celle des cercles élevés de la cour, des ambassadeurs, des princes, des reines,” whereas Portuguese had a more popular quality¹²⁴); second, because they are foreigners,¹²⁵ and third, because they are imaginary figures—though to a lesser degree than Cupid—within an imaginary framework.¹²⁶ It is clear that the Portuguese-speaking characters belong to a lower social class than the Spanish-speaking ones; yet, why should the parvo speak Spanish? None of the views expounded about Vicente's motives in distributing the two languages can explain this discrepancy, unless, of course, one wishes to call to one's aid Beau's idea of the nationality of the actors. Since Vicente looked ahead to representation, it is likely, Beau believes, that when writing each part, Vicente had to consider the mother tongue of each available actor.¹²⁷ There is, however, no evidence to support an assumption that the actor who played the parvo was a Spaniard. Teyssier sees this particular problem as an example of Gil Vicente's dependence on the literary tradition: “Gil Vicente se souvient du théâtre espagnol qui, depuis quelques années, avait créé le type comique du Bobo.”¹²⁸ This solution, however, is not really tenable, for in 1536 the character of the bobo was not yet quite developed in Spanish literature. True, there had been traits, which would eventually blend to form this character as he appears in the theater of Lope de Rueda, even in the Libro de buen amor (cf. “la disputaçión que los griegos é los romanos en uno ovieron”); but we can hardly speak of the bobo as an already conventional character who might have influenced Gil Vicente. Rather, it would be logical to argue that Vicente's parvo, who had appeared earlier in his theater (for example in the Auto da barca do inferno, 1517), anticipates the later bobo. The case of the parvo in the Floresta, then, serves as additional testimony for the lack of definite criteria in selecting one language rather than the other.

That Gil Vicente should use Spanish, in addition to his own language, is not at all surprising: his is not an isolated case in the letters of Portugal, but the reflection of a much wider and more general phenomenon.¹²⁹ In the Floresta, as in all his works, his Spanish has its own idiosyncrasies. Menéndez y Pelayo had pointed out that it was typical of one who had never been in Castile.¹³⁰ It is characterized, as Dámaso Alonso affirms, by “vacilación” and “titubeo”, both of which are natural results of the fact that Vicente stood

en la encrucijada de los vientos, en la encrucijada de su portugués nativo, su leonés inicial, su castellano sobrepuesto; en la división de las aguas del castellano medieval y el clásico, entrecruzada aun con la del portugués medieval y el clásico; en el punto de choque de una gran tradición literaria castellana, con una modesta, sí, pero familiar, tradición castellanizante portuguesa.¹³¹

But Alonso concludes that fortunately “portuguesismo, leonesismo y arcaísmo castellano tienen con frecuencia una frontera borrosa, y a quien haya leído literatura medieval española muchas de estas irregularidades no le han de producir embarazo.”¹³²

Here again Vicente exhibits the same general tendency typifying the Portuguese authors who wrote in Spanish. In the course of time, the Spanish practiced in Portugal took on new features until it reached an identity of its own.¹³³

Notes

1. Laurence Keates, The Court Theatre of Gil Vicente (Lisbon: privately printed, 1962), p. 113.

2. See T. S. Eliot, On Poetry and Poets (New York: Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, 1957), p. 99.

3. Edgar Wind, Art and Anarchy (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1964), p. 92. Besides it is very likely that, without the relentless pressure of Pope Julius II, Michelangelo might not have reached the height of his creativity; see Kenneth Clark: “The Young Michelangelo,” in Renaissance Profiles, ed. J. H. Plumb (New York: Harper and Row, 1965), p. 46, and Ferdinand Schevill, The Medici (New York: Harper and Row, 1960), p. 186.

4. Stephen Orgel, The Jonsonian Masque (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1965), p. 7.

5. Op. cit., loc. cit.

6. See J. P. Wickersham Crawford, Spanish Drama before Lope de Vega (Philadelphia: Univ. of Penn. Press, 1937), p. 62, and N. D. Shergold, A History of the Spanish Stage (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1967), pp. xxvii, 236, 545. Both writers contrast the lack of interest in the theater on the part of Charles V and Philip II with Manuel I's patronage of it.

7. Ronald B. Williams, The Staging of Plays in the Spanish Peninsula Prior to 1555, Univ. of Iowa Studies in Spanish Language and Literature, No. 5 (Iowa City: Univ. of Iowa, 1935), p. 54.

8. Anselmo Braamcamp Freire, Vida e obras de Gil Vicente (Lisbon: Rev. Ocidente, 1944), p. 319.

9. Ibid.; see also Aubrey Bell, Estudos vicentinos, trans. António Álvaro Dória (Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional, 1940), p. 77.

10. Braamcamp Freire, p. 310.

11. For an extensive discussion of the so-called “escola vicentina,” see Carolina Michaëlis de Vasconcelos, Notas vicentinas (Lisbon: Rev. Ocidente, 1949), pp. 509-602. See also Luciana Stegagno Picchio, Storia del teatro portoghese (Rome: Ateneo, 1964), pp. 53-74.

12. António José Saraiva, História da cultura em Portugal, III (Lisbon: Jornal do Fôro, 1962), 146.

13. Ibid., p. 155.

14. I. S. Révah, Recherches sur les œuvres de Gil Vicente. I. Édition critique du premier “Auto das barcas” (Lisbon: Institut Français au Portugal, 1951), p. 12.

15. For an account of the extent of Inquisitorial action on Gil Vicente's work, the following may be consulted: Carolina Michaëlis, Notas, pp. 9-83, 565-96; Braamcamp Freire, Vida e obras, Ch. vii; and Saraiva, História, III, 146-58.

16. Braamcamp Freire, pp. 413-14. The specific changes will be pointed out in the textual notes.

17. Ibid., pp. 456, 458.

18. Ibid., pp. 461-62.

19. Ibid., pp. 372-75; see also Carolina Michaëlis, Notas, pp. 481-84. Besides the Göttingen copy of the Copilaçam of 1562, there are five more known located in: the University of Harvard, the Palácio de Mafra, the Biblioteca Nacional (Lisbon) the Arquivo da Tôrre do Tombo (Lisbon), and the Palácio dos Braganças (Vila Viçosa); see Stephen Reckert, “El verdadero texto de la Copilaçam vicentina de 1562,” in StPh [Studia Philologica], 3 (1963), 55.

20. Braamcamp Freire. pp. 373-76.

21. “Literary Criticism,” in The Aims and Methods of Scholarship in Modern Languages and Literatures, ed. James Thorpe (New York. MLA, 1968), p. 63.

22. Form and Meaning in Medieval Romance (Mod. Humanities Research Assn., 1966), p. 13.

23. Ibid., pp. 11-12.

24. See the Introduction to his edition of Vicente's Amadís de Gaula (Manchester: Manchester Univ. Press, 1959), p. 15.

25. Reis Brasil's case is not uncommon among critics of this field: he has channeled his energy in extolling Vicente; in a paroxysm of nationalism, he has drawn the preposterous conclusion that “Gil Vicente é o criador do teatro português; Gil Vicente é o criador do teatro peninsular; Gil Vicente é o criador do teatro moderno europeo e mundial. Todas as bases desse teatro dos nossos dias dependem da iniciação vicentina;” see the Introduction of his Gil Vicente e o teatro moderno (Lisbon: Minerva, 1965), p. 22. Others have committed the same error as W. C. Atkinson, namely condemning Gil Vicente for what he did not do: see his “Comédias, tragicomédias and farças in Gil Vicente,” BdF [Boletim de Filologìa], 11 (1950), 268-80, and also I. S. Révah's comments on Atkinson's arguments in his “La comédia dans l'oeuvre de Gil Vicente,” BHTP [Bulletin d'Histoire du Théâtre Portugais], 2 (1951), 1-39.

26. See E. C. Riley, Cervantes's Theory of the Novel (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962), Ch. i.

27. Cf. Frye's comments on the intentional fallacy, op. cit., p. 59.

28. Historia de la literatura y del arte dramático en España, trans. Eduardo de Mier (Madrid: Escritores castellanos, 1885), I, 294-95.

29. Antología de poetas líricos castellanos (Madrid: Librería de Hernando, 1898), VII, ccvii.

30. Gil Vicente (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1921), pp. 50, 53-54; Portuguese Literature (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1922), p. 119; Estudos vicentinos, pp. 110, 151.

31. Spanish Drama before Lope de Vega, pp. 103-04.

32. Op. cit., pp. 274, 279; Atkinson is here quoting Óscar de Pratt, Gil Vicente: notas e comentários (Lisbon: Teixeira, 1931), p. 46.

33. See the Introduction to his edition of Vicente's Obras completas (Barcelos: Editora do Minho, 1956), p. xlv.

34. Op. cit., p. 14.

35. Op. cit., pp. 124, 129.

36. See Fidelino de Figueiredo, Características da litteratura portuguesa (Lisbon: Livraria Clássica, 1923), pp. 28-30, and Carolina Michaëlis, Notas, pp. 151 ff.

37. Gino Saviotti, however, points out the case of Inês Pereira, in which Vicente, though unconsciously, shows that he was not incapable of coping with the new forms (“Gil Vicente poeta cómico,” BHTP, 2, 1951, p. 202).

38. Ibid., pp. 189-90.

39. Ibid., p. 189. On theatricality as the essence of Gil Vicente's work, see also Albin Eduard Beau, “Gil Vicente: O aspecto ‘medieval’ e ‘renacentista’ da sua obra,” in his Estudos (Coimbra: Acta Universitatis Conimbrigensis, 1959), I, 84, 105.

40. Eugenio Asensio, “Las fuentes de las Barcas de Gil Vicente,” BHTP, 4 (1953), 235.

41. In his Gil Vicente: Floresta de enganos (Lisbon: Inquérito, 1941), pp. 21-22.

42. See Joseph A. Meredith, Introito and Loa in the Spanish Drama of the Sixteenth Century (Philadelphia: Univ. of Penn. Press, 1928), p. 82.

43. Some Native Comic Types in the Early Spanish Drama, Ohio State Univ. Contributions in Languages and Literatures, No. 1 (Columbus: Ohio State Univ. Press, 1925), p. 78.

44. Ronald B. Williams has indicated (op. cit., p. 47), with reference to this play, that “a single scene represents a succession of places,” and that “transition is indicated by means of an empty stage, and by statements of characters relative to place.”

45. Cf. Gonzalo Correas, Vocabulario de refranes y frases proverbiales (Madrid, 1924), p. 459: “Si quieres matar a un cuerdo, átale al pie un necio.”

46. See I. S. Révah's Introduction to his edition of Inês Pereira, BHTP, 4 (1953), 77.

47. Correas, Vocabulario, p. 179. For analogous folk motifs, see Stith Thompson, Motif-Index of Folk-Literature, FF Communications, Nos. 106-09, 116-17 (Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. 1932-1936), K1600-1699 (Deceiver falls into own trap), and John E. Keller, Motif-Index of Mediaeval Spanish Exempla (Knoxville: Univ. of Tenn. Press, 1959), J1510 (The cheater cheated).

48. See “Blind Cupid,” in his Studies in Iconology (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1939), pp. 95-128.

49. In “Courtly Love in Don Duardos,” RomN [Romance Notes], 2 (1961), 103.

50. For which see Bruce Wardropper, “El burlador de Sevilla: a Tragedy of Errors,” PQ [Philological Quarterly], 36 (1957), 61-71.

51. Cf., for example, the Triunfo do inverno, fo. 179 c, and the Tragicomédia de Amadis de Gaula, fo. 138 d.

52. See his Gil Vicente, p. 54, as well as his Estudos vicentinos, pp. 77, 151.

53. Fos. 20v-21r. For this sermon, see I. S. Révah, Les sermons de Gil Vicente (Lisbon, 1949).

54. For which see Pierre LeGentil, La poésie lyrique espagnole et portugaise a la fin du Moyen Age, I (Rennes: Plihon, 1949), 407-20.

55. Cf., for example, Lope's Comendadores.

56. See T. R. Hart's Introduction to his edition of Vicente's Obras dramáticas castellanas (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1962), p. xxxix.

57. A. A. Parker, “The Approach to the Spanish Drama of the Golden Age.” TDR [Tulane Drama Review], 4 (1959), 49.

58. See Howard R. Patch, The Goddess Fortuna in Mediaeval Literature (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1927), esp. pp. 3-4, 14-15, 39.

59. Ibid., p. 34.

60. Rainer Hess, “Die Naturauffassung Gil Vicentes,” in Aufsätze zur Portugiesischen Kulturgeschichte, 5 (1965), 6.

61. Ibid., p. 5.

62. See John Ruskin. Modern Painters (Boston: Dana Estes, 1856?), III, 272-73.

63. I quote from Natalino Sapegno's edition of the Divina Commedia (Florence: Nuova Italia, 1960). The italics, here and in the following quotation, are mine.

64. IV, xxiv, 12. The reference is to G. Busnelli and G. Vandelli's edition (Florence: Felice le Monnier, 1964).

65. Allegoriae in Sacram Scripturam (s.v. silva), in Patrologia Latina, ed. J.-P. Migne, CXII (Paris: Garnier, 1878).

66. See Marques Braga's edition of Vicente's Obras completas (Lisbon: Sá da Costa, 1951), VI, 132, 133, 161.

67. See the Introduction to his edition of the Comédia de Rubena (Rome: Ateneo, 1965), p. 18. Also, A. E. Beau, “Gil Vicente: O aspecto ‘medieval’ …,” pp. 139-40.

68. Correas, Vocabulario, pp. 208, 255.

69. See Menéndez Pidal's Reliquias de la poesía épica española (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1951), pp. 7-19.

70. According to Herrera, God's wrath was brought upon the Portuguese because they had set out on their mission primarily for the sake of spoils; see “Por la pérdida del rey Don Sebastián,” in Fernando de Herrera, Poesías, ed. Vicente García de Diego (Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1914), pp. 80-88.

71. See the Introduction to his edition of Poesías de Gil Vicente (Mexico: Seneca, 1940), p. 16.

72. See Bruce Wardropper, “Approaching the Metaphysical Sense of Gil Vicente's Chivalric Tragicomedies,” BCom [Bulletin of the Comediantes], 16 (Spring 1964), 4; and Eugenio Asensio, “Las fuentes de las Barcas,” p. 209.

73. Asensio, ibid.

74. One would think along with Enzio di Poppa Vólture—see his translation of Vicente's Teatro (Florence: Sansoni, 1957), I, 680, n. 2—that it would be more logical to have “Grecia” instead of “Persia” since Grata Celia is to marry the Prince of Greece. Vicente's general inconsistency in such matters, however, is no guarantee that this is necessary.

75. In “Propalladia” and Other Works of Bartolomé de Torres Naharro, IV (Philadelphia: Univ. of Penn. Press, 1961), 118.

76. Asensio, “Las fuentes de las Barcas,” p. 208.

77. Waldron, Amadís, p. 5; see also Dámaso Alonso's edition of Vicente's Tragicomedia de Don Duardos (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1942), Ia, 27.

78. I. S. Révah, “Gil Vicente a-t-il été le fondateur du théâtre portugais?,” BHTP, 1 (1950), 168, 170, 182.

79. See António José Saraiva, Gil Vicente e o fim do teatro medieval, 2nd ed. (Lisbon: Europa-América, 1965), pp. 205 ff.

80. “Il Pater Noster dell'Auto do Velho da Horta,” AION-SR [Annali dell'Instituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli (Sezione Romanza)], 3 (1961), 198; see also pp. 193-94 as well as her “Diavolo e inferno nel teatro di Gil Vicente,” AION-SR, 1 (1959), 33-34 and 39, and her “Arremedilho. Di un presunto componimento drammatico giullaresco alle origini del teatro portoghese,” AION-SR, 2 (1960), 31-32.

81. Stegagno Picchio, “Il Pater Noster,” p. 194; C.-H. Frèches, Le Théâtre neo-latin au Portugal: 1550-1745 (Paris: A. G. Nizet, 1964), p. 30.

82. “El soneto ‘No me mueve, mi Dios …’ y un auto vicentino inspirados en Santa Catalina de Siena,” RFE [Revista de Filologia Española], 34 (1950), 136.

83. See his “Les thèmes de Gil Vicente dans les moralités, sotties et farces françaises,” in Hommage à Ernest Martinenche (Paris: Editions d'Artrey, n.d.), pp. 163 ff.

84. See Aubrey Bell, Gil Vicente, p. 53, and Portuguese Literature, p. 119. Bell does not go beyond stating the fact.

85. Elizabeth H. Haight, Apuleius and His Influence (New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1927), Ch. iv, and her More Essays on Greek Romances (New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1945), Ch. v. See also Jan-Öjvind Swahn, The Tale of Cupid and Psyche (Lund: CWK Gleerup, 1955), pp. 382-84.

86. Haight, Apuleius, p. 112.

87. Ibid.

88. Ibid., p. 92.

89. See Menéndez y Pelayo, Bibliografía hispano-latina clásica, I (Santander: Aldus, 1950), 85-86.

90. Ibid., pp. 91 ff. In his Orígenes de la novela, NBAE [Nueva Biblioteca de Autores Españoles], 21 (1915), Menéndez y Pelayo includes the text of the Medina del Campo edition (1543) of this translation. The story of Cupid and Psyche extends from Ch. v of Bk. IV to Ch. iii of Bk. VI.

91. Menéndez y Pelayo, Bibliografía, I, 98 ff.

92. Notas vicentinas, p. 322, n. 264.

93. Haight, Apuleius, pp. 119-20, and More Essays, pp. 113-14. For the text, see Vincenzo Romano's edition (Bari: G. Laterza, 1951), Vol. I, Bk. V, Ch. xxii: “De Psyce XVa Apollinis filia.”

94. Haight, More Essays, p. 136.

95. See Ernest H. Wilkins, The University of Chicago Manuscript of the “Genealogia Deorum Gentilium” of Boccaccio (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1927), pp. 4-6, and his “The Genealogy of the Editions of the Genealogia Deorum,” MP [Modern Philology], 17 (1919), 425-38. Carolina Michaëlis, (Notas, p. 336, n. 312) thinks that the Paris edition may have served as source for Vicente.

96. Jean Seznec, The Survival of the Pagan Gods, trans. Barbara F. Sessions (New York: Harper and Row, 1961), p. 224.

97. Italia e Spagna (Turin: Fratelli Bocca, 1929), I, 100-01.

98. Ibid., p. 99.

99. See Jules Piccus, “El traductor español de De Genealogia Deorum,” in Homenaje a Rodríguez-Moñino (Madrid: Castalia, 1966), II, 59-75.

100. Carolina Michaëlis, Notas, p. 336.

101. Stith Thompson, Motif-Index, Q221.

102. Cf. also John E. Keller, Motif-Index of Mediaeval Spanish Exempla, S263.2.3.

103. Also, Ralph S. Boggs, Index of Spanish Folktales, FF Communications, No. 90 (Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica, 1930), nos. 705-09.

104. And Boggs, nos. 425-49.

105. See also Keller, C960.

106. Also, Boggs, nos. 460-99.

107. The Tale of Cupid and Psyche, pp. 24-36, 162-64, and 168-74.

108. Rosemary Woolf, “The Effect of Typology on the English Mediaeval Plays of Abraham and Isaac,” Speculum, 32 (1957), 806.

109. Ibid., p. 806 and ff.

110. Aubrey Bell (Estudos vicentinos, p. 110) has pointed out the source of inspiration for this episode without going into any further details.

111. See the Introduction to The Hundred Tales, trans. R. H. Robbins (New York: Crown Publishers, 1960).

112. Les cent nouvelles nouvelles, ed. Paul Lacroix (Paris: G. Charpentier, 1884), p. 95.

113. George Sarton, “Aristotle and Phyllis,” Isis, 14 (1930), 8-19, and Émile Mâle, L'art religieux du XIIIe siècle en France (Paris: Armand Colin, 1925), pp. 337-38. Sarton's study includes plates also. See also Stith Thompson, K1215, and Boggs, no. 1424.

114. Sarton, pp. 9-11.

115. See Lesley Byrd Simpson's edition (Berkeley: Univ. of Calif. Press, 1939), pp. 53-54.

116. There were at least five editions of the Corbacho in the dramatist's lifetime (Seville, 1498; Toledo, 1499, 1500, 1518; and Logroño, 1529); see Menéndez y Pelayo, Orígenes de la novela, NBAE, 1 (1905), cvii (note). See also F. J. Norton, Printing in Spain: 1501-1520 (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1966), p. 45, and Clara Louisa Penney, List of Books Printed before 1601 (New York: Hispanic Society of America, 1929), p. 160.

117. This parallel has been developed by Thomas R. Hart in his “La estructura dramática del Auto de Inês Pereira,” NRFH [Nueva Revista de Filología Hispánica], 18 (1965-1966), 165, n. 8.

118. Eighteen of his plays are bilingual; eleven are entirely in Spanish and fifteen in Portuguese. Two anonymous plays, the Auto da geraçam humana and the Auto de Deus padre e Justiça e Misericórdia, which have been attributed to Gil Vicente by I. S. Révah, are not counted here. In terms of the number of lines composed in each language, two thirds of the dramatist's work is written in Portuguese and the remaining third in Spanish; see Paul Teyssier, La langue de Gil Vicente (Paris: Klincksieck, 1959), p. 296.

119. Ibid., p. 297.

120. “El bilingüismo en Gil Vicente,” StPh, 1 (1960), 222, et passim.

121. Teyssier, p. 298.

122. Spanish was assigned to imaginary figures; see Teyssier, p. 299, and Aubrey Bell, Gil Vicente, p. 20.

123. The same could be said of the Chief Justice. An analogous case is that of the Spaniard in the Auto da Fama.

124. La langue, p. 300. See also Bell, Gil Vicente, pp. 19-21.

125. Bell (ibid., and Estudos vicentinos, p. 33) declares that Spanish was the language assigned to a foreigner.

126. See supra, note 122.

127. Op. cit., pp. 222-23.

128. La langue, p. 298.

129. During the second half of the fifteenth century, Portugal's relations with Castile became increasingly intimate, thanks primarily to the intermarriages between the royal families of the two countries. These events had a telling effect on the composition of the Portuguese Court, for, along with the Castilian princesses, there was a considerable influx of Castilians. As a consequence the Court became bilingual. Castilian, then, came to be a sign of social prestige, a status symbol. Spoken among the aristocratic circles of the time, it was considered “la langue noble, distinguée, raffinée.” The fifteenth century was also witness to an unprecedented growth of Castilian literature. This exercised an enormous influence on the Portuguese literari, who not only turned to Castile for literary inspiration and guidance, but also adopted her language; even when writing in their own tongue, they would welcome “les habitudes, les goûts, le style des Castillans.” It should also be remembered that the linguistic distance between Spanish and Portuguese was not as wide those days as it is today (see Teyssier, pp. 293-96). Gil Vicente's use of Spanish thus reflects the linguistic habits of his milieu.

130. In Antología de poetas líricos castellanos, VII, clxxxviii.

131. “Problemas del castellano vicentino,” in his edition of the Tragicomedia de Don Duardos (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1942), I. Quoted in Waldron's edition of Amadís, p. 53.

132. See the Introduction to his edition of Don Duardos (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1942), Ia, 11.

133. Teyssier, p. 296.