SOURCE: Moseley, William W. “‘O Rei do Mar’: Portugal, the Sea, and Gil Vicente.” Luso-Brazilian Review 11, no. 1 (summer, 1974): 98-104.

[In the following essay, Moseley examines Vicente's interest in the sea—an interest shared by his countrymen in the age of Portuguese exploration.]

One of the salient characteristics of the work of Gil Vicente is its variety and range of themes. Whatever may have been his place of birth and early life, a genuine popular flavor pervades much of his production. But his plays probably owe their existence to the influence of the royal court which inspired and nurtured their writing and staging. In the royal household Gil Vicente became imbued with the courtly attitudes and preoccupations of the period, and these enlarged his range of themes. Among those of far more than passing interest to the court and to Gil Vicente were Portuguese maritime exploration and expansion. Although Prince Henry's death in 1460 occurred about the time of the playwright's birth (ca. 1465), the impetus of Henry's program of voyages of discovery and exploration continued to be felt to the end of the century. In the fourteen years preceding Gil Vicente's first known production, Bartolomeu Dias had rounded the Cape of Good Hope, Vasco da Gama had reached India, and Cabral had landed in Brazil.

Gil Vicente's productive period began in 1502 and lasted until about 1536. He spent over forty years at the royal court, and was caught up in the events and national aspirations of the time. No important occasion at court was complete without a dramatic contribution from Gil Vicente. About the time he began writing, the vision of empire and the wealth to be derived therefrom were beginning to be realized. The monastery of Belém, under construction by 1502, and built on the beach from which many of the trading ships sailed, was financed largely by the profits from the earliest trading voyages to the East. The great Manueline window of the church at Tomar, with its representations of coral, ships's cables, and armillary spheres, is the supreme artistic expression of Portugal's preoccupation with the sea. Its completion (ca. 1510-1514)¹ came soon after Gil Vicente began writing. Gil Vicente the goldsmith, who may also have been Gil Vicente the playwright, had, by 1506, finished his monstrance of Belém, fashioned from the first gold brought back from East Africa on Vasco da Gama's second voyage.

C. R. Boxer has pointed out that Portuguese maritime activities, including fishing, exploration, and commerce, engaged only a very small percentage of the population, and that the majority of peasants lived out their lives largely unaware of the sea or its import. The Portuguese were predominantly a race of earthbound peasants, not adventurous seamen.² Maritime endeavors were, however, a primary concern of the crown, and were of paramount importance in Portuguese history. Those at the royal court were fully aware of the events which were taking place, and it was only natural that seafaring and related themes should be found in the dramatic production of Gil Vicente. It is the purpose of this study to suggest the extent of these themes.

The patriotic allegory Auto da Fama (1520)³ has as its basis Portugal's overseas exploration and commerce. Portuguese Fame is desired by all other lands not only “pola gloria interessal dos comercios, mas principalmente polo infinito dano que os Mouros, imigos da nossa fé, recebem dos Portugueses na Índica navegação.”⁴ Portuguese fame is courted in turn by France, Italy, and Spain, none of whom is worthy of her. In the end she is carried off triumphantly by the figures of Faith and Fortitude, who tell her that her spirit is well employed in such great adventures and conquests. The geographical names which signal the greatest maritime, military, and commercial feats are enumerated: Guinea, Brazil, Moçambique, Quiloa, Cochin, Sofala, Malindi, Goa, Aden, and others. Portugal is called not only “o alferez da Fé” (V, 126), but also the “Rei do Mar” (V, 126).

Although the intent of the farce Auto da Índia (1509) is less noble, its background is similar: the trading voyages to the East. The husband departs from Restelo Beach on a voyage to India, and his wife receives lovers in his absence. One of the suitors, a Spaniard, states that

La India hizo Dios,
solo porque yo con vos
pudiese pasar aquesto.

(V, 97)

Allusions are made in the play to the great length of voyages to the East, to the dangers both from hostile peoples and from the sea, and to the wealth expected. The element of farce is predominant, but the framework of the play is the reality of contemporary events.

The Cortes de Júpiter was produced in 1521 on the occasion of the departure of Princess Beatriz to marry the Duke of Savoy, and Jupiter is asked to favor the princess on her voyage. She is accompanied by members of the nobility who take the form of different kinds of fish, and the fishing villages of Cascais and Pederneira are cited. Mars says of Portugal:

E mais eu tenho cuidado
deste reino Lusitano,
Deos me tem dito e mandado
que lh‘o tenha bem guardado,
porque o quer fazer Romano.
Que nas batalhas passadas
que Castela o quis tentar,
levaram tantas pancadas,
que depois de bem levadas,
nam ousaram mais tornar.
E assi nas partes d‘além
sempre foi favorecido,
e na Índia tambem,
ou digam se viu alguem
reino em fama tam luzido.
Pequeno e mui grandioso,
pouca gente e muito feito,
forte e mui vitorioso,
mui ousado e furioso
em todo que toma a peito.

(IV, 254)

These verses recall similar ones in the previously mentioned Auto da Fama. Fame says:

Perguntae à populosa,
próspera e forte Malaca,
se lhe leixárão nem 'staca
pouca gente mas furiosa.
E vereis de longo e de través
se treme todo o sertão:
vêde se feito Romão
com elle m‘igualareis.

(V, 127)

The Triunfo do Inverno is believed to have been performed in 1529 on the occasion of the birth of Princess Isabel. Winter shows its power by inflicting violent storms on Portuguese seamen, but they are undaunted. Winter says that King John III and his queen, “Rey y Reyna de la mar” (IV, 306), are fearless:

Estos solos, sin temor
de mi terror tan profundo,
conquistan la mar del mundo. …
Son sus naves tan podrosas
con la gracia de su zelo,
que aunque se hunda el cielo
con tormentas peligrosas,
van y vienen sin recelo.

(IV, 306-307)

Three sirens sing a long ballad in Spanish in praise of the glories of Portugal from the time of Afonso Henriques. The sirens say:

Recuérdate, Portugal,
quanto Dios te tiene honrado;
dióte las tierras del sol
per comercio á tu mandado. …
Loa al que te dió la llave
de lo mejor que ha criado …

(IV, 309-310)

If the relatively late date is correct, this interpolated song may be an attempt by the poet to recall the earlier visions which by 1529 had begun to fade. Allusions are made, only half in jest, to the practice of giving seagoing commands to noblemen without regard for their nautical skill or experience. Among the farcical characters are sailors, pilots, and cabin boys; seafaring terms abound.

Figures related to the sea are important devices in plays such as the trilogy of the Barcas (1517, 1518, and 1519), the Nao de Amores (1527), and the previously mentioned Cortes de Júpiter. The symbol of the ship as a device for transporting souls to the next world was not original with Gil Vicente; it was part of a common tradition used also by Dom Duarte in the Leal Conselheiro. Vicente's immediate source may have been the Vita Christi of Ludolph of Saxony, translated into Spanish by Fray Ambrosio Montesino in 1502.⁵ The theme was, however, developed to a high degree by Gil Vicente. The all-pervasive influence of the sea is apparent in the detail with which ships are described, and in the abundance of seafaring terms of every category, in both Spanish and Portuguese.

The Nao de Amores was performed in 1527 for the entertainment of the court on the occasion of the entry into Lisbon of Catarina, sister of Charles V of Spain. A prince of Normandy, dying of love, asks permission to build a ship fashioned of the elements and emotions of love:

Ha de ser desta manera,
para navegar segura:
la voluntad la madera,
y la razón plegadura, …
el mastel de fé segura,
e la vela de esperanza,
la gávea de hermosura,
el traquete de membranza,
la mezena de dulzura.

(IV, 67-68)

Other parts of the ship and its rigging are to be made of other elements of love; all of this is to be done, says the prince, to alleviate his distress, and the captain of the ship will be the god of love. The sea will be his passion, and the waves his suffering. More than forty seafaring terms are used, most in Spanish.

Maritime terms are frequently used symbolically; typical is the use of various words for ship as a symbol of spiritual security. In the Auto da Fé (1510) the cross is the “nao da salvação nossa” (I, 90), and poverty is “nao segura na tormenta, / que tem porto cada hora” (I, 94). In the first play of the Barca trilogy, the Ship of Heaven is the “barca segura” (II, 81), and in the second, “barca de grande alegria” (II, 83). In the Auto da Cananeia (1534), the Canaanite woman asks of Christ: “Salva-me no teu navio / no mar de tanta tristeza” (II, 250). The ship also appears as a symbol of insecurity; in the Clérigo da Beira (1529 or 1530) Almeida says that, because of the life he lives at court, he sails “n 'hũa nao perdida” (VI, 15). The duality seems to reflect the reality of the ship as the only means of crossing vast expanses of sea, but a means fraught with danger. In the Auto de Mofina Mendes, (1515) God “occupa o mar, / enche os ceos e as profundezas” (I, 140). In the Romagem de Agravados, represented in 1533 on the occasion of the birth of Prince Philip, the proximity of the sea is suggested as the prince is said to have been born “cuando el sol decrina / sus rayos sobre la mar” (V, 52). The play ends with a cantiga in which there is repeated the refrain, “Viva el Infante, el Rey y la Reyna / como las aguas del mar” (V, 52). The last line alternates with “como las ondas del mar” and “como la tierra y la mar” (V, 51-53).

The frequency of vocabulary related to the sea has already been suggested. The word mar itself occurs seventy-four times in Portuguese, and sixty-eight times in Spanish, in thirty-one different plays. In Gil Vicente's Portuguese there are fourteen different words used for ships of various kinds; the most frequent are barca (forty-three times) and nao (twenty-six times). Others are barco, barinel, batel, bateyra, caravela, caravelão, carraca, embarcação, nao, naviarra, navio, and zambuco. These are found in fourteen different plays. In Spanish there are eight such terms. Nave occurs fifteen times; less frequent are barca, barco, carabela, embarcación, nao, nave, and navío. These are found in nine different plays. Nine Portuguese terms are used for members of a ships's crew, from captain (capitão, eight occurrences) to cabin boy (grumete, nine occurrences). Seven such terms appear in Spanish.

Gil Vicente knew seafaring terms far better than the burlesque characters in the Triunfo do Inverno who call a sail a bedsheet and the foremast a pillory. At least twenty-seven technical terms related to a ship and its rigging occur in his Portuguese, and at least twenty-eight in his Spanish. Such terms are paiol (Portuguese, ‘storeroom, magazine’), driça (Portuguese, ‘halyard’), traquete (Portuguese, ‘foresail’), gavia or gávea (Spanish, ‘topsail’), guardín (Spanish, ‘tiller-rope’), and bolina (Portuguese and Spanish, ‘bowline’). The numbers given above do not include less specialized terms such as navegar, remo, remar, vela, embarcar, and others.

Of the twenty-eight terms used in Spanish, ten are Portuguesisms. Most are Portuguese words Hispanicized: Portuguese traquete (for Spanish triquete), enjarcia (for jarcia), rumo (for rumbo), payol (for pañol), estalero (for astillero), desferir (for alazar), maresía (‘rough seas’), and mezena (for mesana). Two words, prancha and friete, have the Portuguese r instead of the normal Spanish l; friete shows also the hypercorrection of the diphthongized ie.⁶ The Portuguesisms of vocabulary suggest that Gil Vicente's knowledge of nautical terms in Spanish, although broad, was less certain than his knowledge of such terms in Portuguese.

Gil Vicente was not a sailor, and his use of seafaring terms was not always consistent and technically accurate. Some use of nautical vocabulary is forced, and in the Barcas there are, as Admiral Gago Coutinho states, different and conflicting terms used for the same vessel.⁷ These defects, however, scarcely cloud the mirror Gil Vicente has given us of the primary national preoccupation of the time.

It is tempting, though erroneous, to speak of the overseas maritime undertakings as an overriding concern of “o povo português.” They were, rather, the concern of a few: the crown and the royal court, some of the nobility, some merchants, some artisans, deep sea sailors, and, to a limited extent, fishermen. These groups made up only a very small part of the population. Their importance was, however, far out of proportion to their numbers, and the sea with which they were concerned, inextricably bound up with Portuguese overseas expansion and commerce, dreams of national greatness, scientific achievement, and individual heroism, is appropriately reflected in the plays of Gil Vicente.

Notes

1. Robert C. Smith, The Art of Portugal (New York: Meredith Press, 1968), p. 51.

2. C. R. Boxer, The Portuguese Seaborn Empire: 1415-1825 (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1969), p. 14.

3. For the dates of Gil Vicente's plays I have followed I. S. Révah. See his contribution to the Dicionário das Literaturas Portuguesa, Brasileira e Galega (Porto: Livraria Figuerinhas, 1960), pp. 865-866.

4. Gil Vicente, Obras Completas com Prefácio e Notas do Prof. Marques Braga (Lisboa: Livraria Sá da Costa, 1942-1944), V, 117. All quotations are from the Marques Braga edition, the most readily available one.

5. Eugenio Asensio, “Las fuentes de las Barcas de Gil Vicente,” Bulletin d'Histoire du Théâtre Portugais, IV (1953), 207-37.

6. It is often difficult or impossible to determine whether certain Portuguesisms in Gil Vicente are from the pen of the author himself, or were introduced by editors or printers. See Paul Teyssier, La Langue de Gil Vicente (Paris: C. Klincksieck, 1959), especially pages 307-310, and 359-60.

7. Gago Coutinho, “Panorama marítimo das obras de Gil Vicente,” Gil Vicente, vida e obra, edition prepared by the Academia das Ciências de Lisboa (Lisboa: “Ottosgráfica, Limitada,” 1939), pp. 107-108. Gago Coutingo states that, although nautical expressions frequently occur, “mais parece terem sido introduzidas por necessidade da rima, do que por lógica da manobra das barcas” (p. 107). He quotes as an example a passage from the first Barca. He further expresses disappointment that we search in vain in Gil Vicente for a true “man of the sea,” despite the “actualidade palpitante dos extraordinários acontecimentos marítimos, a que a população de Portugal assistiu cêrca de 1500.” (p. 108) Admiral Coutinho seems to expect too much from the landlubber who was our poet.