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Quevedo and the Court of Philip III: Neglected Satirical Letters and New Biographical Data

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

James O. Crosby
James O. Crosby*
Affiliation:
University of Illinois, Urbana
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Extract

In 1613 Quevedo left Spain to join his friend, Pedro Téllez Girón, Duke of Osuna and at that time Viceroy of Sicily. Two years later Quevedo was chosen by the Sicilian Parliament to present in person the triennial contribution of 300,000 ducats to the King of Spain. During the eight months he spent in Madrid, the satirist gained a wealth of experience in intrigue and practical politics. The purpose of this article is to edit with brief comment letters recently uncovered in Spain which bear on this sojourn in Madrid. These documents clarify the nature of Quevedo's relationship with the Duke of Osuna, facilitate the analysis of his experiences at the Court and reactions to current political practices, and make possible the rectification of various misconceptions. No attempt will be made below to restate what is already known about these years of Quevedo's life.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 71 , Issue 5 , December 1956 , pp. 1117 - 1126
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1956

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References

1 Memorial del pleyto qve el señor D. luan Chumacero y Sotomayor, Fiscal del Consejo de las Ordenes y de la Iunta, trala con el duque de Vzeda, sig. a, fol. 1, and sig. g, fol. 13. The location of this printed Memorial (which bears no date or place of publication) is not given by Luis Astrana Marin in La vida turbulenta de Quevedo (see pp. 217 ff.), nor in his edition of Quevedo's Obras complétas: obras en verso (Madrid, 1943), p. 805 (Documents). It is bound in a volume of varios in the Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid, MS. 11569, No. 11 (unnumbered)—hereafter cited as Chumacero.

2 See Aureliano Fernândez-Guerra, “Vida de … Quevedo,” in Obras de … Quevedo (Madrid, 1852), i, xxxix-lxxxi (BAE xxm); Ernest Mérimée, Essai sur la vie et les œuvres de Francisco de Quevedo (Paris, 1886); Luis Astrana Marin, La vida turbulenta de Quevedo (Madrid, 1945). This last book is completely without documentation; on its unreliability see my article “Quevedo's Alleged Participation in the Conspiracy of Venice,” HR, xxiii, 259–273 (1955).

3 Osuna's supposed mistreatment of a page of the Prince of Natoli.

4 Osuna, letter of 5 July, 1615 (a contemporary copy), Archivo Histórico Nacional, Section de Consejos, legajo 49869, No. 20. This archive and section are hereafter cited as AHN, Cons. In transcribing this and other letters, only the following have been modernized: punctuation, capitalization, accentuation, separation of words and, in those MSS which are not autographs, resolution of abbreviations.

5 Carlo Doria, Duke of Tursis, a Grandee of Spain and Captain-general of the Genoese galleys. See Francisco Fernandez de Bethencourt, Historia genealôgica y heráldica de la Monarquía Espanola (Madrid, 1900), ii, 451—hereafter cited as Beth.

6 Osuna often referred to his galleys by color. See Colección de documentes inéditos para la historia de España (Madrid, 1864), XLV, 383.

7 On the association of Orion with stormy weather at sea, cf. Virgil, Aeneid iv 52–53, where Dido is advised to urge Aeneas to stay in Carthage “dum pelago desaevit hiems et aquosus Orion, / quassataeque rates, dum non tractabile caelum.”

8 Juana de la Cerda y de la Cueva, daughter of the Sixth Duke of Medinaceli and wife of Antonio de Aragon y Moncada, Duke of Montalto, a Grandee of Spain, member of the Order of the Golden Fleece and head of an important family of Naples and Sicily (Beth, v, 268).

9 Probably Eufrasia de Leiva, wife of Antonio Manrique, Marqués de Charela, a Spaniard in Osuna's service. See Chumacero, sig. c, fol. 8; Epistolario completo de don Francisco de Quevedo-Villegas, ed. Luis Astrana Marín (Madrid, 1946), p. 79; Obras complétas: obras en verso, ed. Astrana (Madrid, 1943), p. 807 (Documents). The latter two are hereafter cited as EP and Verso, Astrana, respectively.

10 Juan de Salazar, soon to be one of Quevedo's best contacts at the Court. It was Sebastian de Aguirre who gave Salazar the neck-chain (Osuna, copy of a letter to Aguirre, 4 Nov. 1615, in AHN, Cons., leg. 49869, No. 21).

11 Alonso Portocarrero, Marqués de Villanueva del Fresno, known as the “Marqués de Barcarrota.” A close personal friend and drinking companion of Quevedo, he had served Philip II in many naval actions and in 1615 was appointed Captain-general of the Portuguese galleys. See EP, p. 25; Beth, ii, 322; Quevedo, Obras completas en prosa, ed. Astrana (Madrid, 1945), p. 196.

12 Alonso de Alvarado y Velasco, Conde de Villamor and one of Philip Ill's chamberlains. He married a relative of Osuna (Beth, ii, 445).

13 A copy certified by Osuna at his trial in 1621: AHN, Cons., leg. 49869, No. 22.

14 The Duchess was Luisa Manrique de Lara, and her husband Bernardino de Cardenas, Duke of Maqueda (EP, p. 24; Beth, ii, 545; Verso, Astrana, p. 459).

15 On the fact that the letter of 16 Dec. 1615 was a reply to Osuna's letter of 6 Nov., see below, p. 1123.

16 Psalm 118.7-8: “Attolite portas, principes, vestras; et elevamini, portae aeternales: et introibit rex gloriae.”

17 The MSS. of this and 11 other letters of Quevedo (many of them autographs) were collected into 4 legajos and entered as evidence in the trial of Osuna, Quevedo, and others in 1621. These bundles also contained several other letters by Quevedo, Osuna, and others, relative to the Duke's terms as Viceroy in Naples and Sicily. Although the order of their contents has been completely confused, these 4 legajos now form AHN, Cons., legs. 4986669. Twelve of Quevedo's letters, however, are missing; they passed at one time into the rich library of the Marqués de Jerez de los Caballeros, and in 1902 were bought with his library by Archer M. Huntington (see Francisco Rodriguez Marin, “Doce cartas de Quevedo,” Boélin de la Real Academia Espanola, [I 1914], 586). On 14 April 1954, Mr. Huntington replied to an inquiry of mine as follows (in part): “Material of this kind which I have is now in a vault in a trust company in New York, and I am quite unable in my present condition to go and make an examination and select letters that might be useful, if there are any …” In quoting Quevedo's letter, I follow Rodriguez Marin's transcription (Astrana's reprinting of it contains numerous errors, such as the unexplained substitution of “Almirante” for “Alférez,” “portilleros” for “porterillos,” etc.).

18 I have found no comment on the style of this letter. Astrana restricts himself, for comment, to quotations from the letter itself (EP, p. 542) and from Chumacero, giving the wrong signature number (EP, pp. 28–29). Contrary to Astrana's belief, the material about money in EP, p. 29, refers to Quevedo's letter of 12 Oct. 1617, and not to 16 Dec. 1615.

19 On the corruption of Philip Ill's Court, see Chumacero, sig. c, fol. 5, and sig. d, fol. 7v-sig. e, fol. 9V; Cristobal Suárez de Figueroa, El Passagere-, ed. R. Selden Rose (Madrid, 1914), pp. 286–289; Padre Juan de Mariana, “Discurso sobre la moneda de vellôn,” in BAE xxxi, 591. See also Ciriaco Pérez Bustamante, Felipe III: Semblanza de un monarca y perfiles de una privanza (Madrid, 1950), pp. 53–58.

20 The statements at the trial are in Chumacero, sig. a, fol. 1 (reproduced, with erroneous documentation, in EP, p. 28, notes). Quevedo's correspondence in verse with Lerma is in EP, pp. 62–68.

21 EP, pp. 30–31, esp. notes from Chumacero. Astrana does not mention the connection between the 2 letters.

22 Autograph, AHN, Cons., leg. 49866, No. 71.

23 Autograph, AHN, Cons., leg. 49866, No. 72. Pacheco, long since promoted from the Diocese of Cuenca, nevertheless kept that title.

24 See Luis Astrana Marin, La vida turbulenta de Qitevedo (Madrid, 1945), p. 228. As-trana's statements (and for that matter the entire biography) are completely undocumented.

25 Summary of a letter from Sebastián de Aguirre, AHN, Cons., leg. 49866, Sumario, No. 35.

26 Colecci ón de documentes inêditos para la historia de España (Madrid, 1864), xlv, 310, 328–335—hereafter cited as Codoin.

27 EP, p. 29. In the passage in question, Astrana changes the courier's rank from Alférez, as Quevedo wrote, to Almiranle (see n. 17 above).

28 It is known that Quevedo was in Burgos for the royal wedding on 18 Oct. (EP, p. 23). The Court was still in Lerma on 26 Sept. (Codoin, XLV, 334), but it had moved to Burgos before Quevedo reached Spain because he stated that he found it in that city when he arrived in Spain (Chumacero, sig. g, fol. 13).

29 Curious as Osuna's delay of 6 months may seem, it should be remembered that if travel was slow in the 17th century, diplomatic activities were even slower. To take an example from one of Quevedo's later missions to Madrid, Osuna wrote to Madrid from Naples in Nov. 1616, that Quevedo would leave very soon: “Llevará de ellas [unas causas criminales] vn rreasunto D. Francisco de Quebedo, que partirá con toda brebedad.” A month later, “D. Francisco de Quebedo partirá muy presto”; in Feb. 1617, “D. Francisco de Quebedo partirá”; in March, “Don Francisco de Quevedo las leerá [algunas noticias] a V.E.”; in April, “Algunas otras raçones dirálas D. Francisco de Quebedo, que lleua estos despachos a V.M. y a los consejeros de Estado, y cosas que a entendido y visto. … Pa-sando por aqui este correo me pareçio no detener esta cartta [sic], y remitir a don Francisco lo que abiso en ella.” (Unpublished letters of 9 Nov. 1616, in Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid [BNM] MS. 1431, fol. 26; 12 Dec. in AHN, Cons., leg. 49866, No. 60; 19 Feb. 1617, in BNM MS. 1431, fol. 49v; 6 Mar. in Codoin, xxv, 508; 26 April, in BNM MS. 1431, fol. 53v). Quevedo finally left on 31 May 1617 (Francesco Zazzera, Giornali, printed in Verso, Astrana, p. 809 [Documents]. Astrana gives only the folio numbers of the MS., and not its call number, which is BNM MS. 10342).

30 Chumacero, sig. e, fol. 11; Codoin, XLV, 411, 414.

31 AHN, Cons., leg. 49866, Sumario, Nos. 36, 38,39, 41.

32 EP, pp. 37, 39. My text is taken from Rodriguez Marin's edition (see n. 17 above).