hay linage en toda España
De quien conozca
Tan notable antiguedad.
Lope de Vega.
DON DIEGO HURTADO DE MENDOZA, AUTHOR OF “LAZARILLO DE TORMES”
Don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza was the fifth son of the Marquis of Mondejar and Count of Tendilla, first Spanish Governor of Granada, by Francisca Pacheco, daughter of the Duke of Escalona.
The Governor had a palace in the Alhambra near the Torre de Picos, which is now demolished. But the smaller house of his esquire, Antasio de Bracamonte, still stands in a garden, built against the exquisite little mosque on the walls. There are three shields of arms carved on the walls of Bracamonte’s house.
The palace and the esquire’s house, both within the walls of the Alhambra, looked across the valley of the Darro to the Albaicín. Both buildings were surrounded by gardens and fruit-trees. Birth of Don
Diego in the
Alhambra. In this romantic spot Diego was born in the year 1503, and he passed his early years with his brothers and sisters there. Pedro Martir de Angleria was his tutor. At an early age he went to the university of Salamanca, where he learnt Latin, Greek, and Arabic, and studied canon and civil law.
Don Diego at
Salamanca.While he was a student at Salamanca Don Diego wrote Lazarillo de Tormes.
On leaving the university Don Diego went to serve with the Spanish armies in Italy. His services
in Italy. He also attended lectures at Rome, Bologna, and Padua, and was a profound scholar as well as a statesman and a soldier. Charles V. appreciated his ability and his acquirements. In 1538, at the age of thirty-five, he was appointed Ambassador at Venice. He assisted and patronised the Aldi, and Josephus was first printed complete from his library. Afterwards he was for some time Military Governor of Sienna; and he was sent to the Council of Trent to maintain the imperial interests there. His next employment was at Rome, as special Plenipotentiary to rebuke and overawe Pope Julius III., which he did.
Don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza returned to Spain in 1554 at the age of fifty. The library. He was not appreciated by Philip II. and seldom came to Court, living, with his splendid library, in his house at Granada.
In his retirement he wrote a good deal of poetry. But his great work was the Guerra de Granada, a narrative of the rebellion of the Moors in 1568–1570. The Guerra de Granada. He did the Moors such impartial justice that his book could not be published until many years after his death. Sallust was his model. The first edition appeared in 1610, and the second more complete edition at Valencia in 1776. It is one of the finest pieces of prose-writing in the Spanish language.
In his last years Don Diego found much pleasant employment in his library. Last days. He corresponded with Zurita, the historian of Aragon, telling him how the work of looking over his books reminded him of many long-forgotten things, and supplied him with much food for thought. While in Italy he had been diligent in obtaining Greek MSS., and in other respects his library was quite unique. He bequeathed it to Philip II., and it is now in the Escurial.
Death of Don
Diego Hurtado
de Mendoza.Don Diego died at Madrid in April 1575, aged 72.
THE BOOK, “LAZARILLO DE TORMES”
Ticknor[3] describes Lazarillo de Tormes as “a work of genius unlike anything that had preceded it. Ticknor’s opinion of the work. Its object is to give a pungent satire on all classes of society. It is written in a very bold, rich, and idiomatic Castilian style. Some of its sketches are among the most fresh and spirited that can be found in the whole range of prose works of fiction. Those of the friar and the seller of Indulgences were put under the ban of the Church.” They were expurgated by the Inquisition in 1573, when an expurgated edition was published at Madrid, and in the Index Expurgatorius of 1667.
The first edition in Spain was published at Burgos in 1554.[4] It is excessively rare. First edition. There is a copy at Chatsworth, but none in the British Museum. The Duke of Devonshire allowed the late Mr. H. Butler[p. xxviii] Clarke to transcribe his copy of the first edition. This was done with great care, exactly as it was printed. In 1897 Mr. Butler Clarke printed 250 copies at Oxford, with a facsimile of the old title-page.
Many other editions followed the first of 1554.[5] In Mr. Grenville’s library there is an Antwerp edition (12mo) of 1555, Value of copies. for which he paid seven guineas. Colonel Stanley’s copy fetched £31:10s.; Mr. Hanroth’s, £20:10s. The Paris editor of 1827 could only find a 1595 edition.
A second part, by some wretched scribbler, soon appeared, without any merit. It makes Lazarillo go to sea in the Algiers expedition of 1541. The ship founders, he sinks to the bottom, crawls into a cave, and is turned into a tunny fish. Spurious
second parts. He is then caught in a seine, returns by an effort of will to the human form, and finally goes to live at Salamanca. There was another second part by Juan de Luna, a teacher of Spanish at Paris. It continues the story by making Lazaro serve several other masters, and then become a religious recluse. Both second parts are miserable rubbish, and ought never to be reprinted.
Yet they are included in recent Spanish editions, which is much to be deplored. For the work itself is a classic. In at least two instances the Dictionary of the Spanish Academy refers to Lazarillo de Tormes as an authority for the meaning of words.
English Translations
Lazarillo de Tormes was first translated into English by David Rowlands of Anglesey. He called it The Pleasant History of Lazarillo de Tormes drawn out of Spanish. It was published by Abel Jeffes in the Fore Street without Grepell-gate near Groube Street at the sign of the Bell, and dedicated to Sir Thomas Gresham. It contains the Prologue, and a short chapter at the end about Lazaro’s continued prosperity, which is not in the first edition of 1554. This is the best translation. It was published in 1586.
A new edition appeared in 1596, also published by Abel Jeffes, who had then removed to the Blacke Fryers near Puddle Wharfe. There were twenty editions or reprints, and Lazarillo was exceedingly popular with the Elizabethan reading public.
James Blakiston brought out a new edition in 1653 dedicated to Lord Chandos. It consists of the translation by David Rowlands, omitting the Prologue, and of a translation of the spurious second part by Juan de Luna. Another edition appeared in 1669, another in 1677. The title is The Excellent History of Lazarillo de Tormes, the witty Spaniard.
In 1726 there appeared The Life and Adventures of Lazarillo de Tormes, with twenty curious copper cuts. In 1727 the nineteenth edition was published. This version is a bad translation, omits the Prologue, and includes the spurious second parts.
The worst performance of all was the edition of 1789 in two volumes. The type is better, but it is a very careless reprint of a bad translation. It omits the execrable illustrations of the earlier editions. Spanish names are scarcely recognisable. Gelves is called “the battle of Geleas!” for Escalona we have “Evealona.”
All
