Don Quixote [Trans. by Edith Grossman] (154 page)

6. A traditional expression that means, “Don’t go looking for trouble.”

1. Martín de Riquer faithfully follows the first edition of
Don Quixote,
published in 1605; the second edition, printed a few months later by Juan de la Cuesta, the same printer, introduces a brief passage here, indicating that Ginés de Pasamonte, who is also in the mountains, steals Sancho’s donkey. The thorny and ambiguous question of why Cervantes does not mention the theft of the donkey in the first edition (usually attributed to an author’s oversight or a printer’s error) is alluded to in the second part of
Don Quixote,
published in 1615.

2. By the third edition of
Don Quixote,
printed by Juan de la Cuesta, the references to Sancho’s donkey in the Sierra Morena had been deleted; here, for example, the revised text says that Sancho was on foot and carrying the donkey’s load, “thanks to Ginesillo de Pasamonte.”

1. A lost play by Shakespeare,
The History of Cardenio,
was apparently based on Cardenio’s tale. An English translation of the first part of
Don Quixote
appeared only a few years after its initial publication in 1605.

2. A promise of marriage was considered a legally binding contract.

3. This is the eleventh of the books about Amadís and his descendants.

4. Queen Madásima, a character in the
Amadís of Gaul,
did not have a romantic relationship with the surgeon Elisabat.

1. The knight’s penance is a favorite topic in the books of chivalry. Beltenebros is the name taken by Amadís during his penance; it suggests “Dark Beauty” or “Beautiful Dark.”

2. This was the popular name for Aesop among the uneducated.

3. This is Sancho’s misunderstanding of the name Elisabat.

4.
Peña Pobre
can be translated as “Poor Rock” or “Bare Rock” or, to retain the alliteration, “Mount Mournful.”

5. The figure of Opportunity was traditionally represented as bald except for one lock of hair, which, like the proverbial brass ring, one had to grasp and hold on to.

7. Over the years, the question of exactly when Sancho’s donkey was stolen has been a matter of some controversy among Cervantine scholars. According to the first edition, published in 1605, this is the initial indication that a theft has taken place. In the second edition, however, published a few months after the first, a passage inserted in chapter XXIII states that Ginés de Pasamonte, the galley slave, steals the donkey while Sancho is sleeping. Martín de Riquer, editor of the text on which this translation is based, adheres consistently to the first edition, citing the added passage in a footnote but not including it in the body of the text. In brief, then, through an oversight of Cervantes or the printer, Juan de la Cuesta, the first edition does not prepare the reader for the fact that the donkey has been stolen; despite subsequent corrections, in the second part of
Don Quixote,
published in 1615, Cervantes alludes to this omission in chapter III and apparently accepts criticism of the omission as valid.

8. This is Sancho’s corruption of a Latin phrase in the service for the dead:
Quia in inferno nulla est redemptio.

9. In the passage regarding the theft of the donkey, which was inserted in chapter XXIII in the second edition, Don Quixote offers Sancho his own donkeys as compensation for his loss.

10. In an apparent oversight, Cervantes wrote “Perseus” instead of “Theseus.”

1. This phrase was considered irreverent, and in the second edition it was replaced by “And for a rosary he took some large galls from a cork tree, which he strung together and used as prayer beads.”

1. A Visigoth who ruled Spain in the seventh century (672–680).

1. This appears to be a reference to the duke of Osuna.

1. In the first edition, this was the epigraph for chapter XXX, while the one for chapter XXIX appeared before chapter XXX. In other words, the epigraphs were reversed.

2. The kind of gentle horse normally ridden by women and referred to frequently in novels of chivalry; Cervantes uses the term for comic effect since Dorotea is riding a mule.

3. In other words, Sancho will turn them into silver and gold.

5.
Meona
means “urinating frequently” and is often used to describe newborn infants.

1. In this context, religion signifies the order of chivalry.

2.
Azote
means “whip” or “scourge”;
gigote
is “fricassee” or “hash.”

3. The humor in Dorotea’s statement (comparable to her not being able to recall Don Quixote’s name) lies in the fact that Osuna is landlocked and that La Mancha is part of Spain, and not the reverse, as she implies.

4. This is the first reference, in either the first or second edition of the novel, to the theft of Don Quixote’s sword.

5. As indicated earlier, when he is extremely angry Don Quixote changes the way he addresses Sancho, moving from the second person singular to the more distant second person plural. This is the second time he has done so, and he maintains his irate distance until the end of the paragraph.

6. At this point, in the second edition, Ginés de Pasamonte reappears, riding Sancho’s donkey. Sancho begins to shout at him, calling him a thief, and Ginés runs away, leaving the donkey behind. Sancho is overjoyed, especially when Don Quixote says that this does not nullify the transfer of the three donkeys he had promised him earlier.

1. A
fanega
is approximately 1.6 bushels.

2. As a sign of respect, the recipient of a letter from a person of high station touched it to his or her head before opening it.

4. Sancho confuses the proverb, which ends: “…you can’t complain about the evil that happens to you.”

1 Written by Bernardo de Vargas, the book was published in 1545.

2 This novel was mentioned in the examination of Don Quixote’s library by the priest and the barber.

3 Published in 1580, this chronicle recounts the exploits of one of the most famous and successful officers to serve under the Catholic Sovereigns, Ferdinand and Isabella. Gonzalo Hernández de Córdoba (1453–1515) was called the Great Captain; his aide, Diego García de Paredes, was renowned for his enormous strength.

1 This is the first of what are called the interpolated novels (in contemporary terms, they are novellas) in the first part of
Don Quixote;
the story is derived from an episode in Canto 43 of Ariosto’s
Orlando furioso.
There are indications in the second part of
Don Quixote
that Cervantes was criticized for these “interruptions” of the action.

2 Plutarch attributes the phrase to Pericles.

3 An Italian poet of the sixteenth century (1510–1568).

4 An allusion to the story, recounted in
Orlando furioso,
of a magic goblet that indicated if the women who drank from it were faithful.

5 Danae was confined in a tower by her father, King Acrisius, when an oracle stated that her son would kill him. Zeus transformed himself into a shower of gold, visited her, and fathered Perseus.

2 The four Ss that a lover needed to be were
sabio
(“wise”),
solo
(“alone”),
solícito
(“solicitous”), and
secreto
(“secretive”). This conceit was popular during the Renaissance, as were the ABCs of love cited by many authors. The W is omitted from Leonela’s ABC because it is not part of the Spanish alphabet.

1 The phrase in Spanish,
ciertos son los toros,
is equivalent to “the bulls are certain”—that is, “there’s no doubt about the outcome.”

2 A
cuartillo
is one-fourth of a
real.

3 A
cuarto,
a coin of very little value, was worth four
maravedís
.

4 This appears to refer to the battle of Cerignola, in 1503, when the defeat of the French made the kingdom of Naples a Spanish province.

1 In what seems to be another oversight on the part of Cervantes or his printer, the first part of this epigraph actually belongs to the previous chapter.

2 These were worn to protect travelers from the sun and dust.

3 It was believed that nobility was inherited exclusively from the father.

4 Another apparent oversight: it was indicated earlier in the chapter that the two men had already seen each other.

1 An extremely variable liquid measure, ranging from 2.6 to 3.6 gallons (it is also a dry measure equivalent to twenty-five pounds).

3 It seems likely that the earlier description of the character as a “Christian recently arrived from Moorish lands” means that he could only be a former prisoner, although the story of his captivity—another interpolated novel—does not begin until chapter XXXIX.

4 The word means
Señora,
or “Lady.”

5 The debate between arms and letters (that is, the life of a soldier compared to the life of a cleric or scholar), a frequent literary topic in Europe during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, was at least as popular as the theme of the Golden Age, the subject of Don Quixote’s discourse when he shared a meal with the goatherds.

6 A phrase that means going to convents and monasteries for the soup that is distributed to the poor.

1 This is the second of the “interpolated novels.” Cervantes himself had been a captive for some five years, and many of the elements in the story may be autobiographical, but it should also be noted, as Martín de Riquer points out, that it was a fairly common practice to insert a romantic tale with Moorish themes into works that otherwise seemed to have little to do with either romance or the Moors.

2 An amount worth approximately thirty-three thousand
reales.

3 A fortified town on the Tenaro River, near Milan.

4 The duke of Alba reached Brussels on August 22, 1567.

5 Belgian noblemen who fought against the French in the Spanish army and were executed by the duke of Alba on June 5, 1568, for rebelling against the Inquisition.

6 Cervantes fought under this captain at the battle of Lepanto, in 1571.

8 The naval crown, made of gold, was awarded to the first man to board an enemy ship.

9 Uchalí, or Uluch Ali, the viceroy of Algiers in 1570, did in fact take part in the actions described by Cervantes. He commanded the Ottoman fleet from 1571 to 1587 and defeated the flagship of the Order of Malta during the battle of Lepanto.

10 Giovanni Andrea Doria, a Genoese, commanded the Spanish galleys.

11 An insignia that indicated the flagship of an admiral.

12 Muley Hamet, or Muley Mohammad, took possession of Tunis in October of 1573; the following year, he was captured by the Turks. His brother, Muley Hamida, or Ahmad-Sultán, attempted to join the attack on Tunis in 1573 by Don Juan of Austria, and died in Palermo in 1575.

13 The fortress that protected Tunis.

14 A span (
palmo
) is approximately 8 inches; a
vara,
about 2.8 feet.

1 Nicknamed
El Fratín
(“the Little Friar”), Jacome Paleazzo fortified a number of garrisons for the Spanish monarchy.

2 The historical Uchalí died suddenly on June 21, 1587, in Constantinople.

3 The four Ottoman family names are Muhammat, Mustafa, Murad, and Ali.

5 The allusion is to Cervantes himself; his complete surname was Cervantes Saavedra.

6 A historical figure, Agi Morato, or Hajji Murad, the son of Slavic parents, renounced Christianity and became an important personage in Algiers.

7 La Pata is al-Batha, a fortress-city.

8 According to Martín de Riquer, the daughter of Agi Morato (see note 6) was in fact named Zahara; in 1574 she married Abd al-Malik, who was proclaimed sultan of Morocco in 1576 and died in the battle of Alcazarquivir, against the Portuguese, in 1578. She was remarried, to Hasán Bajá, and after 1580 lived in Constantinople. In other words, some characters in this story of the captive are historical, although the action is fictional.

9 Bab Azún, the Gate of Azún, is one of the gates to Algiers.

10 This was the name for perfectly bilingual Moors, usually converts to Christianity, who had lived among Christians; they often came from the ancient kingdom of Aragón, which included present-day Aragón, Cataluña, Valencia, and the Balearic Islands.

1 This was the name of the pirate who captured Cervantes.

2 A gold coin worth approximately six silver
reales.

3 A coin worth approximately seventeen
reales.

5 This is an allusion to the legend of Don Rodrigo, the last Visigothic ruler of Spain, whose illicit love for Florinda, the daughter of Count Julián, caused her father to seek his revenge by betraying Spain to the Moors at the battle of Guadalete, in 711.

1 Martín de Riquer indicates that this lyric (and other poems inserted in the text) was composed by Cervantes years before he wrote
Don Quixote
and set to music in 1591 by Salvador Luis, a singer in the chapel choir of Philip II.

2 These were common coverings for windows before glass was in general use.