Quoted from the Seville, n. d. edition (Biblioteca Nacional R-23, 622).
In a similar vein, the author of Cirongilio de Tracia discusses in his prologue how he was afraid that «la alta fama de la generosa caballería de otros tiempos se escureciesse», and how he was presenting a more accurate translation than any previously available.
Feliciano de Silva, in his Amadís de Grecia, also has separate prologues for the author and translator, as well as a «nota del corrector de la imprenta» -probably inspired in Alonso de Proaza's verses which accompany the Celestina. It is quoted above, in note 224 to Chapter VI.
Marcel Bataillon, Erasmo y España, pp. 620-21.
Raymond L. Grismer, The Influence of Plautus in Spain before Lope de Vega (New York: Hispanic Institute, 1944), p. 59.
Dares and Dictys, or the «verdadero historiador» Turpin, would also have been familiar at the time. Today, of course, we are so blasé that an author must go to ridiculous extremes if he seriously wishes to deceive readers; no one pays the slightest attention if John Updike puts as preface to Bech: A Book a letter from the author whose life is presented, or concludes with a phony bibliography including even a plot outline of one of Bech's supposed works. To fool people nowadays one must do as George Fraser, taking a person from Tom Brown's Schooldays, and involving him in a real event (the first Afghan war). Alternatively, one can steal the plot from a Victorian novel (The Prisoner of Zenda), then claim the novel was based on the person's life whose memoirs are being edited, taking care to present grounds for «some reappraisal» of Otto von Bismarck, and speaking -most important from our point of view- of a manuscript discovery, with some portions remaining to be found (Royal Flash [New York, 1970], p. vii).
Taken from the 1532 edition, Biblioteca Nacional R-4355. English, in contrast with earlier centuries (see the openings of Tristán de Leonís and Oliveros de Castilla) is not a common source language; the only other work I have found it in is Florando de Inglaterra.
Another typical example is found in the preface to Don Silves de la Selva; more accessible is the prologue to Cristalián de España of Beatriz Bernal, quoted by M. Serrano y Sanz in Apuntes para una biblioteca de escritoras españolas, I (Madrid, 1903), 157. It is not, however, a parody, as he calls it.
«Juzga, sabio lector», he says, «cual estaria mi atribulada vida, viendo por tantas partes sea acosada con la horrible muerte». The sense of surprise and of events out of control is emphasized.
The use of heroic figures as a subject for murals is an echo of a classic practice found in several places in the romances of chivalry; see, for example, Chapter 3 of Cristalián de España. It is particularly interesting in this case because the heroes of earlier romances of chivalry are included (since they were as «historical» as Felipe II or Dom Sebastião, who are also there), providing us with some idea of what romances Martínez knew. We find Amadís de Gaula, with his relatives, and Primaleón, «cercado de sus parientes, que por prolijidad no los cuento», Cristalián de España, Olivante de Laura, Belianís de Grecia, and Felixmarte de Hircania. In a similar display in the prologue to Olivante de Laura, we see mentioned, besides the Amadís and Palmerín families, only Clarián de Landanís and his son Floramante.
Book II, Chapter 52, quoted from Vol. IV of my edition, Clásicos Castellanos, 196 (Madrid: España-Calpe, 1975), 163. For another example, see III, 175.