Seventeenth-century scribal manuscripts of Calderón's plays,
in which the Biblioteca
Nacional of Madrid abounds, may prove to be of great
importance to future editors of Calderón, especially now
that most, if not all, of the extant holographs of his comedies and
dramas have been edited1.
If there has been hitherto a natural hesitancy to use these
manuscripts as copy-texts for modern critical editions, it is
simply because so little is known about the men who wrote them, or
indeed about the manuscripts themselves2.
Another reason is probably the often deserved accusation of lack of
scruple levelled against seventeenth-century Spanish autores (actor-managers)
who, having absolute rights over the plays they had acquired, did
not hesitate to mutilate, alter, and modify them at will. But
although this can certainly be said of a great number of scribal
manuscripts, it would obviously be reckless to dismiss every one of
them on these grounds. Indeed, some of these manuscripts may turn
out to contain what can only be termed the final and most
authoritative text of certain plays. A great deal of research is,
however, required before we can separate the wheat from the
chaff.
The immediate
object of this paper is to establish the identity of two
Calderonian scribes by means of their handwriting. At the same
time, the attitude they display towards their copy-texts will
emerge from this study, and it is hoped that this knowledge will
prove to be of some use to future editors of their manuscripts.
The first of these
scribes is Sebastián de Alarcón (see Plate I) whose
signature appears on the last page of Biblioteca
Nacional MS 16,548 of
El Joseph de las
mugeres. Very little is known about Alarcón's life.
The Genealogía
de comediantes says of him that he was an «apuntador» and that
«murio, consta por la
carta del año 1680»3.
His earliest recorded appearance on a stage occurred in May 1640
when he was next to last in the men's list of the company which
Manuel Vallejo formed for the Seville autos4.
In September 1648, he appears last in the men's list of the company
of Esteban Núñez el Pollo that played in the Coliseo of
Seville5
Three manuscripts
of Calderón's El postrer duelo de España in the
Biblioteca Nacional of Madrid
help shed more light on his career. The first is MS 14,884, dated
1665, the first act of which is in the hand of Sebastián de
Alarcón. The second is MS 14,992 which was wholly copied by
him with the exception of four folios. The most likely date for its
transcription is 1664-5 when respectively fourteen and fifteen of
the actors mentioned in the cast-list were working in Madrid for
Antonio de Escamilla, for whom this copy was made6.
The manuscript is then probably contemporary with MS 14,884. The
third is MS 15,273 in which Sebastián de Alarcón
copied the second and third acts only. The characters in the
cast-list are in the hand of the scribe of the first act, but the
names of the actors were written by Alarcón. The manuscript
is dated once more 1665:
Por mandado del
ssr
don diego deespejo
saco este traslado del original de don
P° Calderón y ba cierto y berdadero
md y
março a 7 de 1665
In this last manuscript,
Calderón rewrote two passages which were originally
transcribed by Alarcón. The first is on folio 29v. Alarcón's text read:
marq
Señor
almirante
donde por
aqui
almi
e
querido
ber la
çiudad
marq
segun
esso
no os abia hallado
el abisso
de que el rrey
sale al pilar
almi
no ni hasta aora
lo e sabido
marq
Pues a mi me an
abissado
y temo que abra
salido
porque a rrato
ya
almi
Bolber
açia
palaçio es precisso
marq
benid os yre
sirbiendo
almi
Yo soy el que e de
serbiros
adios don pedro =
Jines
la memoria deste
anillo
te aquerde para
mañana
banse el almite
y marques
Jines
y para de aqui a
mil siglos
Jesus y que
diamantaço
mira
senor
Calderón's enlarged text
appears on a separate sheet which has been tipped into the original
manuscript. It reads:
Marq.
Señor
almirante
Donde por
aqui
Almi.
e
querido
ver la
ciudad
Marq.
segun
eso
no os abra Hallado
el aviso.
de la novedad que
ay.
Alm.
no
Mar.
pues saved que a
tenido
cartas el Rey de
que estando
Salamanca en mil
diuisos
parçiales
vandos Rebuelta
a puesto en moral
conflito.
a toda castilla,
siendo
segun el correo me
dijo
Los
Mançanos y Monrroyes.
Mas ynfaustos mas
noçibos
para ella que para
ytalia
Los guelfos y
Jabelinos.
Carlos con el
ardimiento.
De su alto spiritu
altibo.
para atajar los
ynsultos.
Yras Robos y
Homicidios
que de ellos
Resultan pienso
que a toda prisa
en camino trata ponerse.
Alm.
bolber
acia
palaçio es preciso
Marq.
venid os yre
sirbiendo
Alm.
Yo soy el que e de
seuiros
adios don Pedro,
Jines,
Toma ya que yo e
perdido
la ocasion no
pierdas tu
tus
gajes.
Jines
vivas mil
siglos
Jesus y que
diamantazo
mira
señor
Dale vna sortija y vanse los
dos
The purpose of the change is
threefold: (1) the Almirante
is forced to leave Saragossa and is thus unable to see Pedro's
dama whom
Jinés, unaware of her relationship with his master, is
procuring for him; (2) the duel will now take place in Valladolid
instead of Saragossa; and (3) the revised scene provides some more
historical background by incorporating a reference to the revolt of
the comuneros
(May 1520-April 1521). These are important changes, for the first
two entail further changes later in the play. The important
consideration to bear in mind, however, is that Calderón
made these alterations on Alarcón's copy of his play. The
second passage appears on folio 41v. The text copied by
Alarcón read originally as follows:
flor
si y es que pues
puedo sacalle
por detras de
aquel cançel
finja que buelbo
con el
por la puerta de
la calle
biol
hazlo ansi ues se
me ofreçe
tan buena ocassion
aqui
como oyr delante
de mi
el que ella le
aborrece
In the right-hand margin,
Calderón added four lines which are meant to be inserted
after Flora's quatrain:
ven tras
mi
d. P.
vien este
ynstante
es que finja mi
pesar
que despues a de
quedar
sin esta pena
violante
Then, he deleted the words
hazlo ansi, como
oyr, and el
que in Violante's speech and replaced them respectively by
lograre, el
que, and oyga, so that the speech now reads:
biol
lograre
pues se me ofreçe
tan buena ocassion
aqui
el que
delante de mi
oyga que
ella le aborrece
Finally, a passage
on folio 42r of the same manuscript
appears in the hands of Alarcón and Calderón as
follows:
d P
y confusso en no
saber
a quien vna dicha
tal
como pissar este
vnbral
se la debo
agradecer
o a bos biolante
dibina
que esta licencia
me days
o a bos que la
ocassionays
bellissima
serafina
y pues a vn tiempo
a las dos
Debo alma y vida
Rendiros
ved vos en que e
de seruiros
y ved que me
mandais vos.
The last redondilla is in the hand of
Calderón. Since folio 42r is otherwise in the hand of
Sebastián de Alarcón, Calderón must have
written these four lines either immediately after Alarcón
transcribed the preceding one, or by filling in a space left on
purpose by the scribe. In any case, it is evident that
Calderón was revising and modifying this manuscript copy of
El postrer duelo de
España over Alarcón's shoulder.
Some folios in
Alarcón's hand are also found in the partly autograph
manuscript of Cada
uno para si (Biblioteca
Nacional of Madrid, MS 16,887). Calderón's
autograph folios appear in the third act of the manuscript and
comprise folios 78r to 81v and 84r to 86r, folio 87 being a blank
folio7.
Alarcón's stint comprises, on the other hand, folios 74r to
76v and 88r to 95v, also in the third act. The rest of the
manuscript is in the hand of three other scribes. A quick perusal
of Calderón's autograph folios will readily establish that
the second set (84r-86r) contains the rough draft of part of the
first set. Alarcón's folios, although separated by some
twelve folios in different hands, are numbered consecutively from
seven to twelve in his own hand (this foliation is then
discontinued for no apparent reason). Since, as far as the text is
concerned, the folios also follow one another uninterruptedly, we
must conclude that they belong together and formed, at some time,
part of a larger manuscript. Supporting evidence for this is
provided by watermark and texture of the paper which are completely
different from those of the rest of the manuscript.
Whoever put
Alarcón's and Calderón's folios together with the
other scribal folios did so with the intention of producing a
complete text of the third act of which Calderón's foul
papers and some of Alarcón's folios (specifically 88r to
91r) form no part. This is indicated by the insertion of a
horizontal line and the word ojo at the beginning and at the end of this
section. The excluded folios in Alarcón's hand are then seen
to have been superseded by Calderón's fair folios.
Calderón
was obviously rewriting part of the third act of Cada uno para sí, and
in order to do so he used Alarcón's manuscript copy. In
order to understand the nature of Calderón's revision, a
brief account of the plot of the two versions must be given
first.
In
Alarcón's version, Violante, who has fallen in love with
Félix, her cousin Leonor's suitor, plans in Leonor's
presence to arrange a meeting with him on the banks of the Tagus.
To this effect, she sends her maid Inés with a note to
Félix's house. But, as soon as Violante and Inés have
left the stage, Leonor counterattacks by sending her maid Juana
with a second note to Félix in which she asks him to meet
her. As the first note is unsigned and Inés delivers it with
her face hidden by her cloak, Félix, not recognizing the
handwriting, is reluctant to accept Violante's invitation. But then
Juana appears with the second note and Félix, recognizing
now Leonor's handwriting, dutifully resolves to answer her summons.
At that point, however, Simón announces that his master
Enrique and Don Carlos are about to fight a duel. Félix
feels that his first duty lies in helping his friends, and departs
immediately for the lonely plot of land where the two men are about
to fight.
In the new
version, Calderón introduces some important changes. First,
instead of sending the second note to Félix, Leonor decides
to forestall the meeting by actually going to the appointed place,
hoping to arrive there before her cousin. Félix receives one
note only, but now, although he is still unaware of the identity of
the sender, he resolves to answer it. On arriving at the banks of
the Tagus, he is therefore confronted by two women, concealed
behind their respective cloaks, who beckon to him with identical
handkerchiefs. At that point, however, Simón arrives and
Félix has to rush off to the scene of the duel.
Félix's departure marks the end of the autograph folios.
Calderón
began his revision by merely copying out twelve lines from
Alarcón's text into which he introduced just one minor
variant. Significantly, above the first of these lines of verse
there is a horizontal line opposite which is a cross potent. The
cross potent reappears precisely opposite the same line of verse in
Calderón's hand on folio 78r. The crosses potent are obvious
pointers which indicate the beginning of the revision and were very
probably put there by Calderón himself. Since this first
section dealt with Leonor's resolution to thwart her cousin's
plans, Calderón did not need to alter it extensively. It is
when she begins to describe the way in which she is going to
achieve it that the first significant departure from the original
occurs:
Alarcón
Leo
ay vna alebe de
quien
con sus mismas
armas trato
bengarme biben los
cielos
que a las orillas
del tajo
la e de tener todo
el dia
con su
pañuelo en la mano
Calderón
Leon.
ay vna alebe de
quien
con sus mismas
armas trato
vengarme viven los
cielos
que su misma sena
el laço
a de ser adonde
venga
si sale de ella
llamado
tropezando, en sus
fabores
a caer en mis
agrauios
The scene then shifts to
Félix's house in both versions. First, Hernando enters to
deliver a monologue which, in the primitive version, runs for
thirty-four lines. Calderón reduces it to eleven, which he
copied verbatim from Alarcón's text. Naturally enough the
portion of the monologue that Calderón left out is
stylistically the weakest. Next, Calderón proceeded to copy
word-by-word from Alarcón's text until Inés's
delivery of Violante's note. Here he introduced a few changes which
do not affect the plot directly, for Violante's note still performs
the same function in the new version. What Calderón did was
to develop a comic scene that existed only in embryo in the
primitive version:
Alarcón
ynes
Leed este
papel
lo que dice
haçed y adios
d fe
deten aquessa
muger
por si ymporta ber
quien sea
mientras yo el
papel lea
her
Como la e de
detener
Lee = d fel
de galiana esta
tarde
solo a la orilla
salid
y a quien os llame
seguid
con un
lienço dios os guarde,
La letra no es de
Leonor
biolante sin duda
fue
la que escribio el
papel, que
tengo de
açer pero error
es dudarlo que
aunque sea
biolante con ella
yra
Leonor adonde
bera
que solo mi amor
dessea
oyr sus
desengaños pues
para quedar con
biolante
ayrosso caussa es
bastante
que dama de carlos
es
Calderón
Ynes.
Leed ese
papel
lo que dice haced
y adios
D f.
deten aquesa
mujer
Vase coriendo quiere detenerla
Hernando, ella le da y se va coriendo
Ynes.
no haga tal que
llebara
muchas
destas.
Her
bueno
esta
para
muestra.
d f.
Lee
buelbo a
leer
de galiana esta
tarde
solo a la orilla
salid.
Y a quien os llame
seguid.
con vn
lienço dios os guarde
dime, pero Donde
esta
la que el papel
trujo
H
luego
que a ti te da
solo vn pliego
y a mi vna mano me
da
coriendo se
fue
d f.
pues
no
te mande yo
detenella
H
mandastelo en voz;
mas ella
a bofetadas
mando.
que la dejase. Y
ya ves
quan mas vien
seruido esta
el que da que el
que no da
Df.
notable mi duda
es
la letra no es de
leonor
biolante sin duda
fue
la que escribio el
papel, que
tengo de
Haçer pero error
es dudarlo, que
avnque sea
Violante con ella
yra
Leonor adonde
vera
que solo mi amor
desea
oyr sus
desengaños, pues
para quedar con
Violante
ayroso causa es
bastante
que dama de Carlos
es.
As we can see, Calderón
limited himself to excising a few superfluous lines, and to
expanding a comic scene undeveloped in the primitive version.
Otherwise, he continued to copy Alarcón's text word-by-word.
The only other text Calderón could have used as the basis
for his revision is the 1661 editio princeps8.
But this edition may be immediately ruled out as the ancestor of
the new version, for it lacks a large number of the lines which
Alarcón and Calderón share; for example,
Félix's speech in which he wonders who could have sent the
note. In any case, the very fact that the manuscripts of
Calderón and Alarcón are found next to each other in
the partly autograph manuscript of Cada uno para sí easily leads to the
conclusion that one is derived from the other.
One can only
speculate about the date at which Calderón made his revision
of the third act of Cada uno para sí. It was very likely done
after 1661, for the editio princeps of this date still contains the
first version. It seems in any case that the revision sprang
precisely from an impulse to correct the third act of the
princeps. If
he did indeed revise the third act some ten or twenty years after
he originally composed the play (1652), it must have been rather
difficult for Calderón to locate his own original manuscript
- a manuscript which he had probably sold to an autor and over which he had
thenceforth no right of ownership. He must then have been forced to
resort to the best available copy of his play, and this appears to
have been Alarcón's. We may even go further and suggest that
Calderón knew this copy to be directly descended from his
own autograph. This is not too difficult to believe if we remember
that, as was shown above, Alarcón had previously produced
what can only be termed the definitive version of another
Calderonian play: El
postrer duelo de España. In any case,
Alarcón's text must have possessed great authority in
Calderón's eyes, for it served him as the basis of his
revision of the third act.
The second scribe
is Antonio de Escamilla, the well-known autor de comedias of the second half of
the seventeenth century (see Plate II). His signature appears at
the foot of the list of his company in the Archivo de Villa files for the
years 1661, 1662, 1664, 1665 and 16709.
Apart from his signature, the file for 1675 contains also a list of
his company in his hand10.
In the file for 167811,
he inserted some words about Bernarda Manuela who appears to have
been contracted as an understudy:
pero dize que
quiere hazer terceras y
no
se puede
ajustar
and also about Jerónimo
Carrillo who had been engaged to do «papeles de por medio y
bexetes».
Escamilla's
handwriting is very characteristic and easily distinguishable,
mainly because of his habit of separating letters within a single
word -a practice which appears to run counter to the standard
practice of the day. Escamilla's life, unlike Alarcón's, is
fairly well documented. His real name was Antonio Vázquez
and he was the father of the well-known Manuela de
Escamilla12.
He was born in Córdoba, and his earliest recorded
appearances were with the company of Antonio and Sebastián
de Prado13.
By 1660 he was already established as an autor14.
He was usually cast in the role of the gracioso of the piece, and in this
capacity he played in many Calderonian plays, often in the
Palace15.
Escamilla is also known as the author of short plays, mainly
entremeses and
fines de
fiesta, often written in collaboration: Las beatas, La gayta gallega, El
retrato de Juan Rana, Las naciones16.
He died in 1695.
As a scribe,
Escamilla copied folios 16V-31V of Biblioteca
Nacional MS 15,633 of Bien vengas mal which is dedicated to him on
the title-page. Only the first two acts are extant. The MS is
undated but it has a cast-list on the third folio:
Don Luis
felipe Dominguez
Guzman criado
Salvador
Don Juan de Lara
Jazimo [Jacinto
Becerril?]
Don Diego de Silva
Castro
espinel
cosme
Don Bernardo viejo
autor
Dª Ana
Sª Ines de Ita
Dª Maria
Sª Ysabel de
Gongora
Ynes, criada
Sª Juscosa [?]
Juana
Sª Mariana
If this is really Escamilla's
company, it is rather surprising that neither his daughter Manuela
nor his stepdaughter María should be mentioned in the
cast-list. No less surprising is it that the autor should have played the
part of an old man, when Escamilla was generally cast as the
gracioso. This
makes me suspect that, notwithstanding the assertion on the
title-page, the above cast-list is not of Escamilla's company.
Antonio de
Escamilla's handwriting can also be seen in Biblioteca Nacional MS 16,622 of
La dama
duende. On folio 1r is a sentence in Escamilla's hand which
reads:
ase de sacava don
luis para malagilla
[se ha de sacar
don Luis para Malaguilla?]
Escamilla was also one of the
copyists of the partly autograph MS of Cada uno para sí. The MS is
dedicated to him on the title-page:
es Para Antonio de
escamilla
autor prodigio
de prodigios
The first two acts of this
manuscript were transcribed by two other scribes (A and B) who
followed as copy-text the 1661 editio princeps of Cada uno para sí in Parte XV of Comedias escogidas...
Escamilla's stint in the first two acts consists of twenty-five
lines of verse which he wrote over the fold of folios 19v and 20r.
The passage is designed to expand a short gracioso scene in which Hernando, the
character Escamilla probably played, intervenes. Hernando has just
returned to Madrid and is visiting Juana:
ern
Juana mia a mi
alegria
Perdona el
cariño fuera
de que siendo de
cualquiera
soy cualquiera y
seras mia
Jua
para frialdad ya
esta bien
Escamilla developed this short
exchange with the following lines:
[Hernando]
ya sabes que trae
cunplido
de la execucion el
plaço
sienpre que pide
su abraço
un honbre recien
benido
y asi paga por tu
bida
deuda tan
justificada
ya que oi eres
bien allada
siendo sienpre mal
perdida
[Juana]
en quanto el
abraço al pecho
puedes hernando
llegar
[pero en quanto a
ymaginar]
que yo no le e de
quitar
a la ausencia su
derecho
mas en quanto aber
creydo
que pudo perdia
ser
tan bien allada
mujer
que asta oi a
nadia [nadie a ?] querdo [querido ?]
e de agrabiarme y
asi
por llegarte a
castigar
te e de bolber a
quitar
el abraço
que te di
[Hernando]
si satisfazer mis
quejas
desa suerte
solizitas
quando un
abraço me quitas
buelbe por el que
te dexas
There is no doubt that these lines
were composed by Escamilla himself. Firstly, they do not appear in
any other printed edition or manuscript of Cada uno para sí;
secondly, they seem extracted from an entremés of the type Escamilla
himself used to write; and thirdly, they were written impromptu, as
evidenced by the eleventh line quoted which appears deleted in the
original17.
Other alterations
in the first two acts of the partly autograph MS, although in the
hands of scribes A and B, may have also been dictated by Escamilla.
One example should suffice. The first scene of Cada uno ends in a very
conventional way in the editio princeps:
D.C. Quien vio tan raro
sucesso!
d. Fe. Quien vio tan estraño
caso!
He. Quien vio huesped tā
sāgriento!
In the partly autograph MS,
Hernando's line is followed by this passage:
que caribe
toledano
de a cenar a
forasteros
por darles algo de
pluma
sin que les cueste
dinero
pepitoria de
escribanos
y jigote de
porteros
The third act of
the editio
princeps of Cada uno para sí is only 686 lines long, or
a little over half the length of each of the other two acts; it
begins quite abruptly in the middle of a scene and the action
clearly does not follow that of the second act. The partly
autograph MS contains, on the other hand, 400-odd lines at the
beginning of this act which have no equivalent in the editio princeps. Over
half of these lines were written by Sebastián de
Alarcón; the rest are in the hands of Escamilla and scribe
B. The question now arises as to what source Escamilla used for
these lines. The answer is Sebastián de Alarcón's
manuscript.
Having arrived at
a dead end with the editio princeps, Escamilla must have been forced
to look for a more complete text of the third act of Cada uno. Through
circumstances unknown to us, he must have come across
Alarcón's manuscript which already contained the autograph
folios. Escamilla had access to both manuscripts, for corrections
in his own hand appear on both Alarcón's and
Calderón's extant folios. Now, it will be safe to assume
that Alarcón copied the whole of the third act of
Cada uno and
not just the section that has come down to us in the partly
autograph MS. Why, then, did Escamilla not retain the first section
of this act as he had retained the rest? Simply because he
shortened Alarcón's text. As mentioned above,
Alarcón's extant manuscript begins abruptly in the middle of
a scene on a folio numbered seven, which implies that at least six
folios have not survived. If we allow for the
«title-page» of this act to have occupied folio one, we
are left with five missing folios. Alarcón writes an average
of thirty-five lines per page, which would give a total of 350
missing lines. Escamilla, however, reproduces 221 only. If
Escamilla did indeed cancel over 100 lines of Alarcón's
text, he must have been left with a rather untidy text which he was
forced to recopy.
Escamilla also
made on several occasions modifications in his own hand on the
extant folios of both Calderón and Alarcón. The
majority of these alterations are unimportant, except on one
occasion when he restores a missing line to Alarcón's text
on folio 88r, and in the example that follows. There exist three
versions in Calderón's hand of a quatrain in the third act
of Cada uno para
sí. The first two appear in his foul papers (on folio
84r), and the final one in the fair copy (on folio 81r). The first
version reads:
no eso temas [que
si aqui]
[a ti] vna dama te
llama
y vienen dos la
otra dama
[debe de llamarme
a mi]
The square brackets indicate words
deleted by Calderón which he replaced by the words in
italics below:
no eso temas
te digo
que si
vna dama te llama
y vienen dos la
otra dama
abra de tocarme a mi
In the fair copy, the quatrain
reads as follows:
no eso temas te
digo
que si vna dama te
llama
y vienen dos la
otra dama
abra de
reñir conmigo
Escamilla, however, thought that a
combination of the two versions was better:
no eso temas
que si aqui
a ti vna
dama te llama
y vienen dos la
otra dama
abra de
tocarme a mi
The words in italics indicate
alterations on the fair copy in Escamilla's hand.
What emerges from
the activities of Escamilla as a scribe is that he had no
compunction about modifying, shortening, or adding lines of his own
to the text he was transcribing, even if this text had been given
the seal of approval by Calderón himself. Escamilla was
probably far from being an isolated case. This practice must have
been as prevalent among seventeenth-century autores de comedias as it is
among modern directors. The modern textual critic is, however,
primarily concerned with reconstructing the text that
Calderón originally composed and must therefore approach
Escamilla's scribal copies with mistrust.
To conclude,
Antonio de Escamilla and Sebastián de Alarcón, as
scribes, typify two different attitudes. Escamilla represents the
typical autor
who always copied a play with a performance in mind. His main
interest lay in pleasing his audience with whatever means he had at
his disposal. Sebastián de Alarcón, on the other
hand, was a straightforward copyist. He did not have to worry about
the possible reception given to the play by an audience. If writing
under the author's orders, he would be likely to reproduce what he
had before him. But one must also assume that when writing under an
autor's orders
he would be likely to transcribe whatever changes the autor saw fit to
introduce in the original. The conclusion must be that every
scribal manuscript must be judged on its own merits. Nevertheless,
it is to be hoped that this study will have underlined the
necessity of identifying scribes, when possible, in order to gain
an insight into their methods, purposes, and attitudes to their
tasks18.
