Juan (Don), son of Don Louis Tenorio, of Sicily, a heartless roué. His valet says of him:
“Tu vois en don Juan le plus grand scélérat que la terre ait jamais porté, un enragé, un chien, un démon, un Turc, un hérétique qui ne croit ni ciel, ni enfer, in diable, qui passe cette vie en véritable bête brute, un pourceau d’Epicure, un vrai Sardanapale; qui ferme l’oreille à toutes les remontrances qu’on lui peut faire, et traite de bille-vesées tout ce que nous croyons.”—Molière, Don Juan, i. 1 (1665).
Juan (Don), a native of Seville, son of Don Josê and Donna Inez (a blue stocking). When Juan was 16 years old, he got into trouble with Donna Julia, and was sent by his mother (then a widow) on his travels. His adventures form the story of a poem so called; but the tale is left incomplete.—Lord Byron, Don Juan (1819-21).
Juan (Don). The hero of Richard Mansfield’s play bearing this title, is a gay youth, wild with the joys of liberty to which he is unaccustomed; saucy, audacious and winning, bent upon getting for himself all the pleasure life offers the young. He is tender, inconstant, brave, chivalric, irresponsible, and gains dignity by dying heroically (1891).
Juan (Don), or Don Giovanni, the prince of libertines. The original of this character was Don Juan Tenorio, of Seville, who attempted the seduction of the governor’s daughter; and the father, forcing the libertine to a duel, fell. A statue of the murdered father was erected in the family vault; and one day when Don Juan forced his way into the vault, he invited the statue to a banquet. The statue accordingly placed itself at the board, to the amazement of the host, and, compelling the libertine to follow, delivered him over to devils, who carried him off triumphant.
Dramatized first by Gabriel Tellez (1626). Molière (1665) and Thomas Corneille, in Le Festin de Pierre, both imitated from the Spanish (1673), have made it the subject of French comedies; Goldoni (1765), of an Italian comedy; Glück, of a musical ballet (1765); Mozart, of an opera called Don Giovanni (1787), a princely work.
Juan Fernandez, a rocky island in the Pacific Ocean, near the coast of Chili. Here Alexander Selkirk, a buccaneer, resided in solitude for four years. Defoe is supposed to have based his tale of Robinson Crusoe on the history of Alexander Selkirk.
⁂ Defoe places the island of his hero “on the east coast of South America,” somewhere near Dutch Guiana.
Juba, prince of Numidia, warmly attached to Cato while he lived at Utica (in Africa), and passionately in love with Marcia, Cato’s daughter. Sempro´nius, having disguised himself as Juba, was mistaken for the Numidian prince by Marcia; and, being slain, she gave free vent to her grief, thus betraying the state of her affection. Juba overheard her, and as it would have been mere prudery to deny her love after this display, she freely confessed it, and Juba took her as his betrothed and future wife.—J. Addison, Cato (1713).
Jubal, son of Lamech and Adah. The inventor of the lyre and flute.—Gen. iv. 19-21.