The first is the “Universal Chronicle” of Felipe Foresto, a modest monk of Bergamo, who refused the higher honors of his Church, in order to be able to devote his life to letters, and who died in 1520, at the age of eighty-six. He published, in 1486, his large Latin Chronicle, entitled “Supplementum Chronicarum”;—meaning rather a chronicle intended to supply all needful historical knowledge, than one that should be regarded as a supplement to other similar works. It was so much esteemed at the time, that its author saw it pass through ten editions; and it is said to be still of some value for facts stated nowhere so well as on his personal authority. At the request of Luis Carroz and Pedro Boyl, it was translated into Spanish by Narcis Viñoles, the Valencian poet, known in the old Cancioneros for his compositions both in his native dialect and in Castilian. An earlier version of it into Italian, published in 1491, may also have been the work of Viñoles, since he intimates that he had made one; but his Castilian version was printed at Valencia, in 1510, with a license from Ferdinand the Catholic, acting for his daughter Joan. It is a large book, of nearly nine hundred pages, in folio, entitled, “Suma de todas las Crónicas del Mundo,” and though Viñoles hints it was a rash thing in him to write in Castilian, his style is good and sometimes gives an interest to his otherwise dry annals. Ximeno, Bib. Val., Tom. I. p. 61. Fuster, Tom. I. p. 54. Diana Enam. de Polo, ed. 1802, p. 304. Biographie Universelle, art. Foresto.
The other Chronicle referred to is that of St. Louis, by his faithful follower Joinville; the most picturesque of the monuments for the French language and literature of the thirteenth century. It was translated into Spanish by Jacques Ledel, one of the suite of the French Princess Isabel de Bourbon, when she went to Spain to become the wife of Philip II. Regarded as the work of a foreigner, the version is respectable; and though it was not printed till 1567, yet its whole tone prevents it from finding an appropriate place anywhere except in the period of the old Castilian chronicles. Crónica de San Luis, etc., traducida por Jacques Ledel, Madrid, 1794, folio.
[352] An edition of the “Chronicle of Don Roderic” is cited as early as 1511; none of “Amadis de Gaula” earlier than 1510, and this one uncertain. But “Tirant lo Blanch” was printed in 1490, in the Valencian dialect, and the Amadis appeared perhaps soon afterwards, in the Castilian; so that it is not improbable the “Chronicle of Don Roderic” may mark, by the time of its appearance, as well as by its contents and spirit, the change, of which it is certainly a very curious monument.
[353] Warton’s Hist. of English Poetry, first Dissertation, with the notes of Price, London, 1824, 4 vols. 8vo. Ellis’s Specimens of Early English Metrical Romance, London, 1811, 8vo, Vol. I. Turner’s Vindication of Ancient British Poems, London, 1803, 8vo.
[354] Turpin, J., De Vitâ Caroli Magni et Rolandi, ed. S. Ciampi, Florentiæ, 1822, 8vo.
[355] Preface to the “Roman de Rou,” by Robert Wace, ed. F. Pluquet, Paris, 1827, 8vo, Vol. I.
[356] Letter to M. de Monmerqué, by Paulin Paris, prefixed to “Li Romans de Berte aux Grans Piés,” Paris, 1836, 8vo.
[357] See, on the whole subject, the Essays of F. W. Valentine Schmidt; Jahrbücher der Literatur, Vienna, 1824-26, Bände XXVI. p. 20, XXIX. p. 71, XXXI. p. 99, and XXXIII. p. 16. I shall have occasion to use the last of these discussions, when speaking of the Spanish romances belonging to the family of Amadis.
[358] Don Quixote, in his conversation with the curate, (Parte II. c. 1,) says, that, to defeat any army of two hundred thousand men, it would only be necessary to have living “alguno de los del inumerable linage de Amadis de Gaula,”—“any one of the numberless descendants of Amadis de Gaul.”
[359] Ayala, in his “Rimado de Palacio,” already cited, says:—