[466] This notice of Naharro is taken from the slight accounts of him contained in the letter of Juan Baverio Mesinerio prefixed to the “Propaladia” (Sevilla, 1573, 18mo) as a life of its author, and from the article in Antonio, Bib. Nov., Tom. I. p. 202.
[467] Antonio (Preface to Biblioteca Nova, Sec. 29) says he bred young men to become soldiers by teaching them to read romances of chivalry.
[468] “Intitulélas” (he says, “Al Letor”) “Propaladia a Prothon, quod est primum, et Pallade, id est, primæ res Palladis, a differencia de las que segundariamente y con mas maduro estudio podrian succeder.” They were, therefore, probably written when he was a young man.
[469] I have never seen the first edition, which is sometimes said to have been printed at Naples (Ebert, etc.) and sometimes (Moratin, etc.) at Rome; but as it was dedicated to one of its author’s Neapolitan patrons, and as Mesinerio, who seems to have been a personal acquaintance of its author, implies that it was, at some time, printed at Naples, I have assigned its first edition to that city. Editions appeared at Seville in 1520, 1533, and 1545; one at Toledo, 1535; one at Madrid, 1573; and one without date at Antwerp. I have used the editions of Seville, 1533, small quarto, and Madrid, 1573, small 18mo; the latter being expurgated, and having “Lazarillo de Tórmes” at the end. There were but six plays in the early editions; the “Calamita” and “Aquilana” being added afterwards.
[470] “Viendo assi mismo todo el mundo en fiestas de Comedias y destas cosas,” is part of his apology to Don Fernando Davalos for asking leave to dedicate them to him.
[471] Trissino’s “Sofonisba” was written as early as 1515, though not printed till later.
[472] “Jornadas,” days’-work, days’-journey, etc. The old French mysteries were divided into journées or portions each of which could conveniently be represented in the time given by the Church to such entertainments on a single day. One of the mysteries in this way required forty days for its exhibition.
[473] La Aquilana.
[474] La Calamita.
[475] “Comedia á noticia” he calls them, in the Address to the Reader, and “comedia á fantasía”; and explains the first to be “de cosa nota y vista en realidad,” illustrating the remark by his plays on recruiting and on the riotous life of a cardinal’s servants. His comedias are extremely different in length; one of them extending to about twenty-six hundred lines, which would be very long, if represented, and another hardly reaching twelve hundred. All, however, are divided into five jornadas.