[574] Zurita, Anales de Aragon, Zaragoza, 1604, folio, Lib. IV. c. 13, etc.; Mariana, Historia, Lib. XIV. c. 6;—both important, but especially the first, as giving the Spanish view of a case which we are more in the habit of considering either in its Italian or its French relations.
[575] Schmidt, Geschichte Aragoniens im Mittelalter, pp. 337-354. Heeren, Geschichte des Studiums der Classischen Litteratur, Göttingen, 1797, 8vo, Tom. II. pp. 109-111.
[576] Prescott’s Hist. of Ferdinand and Isabella, Vol. III.
[578] “Con vos que emendays las Obras de Dante,” says Gomez Manrique, in a poem addressed to his uncle, the great Marquis, and found in the “Cancionero General,” 1573, f. 76. b;—words which, however we may interpret them, imply a familiar knowledge of Dante, which the Marquis himself yet more directly announces in his well-known letter to the Constable of Portugal. Sanchez, Poesías Anteriores, Tom. I. p. liv.
[579] Mariana, Historia, Madrid, 1780, fol., Tom. II. pp. 236-407. See also the very remarkable details given by Fernan Perez de Guzman, in his “Generaciones y Semblanzas,” c. 33.
[580] Castro, Bib. Española, Tom. I. pp. 265-346.
[581] See the amusing letters in the “Centon Epistolario” of Fern. Gomez de Cibdareal, Nos. 47, 49, 56, and 76;—a work, however, whose authority will hereafter be called in question.
[582] Ibid., Epístola 105.
[583] Minne is the word for love in the “Nibelungenlied” and in the oldest German poetry generally, and is applied occasionally to spiritual and religious affections, but almost always to the love connected with gallantry. There has been a great deal of discussion about its etymology and primitive meanings in the Lexicons of Wachter, Ménage, Adelung, etc.; but it is enough for our purpose to know that the word itself is peculiarly appropriate to the fanciful and more or less conceited school of poetry that everywhere appeared under the influences of chivalry. It is the word that gave birth to the French mignon, the English minion, etc.