HOW CERVANTES LOOKED
THE NEWLY DISCOVERED AND ONLY AUTHENTIC PORTRAIT OF THE AUTHOR OF “DON QUIXOTE”
THE circumstances of the finding of the portrait, reproduced on the opposite page (from the monograph by D. Alejandro Pidal y Mon, published in Madrid, 1912, for the Spanish Royal Academy), are there given as follows:
A Spanish silversmith in Seville of the name of Albiol, a great collector of old things, had, in his shop, a painted board, which, from age and dirt, showed only the bright parts of a face. On cleaning it he found it to be a portrait of Cervantes, painted by Juan de Jauriguí. At the top of the picture is the inscription: “Don Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra,” at the bottom: “Juan de Jauriguí Pinx. 1600.” Señor Albiol did not know that Cervantes in his preface, of his Novels, published in 1613, refers to “my portrait by the famous D. Juan de Jaureguí.”
This portrait has been sought for all over the world for three centuries by admirers of Cervantes. The ones at the beginning of the innumerable editions, in every known language, have been made up from his description of himself:
This whom you see here, with aquiline face, chestnut hair, smooth and open forehead, with gay eyes and curved nose, although well proportioned, the beard silvery which less than twenty years was golden, with large mustaches, small mouth, the teeth neither small nor numerous, because he has only six, and those so ill matched that they do not correspond one with another, the body between two extremes, neither large nor small, a bright color, rather fair than brunette, a little stooping of shoulders and not very quick of feet, this, I say, is the appearance of the author of “D. Quijote of La Mancha.”
Of course every artist has conceived the appearance of Cervantes in accordance to his fancy, no two alike. The importance of a genuine portrait of the author of “Don Quixote” can hardly be overestimated.
Señor Albiol, not being a scholar, consulted the librarian of his city, the archæologist D. Narciso de Sentenach, an expert on Cervantes, who as soon as he heard the name “Jauriguí” became greatly excited and elated. He inspected the portrait and believed it to be that of Cervantes by Jaureguí, and immediately communicated the matter to his friend the Cervantist D. Francisco Rodriguez Marin, who agreed that it was genuine and communicated the find to the Royal Academy at Madrid.