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Ancient National Poetry of Spain I

Art. III.— 1. Floresta de Rimas Antiguas Castellanas, ordenada por Don Juan Nicolas Böhl de Faber, de la Real Academia Espanola. (Forest of Ancient Spanish Poems, arranged by Don J. N. Böhl de Faber, &c.) 3 tom. 8vo. Hamburgo. 1821—1825.

2. Sammlung der besten alten Spanischen Historischen, Ritterund Maurischen Romanzen. Geordnet and mit Anmerkungen und einer Einleitung versehen, von Ch. B. Depping, &c. (Collection of the best old Spanish Historical, Chivalric and Moorish Romances, arranged, with Introduction and Remarks, by C. B. Depping.) 12mo. Altenburg und Leipzig, 1817.

3. Romancero de Romances Moriscos, compuesto de todos los de esta clase que contiene el Romancero General, imprese en 1614. Por Don Agustin Duran. (Collection of Moorish Romances, consisting of all those of that class contained in the Romancero General, printed in 1614.) Small 8vo. Madrid. 1828.

To every attentive observer Spain must appear a great moral phenomenon, from the impress which in her genius and character she exhibits of other times. The influence of events, which are but dimly seen through the mist of ages, is too conspicuous to be mistaken: it is as perceptible as the traces of the volcanic lava on the natural plain; it is deeply and indelibly stamped on her moral constitution. The proud and unbending Roman, the gloomy and destroying Goth, the fiery and enthusiastic Moor, have not swept over her fertile fields in vain: they have left behind them memorials of their existence and domination, which have survived the wreck of time, and which, amidst the rise and fall of kingdoms and dynasties, appear like so many monuments overlooking the universal waste, and exulting in the consciousness of being little less than imperishable. Thus it is, that while the artificial forms of society are soon scattered over the immensity of human existence, and lost in the distance, the substance to which they adhere can perish only when a repetition of mighty shocks has separated and dispersed its tenacious particles.

Among the objects which bear the national moral impress, Spain can present none so deeply marked as her ancient poetic literature. By the term ancient we do not allude to the period of the Roman, nor even to that of the Gothic domination, prior to the fall of Roderic. The former is as well known as it ever can be to all who have any acquaintance with classical antiquity: of the latter, time has spared but few poetic monuments, and those few are not national: they were chiefly raised by obscure ecclesiastics—not on the everlasting foundations of nature and truth, but on the praise of scholastic dogmas or of ascetic observances. Hence, as they contained little either of imagery or of feeling, they were quietly consigned to the dust of monastic libraries, to slumber in eternal oblivion. But the period to which we do allude, is that of the Moorish rule, from the commencement of the eighth to the close of the fifteenth century.

It must not, however, be supposed that Spain, under the first Gothic dynasty, was without her popular songs: such a supposition would be contrary to all human experience. The state of society then existing was in a high degree favourable to the composition of such as recorded the praises of the brave. The powerful vassals of the crown—too powerful to be controlled by an elective monarch, whose prerogatives were neither numerous nor great—were always at war with one another, if not summoned to repel some foreign aggressor. They acknowledged no law beyond that of brute force: they were bound by no tie beyond that of interest or passion. Not only was the royal authority too weak to restrain them from disturbing the public peace, but the church, potent as it was afterwards to become, had but a feeble hold on their consciences and fears. Though the fierce Goth might sometimes bend to her entreaties (and to her honour be it said, that such entreaties were frequent) he would have scorned threats which she had no power to execute. Hence the collision of rival views and the daring enterprises which called forth into vehement action those mental energies that slumber in scenes of tranquillity: hence those spirit-stirring events which cast the brilliant tints of romance over the surface of life; and hence that highly-wrought enthusiasm, engendered by a mind concentrating its faculties in the pursuit of a given object, which smiles at difficulties the most formidable, and shrinks not even from impossibilities. Such a state of society must have been adorned by popular songs: deeply excited feeling would not have been expressed by ordinary language: it would assume a new elevation: it would wrap itself in a diction at once vigorous and striking: it would become poetry—not that poetry perhaps which delighted in fertility of fancy, or in splendour of imagery; but that which exhibited a faithful, animated picture of such events as were known to every one who listened to its strains. If those strains have not been wafted to our ears on the wings of time, it is because they have been drowned by the more recent, more lofty, and doubtless more thrilling notes of the heroic muse, during the chivalrous contests between the followers of the crescent and the cross.

It was, indeed, after the invasion of the Moors, that the national poetry assumed a new, a higher, and, we may add, a holier character. This improvement was generated by a new state of society. Other passions and interests were brought into action; and the arena of contention began to exhibit greater variety and animation. To courage panting for distinction; to ambition grasping at honours and dignities; to love yearning for the possession of its object, and to revenge thirsting for the blood of its victim, were added the nobler feelings of kindred, of country, and of religion. Then patriotism learned to groan at the bondage of relatives, friends, countrymen; and zeal to burn for the destruction of God's implacable enemies. The addition of two such powerful motives—the most powerful that can actuate the mind of man—could not fail to produce effects at once great and wonderful. They nerved the hero's grasp, and gave vigour to each mortal thrust; they armed youth and age in the sacred contest; they inspired confidence here and hope hereafter; they swelled the song of triumph, and consoled the heart under defeat; and they invested him who fell in so holy a cause with all the glory of martyrdom. Hence fatigues, dangers and death became objects of desire rather than of aversion, as so many resistless claims to the esteem of the bold, to the love of the fair, and to the especial favour of heaven. The union of passions thus fearfully enhanced—the persuasion, that cruelty the most revolting was no more than righteous justice—at first produced deeds of blood at which the heart sickens. But the dark stain was soon washed out by the pure touch of humanity: the deeply breathed curse of revenge, and the loud yell of bigotry, were silenced by the admiration which the nobler qualities of our nature never fail to inspire even in minds the most implacable. The Christian could not behold, without esteem, the dauntless valour, the romantic generosity, and the chivalrous honour of the Moor; nor could the Moor witness unmoved the heroic, nay superhuman efforts of the Christian, in defence of his country and her altars; his devotion to a cause which in human eyes appeared desperate and hopeless; the bold defiance which a handful of men threw in the faces of a host; nor the scorn with which they refused to surrender, or to flee when their destruction seemed inevitable. During the continuance of a truce or a peace, the two enemies at length laid aside their mutual antipathies, and associated freely with each other. Their aim was now—not which should exhibit the greatest valour, but which should vanquish the other in courtesy and magnanimity. They fought at the same tournay; they met at the same table; they shared the same tent. Mahometans and Christians often followed the same chief in pursuit of the common enemy; the same hero, whether Moor or Castilian, was often the pride of both nations; few indeed were the more illustrious warriors of the latter who had not acquired much of their fame under the ensigns of the prophet; in contests especially, where the interests of religion were not vitally concerned, (and many such took place among the numerous independent, or at least nominally independent, sovereigns of the peninsula,) the heroes of both volunteered their services as honour or inclination led: often was Moor banded against Moor, and Spaniard against Spaniard. Individuals of the opposite creeds were frequently joined by the closest bonds of friendship; nay, the Moorish maiden had often a Christian lover, and the high-born Castilian dame did not always turn a deaf ear to the sighs of the gallant and chivalrous infidel. When the trumpet again called into mortal strife the warriors of the rival nations, that strife no longer possessed its reckless character: the battle-field became an arena on which both parties met, not only to prove their courage, but to display their generosity, and to win the esteem of each other.

This is not an imaginary picture of the state of the two hostile nations during the greater portion of the seven hundred and seventy-seven years, which elapsed from the first efforts of Taric to the flight of the Baby King from Grenada. The courtesy of the old Spaniards to the enemies of the cross has greatly scandalized the orthodox historians of that nation, who seldom dwell on it, and never even allude to it without evident pain; most readily would they consign it to everlasting oblivion, if it were not too closely interwoven with historic events to remain wholly unnoticed.

We may safely affirm, that no other country ever exhibited a period so fruitful in all that can inspire the heroic muse, as the one we have mentioned. Then blazed out the mighty passions, the flames of which were constantly fed by a deeply excited enthusiasm; then arose the strife of elements, the collision of which produced one universal tempest; —the lover's ardour; the warrior's quenchless glow; the imperious claims of honour and of friendship; the deadly workings of jealousy and revenge; the thirst for plunder, especially for the possession of beautiful captives; the fierceness and intolerant zeal which, in spite of the courtesies of chivalry, would often break out; the shouts of triumph; the lamentations of despair. All these would form subjects for the heroic muse, and would constitute the chief entertainment of nobles and people. That verses recording the romantic adventures and gallant achievements of the great and the valiant were sung by wandering minstrels at a very early period, is indisputable, not only from the uninterrupted voice of tradition, but from the evidence they internally bear of other and remote times. The exploits of Bernardo del Carpio, of Fernan Gonzalez, of the Cid Rodrigo, and of many other characters distinguished in Spanish history, were the theme of innumerable ballads, which were probably composed soon after the death of those heroes.

But historic personages were not the only ones that figured in the ancient ballads of Spain; there were also the fabulous heroes of chivalry, whose fame has spread over most European countries. The twelve peers of France, the renowned Knights of Arthur's Court, Amadis de Gaul, the mad Orlando, the faithful Durandarte, the famed Gayferos, the Moorish Bravonel, and all who have obtained any noted celebrity in chivalric lore, have from time immemorial been made the subjects of romantic songs among the imaginative inhabitants of the Peninsula. These compositions, which are termed Romances Caballerescos, to distinguish them from the Romances Historicos, are doubtless of equal antiquity with the latter, the subjects of which are the personages of authentic history. They are indebted for their versification only to the Spaniards. The personages to whom they relate, and the events with which they are filled, were known at the same time in other countries; and from other countries they were unquestionably derived. From what common original source the scattered remains of this fabulous lore sprung, it would now be vain to inquire: it is a problem, the solution of which has baffled the ingenuity of the acute, and the researches of the learned. Nor is it easy to account for the facility with which they were transported from kingdom to kingdom. Neither the pilgrims who journeyed to distant shrines, and repaid the hospitality of their hosts by legendary tales, nor the wandering minstrels who lived by their trade, can be supposed to have possessed much knowledge of languages; they could scarcely have introduced those tales into other kingdoms, though they may have greatly assisted in dispersing them through their own. The difficulty may be partially solved by the assumption —not wholly gratuitous—that the intercourse between foreign courts, and especially between the bards who accompanied their patrons to those courts, may have served greatly to disseminate the same lore over so wide an extent. But perhaps to all these causes united, and certainly to other means of communication, which formerly existed among nations, must be attributed this almost universal diffusion of chivalric romance.

Though martial deeds and romantic adventures were the favourite, they were not the only subjects of Spanish song. That nation had its troubadours, whose occupation or enjoyment it was—not to encourage the brave to the battle field, but to entertain lordly knights and gentle dames, in court, in hall, and in bower. They flourished—not amidst the clangour of arms, but in the tranquil bosom of peace. This at least is true, as applicable to the hireling professors of the art; but it had others, who were above the ordinary rewards bestowed on the former—others who were among the noblest in birth, and the bravest in arms. It often happened, indeed, that the same voice which loudly cheered the bold to the deadly fight, "forgot its thunders" at the festive board, and chaunted the sweetest strains to the soft lute or harp. So numerous in the fourteenth century were the professors of the Gaya Ciencia —in Spain at least—that scarcely a courtier or knight could be found who did not "make verses to his mistress' eye-brow." But this was no more than a fashionable mania, confined to the great, and which the people in general neither understood nor regarded. It led to abuse; it produced effeminacy; and in time became disreputable: it was considered too degrading to be longer cherished by any one who would be thought valiant, and was in consequence abandoned to the lowest jugglers. But though the profession itself could never become national, nor exist long in a country so martial, which continually reflected the splendours elicited from the collision of the Christian sword and the Moorish scymitar, it was not without its share of influence on the popular taste: it was unquestionably one of the causes that gave birth to a species of poetic composition, in some respects distinct from the new octosyllabic romance.

This new species combined the narrative of the ancient historical and romantic ballads with the more plaintive and amatory tone of the troubadours. But it did not imitate the animated transitions and noble simplicity, which constitute the great charm of the former, and which bear the unerring stamp of antiquity. It assumed a diction equally splendid and harmonious: it first created and then invested that creation in a rich and brilliant garb. It presents us with the adventures of the gallant and the fair, whose actions and conversation it envelopes in the mantle of a bright, and frequently luxurious imagination. It contains, indeed, less of nature than of art —less of real life than of that which fancy creates for her own amusement: its personages are not human beings, such as we see in the world, but such as those with whom the same power peoples the boundless waste of possible existence.

These romances—the same in measure as the old ballads—have ever been considered by Spanish critics as the best portion of their literature. "They contain," says Quintana, ( Poesias Selectas Castellanas, tom. i. p. 81) "expressions of greater beauty and energy, touches of greater delicacy and ingenuity, than all the rest of our poetry. The Moorish romances, especially, are written with a vigour and sweetness of style that absolutely enchant us. Those customs, in which valour and love were so agreeably united, those Moors at once so singular and devoted, that country at once so beautiful and delightful, those names at once so sonorous and melodious—all contribute to give both novelty and poetic splendour to the compositions in which they are found. In process of time, however, poets became tired of investing gallantry in a Moorish habit, and they adopted the pastoral. Then to defiances, cavalcades, and devices, succeeded the fields, streams, flowers, and characters cut in the bark of trees; and what by this change was lost in force was gained in sweetness, and simplicity."

However much we may feel disposed to agree with the critic in his observations on the Moorish romances, we must protest against the praise which he bestows on the pastoral. Of all the compositions in the language, excepting perhaps such as are professedly religious or didactic, none appear to us so wretchedly inanimate—so lamentably deficient in all that can interest the reader. The world has had enough of sighing gales, of murmuring brooks, and of beautiful landscapes; nor is it willing to hear more of loving turtles, even though the despairing shepherd, envious of their felicity, should pelt them with stones. On such subjects nothing new has been said or written for the last eighteen hundred years; nor can human ingenuity discover an image which has not been repeatedly used to illustrate rural life. In fact, pastoral poetry in Spain, as in most other countries, is an exotic, which no labour or talent could render national. The taste for it, which prevailed so generally from the age of Lope de Vega, was derived from Italy; and the minds over which it exercised any considerable influence, were, with a very few exceptions, cold, languid, lifeless, and destitute of both invention and feeling. The same censure might justly be applied to the larger portion of the Spanish lyric poetry.

The new romances soon banished the yet lingering lays of the troubadours, and became so popular, that they constituted the favourite amusement, not only of the more exalted classes, but of the humbler citizens, although the peasantry never lost their attachment to the more ancient and simple effusions of the early national muse—the historical and romantic ballads. The former were sung in the streets by night as well as by day, accompanied by the sound of the harp or the guitar. The taste for them became not merely a passion, but a rage, far beyond what we of the north could ever have dreamed. Of this fact sufficient evidence may be collected both from the early dramatists of Spain, and from that enthusiastic love of song which, though recent political events have considerably cooled it, is still cherished by the majority of the people.

Of the Spanish poetry then, the species we should regard as more peculiarly national is that of the ancient historic and romantic ballads, 1 as we think there is a great distinction between them and those that began to be composed in the latter portion of the sixteenth century, which, however good in themselves, and even popular, bear not the same characteristic features. The ballads that relate to the early heroes of Spain differ greatly in manner from those of which more modern personages are the subject. If the former have all the varied animation and touching simplicity we have assigned to them, it must be admitted that they have likewise the characteristic rudeness of times when gross superstition and barbaric fierceness held their iron sceptre over the human mind; as bearing the impress of those times, they strike us, with all their roughness, and destitute, as they indisputably are, of imagery and harmony, to be peculiarly interesting. The latter have every mark of an age considerably improved: they exhibit a taste more refined, a language more polished, a versification more studied, an imagination more expanded and luxuriant: they may boast of a fable more artfully combined, and an elegance of which the rude but strong-minded minstrels of the middle ages could form no conception. Both descriptions of song have thus their peculiar advantages; if the one has all the simplicity of nature, the other has all the gracefulness of art.

Much, however, as we have alluded to the comparative antiquity of the Spanish ballads and romances, we have no means of ascertaining the era when these anonymous effusions appeared. We have supposed that many of them may be referred to a date immediately subsequent to the death of the heroes whose actions they relate. But all have been so modernized, probably from age to age, that no internal evidence is afforded by the language as to the point in question: yet from their style, their manner, their general tone, and from a careful comparison of them with those of a date confessedly much more modern in the Romancero General, there is sufficient ground for the supposition we have hazarded.

Some Spanish writers, considering the prodigious number and intrinsic merit of these popular songs, have not hesitated to claim for their countrymen a decided superiority of innate poetic fancy over all other modern nations. They would almost have us believe that the children of the Peninsula, like those of a city in Khorassan, mentioned by Arabshah, can neither cry nor lisp in ordinary measures or tones. We may smile at their harmless vanity; for had they but taken the pains to examine a little more deeply, they would assuredly have paused before they would have suffered it thus to commit them. They would have seen, that as man himself is but the creature of circumstances, so his thoughts, his disposition, his character, depend for their formation on contingent influences; that any peculiarity in these must be owing to causes equally peculiar; and that the same relation exists in nations as in individuals. They would have seen that if Spanish intellect has been more fertile in such productions than that of other countries, it is because the propensity for them has been generated, nurtured and matured by events which no other country has witnessed. To that stirring spirit of Independence which raged first amidst the depths of the Asturias, and afterwards on the plains of Leon and Aragon; to that burning zeal for religion, which dangers, defeats, toils, and death could not extinguish; to that martial intrepidity which never shrunk from the contest with foes not less brave, and beyond measure superior in numbers; to that extraordinary excitement which a life so diversified with defeat and victory, with action and repose, with disappointment and hope, with sorrow and joy, must necessarily have produced; to that intercourse, whether of peace or war, which then subsisted between the contending nations; to the ardent friendships and still more ardent antipathies of both; to that life of wild and restless adventure which was the common lot of the warriors; to that chivalrous spirit which animated both Christian and Moor on the battle-field and domestic hearth: and more than all, to that spirit of gallantry which prompted every one in every possible way to win the favour of his lady-love;—to all these, and not to any innate superiority of fancy, is Spain indebted for her inimitable ancient songs. She is not a whit more imaginative by nature than some other countries; nay, we doubt if her propensity to such songs be so strong as that of the old Scandinavian and Teutonic nations. And we would observe, that to the same sources is she in like manner indebted for that fondness for romantic adventures, for that tone of chivalrous feeling, for that Gothic mode of thinking, for those habits everywhere else exploded, for that attachment, in short, to whatever is antiquated—which have long stamped her as a nation at once highly interesting, and strangely peculiar to the rest of Europe.

An author who is entitled to the highest respect, and from whom no one will dissent but with diffidence in all matters of this kind, (Dr. Southey, in his Introduction to the Chronicle of the Cid), has passed a censure on the Spanish heroic ballads, which has surprised us, in common with every admirer of that branch of the national literature. When he characterises them as comparatively worthless, and as beyond measure inferior to those which our own country has produced, he can scarcely stand clear of the charge of being actuated by very strong prejudice. That their merits have been overrated, is possible enough; but that they are at all inferior to our own, is an assertion, to say the least of it, startling. It should be remembered that any comparison instituted between them here is likely to be to the advantage of one side. As Englishmen, we must naturally feel a much higher degree of interest in whatever relates to the personages and events of our own history than to those of other nations. Putting this feeling aside, we have little hesitation in saying that the compositions in question are even superior to ours.

Of the estimation in which the ballads of Spain have never ceased to be held, not in that country only, but throughout the greater part of civilized Europe, no better proof can be produced than the number of compilations of them, from the first publication of the Cancionero General, in 1511, to the appearance of the three works at the head of our present article.

Of these, the first contains but a small proportion of the ancient ballads and romances. It embraces a much wider range: it exhibits by appropriate extracts a comprehensive view of Spanish poetry generally, from Berceo to what Spaniards call the Augustan era of their literature—that is, from the thirteenth to the seventeenth century, though, by the way, we do not see how pieces of so recent a date can come under the description of Antiguas Rimas. The compiler has classed the subjects in each of the three volumes under the heads of Rimas Sacras, Doctrinales, Amorosas, Festivas, &c. In our opinion, he shows a lamentable want of taste both in his arrangement and selections. The religious and didactic departments (which constitute the greater portion of each volume) we have already characterised as wretchedly inanimate. Peculiar dogmas of faith, inculcated in a style sometimes, it must be owned, exquisite, but in a manner at once drowsy and childish; trite maxims, heavily and pedantically enforced,—are verily the worst pieces he could have chosen. Had he restricted himself to the national poetry, and to some of the better lyrics, his collection would have been invaluable. But on the whole, it is not without its attractions; nor are its contents wholly unknown to the English reader, since it is the source from which Mr. Bowring has drawn the materials for some of his interesting and spirited translations.

In thus expressing our honest opinion as to the injudicious arrangement Mr. Böhl de Faber has adopted, and the comparative worthlessness of his religious and didactic selections, we would not have it supposed that our censure is applicable to every individual piece. On the contrary, a few of them are distinguished by great sweetness and simplicity. Others, again, are highly interesting, not as poetical effusions, but as monuments of a dark and credulous age. Such are the extracts from Berceo, to which we shall hereafter advert.

The collection of Mr. Depping (No. 2.) is restricted to the Historic, Chivalric, and Moorish romances of Spain. And as the selection has been made with great judgment, we need scarcely add that it will be found in a high degree interesting. The only fault we are disposed to find with it (except, indeed, the extreme incorrectness of the text, 2 ) is one not very common in this book-making age—namely, its scantiness. This circumstance is the more surprising, when regard is had to the prodigious quantity of materials from which such compilations may be formed. Neither is this volume unknown to the English reader, since it is the one to which Mr. Lockhart is indebted for the subjects of his beautifully executed volume of Spanish ballads

Señor Duran's publication (No. 3), which has just reached this country, contains all the Moorish romances which are to be found in the original Romancero of 1614. They amount to 208, and include 45 of the 54 which are given by Depping, besides nine or ten more which the latter had classed under other heads. The typographical execution of the work is respectable, and that is all that can be said for it, for the arrangement is exceedingly absurd, and the notes of the Editor amount only to three or four of the most insignificant character. He proposes to reprint the other classes of the Romancero in a uniform size, should the present meet with encouragement.

To illustrate the view which we have taken of the ancient national poetry of Spain, we purpose, in our remaining space, to direct the reader's attention to a few of the more striking pieces. Our notice will be confined to such as are either wholly or but very imperfectly known by previous translations to persons unacquainted with the originals. We commence with the historical.

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