Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

‘The colour of the country’: English travellers in Spain, 1604–1625

2009; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 13; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/13645140902857190

1755-7550

Alexander Samson,

Early Modern Spanish Literature

Abstract The travel writings produced by English travellers to early modern Spain reveal complex and contradictory attitudes to a country that was at once exotic and little known, subject of considerable cultural interest and translation activity, a former ally and yet before the Treaty of London in 1604 the subject of 20 years of hostilities. Travellers' accounts reflect the cultural baggage they took with them, made up of both anti-Spanish propaganda and literary images. The desire to challenge Spanish imperial might and political authority was often expressed through invoking religious difference and by associating Spain with the Ottoman Turks and racial miscegenation. While English travellers represented the common people as deluded by Jesuits and attacked Catholic superstition and veniality, they also lavished praise on cultural achievements like the Escorial. These ambivalences and contradictions underline the extent to which in the early seventeenth century Spain played an integral part in how the English defined themselves and constructed their own identity. Keywords: Anglo-Spanish relationstravel writingRobert TresswellJames HowellCharles CornwallisRichard Wynn Notes Notes 1. See Sara Warneke, Images of the Educational Traveller in Early Modern England (Leiden: Brill, 1995), esp. 1–2. John Stoye writes in English Travellers Abroad, 1604–1667 (London: Yale University Press, 1989), 235: 'Englishmen went to that country primarily on business, commercial or political', 'the prestige of Spanish culture hardly equalled the Italian', yet their production of travel writing on Spain was 'more plentiful than for France, Italy and the Low Countries' (ibid.). On the injunction to serve the commonweal through travel see also the Saxon jurist Jerome Turler, The Traveiler of Ierome Turler, deuided into two Bookes (London, 1575): 'no man … wyl deny, but that the searchinge out of the nature of thinges is most profitable, the same is performed by no meanes more effectually, then by traueill', sig. Dlr. 2. Jocelyn Hillgarth, The Mirror of Spain, 1500–1700: The Formation of a Myth (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000), 7 and 57. Donne's 1591 portrait displayed the motto 'Antes muerto que mudado', in a reference to his steadfast Catholicism at that date. Hillgarth, The Mirror of Spain, 57. Donne participated in the attack on Cadiz in 1596 and joined in two subsequent expeditions designed to engage Spanish ships. 3. See Glyn Redworth, The Prince and the Infanta: The Cultural Politics of the Spanish Match (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003). 4. The appeal of the Anglo-Spanish alliance for Spain was bound up with its important trade with the Low Countries and maintaining the connection between the two halves of the Habsburg empire. 5. Cited by Pauline Croft, 'Trading with the Enemy, 1585–1604', The Historical Journal, 32 (1989): 281–302, 283. For more on the strategies employed to evade restrictions on trade see this indispensable article. 6. Peter Martyr d'Anghiera, The Decades of the Newe Worlde, or West India conteyning the navigations and conquestes of the Spaniards, trans. Richard Eden (London, 1555), sig. A1v and A2v. See also William Maltby, The Black Legend in England: The Development of Anti-Spanish sentiment 1558–1660 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1971), 12–28. 7. On the importance of The Spanish Colonie in the development of English perceptions of Spain and the birth of the Black Legend, see Thomas Scanlan, Colonial Writing and the New World, 1583–1671 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), esp. 1, 8–37. 8. Bartolomé de las Casas, The Spanish Colonie, or Briefe Chronicle of the Acts and gestes of the Spaniardes in the West Indies, called the newe World, for the space of xl. Yeeres wrytten in the Castilian tongue by the reuerend Bishop Bartholomew de las Casas or Casaus, a Friar of the order of S. Dominicke. And nowe first translated into English, by M. M. S. (London, 1583), sig. ¶ 2r. 9. The Apologie of Prince William of Orange Against the Proclamation of the King of Spaine (An Apologie or Defence, of my Lord the Prince of Orange), ed. H. Wansink (Leiden: Brill, 1969), 53. 10. A pageant of Spanish humours Wherin are naturally described and liuely portrayed, the kinds and quallities of a signior of Spaine. Translated out of Dutche, By H. W. (London, 1599), sig. B3r. 11. The Stukeley Plays: The Battle of Alcazar by George Peele; The Famous History of the Life and Death of Captain Thomas Stukeley, ed. Charles Edelman (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2005), 100 [Act 3, sc. 1, ll. 52–3]. See on these plays Sandra Clark, 'Spanish Characters and English Nationalism in English Drama of the Early Seventeenth Century', Bulletin of Hispanic Studies 84 (2007): 131–44, esp. 133. 12. Richard Hasleton, Strange and wonderfull things. Happened to Richard Hasleton, borne at Braintree in Essex, in his ten years trauailes in many forraine countries. Penned as he deliuered it from his owne mouth (London, 1595), sig. B3v. 13. See Maltby, The Black Legend in England; and A. J. Hoenselaars, Images of Englishmen and Foreigners in the Drama of Shakespeare and his Contemporaries (London: Associated University Presses, 1992). 14. John Esquemeling, The History of the Bucaniers (London, 1684), sig. A5, cited by William Sherman, 'Stirrings and Searchings (1500–1720)', in The Cambridge Companion to Travel Writing, ed. Peter Hulme and Tim Youngs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 28. 15. Perhaps the most striking expression of colonial rivalry with Spain is Richard Hakluyt's unpublished text known as the Discourse of Western Planting (1584). See the edition edited by David and Alison Quinn, A particuler discourse concerninge the greate necessitie and manifolde commodyties that are like to growe to this Realme of Englande by the Westerne discoueries lately attempted, written in the yere 1584 (London: Hakluyt Society, 1993). 16. William Lithgow, The Totall Discourse of The Rare Adventures & Painefull Peregrinations of long nineteene yeares travayles from Scotland to the most famous kingdomes in Europe, Asia and Affrica (Glasgow: James MacLehose & Sons, fac. ed. 1906), 402. For more on Lithgow see Clifford Bosworth, An Intrepid Scot: William Lithgow of Lanark's Travels in the Ottoman Lands, North Africa and Central Europe, 1609–21 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006). 17. OED. The instrument is also used for the on-stage death of a destitute English factor in the anti-Spanish play A Larum for London, cited by Clark, 'Spanish Characters', 134. 18. Lithgow, The Totall Discourse, 420. His choice of image, 'contra-banded', is itself curious, suggesting illicit exchange. 19. For a definitive account of this episode see Redworth, cited in note 3. 20. The Pleasant History of Lazarillo de Tormes, trans. David Rowlands (London, 1586), dedication. 21. On the contents of these libraries see Gustav Ungerer, 'The Printing of Spanish Books in Elizabethan England', The Library 5th ser. 20 (1965): 177–229, Appendices 1 and 2, 220–9. 22. Hillgarth, The Mirror of Spain, 57. 23. Quoted in Hillgarth, The Mirror Spain, 57. 24. See especially the scene in which Gardiner tries to trick Philip II into signing Elizabeth's death warrant, leading Philip to instead to recall her to court. Thomas Heywood, If you know not me, You know no bodie: Or, The troubles of Queene Elizabeth (London, 1605), sig. F1v: 'To rescue Innocence so soone betrayd'. 25. Sandra Clark, 'Spanish Characters and English Nationalism in English Drama of the Early Seventeenth Century', 143. 26. James Howell, Epistolae Ho-Elianae: The Familiar Letters of James Howell, 4 vols (Boston, MA and New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Co., 1907), 2: 24. Howell had initially travelled in Spain on behalf of a glass factory based in Broad Street in London in search of materials and expertise, and returned as a merchant's factor in 1622–3 at the time of the Spanish match. His volumes of letters were compiled while he was imprisoned in the Fleet in the 1640s and had gathered together his alleged correspondence in which he had offered accounts of his travels, opinions on peoples and places and anecdotes of his experiences. His role as merchant's factor, linguistic accomplishments and involvement in commerce make his account the least propagandistic and most empathetic. 27. On Cornwallis's account and for a transcription see I.A.A. Thompson, 'Sir Charles Cornwallis y su "Discurso sobre Estado de España" (1608)', in La monarquía española en tiempos del Quijote, ed. Porfirio Sanz Camañes (Madrid: Silex ediciones, 2005), 65–101. 28. Robert Tresswell, A Relation of such Things as were observed to happen in the Journey of the Right Honourable Charles Earl of Nottingham, Lord High-Admiral of English, his Highness's Ambassador to the King of Spain (London: Melchisdech Bradwood for Gregory Seaton, 1605) reprinted in The Harleian Miscellany, 10 vols, ed. William Oldys and Thomas Park (London, 1808–13), 3: 424–48, 430. For some other accounts see J. García Mercadal, España vista por los extranjeros, 3: 39–46 and the fascinating yet disconcerting Tomé Pinheiro da Vega (Turpín), Fastiginia o Fastos Geniales, trans. Narciso Alonso Cortés (Valladolid: Colegio de Santiago, 1916), which contains quite a bit of scurrilous material, mostly unrelated to the English presence, beginning in 1605 just before Semana Santa, describing the solemnities for the birth of the prince, preparations for the arrival of the English ambassador (35), the baptism, juego de cañas and other celebrations. 29. Sir Richard Wynn, A brief relation of what was observed by the Prince's servants in their Journey into Spain, in the Year 1623, ed. Dámaso López García (Santander: Proases, 1996), 117, and Hillgarth, The Mirror of Spain, 41. 30. Fredson Bowers, ed., The Dramatic Works in the Beaumont and Fletcher Canon, 10 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1966–96), 10: 619 [IV.iii.177–8 and 180–2]. 31. Tresswell, A Relation of such Things, 430. Tresswell's account had been specifically published to correct the misimpressions disseminated in another pamphlet about the journey, almost certainly The Royal Entertainment of the Earl of Nottingham (London, 1605). Further references are given in brackets in the text. 32. Antonio Ortiz, A Relation of the Solemnitie wherewith the Catholike Princes K. Phillip the III and Queene Margere were receyued in the Inglish Colledge of Valladolid the 22 of August 1600, trans. Francis Rivers (Antwerp, 1601), A2r. On this text see Berta Cano Echevarría, Ana Sáez Hidalgo, Glyn Redworth and Mark Hutchings, '"Comfort without Offence"?: The Performance and Transmission of Exile Literature at the English College, Valladolid, 1592–1600', Renaissance and Reformation, 31 (2008): 31–67. 33. Trudi Darby and Alexander Samson, 'Cervantes on the Jacobean Stage', and Alexander Samson, '"Last thought upon a windmill"?: Cervantes and Fletcher', in The Cervantean Heritage: Reception and Influence in Britain, ed. John Ardila (London: Legenda, 2008), 206–33. 34. Wynn, A brief relation, 55–6. 35. Ibid., 59. 36. Edmund Spenser, A view of the state of Ireland from the first printed edition (1633), ed. Andrew Hadfield and Willy Maley (Oxford: Blackwell, 1997), 50, and Bodleian MS Perrot 5 'A direction for a Travailer', fol. 23. The anonymous manuscript purchased by William Drake in 1628 was probably written around 1625. 37. Howell, Epistolae Ho-Elianae, 1: 205. 38. Clarence Glacken, Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in Western Thought from Ancient Times to the End of the Eighteenth Century (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976). 39. Howell, Epistolae Ho-Elianae, 2: 28. 40. Ibid., 2: 31. 41. The sexualised nature of colonial discourse is incisively examined in, for example, Peter Stallybrass, 'Patriarchal Territories: The Body Enclosed', in Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourse of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. Margaret Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan and Nancy Vickers (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1986), 123–42. 42. See Miguel de Cervantes, Novelas ejemplares, ed. Harry Sieber, 2 vols (Madrid: Cátedra, 1992), 1: 283, and Isabel Torres, 'Now You See It, Now You … See It Again? The Dynamics of Doubling in La española inglesa', in A Companion to Cervantes's Novelas ejemplares, ed. Stephen Boyd (London: Tamesis, 2005), 115–33. 43. Wynn, A brief relation, 97. 44. Ibid., 100–1. 45. Howell, Epistolae Ho-Elianae, 2: 36. Letter to Sir T. S. at Tower Hill. 46. Wynn, A brief relation, 109. 47. Howell, Epistolae Ho-Elianae, 1: 61; 2: 27–9, 36, 42, and Wynn, A brief relation, 101. 48. There is an expanding literature on early modern travel writing, see for example: Carmine Di Biase, ed., Travel and Translation in the Early Modern Period (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2006); Andrew Hadfield, Literature, Travel and Colonial Writing in the English Renaissance, 1545–1625 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1998); Andrew Hadfield, ed., Amazons, Savages and Machiavels: Travel and Colonial Writing in English, 1550–1630: An Anthology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001); Mike Pincombe, ed., Travels and Translations in the Sixteenth Century: Selected Papers of the Second International Conference of the Tudor Symposium (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006); Sherman, 'Stirrings and Searchings (1500–1720)', 17–36; and Jonathan Sell, Rhetoric and Wonder in English Travel Writing 1560–1613 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006). 49. Osuna never came to trial and therefore it is impossible to know what the charges against him were beyond the minutes recorded in Fernández Navarete, ed., Colección de documentos inéditos para la historia de España, 113 vols (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1842–95), 47: 477 ff; for more information see the biography by Luis M. Linde, Don Pedro Girón, Duque de Osuna, la hegemonía española en Europa a comienzos del siglo XVII (Madrid: Encuentro, 2005). 50. Linde, Don Pedro Girón, duque de Osuna, 301 and 307. 51. Francesco Benigno, La sombra del rey (Madrid: Alianza, 1994), 97–108.