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19. Published in 1573; according to Martín de Riquer, Cervantes’s praise is ironic, since he mocked the book in his Viaje del Parnaso (Voyage from Parnassus).

21. Published in 1582 by Luis Gálvez de Montalvo.

22. Published in 1580 by Pedro de Padilla.

23. Published in 1586 by Gabriel López Maldonado and his collaborator, Miguel de Cervantes.

24. This pastoral novel was the first work published by Cervantes, in 1585; the often promised second part was never published and has been lost.

25. Epic poems of the Spanish Renaissance, they were published in 1569, 1584, and 1588, respectively.

26. Published in 1586 by Luis Barahona de Soto.

1. The first two are epic poems by Jerónimo Sempere (1560) and Pedro de la Vecilla Castellanos (1586); the third work is not known, although Luis de Ávila did write a prose commentary on Spain’s wars with the German Protestants. Martín de Riquer believes that Cervantes intended to cite the poem Carlo famoso (1566) by Luis Zapata.

2. The enchanter Frestón is the alleged author of Don Belianís of Greece, a chivalric novel.

3. A Latinate word for “island” that appeared frequently in novels of chivalry; Cervantes uses it throughout for comic effect.

1. A monstrous giant in Greek mythology who had fifty heads and a hundred arms.

2. An entrance to the mountains of the Sierra Morena, between La Mancha and Andalucía.

3. A historical figure of the thirteenth century.

4. Agrajes, a character in Amadís of Gaul, would say these words before doing battle; it became a proverbial expression used at the beginning of a fight.

5. The “second author” is Cervantes (that is, the narrator), who claims, in the following chapter, to have arranged for the translation of another (fictional) author’s book. This device was common in novels of chivalry.

6. Cervantes originally divided the 1605 novel (commonly called the “first part” of Don Quixote) into four parts. The break in the narrative action between parts was typical of novels of chivalry.

1. These lines, probably taken from a ballad, appeared in Alvar Gómez’s Spanish translation of Petrarch’s Trionfi, although nothing comparable is in the Italian original.

2. A commonplace in chivalric fiction was that the knight’s adventures (Platir’s, for example) had been recorded by a wise man and then translated, the translation being the novel.

3. Published in 1586 and 1587, respectively.

4. A Moor who had been converted to Christianity.

5. An allusion to Hebrew, spoken by the Jews who were merchants in the Alcaná.

6. Cide is the equivalent of señor; Hamete is the Arabic name Hamid; Benengeli (berenjenain Spanish) means “eggplant,” a favorite food of Spanish Moors and Jews. In chapter II of the second volume (1615), the “first author” is, in fact, referred to as Cide Hamete Berenjena.

7. Two arrobas is approximately fifty pounds; two fanegasis a little more than three bushels.

8. Zancas means “shanks”; panza, as indicated earlier, means “belly” or “paunch.”

1. Cervantes apparently divided this portion of the text into chapters after he had written it, and he did so in haste: the adventure with the Basque is concluded, and the Galicians do not appear for another five chapters.

2. The Santa Hermandad, or Holy Brotherhood, was an armed force that policed the countryside and the roads.

3. Sancho confuses homicidios (“homicides”) and omecillos (“grudges”).

4. Lint was used in much the same way that absorbent cotton is used in modern medicine.

6. An azumbre was the equivalent of a little more than two liters.

7. Loosely based on an episode in Ariosto’s Orlando furioso, in which Reinaldos de Montalbán takes the enchanted helmet of the Moorish king Mambrino from Dardinel (not Sacripante) and kills him in the process.

8. A reference to an episode in Boiardo’s Orlando innamorato, in which Agricane’s army, consisting of “twenty-two hundred thousand knights,” laid siege to Albracca.

9. This