Marlowe (1564–93) adapted the legend in The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus (published in 1604), and it also formed the basis for Goethe’s Faust, begun in 1770 and completed in 1832.
10. the wandering Jew: Many different legends exist about this figure, who was said to have been present when Jesus Christ was on his way to be crucified. In the most common version, the Jewish man tells Jesus to move more quickly, and as punishment is told that he will have to remain in motion until the Second Coming.
11. the Inquisition: the Roman Catholic ecclesiastical tribunal, first organized under the jurisdiction of a central governing body in Rome during the thirteenth century, and responsible for the trial and punishment of heretics. The Spanish Inquisition of the fifteenth century was particularly brutal in its methods of torturing accused individuals.
12. bull: a mandate from the Pope.
CHAPTER V
1. Epigraph: Alexander Pope (1688–1744), The First Epistle of the Second Book of Horace, Imitated; To Augustus 296–301. In L. 301, “or” has been changed to “and,” stressing the inevitability of a fall for the individual who “pants for glory.”
2. Anacreon: Greek lyric poet, c. 570 B.C.-c. 485 B.C.
3. Sylvans and fauns: mythological beings: sylvans are forest spirits, and fauns are part man, part goat.
4. Ph?bus: Apollo, the sun god, patron of poetry, music, and healing.
5. the blue-eyed maid: Athena, virgin goddess of wisdom and of the arts and sciences, who sprang from the head of Zeus.
6. Lope de Vega: Felix Lope de Vega Carpio (1562–1635), a Spanish dramatic poet.
7. Calderona: Pedro Calderon de la Barca (1600–1681), a major dramatist of the Spanish Golden Age.
8. “Montemayor’s Diana”: Diana Enamorada (1542), a Spanish pastoral romance published by the Portuguese writer and poet Jorge de Montemayor (c. 1521–61).
CHAPTER VI
1. Epigraph: Nathaniel Lee (?1749–92), Sofanisba (1676), I.i.240–41, slightly modified.
2. syren: siren, a type of monster—half bird, half woman—that lured sailors to their deaths by singing irresistible melodies.
3. “That men … how”: Shakespeare, Measure for Measure II.ii.187, adapted from a first-person speech, “When men were fond, I smiled and wondered how.”
4. strada: Italian, street.
5. Indies: refers to the East or West Indies, synonymous here with wealth and profit.
6. willow: The willow is a symbol for grief over unrequited love or the loss of a loved one.
7. “Of lonely haunts … loves!”: William Strode (1602–45), Melancholly I.12–13. The original reads, “Fountains heads, and pathlesse groves,/Places which pale Passion loves.”
8. St. Rosolia: There is a St. Rosalia, a Sicilian woman who retired from the world to live as an ascetic, first in a cave and then on Mount Pellegrino.
CHAPTER VII
1. Epigraph: Robert Blair (1699–1746), The Grave II.11–20.
2. “Amadis de Gaul”: a Spanish or Portuguese chivalric prose romance, dating from the thirteenth or fourteenth century. Don Galaor is Amadis’s brother.
3. Damsel Plazer di mi vida: a character in Tirante the White.
4. confident: confidant.
5. agnus dei: Latin, Lamb of God. a cake of wax stamped with the image of a lamb and blessed by the Pope.
6. constellated: framed under particular constellations to have certain magical properties; charmed.
VOLUME III
CHAPTER VIII
1. Epigraph: Shakespeare, Cymbeline II.ii.11–16. Tarquin is the Roman who raped Lucretia; Cytherea is another name for Venus.
2. Proteus: a sea god, capable of assuming any shape.
3. “By anthropophagi … shoulders”: Shakespeare, Othello I.iii.144–45. Othello tells Desdemona fantastic tales of his travels and adventures. Anthropophagi are cannibals.
4. Terra Incognita: Latin, land unknown.
5. Hottentot: a term applied to Africans, especially those in the region of South Africa.
6. Silesia: a region in central Europe, now in southern Poland.
7. Loretto: a well-known pilgrimage destination in Italy with a shrine to the Virgin Mary.
8. discovered by a minstrel: According to legend, the minstrel Blondel de Nesle helped rescue his patron, Richard the Lionheart, from the cell in which Leopold of Austria had imprisoned him by wandering through Germany and singing a song known only to Richard and Blondel. When Blondel heard Richard’s response, the troubadour alerted English troops to Richard’s whereabouts.
9. symphony: an instrumental prelude or introduction.
10. The Water-King: based on Der Wassermann, by the German philosopher, critic, and collector of folk songs Johann Gottfried Herder (1744–1803).
11. housings: cloths put on a horse for defense or decoration.
12. St. Genevieve: Patron saint of Paris, she was distinguished from an early age as a holy figure and was credited with saving the city from the invasion of Attila in the fifth century.
13. I doubt they are murderers: “Doubt” is used in the archaic sense here; the meaning is “I fear they are murderers” (not “I don’t think that they are murderers”).
CHAPTER IX
1. Epigraph: Robert Blair, The Grave 11.431–37.
2. hostess: mistress of a lodging establishment.
3. caro sposo: Italian, dear husband.
4. calendar: calendar of days dedicated to the various saints on which rituals or festivals would be observed in their honor.
5. St. James of Compostella: See Chapter I, note for
p. 17, LL. 14–15. St. James’s relics were housed in the town of Compostela, in northwestern Spain.
6. Cain: the firstborn son of Adam. Cain murdered his brother Abel, and his punishment was to wander the earth and to have no crops bear fruit for him.
7. deal: boards of fir or pine.
8. eat flesh upon Fridays: Roman Catholics were supposed to avoid eating meat on Fridays. Fish was not considered to be meat, and some argued that fowl was not meat, either.
9. gallician: a type of chicken, bred in the Spanish province of Galicia.
10. ave-maria: Latin, Hail Mary. A prayer invoking the aid
