1910 Articles

Honor in the Spanish Drama

Stuart, Donald Clive

The origin of the ideal of honor which makes its appearance in the plays of Lope de Vega and Calderón bas not been discovered. Ticknor says in discussing the point of honor found in Calderón:

Here, therefore, we find pressed upon us the question, What was the origin of these extravagant ideas of domestic honor and domestic rights, which are found in the old Spanish drama from the beginning of the full length plays of Torres Naharro, and which are thus exhibited in all their excess in the plays of Calderón? The question is certainly difficult to answer, as are all like it that depend on the origin and traditions of national character.

He then proceeds to show that the rigorous laws which permitted a swift vengeance on an erring woman were in vogue from Gothic times; and he sets aside as groundless the assertion that the Spanish ideals of domestic authority might be derived from the Arabs.