The Presence of María de Velasco in Pinar’s Juego trobado, in the Carajicomedia, and in La novela del licenciado Vidriera by Cervantes

Abstract

Research on the court ladies who participated in Pinar’s Juego trobado, a card game in verse completed in 1496, led to the discovery that María de Velasco, wife of Juan Velázquez de Cuéllar, and adoptive-mother of Ignatius Loyola, subsequently appears in several literary texts, the first of which is the Carajicomedia, where she is metamorphosed into an old prostitute skilled in the arts of seduction. Surprisingly, I have detected her presence in La novela del licenciado Vidriera, one of Cervantes’ Novelas ejemplares: each of the names of the main character, given or adopted during the course of his life, is linked in some way with this lady; and, furthermore, there are other correspondences, above all the symbolism of the quince. This begs the question whether the tale was intended to convey a coded message, and if so, one wonders what kind of message.  This discovery also seems to add some credence to the theory that in Don Quixote Cervantes wished to parody the life of Ignatius Loyola as well as the heroes of chivalric romance.