Laberinto de Fortuna
Encyclopedia
Laberinto de Fortuna is the major work of Juan de Mena
, who completed the poem in 1444. It is an epic poem written in “arte mayor” (verses of 12 syllables). Though the title implies an examination of Fortune, the work is essentially a propagandistic piece in favor of Castilian
political unity behind Álvaro de Luna
, the court favorite of King Juan II of Castilla. It includes considerable social satire
criticizing corrupt nobles and urging the king to take action against them. The Labyrinth was much read during the 15th and 16th centuries, although its linguistic and structural complexity led to the publication of a “glossed” version (in which explanatory notes follow each stanza) in 1499. The work is also known as Las treszientas (The Three-hundred) because it consists of 300 stanzas (although some manuscripts include only 297).
’s Inferno, also a vision poem. Mena himself is the narrator. He opens the poem with a lament about the “casos falaçes” of Fortune (unfortunate things that happen to people). He asks to see Fortune’s home in order to better understand how she functions. After being whisked away by a dragon-pulled chariot, he is guided through Fortune’s abode by Divine Providence (allegorized as a female character). There he sees not one Wheel of Fortune
, but three, representing the past, present and future; each is composed of a series of Dante-like circles ruled by different planets. The circles contain examples of virtuous and unvirtuous historical figures. In the seventh circle, he encounters only one figure – Álvaro de Luna, who is seen as a horseman dominating Fortune, a wild horse.
Having finished his tour of Fortune’s home, the narrator asks Providence for a prophecy regarding King Juan II. Providence promises great glory for the king, but before she offers details the vision ends. The narrator concludes, admonishing the king to fulfill Providence’s prophecy, and wondering whether the vision was just a dream.
), thus the language is basically an antiquated version of the Spanish spoken throughout the Hispanic world today. The "castellano" or Spanish of Mena’s time is generally understandable to speakers of Spanish today and even to advanced non-native students of Spanish. Mena’s language, however, is considerably more difficult. He uses many archaic words that even in his day had already fallen out of use. Even more often, he uses Latinisms. Some of the Latin
words that Mena introduces were later adopted into Spanish, most were not. This linguistic experimentation creates a text that can only be read with great difficulty, and we may assume that Mena’s contemporaries faced a similar difficulty. As medieval Spanish scholar Alan Deyermond
states that “the precise meaning of some lines has baffled editors from the late-fifteenth-century…to the present.”
To sum up: We three Wheels of Fortune; each Wheel has seven rings representing a planet and its virtues; but, only two of the Wheels are visible to the narrator. On each ring there appear historical personages who either exemplify or lack the given virtue.
First, his notion of three wheels (past, present and future) conflicts with the very metaphor of the Wheel of Fortune – that is, a wheel that represents past, present and future in the different points of its rotation.
Providence explains that narrator will see the wheel of the present in motion (symbolic of the unfinished nature of the present lives) – in fact, the wheel is presented as stationary. A second problem is that the wheel in fact does not include characters from the present, but rather from the recent past. Of all the Laberinto’s characters, only the narrator, Juan II and Álvaro de Luna were alive at the time of composition. Political prudence led Mena to fill his wheel of the present with figures from the recent past, thus avoiding a backlash from offended power-brokers.
Undoubtedly the greatest inconsistency is that the Wheels turn out not to symbolize the blindness of Fortune at all; instead they represent the reward for virtuous action and the punishment for vice. They show not an unpredictable and changing system (Fortune) but its opposite, a well-defined and permanent moral structure. Thus the work, originally presented as a discussion of Fortune, avoids the topic all together.
Finally, the Ptolemaic rings and the Wheels of Fortune cannot be combined in a way that makes visual or conceptual sense (Deyermond).
By the final circle, Mena ignores his established structure and replaces it with praise for Álvaro de Luna.
While perhaps not a flaw, it is certainly worth mentioning that the Laberinto actually contains no labyrinth. Fortune’s abode is presented as a house, and as we have seen, it contains not a labyrinth, but rather three wheels and their rings. Scholars generally agree that the “labyrinth” is a reference to the political situation of Castile
at the time (full of intrigue, difficult to navigate), but the work itself is silent on this point.
, its allegorical weaknesses don’t appear so important. If the reader understands the political message, Mena has achieved his goal.
Scholars generally accept that Mena delivered the poem to Juan II in person in 1444. The poem intends to be a Spanish epic, an inspiration to nationhood that presents Castilla’s destiny (unity and the Reconquista
) in epic terms, and leaves no doubt that Luna is the epic hero to whom the task should be entrusted. Its complex structure and vocabulary are designed to appeal to appeal to Juan II, who wrote poetry himself and was a patron to many poets. Mena’s difficult poem aims to flatter its very specific audience, thus winning over the king, convincing him to continue support for Álvaro de Luna. In what is undoubtedly the most memorable moment of the work, Luna is seen to “cavalga sobre la fortuna” (ride astride Fortune). Fortune is presented as a wild horse tamed by the heroic Luna.
and Navarra. Perhaps in part inspired by the poem, the king once again backed Luna, and this favorite reached his peak of power after the First Battle of Olmedo in 1445. Nevertheless, in 1453 Luna was beheaded by order of the king, and Juan II himself died not long after. Mena’s final years were spent with the knowledge that his political goals had not, in the end, been achieved.
And yet, the work itself survived and thrived, partly because of the political debate which developed around the figure of Álvaro de Luna. It is now considered one of the most important works of late-medieval Spain
.
was quickly suppressed, being published only once. It was recovered by a Spanish Quaker in the 19th century. It adeptly reproduces the rhyme scheme and meter of the Laberinto and parodies its plot.
Gericke, Philip O. "Juan de Mena (1411-1456)." Castilian Writers, 1400-1500. Edited by Frank A. Domínguez and George D. Greenia. Vol. 286. Detroit, MI: Gale, 2004. 109-126.
Hutcheson, Gregory S. "Cracks in the Labyrinth: Juan de Mena, Converso Experience, and the Rise of the Spanish Nation." La corónica: A Journal of Medieval Spanish Language and Literature 25.1 (1996): 37-52.
Nieto Soria, José Manuel. "Apología y propaganda de la realeza en los cancioneros castellanos del siglo XV. Diseño literario de un modelo político". En la España Medieval 11 (1988): 185-221.
Juan de Mena
Juan de Mena was one of the most significant Spanish poets of the fifteenth century. He was highly regarded at the court of Juan II de Castilla, who appointed him veinticuatro of Córdoba, secretario de cartas latinas and cronista real...
, who completed the poem in 1444. It is an epic poem written in “arte mayor” (verses of 12 syllables). Though the title implies an examination of Fortune, the work is essentially a propagandistic piece in favor of Castilian
Crown of Castile
The Crown of Castile was a medieval and modern state in the Iberian Peninsula that formed in 1230 as a result of the third and definitive union of the crowns and parliaments of the kingdoms of Castile and León upon the accession of the then King Ferdinand III of Castile to the vacant Leonese throne...
political unity behind Álvaro de Luna
Álvaro de Luna
Álvaro de Luna y Jarana , Duke of Trujillo, 1st Count of San Esteban de Gormaz, was a Spanish politician...
, the court favorite of King Juan II of Castilla. It includes considerable social satire
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
criticizing corrupt nobles and urging the king to take action against them. The Labyrinth was much read during the 15th and 16th centuries, although its linguistic and structural complexity led to the publication of a “glossed” version (in which explanatory notes follow each stanza) in 1499. The work is also known as Las treszientas (The Three-hundred) because it consists of 300 stanzas (although some manuscripts include only 297).
Summary
The plot is typical of the “vision poem” genre popular in the Middle Ages. The modern reader will recognize similarities to DanteDANTE
Delivery of Advanced Network Technology to Europe is a not-for-profit organisation that plans, builds and operates the international networks that interconnect the various national research and education networks in Europe and surrounding regions...
’s Inferno, also a vision poem. Mena himself is the narrator. He opens the poem with a lament about the “casos falaçes” of Fortune (unfortunate things that happen to people). He asks to see Fortune’s home in order to better understand how she functions. After being whisked away by a dragon-pulled chariot, he is guided through Fortune’s abode by Divine Providence (allegorized as a female character). There he sees not one Wheel of Fortune
The Wheel of Fortune
The Wheel of Fortune, or Rota Fortunae, is a concept in medieval and ancient philosophy referring to the capricious nature of Fate. The wheel belongs to the goddess Fortuna, who spins it at random, changing the positions of those on the wheel - some suffer great misfortune, others gain windfalls...
, but three, representing the past, present and future; each is composed of a series of Dante-like circles ruled by different planets. The circles contain examples of virtuous and unvirtuous historical figures. In the seventh circle, he encounters only one figure – Álvaro de Luna, who is seen as a horseman dominating Fortune, a wild horse.
Having finished his tour of Fortune’s home, the narrator asks Providence for a prophecy regarding King Juan II. Providence promises great glory for the king, but before she offers details the vision ends. The narrator concludes, admonishing the king to fulfill Providence’s prophecy, and wondering whether the vision was just a dream.
Language
The poem is written in "castellano" (CastilianSpanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
), thus the language is basically an antiquated version of the Spanish spoken throughout the Hispanic world today. The "castellano" or Spanish of Mena’s time is generally understandable to speakers of Spanish today and even to advanced non-native students of Spanish. Mena’s language, however, is considerably more difficult. He uses many archaic words that even in his day had already fallen out of use. Even more often, he uses Latinisms. Some of the Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
words that Mena introduces were later adopted into Spanish, most were not. This linguistic experimentation creates a text that can only be read with great difficulty, and we may assume that Mena’s contemporaries faced a similar difficulty. As medieval Spanish scholar Alan Deyermond
Alan Deyermond
Alan Deyermond FBA was a British professor of Medieval Spanish Literature and Hispanist. His obituary cited him as the English-speaking world's leading scholar of medieval Hispanic literature. He spent his academic career associated with one college, Queen Mary and Westfield.Deyermond started...
states that “the precise meaning of some lines has baffled editors from the late-fifteenth-century…to the present.”
Structure
The structure of the poem is a mixture of two popular medieval allegorical elements: the Wheel of Fortune and the Ptolemaic universe. As mentioned above, the structure of the poem centers around three Wheels of Fortune (past, present and future). The first two wheels are visible to the narrator, while Providence leaves the third one veiled. Providence explains that the past and future wheels do not rotate, but the wheel for the present is still in motion, its outcome uncertain. On each wheel the narrator sees people from classical or Castilian history at varying levels of fortune. These different levels of fortune are represented by the Ptolemaic structure. Each wheel represents its own miniature of the Ptolemaic universe (the seven known celestial bodies with their allegorical connotations). The Ptolemaic element dominates the narrative structure of the poem, as the narration advances in order through the rings of the various planets.To sum up: We three Wheels of Fortune; each Wheel has seven rings representing a planet and its virtues; but, only two of the Wheels are visible to the narrator. On each ring there appear historical personages who either exemplify or lack the given virtue.
Structural Problems
Mena’s allegorical structure is complex, and may fail to make sense to a modern reader. Upon close analysis, we see that he does not follow the structural blueprint of wheels and circles that he outlines at the beginning of the work (Deyermond). Because his main concern is not the allegory of Fortune, but the political meaning of his work, he allows several structural problems to remain in the poem.First, his notion of three wheels (past, present and future) conflicts with the very metaphor of the Wheel of Fortune – that is, a wheel that represents past, present and future in the different points of its rotation.
Providence explains that narrator will see the wheel of the present in motion (symbolic of the unfinished nature of the present lives) – in fact, the wheel is presented as stationary. A second problem is that the wheel in fact does not include characters from the present, but rather from the recent past. Of all the Laberinto’s characters, only the narrator, Juan II and Álvaro de Luna were alive at the time of composition. Political prudence led Mena to fill his wheel of the present with figures from the recent past, thus avoiding a backlash from offended power-brokers.
Undoubtedly the greatest inconsistency is that the Wheels turn out not to symbolize the blindness of Fortune at all; instead they represent the reward for virtuous action and the punishment for vice. They show not an unpredictable and changing system (Fortune) but its opposite, a well-defined and permanent moral structure. Thus the work, originally presented as a discussion of Fortune, avoids the topic all together.
Finally, the Ptolemaic rings and the Wheels of Fortune cannot be combined in a way that makes visual or conceptual sense (Deyermond).
By the final circle, Mena ignores his established structure and replaces it with praise for Álvaro de Luna.
While perhaps not a flaw, it is certainly worth mentioning that the Laberinto actually contains no labyrinth. Fortune’s abode is presented as a house, and as we have seen, it contains not a labyrinth, but rather three wheels and their rings. Scholars generally agree that the “labyrinth” is a reference to the political situation of Castile
Crown of Castile
The Crown of Castile was a medieval and modern state in the Iberian Peninsula that formed in 1230 as a result of the third and definitive union of the crowns and parliaments of the kingdoms of Castile and León upon the accession of the then King Ferdinand III of Castile to the vacant Leonese throne...
at the time (full of intrigue, difficult to navigate), but the work itself is silent on this point.
Propagandistic Value
Considering the fundamental structural problems and the troublesome lexicon, we might wonder why this poem was so respected in its time and continues to be studied today. At least part of the answer lies in the work’s function. Because the central purpose of the work is to serve as political propagandaPropaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
, its allegorical weaknesses don’t appear so important. If the reader understands the political message, Mena has achieved his goal.
Scholars generally accept that Mena delivered the poem to Juan II in person in 1444. The poem intends to be a Spanish epic, an inspiration to nationhood that presents Castilla’s destiny (unity and the Reconquista
Reconquista
The Reconquista was a period of almost 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms succeeded in retaking the Muslim-controlled areas of the Iberian Peninsula broadly known as Al-Andalus...
) in epic terms, and leaves no doubt that Luna is the epic hero to whom the task should be entrusted. Its complex structure and vocabulary are designed to appeal to appeal to Juan II, who wrote poetry himself and was a patron to many poets. Mena’s difficult poem aims to flatter its very specific audience, thus winning over the king, convincing him to continue support for Álvaro de Luna. In what is undoubtedly the most memorable moment of the work, Luna is seen to “cavalga sobre la fortuna” (ride astride Fortune). Fortune is presented as a wild horse tamed by the heroic Luna.
Historical Implications
Mena’s work may have achieved its propagandistic goals in the short-term. Mena presented the poem to the king in 1444 at a time of crisis, when Juan II was being held under house arrest by his rival cousins of AragónAragon
Aragon is a modern autonomous community in Spain, coextensive with the medieval Kingdom of Aragon. Located in northeastern Spain, the Aragonese autonomous community comprises three provinces : Huesca, Zaragoza, and Teruel. Its capital is Zaragoza...
and Navarra. Perhaps in part inspired by the poem, the king once again backed Luna, and this favorite reached his peak of power after the First Battle of Olmedo in 1445. Nevertheless, in 1453 Luna was beheaded by order of the king, and Juan II himself died not long after. Mena’s final years were spent with the knowledge that his political goals had not, in the end, been achieved.
And yet, the work itself survived and thrived, partly because of the political debate which developed around the figure of Álvaro de Luna. It is now considered one of the most important works of late-medieval Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
.
Imitations
Laberinto de Fortuna inspired an extremely bawdy parody, Carajicomedia (Dick Comedy), written 1516-1519. This social satireSatire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
was quickly suppressed, being published only once. It was recovered by a Spanish Quaker in the 19th century. It adeptly reproduces the rhyme scheme and meter of the Laberinto and parodies its plot.
Sources
Deyermond, Alan. "Structure and Style as Instruments of Propaganda in Juan de Mena's Laberinto de Fortuna." Proceedings of the PMR Conference: Annual Publication of the International Patristic, Mediaeval and Renaissance Conference 5 (1980): 159-67.Gericke, Philip O. "Juan de Mena (1411-1456)." Castilian Writers, 1400-1500. Edited by Frank A. Domínguez and George D. Greenia. Vol. 286. Detroit, MI: Gale, 2004. 109-126.
Hutcheson, Gregory S. "Cracks in the Labyrinth: Juan de Mena, Converso Experience, and the Rise of the Spanish Nation." La corónica: A Journal of Medieval Spanish Language and Literature 25.1 (1996): 37-52.
Nieto Soria, José Manuel. "Apología y propaganda de la realeza en los cancioneros castellanos del siglo XV. Diseño literario de un modelo político". En la España Medieval 11 (1988): 185-221.