Alonso de Contreras

Alonso de Contreras (actually Alonso de Guillén ) (born January 6, 1582 in Madrid ; † 1641 or after 1645) was a Spanish soldier, sailor, privateer, adventurer and writer, who was best known for his autobiography. It was not until 1900 that the archivist, historian and Americanist Manuel Serrano y Sanz (1866-1932) published Contreras' memoirs for the first time, which, despite their adventurous content in terms of location, time and facts, proved to be absolutely reliable and accurate.

Life

youth

Soldiers of a Spanish Tercio, around 1650

Contreras was born as Alonso de Guillén; the eldest of sixteen children in a poor Madrid family later took his mother's name. From childhood on he enjoyed fighting and looking for deals, the apprenticeship with a silversmith did not suit him, so that he was enlisted as a soldier as early as 1595, at the age of 13.

Soldier and sailor

In Flanders he deserted together with his captain and entered the service of the Spanish viceroy in Naples and Palermo ; at the age of 17 he became a soldier on a galleon ; Pirate trips against the Ottoman war and merchant fleets took him across the Mediterranean to the Turkish and North African coasts, of which he made nautical maps ("Derrotero"). Because of affairs of the Order of St. John Knights of Malta devious, he undertook as a captain whose fleet a frigate on behalf of the Grand Master numerous Kaper- and reconnaissance trips against the Turks and their Algerian and Tunisian governor to the eastern Mediterranean. Here he completed his nautical knowledge, which he had acquired self-taught.

In 1600 he took leave to serve as a soldier in Spain; he was left to recruit troops. After the end of his mission he went to Sicily in 1604, where he was again entrusted with a privateer.

Contreras was a womanizer and had many loves; the relationship with a prostitute who followed him to the camp ended in an act of violence when an officer tried to assault her. With a quick-tempered character, quick with a sword at hand and great personal bravery, his marriage to the widow of a Spanish Oidor in Sicily (1606) ended with the murder of his unfaithful wife and her lover when he caught the couple in bed.

Returning to Spain in 1607, he tried to get a promotion, but failed and quickly became a hermit and lived on alms. An accusation of favoring the Moriscos and the plan to build his own principality in a strategically favorable location between Castile and Aragon brought him to prison in 1608, but could not be proven, even with the use of torture.

Sent to Flanders as a captain in 1608, he was only entrusted with a troop in 1610. Contreras therefore applied for use again in Malta, was accepted, but was arrested on the journey there in Burgundy as an alleged Spanish spy. Only a letter of recommendation from Prince Condé set him free again.

In 1611 the Knights of Malta sent him on a voyage to explore the Levant , the eastern Mediterranean, and accepted him as a novice in the order - despite concerns about his violent acts .

Then Contreras returned to Spain; In 1616 he sailed with two galleons and 200 infantry in the Caribbean to defend Puerto Rico against the Dutch; there he clashed with Walter Raleigh , who escaped him with his faster ships.

Since 1619 Contreras was on the North African Atlantic coast, where he broke the Turkish siege of the then Spanish, now Moroccan El Mehdiya-La Mármora . King Philip III therefore appointed him naval admiral with the task of overseeing the Strait of Gibraltar and the return of the silver fleet .

Encounter with Lope de Vega

When Contreras traveled to Madrid in 1624 to receive new orders , he stayed there for eight months with Lope de Vega (1562–1635), who, according to Ortega y Gasset’s assumption, encouraged him to write down his memories. The twenty years older writer, former bon vivant and playwright belonged like Contreras to the Order of Malta and exploited some of his guest's adventures in his dramas; the imprisonment of his friend and housemate in 1608 inspired him to the comedy "El rey sin reyno" (1625) and "Los Moriscos de Hornachos".

Knight of the Order of Malta

Vesuvius eruption 1631 (Merian)

Contreras was traveling from Madrid to Rome, where he by Pope Urban VIII. A brief received, which brought the Order of Malta to accept him as a Knight (1630) and give it a Commandery (branch of Knights, a Coming or fief) in León to give (1632). The former adventurer and soldier of fortune had thus reached the peak of his career.

Meanwhile back in the service of the Viceroy of Naples, he succeeded in his tenure as administrator of the important fortified city of L'Aquila northeast of Rome, through drastic measures to break the resistance of the rebellious population and to restore the rule of the Spaniards. In Naples, Contreras experienced the eruption of Vesuvius on December 16, 1631, which he vividly described. In 1633 he returned to Spain to take possession of his commandery.

Last years of life

In the last years of his life, from 1640 to 1645, Contreras was again active as admiral of a royal fleet in the Caribbean.

plant

Style, classification

Contreras' report is part of non-fiction based on its subject - the autobiography - but can definitely be counted as literature because of its concise style and the dramatically skilfully structured narrative strands in both the entire work and the individual scenes. Far less, actually not at all fictional compared to the contemporary picaresque novels, but with narrative momentum and with a sense for the comic, drastic and fantastic, Contreras' biography is nevertheless on a par with the great works of picaresque literature , such as that of Miguel de Cervantes , Mateo Alemán or the anonymous author of Lazarillo de Tormes were published at the same time. It was probably also a certain literary ambition and the prospect of fame that spurred Contreras to write his biography.

As a historical script, his “Vida” highlights the way of life of the generation and professional group that is so characteristic of the power and dynamism, but also the weak points of the Spanish empire - the warrior soldiers. At home on the sea as well as on the land, familiar with all the tricks from the Caribbean to the Levant, from an exaggerated sense of honor, quick-tempered, but in everything relying on himself, without fear of tomorrow and steadfast, even if there is no longer any hope seems to give - Contreras embodies these character traits in a special way.

Aftermath

Contrera's memoirs are among the few authentic, contemporary reports on experiences and their meaning can only be compared with the memories of Pedro de Cieza de León or Bernal Diaz del Castillo .

The unprinted memoirs were only rediscovered as a manuscript in the archives in 1900; after their publication, however, they attracted less attention in his home country than abroad; A French edition was published in 1911, a German edition in 1924, and an English edition in 1926. Only today do numerous Spanish reprints testify to an increasing awareness and appreciation.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ 1645 after Hildegard Ernst:  Contreras, Alonso de. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 33, Bautz, Nordhausen 2012, ISBN 978-3-88309-690-2 , Sp. 244-248.
2. ↑ The comparison with his contemporaries, the musician-Prince Carlo Gesualdo , is obvious that in 1590 - also in Naples - his wife along with lovers in flagrante killed.
3. ↑ Ortega y Gasset (1961), foreword p. 8.

Editions and literature

Manuscripts

• Memorial de Servicios , written around 1628, now in the Archivio General de Simancas , Province of Valladolid.
• Memorial de Servicios , written around 1645, also in Simancas
• Derrotero ; Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid
• Vida ; Biblioteca Nacional de Madrid

Spanish book editions

• Vida del Capitán Alonso de Contreras, Caballero del Hábito de San Juan… años 1582 á 1633. (Discurso de mi vida desde que salí á servir al Rey, etc.). Con una introducción de Manuel Serrano y Sanz . In: Boletín de la Real Academia de la Historia, XXXVII, pp. 129-170. Madrid: Fortanet 1900. - Incomplete, numerous errors.
• Aventuras del capitán Alonso de Contreras . In: Revista de Occidente, 1943. With a foreword by Ortega y Gasset. - Does not reproduce the original exactly.
• Autobiografías de soldados (Siglo XVII) [Contains Vida del Capitán Alonso de Contreras ]. Edición y estudio preliminar de José María de Cossio. Madrid: Atlas 1956. (Biblioteca de autores españoles desde la formacion del lenguaje hasta nuestros dias XC). - Also contains the Derrotero del Mediterraneo
• Discurso de mi vida . Edición, introducción y notas de Henry Ettinghausen. Barcelona: Bruguera 1983. (NA Madrid: Espasa Calpe 1988)
• Derrotero universal del Mediterráneo . Manuscrito del siglo XVII. Estudio preliminar de Ignacio Fernández Vial. Malaga: Algazara 1996.
• Discurso de mi vida . La Tinta del Calamar 2007. - With a foreword by Ortega y Gasset and Rafael Reig.
• Discurso de mi vida . Con prólogo de Arturo Pérez-Reverte. Reino de Redonda 2008.

On-line

• http://www.oocities.org/es/capitancontreras/contreras.pdf
• http://users.ipfw.edu/JEHLE/CERVANTE/othertxts/Suarez_Figaredo_VidaContreras.pdf

German

• [Alonso Contreras:] The life of Capitán Alonso de Contreras told by himself. Translated by Arnald Steiger. Foreword by José Ortega y Gasset . Zurich: Manesse 1961.
• In 2012, the first uncensored and uncensored translation of the Discurso de mi vida into German appeared: Mein Leben . Translated by Christoph Wurm. Munich: AVM; ISBN 978-3-86924-313-9 .

filming

• La otra vida del Capitán Contreras . Director: Rafael Gil, 1955. - The film is based on the novel of the same name by Torquato Luca de Tena (1923–1999) from 1953, which greatly alienates the plot and relocates it to the present.

literature

• Hildegard Ernst:  Contreras, Alonso de. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 33, Bautz, Nordhausen 2012, ISBN 978-3-88309-690-2 , Sp. 244-248.