Antonio de Solís (1684) Historia de la conquista de México

Antonio de Solís y Ribadeneyra (18 July 161019 April 1686) was a Spanish dramatist and historian. His work includes drama, poetry, and prose, and he has been considered one of the last great writers of

Spanish Baroque literature Spanish Baroque literature is the literature written in Spain during the Baroque, which occurred during the 17th century. Spanish Baroque literature is a period of writing which begins approximately with the first works of Góngora and Lope de Veg ...

. He was born at

Alcalá de Henares Alcalá de Henares () is a Spanish city in the Community of Madrid. Straddling the Henares River, it is located to the northeast of the centre of Madrid. , it has a population of 193,751, making it the region's third-most populated Municipalities ...

(or, less probably, Plasencia). He studied law at Salamanca, where he produced a comedy entitled ''Amour and Obligation'', which was acted in 1627. He became secretary to the count of Oropesa, and in 1654 he was appointed secretary of state as well as private secretary to

Philip IV Philip IV may refer to: * Philip IV of Macedon (died 297 BC) * Philip IV of France (1268–1314), Avignon Papacy * Philip IV of Burgundy or Philip I of Castile (1478–1506) * Philip IV, Count of Nassau-Weilburg (1542–1602) * Philip IV of Spain ...

. Later he obtained the lucrative post of chronicler of the Indies, and, on taking orders in 1667 severed his connexion with the stage. He died at

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...

on 19 April 1686.

His Work

Of his ten extant plays, two have some place in the history of the drama. ''El Amor al uso'' was adapted by

Scarron Paul Scarron (c. 1 July 1610 in Paris – 6 October 1660 in Paris) (a.k.a. Monsieur Scarron) was a French poet, dramatist, and novelist, born in Paris. Though his precise birth date is unknown, he was baptized on 4 July 1610. Scarron was the fi ...

and again by Thomas Corneille as ''L'Amour de la mode'', while ''La Gitanilla de Madrid'', itself founded on the novela of Cervantes, has been utilized directly or indirectly by Pius Alexander Wolff,

Victor Hugo Victor-Marie Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romantic writer and politician. During a literary career that spanned more than sixty years, he wrote in a variety of genres and forms. He is considered to be one of the great ...

and

Longfellow Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet and educator. His original works include "Paul Revere's Ride", ''The Song of Hiawatha'', and ''Evangeline''. He was the first American to completely transl ...

. The titles of the remaining seven are ''Triumph from Armor and Fortune'', ''Eurídice y Orfeo'', ''The Alcetzar del secretion'', ''The Amazons'', ''The Doctor Carlino'', ''Un bobo hace ciento'' and ''Defend the Enemy''. ''Amor y obligación'' survives in a manuscript at the Biblioteca Nacional. The ''Historia de la conquista de México, población y progresos de la América septentrional, conocida por el nombre de Nueva España'', covering the three years between the appointment of Cortés to command the invading force and the fall of the city, deservedly ranks as a Spanish prose classic. It was first published in 1684 in Spain. French and Italian translations were published by the 1690s, and an English translation by Townshend appeared in 1724. The book was extremely popular on both sides of the Atlantic and was known to important figures in colonial Latin America and the British colonies. It remained the most important European source on Latin American history up through the first part of the nineteenth century.

His Work

References

Further reading