Honor in the Spanish Drama

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 thé beginning of the full length plays of Torres Naharro, and which are thus exhibited in all their excess in the plays of Calderon? 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 whichpermitted 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. It is pointed out that "everything relating to domestic honor was left by these laws, as it is in Calderon, to domestic authority." While thèse were not legally in force in Calderôn's time according to Ticknor, still "the tradition of their power was not yet lost on the popular character, and poetry was permitted to preserve their fearful principles long after their enactments had ceased to be acknowledged anywhere else." This explanation of the origin of the point of honor contains a part of the truth, but only a part.1 Fitzmaurice-Kelly gives his view of the question as follows: The point of honor-the vengeance wrought by husbands, fathers, and brothers in the cases of women found in dubious circumstances-isharder to explain, or, at least, to justify; yet éven this was a perverted outcome of chivairesque ideals very acceptable to men who esteemed life more cheaply than their neighbôrs.~