Glossary of Don Quixote
The people, places, and things of the novel, explained plainly.
Amadis of Gaul
The hero of the most famous Spanish chivalric romance, printed around 1508. Quixote's chief model; in the library scrutiny (Part I, ch. 6) it is the first romance spared from the bonfire. See the knight-errant.
Avellaneda, Alonso Fernández de
The pseudonym behind the spurious 1614 continuation of Don Quixote. Cervantes attacks the false sequel inside the genuine Part II (ch. 59, 72). See the manuscript.
Barataria
The "island" — actually a town — governed by Sancho Panza in Part II (ch. 45–53), a prank arranged by the Duke and Duchess. Sancho governs with surprising wisdom and resigns after ten days. See sancho panza.
Beltenebros
The penitent name taken by Amadis of Gaul in his despair; Quixote considers imitating him in the Sierra Morena (Part I, ch. 25–26).
Cide Hamete Benengeli
The fictional "Arab and Manchegan" author of the manuscript on which the novel claims to be based, discovered in Toledo in Part I, chapter 9. The novel's founding joke — and its deepest metafictional device. See the manuscript.
Clavileño
The wooden flying horse of Part II, chapter 41 — a prank of the Duke and Duchess in which Quixote and Sancho are blindfolded and made to believe they fly to disenchant Dulcinea.
Dapple (Rucio)
Sancho Panza's donkey, his constant companion. Sancho's attachment to Dapple is one of the novel's running jokes and, in the end, one of its most touching constants.
Dulcinea del Toboso
The lady of Quixote's thoughts, renamed from Aldonza Lorenzo of El Toboso (Part I, ch. 1). She never appears in person; she is an idea Quixote serves. See dulcinea del toboso.
Enchanter (encantador)
Quixote's universal explanation for the gap between his visions and the world's facts. The sage Friston "carried off my study and books" and turns giants into windmills (Part I, ch. 8).
Fulling mills
The adventure of Part I, chapter 20: in the dark, Quixote mistakes the pounding of fulling hammers for giants, and Sancho's laughter at the discovery nearly gets him killed.
Galley slaves
Part I, chapter 22: Quixote frees a chain gang of convicts, who promptly stone him and rob him. The novel's darkest joke about the consequences of idealism.
Hidalgo
A member of Spain's lowest nobility — gentle by birth but often poor, entitled to the don and exempt from some taxes. Alonso Quixano is one; the whole novel turns on what that status means when the money is gone. See spain in the 1600s.
Knight-errant
A wandering knight of the romances, bound to right wrongs, protect the weak, and serve a lady. Quixote attempts to live the code literally, four centuries (in his mind) after its age. See the knight-errant.
Knight of the Mirrors
Samson Carrasco's disguise in Part II, chapters 12–14: he challenges Quixote hoping to defeat him and force him home, and is beaten instead.
Knight of the White Moon
Samson Carrasco's second disguise (Part II, ch. 64): this time he defeats Quixote on the beach at Barcelona and binds him by knightly oath to retire for a year — which ends the adventures.
La Mancha
The high plateau of central Spain where the novel is set and from which Quixote takes his surname. A real region; the "village" is deliberately unnamed. See spain in the 1600s.
Mambrino's helmet
Part I, chapter 21: a barber's brass basin, which Quixote takes for the enchanted golden helmet of the romance hero Mambrino. It becomes the novel's emblem of seeing glory in the ordinary.
Montesinos, Cave of
Part II, chapters 22–23: Quixote is lowered into a real cave near La Mancha and reports a dream-vision of the enchanted Durandarte and Belerma. The novel's strangest episode, half-dream, half-lie.
Morisco
A Spaniard of Moorish descent, nominally Christian after the forced conversions. In Part I, chapter 9, a morisco in Toledo translates Cide Hamete's Arabic manuscript into Castilian. The moriscos were expelled from Spain in 1609–1614, between the novel's two parts. See spain in the 1600s.
Ormsby, John
The translator (1829–1895) of the English version quoted throughout this site. His 1885 translation is in the public domain in the United States. See sources.
Rocinante
Quixote's horse, renamed from a broken-down nag (Part I, ch. 1). Loyal, starved, and indestructible — the equine counterpart to his master.
Sancho Panza
Quixote's squire: a laborer from the same unnamed region, promised an island to govern, who becomes the novel's voice of proverbial common sense — and, by the end, something more. See sancho panza.
Santa Hermandad (Holy Brotherhood)
The rural police of early modern Spain, whose officers Quixote repeatedly assaults. The law, in the novel, is always a few steps behind the knight.
Sierra Morena
The mountain range of southern Spain where Quixote performs his lover's penance in imitation of Amadis (Part I, ch. 23–26), and where the novel's interpolated tales accumulate.
Siglo de Oro
The Spanish Golden Age — roughly the 16th and 17th centuries — the age of Cervantes, Lope de Vega, Velázquez, and El Greco. See spain in the 1600s.
Tilting at windmills
The idiom for attacking imaginary enemies, drawn from Part I, chapter 8. One of the novel's gifts to the world's languages. See the windmills and quixotic idealism.
Quixotic
The adjective the novel gave the world: extravagantly idealistic, romantic to the point of impracticality. See quixotic idealism.
Source notes
- Definitions reflect the Ormsby translation's usage, verified against Project Gutenberg eBook #996; see sources and methodology.
- Historical terms (hidalgo, morisco, Santa Hermandad, Siglo de Oro) follow standard scholarly usage; see spain in the 1600s.