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482 Miguel José Deyá Bauzá

que pecados generales
la Justicia en dos o tres
los reprime y satisface,
y queda el ejemplo a ser
castigo de los restantes (p. 25) 40 .

This encounter serves more than one purpose: it provides an
opportunity for Charles to exercise a degree of self-criticism by
recalling his own experiences when the revolt of the Comuneros
erupted. He attributes it to his own mistake in giving his leading
Flemish adviser, Chièvres, too much power . Having acknowledged
41
this, he goes on to say that when he crushed the rebellion and the
Council proposed that two hundred people be sentenced to death, he
reduced that number to six, demonstrating his clemency. His words
exemplify another popular aspect of Spanish Baroque theatre, which
represented the authoritarian and hierarchical social structure as just
and fair . It is also important to stress that the emperor refers to the
42
comuneros (literally, commoners) not as traitors but as people who had
been deceived. Nor does he accuse the nobility of disloyalty or
disaffection during the conflict. In fact he admits that he wore his
Crown thanks to the behaviour of the aristocracy during that rebellion,
something that has been challenged by historians of the period, but
which fits with the play’s reiterated defence of the hierarchical social
structure .
43

40 «You are cruel, ambitious, / mistrustful, inconstant / and vengeful; such features
/ are not becoming in a king / for a king cannot take revenge over everything; / The art
of ruling is the art / of dissembling when offence is given / for as regards general sins
/ the Law soon takes care of them / repressing and providing justice / setting an
example / that serves as punishment for others».
41 Also at p. 25.
42 J.A. Maravall, Teatro cit., pp. 32-33.
43 Elliot characterises the nobility’s response to the revolt as cautious; Belenguer
calls it inhibition, and Kamen emphasises the division of the sector into those who
collaborated with the rebels and those who repressed it. J.H. Elliot, La España Imperial,
Vicens Vives, Barcelona, 1983, p. 161; E. Belenguer, El Imperio Hispánico (1479-1665),
Grijalbo Mondadori, Barcelona, 1995, p. 161; H. Kamen, Una sociedad conflictiva:
España, 1469-1714, Alianza, Madrid, 1984, p. 133. It is likely that with exceptions like
the great Andalusian noblemen with rights over large tracts of land, most Castilian
nobles remained passive at first, but supported the King when the rebels threatened
their seigniorial rights and privileges. M. Rady, Carlos V, Altaya, Barcelona, 1997, pp.
64-65. The repression was harsher than is presented in the play but it would have
dented the emperor’s portrayal as morally irreproachable to have acknowledged this.
Rivero argued that out of the 285 people excluded from the general pardon, 23 were
executed, and that the consequences were more political than anything else. Á. Rivero,
El mito comunero y la identidad nacional española, in B.J. García, A. Álvarez-Ossorio
(eds.), La Monarquía cit., p. 727. Others claim it was severe without providing
quantitative data: A.M. Bernal, Monarquía e Imperio, Crítica-Marcial Pons, Barcelona,
2007, p. 87.

Mediterranea - ricerche storiche - Anno XVII - Agosto 2020
ISSN 1824-3010 (stampa) ISSN 1828-230X (online)