C1 · Part One, Chapter 7
Sancho Panza enters the story: a good man with little salt
Sancho arrives in a single paragraph, described before he is named, and the description is a joke with a sting in it about poverty. This unit covers the reported promises that talk him into it, the set phrases of village speech, and the word ínsula, which Sancho will chase for the rest of the book.
The passage, exactly as Cervantes wrote it
Miguel de Cervantes, Part One, Chapter 7. Unadapted.
En este tiempo, solicitó don Quijote a un labrador vecino suyo, hombre de bien —si es que este título se puede dar al que es pobre—, pero de muy poca sal en la mollera. En resolución, tanto le dijo, tanto le persuadió y prometió, que el pobre villano se determinó de salirse con él y servirle de escudero. Decíale, entre otras cosas, don Quijote que se dispusiese a ir con él de buena gana, porque tal vez le podía suceder aventura que ganase, en quítame allá esas pajas, alguna ínsula, y le dejase a él por gobernador della. Con estas promesas y otras tales, Sancho Panza, que así se llamaba el labrador, dejó su mujer y hijos y asentó por escudero de su vecino.
At this time don Quixote worked on a labourer who was a neighbour of his, a good man, if that title can be given to someone who is poor, but with very little salt in his skull. In short, he told him so much, persuaded him so much and promised him so much that the poor peasant made up his mind to go off with him and serve him as squire. Among other things don Quixote told him he should be willing to come, because an adventure might come along in which he won some island in no time at all and left him there as its governor. With these promises and others like them, Sancho Panza, for that was the labourer's name, left his wife and children and signed on as his neighbour's squire.
The same thing in Spanish as it is written today
Read the two side by side. What has changed between them is the syllabus of this level.
Por entonces, don Quijote convenció a un labrador vecino suyo, hombre de bien, si es que se le puede llamar así a un pobre, pero con muy pocas luces. En resumen, tanto le dijo, tanto le insistió y tanto le prometió que el pobre campesino decidió irse con él y servirle de escudero. Entre otras cosas, don Quijote le decía que se animara a acompañarle, porque en cualquier momento podía ocurrirle una aventura en la que ganara, en un abrir y cerrar de ojos, alguna isla, y lo dejara a él de gobernador. Con estas promesas y otras parecidas, Sancho Panza, que así se llamaba el labrador, dejó a su mujer y a sus hijos y entró a servir como escudero de su vecino.
What changed, form by form
| In the text | Today | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| solicitó | convenció, tentó | Solicitar in the sense of working on someone, talking them round. Today it means to apply for. |
| de muy poca sal en la mollera | con muy pocas luces | Salt stood for wit, and the mollera is the crown of the head. The phrase is still understood. |
| se determinó de salirse | decidió irse | Determinarse de, where today it is determinarse a, or simply decidir. |
| que se dispusiese | que se animara | A reported request in the imperfect subjunctive, which is still how indirect speech works. |
| en quítame allá esas pajas | en un abrir y cerrar de ojos | In the time it takes to say take those straws off me. It survives as por un quítame allá esas pajas, over a trifle. |
| ínsula | isla | The word of the books of chivalry. Nobody said it in 1605, and Sancho will never stop saying it. |
| asentó por escudero | entró a servir como escudero | Asentar por, to sign on as, from the language of hiring servants and soldiers. |
| dejó su mujer y hijos | dejó a su mujer y a sus hijos | No personal a before people, and one possessive for two nouns. |
The syntax
The paragraph is built around a narrator who keeps interrupting himself. The first sentence stops to question its own words, si es que este título se puede dar al que es pobre, and the name Sancho Panza arrives only at the end, in a relative clause tucked into the last sentence. In between, everything don Quixote says is reported and not quoted: que se dispusiese, que ganase, que le dejase. You learn what the promises amounted to without hearing a single one of them.
What a Spanish reader hears
Hombre de bien, si es que este título se puede dar al que es pobre. The aside is a joke about a society in which honour went with money, so that calling a poor man a man of worth needed an apology, and the narrator plays innocent. Notice also how cheaply Sancho is bought. One island, promised in a phrase that means in no time at all, and he leaves his wife and children. The book will spend a thousand pages paying off that sentence.
Where the course prepares you for this
- Sentences that join up: porque, para, si, creo queLesson 20Sancho Panza and the windmills