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Czekoladowy sen Tymianka. Analiza sceny teatralnej z dramatu Valor, agravio y mujer (Odwaga, zniewaga i kobieta) autorstwa Any Caro de Mallén

Jadwiga Clea Moreno-Szypowska

Modern medicine, Volume 31 (2025) Supplement I, 2025, pp. 531-553

https://doi.org/10.4467/12311960MN.25.051.22738

The play Valor, agravio y mujer (Courage, Betrayal, and a Woman Scorned) by Ana Caro de Mallén, a 17th-century writer of the Spanish Golden Age, is a female response to the myth of Don Juan. In it, both at the level of the main characters – who belong to the aristocracy – and at the level of the subordinate characters – servants – women take revenge on men who have either deprived them of their virginity or want to do so. In one scene, a servant, Thyme, is deeply put to sleep by a maid, Flora, using a chocolate potion. Flora takes advantage of Thyme’s unconsciousness to rob him. A detailed analysis of this scene, with reference to the properties and symbolic meaning of the plants that appear in it, shows how Ana Caro de Mallén thoroughly conceived her most famous dramatic work. The upsidedown world she has created functions both in the plot – a woman robs a man – and in the names that determine the actions of plants, which have the opposite effect on beings belonging to the plant world than on humans. In addition, the author uses this text to show the importance of chocolate in 17th-century Spain.

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Siła roślin w twórczości Miguela de Cervantes

Jadwiga Clea Moreno-Szypowska

Modern medicine, Volume 30 (2024) Supplement I, 2024, pp. 479-506

https://doi.org/10.4467/12311960MN.24.029.20022

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra has been associated with medicine since his very birth in Alcalá de Henares, in a house adjacent to the hospital where his father worked. From him, the future writer inherited an extensive library, in which a prominent place was occupied by the work De Materia Medica by Dioscorides, translated and completed by Andrés Laguna, a prominent physician and botanist, the initiator of the establishment of the first botanical garden in Spain. Thus, from his youth, the author of Don Quixote had the opportunity to learn in detail about the healing effects of plants. It was not only his background that influenced Cervantes’ interest in herbalism in the broadest sense, for his works present a full cross-section of the society of the time, which had no shortage of folk “miracle workers” practicing magic with the help of herbs. Fearing the Inquisition – particularly interested in combating practices that were considered to be deviant from the prevailing faith – the author of Don Quixote avoided naming the plants that his characters used in various ointments and decoctions in his works, lest it be assumed that he himself possessed some “secret”, i.e. forbidden, knowledge. However, the mere description of their “bizarre” behavior is enough for specialists to determine the ingredients of the stimulants, in which hallucinogens such as black loosestrife (Hyoscyamus niger), medicinal verbena (Verbena officinalis) and poppy (Papaver somniferum) predominated. This fact sheds new light on many of the heroes of Cervantes’ works, who, considered madmen or witches in their time, were in fact drug addicts. It is noteworthy that magic in the popular imagination of Cervantes’ time, was associated with a socially excluded group of descendants of converted Jews and Moors, from such families also came mostly doctors, like the writer’s father. This work focuses on presenting the nontherapeutic use of plants in selected works by Spain’s most prominent writer.

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Oddany rycerz Zifar jako wierny Hiob. Zestawienie Libro del caballero Zifar (Księgi rycerza Zifara) z Księgą Hioba

Jadwiga Clea Moreno-Szypowska

Terminus, Volume 27, Issue 4 (77), 2025, pp. 419-436

https://doi.org/10.4467/20843844TE.25.021.22949

During the time of the first crusades, when knighthood was being established, a knight seemed to be a model of a successful man who achieved the desired wealth and fame through his military service. In reality, however, the hard and dangerous yet poorly paid fight for foreign rulers often meant that they lived in poverty, making tchem similar to Job, who asked: ‘His days like a hired‑hand’s day?’ (Job 7:1). Perhaps it was precisely to revive the idealised image of the knight and encourage young people to take up the sword and lance to help establish God’s justice in the world why the first romance novel was written, entitled Libro del caballero Zifar (The Book of the Knight Zifar). The protagonist, the model knight Zifar from India, is very successful on the battlefield, but suffers from a curse that kills one of his horses every ten days. Since the Spanish word for knight (caballero) is based on the word for horse (caballo), the death of his steed can be interpreted as the cyclical loss of his very knighthood. However, Zifar humbly endures the misfortune that befalls him, for ‘what was to be lost was lost, for God reclaimed it for himself, for it was his property’. The patient and humble knight is guided by Job’s maxim: ‘YHWH has given, and YHWH has taken. May the name of YHWH be blessed’ (Job 1:21). This justifies a comparison of these two characters, leading to the conclusion that the first chivalric novel in Castilian carries a similar sapiential message as the biblical text.

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Biography

Jadwiga Clea Moreno‑Szypowska is Assistant Professor at the Renaissance and Baroque Literature Department and European Literary Research Group at the Institute of Literary Research (Polish Academy of Sciences). Research interests: Biblical issues in early Spanish literature and its influence on contemporary thought; aspects of Sephardic culture in literary and philosophical texts from different centuries. Recent publications: “The Catalan Kabbalist Ezra of Gerona on the Song of Songs”, Filozofia Chrześcijańska 21 (2024); “The power of plants in the work of Miguel de Cervantes”, Medycyna Nowożytna. Studia nad Kulturą Medyczną (2024).

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Jadwiga Clea Moreno-Szypowska

Instytut Badań Literackich Polskiej Akademii Nauk

Biography

Instytut Badań Literackich Polskiej Akademii Nauk

Jadwiga Clea Moreno-Szypowska Email

Instytut Badań Literackich Polskiej Akademii Nauk

Biography

Jadwiga Clea Moreno-Szypowska