When I first read Gil Blas, thirty years ago, I took no great notice of its geography. I had never been to Spain then, and the place-names were just names. My experience this time around was quite different. Now I had done quite a bit of travelling around inner Spain, and I found with delight that the journeys of Gil Blas and the other characters often brought them to places I had some sort of acquaintance with: Burgos, Valladolid, Salamanca, Toledo, Aranjuez, Coria, Valencia...
Which is more acquaintance than Alain-René Le Sage ever had. He was a Breton who was scraping a living in Paris; he never went to Spain in his life. But he knew a lot of Spanish romances and novels and plays; he read all the accounts by French travellers; and, thanks especially to the Sanson family of geographers, he had maps.
This last was almost the most important thing. Most novelists, setting their story in a land they didn't know, would try to limit it to as few locations as possible, but Le Sage did the opposite. His fictional Spaniard's autobiography visits or references hundreds of Spanish locations. Gil Blas himself travels widely, especially in his younger days. And the narratives of the other characters seem almost designed to fill in the gaps on the map: for instance Don Raphael and Don Gaston in Extremadura, Laura and Scipio in Seville, Don Roger de Rada on the Andalucian coast... (It's remarkable that Gil Blas himself, born in Santillana del Mar, never again reaches the sea-coast.)
*
We slept at Duengnas the first night, and reached Valladolid on the following day, about four o'clock in the afternoon. We alighted at the inn of the most respectable appearance in the town. (Bk I Ch 16 -- Malkin's translation)
We stopped for the night at a little village between Moyados and Valpuesta; I have forgotten the name: and the next morning, about eleven, we reached the plain of Olmédo. (Bk II, Ch 9)
We all four agreed to set off in a body, and never to part company. The question was put whether we should sound a retreat on the instant, or first give a peremptory summons to a flagon of excellent wine, which brother Antony had invested by regular approaches at Cuença the day before; but Raphael, a more experienced general than any of us, represented that the first thing to be done was to render our own camp impregnable, for which purpose he proposed that we should march all night, to gain a very thick wood between Villardesa and Almodabar, where we should halt, as in a friendly country, and recruit after the fatigues of the campaign. These general orders were approved of in council. (Bk IV Ch 11)
It will be very soon four years since I left Madrid to go and see my aunt Donna Eleonora de Laxarilla at Coria: she is one of the richest dowagers in Old Castile, with myself for her only heir. ... I gave a splendid party at my aunt's country-house, in the suburbs on the side of Manroi. ... (Bk IX Ch 6)
*
Key locations in Gil Blas's own journeys are in bold.
A "league" is about three miles.
Le Sage took most of his place-names from Sanson's Atlas (1674) [SA]; see the 1863 article by Thomas Keightley. (I've tried to match these place-names to actual places on Google Maps, not always successfully.) There was an improved edition in 1696, but Le Sage didn't use it. He used the 1674 edition, which didn't show the roads. Le Sage tended to assume that places that stood in a straight line formed a good, practicable route, which was sometimes far from being the case.
Book I
Ch 1: GB born at Santillane (Santillana del Mar in Cantabria, a little to the west of Santander), and grows up in Oviedo (Asturias).
Ch 2: Peñaflor (de Grado), west of Oviedo. (GB's route from Oviedo to Astorga is shown as a straight line in SA. In fact it's an extremely circuitous route, but a credible one, skirting the Cantabrian mountains.)
Ch 3: Cacabelos.
Ch 4. The thieves' cave. (Captain Rolando.)
Ch 5. The cave. [Stories of the gang members. Madrid, Toledo, Seville.]
Chs 6-7 The cave. (GB is there six months.)
Ch 8. Ponferrada. (First expedition with the gang.)
Ch 9. Ponferrada. (Donna Mencia)
Ch 10. Back to the cave. The escape to Astorga.
Ch 11. [Donna Mencia's story. Valladolid, and the castle of the Marquis de la Guardia "near Burgos, between Grajal and Rodillas". These names are taken from SA: Grajal could be Grajal de Campos, which is in the right area though nearer to León than Burgos; and "Rodillas" might then be a rendering of Boadilla de Rioseco. Pace Henri van Laun, this "Rodillas" definitely isn't the same as the one that Scipio walks to from Toledo in Bk X Ch 12.]
Ch 12. Astorga. (GB in prison.)
Ch 13. Astorga. GB released, takes the road to
Burgos. (Le Sage took "Ponte de Mula" from
SA. The 1844
Blackwoods article identifies it as "Puenta Duro", but I can't trace that either. Maybe Puente Fitero (Itero de la Vega)?)
Ch 14. Burgos. (Donna Mencia)
Ch 15. Burgos. Meets Ambrose de Lamela and sets off for Madrid.
Ch 16. Dueñas, Valladolid. (Don Raphael)
Ch 17. Valladolid. Meets Fabricio. [Fabricio's story: Oviedo, Galicia, Palencia, Valladolid.]l Signor Arias de Londona.
Book II
Ch 1. Valladolid. GB in service to the Licentiate Sédillo.
Ch 2. Valladolid. (Doctor Sangrado, and the canon's death.)
Ch 3-5. Valladolid, in service to Doctor Sangrado.
Ch 6. Flees Valladolid (and the enraged Don Roderic), takes the road for Madrid. Meets the journeyman barber Signor Diego de la Fuenta.
Ch 7. [Signor Diego's story: Olmedo, Madrid.]
Ch 8. They reach Ponte de Duero (Puente Duero), and soon after meet the actor Melchior Zapata.
Ch 9. They spend the night at a village between Moyados [Mojados] and Valpuesta [shown in SA, but I can't match it to a real place], then proceed to Olmedo, where GB stays for a while with Signor Diego.
Book III
Ch 1. GB proceeds via Segovia to Madrid. (GB in service to Don Bernard de Castil Blazo.)
Ch 2. Madrid, where he meets Captain Rolando. [Captain Rolando's story: Mansilla, Leon, Madrid. Luceno, mentioned during this narrative, is a place-name from SA; it's been suggested that it means Luyego de Somoza.]
Ch 3-6. Madrid. (GB in service to Don Matthias de Silva.)
Ch 7. [Don Pompeyo de Castro's story: Portugal.]
Ch 8. Madrid. (Death of Don Matthias)
Ch 9-12. Madrid. (GB in service to the actress Arsenia.)
Book IV
Ch 1: Madrid. (In service to Aurora.)
Ch 2. Madrid.
Ch3. Madrid, then Aurora's "castle on the Tagus, between Sacedon and Buendia. " (Sacedón and Buendía, east of Madrid. ) Then Madrid again, then their journey towards Salamanca: Donna Elvira's castle between Ávila and Villaflor.
Ch 4. [Donna Elvira's story: The Fatal Marriage, set in Sicily.]
Ch 5. Leaving Donna Elvira. Salamanca. Aurora and Don Lewis Pacheco.
Ch 6. Salamanca, then back to Madrid.
Ch 7. Madrid. Don Gonzalez Pacheco.
Ch 8. Madrid. The Marchioness of Chaves.
Ch 9. Leaving service in Madrid; first to Toledo (his intention to make the tour of Spain), then heading for "Cuença" (Cuenca, intending to go on to Aragon); the second day, meeting Don Alphonso, then seeking shelter at a hermitage near Cuenca (meeting Don Raphael and Lamela).
Ch 10. [Don Alphonso's story: Madrid, then the Toledo road, Seraphina's house two leagues beyond Illescas, Toledo and then back to Seraphina's, Toledo and then setting off in a random direction, when he meets GB.]
Ch 11. "those who are always on the scamper see a great deal of the country", says Don Raphael. GB, Don Alphonso, Don Raphael and Lamela decamp to a spot in "a very thick wood between Villardesa and Almodabar" (Two places south of Cuenca: Villardesa = Villar del Saz de Arcas, Almodabar = Almodóvar del Pinar.)
Book V
Ch 1. [Don Raphael’s story. Madrid, then Toledo, then Alcántara (Extremadura), where he meets two naïve youths from Plasencia on a jaunt to Portugal. (When he suggests travelling with them to Almeria, I suppose he means Almeirim near Lisbon.) Robs them and heads towards Mérida. On the way he meets Moralez, who is fleeing Portalegre (in Portugal near the Spanish border); attempted swindle at Mérida, then they make for Trujillo but meet Moralez' brother on the way and join his party, who are going to serve a newly appointed governor of Mallorca. They embark at Alicante, but a storm means they have to land on the desert island of Cabrera (south of Mallorca). Don Raphael is captured by corsairs and taken to Algiers, where he lives for more than seven years and has many adventures, including meeting his mother Lucinda. [[ Lucinda's story: Madrid, Valencia. ]] He escapes, landing at Leghorn (Livorno in Tuscany); adventures in Florence, then by ship to Barcelona; Madrid, Valladolid where he makes the acquaintance of Ambrose de Lamela and they rob GB (cf Bk I Ch 16). They leave intending to go to Madrid, then change their mind and go via Zebreros (Cebreros) to Toledo, where he kills a husband and leaves. At Villarubia (Villarrubio, west of Cuenca) they hear the aftermath from a merchant on his way to Segorba (Segorbe, north of Valencia) and decide to leave the highway and go cross-country, finding the hermitage and the dying hermit (cf. Bk IV Ch 9). They take over the hermitage, Lamela sells the mules at Toralva (Torralba) and they strike up with some like-minded women (pretended religionists) at Cuenca, until a jealous rival reports their whereabouts to the authorities (hence their sudden departure from the hermitage in Bk IV Ch 11).]
Ch 2. GB and the others plan to head for Valencia via Requena, but then they rescue two noble captives from bandidos; they turn out to be Seraphina and her father the Count de Polan (cf Bk IV Ch 10). They all retire to an inn (which, contrary to Lamela's assurance that it's nearby, proves to be over two hours away).
Book VI
Ch 1. The Count de Polan and Seraphina proceed, heading for Turis (west of Valencia). GB's party, following Lamela and travelling by night, get near to Campillo (Campillo de Altobuey), rest and at nightfall continue, reaching the Valencian region the next morning, where they halt in a delightful spot with a rivulet, but stocks are low: Lamela, reprovisioning in Xelva, hears about Samuel Simon and recruits the others to fleece him. They rob him and head for Segorba (Segorbe), still travelling by night.
Ch 2. They halt in the shade of some willows near a village two leagues from Segorba. Here GB (and Don Alphonso) decide to part from Don Raphael and Lamela.
Ch 3. GB and Don Alphonso head for Valencia, intending to sail for Italy and serve the Venetian republic. At Bunol (Buñol, modern-day home of La Tomatina) Don Alphonso has a fever and is nursed by GB. Passing the nearby castle of Leyva Don Alphonso encounters his foster-father and meets his real father, Don Caesar da Leyva, whose castle this is, and also Seraphina's party. Don Alphonso marries her and GB becomes his steward. [Buñol, however, isn't on any conceivable route from Segorbe to Valencia. It looks like Le Sage mistakenly thought Segorbe lay to the west of Buñol and Llíria; compare Bk X Ch 3).] [NB There really is a Castillo de Leiva, but it isn't near Valencia; it's to the east of Burgos.]
Book VII
Ch 1. GB goes to Xelva (Chelva) and restores the stolen money to Samuel Simon (cf. Bk VI Ch 2) and then returns to the castle of Leyva, but soon reluctantly leaves his post (because of trouble with Lorenza Sephora, Seraphina's servant).
Ch 2. GB (who has a horse at this point) takes the Almansa road and travels without incident via Murcia to Grenada (Granada). He becomes literary secretary to the archbishop.
Ch 3. Grenada (Granada).
Ch 4. Grenada (Granada). GB dismissed by the archbishop.
Ch 5. Grenada (Granada).
Ch 6. Grenada (Granada). GB meets Laura again (Arsenia's maid, cf Bk III Ch 9-12). To her lover (the Marquis de Marialva) she passes him off as her brother.
Ch 7. [Laura's story. Arsenia retires to her estate in Zamora. Laura arrested then taken under the wing of the Biscayan Pedro Zendono; they flee to Braganza (Bragança in Portugal), then Coimbra. Abandoned by Pedro Zendono, Laura befriends the elderly Dorothea and travels with her to Seville, meets Phenicia there and becomes an acclaimed actress, then moves on to Grenada.]
Ch 8-10. Grenada (Granada). GB now in service to the Marquis de Marialva.
Ch 11. Warned of imminent exposure GB flees Granada with a muleteer, stays at Ubeda (Úbeda) the first night, and on the fourth day reaches Toledo, where however he learns that the Count de Polan is absent, having gone to the Castle of Leyva because Seraphina is dangerously ill. GB moves on to Madrid, thinking he might try his hand at the court.
Ch 12. Madrid. (Don Annibal de Chinchilla.)
Ch 13. Madrid. (Meets Fabricio, cf. Bk I Ch 17.)
Ch 14-15. Madrid. GB in service to Count Galiano.
Ch 16. Madrid. GB falls ill. When he recovers, he finds his master has gone back to Sicily, and most of his goods were robbed, the rest being eaten up in medical expenses.
Book VIII
Ch 1. Madrid and elsewhere. GB has a post collecting farm rents on behalf of the prime minister, the Duke of Lerma. He visits the duke's farms, and also the castle of Lerma itself when it burns down (Lerma is to the south of Burgos). Six months later GB becomes one of the duke's secretaries.
Ch 2-5. Madrid. Life at court.
Ch 6. El Escorial (45km NW of Madrid).
Ch 7. Madrid.
Ch 8. [Don Roger de Rada's story. Antequera (N of Málaga), Málaga, the isle of Alborán, Punta de Helena (E of Adra, approximately ≈ Punta Sabinar), Adra, Antequera, Madrid, Antequera.]
Ch 9. Madrid. (Fabricio.)
Ch 10-12. Madrid. (Catalina.)
Ch 13. Madrid. (GB hears of his family in Oviedo, ignores them, and quarrels with Fabricio.)
Book IX
Ch 1-2. Madrid. GB nearly married.
Ch 3 Madrid; then GB is arrested, and taken via Mancanarez (the banks of the river Manzanares) and Colmenar (Colmenar Viejo) to prison in Segovia. (It doesn't seem a very good route. They should really have taken a more westerly route to avoid the mountains between Colmenar and Segovia. But Le Sage didn't know about the mountains, and his map didn't mark roads.)
Ch 4-5. Segovia. (GB has a view of the river Eresma and the vale of Coca.)
Ch 6. [History of Don Gaston de Cogollos and Donna Helena de Galisteo. Madrid, Coria, Plasencia, Italy, Coria, Madrid. Coria is an ancient town, not in Old Castile as the text might lead you to infer but in NW Extremadura. This location is confirmed by other place-names: e.g. Galisteo, Manroi (Monroy) and Plasencia.]
Ch 7-8. Segovia. (Scipio and GB's fever.)
Ch 9. Segovia. (GB released; travelling towards Madrid with Scipio. In a month GB will be exiled from the Castiles; they plan to go to Aragon.)
Ch 10. Madrid. (GB meets Don Alphonso, who gives him an estate at Lirias (Llíria, NW of Valencia). GB is delighted, but says he must first travel to Asturias to see his family.)
Book X
Ch 1. GB and Scipio leave Madrid, initially for Valladolid via Alcala de Henares, Segovia, Peñafiel. (As many have pointed out, Alcala de Henares, NE of Madrid on the Zaragoza road, is in the wrong direction for getting to Segovia. Seemingly Le Sage misunderstood the map in SA, and thought Alcala was where El Pardo is.) In Valladolid they meet Dr Sangrado and Signor Manuel Ordonnez (Fabricio's former master).
Ch 2. They travel without incident to Oviedo (in four days). GB witnesses the death of his father, is condemned by the townsfolk for his neglect of his family, and finds his mother unwilling to leave Oviedo.
Ch 3. GB and Scipio leave, taking the Leon road, then heading for Valencia, arriving at Segorba (Segorbe) on the tenth day, then "three leagues" to Lirias (Llíria).
They arrive at GB's estate, which is by the river Guadalaviar (= Turia). [Presumably the journey is via Burgos and Zaragoza. It takes them right across Old Castile, though GB's banishment from the Castiles is surely in force by now; to be fair it was a trespass he couldn't easily avoid. As in Bk VI Ch 3 there's some awkwardness in connection with Segorbe, as if Le Sage had a mistaken idea of its whereabouts. As the crow flies it's fully 30 miles from Llíria (10 leagues rather than three) and that's only if you go straight over the Serra Calderona!]
Ch 4. GB goes to Valencia to thank Don Alphonso (now governor of Valencia).
Ch 5. Valencia. GB goes to the theatre.
Ch 6. Valencia. GB meets Lamela and Don Raphael as Carthusian monks; soon after, they abscond with the monastery's money.
Ch 7. GB returns to Lirias (Llíria). The library, reducing the household.
Ch 8. Lirias (Llíria). GB falls in love with Antonia.
Ch 9. Lirias (Llíria) and briefly Valencia. GB's wedding.
Ch 10. Lirias (Llíria). [Scipio's story. Toledo, Galves (Gálvez), back to Obisa (garbled rendering of Cobisa), Toledo, Seville, via Carmona to Cordova (Córdoba).]
Ch 11. [Scipio's story. Cordova (Córdoba), the mountains of Fesira, supposedly on the road to Mérida. (Was it a garbled version of Trassierra? Alternatively, in the Crónica of Francisco de Rades y Andrada (d. 1599), "Fesira" is recorded as the name of a Moorish fortress in the Córdoba area, destroyed in 1209.)]
Ch 12. [Scipio's story. Córdoba, Toledo, then via Rodillas (garbled rendering of Caudilla?) and Maqueda (on foot) and then Illescas (by mule) to Madrid. (Pace Henri van Laun, this is clearly a different Rodillas from the one "near Burgos" in Bk I Ch 11.)]
Book XI
Ch 1. Lirias (Llíria), Valencia. (Death of GB's wife Antonia and his son Alphonso.)
Ch 2. GB and Scipio travel to Madrid, taking less than eight days on two good horses. (GB attempts to gain favour with the new king and new prime minister, the Count d'Olivarez.)
Ch 3. Madrid. (GB in service to Olivarez.)
Ch 4-12. Madrid.
Ch 13. Madrid. [Don Gaston's story (cf Bk IX Ch 6). He leaves Madrid intending to go to Coria. After leaving Colmenar, in the mountains, he gets into a fight and is seriously wounded near Villarejo. After recovering, he proceeds to Coria. (If these common and ambiguous place-names are taken seriously there are a few possibilities on Google Maps, but none really satisfactory. Colmenar del Arroyo and Villarejo del Valle would at least be roughly in the right direction for Extremadura.]
Ch 14. Madrid.
Book XII
Ch 1. GB sent to Toledo. (The end of Don Raphael and Ambrose de Lamela; GB meets Laura again, with her "niece" Lucretia.)
Ch 2-7. Madrid.
Ch 8. Madrid. (Includes the king's journey via Aranjuez, Cuenca, and Molina de Aragon to Zaragoza, with Olivarez' delaying tactics.)
Ch 9. GB travels with the disgraced Olivarez to Loeches (a little to the east of Madrid).
Ch 10-11. Loeches. (Death of Olivarez.)
Ch 12. Loeches, then Madrid, then via Cuenca to Lirias (Llíria).
Ch 13. Lirias (Llíria). Visits to Jutella, only a mile away (this seems to be a fictional location).
Ch 14. Lirias (Llíria) and Jutella.
Labels: Alain-René Le Sage
