Introduction

In contrast to the Petrarchan sonnets written by her contemporaries, Mary Wroth’s sonnet sequence Pamphilia to Amphilanthus pays little attention to the physical aspects of love. Some readers, notably Paul J. Hecht, do see the language of sexual desire in these poems. In general, though, the object of love (Amphilanthus) remains “distant” and “dispersed.” The action of the sonnets takes place largely within the mind of the speaker, Pamphilia. One particularly vivid example of this phenomenon is Sonnet 23, where the speaker contrasts the activities of those around her with her own thoughts of love:

In these lines, it is Pamphilia’s “thoughts,” “minde,” and “spirit” where love is concentrated. The love of the sonnets, then, is largely a love of the intellect, the emotions, and the imagination.

Pamphilia and Amphilanthus are also the main characters of Wroth’s sprawling romance, The Countess of Montgomery’s Urania. Wroth’s prose narrator is, in general, hardly more interested in the physical side of love than her poetic speaker. While illicit love affairs play a role in the romance, the major love story in Urania is a meeting of two minds. Pamphilia and Amphilanthus largely court one another intellectually; for example, Amphilanthus reads Pamphilia’s poems about her love for him (Wroth 1.320.18–32). In addition, many of their conversations are ripe with hidden meanings, as when Pamphilia wonders that Amphilanthus has changed the color of his armor so often, using the loaded term “inconstancy” to suggest that she is really asking whether his feelings for her have changed (Wroth 1.165.28). Overall, Amphilanthus is described in terms of his virtues—a typical narrative description is “all others vertues being single in them, but knit in one in him” (Wroth 1.61.1–2). Exceptions are limited to the aforementioned color of his armor when he rides in disguise (Wroth 1.165.27–28, 1.233.28, 2.193.26–27). This avoidance of the physical in Pamphilia and Amphilanthus’ descriptions may be an expression of Wroth’s overall vision for Urania, which is a highly intellectual work, leaning heavily on Wroth’s self-appointed position as the Sidney literary heir.

MARY Wroth bases her prose romance Urania (1621) and its manuscript sequel (in this essay, Urania 2) on a rich variety of sources. In addition to the Sidney family project, Arcadia, Wroth includes material from Shakespeare's plays, Spenser's Faerie Queene, and Cervantes’ Don Quixote.

Wroth also draws from less famous sources, including Margaret Tyler's Mirror of Princely Deeds and Knighthood (1578). This work is a popular translation of an even more popular Spanish romance. Josephine A. Roberts identifies Tyler as one of Wroth's sources. However, Roberts only takes the time to point out a single connection: a shared setting, “the Monastery of the River” in Hungary. Tyler features this monastery in the early part of the Mirror. A Hungarian princess named Briana lives in the monastery with her son, Rosicleer, one of the Mirror's knightly protagonists. The monastery is also an emblem for the faith, honor, and chastity that both Briana and Rosicleer display. In Urania 2, Wroth uses this setting as a retreat for the widowed queen of Hungary (Melasinda, 2.401.17). In addition, Wroth describes the monastery as “a most sweet and ever-renowned place for pleasure and Chastetie” (2.401.17–18). This description suggests that Wroth was familiar with Tyler's work and its major themes. Despite this connection between Urania and the Mirror, few scholars have gone on to explore Tyler's influence on other episodes in Wroth's romance. In fact, Tyler remains relatively unknown to many of Wroth's readers.

In this article, I examine a longer episode in Urania 2, looking for connections that demonstrate Tyler's influence. In this episode, a young prince named Clavarindo disguises himself as a lady to defeat a tyrannical enemy. I argue that this episode in Urania 2 is based on one of Rosicleer's adventures from Tyler's Mirror. Establishing Tyler's influence explains a few of Wroth's unusual narrative and stylistic choices in the Clavarindo episode. Furthermore, examining the differences between Tyler's version and Wroth's illuminates the process by which Wroth adapted her source material for Urania. Connecting these two works solidifies both Tyler's influence on Wroth and the larger chain of literary inspiration that created the early modern romance.

Tyler's Influence on Wroth's Plot and Character

Clavarindo, the protagonist of Wroth's episode, is the banished prince of Thessaly.

Introduction

MARGARET Tyler's Mirror of Princely Deeds and Knighthood, published in 1578, translates Book One of Espejo de Príncipes y Caballeros by Diego Ortúñez de Calahorra, but Tyler makes several changes and additions to the Spanish text she translates. As Joyce Boro's excellent 2014 edition details, most of these changes are in the service of Tyler's English audience, incorporating specifically English vocabulary and literary techniques as well as making English characters and settings more attractive than in the Spanish original. One particular addition, however, has remained perplexing: a standalone reference to “the Jews” that Tyler adds to a chapter title. While there are several possible interpretations of Tyler's addition here, this essay suggests that this reference alludes to the apocryphal story of Judith, with which Tyler's audience would have been familiar.

Chapter 29 of the Mirror bears the following title: “Rosicleer, in Liverba's name, slayeth Argion and removeth the Jews.” As Boro notes, “the removal of the Jews is added to the chapter title, which is very odd since there are no Jews in the chapter, or anywhere at all in the romance.” A little context for this title: in chapter 29, one of the Mirror's protagonists, Rosicleer, undertakes his first battle on his quest to become a knight. Rosicleer has grown up in a monastery and has only recently discovered his true identity as the son of the Hungarian princess Briana and a great foreign knight. In the previous chapter, Rosicleer stumbles on a valley ruled by the evil tyrant Argion; among Argion's most despicable practices is his continual demand for young women “for his carnal liking” (127.89). Liverba is one of the young women Argion requests; Rosicleer disguises himself as a woman in order to take her place, get close to Argion, and slay the tyrant.

As Boro notes, the reference to “the Jews” seems misplaced in this episode. “[R]emoveth the Jews” certainly sounds like an anti- Semitic reference, which of course cannot be ruled out given the expulsion of Jews from medieval England as well as the general rhetoric of distrust that persisted into the early modern era.

Years ago, we began a research program in the development of deliberate tactical deception because we felt that deception was central to the evolution of human social intelligence. We were also convinced that it was central to a successful social life in the modern era, particularly the ability to unmask deception masquerading as benevolence or cooperation. This is the pith of the Machiavellian Hypothesis that came to the forefront of evolutionary thinking in the 1980s (e.g., Byrne & Whiten, 1988; Humphrey, 1976). Now, 40 years later, we review the empirical case for its progressive development in children.

We view this essential question regarding the ontogeny of deception within a broader framework of interrelated questions. In his influential paper, “On the Aims and Methods of Ethology” (1963), Tinbergen gave the discipline of ethology a strong and enduring paradigm.

Introduction

WHEN Mary Wroth published The Countess of Montgomery’s Urania in 1621, she contributed to a long-running debate about the value and dangers of reading. Reading in general was often thought to be perilous, and the popular romance genre was widely viewed as dangerous for early modern readers. As Tina Krontiris notes, “Moralists and theoreticians on education almost unanimously castigated romantic literature … especially for women.” In fact, in the wake of Urania's publication, Wroth was reprimanded by one of her readers, Sir Edward Denny. Denny chastised Wroth in a series of letters, accusing her of corrupting her readers with “lascivious tales and amorous toyes” (239). Given both the early modern suspicion of reading and Denny's response, it is not surprising that Wroth also addresses the dangers of reading in her manuscript sequel to Urania. Of particular interest is an episode in which a woman named Antissia goes mad from reading too much. On its surface, this episode supports common early modern concerns about reading—and women. Antissia's madness is caused by reading and is described by other characters as a particularly feminine affliction. Furthermore, her madness manifests in the creation of poetry that other characters condemn in terms strikingly similar to those Denny used for Wroth's work. However, as I argue, beneath the surface of this episode lies a pointed critique of the belief that reading is dangerous. All of Antissia's problems arise, ultimately, not from her own choice to read certain things but from the bad reading and interpretation practiced by other characters.

Wroth's critique of poor reading in this episode draws on the literary ancestor of the reading-mad Antissia: Don Quixote. As Josephine Roberts argues, Cervantes's Don Quixote, particularly Thomas Shelton's English translation (1612/1620), significantly influenced Wroth. Don Quixote does not form the basis for many episodes in Urania. However, Roberts notes that Cervantes’s romance “guided [Wroth’s] response to a range of her more direct sources.” In other words, Cervantes's satirical perspective toward the romance genre influences Wroth's overall attitude in her work. This influence is often seen in the ironic tone that Wroth's narrator takes toward events in the tale. For instance, this narrative comment from Urania 1: “It being impossible for Knights and Ladies to travel without adventures, this befell them” (Urania 1:397.40–41).

EARLY in Christopher Marlowe's The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus, the title character admonishes himself: “Faustus, begin thine incantations / And try if devils will obey thy hest” (B 1.3.5–6). In the play, devils indeed obey Faustus—for a price. While Marlowe's play is the most famous Elizabethan portrayal of devils, it is not the only early modern work to treat devils as substantial characters. Around the time when Faustus first appeared on stage, an unlikely Marlovian counterpart was at work. Anne Dowriche, a Puritan preacher's wife, whose preface haughtily notes that “Poëtrie [has] been defaced of late so many waies by wanton vanity,” published The French Historie in 1589. This poem, in the tradition of John Foxe's Acts and Monuments, portrays the persecution of French Protestants during the Wars of Religion; Dowriche includes a remarkably vivid characterization of Satan, one that I argue can be fruitfully compared to the devils in Marlowe's Dr. Faustus.

These two authors make an unlikely pair: an obscure Puritan poet and a famously controversial playwright. Their works are in different genres, with different purposes, and, consequently, have different depictions of the devil. Marlowe's play has many devils, from Satan to lower-level minions; Mephistopheles falls somewhere in the middle of this hierarchy. Dowriche, on the other hand, focuses only on Satan himself. Marlowe's blank-verse play has frequent dialogues between Faustus and Mephistopheles; Dowriche's poem, employing the much-maligned poulter's measure, contains primarily monologues delivered by Satan to eager listeners. Marlowe's portrayal of devils is thus much more immediate and intimate, at least where the characters are concerned. While Faustus and Mephistopheles make a brief detour to interfere with the Pope's quarrel with the Holy Roman Empire, Mephistopheles is primarily concerned with Faustus's individual soul rather than with international politics. Dowriche's Satan, on the other hand, speaks most often to the heads of state in France, while Dowriche's narrator (a French exile) directly challenges England to “remaine … A Nurse to Gods afflicted flock”—i.e., persecuted Protestants (lines 97–98). In fact, Dowriche's dedication of the poem to her brother, Piers Edgecombe, a strong supporter of Protestant refugees relocating to England, suggests that Dowriche had a political as well as a religious purpose for publishing her poem. It is not surprising that two such different authors produced different depictions of the devil.