Note 69 — Chapter V · LA ARAUCANA

Figueroa’s book was published in 1613, and was republished in the Colección de historiadores de Chile, Santiago de Chile, 1864; see Barros Arana’s Introduction to the fifth volume of this collection, also Obras completas, VIII, 210.

Figueroa was born in Valladolid in 1578. In his book El pasajero he narrates the varied vicissitudes of his early life. His father was a lawyer whose family was from Galicia. Envious of the special attention shown his brother and probably for other reasons, he left his home at the age of seventeen, wishing to go to Italy, and expressing in the presence of his parents his determination not to return to Spain while they lived. He studied at Bologna and was there granted an academic degree. From the governor of Milan he obtained the post of auditor of a body of troops operating in Piedmont against France. After the death of his brother and his parents he returned to Valladolid, where instead of an inheritance he found debts and more debts. In Cuellar, as the result of a quarrel, he “was accused of homicide, and long days of imprisonment followed.” He subsequently visited Ubeda, Jaén, and Granada. “Here,” to quote from El Pasajero, “I became desperately enamoured of a rich and noble lady, an only daughter, much courted by suitors, but in spite of my humble condition I knew how to make myself accepted. Her unexpected death caused in me such a sentiment that again I saw myself at the point of death.... From Granada I went to Seville, and at Santa María I began a true friendship with Luis Carrillo. I went then to Madrid, where I took my pen, and wrote a number of borrones, which the learned with great courtesy honoured.... Tired of life in Madrid, I embarked a second time for Italy from Barcelona.... This time I had not the least sentiment in abandoning my native soil, where my childhood had been nourished, my boyhood and youth had received training and education, as the first time, thinking that to the brave any part of the world might serve as a country and a home.”—Quoted by Medina, Lit. col. de Chile, II, 205-208.

The later years of his life Figueroa spent in the public service, particularly in Naples under the viceroy, as auditor; later he was in the department of justice, where his prompt and severe judgments helped very materially to curb the unruly population. The time of his death does not appear to be surely determined. Opinions range over at least three years, 1616, 1621 and 1624.

The prominent position held by La Araucana in the colonial literature of South America has made it the subject of extensive comment. References here may be limited to Jean Ducamin’s critical examination of some parts of the poem, published at Paris in 1900; Colección de los mejores autores españoles, tomo XXI; Medina, Historia de la literatura colonial de Chile, I, 1-117; Barros Arana, Obras completas, VIII, 174-184; Ticknor, History of Spanish Literature, New York, 1849, II, 426-432; and especially the noteworthy publication by José Toribio Medina embracing in five volumes the life of Ercilla, the text of La Araucana, and notes, documents, and illustrations, Santiago de Chile, 1910-1918.