Kinship and polity in the Poema de mío Cid
By: Michael Harney.
Series: Purdue studies in Romance literatures ;; v. 2
Publisher: Purdue University Press
Published: 1993
Place of publication: West Lafayette, Ind
Language: eng
Number of pages: 285
Subjects: Cid, ca. 1043-1099 -- Romances -- History and criticism; Cantar de mío Cid; Kinship in literature; Social classes in literature
Description: This study of the social content of the only Spanish epic surviving in more or less complete form provides a means of assessing the motives and intentions of the protagonist and of other characters. Chapters are devoted to such themes as the significance of kinship and lineage; amity as a system of fictive kinship, personal honor, and public organization; the importance of women and the meaning and function of marriage, dowry, and related practices; the emergence of polity as the result of a rivalry of social, legal, and economic systems; and the implications, within an essentially kin-ordered world, of the poem's notions of shame, honor, status, and social inequality.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 241-266) and index.