ESPINEL, Vicente Martínez (1550-1624). Relaciones de la vida del escudero Marcos de Obregón. Barcelona: Sebastian de Cormellas, 1618. 8° (149 x 95mm). Title with woodcut male and female figures, woodcut initials, type ornaments. (Title with creases and slight soil marks, title, E4, and quire D with repaired margin, H4 and Aa4 with corner restored, L5v slightly soiled, heavy browning to Cc1.) Maroon morocco by Brugalla, 1937, gilt supralibros, gilt edges. Provenance: bought from Librería Babra, 1937, then rebound.
Probable second edition of Espinel's novel, a piracy which quickly followed its first publication in quarto by Juan de la Cuesta earlier the same year; Geronimo Margarit also published a Barcelona piracy in 1618. Lesage owed a considerable debt to Obregón's novel of misadventure which recounts the elderly hero's travels in the Basque country, Saragossa, Valladolid, Madrid and Seville, his capture by Barbary pirates and subsequent enslavement to a Valencian renegade. Espinel, also a major poet, was known among his contemporaries for adding the fifth string to the guitar. Goldsmith E-97; Palau V, 82587; cf. Salvá II, 1796.