between Reason and the Seven Deadly Sins, represented
as seven faces of Will, the work leaves off at Stanza
106, during the debate between Reason and Anger. An
indication of the work’s reception in its own time are the
continuations of it written by Gómez Manrique, Pero
Guillén de Segovia, and Fray Jerónimo de Olivares.
Mena’s earliest prose work is probably his com-
mentary to the Coronación. There he cultivates sev-
eral styles, ranging from elaborate Latinate through
simpler narrative to direct didactic. The Ilias latina is
his translation of an abridged version of the Homeric
epic in 1,070 Latin hexameters. Tratado de amor, in
relatively straightforward didactic style, reveals some
of the author’s subtle humor as he concentrates on “el
amor no líçito e insano” and devotes almost equal atten-
tion to that which engenders it as to that which repels
it. Tratado sobre el título de duque purports to trace the
origins, rights, privileges, insignia, and prerogatives of
dukes but serves as a vehicle for the poet’s praise of the
duke of Medina Sidonia and count of Niebla, Juan de
Guzmàn, to whom it is dedicated. In his brief prologue
to Alvaro de Luna’s Libro de las virtuosas e claras
mugeres, Mena renders thanks at the behest, he says, of
many well-born ladies to Alvaro for his defense of their
honor; fi nally, the fragmentary Memorias de algunos
linages antiguos é nobles de Castilla are brief sketches
of the historical and geographical origins of fourteen
lineages, including his own.
Mena’s works—particularly the Laberinto—were
well known to his contemporaries and to posterity.
He was cited extensively by Elio Antonio de Nebrija
and Juan del Encina, annotated by Hernán Núñez and
Francisco Sánchez de las Brozas, and his infl uence can
be found throughout the sixteenth century (in Cristóbal
de Castillejo and Fernando de Herrera, for example),
and into the seventeenth (Luis de Góngora). The point
of departure for modern Mena scholarship is Lida de
Malkiel’s monumental study (1950).
See also Luna, Álvaro de
Further Reading
Deyermond, A. D. “Structure and Style as Instruments of Propa-
ganda in Juan de Mena’s Laberinto de Fortuna,” Proceedings
of the Patristic, Medieval, and Renaissance Conference 5
(1980), 159–67.
Gericke, P. O. “The Narrative Structure of the Laberinto de For-
tuna” Romance Philology 21 (1968), 512–22.
Lida de Malkiel, M. R. Juan de Mena, poeta del prerrenaci-
miento español 2d ed. Mexico City, 1984.
Mena, J. de. Obras completas. Ed. M. A. Pérez Priego. Barce-
lona, 1989.
——. Tratado sobre el título de duque. Ed. L. Vasvari Fainberg.
London, 1976.
Philip O. Gericke
Colbert I. Nepaulsingh
MÉZIÈRES, PHILIPPE DE (1327–1405)
Born in Mézières in Picardy, Philippe was a soldier of
fortune, then an advocate on the diplomatic and political
levels of a crusade to regain Jerusalem for Christendom.
He founded the chivalric Order of the Passion of Jesus
Christ, was chancellor of Cyprus under Peter I, was a
citizen of Venice, knew popes Urban V and Gregory XI
and was a friend of Petrarch, and served as counselor
to Charles V of France from 1373 until 1380, when he
withdrew to the convent of the Celestines in Paris. Here,
he wrote the major part of his work, in both French and
Latin prose, remaining at the convent until his death.
His fi rst known work is the Latin vita (1366) of his
spiritual adviser, Peter Thomas. He wrote on the feast
of Mary’s Presentation at the Temple, achieving celebra-
tion in the West of this originally eastern feast. Three
of his treatises depict the order he had founded: Nova
religio milicie Passionis Jhesu Christi pro acquisicione
sancte civitatis Jherusalem et Terre Sancte, extant in
two versions written in 1368 and 1384, respectively,
but copied together in the only surviving manuscript;
the Sustance de la chevalerie de la Passion de Jhesu
Crist en françois (ca. 1389–94); and the Chevalerie
de la Passion de Jhesu Crist, written in 1396 shortly
before the Battle of Nicopolis. The Livre sur la vertu
du sacrement de mariage (1384–89) contemplates the
mystical union of Christ with the church and the human
soul and includes the famous exemplum of “patient
Griselda,” translated by Philippe from the Latin of his
friend Petrarch. The Songe du vieil pèlerin, an allegori-
cal pilgrimage fi nished in 1389, points out the evils of
the world and suggests remedies. His 1395 letter to
Richard II of England urges the king to wed Isabella of
France as a means to European peace. All of Philippe
de Mézières’ major works urge the social and political
stability of Europe necessary for his long-sought but
never to be realized crusade.See also Charles V the Wise; Petrarca, Francesco;
Richard IIFurther Reading
Mézières, Philippe de. Campaign for the Feast of Mary’s Presen-
tation, ed. William E. Coleman. Toronto: Pontifi cal Institute
of Mediaeval Studies, 1981.
——. Letter to King Richard II, ed. and trans. G.W. Coopland.
New York: Harper and Row, 1976.
——. Le songe du vieil pèlerin, ed. G.W. Coopland. 2 vols.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969.
——. La sustance de la chevalerie de la Passion de Jhesu Crist
en françois: Philippe de Mézières and the New Order of
the Passion, ed. Abdel Hamid Hamdy. 3 vols. Alexandria:
Alexandria University Press, 1964–65. [Transcription of
Ashmole 813.]
——. Vita sancti Petri Thomae, ed. Joachim Smet. Rome: Insti-
tutum Carmelitanum, 1954.MÉZIÈRES, PHILIPPE DE