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Gutierre Diaz de Gamez served as the head of Pero
Niño’s military household for almost fifty years. He began this
chronicle of his master’s deeds around 1431, presenting us with an
eyewitness account of a knight’s life, through times of war and
peace. Though full of praise for his master, who was without doubt a
successful military leader, Diaz de Gamez also shows the reality of
a knight’s existence, particularly the hardships of life on
campaign: ‘Knights who were at the wars east their bread in sorrow….
Mouldy bread or biscuit, meat cooked or uncooked, water from a pond
or a butt, poor sleep with their armour still on their backs, the
enemy an arrow-shot off….’ On the other hand, he also vividly evokes
the glories of the tournament, at which his master excelled. This is
a story full of colour, adventure and romance, and one which
deserves its place in the chronicles of chivalry. |
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Excerpt From the First Part, as Don Pero Niño, the Unconquered Knight, fights fiercely at Pontevedra:
While Pero Niño was doing among the enemies of his
lord the king as a wolf does among sheep when there is no shepherd
to defend them, it befell that an arrow struck him in the neck. He
received this wound at the beginning of the battle. The arrow had
knit together his gorget and his neck; but such was his will to a
finish the enterprise that he had entered upon that he felt not his
wound, or hardly at all; only it hindered him much in the movement
of the upper part of his body. And this pricked him on the more to
fight, so that in a few hours he had swept a path clean before him
and had forced the enemy to withdraw over the bridge close against
the city. Several lance stumps were still in his shield, and it was
that which hindered him most. […] He went forward with his face
uncovered and a great bolt there found its mark, piercing his
nostrils through most painfully, whereat he was dazed, but his daze
lasted but little time. Soon he recovered himself, and the pain only
made him press on more bitterly than ever. At the gate of the bridge
there were steps; and Pero Niño found himself sorely bested when he
had to climb them. There did he receive many sword blows on head and
shoulders. At the last, he climbed them, cut himself a path and
found himself so pressed against his enemies that sometimes they hit
the bolt embedded in his nose, which made him suffer great pain. |
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Preface
Gutierre Diaz de Gamez began writing his chronicle in 1431 and ended
soon after 1449.