Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Royal Commissar of Supplies in the Ducal Town of Osuna (1593)

Abstract

The recent discovery among the notarial protocols of the Provincial Historical Archive of Seville of a new and unpublished Cervantine document, granted in the Sevillian capital on March 11, 1593 and linked to the novel commission that Cristóbal de Barros, the first general supplier of the Navy of the Guardia de las Indias, commissioned Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra on February 21 of that same year for the collection of supplies, would confirm a fact that some of the most distinguished Cervantes biographers had always assumed but could never corroborate documents: Miguel de Cervantes’ personal stay in the ducal town of Osuna. In this way, we would fulfil the dream of Francisco Rodríguez Marín, the famous Cervantist who dedicated most of his life to search for some documentary proof that would demonstrate the real presence of the author of Don Quixote in Osuna and thus justify the mentions that Cervantes made of it, its dukes and it vilified University in his most universal literary work.