El libro de buen amor was written by Juan Ruiz in the 1300s. The exact year he wrote it is thought to be 1330, but this has not been proven. This is Juan Ruiz’s only book and his full title is the “Archpriest of Hita”. He lived during the struggle between a Christian and Moorish Spain. El libro de buen amor is one of the longest poems of the style ‘Clerical Art’, and it has 1,728 strophes. The style he used is characterized by the presence of strophes with four verses with consonantal rhyme. Most people assume that this is an autobiographical work about Juan Ruiz’s life, though this has not been confirmed. El libro de buen amor was written in the 14th century, which was a time of conflict between the Christian and Moorish forces during the Middle Ages.
The Middle Ages in Spain lasted from about the year 500 to 1492. Throughout this time, Spain went through many conquests from various groups of people. From Germans to Muslims, attempted conquering of Spain occurred many times during this period. Spanish history began with the Iberian Kingdom having control of the land. This kingdom belonged to the Arianist Visigoths, who were later converted to Catholicism with their king Reccared during the first century B.C. Muslim forces from Northern Africa, especially the Muslim Umayyad dynasty ignited a Muslim versus Christian war, which is known as the Reconquista, also known as the Reconquest. Christian and Muslim groups struggled for a long time and the border between the Christian and Muslim states changed constantly due to the fighting between them. Ultimately, Christian forces prevailed, and Spain is primarily Christian today.
There were also many dynastic struggles that were caused in part by differences in religion. However, there were also dynastic struggles within Spain’s Christian states. For example, the Crown of Aragon and Castile-León had many struggles against one another, in part due to dynastic rivalries. They were also sometimes caused because of disagreements over plots of land conquered or planning to be conquered in the south of Spain that was primarily Muslim.
Most people assume that El Libro de Buen Amor is an autobiographical account of Juan Ruiz’s life, but there is actually no supporting evidence for this claim. There are copies of a document that mentions Juan Ruiz but uses a different last name for him. This document consists of a dispute between the archbishop of Toledo and some parish priests from Madrid. The dispute refers to matters of penance within the church. There was a rebellion being planned, so the archbishop was trying the avoid that rebellion at all costs. The argument went on for many years but was finally resolved thanks to the decision of the canon of Segovia, which was witnessed by the Archpriest of Hita, or Juan Ruiz.
During this time, there was a lot of drama within the church. Different types and levels of priests were arguing over what each had the power to do. Many cases were seen by the papal court, including the priests from Madrid mentioned above, that eventually were excommunicated due to not following court protocol in a timely manner. Again, there were many conflicts not only across religions like Christianity and Islam, but even within Christianity itself. Many people and groups were excommunicated if they didn’t follow the church’s many strict rules. Juan Ruiz helped settled some of these disputes, by being a witness during the trial. This is where historians first see his name in any historical documents. Since his name is included, historians believe he was a real person, but are not completely sure about whether his stories in El Libro de Buen Amor are all actually true and are about him.
Assuming it was an autobiographical account, this would mean that Juan Ruiz studied in theology and science at Toledo and likely knew Arabic due to Moorish control over parts of Spain, Medieval Spanish, and Latin. During this time, many Spaniards learned Arabic due to Moorish control of parts of Spain. Due to his intellectual background, Ruiz likely studied many of the literary works of his time. This leads historians to believe that he may have fictionized parts of his story, using popular literary practices of the time.
Going off the story in El Libro de Buen Amor, Juan Ruiz was first awarded a bureaucratic position in the diocesan curia. Later he eventually worked as a personal secretary to Don Gil de Albornoz, Archbishop, and later Cardinal, of Toledo. Because of his background in this work he was later awarded the prestigious title of Archpriest of Hita, a very small, but also significant town on the border of Christian and Arab towns.
Based on both historical events and on the content of his book, historians believe that many parts of El Libro de Buen Amor are actually true and plausible for this time period. For example, El Libro de Buen Amor says that Juan Ruiz spent time in Alcalá, which would make perfect sense, because that is where many of the trails happened between members of the church. Alcalá was the second archiepiscopal town of the diocese, second only to Toledo. Due to this fact, archbishops went there quite often, thus it’s very plausible that Juan Ruiz would have spent plenty of time in Alcalá. Juan Ruiz also mentioned various other members of the church, from Ferrán García, who was Gutierre Gómez’s messenger to other members of the Madrid clergy. He wanted readers to recognize these names to create a stronger belief in the readers that this was an autobiographical account of Juan Ruiz.
Also, Ruiz employed many different styles of poetry in his work. Some mimics the structure of refrains found in the Bible, poetic forms introduced to Spain by Arabs, and even less sophisticated poetry styles that contained a varying number of syllables. Ruiz strategically uses these different styles to speak about people of different social classes. This story follows Ruiz as he tries to make love connections, of which there are ten. He also explains how one’s zodiac sign affects his love life. This was also a time of transition from long and complicated epic poetry to the types of literature that have origins in French and Italian.
Juan Ruiz employed unique strategies in his writing. Unlike most poets of his time, Juan Ruiz included specific details about the human bodies and their functions of his characters. El Libro de Buen Amor includes small, but significant descriptions of the color, the sounds, the scents, and the humor of life in medieval Spain. These descriptions do a lot to set El Libro de Buen Amor apart from other works of the time. He even brings into El Libro de Buen Amor the practice of really paying attention to and following astrology and star signs, that our modern culture often takes very lightly and even jokes about.
All in all, while we are not one hundred percent certain about the existence and life of Juan Ruiz, it is a concrete fact that El Libro de Buen Amor has done a lot to show the transition of older types of literature to more modern styles. Also, it was clearly heavily influenced by the culture of religion in the Middle Ages. Being Christian, Juan Ruiz gave an intimate look into the strict and complicated religion practices and rules of the time. It brings to the literature of the time, a new perspective about the religious beliefs and the philosophical beliefs of the time. Finally, one of the most striking things about El Libro de Buen Amor is the honesty of Juan Ruiz as he recounts his various tales of failed love while also trying to navigate life in Spain during the fourteenth century.
References:
Destephano, Mark. “Juan Ruiz and the Ultimate Reality and Meaning of Buen Amor.” Ultimate Reality and Meaning, vol. 28, no. 3, 2005, pp. 175–200.
Hernández, Francisco J. “‘ La Coronica.” Classical and Medieval Literature Criticism, edited by Jelena O. Krstovic, vol. 66, Gale, 2004. Literature Resource Center