A machiavellian envoy: the polemic figure of Gondomar as an ambassador in England

摘要

Don Diego Sarmiento de Acuña, the Count of Gondomar, was undoubtedly one of themost influential and controversial men ever seen at the seventeenth-century EnglishCourt. However, in a time when anti-Spanish views were being disseminated not only inEngland but all around the world, the Spanish ambassador’s strategic abilities would notbe commented precisely in a positive way by English people. This dissertation studiesthe process by which the Count of Gondomar was added to the Black Legend thatcirculated since the sixteenth century. By exploring Modern views on Gondomar together with Scott’s political pamphlet Vox Populi (1620) and Middleton’s play A Game at Chesse (1624), the analysis shows how a flesh and blood diplomat whose professional aim was the preservation of his home state was, mostly due to subtle propaganda, turned into nothing but an evil fictional character that incited hatred all over Europe.