Garcilaso de la Vega was sprung from one of the noblest families of Toledo. His ancestry is illustrious in Spanish chronicles. They were originally natives of the Asturias, and, possessing great wealth, arrived at high honours under various sovereigns. One of them, by name also Garcilaso, received the name of De la Vega, in commemoration of his having slain a gigantic Moor on the Vega or plain of Granada.[14] The miscreant having attached the Ave Maria to his horse's tail, all the knights of Spain were eager to avenge the injury done to our lady. Although a mere youth, Garcilaso triumphed, and was surnamed in consequence De la Vega, and adopted for his device the Ave Maria in a field d'or. The father of the poet, named also Garcilaso, was fourth lord of Los Anos, grand commendary of Leon, a knight of the order of St. James, one of the most distinguished gentlemen of the court of Ferdinand and Isabella. His mother was donna Sancha de Toral, an heiress of a large estate in Leon,--a demesne, it would seem, where the poet passed his earlier days; for the fountain which ornaments it still goes by his name, and is supposed to be described in his second eclogue.[15] These eclogues were written at Naples; it may, therefore, be a piece of fond patriotism in the Spaniard, that attributes this description to a fountain in his native woods; but there is a pleasure in figuring the boy-poet loitering beside its pure waters, and so filling his imagination with images presented by its limpid waves and the surrounding scenery, that, in after years and in a foreign country, he could fondly dwell upon and reproduce them in his verse. Garcilaso was born at Toledo in 1503, being a few years younger than the emperor Charles V. When, on his accession to the throne, that prince visited the Spain he was called by right of birth to reign over, Garcilaso was only fifteen. We are told, however, that his skill in martial and gymnastic exercises made him early a favourite with his sovereign, and he soon entered on that warlike career destined to prove fatal to him. His poetic tastes, also, were developed while still a youth. He was passionately fond of music, and played with extreme sweetness on the harp and guitar.