From the Middle Ages the occupations of a shepherd’s life had prevailed in Spain and Portugal to a greater extent than elsewhere in Europe;[58] and, probably in consequence of this circumstance, eclogues and bucolics were early known in the poetry of both countries, and became connected in both with the origin of the popular drama. On the other hand, the military spirit of such a civilization as existed in Spain down to the sixteenth century may have gladly turned away from such a monotonous exaggeration of its own character as is found in the romances of chivalry, and sought refreshment and repose in the peace and simplicity of a fabulous Arcadia. At least, these are the two obvious circumstances in the condition and culture of Spain, that favored the appearance of so singular a form of fiction as that of prose pastorals, though how much influence either exercised it may now be impossible to determine. [58] The laws of the “Partidas,” about 1260, afford abundant illustrations of the extent and importance of the pastoral life in Spain at that period, and for a long time before. On one point, however, we are not left in doubt. We know whence the impulse came that called forth such a work for the first time in Castilian literature, and when it appeared there. It was Sannazaro,--a Neapolitan gentleman, whose family had been carried from Spain to Naples by the political revolutions of the preceding century,--who is the true father of the modern prose pastoral, which, from him, passed directly to Spain, and, during a long period of success in that country, never entirely lost the character its author had originally impressed upon it. His “Arcadia”--written, probably, without any reference to the Greek pastoral of Longus, but hardly without a knowledge of the “Ameto” of Boccaccio and the Eclogues of Bembo--was first published entire, at Naples, in 1504.[59] It is a genuine pastoral romance in prose and verse, in which, with a slight connecting narrative, and under the disguise of the loves of shepherds and shepherdesses, Sannazaro relates adventures that really occurred to him and to some of his friends;--he himself appearing under the name of Sincero, who is its principal personage. Such a work, of course, is somewhat fantastic from its very nature; but the fiction of Sannazaro was written in the purest and most graceful Italian, and had a great success;--a success which, perhaps, from the Spanish connections of his family, was early extended to Spain. At any rate, Spain was the first foreign country where the Arcadia was imitated, and was afterwards the only one where such works appeared in large numbers, and established a lasting influence. [59] Ginguené, Hist. Litt. d’Italie, Tom. X., par Salvi, pp. 87, 92.