Be all that as it may, we are on firm ground when we come to the proved facts concerning the actual writing of the Spanish _Amadis_. It belongs to the years between 1492 and 1504. The first known edition, that of Rome, is dated 1519; but it is unlikely, though not impossible, that there had not been a Spanish predecessor. There is a known edition of the first of the rival _Palmerin_ series, which is dated 1511. What is beyond doubt is that its popularity was immediate and widespread. Spain produced twelve editions in fifty years. It was translated in French and Italian with immense acceptance. One of the best known stories of lost labour and disappointment in literature is that Bernardo Tasso, the father of Torquato, founded a considerable reputation on the fact that he had undertaken to make the _Amadis_ the foundation of an epic, which reputation endured until the appearance of the poem. As if in direct imitation of the mediæval custom, Amadis was made the founder of a family. Montalvo gave the world the deeds of his son Esplandian in 1526, and from another hand came in the same year his nephew, Florisando, and then a long line, reaching to the twelfth book. The succession in France was even longer, for it reached the twenty-fourth. Beside the house of Amadis, there arose and flourished the distinguished family known as the Palmerines. The first two of this series, the _Primaleon_ and the _Palmerin de Oliva_, are said to have been the work of a lady of “Augustobriga, a town in Portugal.” But her name and very existence are uncertain, while neither of the places called Augustobriga in the time of the Roman dominion in the Peninsula is in Portugal. The most famous of this line, the _Palmerin of England_, was for long attributed to a Portuguese, Francisco de Moraes, who after a rather distinguished public career was murdered at Evora in 1572; but it was probably the work of a Spaniard, Luis Hurtado of Toledo. It was the confusing habit of the authors of these tales to call them the fifth, or sixth, or other, “book” of _Amadis_, or of _Primaleon_. Sometimes rival fifths or sixths appeared, and translators did not follow the Spanish numeration. Hence much trouble to the faithful historian. Yet the family history can be followed with tolerable accuracy. Don Pascual de Gayangos has been at the pains to make a regular pedigree for both, showing the main lines and collateral branches. It is a satisfaction to be able to state with confidence that the lady Flérida, daughter of Palmerin de Oliva, married Don Duardos (Edward), son of Frederick, King of England, and of a sister of Melèadus, King of Scotland, and that Palmerin of England was their son. He again married Polinarda, and was the father of Don Duardos de Bretaña II., who was the father of Don Clarisel. The _Palmerin_ series, by the way, is much less rich than the _Amadis_ in those superb names which are not the least of the pleasures of the Tales of Chivalry.