O capitâo-soldado na historiografia portuguesa de Quinhentos

Abstract

The sixteenth-century Portuguese historiography provides numerous descriptions of battles that suggest the appearance of the ideal figure of the general-soldier, figure that dates back to Homeric epic. The arrival on the scene of the general-soldieror the captain-soldier follows a well established script: fulfilling their duties as a military leader, whether before or during the battle, the captain bursts in among the soldiers, uttering one or more exhortations that seek to encourage the troops to fight. Then, as if he were a soldier, snatching a shield or a spear, he is the first one to face the enemy, an act intended to drag the dubious soldiers to combat. In these circumstances he addresses different kinds of harangues to his soldiers, usually in the form of epipolesis, pronounced on foot, on horseback or on board of a small vessel, mainly because the epipolesisis a type of speech used only by captains, and the one that best marks the heroism of the hero and the drama of battle.

Keywords

• Portuguese historiography
• sixteenth century
• captain-soldier
• epipolesis