“Tan lejos de mi tierra...”: Note on Garcilaso's Homeric Model

Abstract

This brief essay aims to shed some light on possible Homeric echoes of the final clause of Garcilaso de la Vega’s XVIth sonnet, “Para la sepultura de don Hernando de Guzmán”. By analysing some passages of the Iliad and of the Odyssey, their XVth century translations and some poetic epitaphs which were composed in the circle of Janus Lascaris, we show how Garcilaso recovers a poetic formula which had a long tradition and makes use of it in order to produce a final effect full of antique resonances.