Belerma

Also known as: Doña Belerma / lady Belerma / the lady Belerma · Role: lady and beloved of Durandarte · First appears: Part 2, Ch. 23.1

Life events

Montesinos carries Durandarte's heart to Belerma at Durandarte's request.(Part 2, Ch. 23.1 · 📍 cave of Montesinos)
- With: Montesinos Durandarte
- “he had taken out the heart of his great friend Durandarte from his breast with a little dagger, and carried it to the lady Belerma”
Merlin enchants Montesinos, Durandarte, Belerma, and Guadiana for more than five hundred years.(Part 2, Ch. 23.2 · 📍 cave of MONTESINOS)
- With: Montesinos Durandarte Guadiana
- “the sage Merlin has been keeping enchanted here these many years; and although more than five hundred have gone by, not one of us has died;”

with Durandarte (The preceding account states that Durandarte commanded Montesinos to carry his heart to Belerma.) “He said in reply that they spoke the truth in every respect except as to the dagger, for it was not a dagger, nor little, but a burnished poniard sharper than an awl.”
with Montesinos (Montesinos carried Durandarte's heart to Belerma.) “The instant he told me he was Montesinos, I asked him if the story they told in the world above here was true, that he had taken out the heart of his great friend Durandarte from his breast with a little dagger, and carried it to the lady Belerma, as his friend when at the point of death had commanded him.”
courtship with Durandarte (Durandarte's dying request to send his heart to Belerma implies their romantic attachment.) “The instant he told me he was Montesinos, I asked him if the story they told in the world above here was true, that he had taken out the heart of his great friend Durandarte from his breast with a little dagger, and carried it to the lady Belerma, as his friend when at the point of death had commanded him.”

courtship with Durandarte (Belerma is described as mourning Durandarte, her lost lover.) “the sad fate of her lost lover;”
with Montesinos (Montesinos carried Durandarte's heart to Belerma.) “I took the road to France with it, having first laid you in the bosom of the earth with tears enough to wash and cleanse my hands of the blood that covered them after wandering among your bowels; and more by token, O cousin of my soul, at the first village I came to after leaving Roncesvalles, I sprinkled a little salt upon your heart to keep it sweet, and bring it, if not fresh, at least pickled, into the presence of the lady Belerma,”
patron: Don Quixote (Belerma is explicitly described as enchanted and included among those awaiting disenchantment.) “that Don Quixote of La Mancha I mean, who has again, and to better purpose than in past times, revived in these days knight-errantry, long since forgotten, and by whose intervention and aid it may be we shall be disenchanted;”
with Durandarte (interaction) “the lady Belerma, who, with her damsels, four days in the week went in procession singing, or rather weeping, dirges over the body and miserable heart of his cousin”

Extracted from the original text of Don Quixote (Ormsby's translation). Made with Rho MD.