SOURCE: DuBois, Gene W. “The Return of Rachel and Vidas.” Hispanofila, no. 106 (September 1992): 1-8.

In the following essay, DuBois discusses the narrative shortcomings of the episode involving the moneylenders Rachel and Vidas in the Cantar de mio Cid and considers its implications for the unsatisfactory handling of The Cid's debt in the poem.

At an early point in the narrative development of the Poema de mio Cid (ll. 78-207), the poet describes in some detail how the impoverished hero, through the clever machinations of Martín Antolínez, goes about securing 600 marcos from the moneylenders Rachel and Vidas, while leaving as surety chests filled with sand. Some 1,200 lines later, near the conclusion of Alvar Fañez's second embassy to Burgos on behalf of the exiled Cid, Rachel and Vidas suddenly and quite unexpectedly reappear, demanding that the hero's outstanding debt be repaid (ll. 1431-34).

The vague nature of...