Don Quixote, Volume One characters

Appears from the start

An aging gentleman of La Mancha whose constant reading of chivalric romances convinces him to become a knight-errant. He renames himself Don Quixote, repairs ancestral armor, mounts his worn horse, and sets out to defend the helpless and win fame. His ideals can be generous, but he forces ordinary events into the patterns of his books and resists evidence that contradicts him.

Also known as Aldonza Lorenzo

Appears from the start

A farm woman from a nearby village whom Don Quixote chooses, without consulting her, as the noble lady to whom he will dedicate his adventures. He gives her the courtly name Dulcinea del Toboso and treats his imagined service to her as the foundation of his knighthood.

Appears from the start

The practical woman who manages Don Quixote's household. Alarmed by his disappearance and by the hold his books have over him, she readily supports efforts to remove the romances and keep him safely at home.

First appears in chapter 2

The proprietor of the first inn Don Quixote mistakes for a castle. Amused but cautious, he plays the part of a lord and performs a makeshift ceremony when his guest insists on being knighted, largely to send the armed stranger on his way without further trouble.

First appears in chapter 5

The village priest and an old friend of Don Quixote. Concerned that the romances have displaced his friend's judgment, he helps inspect the library and later uses stories, disguises, and staged adventures in an effort to bring the wandering knight home.

First appears in chapter 5

The village barber and friend of Don Quixote who joins the priest's attempts to cure and retrieve him. He is willing to enter the logic of the imagined adventures, adopting disguises and improvised roles when direct argument proves useless.

First appears in chapter 7

A neighboring farmer whom Don Quixote recruits as his squire by promising the governorship of an island. Sancho is illiterate, proverb-loving, attached to food and comfort, and more alert to the material world than his master. Even so, hope of advancement and growing loyalty keep him beside Don Quixote through repeated disasters.

First appears in chapter 14

A young shepherdess whose beauty attracts many suitors even though she has chosen an independent pastoral life and promised herself to none of them. After Grisóstomo dies in despair over her rejection, Marcela appears at his funeral to reject the claim that another person's desire creates an obligation to return it.

First appears in chapter 16

A servant at an inn that Don Quixote again takes for a castle. Maritornes becomes entangled in a confused nighttime encounter when the knight interprets her movements through a courtly fantasy, causing a chain of mistaken blows among the inn's occupants.

First appears in chapter 22

A clever and defiant convict being marched to the galleys. Don Quixote questions the prisoners, decides that their forced journey is an oppression he must correct, and frees them. Ginés responds to the knight's demand for tribute to Dulcinea with mockery and violence.

First appears in chapter 27

A ragged young nobleman living in the Sierra Morena, alternating between lucid grief and violent distraction. He tells of loving Luscinda and trusting his high-born friend Don Fernando, only to be betrayed when Fernando pursued her and displaced him at their wedding.

First appears in chapter 27

The noblewoman Cardenio loves. Pressured into marrying Don Fernando despite her commitment to Cardenio, Luscinda tries to resist through a concealed declaration of loyalty and then disappears from the failed wedding's aftermath.

First appears in chapter 28

The privileged younger son of a duke who befriends Cardenio and abuses that trust. After secretly promising marriage to Dorotea, he abandons her and uses his rank to pursue Luscinda, even though he knows she and Cardenio love one another.

First appears in chapter 29

A capable young woman from a prosperous farming family who was courted and secretly promised marriage by Don Fernando before he deserted her. Disguised in male clothing while searching for him, she agrees to play a distressed princess so the priest and barber can lure Don Quixote home.

First appears in chapter 41

A Spanish officer returning after years of captivity in Algiers. At the inn he recounts his military service, capture, enslavement, and escape, bringing a history of real warfare and endurance into a gathering dominated by Don Quixote's imagined adventures.

First appears in chapter 41

A young woman from Algiers who secretly seeks conversion to Christianity and arranges the captive captain's escape using money from her wealthy father's household. She leaves her home with the fugitives and reaches Spain under the name María, dependent on her companions while beginning a new life.