Examen de ingenios para las sciencias. Compuesto por I. Huarte de san Iuan; Agora nueuamente emendado por el mismo autor, y añadidas muchas cosas … Medina del Campo: C. Lasso y F. Garcia, a costa de M. Martinez, 1603. Title-page. Classmark: F160.e.8.5

One the most important early modern European treatises devoted to the theme of ingenuity is this book on the left: Examen de ingenios para las ciencias, written by the Spanish physician Juan Huarte de San Juan (1529-1588) and first published in 1575 [the title-page shown here belongs to a later edition].

Drawing on a number of medical and philosophical ideas -from the ancient theory of humours to contemporary debates on faculty psychology- the Examen is an attempt to survey and classify human ingenuity with a particular social and political aim: to organise society in such a manner that individuals are assigned the professions that are best suited to their abilities. Huarte de San Juan discusses how factors such as temperament, age, diet or climate determine these abilities, by examining, among other effects, the influence that the four primary qualities -heat, cold, dryness and moisture- have on the body.

As it has long been claimed, Cervantes must have known the Examen well. In fact, it has been argued that the characterization of Don Quijote as “ingenioso” might have been inspired by Cervantes’ reading of this treatise. Certainly, Huarte de San Juan provides a medical framework that would account for many of Don Quijote’s features as a character. Take, for instance, the description of Alonso Quijano’s symptoms at the very beginning of the novel: excessive reading and lack of sleep have caused the hidalgo’s brain to dry, with the subsequent alteration of his mental faculties and the loss of judgment. Psycho-physiological considerations of this kind lie at the core of Huarte de San Juan’s argument. In line with other treatises of the period, the Examen also discusses how ingenious individuals are particularly associated with certain humours and complexions, e. g. the choleric and, specially, the melancholic -whose traits Don Quijote displays throughout the novel.