‘There are two kinds of lineage in this world’, Don Quixote told Sancho Panza, ‘those that sprang from princes and monarchs, and that time has gradually destroyed … and others that began with low-born people, and have prospered little by little’. But if many could agree with the knight of La Mancha that virtue was to be found even in men of obscure parentage, there was an increasing trend around this time to seek for it a more secure foundation. Much commentary on the ills of society had as its target the blurring of ranks, the rise of new men, the disintegration of the Christian commonwealth through selfishness. This is an age of iron, wrote Suárez de Figueroa in 1617: ‘no longer can a man count on his friends, no longer on true counsel, no longer on good will. All has become lies, all fair-seeming, all love of the self.’ The growth of cities in particular had contributed to this outcome, where one had to judge a man by his traje (costume) rather than his linaje (family background). As part of the restoration of the age of chivalry, from which he hoped would flow great benefits for Spain, the Benedictine monk Juan Benito Guardiola, urged that greater attention be paid to lineage when promoting men to positions of honour and leadership. For coming of a noble family ‘is important as a stimulus to acts of heroism, famous achievements and feats of arms worthy of enduring memory’.