History Literature / Alatriste

** The series repeats over and over the notion that the Battle of Rocroi was Spain's final defeat in the international landscape and the end of the dominance of the ''Tercios''. This idea is popular and can be found in many textbooks, but it doesn't hold any more water that the pop belief that the [[UsefulNotes/AngloSpanishWar15851604 Spanish Armada]] marked the fall of Spain against England. While Rocroi was decidedly a serious blunder, with a lot of symbolic value for France because it was the first time in centuries that they scored a big, direct win over Spain, it was not the utter annihilation Íñigo describes and did not even change the course of the war, with Spain returning the favor quickly with a crushing victory in Tuttlingen. The true end of their dominance would not come until around fifteen years later.

At one time it was reported that two more books were planned, named ''Alquézar's Revenge'' and ''Mission in Paris'', the latter being presumed to be set against the backdrop of the 1643 Battle of Rocroi [[spoiler:and culminate with Alatriste's death]]. The series is in effective hiatus however, with Pérez-Reverte being devoted to the wartime spy fiction series ''Falcó'' and standalone projects like ''Film/Gold2017'' and ''Sidi''. He has not discarded resuming the series but it's clear that he doesn't promise to do so.

** The first novel is impliedly set in 1623, a period in which the president of the Spanish Inquisition was Andrés Pacheco de Cárdenas. His replacement by Emilio Bocanegra is definitely a case of making history DarkerAndEdgier, Cárdenas was a known philanthropist and lived in an era where he never had to sign a single death sentence, very far from the book's SinisterMinister (and he was a Franciscan, an order that has a much better reputation than Dominicans in pop culture).

** íñigo claims that UsefulNotes/FernandoAlvarezDeToledoYPimentel and UsefulNotes/AlexanderFarnese were huge hypocrites that disdained their own troops. The reader has no reason not to consider it true in the story (or at least Íñigo's own subjective opinion in-universe), but it doesn't stop being a rather arbitrary artistic license for two generals that owed much of their successes to their high leadership skills.

* BolivianArmyEnding: In the movie, and confirmed by WordOfGod for the books. It's just that the author has not bothered to write the scene down yet.

* CompressedAdaptation: The movie is mostly a cut-and-paste job of elements from all the books. Which means that unlike in the individual books (which all had interesting plots), we don't actually get an engaging plot, just a selection of set pieces (as if the movie was a series of illustrations for the novels).

* HomageShot: In the movie, the scene of the surrender of Breda is modelled after Velazquez's famous painting.

* SuspiciouslySmallArmy: In the movie. All we see of the battle of Rocroi is about a dozen Spanish foot soldiers and twice as many Frenchmen on horses.

There is also a movie, starring Creator/ViggoMortensen, that tries to condense the nine plots all at once. A [[Series/{{Alatriste}} TV series adaptation]] aired in early 2015, flopping notably.

-->''"He was not the most honest man, nor the most pious, but he was a brave man."''\\
- '''Íñigo de Balboa''', ''The Adventures of Captain Alatriste''

** Gualterio Malatesta counts as well. He is insistently presented as sneaky, malicious, and even sadistic, but his goals aren't much more evil than Alatriste's, as he is another hired gun who simply follows what his recruiter (who most of the time happens to be the BigBad) orders him.

** The first novel is impliedly set in 1623, a period in which the president of the Spanish Inquisition was Andrés Pacheco de Cárdenas. His replacement by Emilio Bocanegra is definitely DarkerAndEdgier, as Cárdenas was a known philanthropist that never signed a single death sentence, far away from the book's SinisterMinister (and he was a Franciscan, an order that has a much better reputation than Dominicans in pop culture).

%%* BeardOfEvil: Alquézar.

''The Adventures of Captain Alatriste'' is a series of HistoricalFiction novels written by Creator/ArturoPerezReverte starring a Spanish soldier-turned-mercenary-turned-sword-for-hire, the titular Diego Alatriste y Tenorio (who was never an actual Captain in the Army, [[NonIndicativeName but was called that way]]). Alatriste is a veteran of the [[UsefulNotes/TheEightyYearsWar Flanders War]] who lives badly in 17th-century Europe, looking for shady jobs and sometimes being led to international conspiracies involving the Spanish Crown and the Inquisition. At the same time, Alatriste trains a squire, Íñigo de Balboa, the orphan child of an old friend; Íñigo serves as the narrator of the story. The series includes adventures and noir in a well-researched historical setting.

At one time it was reported that two more books were planned, named ''Alquézar's Revenge'' and ''Mission in Paris'', the latter being presumed to be set against the backdrop of the 1643 Battle of Rocroi [[spoiler:and culminate with Alatriste's death]]. The series is in effective hiatus however, with Pérez-Reverte being devoted to the wartime spy fiction series ''Falcó'' and standalone projects like ''Film/Gold2017'' and ''Sidi''. He has not discarded resuming the series but is clear that he doesn't promise to do so.

** The first novel is impliedly set in 1623, a period in which the president of the Spanish Inquisition was Andrés Pacheco de Cárdenas. His replacement by Emilio Bocanegra has also vibes of HistoricalVillainUpgrade, as Cárdenas was a known philanthropist that never authorized a single death sentence, far away from the book's SinisterMinister (and he was a Franciscan, an order that has a much better reputation than Dominicans in pop culture).

* HistoricalVillainUpgrade: Zig-zagged in the case of Olivares. He's a shrewd, ruthless politician with his hands stuck in literal conspirations, but his goals aren't particularly villainous and he never goes out of his way to do anything evil. Alquézar and Bocanegra, on the other hand, are straight examples.

* NoHistoricalFiguresWereHarmed: María de Castro is a rather obvious stand-in for the Golden Age actress [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Calderon María Calderón]] with a few changes for story purposes. The book mentions María Calderón as her successor in the Spanish theatre.

* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed:
** María de Castro is a rather obvious stand-in for the real actress [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Calderon María Calderón]] with a few changes for story purposes. Ironically, the book mentions María Calderón as her successor in the Spanish theatre.
** The fourth book presents a character known as Eslava, the "Galán de la Alameda", an obvious nod to modern, real life Spanish writer Juan Eslava Galán, who is a friend of Pérez-Reverte. Another mercenary is a Portuguese named Saramago, a reference to writer Creator/JoseSaramago, who once asked jokingly Pérez-Reverte to write him into a novel.

At one time it was reported that two more books were planned, named ''Alquézar's Revenge'' and ''Mission in Paris'', the latter being presumed to be set against the backdrop of the 1643 Battle of Rocroi [[spoiler:and culminate with Alatriste's death]]. The series is in effective hiatus however, with Pérez-Reverte being devoted to the wartime spy fiction series ''Falcó'' or standalone projects like ''Film/Gold2017'' and ''Sidi''. He has not discarded resuming the series but is clear that he doesn't promise to do so.

''The Adventures of Captain Alatriste'' is a series of HistoricalFiction novels written by Creator/ArturoPerezReverte starring a Spanish soldier-turned-mercenary-turned-sword-for-hire, the titular Diego Alatriste y Tenorio (who was never an actual Captain in the Army, [[NonIndicativeName but was called that way]]). Alatriste is a veteran of the [[UsefulNotes/TheEightyYearsWar Flanders War]] who lives badly in 17th-century Europe, looking for shady jobs and sometimes being lead to international conspiracies involving the Spanish Crown and the Inquisition. At the same time, Alatriste trains a squire, Íñigo de Balboa, the orphan child of an old friend; Íñigo serves as the narrator of the story. The series includes adventures and noir in a well-researched historical setting.

Seven books have been published so far, with two more in the making:

* ''Corsairs of the Levant'' (2008): Alatriste and Íñigo join the galleys of the Levant in their struggle against the Ottoman Turks, leading them to an adventure all over the Mediterranean. (Published in English as ''Pirates of the Levant''.)

* ''Alquézar's Revenge'' (unreleased)
* ''Mission in Paris'' (unreleased): Presumed to be set against the backdrop of the 1643 Battle of Rocroi [[spoiler: and culminate with Alatriste's death]]

** In terms of skill, Alatriste is the best swordman in the series, to the extent that he can hold his own against five [[EliteMook Elite Mooks]] at once and even defeat Malatesta in a few moves after battling an entire night. He only gets in danger when outnumbered or disabled, and he still always finds a way out.

* ArcWords: The book series's most famous quote is ''¡No queda sino batirnos!'' (''There's no choice but to fight!''). Contrary to popular belief, this is not Alatriste's CatchPhrase, but a statement uttered by a drunk Quevedo in the first pages of the series. It doesn't fully becomes a recurrent quote either; if the quote comes up, odds are that it is said as a resigned IronicEcho or a FlashbackToCatchphrase.

* CatchPhrase: Subverted. As said above in Arc Words, the identification of "There's no choice but to fight" to Alatriste or Quevedo is superficial at the best, being said by the former and rarely used again. (If Alatriste had something resembling a catch phrase, it woud be depressed silence.) However, it does synthesize pretty well the universe's philosophy: if Quevedo is saying it, Alatriste is probably thinking it too.

** María de Castro is a rather obvious stand-in for the real actress [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Calderon María Calderón]] with a few changes for story purposes. Ironically, the book mentions María Calderón as her sucessor in the Spanish theatre.

* SuspiciouslySmallArmy: In the movie. All we see of the battle of Rocroi is about a dozen Spanish foot soldiers and twice as many Frenchmen on horse.

* BadassMustache:
** Just look at the image, damn it! Iñigo laments in an aside his lifelong inability to grow one nearly so magnificent as Alatriste.
** The Count-Duke of Olivares sports a fiery mustache too (as [[http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Conde-Duque_de_Olivares.jpg he did]] in RealLife).

* EvilCounterpart: Gualterio Malatesta is basically Alatriste without his ScrewTheMoneyIHaveRules part. Not what Malatesta thinks, though; he believes they are both NotSoDifferent.

* NotSoDifferent: Malatesta invoke this towards Alatriste, and the latter sometimes agrees.