ESPINEL, VICENTE MARTINEZ Span ish poet and novelist. Expelled from the University of Sala manca in 1572, he served as a soldier in Flanders, returning to Spain in 1584 or thereabouts. He took orders in 1587, and four years later became chaplain at Ronda, absented himself from his living, and was deprived of his cure ; but his musical skill obtained for him the post of choirmaster at Plasencia. His Diversas Rimas (1591) are undeniably good examples of technical accomplish ment and caustic wit. Espinel, however, survives as the author of a clever picaresque novel entitled Relaciones de la vida del Escudero Marcos de Obregon (1618), from which Le Sage has not scrupled to borrow many of the incidents and characters in Gil Blas. Espinel also revived the decima known as espinela, a stanza of ten octosyllabic lines.