The Land of the Vandals Yields
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" Ajuda-o seu destino de maneira Que fez igual o efeito ao pensamento, Porque a terra dos Vândalos fronteira Lhe concede o despojo e o vencimento. Já de Sevilha a Bética bandeira E de vários senhores num momento Se lhe derriba aos pés, sem ter defesa Obrigados da força Portuguesa.
His destiny helps him so well that the outcome matched the plan exactly, for the bordering land of the Vandals hands him both the plunder and the victory. Already the Baetic banner of Seville, and the banners of assorted lords, are thrown down at his feet in a single moment, with nothing left to defend them, forced under by Portuguese strength.
After Aljubarrota, Nuno Álvares Pereira carries the war across the border into Castilian Andalusia. Here the raid succeeds exactly as he had planned it, and Seville's banner goes down with the banners of lesser lords.
The stanza reports a raid going right. Nuno Álvares crosses into Andalusia after Aljubarrota, and Camões measures the success by a single line: the effect came out equal to the thought. Banners drop, spoils change hands, and the whole thing takes one moment.
What a first reader misses is the grammar doing the work. Nobody in this stanza acts except destiny and the land itself — the destiny helps, the land concedes, the banner throws itself down. Nuno Álvares appears only as "lhe" and "pés," a pronoun and a pair of feet. The victory is staged as something the world hands over rather than something a man takes, which is how Camões keeps praising the House of Aviz without having to describe the actual work of burning Castilian towns.
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