Baltasar Guzmán

Baltasar Guzman was an officer in the Spanish army of the Duke of Parma, which occupied England from 1588 until 1598. Guzman was Lope de Vega's commanding officer, and though he had assigned de Vega to spend time with William Shakespeare in the Globe Theater, de Vega was unimpressed with Guzman's lowbrow literary tastes. (His servant, Enrique, on the other hand, de Vega considered formidable.)

Guzman was a devout Catholic who shared King Philip II's dream of overthrowing all the Protestant kingdoms in Europe. However, his military skill was not as grand as this ambition, and he rather foolishly ordered his squad to attack a much larger body of English rebels fighting from behind a fortified position during Robert Cecil's rebellion in 1598. Guzman was killed in this rebellion.