Manfred’s daughter Matilda learns of these events and is afraid that he will marry her off against her wishes. Meanwhile, the leg of the suit of armor appears in the gallery of the castle. Nicholas she is led to safety by the peasant, who has escaped. Isabella flees Manfred and finds a secret passageway to the Church of St. He accuses the peasant of treason, then informs Isabella that he will marry her himself and divorce his wife Hippolita. A peasant reveals that the helmet belongs to a statue of Alfonso the Good, which Manfred treats as a confession of guilt. Manfred’s son Conrad is mysteriously crushed to death by the helmet of a giant suit of armor on the day he was set to marry the beautiful Isabella, stoking Manfred’s fear of the curse. Fear that this prophecy will come to pass motivates the bizarre and villainous Manfred, the Prince of Otranto, to cling to ownership of the castle at all costs. The Castle of Otranto exists under an ancient prophecy: 'the castle and lordship of Otranto should pass from the present family, whenever the real owner should be grown too large to inhabit it' (6). This study guide references the Kindle edition of Walpole’s novel. Once Walpole revealed that the work was his original writing, many readers dismissed the text as unrealistic, immoral, and absurd.

The Castle of Otranto was published at a time when the role of fiction was debated: Should it mirror real life, or should it embrace the imagination? Walpole first published the novella with a claim that it was a translated work of medieval fiction from the 11th and 12th centuries. Gothic motifs valorize medieval history and tradition. Walpole introduces Gothic elements that drive the plot, such as mysterious deaths and long-hidden secrets, and themes that reflect 18th century anxieties, including the importance of family lineage, the power of patriarchal societies, and women in servitude to their husbands. The five-chapter long novella revolves around the mysterious supernatural events at the titular castle, whose owner goes to villainous lengths to maintain control of it.

The castle of otranto sparknotes