Tamburlaine Never Fights

[shaxper]

What do you guys think about this?  He never faces off with anyone, and there are no indications that he's ever actually part of the battle.  He just shows up when it's decided and takes the crown.  If you think about it, in the begining, he won Techelles just by looking scary.  No combat was necessary.  Cosroe then joined with him simply because he also wanted a revolution in Persia.  Once he has the Persian soldiers, they do all the fighting for him.  Even when he catches Agydas trying to convince Zenocrates to hate him, instead of putting him to death or slaying him himself, Tamburlaine simply throws him a look and Agydas kills himself out of fear for a worser fate.  Tamburlaine's success throughout is based entirely upon his looks (which are constantly refered to) or the number of men that follow him (becuase of his looks).  When he tells the virgins that death sits on his sword and then tells them death has moved to the tips of his men's spears, aside from the obvious sexual connotation, the point is made (no  pun intended) that Tamburlaine's men do the killing; not Tamburlaine himself.

Is this simply done because it's hard to show violence on the stage and we're simply to assume Tamburlaine is a great warrior (though no one EVER mentions his fighting ability when reeling off long lists of praise), is Marlowe raising a point about the power of politicians and charisma, or is it simply funny?  Maybe none of the above.  What do you think?

[nolablue]

Several points:

1) If Tamberlaine actually participated in the deaths that his men inflicted, he would be horrible. It's bad enough to order the deaths (or whatever it was) of the virgins; if he actually demonstrated a desire to jump in there and rend innocent girls limb from limb personally, he would lose all pretence of heroism. His hold on nobility is tenuous enough as it is.

2) Perhaps he is being depicted as something other than mortal. Humans who want to subdue a populace go about it by getting their hands bloody. Gods who want to command obedience from humans send in fearsome messengers and death-dealers, and inspire awe through terrible looks and words.

3) Few leaders in Marlowe's time actually leapt into the fray; they hung back and gave orders, as they were too personally important to risk death on a battlefield. So perhaps Marlowe /is/ making a point about charisma. Though truth be told, of the few Marlowe plays I have read, in none of them do the heroes (or antiheroes, as it were) actually /do/ much. Look at how useless Faustus actually was.

4) Tamburlaine was a historical figure. Perhaps there is something in his legends that indicates that he was able to command people to do terrible things without actually doing terrible things himself. I don't know.

[shaxper]

I particularly like your second suggestion, Nolablue.  There does seem to be an immense amount of inhuman power in Tamburlaine's ability to control and manipulate people through appearance.