Alonzo Quixada, a middle-aged Spaniard, is so enthralled by knights' tales of gallantry, chivalry and adventure in the days of yore, that he renounces his old identity to become Don Quixote De La Mancha. Dressed in ancient rusty armor and mounted on a broken down horse, he appoints Sancho Panza, a neighboring peasant, to be his squire and believes a washerwoman to be the Lady Dulcinea, his muse.