Sancho Panza governs Barataria for ten days.
The governorship is one of the great comic episodes in Part II of Don Quixote. A duke and duchess, amused by the first part of the novel, pretend to reward Sancho with an island called Barataria. It is not a real independent island but a staged fiefdom, and the surrounding officials are instructed to play along with the joke.
Sancho surprises the household by handling disputes with practical judgment and earthy common sense. He hears cases involving contradictory claims, dishonest traders and local quarrels, often reaching decisions more sensibly than the learned men who expected him to fail. His rule is nevertheless made miserable by Doctor Pedro Recio, who keeps him from eating by insisting that nearly every dish is medically dangerous.
After a fake night attack, Sancho is crushed between shields and exhausted by the responsibilities of office. He resigns and returns to Don Quixote, saying that in the ten days he held the government he learned that he would not want to govern even the whole world. The episode contrasts bookish theories of rule with lived wisdom.