MEDIEVAL LITERATURE IN
BRITAIN: THE CHIVALRY
ROMANCES
Instructor: Professor Ecaterina Haniu PhD
Middle English Prose and Poetry
Middle English prose of the
13th century continued the
tradition of Anglo-Saxon
prose didactic and
directed toward ordinary
people rather than
aristocratic society.
The fact that there was no
French prose tradition was
very important to the
preservation of the English
prose tradition, formed with
the help of the story-tellers
and historians.
Poetry took a lyrical turn
under the impact of French
sources.
Several poems in early
Middle English were
preserved, offering samples
of language, philosophical
thought and artistic force.
The Orrmulum (c. 1200), a
verse translation of parts of
the Gospels, is of linguistic
(mainly phonological) and
prosodic rather than literary
interest. This collection of
homilies was written by
Orrm (or Orrmin), an
Augustinian monk of
Lincolnshire, hence the
name of the work.
The Owl and the Nightingale
Of approximately the same
date, The Owl and the
Nightingale is the first
example in English of the
debat, a popular continental
form. In the poem, the sober
owl, representing monastic
and didactic ideas, and the
merry nightingale, a free
secular spirit, debate the
virtues of their ways of life.
The allegory may represent
the argument between
asceticism and pleasure,
philosophy and art, or the
older didactic poetry and the
newer secular love poetry.
The poem can be regarded
both as an allegory and a
bestiary, specific forms
illustrative for medieval
literature.
Owl and nightingale
(Illustrations from "De arte
venandi cum avibus"
Codex Ms. Pal. Lat. 1071,
ca. 1260)
The Medieval Romance
In the 13th century
the romance, an
important continental
narrative verse form,
was introduced in
England. It drew from
three rich sources of
character and
adventure:
the legends of
Charlemagne (the
matter of France);
the legends of
Greece and Rome
(the matter of Troy
and the matter of
Rome);
the British legends of
King Arthur and the
Knights of the Round
Table (the matter of
Britain).
Charlemagne (Charles the Great) (742/747 814) was King of
the Franks from 768 to his death. Through his foreign conquests
and internal reforms, Charlemagne helped define Western Europe
and the Middle Ages. His rule is also associated with the
Carolingian Renaissance, a revival of art, religion, and culture.
Layamons BRUT
Layamons Brut, a late 13th century
metrical romance translated from
French marks the first appearance
of Arthurian matter in English.
Original English romances based
upon indigenous material include
King Horn and Havelok the Dane,
both 13th century works that retain
elements of Anglo-Saxon heroic
tradition.
The Brut is 16,095 lines long and
narrates the history of Britain. It is
largely based on the Anglo-Norman
Roman de Brut by Wace, which is
in turn inspired by Geoffrey of
Monmouth's Historia Regum
Britanniae, though is longer than
both and includes an enlarged
section on the life and exploits of
King Arthur. The rhyming style is
the alliterative verse line style
commonly used in Middle English
poetry.
New Values and Tastes
French romances were
easily accepted even on
British soil, as they
popularized ideas of
adventure and heroism
based upon new values and
tastes. New manners and
rituals, the idea of courtly
love replaced some of the
principles of the old heroic
code.
The "lovesick" knight
became a conventional
figure in medieval romance.
Typical symptoms: sighing,
turning pale, turning red,
fever, inability to sleep.
THE CHIVALRY ROMANCES
We generally define chivalry
as a system of ethical ideals
that arose from feudalism and
had its highest development in
the 12th and 13th centuries.
Chivalric ethics originated
mainly in France and Spain
but spread rapidly to the rest
of the Continent and England.
Young noblemen were taught
from early childhood the
principles of both Christian
and military morality and
conduct. Piety, honour, valour,
courtesy, chastity and loyalty
were the chief chivalric
virtues.
LAmour Courtois
The romance of chivalry had a
great importance in those days.
New ideals of life were
expressed in such literary
creations, in which the brave
knights fought for honour and
dignity, for a noble life, for a well-
respected and beloved lady.
Love, in the chivalrous sense,
was largely platonic; it was the
so-called amour courtois (courtly
love), the object of which could
be only a virgin or another mans
wife. In the romances the knight
tended to appear as the
embodiment of all human virtues,
even if in real life chivalric
conduct was never free from
corruption.
The ideal of militant
knighthood was greatly
promoted by the Crusades
and the monastic orders of
knighthood (The Knights
Templars and the Knights
Hospitalers). The virtues of
the knights could be
proved either on battlefield
or in tournaments,
according to the
complicated code of
conduct imposed at court.
The capture of Jerusalem marked the First Crusade's success
The Arthurian Cycle
The Arthurian Legend consists of a cycle of tales
(in several languages) that developed in the
Dark Ages concerning Arthur, semihistorical king
of the Britons, and his knights. The legend is a
complex weaving of ancient Celtic mythology
with later traditions around a core of possible
historical authenticity. Arthur might have been a
British king, but in time his legendary figure
faded more and more into the background, until
he finaly became the phantom monarch of an
imaginary land of fairies.
Sources
The earliest references to
Arthur are found in Welsh
sources poems (c. 600),
histories written in Latin
in the 9th and 10th
centuries, and tales in the
Welsh story collection
The Mabinogion (c. 1100).
One of the early Latin
sources, Historia
Britonum (c. 679)
mentions Arthur as the
Celtic hero of a feud with
the Anglo-Saxons, where
he was 12 times
victorious, but here he
appears as a military
leader and not as a king.
When did Arthur live?
William of Malmesbury refers to Arthur as a hero of popular
tradition, deserving to be celebrated in authentic history as well as
in fiction. The transformation of the British Arthur into a romantic
hero of European renown was the result of the contact between
British and Norman culture.
Alas for the Red
Dragon, for its end is
near. Its cavernous
dens shall be
occupied by the
White Dragon, which
stands for the
Saxons which you
have invited over.
The Red Dragon
represents the
people of Britain,
who will be overrun
by the White One..."
(Geoffrey of
Monmouth 171)
The earliest continuous
Arthurian narrative is given
in the Historia Regum
Britanniae (c. 1139) by the
English chronicler Geoffrey
of Monmouth. Here Arthur
is identified as the son of
the British king Uther
Pendragon, and his
counsellor Merlin is
introduced. The Historia
mentions the isle of
Avalon, where Arthur went
to recover from wounds
after his last battle, and it
tells of Guinevere's
infidelity and the rebellion
instigated by Arthur's
nephew Mordred.
Avalon is often equated with Glastonbury, a small town
in Somerset, England, situated 50km south of Bristol.
All later developments of the
Arthurian legend are based on
Geoffrey's work. Thus, the first
English Arthurian story, in the poet
Layamon's Roman de Brut (1205),
is an English version of Geoffrey's
Historia. Arthur is depicted as a
warrior on an epic scale and the
story of his magic sword
Excalibur, which only he could
extract from a rock, as well as the
story of the Round Table, meant
to symbolize equality is included
here for the first time.
An Arthurian tradition also
developed in Europe, probably
based on stories handed down
from the Celts, who migrated
to Brittany in the 5th and 6th
centuries. By 1100 Arthurian
romances were known as far
away as Italy. Inspired by
chivalry and courtly love, they
are more concerned with the
exploits of Arthur's knights
than with king Arthur himself. It
is surprising to notice the rapid
development of the basic story
and the way in which it
became the centre of many
gravitating stories (such as
those about Merlin the wizard,
Sir Gawain, Sir Lancelot,
Tristram, Percival and others)
that finally became part of the
Arthurian system.
Morgan le Fay
The Continental Arthurian Romances
The oldest of the French Arthurian romances is
a series of 12th-century poems by Chrtien de
Troyes.
Chrtien's work had great influence on later
Arthurian romance, particularly early German
versions, such as Erec and Iwein, by the 12th-
century poet Hartmann von Aue, and the epic
Parzifal (c. 1210), by Wolfram von Eschenbach.
By the early 13th century the story of Tristram
and Iseult (or Tristan and Isolde), from another
Celtic tradition, was added to the Arthurian
legend.
The Principal Arthurian Legends (Summary)
Arthur was the son of a Welsh
king, Uther Pendragon and was
born (just as Hercules, the hero in
the ancient Greek legend) as a
result of his fathers assuming a
false identity by means of magic.
Deep in love with Igaerne, the
Duke of Tintagils beautiful but
virtuous wife, Uther asked Merlin,
the wizard, to help him get into her
bed while her husband was
fighting against his enemies. A
magic transformation took place,
Uther came to Igaerne as the lord
of the castle and was received
with great joy by everyone, except
for Morgan, Tintagils little witch
daughter, who could be tricked
neither by the resemblance nor
the disguise.
King Uther Pendragon
The Duke was killed in battle
and Igaerne married Uther
Pendragon, without being told
the truth and without knowing
that Arthur was in fact Uthers
son. After Uthers death the
only person who was able to
extract the magic sword
Excalibur from a rock was
young Arthur, who thus
became a king. With this
magic sword and Merlins
help Arthur gained victory
after victory on many a
battlefield.
Tintagel Castle
Arthur married beautiful
Guinevere with whom he lived
happily in a castle named
Camelot. It was in the big hall
of Camelot that the king
ordered to have a Round
Table made for 150 knights.
Sitting round the table and
listening to the knights stories
was one of the kings greatest
pleasures. To have a seat
there was an honour reserved
for all those who had done
remarkable heroic deeds. The
shape of the table was
symbolic: it showed that all
the knights, the king included,
were equal and had equal
rights.
The Holy Grail
The legend of the Holy
Grail added to the cycle
new symbols regarding the
virtues of a true knight. The
golden cup in which Jesus
Christs blood was collected
could not be found but by a
knight who was pure in
body and spirit, who was
honest, faithful and brave.
The youngest of all knights,
Sir Percival, finally
manages to find the Holy
Grail, but only after having
passed through lots and
lots of adventures.
During the war against the
Roman Emperor Lucius,
Arthur and his knights
bravely defended the
independence of their
country. While Arthur was
fighting battle after battle,
the kingdom was ruled by
Morderd, Arthurs nephew
(and also, as some of the
legends suggest, Arthurs
son born from an
incestuous relationship
with his half-sister,
Morgan).
Arthur deals Mordred a mortal blow, but in return
Mordred gives Arthur a wound which proved to be fatal.
Mordred decided to get both
crown and queen, made
Guinevere his prisoner, but
Arthur returned and regained his
throne and his wife. Mordred
was killed during the fight but
Arthur was also severely
wounded. Reluctantly obeying
the Kings order of throwing
Excalibur into the waters of a
lake, Sir Bedivere was the
witness of Arthurs passing
away: he could see how the
king was taken away by a group
a fairies with whom he sailed to
Avalon, the land of the
immortals, where it was
expected that he would be
healed of his wounds and
someday return to his people.
Sir Bedivere waits with King Arthur as
the Barge to Avalon appears.
After Arthurs
disappeareance,
Queen Guinevere
went to a monastery
and became a nun,
refusing the proposal
made to her by her
fromer lover, Sir
Lancelot.
The Lady of the Lake
The stories about Sir Lancelot
are almost as numerous a
those about Arthur, making
Lancelot the most famous and
well-known of all knights. He is
presented as the son of king
Ban of Brittany, who was
kidnapped in early infancy and
then brought up by Vivian, the
Lady of the Lake, a beautiful
fairy that Merlin was in love
with. Many legends deal with
the brave heroic deeds of
Lancelot, but also with the
women in his life: Elaine, the
Lady of Astolat, mother of
Lancelots son, Sir Galahad
and Queen Guinevere, the love
of his life.
The Lady of the Lake is usually referred to
by various spellings of the names Nimue
or Vivienne.
Sir Gawain
Sir Gawain, a nephew of King
Arthur renowned for his skill
as a warrior, is also one of
the knights present in many
legends. He is often
presented as an irresponsible
person who seeks the thrill of
combat with little thought of
serving others. He becomes a
friend of his fellow knight
Lancelot, but in some
accounts the friendship
eventually dissolves, as
Gawain is not always a
perfect flawless knight, as Sir
Percival, who finally manages
to get to the Holy Grail is.
Sir Percival
In the early Arthurian tales,
Percival has a central role in the
tale of the Holy Grail. As a youth,
he leaves home to travel to the
court of King Arthur. Before he
reaches his destination, he stops
at the castle of the Fisher King.
The Fisher King is guardian of the
Holy Grail and of the spear that
wounded Jesus when he was
crucified; however, because of the
Fisher Kings sinful ways, he is
struck mute when he comes into
the presence of the sacred
chalice. After Percival arrives at
the Fisher Kings castle, he
witnesses a procession in which
the bleeding spear and the Holy
Grail pass before the speechless
king.
According to tradition,
Joseph of Arimathea
kept the Grail after the
Last Supper and
collected Jesus blood
in it when Jesus was
crucified. The Grail
supposedly
possessed many
miraculous properties.
It could furnish food
for those without sin,
and it could blind the
impure of heart and
strike mute the
irreverent who came
into its presence.
Percival fails to ask any
questions concerning the strange
scene in the Fisher Kings house,
but he later learns that if he, a
pure soul, had spoken, his action
would have healed the king. After
many wanderings, Percival
returns to the Fisher Kings castle
and welds together a broken
sword, or (in another version)
restores the power of speech to
the king, and succeeds him as
king.
His quest for the Holy Grail is
later on completed by Sir
Galahad, Lancelots son, a knight
completely free of sin and pure of
heart.
The Arthurian Legends and Their Legacy
The various legends included in the Arthurian cycle
were used as sources of inspiration by numerous
authors in the centuries to come.
English Arthurian romances, dating from the 13th
and 14th centuries, concerned mainly individual
knights - Percival and Galahad, the Grail knights,
and especially Gawain. The culminating masterpiece
of these was the anonymously written Sir Gawain
and the Green Knight (c. 1370), one of the literary
gems of 14th century poetry. A number of the
Arthurian tales were retold, in English prose, by Sir
Thomas Malory in his Morte d'Arthur (1485). On this
book the poet Alfred Lord Tennyson based his Idylls
of the King (1859-1885), an interesting allegorical
treatment of Victorian society.
The Arthurian Legends and Their Legacy
Many other writers have adapted the
stories of Arthur and his knights and their
great court at Camelot to contemporary
tastes and themes. The Renaissance
poet Edmund Spenser used Arthur, as
the perfect knight, in his epic allegory of
Elizabethan society, The Faerie Queene
(1590-1599). Mark Twain contrasted New
England progressivism with medieval
society in his A Connecticut Yankee at
King Arthur's Court (1880). The Once and
Future King (4 vols., 1939-1958), by the
English author T. H. White, remains a
widely read modern version of the
legend. The novel The Mists of Avalon
(1982) by American author Marion
Zimmer Bradley focuses on the female
characters of Arthurian legend. In this
modern version, Morgaine (another name
for Morgan le Fay), sets the scene for her
retelling of the story.
The Arthurian Legends and Their Legacy
Music, too, shows the abiding interest in Arthurian
storiesfrom Parsifal by Richard Wagner (1882) to the
Broadway musical Camelot (1960), by Alan Jay Lerner
and Frederick Loewe.
Throughout the 20th century, beginning with a 1904
production of Parsifal by the American director Edwin
Porter, filmmakers have been drawn to the story of King
Arthurfor example, A Connecticut Yankee in King
Arthur's Court has been filmed repeatedly. Excalibur
(1981), a serious British production, tells the entire
Arthurian story as Sir Thomas Malory presents it, from
Arthur's birth and the Sword in the Stone to Lancelot and
Guinevere's love, and on to the king's final grievous
wound.
The Arthurian Legends and Their Legacy
Other prominent films
include the animated picture
The Sword in the Stone
(1963), about the education
of the young Arthur, and
Camelot (1967), based on
the Broadway musical of the
same name. T. H. Whites
work inspired both films.
Some movies recast
Arthurian motifs in modern
form, as in The Fisher King
(1991), a story of personal
redemption by characters
involved with a modern
Grail.
Others, including Indiana
Jones and the Last Crusade
(1989) or The Da Vinci
Code (2006) use the Grail
as an impetus for adventure
and speculation.
Vitruvian Man, by Leonardo da Vinci
The Arthurian Legends and Their Legacy
Parodies and even
cartoons (including Mickey
Mouse and Tom and Jerry
versions) resume the main
ideas and present the main
heroes of the legends in as
many ways as possible,
according to the
imagination of their
creators, which accounts
for the success of the
Arthurian legend along the
centuries.
Main Features of the Chivalry Romances
1. The chivalry romances include for the
first time in literature a deep psychological
analysis, a description of the heroes inner
feelings. Although the narrative element
gets a considerable place, the description
of different events is not the main purpose
of these works, as the spiritual life of the
Middle Ages is present in them to a great
extent.
2. Mans rights to love and happiness on earth
(and not only in Heaven, as promised by the
church) are proclaimed here. The chivalry
romances generally present love as a noble
sentiment, in contrast with the ecclesiastical
morals that considered it a dirty aspect of human
nature. It is true that in the legend about the Holy
Grail the author(s) tried to preach the idea of
renouncing earthly goods and devoting ones
activities to purity, which was to be rewarded
after death, but this is a theme that gets only a
secondary place in the chivalry literature.
3. However, it is obvious that the romances
idealized the idea of chivalry. They described
the refined and delicate manners of the knights,
who came to find the ancient manners rough
and unfit and who adopted the notion of
politeness and noble behaviour. In real life and
there is plenty of evidence to prove this the
knights were not exactly the embodiment of lofty
ideals: they could be arrogant and false, mean
and uncivil. But the romance knight was always
presented as generous, loyal, honest and brave.
4. Women, who in Anglo-Saxon times had
been but a shadowy part of a mans
universe, get a new status in the
chivalrous romances: they are an ideal
worth fighting for.
5. In this respect, as in many others,
pointing to dramatic changes in society
and the new forms of life, the chivalry
literature was looking forward.
Summary: Characteristics of the Medieval Romance
The Medieval
Romance = A tale
of High Adventure.
Can be a religious
crusade, a
conquest for the
knight's liege lord,
or the rescue of a
captive lady or any
combination.
Characterized by:
1. Medieval romance usually
idealizes chivalry.
2. Medieval romance Idealizes the
hero-knight and his noble deeds.
3. An important element of the
medieval romance is the knight's love
for his lady.
4. The settings of medieval romance
tend to be imaginary and vague.
5. Medieval romance derives mystery
and suspense from supernatural
elements.
6. Medieval romance uses concealed
or disguised identity.
7. Repetition of the mystical number
"3." (Repetitions of the number or
multiples of 3)
Characteristics of the Hero-Knight
1. Birth of a great hero is
shrouded in mystery.
2. He is reared away from
his true home in
ignorance of his real
parents.
3. For a time his true
identity is unknown.
4. After meeting an
extraordinary challenge,
he claims his right.
5. His triumph benefits his
nation or group.
For Further Study
