SEL1004

Introduction to Literary Studies 2

Week 4, lecture 2: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

This lecture undertakes a detailed examination of what is one of the best pieces of Arthurian literature come come out of the Middle Ages: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (GGK).

1.  Authorship and date

The author of GGK is unknown, though the dialect of the poem indicates that he lived in or came from north-west England --possibly the Wirral near Liverpool. The exact date is also unknown, but there is a general consensus that the poem was written in the late 14th century, between about 1375 and 1400 AD.

2. Plot synopsis

  • A green knight enters the Arthurian court on New Year's day carrying a large axe and proposes a challenge: a member of the court is to cut off his head, and submit to a return blow of the axe the following year.

  • Gawain accepts the challenge and cuts off the knight's head, but instead of falling dead the knight picks up the head, tells Gawain to meet him at the Green Chapel the same day the following year, and leaves the court.

  • The following Christmas Gawain sets out to find the Green Chapel for the return blow.

  • After journeying through a wilderness he comes to the castle of Sir Bertilak de Hautdesert, who entertains him over the Christmas season. Part of the entertainment is Bertilak's wife, who three times tries to seduce Gawain; Gawain properly resists each time, but at the last attempted seduction accepts from the wife a girdle that, she claims, will protect him from physical harm.

  • The next morning Gawain sets out to find the Green Chapel and comes upon it pretty much immediately --not a church but a green mound.

  • Beside the mound is the Green Knight sharpening his axe. Gawain puts his head on the block and the Green Knight takes a swing, but stops short of Gawain's neck. He takes another swing and again stops short. At the third and final swing the Green Knight slightly nicks Gawain's neck and declares the bargain complete.

  • He then explains that he is Sir Bertilak, that he arranged the attempted seductions to test Gawain and thereby thereby the chivalric reputation of the Arthurian court, that Gawain passed with flying colours except for his acceptance of the girdle, which was punished by the slight nick.

  • Gawain returns to Camelot convinced that he has failed in the quest and brought shame to the court. The court laughs at him, and all members agree to wear a facsimile of the girdle as a sign of their supposed failure.

3. Source

There is an Old Irish text dating from about 800-900 AD which contains an episode whose narrative is so close to that of GGK that, according to some scholars (myself included), the author of GGK based his poem on it or a narrative very like it. The Old Irish text is called Bricriu's Feast, the the reasons for regarding the episode as the basis for GGK are:

  • The close similarity between the two narrative sequences
  • The known dependence of medieval Arthurian romance on Celtic narratives
  • The presence of Irish communities in north-west Britain in the 14th and earlier centuries

The episode in question is available here, and the full text in the links at the foot of the page. A table showing the correspondences between GGK and Bricriu's Feast is here.

4. Analysis

GGK is one of the most important pieces of Middle English literature. As such, the critical literature on it is large, and many interpretations of the poem have been proposed --the links at the foot of the page provide an overview. The one proposed here is based on the following two principles:

  • Like speakers of sentences, authors of literary works use language to convey propositions, and hearers / readers are intended to understand what is being conveyed.

  • An interpretation of a literary text has the status of a scientific hypothesis: to be valid it must be falsifiable with respect to the text, and, to be credible, it must be supported by evidence from the text.

The interpretation proposed here is in two parts:

a) GGK uses the narrative based on Celtic mythology to test the chivalry that the Arthurian court exemplified in medieval romance. It concludes that chivalry has a limit -- the natural human fear of death -- and that its status as a noble code of aristocratic conduct is not compromised by that limit.

b) GGK was intended by its author to be the foundation legend of the Order of the Garter

The two parts are considered separately.

 

4.1 Chivalry and the fear of death

To support this part of the interpretation of GGK, three themes will be noted:

  • Testing
  • Games and laughter
  • Christian theology

The first two are considered in the lecture. To facilitate the discussion, a translation of GGK in which particularly important passages are highlighted is used. That translation is available here.

 

4.2 GGK and the Order of the Garter

The Order of the Garter is an order of chivalry founded by King Edward III between 1344 and 1351, shortly before GGK is generally understood to have been composed. Membership is confined to the UK sovereign, the Prince of Wales, and 24 'companions' drawn from the higher aristocracy. As such, the Order of the Garter  'is the pinnacle of the honours system in the United Kingdom' (Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_Garter). Its emblem is a garter, shown in Figure 1a below, with the words 'Honi soit qui mal y pense' ('Shame to him who thinks the worse of it') embroidered on it. This emblem is a component of the English crown's royal coat of arms (Figure 1b), and Figure 1c shows Henry VIII wearing the garter in Holbein's 1537 painting.

Royal coat of arms
a b c

What is the connection with GGK? Two observations:

  • At the end of the poem in the only surviving manuscript the words 'Honi soit qui mal y pense' appear.

  • In the absolution scene Sir Bertilak observes of Gawain's 'sin' against chivalry že lasse I yow blame ('I blame you the less'), which is very close to honi soit qui mal y pense.

Assuming that there is a connection, GGK can be interpreted as a foundation legend for the Order of the Garter. It would root the Order in the context that defined ideal chivalry --the Arthurian court-- and its motto would mean something like: 'The chivalry of the Arthurian court is compromised by the human fear of death but is a noble code of conduct despite that, and anyone who doubts it on that account is laughable'.

Reading

Arthurian Romance

Bricriu's Feast

Translation

Commentary

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

Online texts

  • Luminarium: http://www.luminarium.org/medlit/gawaintx.htm. Either of the modern translations listed here is suitable, but for the sake of compatibility of reference in seminar discussion I suggest that everyone use the one by Jesse Weston.

Commentary

The Order of the Garter