The Endless Knot: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (The Matter of Arthur, Part 3)

Today we look at Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, an anonymous narrative poem from the late 14th century Midlands.  The Gawain Poet is a gifted technician and craftsman as well as storyteller whose technique interlaces disparate strands into an elegant pattern -- imagine a Celtic knot, the monastic Gospel illuminations, or the intricate metalwork of Saxon artisans, and you have the visual equivalent of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the greatest English Arthurian romance! 

Transcript

Hello, hello, hello!  Welcome again to the Classic English Literature Podcast, where rhyme gets its reason.

Ooh, I like that: rhyme gets its reason.  I’ll make that my tagline.  The Classic English Literature Podcast, Where Rhyme Gets Its Reason, ™!

For lucky episode 13, we bid farewell to Geoffrey Chaucer and his merry pilgrims and leave them on their road to Canterbury and strike out for the northwest Midlands, say Cheshire or Lancashire, for what many consider the greatest medieval romance ever: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.  Like the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf, Gawain and the Green Knight survives in only one manuscript and, again like its epic antecedent, was part of the collection of manuscripts belonging to Sir Robert Cotton that survived the fire of the rather portentously named Ashburnham House.  Usually called the Gawain Poet, the author is also known as the Pearl Poet for also in that manuscript are texts called Patience, Cleanness, and Pearl (this last being one of the great medieval dream vision poems and one I still somewhat regret not covering in our dream vision episode.  Maybe some day if the podcast succeeds and we return to the Middle Ages for a season 2).

We’re back in the realm of the King Arthur legends, but this time, rather than borrowing from French or Welsh traditions, the story of Gawain and the Green Knight is as British as Sunday roast and mushy peas.  Real local fare – stick to your ribs poetry.

We get some of that local flavor right in the language itself.  As I say, we’re somewhere in the northwest midlands in the late 14th century, far away from the English of Chaucer’s London.  The dialect here is one of a provincial court, somewhat more conservative in its sound than the London dialect that was exerting the greatest influence.  You may recall that, after the Norman Conquest of 1066 disrupted the West Saxon dialect of Old English (which was beginning to become the standard), that lack of a linguistic center allowed English of the Middle Ages to atomize along lines of local pronunciation.  So, for instance, different dialects of Middle English used different verb endings.  Where Chaucer would have used the verb “loveth” as in “he loveth me,” the writer in the north would use “loves” and the one from the midlands would use “loven.”  The “ing” ending, too, as in “loving”, only gradually appeared in the Midlands dialect, which used “lovinde.”  Our modern pronouns “they, them, and their” also come from the northern part of the country where the Norse influence was stronger, beating out the southern “here and hem.”

Of course, the biggest difference in dialects and accents comes from the vowels because vowel sounds easily float around in the middle of the mouth, so southern versions used an “o” sound for words like “stone” and “home,” but elsewhere they sounded more like an “a” sound: stane and hame – kind of Scottish sounding, which shouldn’t surprise.  Here’s the opening of Gawain and the Green Knight in its original dialect:

siþen þe sege and þe assaut watz sesed at troye

þe bor3 brittened and brent to brondez and askez

þe tulk þat þe trammes of tresoun þer wro3t

watz tried for his tricherie þe trewest on erþe

hit watz ennias þe athel and his highe kynde

þat siþen depreced prouinces and patrounes bicome

welne3e of al þe wele in þe west iles

fro riche romulus to rome ricchis hym swyþe

with gret bobbaunce þat bur3e he biges vpon fyrst

and neuenes hit his aune nome as hit now hat

ticius to tuskan and teldes bigynnes

langaberde in lumbardie lyftes vp homes

and fer ouer þe french flod felix brutus

on mony bonkkes ful brode bretayn he settez

wyth wynne

where werre and wrake and wonder

bi syþez hatz wont þerinne

and oft boþe blysse and blunder

ful skete hatz skyfted synne

This opening stanza establishes a heroic history to the current tale, tying the Arthurian court of the poem all the way back to the Trojan War and the founding of Britain.  We’ll be doing our analysis of the poem in a modern translation, never fear.  But first, let’s do a super summary of the poem before we start unpacking its form, structure, themes, and moral dilemmas.

So, it’s Christmas and the whole of Arthur’s court is celebrating.  They gather in the great hall for the feast, but Arthur will not eat until he’s heard of some extraordinary adventure.  Right on cue, in storms a massive knight on a massive horse carrying a massive axe.  And he’s green – very green.  No, not inexperienced, envious, or nauseous – actually colored green: skin, hair, garments, horse, bridle, teeth (presumably).  Green, green, green, green, green.  He challenges Arthur’s court to a test of their vaunted chivalry.  And he feigns not knowing which is Arthur (sick burn!) then taunts the knights as feeble “beardless children” and asks if any “be so bold in his blood, his brain so wild, as stoutly to strike one stroke for another.”  So, is anyone here man enough to hit me, knowing that I’ll hit him back?  If so, you can have this fabulous green ax.  The assembly is cowed, so Arthur steps up to defend the honor of his court.  But then Gawain, Arthur’s nephew, accepts the challenge.  He takes the ax and with a mighty stroke lops off the head of the Green Knight.  The Green Knight (somehow) manages to find his severed head, picks it up, holds it out and says: “you’ll get your stroke a year and a day from now at the Green Chapel.  Don’t be late!”  Arthur says, “That was extraordinary. Let’s eat.”

Time passes and Gawain sets out to keep his appointment at the Green Chapel.  He gets lost in the winter snows and comes upon a startling castle in a summery land.  The castle is called Hautdesert and its master Bercilak. Gawain appeals to the lord’s hospitality and stays there until the day of his appointment comes.  During that time, the lord of the castle proposes a game: I’ll go hunting and give you whatever I catch.  You stay here and relax, but give me whatever you win during the day.”  Gawain agrees.  But the lady of the castle has decided she likes the cut of Gawain’s gib, and so she tries to seduce him.  Nobly, he resists and she must be satisfied with merely a kiss.  The lord returns from hunting the deer, gives the venison to Gawain and Gawain kisses him.  Fair enough.

Day two, the Lady tries again to breach Gawain’s defenses, but he stands by his chastity and only gets kissed.  The lord returns with a dead boar and Gawain kisses him.  Fair enough.

Day three, undeterred, the lady once again tries to tempt Gawain, but he finally defeats her.  She kisses him and gives him a green girdle (like a sash, not a tummy control garment).  It is magical and will protect him from harm.  “Just the thing I need, “he thinks, considering his upcoming rendezvous with the Green Knight and feeling a twinge in his neck.  Bercilak comes home having killed a fox for Gawain.  Gawain kisses him, but doesn’t turn over the girdle!  Oh, bad form, Gawain.

Day four, Gawain makes his way to the Green Chapel, sees the Green Knight sharpening his ax, and submits to the test.  The Green Knight check-swings twice, and each time Gawain flinches.  Ugh! Cowardice! At the third stroke, Gawain holds steady and the Knight, pulling his punch, barely knicks Gawain’s neck, drawing a trickle of blood.  Gawain gets a lesson in humility and from then on, Arthur’s knights wear a green sash as a reminder.  Turns out, the Green Knight and Bercilak are the same guy, and the whole episode was orchestrated by Morgan Le Fay to test the chivalry of Arthur’s famous knights.

The Gawain Poet is real hipster.  Like Langland in Piers Plowman, the Gawain Poet is part of the Alliterative Revival, bringing back the alliterated long line from Anglo-Saxon poetry after it languished when those trendy French styles became popular with the kids.  So we have a traditional, conservative feel to the verse already, especially emphasized by the notable provincial pronunciation.  The long line, with its repetitive sounds, gives a more free, rambling feel to the poem, as if the language was unbound.  It’s too much to say the verse feels rough or unhewn, as some have said, comparing the Gawain Poet unfavorably to Chaucer.  I think the pseudo-archaism of the style fits well with this romance.

And the Gawain Poet does give us a taste of more “sophisticated” versifying – after a stanza (called a stock) of any number of alliterated lines, the poet drops a single two-syllable line, called a bob, followed by a quatrain of three-beat lines which alternately rhyme.  The effect of this bob-and-wheel structure allows the action to sprawl across the stock, capacious and comprehensive, then jerks it up short, and marches it to a orderly and stately conclusion, only to sprawl once again in the next stanza.  Quite a musical effect that would have been much appreciated by the original audience.  I like the expansive and contractive dynamic here – it feels to me like propulsion, like drawing back and flinging forward.  It also, of course, calls one’s attention especially to the contents of the wheel, so the poet frequently puts items of particular significance or effect in that little quatrain.

There are other quite intricate architectural elements to this poem.  It is composed in four sections called “fitts” (though I’ve seen some translations call them “passuses” like Piers Plowman) to mirror all the “fours” that dominated medieval thinking: the four seasons, the four elements, the four bodily humours.  We see frequent use of the number three, obviously a number with quite a mystical pedigree: we have three days at Hautdesert, the castle of Bercilak, we have three hunting scenes, three seduction scenes, three strokes at the Green Chapel. 

The number five is of particular significance.  Most famously, we have the description of the pentangle on Gawain’s shield, which the poet goes to some length to describe:

Then they showed forth the shield, that shone all red,

With the pentangle portrayed in purest gold.

About his broad neck by the baldric he cast it,

That was meet for the man, and matched him well.

And why the pentangle is proper to that peerless prince

I intend now to tell, though detain me it must.

It is a sign by Solomon sagely devised

To be a token of truth, by its title of old,

For it is a figure formed of five points,

And each line is linked and locked with the next

For ever and ever, and hence it is called

In all England, as I hear the endless knot.

And well may he wear it on his worthy arms,

For ever faithful five-fold in five-fold fashion

Was Gawain in good works, as gold unalloyed,

Devoid of all villainy, with virtues adorned

in sight.

On shield and coat in view

He bore that emblem bright,

As to his word most true

And in speech most courteous knight.

And first, he was faultless in his five senses,

Nor found ever to fail in his five fingers,

And all his fealty was fixed upon the five wounds

That Christ got on the cross, as the creed tells;

And wherever this man in melee took part,

His one thought was of this, past all things else,

That all his force was founded on the five joys

That the high Queen of heaven had in her child.

And therefore, as I find, he fittingly had

On the inner part of his shield her image portrayed,

That when his look on it lighted, he never lost heart.

The fifth of the five fives followed by this knight

Were beneficence boundless and brotherly love

And pure mind and manners, that non might impeach,

And compassion most precious- these peerless five

Were forged and made fast in him, foremost of men.

Now all these five fives were confirmed in this knight,

And each linked in other, that end there was none,

And fixed to five points, whose force never failed,

Nor assembled all on a side, nor asunder either,

Nor anywhere at an end, but whole and entire

However the pattern proceeded or played out its course.

And so on his shining shield shaped was the knot

Royally in red gold against red gules,

That is the peerless pentangle, prized of old 

in lore.

Now armed is Gawain gay,

And bears his lance before,

And soberly said good day,

He thought forevermore.

So, a shield with a five-pointed star stands for five symbolic and virtuous clusters: the five senses, the five fingers, the five wounds of Christ, the five joys of Mary, the five virtues.  That’s 25.  Additionally, the Gawain poet spends 50 lines describing the “fives” of the pentangle.  The poem’s lines are a multiple of five

So the numerology is cool.  You probably also noticed that the poem begins and ends with an allusion to the Trojan War, so there’s a pleasing symmetry there.  Maybe you also noticed that the entire poem is obsessed with ideas about technique: the detailed descriptions of armor, clothing, needlework, and cookery.  The middle of the poem parallels each seduction scene with a corresponding hunting scene (a classic combination, like bangers and mash).  Every element in  the construction of the poem is intricately and deftly intertwined with every other element, it is, like the pentangle itself, “an endless knot.”  And it’s all tied up with a girdle – the symbol that binds the text together.  Rather craftily done, Sir Poet.

Furthermore, I think the elegant symmetry of the form cleverly contrasts the ambiguity of the content.  We get a number of opposing pairs – the natural and the social or civil, the pagan and the Christian, the matriarchal and the patriarchal.  The first contrast is, of course, the very “civilizational” quality of Arthur’s court: dances, tournaments, feasting.  And this all occurs during the Christmas holidays (which extended well beyond our current celebrations) and New Year’s.  One can certainly make the argument that these Christian feasts are impositions upon earlier pagan festivals around the solstice, so already there is a bit of tension.  Into this court rides the Green Knight, whom many scholars argue is an ancient fertility symbol or version of the Wild Man archetype or some other personification of a pantheistic nature.  The fact that he survives a beheading does point to the regenerative powers of nature that we’ve seen in Chaucer’s prologue or the Cuckoo song.  

And let’s talk about that Beheading Game, shall we?  The Gawain Poet is definitely borrowing an old folklore motif here.  It’s pretty straightforward: You can cut my head off if I can cut your head off.  It probably originates in Irish – and particularly Ulster Irish – mythology and maybe a metaphorical rendering of a pagan midwinter ritual: killing the old year off so the new year can begin.  Later, it makes its way into French, German, and English (in that order) narratives. Here, it’s usually seen as a coming of age motif – you know, a young fella winning his spurs.  And it's usually young fellas who are the protagonists of such tales.

And while we call it the Beheading Game in Gawain and the Green Knight, too, it does have some noticeable differences from its antecedents.  One, the Green Knight never mentions beheading – he doesn’t really even mention violence.  He just says they must “strike one stroke for another.”  Conceivably, a man could merely flick the Green Knight’s forehead or poke him in the chest.  Snap him with a wet towel.  The Green Knight may simply be proposing a bit of a holiday game, for all they know, not a life-and-death contest.  It’s actually Arthur who grabs the Green Knight’s ax (which the knight says is to be the prize) and assumes it is the means of the contest.  He’s the one who makes it violent.

Then Gawain stands up and offers to take his uncle’s place: “I am the weakest, well I know, and of wit the feeblest; And the loss of my life would be least of any; That I have you for uncle is my only praise.”  OK, I have to admit that I find Gawain kind of tiresome here.  Clearly, this speech is mere politesse, false modesty.  “I am the lowliest, most humble, most stupid knight?”  Come on.  In this tale, Gawain is well-established as the champion of the court, so this mock humility is a bit nauseating – he’s come of age, he doesn’t have to “win his spurs.”  But, this is a chivalric romance and so there are protocols, but I suspect that having to boast about your humility is a bit of a cod.

Other folklore motifs evident here are the “Temptation Story” and the “Exchange of Gifts.”  These introduce the real heart of the poem, I think, for here is where Gawain, and by extension, European ideals of chivalry, face their internal moral contradictions.  The temptation story involves a woman trying to seduce a man who cannot acquiesce because of his moral obligations.  Gawain, upon his arrival at Hautdesert, binds himself to both the lord and lady: “straightway he asks to be received as their servant, if they so desire.”  He’s pledged loyalty and service to them both and these competing obligations complicate matters.  Gawain cannot sleep with Bercilak’s lady because he is bound by laws of Christian chastity and because to do so would violate his bond to Bercilak as his guest.  But, as this is a medieval romance, Gawain also  has an obligation to the lady to preserve her dignity and honor, not to mention fulfill her wishes.  So, Gawain is stuck between a rock and a hard on.

The exchange of gifts puts that moral rectitude to the test.  Gawain has obligated himself to turn over all that he wins during the day to Bercilak, who will in turn turn over his quarry in the hunt.  Now, if Gawain had indeed slept with the lady, I think Bercilak would have a rather surprising welcome home from Gawain.  So, yes, there are some humorous and homoerotic implications in this rendering of the game.  

I’ve already mentioned that hunting and seduction are frequently used as mirrors of each other by writers: the old Thanatos and Eros, sex and death.  But the Gawain poet cleverly juxtaposes these scenes.  In the first scene, Bercilak hunts a deer while his lady offers herself to Gawain.  Interestingly, the word for deer meat – venison – shares a root with the word venereal, as in having to do with sex: the Roman goddess Venus, the goddess of love.  

The second scene, in which Bercilak hunts a ferocious boar (easily the most dangerous animal to hunt at the time – special spears and techniques were required to bring down this aggressive beast).  The Poet writes: “the best of all boars broke from his cover . . . For of tough-brawned boars he was biggest by far.”  Bercilak wants “his bloodthirsty heart to quell.” Here, the boar is a cipher for Gawain, whom the lady describes as “stout enough to constrain with strength” any who would seek to constrain him.  So Gawain is like a strong boar, but he needs to be taken down a peg – Arthur’s knights have forgotten genuine humility and only perform it, so their swollen hearts need to be quelled.  You get the picture.

And the final scene is the hunting of the fox, famous both for its bushy tail and its proverbial slyness.  Reynard, the French call him.  This parallels the seduction scene in which the lady offers Gawain the girdle, with which he will deceive both Bercilak in the exchange and the Green Knight in the beheading game (yes, I know they’re the same guy, but you get what I’m after).

So all this adds up to the Gawain Poet’s critique of chivalry.  And it’s a quite ambiguous critique, I think.  The poet is evidently devoutly Christian, but seems to posit a pagan view of nature that supersedes the will of Christian civilization and institutions.  The Green Knight is not an emblem of post-Edenic fallen nature, but rather of a nature that persists despite the attempts of humans to control it, to game it with their ingenuity or their rituals.  And a chivalry that values honor above life (who would choose to participate in a beheading game?) must be fundamentally unnatural, opposed to a divinely ordered natural world.  Maybe Gawain’s vaunted chastity is another complication or foil for natural fertility?  I don’t know.  

He certainly is humorously awkward in the seduction scenes.  And rather prissy.  He reminds of Benjamin Braddock with Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate.  She is firmly in control, as is the Lady of Hautdesert and Morgan le Fay – the poem is a specifically feminine critique of masculine codes of honor.  The lady shrewdly tempts Gawain because she knows the conventions of romance and courtly love but she mocks those conventions because they are sexually aberrant.

The Gawain Poet gives a sinuous, elegant work that is at least the equal in its sophistication as any in medieval England, Chaucer included.  Its deft use of language and rhythm, its masterly woven structural symmetries, its numerological intricacies combine to valorize courtly virtues as well as to warn of necessary correctives.  As the 14th century gives way to the 15th, such warnings prove prescient as chivalry and courtly love become mere theatre, setting the stage for the last of the great medieval renderings of Arthur and his knights: Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur.  But that tale, friend listener, is for another day.

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