
MARS 2P95 & Callie Norwich Present:
The Medieval Hero

Le Morte D'Arthur
Malory's text, Le Morte D'Arthur, is what many consider to be the definitive source of King Arthur and thus is what many people think of when they think of knights, King Arthur or the chivalric code. In this text, although there is still courtly love, we get more of a glimpse into being a king, a knight and the kingdom. Within this text we see many hero figures emerge, but normally they are either King Arthur or one of the knights from the round table.
Honour: This is the responsibility you have to upholding the reputation of yourself, your king, women and fellow knights. If anyone’s name is called into question or sullied the literary heroes of this text are called into action to fix it. Often these 4 different reputations are interlinked and thus if someone does dishonour to your king or to your lady it is as if they are dishonouring you. This is important because it teaches its audience about how to properly honour certain people in society and it unifies the bonds people feel with one another.
Strength/Skill: The literary hero must have strength and skill in battle in the text in order to help him overcome his ordeals and quests. It is normally his strength or skill that saves a lady and thus garners her attention. The heroes’ strength is normally great but still natural and on par with his adversary, unlike his Anglo-Saxon counterpart who shows unnatural strength. This important for the literary hero to have because it shows the men in society how important it is to have strength and skill in combat. One cannot be a proper knight or soldier within being strong and knowing how to properly battle. It was important to make men aware of what they were getting themselves into when they wanted to be knights or were sent to war.
Tradition: Continuously performing or doing the same ritual/behaviours for propriety sake. Just as King Arthur does not let anyone eat at the pentecoast feast unless some quest comes before them, year after year for no other reason than he likes to have interesting stories to hear/tell (Malory 231). Tradition is important to promote through the literary hero because it was a big part of their society. A lot of the rules, codes and etiquette was based off of years of tradition.
Chivalric code: The code of ethics that the Knights follow regarding women, other knights, duty to their king and quests. This is different from Marie's chivalric code because this pertains to things other than women. This was important to creating that bond between knights in the stories because they became as important in the eyes of their fellow knights as women and their king. It was promoted within the literary hero because it shows the men that there is a code of ethics they should be following and cannot go around doing whatever they please, simply because of their gender or position in society.
Love: True love takes precedence over everything else and is a force that cannot be stopped, but it may cause the destruction of you and everything you hold dear. Again there is a difference in the treatment of love between Marie and Malory's texts. Love in the literary heroes is again a force that is correlated with fate, however it doesn't always end well. The fact that Guenevere and Lancelot are in love with each other leads to the fall of the kingdom and ultimately the death of King Arthur in Volume 2 or (for an example in our text) how Balin finds a poor man who is in love with a dukes daughter and trying to win her over the poor man slays his love and himself (Malory 85-86). It was important to portray it this way to remind citizens that if you find yourself in a tempting or immoral situation to still act with the chivalric code, otherwise you could have devastating effects. It was in the text to remind people that love and temptation are no reason to be unfaithful.
Fate: Can either lead you to great future or lead you to your death/destruction. There doesn’t seem to be any qualifications for being fated, just how it was meant to turn out, but it may not be what you wanted. There is also this idea, through Merlin’s warnings, that nothing can be done to escape fate. Merlin and Nimue often discuss King Arthurs fate and how it is inescapable, like when Merlin tells him if he marries Guenevere she is fated to cheat on him (Malory 93). Again the idea of fate leads to this idea that God is always watching over you and for a warring country it was important to feel as if someone was looking out for you. Although with many kings at war with one another, the text could not assume fate would be always positive and thus why it sometimes leads to the destruction.
Loyalty: Being faithful to your king and his commands above all else and then remaining faithful to your fellow knights. In Malory's text we see this shift from loyalty to your lady to loyalty to your king and fellow knights. Loyalty would have been important to the society since everything was always shifting and there was no one ruler. Malory is trying to show his society the importance of loyalty and what can be accomplished if people work together and stick to those alliances/vows.
Ambiguous Identity: Many of the knights ran around in disguise, refused to give out their identity or as an unknown person – perhaps of lower rank. Like Sir Gareth does during the entirety of Book 7 (Malory 231-302). Concealing your identity teaches 2 things. The first is that it teaches that it is your skill and strength that is important to gathering glory, not your name or parentage. The second is it suggests that anyone can rise through fame, regardless of his family name. The ambiguous identity of the literary hero suggests that society wanted their men to know that it is more about strength than it is about where you come from.
Betrayal: This is the idea that people close to you will lead to your destruction and is very tied into the idea of fate. There is this sense within some of the literary heroes of the text that tragic betrayals will happen to good people. This suggests that the text is trying to make their citizens more aware and prepared. In a society where everything is chaotic, alliances change and there is turmoil everywhere it is important to remind people to be on their guard.


