Models of Knighthood in Marie de France's Lays

By: Robert Sanderson

Introduction

Marie de France was one of the most widely known authors of the twelfth century, immensely popular both then and now. Her works, and in particular her lays, express ideas about what the ideal knight should be, and conversely what qualities are undesirable in chevaliers. These models of knighthood, both good and bad, are quite consistent throughout her works.

The Lays

Marie de France wrote twelve Breton lays which have survived to today, found all together in a thirteenth century manuscript (MS Harley 978), and scattered among other manuscripts in more fragmentary forms. Rather than look at each in turn it is more profitable to investigate each quality and in which lay or lays it is evident. All Old French references refer to Ewert's edition of the text as presented by Glyn Burgess in Marie de France: Lais, 1995. All English quotations are from Glyn Burgess and Keith Busby's Penguin Classics translation, 1986.

While not always, it is often the case that Marie's characters are ideal knights with one flaw to their character. Guigemar has all the qualities of the perfect knight, except that he has no interest in love. Another example is the young man in Les Deus Amans who displays a lack of wisdom and is thus overconfident of his abilities, but otherwise displays all the qualities of a good "chevalier". By doing this Marie focuses on these specific characteristics, showing how they are necessary in a model knight.

Marie's most commonly depicted virtue is to be loving, to which we will turn to now.

To Love

To be loving is the most frequently used virtue, appearing in all of the twelve lays. The ability to love, and to love properly, is paramount in Marie's ideal knight. This is shown most clearly in Guigemar as the title character attains over the course of the lay the status of the ideal knight by overcoming the character flaw of having no interest in love.

Guigemar is the ideal knight except for this single flaw - he does not have any interest in love. This is the major theme of the lay, and is related from lines 53 to 57:

"En Lorreine në en Burguine
Në en Angou në en Gascuine
A cel tens ne pout hom truver
Si bon chevalier ne sun per.
De tant i out mespris nature
Kë unc de nul' amur n'out cure."
(Guigemar, ll 53 - 57)
He was considered a "lost cause by friend and stranger alike" (ll 67-68), despite having been just described as the best knight in the realm, which shows the great emphasis Marie puts on the ability to love properly.

After being wounded while out hunting, Guigemar finds a boat which takes him to a city where he is taken in by the lady of the lord of the city who is kept shut away in a tower. Guigemar falls in love with the `mal mariée', who likewise does the same with him. He is healed of his wound, and achieves Marie's ideal for knighthood. The love is technically adulterous, but in Marie's eyes the marriage is a sham; the lady is a prisoner to be rescued, not a wife as the lord does not properly love her.

Guigemar is a character who progresses when he learns to love, and thus portrays both the knight able and unable to love at different points in the lay. There are other knights who are portrayed in Marie's lays who could be argued to not love their lady, however for all apart from Guigemar at the beginning of the text they seem rather to portray knights that do not love fully, rather than not at all or are too poorly developed to argue one way or the other. For example the husband of the ladies in Yonec, Guigemar and Laüstic treat their partner very poorly, however none could be said to not love at all as is said of Guigemar; they let other emotions such as the fear of their wife being unfaithful rule their actions.

To Love Faithfully

It is not good enough to simply love a lady, Marie portrays several aspects which are required of the knight to love properly. The knight should be faithful and devoted in his love for his lady. In Guigemar Marie writes at lines 493 to 495,
"Ki un en peot leal trover,
Mut le deit servir e amer
E estre a sun comandement."
(Guigemar, ll 493 - 495)
It is "ignoble", "foolishness, wickedness and debauchery" to take lovers wherever one goes and boast of one's sexual deeds. Guigemar is faithful to his lady, as is symbolised and actualised by the recognition devices that the lovers exchange before being discovered by the lady's husband.

Lanval also has this theme of loving faithfully as a very evident theme. Lanval breaks his word to his fairy mistress to never reveal the object of his love, and by this action is shown to have fallen from the ideal state of faithful love. By doing so his mistress refuses to appear no matter how long or desparingly he calls for her. At the same time Queen Guinevere takes offence at Lanval saying that his mistress was better than she and declares that he asked her to be unfaithful to the king.

Lanval returns himself to grace by proving that he can be faithful under much temptation not to be. At the end of the lay his mistress's servants approach the court on the day that Lanval is going to be executed and each time Lanval resists the temptation to say that his lady is among them until she herself appears. Upon proving Lanval's innocence the fairy takes him off to Avalon, rewarding him and showing him to have redeemed himself.

While Guigemar starts off less than ideal and then attains this status, Lanval begins as the ideal knight, falls from grace and then regains it. Lanval is punished by the author in two ways for not acting faithfully, then is rewarded for proving himself to be devoted later, thus showing Marie's ideals and providing examples for both the negative and positive cases of loving faithfully.

In Equitan this is demonstrated very well. The seneschal's wife is seduced away by the king, Equitan, and when he and the lady are discovered by the seneschal, they are both scalded to death in a trap they had planned to kill the loyal seneschal with. The wife and king both die due to their unfaithfulness, Marie showing quite plainly her thoughts about devotion in love.

Likewise in Bisclavret the main character's wife abuses the information that he trusted her with and has him trapped in his wolf form while she takes a neighbouring knight as a lover. She is punished for this by being both exiled and having her nose torn from her face by the enraged Bisclavret. Like Equitan she is punished for being unfaithful.

To Love Above All Else

The ideal knight does not think twice before putting himself at risk for the sake of his loved one. In order to properly love, the knight must love his lady above everything else including himself and his safety. Bisclavret reveals this aspect very effectively, although there are other examples as well.

In Bisclavret the title character, a knight described as "Beaus chevalers e bons estiet e noblement se cunteneit." (ll 17-18), has the secret of being a werewolf three nights every week. Not even his wife knows this at the outset, however she pleads with him to tell her what he does when he disappears, and then where he leaves his clothes - without which he cannot regain human form. Bisclavret reveals to her his true nature and then the location of his hiding place for his garments, thus demonstrating that he loves and trusts his wife, putting her before his own personal safety.

This theme is taken to extreme in Les Deux Amans. The knight puts his love for the lady behind his own safety in attempting the impossible by climbing a mountain with the girl in his arms. Marie, as will be discussed later, is damning of the knight for démesure, however his heart is still in the right place - his attempt in itself to fulfil the damselle's father's quest is very worthy, where he fails is to not drink the potion that could have saved him from death.

In Yonec the lady has a knightly lover who can turn himself into a hawk who comes to her through a window when she desires him, similar to the Fairy Mistress in Lanval. The knight accurately predicts his own death at the hands of her husband,

"Sil cuntera a sun seignur.
Si ceo avient cum jeo vus di,
E nus serum issi trahi,
Ne m'en puis mie departir,
Que mei nen estuce murir.
(Yonec, ll 206 - 210)
Yet he still comes to his beloved whenever she calls. He thus shows great love to put her pleasure ahead of his own life.

To Not Love Possessively

Several of Marie's lays portray a very selfish and possessive love by knights of their ladies. The unknightly lover treats his lady like a chattel, something to be controlled and treated as an object, not a fellow human being to be adored and cherished.

In Guigemar the two knights other than the title character both portray this failing. First the lady's husband and then Meriaduc treat her like a possession. The husband keeps her locked in a tower, afraid that she might be unfaithful to him as he is much older than her. This is shown to be despised by Marie as her heroine curses her fate and her husband. She would rather die than continue to live unloved in the tower.

"La dame regretout sovent
E prie Deu omnipotent
Qu'il li dunast hastive mort"
(Guigemar, ll 623 - 625)
Meriaduc also treats her as a chattel. He says that he found her and will keep her, like a stone found on the beach. He is lustful and possessive, and because of these qualities is killed and his castle destroyed. Marie portrays very negatively these two antagonists in Guigemar, demonstrating her dislike of knights who treat women in this manner.

Yonec and Laüstic focus on this theme almost exclusively, and provide very good examples of it. Yonec, again, focuses on the device of the mal marié. The husband of the lady keeps her locked in a tower, and is killed by the lady's son at the end in vengeance for the suffering he caused her and her lover; Marie once again having the knight guilty of being too possessive put to death by the hero.

Laüstic has little value for this study aside from the criticism of being overly possessive of one's lady. The knight-husband kills a nightingale out of spite as his wife says that it is for that reason that she stands at the window. The knight is described as "evil" and "spiteful", for example when he hears the lady's excuse for standing at the window, Marie writes:

"Quant li sires ot que ele dist,
De ire e de maltalent en rist."
(Laüistic, ll 91 - 92)
His actions are not condoned by Marie, although he does not suffer because of them as does the husband in Yonec.

To be of the Nobility

To be a peasant and to be a knight are mutually exclusive, at least in Marie's lays. Flori, however, traces the historical path of the ideology of chivalry from the nobility down to the common "milites" over the eleventh and twelfth centuries, proving that it was for a time possible to hold to the ideals of chivalry and not be of the higher social classes.

All of Marie's characters are well placed on the social ladder. It is not left out from any of the knights portrayed, as Marie seems to consider it to be a fundamental part of knighthood. Guigemar for example is the son of a "barun" (l 29), the seneschal in Equitan is the lord of a castle and Eliduc has his own land and vassals as is stressed particularly at the end of the lay:

"E bonement cungé doné:
Tute sa volunté fera
E de sa tere li durra."
(Eliduc, ll 1132 - 1134)

To Fulfil One's Feudal Duties

As being one of the nobility is a necessary qualification for being a knight in the lays, with this comes the duty to be a good member of the feudal society. If a knight were not to act in this way it would be bad for society as a whole, the links tying the population together into a more of less coherent social structure would break, resulting in an unstable social structure. It is especially important for the knights as part of the lesser nobility to act in this way, as they provide the link between those who rule and the common folk.

The most obvious duty is to be loyal to one's feudal lord, and in Equitan Marie shows this in the relationship of the seneschal to the traitorous king. He is described at the beginning of the lay as,

"Bon chevaler, pruz e leal;
Tute sa tere li gardoit
E meinteneit e justisoit."
(Equitan, ll 22 - 24)
And what little is said of him throughout the lay does not contradict this. The seneschal is, while not a major player in the work, the only surviving character at the end and the only truly chivalric one. He is contrasted with Equitan, who is killed for his disloyalty.

Eliduc is a particularly useful lay for revealing this theme. The main character is described as an ideal knight at the beginning of the text, so we can be fairly certain that the other qualities he displays are part of this model of knighthood.

"En Bretaine ot un chevalier
Pruz e curteis, hardi e fier;"
(Eliduc, ll 5 - 6)
Eliduc is loyal to his lords in both countries. He starts of in Britanny where he "loyally" serves his "seignur".
"Elidus aveit un seignur
Reis de Brutaine la meinur,
Que mut l'amot e cherisseit,
E il lëaument le serveit."
(Eliduc, ll 29 - 32)
Marie approves greatly of this and even says that,
"Sil est sages e vedzïez
Ki lëauté tient sun seignur,
Envers ses bons veisins amur."
(Eliduc, ll 64 - 66)
Once in England he is loyal to Guilliadun's father, after swearing his allegiance to him at line 269. When Eliduc goes to talk to the maiden and she professes her love for him he talks of his duty to her father, that he must serve him for a year as promised (ll 523 - 527). He also remains loyal to his lord in Britanny, even though he was unwarrantedly banished from the lord's court.

To Give Good Advice

As part of the knight's feudal obligations he owed 'consillium' to his lord, good advice or counsel. The knight had to advise his lord as to the best action when this was sought. Marie shows this in her lays as part of fulfilling one's feudal duties.

Bisclavret is described as a good knight and also as one of his lord's closest advisors at the beginning of the text,

"Beaus chevalers e bons esteit
E noblement se cunteneit
De sun seinur esteit privez
E de tuz ses veisins amez.
(Bisclavret, ll 17 - 20)
Bisclavret, even in his wolf form, retains this sense of intelligence and loyalty to the king, who in turn protects him in true feudal fashion. The king says when Bisclavret pleads for mercy when he is being hunted,
"Cum cest beste se humilie!
Ele ad sen de hume, merci crie."
(Bisclavret, ll 153 - 154)
So even though the title character is very strange and uncourtly in one sense, he is still a model knight because of the way he acts including this motif of intelligence and giving good advice.

Wisdom thus is a quality that Marie displays as necessary in the ideal knight. She also does this by showing how destructive the lack of it, often called démesure can be. Two of the lays, Les Deus Amanz and Chaitivel have this theme as fundamental to them.

The main negative aspect of knighthood that Marie relates in the text of Les Deus Amanz is démesure: vanity and the lack of self-control. The lover refuses to drink the potion which would have saved his life because it would appear less honourable, and he simply wants to do it by himself although he cannot. Marie is thus saying that while valour and courage are good qualities, they need to be tempered by wisdom and self-control. The knight should know his limits.

In Chaitivel, there are four knights, described as a single entity rather than four individual characters. They are described from line 35 through 38 as:

"Il n'avaient gueres de eé
Mes Mut erent de grant beauté
E chevalers pruz e vaillanz
Larges, curteis e despendanz"
(Chaitivel, ll 35 - 38)

They have the same qualities as the other knights described by Marie - handsome, brave, valiant, generous and courtly. Each is, however, implied to suffer from `démesure' believing that they can outdo the others and three of the four are killed in a tournament trying to impress the lady who looks down from a tower. The last is castrated and lives on unable to profit from being the last of the four left. Marie is again showing that vanity and foolhardiness are not qualities of the good knight.

To be Skilled at Arms

The feudal terms are taken up again at line 567 of Eliduc when Eliduc's lord in Britanny summons him back to fight for him.
"Par l'aliance qu'il li fist,
Quant il l'umage de lui prist,
Que s'en venist pur lui aider;
Kar mut en aveit grant mester.
(Eliduc, ll 567 - 570)
This is the second part of a knight's feudal duties; "auxillium". The knight must provide military service, and to do this he needs to be able to fight skillfully with both lance and sword, on horseback and on foot. One could not be a knight without knowing how to fight, and Marie demonstrates this well.

The knights in the lays are continually being described with such adjectives as "proz", "hardi", "vaillant" and "fier". Eliduc for example at the beginning of the lay is described as quoted above, two lines further down with "vaillant". Eliduc's combat skills are shown to be very good when he captures 30 of the enemy and shows good tactical skills in setting up an ambush. He is a good knight and is treated as such by the king on his return to the city.

"Il i ferirent durement
Ne nes esparnierent nïent.
Cil esteient tut esbaï,
Tost furent rut e departi,
En poi de hure furent vencu.
(Eliduc, ll 213 - 217)

Milun is described similarly to Eliduc,

"Francs e hardiz, curteis e fiers"
(Milun, l 14)
The list of Milun's good qualities is repeated later by the lady who had brought up his son. She says that he is "brave, bold and fierce" and that no one in the land had "greater fame or valour". This military prowess aspect is presented as a knightly virtue more forcefully than in any of the other lays. Milun and his son are their respective generations' best warriors and are unable to be unhorsed except by each other at tournaments. Milun beats everyone except his son at the tournaments he attends, and strikes him so hard that he breaks his lance. However the son is shown to have even more prowess in that he remains on his horse after such a blow. Marie has this as an important part of the lay, rather than incidental as in Guigemar where the only combat comes at the end and is only briefly described.

To be Generous

Generousity is portrayed as part of the ideal knight by Marie de France and other authors.

Lanval is described in the very typical fashion of the ideal knight. Marie writes at lines 21 to 23 that

"Pur sa valur, pur sa largesse,
Pur sa beauté, pur sa prüesce
L'envioënt tut li plaisur;"
(Lanval, ll 21 - 23)
He is shown to be very generous and unselfish as he does not ask for what he was due after finishing his private resources. He is overlooked by Arthur however stoically continues. Lanval is rewarded for this stoicism in being given an `ever-full purse', he can spend as much as he likes and never run out. He performs many honourable acts with this new ability.

The generousity motif is to be found in Milun as well. The son is shown to be generous by spending freely when he attended the tournaments, and giving what money he won to the poor and less fortunate. Milun also "frequently entertained lavishly and spent generously" in Brittany.

"Les povres chevalers amot:
Ceo que des riches gaainot
Lur donout e sis reteneit,
E mut largement despendeit."
(Milun, ll 327 - 330)

Eliduc is also shown to spend his money freely. When he arrives in the new land he makes sure that all the poor knights eat at his table. Likewise at the very end of the story he gives most of his land and wealth to the church.

"Eliduc se fist bien servir;
A sun manger feseit venir
Les chevalers mesaeisez
Quë al burc erent herbergez."
(Eliduc, ll 137 - 140)

To be Handsome

The first mention of the main character in Guigemar is at lines 37 to 38:
"Guigemar noment le dancel,
El rëaulme nen out plus bel;"
(Guigemar, ll 37 - 38)
He is described as the most handsome in the land. Beauty is definitely an aspect of the ideal knight.

Eliduc as well is described as being handsome. The daughter of the King in England looks him up and down and decides there in nothing at all wrong about him, ie he is perfectly handsome.

"Icele l'ad mut esgardé,
Sun vis, sun cors e sun semblant;
Dit en lui n'at mesanenant,
Forment le prise en sun curage."
(Eliduc, ll 300 - 303)

Lanval is also described as being handsome, in this case it is one of the reasons that people are envious of him.

"Pur sa beauté, pur sa prüesce
L'envioënt tut li plusur;"
(Lanval, ll 22 - 23)

The adjective "beaus" is often used of knights by Marie, continually reinforcing the notion that ideal knights were handsome.

To Act for the Correct Reasons

Equitan, in the lay of the same name, is described as upholding the principles of chivalry because he adores pleasure and amorous dalliance.
"Deduit amout e drüerie
Pur ceo maintint chevalerie.
Cil metent lur vie en nuncure
Que d'amur n'unt sen e mesure"
(Equitan, ll 15 - 18)
This is a warping of chivalry to a bad purpose, using it as a means to an unchivalric end. Equitan "desires" his seneschal's wife even before he meets her, and then convinces her that this desire is actually true love. This is quite the opposite of what the chivalric ideal of true love is. Although the king speaks nobly, his heart is in the wrong place and this is what really matters.

Marie explicitly states her moral of the lay at the end,

"Tel purcace le mal d'autrui
Dunt le mals [tut] revert sur lui"
(Equitan, ll 309 - 310)
People should not wish evil on others lest it fall back upon themselves. It is morally reprehensible for a knight to act for their own gain, as Flori stresses in his works, they should act for the good of their lady, their lord and their vassals, and the church.

Other Virtues

There are several other virtues protrayed in the texts, however these are less forcefully stressed by Marie, only having each appear in a single lay.

To Respect Others

An important but less strongly presented aspect of the model knight is respect for one's elders and lords. When Milun unhorses his father he is distressed to find that he has knocked off an older man and apologises eloquently and profusely.
"Puis li ad dit: "Sire, muntez!
Mut sui dolent e trespensez
Que nul humme de vostre eage
Deüsse faire tel utrage"
(Milun, ll 427 - 430)
Milun, and thus Marie behind the scenes, is very pleased by what the young man does, showing it to be a virtuous aspect.

To be Patient

Chevrefoil is very short at only 118 lines and concerns a meeting between Tristram and Yseult. Tristram waits patiently for the queen to come in a procession past where he has left a sign for her, a stick with his name carved into it. The queen then meets him in a clearing where they express their love. Very little can be gathered concerning models of knighthood, except to deduce that patience is a good quality and will be rewarded in due course.

Not to be Wealthy?

Le Fresne mentions knighthood only very briefly at the beginning, the main focus of the story being on Le Fresne herself.
"En Bretaine jadis maneient
dui chevaler, veisin esteient;
Riche humme furent e manant
E chevalers pruz e vaillant."
(Le Fresne, ll 3 - 6)
This is an interesting passage as it can be interpreted in to entirely opposite ways. One can take it that being a "Riche humme" is a good quality, as the knights display other more recognisable virtues such as "pruz e vaillant". This would be in keeping with historical evidence, as owning and maintaining a "destrier", armour and weapons, let alone a squire and a household were very expensive. However one might equally read that because Marie made the distinction that they were rich men but valiant knights, that she is disapproving of their wealth. This fits with her other much more definite quality of being generous, if one is wealthy as a knight rather than as a land owner the duty must be to be generous and give the more needy some of your wealth thus reducing it. Marie chooses to ignore the reality of the situation in favour of the more fantastic and legendary knight, as one would expect in literature rather than history.

To Avenge Wrongs

There are two knights in Yonec, the son and the hawk-knight father. Yonec's only knightly virtue shown is that of vengeance; he avenges his parents' deaths by killing his stepfather. Vengeance is one of the feudal duties owed by a lord to his vassals, and Yonec fulfills this for his mother.

Conclusion

Marie de France in her lays displays several qualities as being important for knighthood. Her principle focus is love, and to love properly. She has her favoured knights displaying this faithful, unpossessive love while others lack one of more of the characteristics.

Her next focal point is that of being a useful part of feudal society, the knight needs to be loyal to his lord, and provide him with 'auxillium' and 'consillium' - military service and advice. Less stressed is the lord's reciprocal duty to provide vengeance for his knights as shown in Yonec.

Marie also shows in several lays that she considers it necessary to be generous to those less fortunate, handsome and to act for the correct reasons. She also has several less important virtues which she only portrays in one lay each, respect in Milun, patience in Chevrefoil, wealth in Le Fresne and as mentioned above, vengeance in Yonec

Bibliography

Burgess, G.S. and Busby, K. The Lais of Marie de France, 1986, Penguin Books.

Burgess, G.S. (Introduction), Ewert A. (edition) Marie de France, Lais, 1995, Bristol Classical Press

Burgess, G.S. Marie de France, Text and Context, 1987, Manchester University Press

Duby, Georges The Chivalrous Society, Translated by Cynthia Postan, Edward Arnold Ltd, 1977

Flori, Jean L'Essor de la Chevalerie, XIe - XIIe Siécles, 1986, Librairie Droz

Flori, Jean L'Idéologie du Glaive 1983, Librarie Droz