CHAPTER VI
THE PROSE LANCELOT—THE 'ENFANCES' OF THE HERO
In the preceding chapters we have examined certain romances of the Lancelot cycle lying outside the great prose compilation which represents its final form. The popular 'Lancelot' legend was the legend as told in the prose Lancelot, and the Grail romances therewith incorporated. It is with these romances we must now deal.
The elements composing this vast compilation (which in its completed form appears to have aimed at embracing the entire Arthurian cycle in all its ramifications) are so diverse that it would, under any circumstances, be a matter of great difficulty to decide how best to analyse and examine the composite structure; and this initial difficulty is much increased by the fact that so far the material at our disposal, abundant though it be, is in an inchoate and unorganised condition. There is no critical edition of the prose Lancelot; and as we shall see in the following studies, not merely the MSS., but the numerous printed editions derived from the MSS., differ so widely from each other that until a critical text based on a comparison of all the available versions is in our hands, it will be quite impossible to do more than form a tentative hypothesis, or advance a guarded suggestion as to the gradual growth and formation of the completed legend.
I would therefore entreat any readers of this and the subsequent chapters to bear in mind that I am not attempting any critical study of the prose Lancelot, as a whole—the time for such a study has not yet come—but rather I am examining (a) certain points of the prose legend which are of capital importance in themselves, or must have existed in some form even in a shorter version of the story, e.g., such as Lancelot's youth, and first appearance at court, his relations with Guinevere, and connection with the Grail story; (b) certain interesting variants in the texts we possess, variants which are of the greatest importance to English scholars as clearing up many of the difficulties connected with the character of the source used by Malory in his compilation.96 My aim is to prepare the way for a critical examination of the prose Lancelot rather than to myself offer such a critical examination.
In a previous chapter I hazarded the suggestion that the original germ of the whole story might prove to be a lai recounting the theft of a child by a water-fairy, and in spite of the unwieldy dimensions to which the tale has grown, I think this suggestion will be found to hold good.
As I hinted above, the Lancelot legend is not confined to the prose Lancelot, but it has affected romances originally entirely unconnected with our hero, such as the Merlin and the Tristan. In the earliest forms of the story neither of these tales have anything whatever to do with Lancelot; in the latest versions Tristan has been practically incorporated into the Lancelot, while Merlin forms an elaborate introduction to it.
Though it has undergone a certain amount of modification, the tradition at the base of the Merlin and prose Lancelot appears to be identical with that related by the Lanzelet. The names Ban of Benoic and Pant of Genewîs are quite near enough to represent the same original, probably modified in the Lanzelet by translation into another tongue. The story of the king driven from his kingdom and dying of a broken heart is the same, au fond, though the motif has been varied, and in the prose Lancelot the king's misfortunes are caused by treachery, and not by his own misgovernment. This is a very natural modification, and one likely to be caused by the growing popularity of the son, which would have a tendency to react favourably on the character of the father.97
It is clear that both versions of the Merlin story know the Lancelot legend in its completed form. Thus the Vulgate Merlin knows of his two cousins, Lionel and Bohort, whose introduction into the legend marks that secondary stage, when not merely the hero, but the hero's race in its entirety, is selected for special honour.98
In the Ordinary, or Vulgate, Merlin, the enchanter is never brought into direct contact with Lancelot, but is betrayed to his doom before the birth of that hero takes place. In the Suite de Merlin, however, he and his treacherous love visit the castle of King Ban, and see the child, whose future fame Merlin prophesies; while the lady is identified with the fairy who brings up Lancelot.99
The Suite also refers in a prophetic manner to certain subsequent feats of Lancelot, and introduces the personages of the Tristan story, such as Morholt (Le Morhout),100 a clear proof that it is posterior to the incorporation of this legend with the Arthurian cycle.
Of the two Merlin versions, the Suite therefore appears to be the later, but the Vulgate Merlin also refers to the Grail romances,101 so that it seems clear that both have been redacted subsequent to the completion of the Lancelot story.
To return to the prose Lancelot. The story of the hero's youth, while agreeing in the main with that told by Ulrich von Zatzikhoven, is yet marked by important modifications and additions. The brothers Lionel and Bohort appear on the scene, and become Lancelot's companions, while the whole conception of the kingdom of the Lady of the Lake is radically modified. It is no longer a Meide-lant; Lancelot has knight-attendants as well as cousin-playfellows, indeed, save for the Mirage, which counterfeits a lake and thus keeps off unwelcome intruders, the country is to all intents and purposes an ordinary earthly kingdom.102
When the lad (who is always called by his protectress Fils du roi, and has a more than adequate idea of his own importance) leaves the kingdom, which he does in order to seek knighthood at Arthur's hands, he goes gorgeously equipped, with armour, steed, and retinue of servants.
But his arrival at Arthur's court is most interesting and suggestive. Arthur meets him without the town, and consigns him to the care of Ywain, who, the next day, leads him to the palace through a crowd of spectators eager to look upon his beauty.
In a previous chapter I have commented upon the strong resemblance between the account of Lanzelet's entry into the world, as described by Ulrich von Zatzikhoven, and that of Parzival, as related by Wolfram von Eschenbach. Both alike are ignorant of knightly skill and customs; both are unable to control their steeds, they cannot even hold the bridle; both are alike fair to look upon, but apparently foolish (tumbe); both are ignorant of their name and parentage. Different as the account of the prose Lancelot is from this, and no difference could well be wider, yet here again the Lancelot falls into line with the Perceval story, and again in the form peculiar to Wolfram von Eschenbach; for there, too, Parzival makes his entry on foot, through a crowd eager to behold his beauty, and his guide is the squire Iwanet.103
It will be remembered that in Chrétien's version of the story Perceval's entry is made under quite different circumstances. He rides into the hall, and advances so close to the king that his horse's head touches him, and subsequently he refuses to dismount.
The correspondence of the name Ywain=Iwanet is also significant. In the case of Wolfram's poem it has been generally concluded that the name was a diminutive of Iwein or Iwan, and therefore distinct from the name Chrétien gives to Gawain's squire who aids Perceval to disarm his fallen foe—Yonet. Hertz, in his recent translation of the Parzival,104 takes this view, though he would differentiate the Ywain referred to from King Urien's famous son, and in my translation of the poem I adopted the same view. But further study has led me to doubt this solution. I now think it more probable that the name is in both cases the same, i.e. a form of the Breton Yonec, which we find with the varying spelling, Iwenec and Yonet.105 Thus both Chrétien and Wolfram refer to the same character; and the compiler of the prose Lancelot probably knew the Perceval story under a form analogous rather to Wolfram than to Chrétien. Whether the form Ywain was adopted through a mistake, or from a desire to substitute a well-known hero for an obscure squire, it is impossible to say, in any case the correspondence, though less striking than the similar passages of the Lanzelet, is worth noting.106
Again we find that Guinevere, failing to obtain an answer from the youth, who is struck dumb by her beauty, makes some contemptuous remarks as to his lack of sense, and leaves the hall. This may be compared with Parzival, Book III. ll. 988-9.107
A further indication of contact with the Perceval romances is afforded by the love-trances which overtake the hero at the most inconvenient moment, and are repeated ad nauseam in the most clumsy and inartistic manner. It is noticeable that on the occasion of the first attack (in the case of Lancelot one can only regard these trances as an intermittent malady) the knight is clad in red armour and leans on his spear—as does Perceval when he sees the blood-drops on the snow. In the prose Lancelot it is invariably the sight, and not the memory, of Guinevere which causes the trance, a far less poetical conception than that of the Perceval.
But in face of the passage quoted by M. Paulin Paris, in his translation of the prose Lancelot, probably few will contend that the story of Perceval was not anterior to, and well-known by the compiler of, the first mentioned romance. Et le grant conte de Lancelot convient repairier en la fin à Perceval qui est chiés et la fin de tos les contes ès autres chevaliers. Et tout sont branches de lui, qu'il acheva la grant queste. Et li contes Perceval meismes est une branche del haut conte del Graal qui est chiés de tos les contes.108
We should note here that when this particular passage was written the writer evidently knew nothing of Galahad as the Grail Winner, though he knew the Lancelot story in an advanced stage. We shall have occasion to refer to this later on.
In the account of Lancelot's first appearance at court we find an incident which appears to connect the story with a cycle of poems bearing a curious resemblance to the Perceval cycle—the Bel Inconnu poems. Immediately after the hero has received knighthood, as they sit at meat in the hall, a messenger arrives, sent by the 'Dame de Nohan,'109 asking for a champion to aid her against the King of Northumberland. Lancelot (whose name we must remember is not yet revealed, and who is referred to by the compiler as Le Beau Varlet) at once requests that the adventure be given to him, and, though Arthur demurs on account of his youth and inexperience, insists that he has a right to it, as the first boon he has claimed since he was knighted.
It is under precisely similar circumstances that the hero of the Bel Inconnu stories undertakes his first adventure.
Others have been struck by this resemblance, and M. Philipot, in his review of Dr. Schofield's Studies on the Libeaus Desconus,110 maintains that the Lancelot story (more particularly in the version known to Ulrich von Zatzikhoven) is the elder of the two, and the source of the parallel adventure of the Bel Inconnu group.
With this view I cannot agree. I have elsewhere111 given reasons for holding the true order of the Enfances to be as follows, Perceval, Le Bel Inconnu, Lancelot, and to this view I adhere. We must remember that the French original of the Lanzelet must in any case be prior to 1194; how much earlier we have no means of deciding, but the Lanzelet has points of contact with both the Perceval (Enfances) and the Bel Inconnu (Fier Baiser) story. Further, the prose Lancelot, though differing very widely from Ulrich von Zatzikhoven's poem, yet, as we see, also offers parallels both to Perceval and Le Bel Inconnu; such parallels being entirely different from those of the Lanzelet. To assert that these stories borrowed from the Lancelot would involve the existence, at an early date, of a fully developed and widely diffused Lancelot legend, a conclusion which the absence of all reference to the hero in the earlier Arthurian romances forbids.
To my mind, when we have three separate cycles of romance closely connected with each other, if we desire to discover which is the oldest of the stories we should ask in the first instance, in which of the stories are the incidents common to all the essence, in which are they the accidents, of the tale. It is quite clear that they are not essential to the Lancelot story. The characteristics of ignorance, simplicity, and headlong impulsiveness attributed to him by Ulrich von Zatzikhoven, are entirely foreign to his character as elsewhere represented; even in the Lanzelet they are promptly discarded: but they are the very essence of Perceval's character, he, and no other, is the schöne tumbe of romance. Again, the adventure of the Fier Baiser has absolutely nothing to do with Lancelot; it is manifestly dragged into the Lanzelet version 'by the head and shoulders,' and has no connection with the context, but it is the crown and completion of the adventures of Gawain's nameless son.112
Whatever be the connection between the Perceval and Bel Inconnu stories, I think it is clear that both were well known before the development of the Lancelot legend took place, and that in the process of development this latter borrowed from both. A close examination of the variants of the Lancelot 'Enfances' will, I think, strengthen the hypothesis advanced in a previous chapter, i.e. that the connection of the hero with a water-fairy alone is of the essence of the tale, all the rest is comparatively late in development, and markedly non-original and secondary in character.113
CHAPTER VII
THE PROSE LANCELOT—THE LOVES OF LANCELOT AND GUINEVERE
In the previous chapter I remarked that the time, and the material, for a really critical study of the prose Lancelot were not yet ripe, and that I should, therefore, confine myself to the discussion of the more striking features of the story, i.e. the Enfances, the liaison with Guinevere, and the connection with the Grail Quest. These form what we may call the persistent element in the completed Lancelot legend; the great mass of adventures filling in the framework, varying (as we shall presently see) so considerably, that till we have some idea of the growth and various redactions of the story it is hopeless to attempt to criticise them.
Certain remarks, however, we can safely make. The story as we have it at present is marked by a constant repetition of similar incidents. I have already alluded to one, the love-trance. What we may perhaps consider an exaggeration of this motif, the love-madness, also occurs more than once and has affected the Tristan story. This is certainly not an original feature, but I think it is a question whether the source be the Chevalier au Lion or the Prophecies of Merlin; personally I incline to the latter solution, and think the name of Merlin's wife, Guendolen, may have suggested its introduction into the Lancelot story.114
Another incident of frequent repetition is the release of the hero from prison in order that he may attend a tournament. Of this we have at least three instances: the version of the Charrette, where it is the wife of the seneschal, his jailor, who assists him; and two belonging specially to the prose Lancelot. In one instance it is from the prison of the Dame de Malehault that he attends the tournament and returns, as in the Charrette; in the other he is freed from the prison of the three queens by the daughter of the Duc de Rochedon, and does not return. This latter also corresponds with his being freed from the prison of Meleagant by the daughter of King Baudemagus, whom Malory, doubtless under the influence of the Charrette story, substitutes in his translation for the heiress of Rochedon.
Again we find that certain adventures, some of considerable importance, are related in some versions of the story while they are omitted in others, but in the absence of a critical and comparative edition it is impossible to say which of the great mass of adventures now composing the prose Lancelot belonged to the original redaction. Nor can this again be satisfactorily settled till we have determined the mutual relation between the Grand S. Graal, the Queste, and the Lancelot. In short, the Lancelot problem involves a number of minor problems of extreme intricacy, and till these be solved we only stand on the threshold of Arthurian criticism.115
A point in which it appears to me that we have a suggestion of the original tale, expanded from a source foreign to that tale, is in the account of the expedition undertaken to recover Lancelot's ancestral kingdom from the hands of King Claudas. There is no doubt that the hero should, as a matter of poetical justice, regain his inheritance, and in the Lanzelet we find it summarily recorded that he does so,116 but under entirely different circumstances from those recorded in the prose Lancelot. The latter account is of extreme length, and apparently a free imitation of the Arthurian expeditions of the Chronicles; the incident of Frollo's defeat before Paris is certainly borrowed from Geoffrey or his translators. As it now stands the incident is lacking in point and practically unnecessary to the story, since Lancelot prefers to continue Arthur's knight rather than become a sovereign in his own right, and therefore bestows the lands on his cousins and bastard half-brother. The retention of a feature which evolution has thus robbed of its significance appears to afford evidence both of the original independence of the tale and also of the priority of Ulrich von Zatzikhoven's version.
Leaving on one side then the minor adventures into which the successive redactions have introduced considerable variation, we will turn to that feature of the story which, practically unvarying in form, appears to offer us a fairer prospect of arriving at some real and definite conclusion—the love of Lancelot for the wife of his liege lord. Setting aside the many minor questions to which the subject gives rise, it seems to me that the main problem of the amours of Lancelot and Guinevere is, Do they represent the latest form of an original feature of the story, or are we to consider them as an addition to the tale, an element imported into it under the influence of the popular Tristan legend?
This much is certain, there is no literary evidence of growth in the story; either it is non-existent, as in the Lanzelet, or complete, fully developed, and decked out in all the artificialities and refinements of Minne-dienst, as in the Charrette. As we noted in our discussion of the latter poem, Chrétien evidently credits his audience with a previous knowledge of the relations between the queen and his hero; he nowhere hints that he is about to tell them something new, nor does he offer any explanation why Lancelot rather than Gawain, who, as the Merlin informs us, was 'the queen's knight,' should achieve the rescue of his liege lady. There can be no doubt that he was dealing with a situation thoroughly familiar to, and understood by, his hearers.
A point which we are much tempted to overlook in the criticism of Arthurian romance is the length of time intervening between the period at which the events recorded are supposed to have happened, and the earliest known literary record of those events. If we estimate this intervening period as five centuries, we are speaking well within the mark. It is obvious that we have here ample time for forgetfulness, dislocation, or rearrangement of the original legend. Yet that that legend survived I hold for certain. Had Arthur been completely forgotten, the immense popularity achieved by the romances of his cycle would constitute a literary phenomenon practically unique; the seed that in the twelfth century burst into such glorious flower had been germinating for ages. The question is, what was the nature of that seed—what the relation of the original Arthurian legend to the completed Arthurian romance?
On this point it behoves us to tread warily, and to avoid dogmatising. I have suggested elsewhere that probably the historic germ of the Arthurian legend is to be found in his fights with the Saxons, his betrayal by his wife and nephew, and his death in battle with the latter. Certainly there is a genuine historic element in the account of his wars; and it is significant that the older Arthurian chroniclers—Geoffrey of Monmouth and his translators—all agree in relating at considerable length the story of Guinevere's betrayal of her husband; while the Welsh tradition, which does not know Lancelot, is even more emphatic on the subject of her infidelity.117
We must remember that, alike in Geoffrey, Wace, and Layamon, the account of Guinevere's relations with Mordred is totally different to that familiar to us through Malory, and borrowed by him from the Mort Artur. In the latter, the queen is no accomplice in Mordred's treason, but resists his advances vi et armis, barricading herself in the Tower of London, where the traitor vainly besieges her.
In the chronicles the whole position is different: they shall speak for themselves. This is Wace's account:
'Que Mordret fist en Engleterre
La roine sot et oï,
A Evroïc ert à sejor,
En pensé fu et en tristor.
Membra lui de la vilenie
Que por Mordret se fu honie;
Le roi avoit deshonoré
Et son neveu Mordret amé,
Contre loi l'avoit esposée,
S'in estoit honie et dampnée;
Mius vausist morte estre que vive,
Mult en estoit morne et pensive.
A Karlion s'en est fuie,
S'in entra en une abaïe,
Iloc devint none velée;
Tote sa vie i fu celée.
Ne fu oïe, ne véue,
Ne fu trovée, ne séue.
Por la vergogne del mesfait
Et del pécié qu'ele avoit fait.'—Brut, ii. ll. 13607-30.
In the corresponding passage, Geoffrey of Monmouth gives as his authorities 'Breton' tradition and the clerk Walter of Oxford (cf. note to above passage). Layamon in his account is even more severe towards the guilty pair:
'Arður bi-tahte
al þat he ahte.
Moddrade and þere quene
þat heom was iquene.
þat was ufele idon
þat heo iboren weoren.
þis lond heo for-radden
mid ræuðen uniuoƺen.
and a þan ænden heom seolven
þe wurse gon iscenden.
þat heo þer for-leoseden
lif and heore saulen.
and ædder seoððe laðen
nauer ælche londe.
þat nauer na mā nalde.
sel bede beoden for heore saule.'
Brut, Layamon, Madden's ed., ll. 25500-14.118
In the passage corresponding to that quoted above from Wace, Layamon adds the detail, that none knew the manner of the queen's death, whether she had drowned herself:
'nuste hit mon to soðe.
whaðer heo weore on deðe
(and ou ƺeo hinne ende) 119
þa heo seolf weore
isunken in þe watere.'—ll. 28481-85.
From these passages it is abundantly clear that Guinevere was no victim of treachery, but a willing sinner; and that the tradition of her infidelity to her husband existed prior to the formation of the Arthurian romantic cycle.
Granting, then, that the feature formed part of the early Arthurian legend, are we to consider that the version given by the chronicles faithfully represents the original tradition, and that it was Mordred who was Guinevere's original lover? I think not. It is an extremely curious feature of the problem, that though in each of the pseudo-historic versions Guinevere, as we have seen, is genuinely in love with Mordred, and is roundly condemned by the chroniclers for her conduct, in no single one of the Arthurian romances is there any trace of the slightest affection existing between them. Mordred, save as traitor in the final scenes, plays no rôle in the story; he is never represented as a persona grata at court; in one important version, as we shall see, the queen dislikes him because she suspects his true relation to Arthur. Guinevere's moral character is held to be untarnished, even by her liaison with Lancelot.
I suspect that we have here to deal with a lapse of tradition. Mordred is not the original lover, but he represents him; and between that original lover and Lancelot there intervenes a period in which Guinevere's lapse from virtue was smoothed over, and partially forgotten. It is certainly remarkable that in each of the three great prose branches, the Merlin,120 the Tristan, and the Lancelot, Guinevere's moral character is apparently unaffected by her conduct with Lancelot. The compilers all agree in extolling her as the noblest of queens and best of women. Even so aggressively virtuous and clerical a romance as the prose Perceval li Gallois, though quite aware of the connection, regards Guinevere in a favourable light—indeed, as morally superior to Arthur! Nor can we quote the Queste as representing the opposite view; true, Lancelot is blamed for his relations with the queen, but Guinevere, when she appears upon the scene, is treated with marked respect, and the reader has an uncomfortable suspicion that the writer objected to her rather as woman than as wife,—he objects to the sex as a whole, only forgiving Perceval's sister on account of her virginity. It seems clear that if the character of Guinevere has, among the Welsh, been handed down to posterity under the unfavourable light in which Professor Rhys tells us she is popularly regarded, this must be due either to a tradition emanating from an earlier and healthier state of society, when conjugal infidelity was not regarded with complacency, or to a later and more enlightened verdict on her relations with Lancelot, but in no case can it be due to the influence of those who told the story of these relations.
The second cause will, I think, account for the nineteenth-century presentment of Guinevere's character; we judge her on the grounds of her relations with Lancelot, which we regard as blameworthy, though not undeserving of sympathy—in fact, we do but emphasise Malory's verdict.
But this does not account for the Welsh tradition, which, as I have before pointed out, knows practically nothing of Lancelot; that must rest upon other grounds, and I believe it rests upon the tradition preserved to us in the Mordred story.
What this original tradition was, we can now only surmise; it belonged to a period of which but few and fragmentary traces survive, but I think that most probably the primitive story ascribed the rôle of lover to Gawain. I made this suggestion some four years ago,121 and subsequent study has shown me nothing to induce me to alter my opinion, though it has suggested sundry important modifications.
I think now that Gawain and Mordred really represent the two sides of one original personality; and that a personality very closely connected with early Celtic tradition.
What the exact nature of the relation between Gawain and early Irish mythic tradition may be we cannot yet say: that such a relation exists is practically beyond doubt.122
Among the characteristic features of the early Irish heroes with whom Gawain is connected, we find the following: Adventurous hero and nephew on the female side to royal centre of cycle (Cuchulinn and Diarmid123); son to that uncle (Cuchulinn); lover of uncle's wife, eloping with her (Diarmid); deadly combat between father and son (Cuchulinn and Conlaoch). This latter incident I believe to be of greater importance in heroic-mythic tradition than has yet been realised. As I interpret it, the father and son combat in heroic tradition really represents the 'slayer who shall himself be slain,' the prehistoric combat of the 'Golden Bough' (to which I have referred in chap. v.) influenced by the doctrine of re-birth, as set forth by Mr. Nutt in vol. ii. of the Voyage of Bran, i.e. it is a conflict of the god with his re-born and re-juvenated self, and as such has a very real place in Celtic tradition.
As we see above, we do not at present possess a version in which all these characteristics are united in one hero, but they might very well be so united. I think that the earlier Gawain was at once Arthur's nephew and son by his sister,124 adventurous hero of the court, lover of the queen, and eventually slayer of his father-uncle.125
Very probably in the original story there was some such device as the beauty-spot of Diarmid, which aroused involuntary passion in every woman who beheld him; or the love-potion of the Tristan story; a device whereby the earlier tellers of these tales secured sympathy for the lovers, without lowering the character of the husband, so that Gawain, no less than Diarmid and Tristan, would be regarded as a gallant and sympathetic figure.
But the peculiar line of evolution followed by the Arthurian story, the strongly ethical and Christian character which it early assumed (due probably to the heathen belief of the historic Arthur's genuine antagonists, the Saxons), made a change necessary, if Gawain was to preserve his position as leading hero of the legend, and I now think it most probable that that change was effected by divesting Gawain of the characteristics incompatible with his later position, and bestowing them on another personality, created for the purpose, since they could not altogether be dropped out of the story. It is significant that, as I remarked above, the earliest tradition gives Gawain no brother save Mordred, and Layamon remarks emphatically, 'he never had any other.'
Further, I suspect, that exactly the same process took place with regard to Guinevere, and that we have a survival of it in the person of that mysterious lady, the false Guinevere.
I would therefore modify my original views on the subject, by saying that I now think that though Gawain was Guinevere's original lover, Lancelot did not succeed him in that rôle, in fact that Lancelot does not represent the original lover at all, that that tradition is now represented by the Mordred story, and that there was a period in the evolution of the legend, preceding the introduction of Lancelot into the cycle, during which the tradition of Guinevere's voluntary betrayal of her husband was dropped, and she was regarded in an altogether favourable light.