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The Awntyrs off Arthure : Beyond the tapestry
アーサーの『ターン・ワザリング冒険』 : タペストリーの向う側
Connolly, Martin
慶應義塾大学日吉紀要刊行委員会
2012
慶應義塾大学日吉紀要. 英語英米文学 (The Hiyoshi review of English
studies). No.60 (2012. 3) ,p.1- 21

Departmental Bulletin Paper
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The Awntyrs Off Arthure:
Beyond the Tapestry

Martin C. Connolly
Introduction
The Awntyrs Off Arthure, an alliterative poem written in the North ofEngland circa 1420, doesn’t receive quite the attention it deserves, which isa pity, because it really is a gem of English Arthurian literature. Students ofmedieval English literature will invariably read and learn about Sir Gawain
and the Green Knight, The Alliterative Morte Arthure, The Stanzaic Morteand Malory before they ever come to the Awntyrs, if at all. There areprobably a number of reasons for this. Perhaps it is because of the poem’s
reputation for being difficult to categorize: is it a knightly romance or an
exemplum on Christian values? Interpretation is made problematic, many
would say, because the poem seems to juxtapose religious and secularmaterial in an unsustainable mix. Yet, whatever difficulties the poem does
present the modern reader, there is no question that it is a poem of some
importance in the Arthurian canon. The Awntyrs possesses obvious linkage
to the Alliterative Morte and to the chronicle aspect of the Arthur story. It
also shares a great deal of vocabulary and aspects of its literary composition
with Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Furthermore, its survival in no lessthan four manuscripts speaks volumes, if you’ll pardon the pun, on thepoem’s popularity in the early fifteenth century -the Alliterative Morte, theStanzaic Morte and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, of course, survive in
only one manuscript apiece.
The present essay attempts to train a little much-needed light upon thisfine, if somewhat neglected, example of Northern English alliterative poetry.
I will seek to disclose a little of the poem’s rather original way with medieval
literary conventions. We will look at, in particular, the way in which thewriter draws attention to the fine garments and exquisite jewelry worn by the
courtly characters, and discuss to what extent this approach leads toward a
communication of the themes of the work as a whole. This is a rich area of
inquiry for anyone even partially interested in the medieval world: it is often
the hanging tapestries depicting medieval hunts or court life (in castles,
museums and history books) which picture the medieval world for many of
us. The various strands and braids of cloth help to convey a sense ofpervasive luxury and finery, the very fabric of the untouchable realm of king,chivalric knight and fair damsels. In The Awntyrs Off Arthure, however, thepoet appears to be doing more than just exercising his descriptive powers.
Part of the thematic mechanics of the poem derives from contemporary
notions of a meeting between the humbled dead and the prideful living, as
related in poems, stories and even in sculptures; such a meeting is designed
to present a stark contrast, within the terms of a Christian outlook, on thetransiency of life and worldly concerns. And this is an aspect to the Awntyrs
which is certainly valid. Yet, the poet appears to be doing more; ultimately,
the poem’s profligate foregrounding of the shiny exterior surfaces of the
Arthurian kingdom can be also read as a critique of the very literary tradition
it is using as the vehicle of its own transmission. This, in turn, may be
accompanied by more than a touch of socio-political critiquing ofcontemporary medieval England. It is hoped the present investigation can

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestry



help to shed at least some light on the poetic mastery and thematic ambition
inherent in the work.
Brief Description / Narrative1
At the outset, however, a basic description of the story of The Awntyrs
Off Arthure is in order. The poem survives in four manuscripts of the
fifteenth century, Lincoln Cathedral MS 91 (often referred to as the ‘Lincoln
Thornton’ manuscript as it was copied by famous book owner RobertThornton), Lambeth Palace Library MS 491, the Ireland-Blackburn MS andOxford, Bodleian Library, MS Douce 324. These are all importantcollections, and the Thornton collection is one of the most importantmanuscripts in medieval English literature. The poem is 715 lines long andwritten in a series of thirteen line stanzas (fifty five in all) which end withfour short lines (known as a ‘wheel’ in metric verse) similar to the way inwhich the stanzas in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight are constructed. Note
might also be made of the fact that the Awntyrs, in common with all thepoems of the ‘Gawain poet’, exhibits a circularity of construction, with thelast line echoing the first. The narrative structure of the Awntyrs istraditionally described as bi-partite, as the bulk of the poem comprises two
distinct, and some would say, discrete, passages, one set in a forest, and thesecond set at court. As we shall see, however, this approach may be
misleading; the poem’s narrative structure is a little more complex than that.
The poem opens by presenting the Arthurians in the midst of a hunt for
deer in the Forest of Inglewood, in Cumbria, in the north of England. This is
the kind of scene often depicted in medieval tapestries, and well known toreaders of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. The reader is provided withrich descriptions of the costumes and finery worn by the protagonists andthis illustrates that the poet was well acquainted with both the accoutrements



The Devonshire Hunting Tapestries: Deer hunt. (1440–1450, Netherlands)(Photo © Victoria & Albert Museum, London)

and the mechanics of a medieval hunt. The activities are soon interrupted,
however, by the sudden and inexplicable darkening of the sun: at one point,
Sir Gawain suggests this may be an eclipse. In fact, it is not, and Gawain
knows this. He and Queen Guinevere have, for some reason which is not
explained, become separated from the rest of the troupe, and must endure
the worst consequences of this sudden interruption by themselves. What has
occurred, in fact, is properly supernatural; Gawain witnesses a grotesqueapparition rise from a small lake (named Terne Wathelyn, or Tarn Wadling)at the centre of the forest, and only makes the eclipse reference in order toallay the fears of his delicate charge. This is a little surprising, consideringmodern assumptions about medieval superstitions, but celestial phenomena
are certainly easier to deal with, as they soon discover. The apparition, it
seems, is not merely a random piece of protoplasm, but the spirit ofGuinevere’s deceased mother. Not only that, but she has come back from thegrave, or somewhere not very wholesome beyond the grave, in order toberate the Arthurians for their high-living and ingrained self-indulgence.

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the TapestryThis kind of meeting, as stated before, of the humbled dead confronting the
prideful living, is associated in medieval literature with De Tribus Regibus
Mortuis, or The Three Dead Kings, a version of which was composed byJohn Awdelay, relating the tale of three living kings coming face to face withthree dead kings one day in the midst of a hunt. There are also a number ofother possible analogues and sources wherein the dead meet the living, manyof them of the ‘exemplum’ variety, as seen in works like the Gesta
Romanorum. For the next few stanzas, the remainder of the whole first halfof the poem, the ghost does her best to spoil whatever feelings of selfindulgence and sport Gawain and Guinevere may have been enjoying. Not
only, she informs them, will all beauty and riches become rotting flesh andash, but, in a kind of non-sequitur to beat all non-sequiturs, the entire
Arthurian kingdom is destined to implode, resulting in total dissolution, andall due to the greed and reckless ambition of Arthur. She even makes implicit
reference to the rising of Mordred, who is now just a child at court,
innocently playing with a ball (309–12).
In riche Arthures halle,
The barne playes at þe balleÞat outray shall you alle,
Derfely þat day.
The ball, of course, can be read as a trope for the world, and therefore theactivity of the innocent infant parallels that of the over-reaching king (in thiscase Arthur, who will indulge in a bit of territorial expansion all the way toRome), thus inferring the cyclical nature of life under the Goddess of
Fortune, to which she also makes reference. The Awntyrs comes closest here
to the The Alliterative Morte Arthure, which, of course, relays the end of

Illustration of ‘The Three Living and The Three Dead Princes’, in the Psalter of Robertde Lisle, in British Library MS Arundel 83 II f.127, c.1310–1320 © British Library

Camelot in great, and gory, detail.
The second episode opens back at the court of King Arthur. Everyone
has returned from the hunt, and is doing their best to forget the strange
interruption; this is a lot harder for Gawain and Guinevere, who decide not
to ruin everyone’s day even further by disclosing what they have witnessed.
Indeed, no mention whatsoever is made of the incident again, except at thevery end of the poem, and then in a way which does not disclose the deadmother’s dire predictions. Guinevere remembers one very important point
concerning her meeting with her deceased mother: the ghost had, in answer
to her daughter’s concern, explained that the saying of some special prayers
would help alleviate her pain, as a tortured soul in purgatory. In the very
final stanza, then, Guinevere dutifully takes the requested action, anddelegates the saying of these prayers. They are called ‘Trental’ prayers,
because, deriving from the French, they involve the saying of the chief ten
feasts of the liturgical year three times each, bringing the total said to thirty.

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestry

It is well known that this aspect, as well as the returning of a deceased
mother to speak with her child is indebted to The Trentals of St Gregory.
The main content of the second episode revolves around the claims of a
stranger knight, a Scottish lord, Sir Galeron, who enters the court
unexpectedly, together with his lady. They are both decked out in the finest
cloths and jewels. He is seeking the return of lands, stolen from him, hesays, by the king. Rather than simply dispatch the intruder without moreado, King Arthur displays high courtesy to him, and provides him with themeans by which to obtain the satisfaction of his claim: a duel, with, ittranspires, Sir Gawain, Arthur’s doughtiest knight. This turns out to be arather violent affair, one which claims the life of Gawain’s beloved horse (bydecapitation, no less), and almost ends with the death of both knights, and in
the most messy, bloody fashion; at the critical moment, Guinevere intervenes
on behalf of Sir Galeron, to plead mercy. It all ends amicably, if
problematically, with Arthur praising the knight’s courage and ceding him
back his lands, and then re-granting Gawain other territories (which, ofcourse, is the problematical part, as it will no doubt incur the wrath ofanother land-owner).
Worldly Duty vs. Spiritual Duty
Considering the narrative as it is related above, it is perfectly
understandable to think of the narrative structure as bi-partite, since it islargely composed of two sizeable self-contained episodes: the appearance ofthe ghost of Guinevere’s mother in the first, and the appearance of Sir
Galeron of Galloway in the second. Yet, this approach tends to de-emphasize
the promise mechanism which helps to frame the episodes, and which I
strongly believe would have been well noted by contemporary readers/
listeners. This promise, or request, from the dead to the living, was based onthe verse legend, The Trentals of St Gregory, a fictional tale designed topromote the common liturgical practice of having thirty masses said in orderto speed the soul’s passage through Purgatory. In the Awntyrs, the ghostly
mother informs Guinevere that the saying of ‘thirtty trentales’ (218) will
effect her release from purgatorial suffering (a result of her own sin of
prideful, non-spiritual living) and see her ‘brought vnto blys.’(221) Whilereference to this promise is conspicuous by its absence until the very final
stanza, it can be maintained that the promise mechanism creates a narrative
frame. Critic Helen Phillips is very suspicious of the simple bi-partite
description of the poem:‘The structure does not offer us simply two discrete sections which canbe labelled secular or spiritual according to their subject matter, but acurious network of repetitions, recurrent patterns and episodes whichbecome frames for other episodes, through which the secular becomes acontext for the spiritual and the spiritual for the secular…’2
From there, Phillips emphasizes the importance, in contrast to the view ofsome, of the final stanza, in which Guinevere is seen carrying out thepromise to her mother:‘However it [the final stanza] got where it is, it creates a frame, in thiscase a frame for the whole rest of the narrative.’
This view entirely accords with my own, and in a separate study, I sought toreveal precisely how indeed the final stanza ‘got where it is’. Basically, I
argue that the episode involving Sir Galeron and his battle with Gawain is a
distraction from Guinevere’s more important spiritual duty, to pray for her

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestrymother, failure of which will condemn her mother to everlasting torment.
This episode, which I termed a ‘promise-postponement device’, derives
from a lesser-known version of The Trentals of St Gregory. In that poem,
there is a long passage set between the giving of the promise and its
completion (the full saying of the prayers), in which devils attempt to
distract Pope Gregory from finishing his task. The passage, in contrast to thenarrative up till then, involves a great deal of elements which seem derived
from romance narrative traditions.
Without wandering down that particular avenue of inquiry too far, this‘promise-postponement’ device appears to provide all the rationale that isneeded to explain why, and how, two distinct generic modes can beaccommodated within a single poetic frame. The promise mechanism would
have been seen by contemporary readers as highly significant, not as anelement introduced at one point, forgotten about, and then, in the words of
one critic ‘just added by some kind soul to achieve the semblance of formal
closure.’3 Rather, the reader is lead to appraise the relative merits of one
urgency over another: which is more pressing –the needs of Sir Galeron, orthe needs of Guinevere’s deceased mother? The narrative structure whichturns on the promise device provides the poem with a coherent poetic
rationale, and also encapsulates a major contemporary medieval concern,that one’s spiritual duty –embodied in the need to fulfill the promise to themother– should not be overridden by what are essentially less important,worldly concerns –embodied in the claim of Sir Galeron, which is an affair
of state. It sets up an important contrast, or conflict, within the work,
between the claims of the spiritual and the claims of the worldly. This
contrast and conflict is woven into other aspects of the poem, not least theway in which beauty is to be perceived, as something physical (and worldly)
or as something spiritual.

10Worldly Beauty vs. Spiritual Beauty
A significant poetic amplification of the theme of the competing claimsof worldly and spiritual duty can be identified in the poet’s use of clothes,apparel, jewelry, and armour, in such a way as to suggest the untrustworthy
and purely superficial beauty of worldly things. This element sets up the
poem’s second main contrast –between worldly and spiritual beauty.
Spiritual beauty, however, is only implied, contrarily, by the mother’s sindeformed ugliness, and by the hope that realization of the promise will bringabout a transformation. In the Awntyrs and in the Trentals, she is described
as grotesque. In all versions of the Trentals, the mother returns at the end of
the poem; after all the cleansing prayers have been said she has now become
transformed into a figure of such radiance that the pope mistakes her for theVirgin Mary. That such transformation does not occur at the end of the
Awntyrs, in stark contrast to what happens in the Trentals source, suggeststhat redemption –for the mother and/or for the Arthurians– will not be soeasily won. Either that, or the poet was unsure how to visually depict
spiritual beauty after having spent most of the poem depicting the very
worldly splendour of the Arthurian kingdom.
The poem’s focus on dress, costume and armour has been noted bymany. Commenting on the poet’s emphasis on Guinevere’s dress inparticular, A.C. Spearing notes that this ‘might seem to suggest that she isconcerned only with externals, mere trimmings; and indeed the widespreadtendency in medieval literature and art to convey courtly grandeur andluxury through exhaustive representations of costume must always have thisas a potential meaning.’4 Spearing’s tentativeness (‘might seem to suggest’)reflects the fact that, unlike in many medieval works, this poem’s use ofclothes and externals –what I will term a ‘clothing-motif’– as a way of

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestry

11

commenting upon moral standing, is not made explicit. It is not that kind ofpoem. The poet does, however, employ the ghostly mother to make things asclear as they need to be, conspicuously contrasting her present self –‘Naxté
and nedefull, naked on night’ (185)– with her former incarnation – ‘I was of
figure and flesh fairest of alle,/ Cristened and crisomed with kings in mykynne’(137–8). And now, adorned with only filth, writhing snakes and toads,
she invites the fashionable Arthurians to take a good look at themselves(166–7):
For al þi fressh foroure,Muse on þi mirrour;The sensitive reader, however, will have already picked up on this contrast,
etched into the visual sumptuousness (of the Arthurians’ dress), andjuxtaposed horror (in the grotesque appearance of the mother-spirit), of thepoem’s designedly slow-paced narrative. Indeed, the densely wrought
language of the poem itself, rich in repetitions and alliterative conventions,
may itself call attention to the surface and superficies of the world it
describes.5 As Thomas Hahn observes, ‘the cloisonné surface gives
preeminence to pattern, to exteriority as meaning’.6 He rightly calls attention
to the ‘poem’s profligate consumption of formulaic phrases and type scenes,of nearly fetishized objects like tapestries, dress, swords, helmets, shields, orcoats of arms…’ Lingering on the fine detail is one of the strengths of thepoem, for the visual richness it brings, as well as the sense of ambiguous
delight in the trappings of luxury.
The clothing-motif was employed in a variety of ways in both religious
and secular medieval literature, –physical appearance providing the12opportunity for oblique moral critique of a character, as in Chaucer’s
General Prologue, where the red and blue silk of his attire suggests the
Physician’s materialism, or as a way of contrasting past glories with present,
usually post-mortem, decrepitude, as in some fifteenth century politicalpieces,7 or allegorically, as in Passus XIII and XIV of Piers Plowman, in
which Hawkyn, the man of the world, the Vita Activa, is depicted wearing acoat stained with all of the Seven Deadly Sins.8 And the green girdle
fatefully accepted from Lady Bertilak in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight,
of course, is transformed by the end of that poem into the mark of Gawain’s
inescapably human imperfection. Revelation of this fact dramatically frames
the immediately preceding episodes at the Castle Hautdesert, making thegirdle an integral part of the poem’s narrative structuring.
The Awntyrs poet may also be using the clothing-motif as a way ofstructurally unifying his poem. In the opening two or three stanzas of boththe hunting scene and of the court scene (from 339) sustained andconspicuous attention is given to the sumptuous externals: e.g. ‘riche
ribaynes reuersset’ (16), ‘rybées of riall aray’ (17), ‘Al in gleterand golde’(27), and ‘a siller of silke dayntly di3t’ (340), ‘In pal pured with pane prodly
pight’ (353). Furthermore, the ninth line of the opening stanza of the court
scene precisely echoes the ninth line of the poem’s opening stanza inrecycling the phrase, ‘wlonkest in wede(s)’, strongly suggesting a designedly
symmetrical structural approach, which, incidentally, serves to counter any
notion of narrative disjointedness. It is certainly a pattern of description
which runs through the poem, knitting it together in the manner of amedieval wall tapestry. The more the exterior surfaces appear to shine,
contrasted with, or rather, mirrored by, the spiritual ugliness of the ghost(who was once one of them), the more they appear to manifest a potentially
dangerous shallowness.

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestry

13

Beyond Passive Description
The Awntyrs poet, however, doesn’t seem to be content with employing
this as a purely passive element of his narrative: the fight between Gawain
and Galeron can be read as a dramatic exposure of the shallowness ofexterior, worldly, beauty, and, specifically, chivalric glory (although there isno critical consensus on this: see endnote 9). Extending the traditionalromance writer’s propensity to linger over the details provides the poet with away of showing how the pursuit of chivalric customs –here, the gentlemanly
duel– can quite literally undo the trappings of chivalric life.9 It is an approach
which rudely juxtaposes fine sensibility –evidenced by the use of approbatory
or positive adjectives– with crude and violent action. Therefore, we read not
simply that ‘sheldes wer shred’ (569) [shields were cut to pieces] but that
‘Shene [beautiful, noble] sheldes wer shred’, not that there were ‘brenés
bybled’ (570) [coats of mail covered with blood] but ‘Bright [radiant] brenés
bybled’. The further detailing of precisely what is being destroyed or
dislodged, coupled again with approbatory adjectives (‘bright’, ‘fine’) andphrases (‘þat shene were to shewe’) seems strangely meticulous if the focus
is merely on the violent action of two battling knights. Also, one mightreasonably ask, why does the poet need to explain that the decorative aspectsof their armour are actually of little practical use? Is it to expose theessentially flimsy exteriority of chivalric trappings?10 Lines 586–91:
Hardely þen þes haþelese on helmes þey hewe; Violently / warriors
Þei beten downe beriles and bourdures bright.

beryls [gemstone] / decorative edge of mail-coat

Shildes on shildres þat shene were to shewe,

Shields/shoulders that bright were to gaze upon

Fretted were in fyne golde, þei failen in fight.

Adorned with jewels / prove deficient in battle

Stones of iral þey strenkel and strewe;‘iral’ [gemstone] / scatter and strewStiþe stapeles of stele þey strike don stri3t.

Stout armour fastenings

14

An illustration from Le Livre des Tournois, Barthélemy d’Eyck
Bibliotheque Nationale de France, MS Fr 2695. © BNFr

In an action scene, such particularity, which stretches to the naming of
precious stones, might seem inappropriate, unless it operates as a way of
reminding the reader/audience of all of the jewels and finery encountered inearlier scenes. In this sense, then, the jewels we see this time are seen
through a mirror, the mirror already proposed by the ghost of Guinevere’s
mother.
With the degeneracy of exteriority comes the degeneracy of the fightitself, from the fiction of the noble encounter between two chivalric knights
observing rules of engagement into something more closely approaching an
unruly, vicious, and potentially deadly, brawl. This battle has long been
dismissed as ‘stock romance’ –in fact, it is a battle of such ferocity that by
the end of the fight, with Galeron slashing haphazardly with his sword andGawain pulling him up roughly by the collar, we might say that the ‘lie’ ofchivalry as the noble art of fighting has been well and truly exposed. With
the armour splattered with blood and precious stones strewn in all directions,

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestry

15

the scene may be read as a tableau of the ideality of the Arthurian/chivalricdream stripped of its veneer.
Socio-Political Aspect vs. Moral Aspect
At this point, the modern reader of the Awntyrs might be forgiven for
concluding that the poem is a piece of sophisticated didacticism, an attackon those who indulge in ‘delices of luxurie’, to quote Chaucer’s Parson. In
some ways this is entirely understandable: the ghost’s appearance in theForest of Inglewood casts such a shadow over all that follows, it is perhaps
inevitable that her preachy didacticism will remain as the lasting image andsemantic resonance of the poem for some readers. Yet, such a conclusion
requires that the reader ignore the potentially political aspects of the poem,
together with its curious emphasis on geographical particularity, a feature
brought into sharp contrast by recent scholarship which speculates on the
poem’s possible direct audience and sponsorship.11 Stressing the purely
moral aspect of the poem also, as Phillips points out, runs the risk of overemphasizing the religious nature of the ghostly mother’s words.12 Galeron,while potentially as much a target of criticism as the Arthurians, because heis of the same class and armigerous bent, is, however, sympatheticallyportrayed as a Scottish knight nursing a legitimate grievance against an
English king. The issue raised by Galeron would have been seen as a
symptom of a long-running unjust English territorial policy; and Galeron’s
righteous anger would have struck a chord with readers who had their own
grievances. If the author had wished to, of course, he could well have locatedhis poem in more neutral or less identifiable territory, as the author of
Golagras and Gawain does, transporting his dramatic critique of Arthurian
policy to an overseas location. While the religious didactic aspect to thepoem –the deliberate contrasting of worldly and spiritual duty and beauty–

16

helps to construct the narrative, it is less sure that it provides the defining
principle of the poem. The Awntyrs is simply too particular in its references
and potentially too political in its overall import to be purely religious innature, a point which many critics now accept.13 In this reading, then, thefierceness of moral censure is most likely harnessed, not to do the samething as the literature it derives from –to preach Christian values– but rather
to attack the policies and underlying value system of the ruling classes. The
Awntyrs poet is less interested in creating a work of religious intent, a work
which expresses the absolutes of moral judgement, and more interested increating a work of literature that challenges the status quo, throwing out
difficult questions rather than providing easy answers.
Concomitantly, the poem can also be seen as challenging the conventionsof the Arthurian/secular romance tradition. Due to its complex prosody andthe breadth of the sources employed, the Awntyrs reads as a very selfconscious piece of literature, and as such inevitably invites critical inquiry
into the nature of the romance mode in which it is couched. The poet, it may
be argued, is seeking to inject some maturity into a literary tradition, which,by this time, is beginning to look decidedly repetitive and formulaic –as theauthor of ‘The Wife’s Tale’ and ‘Sir Thopas’ would no doubt agree.
Chaucer’s apparent wariness (or weariness?) concerning popular romance
tradition indicates that the mode had, for some, become decidedly
superannuated, perpetuating, among other things, a false representation of
the armigerous classes. The unchivalric knight who commits rape at the
opening of ‘The Wife’s Tale’ presents a jarring conflation of romance andcontemporary realism. Philandering friars and unprincipled knights now
displace the fairies and Arthurian heroes and the mythical by-gone innocenceof yore –‘now kan no man se none elves mo’. The literature-derived fantasyof chivalric adventure and courtly love can no longer be tolerated in an

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestry

17

uncritical fashion.
The Awntyrs poet would no doubt agree, but his chosen narrative
vehicle is Arthurian romance –complete with hunting scene, the longestablished figure of Gawain, all the trappings of Arthurian glory and abattle-scene– and so his manner of criticism will necessarily be different.
The introduction of a wholly alien literary element, the religious didactic, inthe figure of the sin-deformed ghostly mother, constitutes by itself achallenge to the conventions of the secular romance mode. Through her,criticism can be levelled at the ethos of the Arthurian dream, or, translated
into the political reality of the day, at the policies and practices of thepresent-day ruling class. Furthermore, and very significantly, because she
represents an orthodox outlook –she is, after all, a revenant from theChristian underworld, pointing out standard orthodox ideas on the need formoral rectitude and responsibility– her words cannot be met with anythingother than acceptance. Her status as spokesperson for what was theprevailing Christian ethos provides her with a kind of diplomatic immunity.
Gawain, knight of the Round of Table, constrained by his courtesy to ladies(even ones from Hell, or Purgatory) and unspoken adherence to Christian
principles, cannot but be accommodating, even to a fault. Therefore, hisquestion to her is remarkable for the degree to which he empathizes with thespirit’s negative view of chivalric conquest (261–4):‘How shal we fare,’ quod þe freke, ‘þat fonden to fight,And þus defoulen þe folke on fele kinges londes,
And riches ouer reymes withouten eny right,
Wynnen worshipp and wele þorgh wightnesse of hondes?’The universe, or realm, of medieval literary romance is nothing if not18

hermetic and self-referential, existing within its own well-defined bubble, so
to speak, or in parallel to, but necessarily divorced from, the reality of
everyday life. Chaucer wishes to expose the stereotypical conventions of theromance tradition as flawed, and he does this by dragging in a dose of blunt
reality, or, as in ‘Sir Thopas’, blunt parody. The Awntyrs poet wishes topuncture romance’s bubble also, but in a wholly different manner. He
presents the archetypal situation of the Arthurians meeting a supernatural
being in the forest, but this time, the weird creature is not merely fromanother world, it’s from another literary tradition, a tradition from which thepoet is borrowing in order to confront the self-serving conventions of the
Arthurian/chivalric tradition. The Awntyrs’ poet is nothing if not earnest; heis employing many of the elements of the romance, but in a manner which
exposes their limitations. He is infinitely more respectful than Chaucer/the
Wife of Bath, but no less aware that chivalric trappings, fine furs and shining
jewels among them, gloss over a multitude of sins.

Dedication
For Malcolm Andrew, who introduced me to the Awntyrs, and taught me so
much
Notes
1	

The content of this section can be gleaned from any a number of sources, notably
Hanna (1974), in the introduction to his edition of the poem; Moll (2003); Allen(2001).

2

Phillips (1993), 87–8, also for flowing quote.

3

Fichte (1989), 136.

4

Spearing (1985), 135.

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestry
5

19

Twu (2003), 111–2, details the poem’s use of concatenations, repetitions and‘semantically empty declarations’, which ‘impede[s] narrative progress’. She
concludes: ‘The poem indulges itself and its aristocratic audience in the pure leisureof time passing through art for its own sake.’

6

Hahn (1995), 173, for both quotations.

7

Matsuda (1984) mentions ‘The Lament of the Duchess of Gloucester’, ‘The Lamentof Queen Elizabeth’ and others of this type, commenting: ‘The nostalgic and uneasy
remembrance of past beauty and luxury, the dramatic contrast with present misery,
the delayed repentance of pride, and the warning to the living are all conventional
motifs in such poems…’, 52.

8Langland (2006), Passus XIII, from 271 to 459, the end of the Passus, the ‘sondri
plottes’, or allegorically, sins, on Hawkyn’s ‘cote’ are the main subject of
discussion, and carries on into Passus XIV. There are also other references toclothes throughout the poem, in the sense of appearance indicating spiritual
integrity, many Biblical in origin.

9

Selection of critical opinion on the battle-scene. Note the wide, and sometimes
conflicting, variety of opinions: Twu (2003): ‘The stripping away of exterior
trappings of rank and wealth reveals the underlying, inner sameness of theirmorality, thus reminding us once again of the Ghost’s appearance in the rotting ragsof its mortal remains..,’ 115. Goff (1984): ‘The combat itself, though notable for its
ferocity, is hardly an unqualified celebration of knightly prowess.’ 156. The battlesuggests to Chism (2002) ‘the inadequacy of institutional ritual’, and to Haught(2010) ‘the primacy of ritualized violence as the premier form of masculine
discourse’. Spearing (1985) sees it as possessing ‘a piquant aesthetic quality’, 138,as ‘an enactment of…aristocratic waste, a form of conspicuous consumption of thepoet’s verbal substance and of his listeners’ leisure’, 139. Ingham (2001) develops
this: ‘…the text is not particularly critical of militarism per se. The tournament
battle between Gawain and Galleroun offers a beautiful scene of violent display,’
186. Allen (2004) suggests that the fight can be interpreted as ‘light-hearted self
idealization by northern magnates…’

10

Ingham (2001) quoting the same lines, comes to a different conclusion: ‘Armor
glitters; shields glisten with golden filigree; the violence of warriors literally

20
showers the field with precious stones. Such a description foregrounds the pleasuresof watching. Moreover, it suggests that warrior bodies explode in the heat of contest
to produce showers of gold and gems, not bloody heaps of flesh.’ 186.
11

Allen (1996), Allen (2004), Goff (1984), 20–25.

12Phillips (1993), 74 to end.

13

Schmolke-Hasselmann (1998), 287–8; Chism (2002), 253–4; Goff (1984), 72;
Ingham (2001), 186–191.

Bibliography:
Allen, Rosamund (1996), ‘The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Jests and jousts,’ in (ed.) Jennifer
Fellows et al, Romance Reading on the Book: Essays on Medieval Narrative
presented to Maldwyn Mills, (Cardiff: University of Wales Press), 129–42.
Allen, Rosamund (2001), section on the Awntyrs in Chapter 5, ‘Chivalric Romance,’ in
W.R.J. Barron (ed.), The Arthur of the English (Cardiff: University of Wales Press),
150–5.
Allen, Rosamund (2004), ‘Place-Names in The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Corruption,
Conjecture, Coincidence,’ (ed.) Bonnie Wheeler, Arthurian Studies in Honour of P
J C Field (Cambridge: D S Brewer), 181–198.
Chism, Christine (2002), Alliterative Revivals (Philadelphia: Univ of Pennsylvania
Press).
Connolly, Martin (2006), ‘Promise-Postponement Device in The Awntyrs Off Arthure: A
Possible Narrative Model,’ Arthurian Literature XXIII, (eds.) Busby, Keith andDalrymple, Roger.
Duffy, Eamon (2005), The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England
1400–1580 (New Haven, London: Yale University Press).
Fichte, J.O. (1989), ‘The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Unconscious Change in the Paradigm ofAdventure’, in Böker, U et al (eds.), The Living Middle Ages: Studies in Mediaeval
English Literature and Its Tradition (Regensburg: Belser Press), 129–136.
Goff, Frederick (1984), A Study of the Middle English Gawain Romances (Ann Arbour,
Michigan: University Microfilms International).
Gray, Douglas (2008), Later Medieval English Literature (Oxford: Oxford University

The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Beyond the Tapestry

21

Press).
Hahn, Thomas (ed.) (1995), Sir Gawain: Eleven Romances and Tales (Kalamazoo,
Michigan: Medieval Institute Publications).
Hanna, Ralph (ed.) (1974), The Awntyrs Off Arthure at the Terne Wathelyn (Manchester:Manchester University Press). Used for all quotes from the poem.
Haught, Leah (2010), ‘Ghostly Mothers and Fated Fathers: Gender and Genre in The
Awntyrs Off Arthure,’ Arthuriana 20, 1, 3–22.
Ingham, Patricia (2001), Sovereign Fantasies: Arthurian Romance and the Making ofBritain (Philadelphia: Univ of Pennsylvania Press).
Matsuda, Takami (1984), ‘The Awntyrs Off Arthure and the Arthurian History,’ Poetica
19 (Tokyo: Sanseido), 48–62.
Moll, Richard James (2003), ‘The Awntyrs Off Arthure’, in Before Malory: Reading
Arthur in later medieval England (Toronto: Univ of Toronto Press), 125–140.
Phillips, Helen (1993), ‘The Awntyrs Off Arthure: Structure and Meaning, A
Reassessment,’ Arthurian Literature, XII (Cambridge: D S Brewer), 63–89.
Schmolke-Hasselmann, Beate (1998), The Evolution of Arthurian Romance –The Verse
Tradition from Chrétien to Froissart (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press)(trans. By M. & R. Middleton, from the 1980 original German publication).
Spearing, A C (1985), Medieval to Renaissance in English Poetry (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press), section on the Awntyrs in Chapter 4, ‘Outside theChaucerian Tradition,’ 121–142, notes 346–348.
Twu, Krista Sue-Lo (2003), ‘The Awntyrs Off Arthure at the Terne Wathelyne: Reliquaryfor Romance,’ Arthurian Literature, XX (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press),
103–122.