Durendal: Sir Gawain and Christian Chivalry

In his loquaciously entitled article The Duke of Clarence and the Earls of March: Garter Knights and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Leo Carruthers argued in favour of the connection between Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (hereafter SGGK) and England’s highest chivalric order—the Order of the Garter. However, his argument is not without at least one misstep. Carruthers makes it when he writes that, “the ‘endless knot’ has been undone,” thence Sir Gawain must be “reintegrated into the Christian community”. On the contrary, Sir Gawain’s fault is a trivial thing.One should not make the mistake of taking Sir Gawain’s self-condemnation too seriously (lines 2501-2512).J.R.R. Tolkien, discussing this very same point in his essay on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, wrote that Sir Gawain “is not competent to judge this case impartially, and his judgment cannot be held valid”.In a conflict between the higher purpose of Christian Chivalry and the lower game of courtly courtesy, Sir Gawain is faithful to the higher.His fault is minor, almost silly.His excessive sense of guilt should not confound readers.His virtues are worthy of imitation, and Carruthers would have done well to consider the motto of the Order of the Garter:“shamed be he who thinks evil of it” (Honi soit qui mal y pense). If, as the Carruthers aptly argues, Sir Gawain was presented by the poet as the prefigurement of the first Knight of the Garter, it follows that the poet would have the readers focus on Sir Gawain’s knightly virtues.This is not hard to do, for Sir Gawain reflects the chivalric ideal, but far from reducing the character to mere allegory, the poet’s attempt to present an ideal, yet very real, knight in imperfect conditions.Sir Gawain, either explicitly or implicitly, embodies the chivalric code as understood by the 14thcentury Christian knight.


Above all else, the knight was called on to live a holy life and to defend the Church and Christendom against the enemies of Christ. In the ancient ceremony retained in the Roman Pontificum, the knight was dubbed with these words:




Receive this sword in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Use it in defence of thyself and the Holy Church of God, for the confusion of the enemies of the Cross of Christ and the Christian Faith, and never unjustly to the injury of any man, so far as human frailty will admit.



Sir Gawain was not exempt from this charge, and he fulfils this duty early in the poem. When Sir Gawain leaves Camelot in search of the Green Chapel, he must face various enemies. Tolkien’s translation of SGGK (used here and throughout) renders it thus:

At whiles with worms he wars, and with wolves also,at whiles with wood-trolls that wandered in the crags,and with bulls and with bears and boars, too, at times;and with ogres that hounded him from the heights of the fells. (lines 720-723)
These creatures, especially the ogres (giants) and worms (dragons), should be viewed as ancient foes of Christian peace. To associate dragons with Satan and demons is common. The very first knight, St. Michael the Archangel, in the Apocalypseof St. John, faces Satan as a dragon: “And there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels” (12:7).Sir Gawain, like the Celestial Knight, is called on to vanquish these foes of heaven. Likewise, giants are biblical enemies of God’s people: “A man that shall wander out of the way of doctrine shall abide in the company of the giants” (Proverbs 21:16). Violent heretics and infidels are associated with giants, and ‘‘the hero slaying a dragon or a giant,” writes Richard Cavendish, “is carrying out his duty as the upholder of right and order”(qtd. in Rudnytzky Schry 1). It is evident, then, that Sir Gawain fulfils his duty to defend the Catholic Church and Christendom.




Moreover, the beginning of the poem is not the only time when Sir Gawain is called on to face the enemies of God.When Sir Gawain arrives at the Green Chapel, he realizes that it is not one dedicated to Christ and his saints.He is now outside of Christendom:

“Can this be the Chapel Green,O Lord?” said the gentle knight.“Here the Devil might say, I ween,his matins about midnight! (lines 2185)
However, Sir Gawain does not provoke an unnecessary battle in the enemy’s realm. He has no desire to use his sword “unjustly to the injury of any man”. After permitting the Green Knight to strike, Sir Gawain pulls his sword and warns:

“Have done, sir, with thy dints! Now deal me no more!I have stood from thee a stroke without strife on this spot,and if thou offerest me others, I shall answer thee promptly,and give as good again, and as grim, be assured,shall pay.” (lines 2322-2326)
The reader finds in Sir Gawain the courage to fight, but he is just. Even the blow which he laid upon the Green Knight in Camelot came by way of necessity.




This is a good time to return to the first scene, when the Green Knight first appears at King Arthur’s court, for it demonstrates another high ideal of chivalry: fealty.Since the medieval mind did not suffer the state to be separated from the Church, the next highest duty of Christian chivalry, after the defense of the Church, is loyalty to one’s liege lord.In Sir Gawain’s case, this was principally King Arthur. When the Green Knight arrives and challenges the court to trade blows with him, the court—although apparently not King Arthur—has every reason to believe that magic is involved.The court wondered at the sight of a “phantom or fay-magic” (line 240).King Arthur, on the other hand, foolishly takes up the challenge, and seeing this, Sir Gawain is forced to act (lines 323-342). It is an act of loyalty and self sacrifice.Sir Gawain realizes, or at least intuits, that this challenge is a trap.After humbly requesting of Arthur permission to take his place in the challenge, Sir Gawain tells the King, “I am the weakest, I am aware, and in wit feeblest,/ and the least loss, if I live not” (lines 354-355). Far from needing to be humbled by grave sin and retransformed, Sir Gawain is humble from the beginning, and when he leaves the court in search of the Green Chapel, he has every reason to believe that he is sacrificing his life for the good of his king and in fulfilment of his word.




All things considered, Sir Gawain demonstrates the qualities of Christian chivalry.He shows a willingness to defend the Church and Christendom, and he is willing to put his life on the line to rescue his king from a foolish decision.His virtues far outweigh his vices. While Sir Gawain, through humility and an overly sensitive conscience, would have the reader dwell on his faults, the poet would not.The poet presents a knight struggling yet succeeding in virtue. The Garter Knights could do worse than imitating him.









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