article June 9, 1998
Sir Gawain and the Green knight
Composed c.1400 AD by an unknown author, the Middle English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight takes a theme of the beheading game from the Irish tale of Bricriu's Feast. Into Arthur's Camelot one New Year's Day strode a green-clad, green skinned giant, in one hand holding a holly branch, in the other a razor sharp battle axe. He offered his head to any knight who would accept a return blow a year hence. Only Gawain agreed, beheading the giant with one blow. Picking up his head, the giant turned it to Gawain. Its mouth told him to be at the Green Chapel a year hence. Then the guant left.
A year later Gawain rode north through a wintry land on his otherworld warhorse, Gringolet. On Christmas Eve he came to a castle in a wild wood. The lord, sir Bercilak, told him the Green Chapel was near and invited him to stay until New Year's Day. Also here lived Bercilak's lovely wife and an old hag, her companion. Bercilak went hunting each day while Gawain stayed indoors: Bercilak agreed to give Gawain whatever he caught in the hunt, and Gawain agreed to give Bercilak whatever he received in the castle.
Each day Bercilak's wife tried to seduce Gawain, kissing him fervently: each evening when Bercilak returned, Gawain kissed him. But the lady had also given Gawain a magic green girdle, saying it would protect him the Green Chapel. This, fearing for his life, he kept secret.
On New Year's Day he rode to the Green Chapel-a hollow mound in a valley near a waterfall. The Green Knight appeared: Gawain bowed his head, but flinched. Rebuked, the second time he kept still. Down came the axe-just nicking his neck. Then the giant revealed himself as Bercilak, saying he was spellbound by the old hag, in fact the enchantress Morgan Le Fay, who had devised the entire test to discredit the Round Table. Gawain was spared for honourably denying Lady Bercilak's advances, but his neck has been nicked for concealing the girdle. Though free to leave, Gawain felt disgraced. He returned to Camelot wearing the girdle tied around his arm as a badge of shame. But then every knight also agreed to wear a green baldric in his honour, for he had brought renown to thr Round Table.
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