Selections from Sir Thomas Malory's Morte Darthur

Front matter

(J

o

-H -r rP.

Preface

The aim in these selections from Le Morte Darthur has been to present connected wholes rather than fragmentary and mutilated passages. Hence Books I and XVIII are printed with only minor omissions, and Books II, XIII, XVII, XXI, without abridgment. These six books contain some of the choicest portions of the Morte Da7'thm\ and are really representative of its character. Of course there are other extended passages and even whole books that might well have been included. The chief regret of any lover of the Morte Darthur is at being obliged to make selections at all. Of the omitted portions perhaps Books VII and XII appeal most strongly to the general reader.

Text. — The text here offered follows letter for letter Caxton's edition of 1485 (as reprinted by Sommer in 1889), but with certain modifications made necessary by the plan of the Athenaeum Press Series.

The following letters and characters have been represented by their modern equivalents. All expansions (except andiox &) are indicated by italics :

ai as m sage = sawge

= 0//, somos = somows.

e thene = the«ne.

u

Lancelot = Lau;/celot

I

= gh, my^tely = my^/^tely.

Ihu = ]\\es\x.

1 In a few cases a = aw. Cf. ca = caw, IS 9.

IV PREFACE.

n = n«, as in theiie = then«e.

f

H

=th, u

V fo

= so.

be

= tJlQ.

= that.

loue

= love.

vpon

= upon

1. In a very few instances Sommer slightly amends Caxton's text by adding in italics letters that had been accidentally omitted. These italics have been reproduced.^

2. Caxton's punctuation^ has been entirely disregarded, except in the few passages here reprinted in black letter. Capital letters have been regulated according to modern usage.

3. The division lines of the original paragraphs have been shifted so as to correspond more closely with the divisions in the narrative. In many cases, however, the paragraphs are so loosely constructed that they afford opportunity for much difference of opinion as to where a paragraph should begin or end.

4. Systematic reconstruction of the text has not been attempted, but some obvious errors have been corrected at the bottom of the page or discussed in the Notes. In every such case the original reading is also given.

The various readings of the later editions have been sparingly used. There is no evidence that the variants are based upon Malory's MS., and they are therefore of little more authority than the emendations of a modern editor. Moreover, they are for the most part very trivial,

1 Commonly the old text has th printed in full, but \> also appears, and in a very few cases y for \> ; e.g., ye = th^, 23 5.

3 In all but a very few cases (where the period is used), Caxton's only marks of punctuation are €1 , used to indicate the beginning of paragraphs, and /, which does duty for comma, semicolon, colon, and period.

PREFACE. V

and afford slight help in the emendation of the text. Where they appear to be of value they have been cited. A really critical text of the Morte Darthur can be produced only by the aid of critical editions of the French romances. Comparison with scattered MSS. will not suffice. I have therefore thought it better to defer this work for the present rather than to leave it half done.

Notes. — The Notes are designed to stimulate further research, and hence make frequent reference to books that should be within the reach of every student of Arthurian romance. As far as possible, I have endeavored to let one part of Malory interpret another, but 1 have also sought to find parallels in other Middle English literature. The Notes are not primarily linguistic, for the especial value of the Morte Darthur to us is that it is a noble piece of literature ; yet they take account of unusual forms and constructions, and make frequent reference to Baldwin's Inflections and Sy?itax of the Morte d' Arthur^ to Kellner, etc. The phonology of the forms in Malory is so fully treated in Hermann Romstedt's Preisschrift Die e?iglische Schriftsprache bei Caxton^ Gottingen, 1891, that the student may be referred, once for all, to his discussion.

It may be proper to add that, with the exception of a few cases where specific credit is given, the Notes owe nothing to other editions of the Morte Darthur.

Glossary. — The Glossary is based upon that in Sommer's edition, with additions or modifications, and an entirely independent set of references. The list of words is not intended to be exhaustive, but to include in the main only those that may be unfamiliar to the modern reader.

In conclusion it is a pleasure to thank Dr. Sommer and

1 For a review of Baldwin's book, see the Anglia, v, 323, 324. Corrections to Baldwin's list of strong verbs are made by Hempl in Mod. Lang. Notes, ix, 479-481, and by Baldwin himself, ibid., x, 92-94.

VI

PREFACE.

Mr. Alfred Nutt for full permission to use the exact reprint of Caxton's edition of 1485. The conclusions of Dr. Sommer with regard to the sources I have in the main adopted, but I have been obliged to differ from his views in some points, particularly on the source of Book XXI. He is, moreover, not responsible for the form in which the text appears, for the Introduction, the Notes, or the Indexes.

Professor Kittredge of Harvard University contributes to the Introduction a short paper presenting new views on Sir Thomas Malory and his family, and to the Notes the comments signed '' K." He has also read the entire book with much care, and made many helpful suggestions, for which I offer my sincere thanks.

My indebtedness to the investigations of the leading students of Arthurian romance I have endeavored to indicate in each case. I may remark, however, that in citing references to speculations on various questions connected with the romances, I am by no means ready to adopt without reserve the theories proposed. I have merely desired by making such references to call the attention of the reader to problems which he may work out for himself.

W. E. M.

MiDDLETOWN, CoNN.,

Contents

INTRODUCTION. page

I. Literary Character of the Fifteenth Century - ix II. Sir Thomas Malory and his Family (by Professor

Kittredge) xiii

I

The 15th century has had its full measure of condemnation as an unproductive period in English literary annals. Its barrenness is often contrasted unfavorably with the comparative richness of the century that preceded it, and particularly with the marvellous fecundity of the age of Elizabeth. Taken as a whole, the literary output of the 15th century must be acknowledged to be small in quantity and mediocre in quality. Yet, singularly enough, the 15th century produced one writer who shares with Chaucer the distinction of being read to-day by the general public. Sir Thomas Malory is, by popular consent at least, the greatest master of prose before the Revival of Learning.

The popular verdict, which has marked the Morte Darthiir as worthy of the attention of the modern reader, while allowing all other early English prose — with the possible exception of the pseudo-Mandeville's Travels — to remain the undisturbed possession of scholars, may not be the surest test of the merit of the book as a piece of original composition. Some other names rank high in any survey of 15th-century literature, such as Fortescue and Fabyan and Capgrave and Pecocke. To take a single instance, Fortescue's Treatise on the Difference between Absolute and Limited Monarchy was, in its way, more original than the Morte Darthnr, and was probably quite beyond the powers of Malory. Yet the nature of the topics that Fortescue dis-

X INTR OD UC TION.

cussed must have made his readers few even in his own day. Malory, on the other hand, could appeal at the outset to a widespread interest in his subject, and he knew how to awaken interest where it had not existed.

The 15th century was doubtless not an ideal time for a writer or a student. The utter neglect of English letters under Henry V, the selfishness and greed of the turbulent nobles who crowded the court of Henry VI and took advantage of his helplessness to make gains while they could, the wasting of England under the armies of York and of Lancaster, fighting for — men hardly knew what, took away much of the inspiration for original literary production.

Yet, as Emerson somewhere says, " every age has a thousand sides and signs and tendencies " ; and one who lives in the age itself cannot always tell whither it is drifting. In the 15th century the feudal system was tottering to its fall. The forms still survived, and the pomp and glitter of feudal life were present at every turn. But the times were evil, and they seemed to contain the promise of evil. In such an age, men who saw the troubled state of their own time, but who were not skilled as prophets, may well have dreamed of the olden days when the institutions which were rapidly going to decay had been vigorous with a new life. It is not strange, therefore, that when Malory cast about for a subject he turned away from the intrigues and petty quarrels of court factions to the deeds of an ideal king and an ideal court in a far-away age.

We know indeed very little about the influences that shaped a writer in the turbulent 15th century. Some of them may have been more favorable than we commonly think. We may freely admit that the poetry, except that produced in the North, could hardly be worse. Hobbling, uninspired doggerel most of it is, as inane as it is formless. But the prose, taken as a whole, is surely better than any that

INTKODUCTION. xi

England had produced since the Norman Conquest. There are modern readers who even prefer the simple, natural style of Malory and his contemporaries to the tortuous indirectness of much of the Elizabethan and early 17th-century prose. Malory opened new paths for the prose writer, and showed how men to whom the gift of song was denied might still write a rich and beautiful prose. Possibly his age was the most unfavorable in which a writer's lot could be cast, but those who hold that opinion are bound to give all the more credit to Malory for rising above the dead level of his time.

It is perhaps worth while to note that England was not the only country in the 15th century where literature was in a depressed state. France, w^hich had for centuries been the wellspring whence other nations drew literary inspiration, was now reduced to comparative unproductiveness. She could point in Malory's time to Villon, Christine de Pisan, Charles d'Orleans, and, somewhat later, to Philippe de Comines and a few others, but she was no longer the central figure in European letters.

Germany was split into little rival states and cities, and had no unified national life. The towns were the prey of robber barons, and the barons were the prey of one another. The development of manufactures and the extension of commerce had, to some extent, stimulated literature, or what passed for such. Some homely pieces like Till EiileJispiegel and Brant's Narrenschiff (1494) have a rough life and humor that contrast refreshingly with the dullness and solemn platitudes of the vast wastes of didactic verse which meet the student of the period. Yet no literary masterpiece was produced in Germany in the century before the Reformation.

The only country of Western Europe that has reason to boast of her literary production in the 15th century is Italy.

xii INTR on UC TION.

The sudden influx of the scholars of Constantinople and the generous patronage of men of letters by the Medici and rival princes made Italy a paradise for writers, and established her as the training school of the rest of Europe. For a time Italy was the intellectual light of the world, and for two or three generations she won greater recognition than any of the states that aspired to high place in learning or literature.

As for the remaining countries of Europe in the 15th century, their literature, with a few marked exceptions,^ presents nothing striking. The state of literature in England, though surely bad enough, was not so decidedly worse than that of the rest of Europe as one might at first imagine. The soil was preparing. for the great outburst of the following century.

Malory, however, belongs to the older order. Scarcely a ripple of the great Renaissance movement had touched England when he began to write. He was himself entirely uninfluenced by it. He lived wholly in the Middle Ages, and breathed their very spirit into his great book of romances. Yet there must have been signs enough, even in Malory's time, that a new spirit was rising, and that the days of the old order were numbered. Tradesmen were acquiring political power and social recognition. The towns were rapidly growing in wealth and population and influence. The people were gaining more than the privileged classes. Each new turn of events that brought the king out of harmony with his great nobles threw him into the hands of the people, and they did not fail to profit by the opportunity. The new common soldiers were a match for the knights and gentlemen. War abroad and civil strife at home had reduced the number of the nobles and made still easier the progress

1 One of the most popular books of the century was the Netherlandish version of Reinke de Vos.

INTRODUCTION. xiii

of the social revolution. In a generation or two more, chivalry was the theme for a jest, and its glory had departed forever.

In any attempt to identify the author of the Morte Darthur with an historical Sir Thomas Malory, one must not look for demonstration. Probably no direct evidence on the subject exists. Public records and business papers of the 14th and 15th centuries may be expected to supply information about estates and offices and military service, but they are not likely to mention literary works." A high degree of probability may, however, be arrived at. If, amongst the various Malorys of the 15th century, but one can be found who satisfies all the conditions of the problem, we may reasonably claim for him the authorship of this famous work, though no direct evidence of his connection with it be procurable.

What the required conditions are may be seen from three places in the Mortc Darthur which mention Malory :

(i) Caxton's Preface, in which he says he has printed "after a copye vnto me delyuerd, whyche copye Syr Thomas Malorye dyd take oute of certeyn bookes of frensshe and reduced it in to Englysshe " (Sommer, p. 3).

(2) The concluding words of the last book : *' I praye you all lentyl men and lentyl wymmen that redeth this book of Arthur and his knyghtes . • . | praye for me whyle I am on lyue that god sende me good delyueraunce | & whan I am deed I praye you all praye for my soule [ for this book was ended the ix yere of the reygne of kyng edward the fourth | by syr Thomas Maleore knyght as Ihesu helpe hym for hys

1 This section on Sir Thomas Malory and his family is contributed by Professor George Lyman Kittredge of Harvard University.

■^ The reader will remember that the public records which furnish us with so much information about Chaucer say not a word about his poetry.

xiv INTRODUCTIOIV.

grete myght | as he is the seruaunt of Ihesu bothe day and nyght I " (Sommer, p. 86 1). These are obviously not the words of Caxton, as Dr. Sommer takes them to be, but the words of Malory himself.

(3) Caxton's colophon, which says that the book " was reduced in to englysshe by syr Thomas Malory knyght as afore is sayd^ | and by me deuyded in to xxi bookes chapytred and enprynted | and fynysshed in thabbey westmestre the last day of luly the yere of our lord | M | CCCC | Ixxxv I " (Sommer, p. 861).

From these passages it appears that any Sir Thomas Malory advanced as the author of the Morte Darthur must fulfill the following conditions : (i) He must have been a knight ; ^ (2) he must have been alive in the ninth year of Edward IV, which extended from Mar. 4, 1469, to Mar. 3, 1470 (both included) ; (3) he must have been old enough in 9 Edward IV to make it possible that he should have written this work. Further, Caxton does not say that he received the " copy " directly from the author, and his language may be held to indicate that Malory was dead when the book was printed. In this case he must have died before the last day of July, 1485, and we have a fourth condition to be complied with.

Up to the present time ^ but one Thomas Malory has been discovered who fulfills these three imperative conditions, and this person satisfies also the fourth condition, which, as -^ have seen, is not entirely imperative. We may,

^''That is, in Caxton's Preface.

2"Sir/W^j/" is out of the question, though some have absurdly suggested it (see the reference in Sommer, ii, 2, n. i).

3 This chapter is in part a reprint of an article entitled " Who was Sir Thomas Malory?" published in 1897 in the Harvard Studies and Notes in Philology and Literature, iv, 85-105. The reader is referred to that article for the details of the evidence as well as for a discussion of the baseless theory that Malory was a Welshman. The conjectural

INTRODUCTION. XV

therefore, accept him as the author of whom we are in search and insert his biography in our literary histories, at least until a better candidate offers. That such a candidate is likely to appear the present writer is not inclined to believe, for obviously, the number of knights named Thomas Malory and living at any single time must, of necessity, be small ; and, in the attempt to apply as rigid a test as possible to this identification, the pedigree and alliances of the several Malory (Malore) families have been carefully scrutinized.

This Sir Thomas Malory ^ was (i) certainly a knight. (2) He survived the ninth year of Edward IV, dying Mar. 14, 1470 (10 Edward IV). This fits the closing passage of the Morte Darthur. (3) He was not under fifty-seven years of age when he died, and he may have been seventy or above. (4) The Morte Dai'thur was not printed until some fifteen years after his death.

The birth, circumstances, and education of this Sir Thomas Malory appear, so far as we can discover them, to fit well with his authorship of this work. He belonged to that class to whom the Arthurian stories directly appealed: he was a gentleman of an ancient house and a soldier.^

identification discussed in the present chapter was made public by the writer Mar. 15, 1894, at a meeting held at Columbia College in honor of Friedrich Diez (cf. Mod. Lang. Notes, April, 1894, ix, 253). It was put on record by the writer in a brief article on Malory published in 1894 in vol. V of Johnson'' s Universal Cyclopedia (p. 498). In July, 1896, Mr. T. W. Williams, who had, very naturally, not seen the brief article in Johnson^s Cyclopcedia., suggested {Athenceum, No. 3585) that the author of the Moj'te might be a " Thomas Malorie, miles " whem he had found mentioned in a document of the eighth year of Edward IV, but concerning whom he had no information except the single fact furnished by the document itself. Mr. Williams's Thomas Malory and the writer's are probably one and the same person.

^ The name is variously spelled, but was always trisyllabic.

2 Cf. Caxton's Preface : " Many noble and dyuers gentylmen of thys royame of England camen and demaunded me many and oftymeswherxvi INTR OD UC TION.

His ancestors had been lords of Draii[^hton in Northamptonshire as early, apparently, as 1267-68, and certainly earlier than 1285 ; and the Malores had been persons of consequence in that county and in Leicestershire from the time of Henry H or Stephen. Sir Peter Malore, justice of the common pleas (i 292-1309) and one of the commission to try Sir William Wallace, was a brother of Sir Stephen Malore, the great-grandfather of our Sir Thomas, — that Sir Stephen whose marriage with Margaret Revell brought the Newbold estates ' into the family. Thomas's father, John Malory, was sheriff of Leicestershire and Warwickshire, Escheator, Knight of the Shire for Warwick in the Parliament of 1 41 3, and held other offices of trust. It is not to be doubted, then, that Sir Thomas received a gentleman's education according to the ideas of the 15th century, which are not to be confounded with those of an earlier, illiterate period. That he should learn to read and write French, as well as to speak it, was a matter of course.

Sir John Malory seems to have died in 12 Henry VI (1433 or 1434), and Sir- Thomas succeeded to the ancestral estates. We have, however, some information about Sir Thomas in his father's lifetime : when a young man he served in France, in the military retinue of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, — a fact to which I shall soon revert. In the twenty-third year of Henry VI (1445) we find him a knight and sitting in Parliament for Warwickshire. Some years later he appears to have made himself conspicuous on the Lancastrian side in the War of the Roses, for in 1468 "Thomas Malorie, miles," is excluded, along with '' Humphry Nevyll, miles," and several others, from the operation of a pardon issued by Edward IV. We know

fore that I haue not do made & enprynte the noble hystorye of the saynt greal and of the moost renomed crysten kyng . . . kyng Arthur.'' ^ In Warwickshire.

INTRODUCTION. xvii

nothing of the matter except this bare fact. Whether or not Malory subsequently obtained a special pardon cannot now be determined. If he did not we must suppose that he was relieved by the general amnesty of 1469, since, on his death in 1470, there seems to have been no question as to the inheritance of his estate. Malory died, as has been already noted. Mar. 14, 1470, and when Dugdale wrote his Wm'wickshire (about 1656) lay " buryed under a marble in the Chappell of St. Francis at the Gray Friars, near Newgate in the Suburbs of London." He left a widow, Elizabeth Malory, who lived until 1480, and a grandson, Nicholas, about four years of age. This Nicholas was alive in 1511. He died without male heirs.

The most interesting of these biographical fragments is the association of Sir Thomas Malory with Richard of Warwick. Dugdale states the fact in the following words : " Thomas ; who, in IL. H. ^. time, was of the retinue of Ric. Beaiichamp E. Warr. at the siege of Caleys, and served there with one lance and two archers ; receiving for his lance and I. archer xx. li. per an. and their dyet; and for the other archer, x. marks and no dyet." I can find no siege of Calais in Henry V's time. Perhaps the agreement was merely to serve at Calais. In that case the likeliest date for Malory's covenant is perhaps 141 5, when Warwick indented " to serve the King as Captain of Calais, until Febr. 3. Aji. 141 6 (4 He7i. 5). And to have with him in the time of Truce or Peace, for the safeguard thereof, Thirty Men at Arms, himself and three Knights accounted as part of that number ; Thirty Archers on Horsback, Two hundred Foot Soldiers, and Two hundred Archers, all of his own retinue. . . . And in time of War, he to have One hundred and forty Men on Horsbak," etc.

In our uncertainty with regard to the year of this service we can draw no solid inference as to the date of Malory's xviii INTRODUCTION.

birth. We have already seen that he was probably of age and over in 1433-34 (see p. xvi, above) : if he served with Beauchamp in 141 6, he was doubtless born as early as 1400, but not much earlier. This would make him seventy years old at the time of his death.

The service of Malory with Richard of Warwick is, however, peculiarly significant in view of the well-known character of the earl. No better school for the future author of the Morte Darthur can be imagined than a personal acquaintance with that Englishman whom all Europe recognized as embodying the knightly ideal of the age. The Emperor Sigismund, we are informed on excellent authority, said to Henry V " that no prince Cristen for wisdom, norture, and manhode, hadde such another knyght as he had of therle Warrewyk; addyng therto that if al curtesye were lost, yet myght hit be founde ageyn in hym ; and so ever after by the emperours auctorite he was called the Fadre of Curteisy." ^

The history of Warwick's life, as set down by John Rous, chantry priest and antiquary, and almost a contemporary of the great earl, reads like a roman d'^aveiitiwe. One exploit in particular might almost have been taken out of the Morte Darthur itself.^ '' Erie Richard," we are told, ". . . heryng of a greet gaderyng in Fraunce, inasmoche as he was capteyn of Caleys he hied him thidre hastely, and was there worthely received ; and when that he herd that the gaderyng in Fraunce was appoynted to come to Caleys, he cast in his mynde to do sume newe poynt of chevalry ; wheruppon," under the several names of "the grene knyght," " Chevaler Vert," and '' Chevaler Attendant," he sent three challenges

1 John Rous, Life of Richard Earl of Warwick., as printed from MS. Cotton. Julius E. IV, by Strutt, Horda Angel-cynnan, 1775-76, ii, 125, 126. Rous died Jan. 1492; Beauchamp, May 31, 1439.

2 For similar incidents in romance, see Ward, Catalogue of Romances, i, 733 ff., with which cf. Malory's Morte Darthur, P.k. vii, chs. xxviii, xxix, Sommer, i, 257 ff.

INTRODUCTION. xix

to the French king's court. "And anone other 3 Frenche knyghtes received them, and graunted their felowes to mete at day and place assigned." On the first day, "the xii day of Christmasse, in a lawnde called the Park Hedge of Gynes," Earl Richard unhorsed the first of the French knights. Next day he came to the field in another armor and defeated the second French knight, "and so with the victory, and hymself unknown rode to his pavilion agayn, and sent to this blank knyght Sir Hugh Lawney, a good courser." On the third day the earl "came in face opyn . . . and said like as he hadde his owne persone performed the two dayes afore, so with Goddes grace he wolde the third, then ran he to the Chevaler name[d] Sir Colard Fymes, and every stroke he bare hym bakwards to his hors bakke ; and then the Frenchmen said he was bounde to the sadyll, wherfor he alighted down from his horse, and forthwith stept up into his sadyll ageyn, and so with worshipe rode to his pavilion, and sent to Sir Colard a good courser, and fested all the people ; . . . and rode to Calys with great worshipe " (Strutt, Horda, ii, 124, 125).

This romantic adventure cannot be dated with any certainty. The days are settled by the text of Rous : they are January 6, 7, and 8 (Twelfth-Day and the two days following), but the yea?' is not easily fixed. By a process of elimination we may arrive at the date 141 6 or 141 7, either of which may be right. One likes to imagine Thomas Malory as serving in Warwick's retinue on this occasion, and I know of nothing to forbid our indulging so agreeable a fancy.

It may, I think, be safely asserted that we have before us a Sir Thomas Malory who, so far as one can see, fulfills all the conditions required of a claimant for the honor of having written the Morte Darthur. There is absolutely no contestant, and until such a contestant appears, it is not unreasonable to insist op the claims of this Sir Thomas.

XX ■ INTRODUCTION,

III

On the 3TSt of July, 1485, 'M.zXoxy^ s Morte Da^'thur yiV2iS issued from the press of William Caxton at Westminster. At the very time of its appearance England was in a turmoil over a threatened change of rulers. Three weeks later, on the 2 2d of August, Richard III fell on Bosworth Field and was succeeded by Henry of Lancaster. The settlement of the crown and the long peace that ensued were doubtless of no small importance in giving opportunity for the growth of the reading habit and for the great development of literature in the following century.

The year 1485 was a busy one for Caxton, He had already been seven years at Westminster, and had printed there not less than forty-eight books, some of them very extensive. He had published as early as 1478 such books as Chaucer's Ca^tterbury Tales and Lydgate's Temple of Glas. In 1 48 1 appeared his edition of The History of Godfrey of Boulogne ; in 1483, Gower's Coufessio Ainantis and The Golde7i Legend (Caxton's own translation) ; and in 1484, Chaucer's Troylus a7id Cresside. Other books of considerable size and importance also kept his press active during the same period. For the year 1485 we have four books, the first of which is not dated : The Life of Saint Winifred, translated by Caxton ; Malory's Morte Darthtir (July 31) ; The Life of Charles the Grete, translated by Caxton, and published December i ; The Knight Paris and the Fair Vienne, translated by Caxton, and published December 19. Caxton finished his translation of The Life of Charles the Grete on the i8th of June, six weeks before he had completed the printing of the Morte Darthur. The translating and the printing must therefore have been for a considerable part of the time going on together. As in the preceding years, so in 1485, Caxton aimed to publish chiefly