Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Contributors
- Foreword
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 Arthurian Ethics before the Pentecostal Oath: In Search of Ethical Origins in Culhwch and Olwen
- 2 Too Quickly or Not Quickly Enough, Too Rash and Too Harshly: The Arthurian Court’s Lack of Ethics in Hartmann von Aue’s Erec and Iwein and Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival
- 3 The Ethics of Arthurian Marriage: Husband vs Wife in Hartmann von Aue’s Iwein
- 4 Arthurian Ethics and Ethical Reading in the Perlesvaus
- 5 Translation Praxis and the Ethical Value of Chivalry in the Caligula Brut
- 6 Imperial Ambitions and the Ethics of Power: Gender, Race, and the Riddarasögur
- 7 Lowland Ethics in the Arthur of the Dutch
- 8 Contesting Royal Power: The Ethics of Good Lordship, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and the March of Wales
- 9 “As egir as any lyoun”: The Ethics of Knight-Horse Relationships in Lybeaus Desconus
- 10 Malory’s Ethical Dinadan: Moderate Masculinity in a Crisis of Hypermasculine Chivalry
- 11 Virtus, Vertues, and Gender: Cultivating a Chivalric Habitus in Thomas Malory’s Tale of Sir Gareth
- 12 Kingly Disguise and (Im)Perception in Three Fifteenth- Century English Romances
- 13 “Adventure? What is That?” Arthurian Ethics in/and the Games We Play
- 14 The Ethics of a New Edition of Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte Darthur – and More Evidence for the Superiority of the Winchester Manuscript
- 15 The Ethics of Writing Guinevere in Modern Historical Fiction
- Afterword
- Index
12 - Kingly Disguise and (Im)Perception in Three Fifteenth- Century English Romances
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 January 2024
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Contributors
- Foreword
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 Arthurian Ethics before the Pentecostal Oath: In Search of Ethical Origins in Culhwch and Olwen
- 2 Too Quickly or Not Quickly Enough, Too Rash and Too Harshly: The Arthurian Court’s Lack of Ethics in Hartmann von Aue’s Erec and Iwein and Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival
- 3 The Ethics of Arthurian Marriage: Husband vs Wife in Hartmann von Aue’s Iwein
- 4 Arthurian Ethics and Ethical Reading in the Perlesvaus
- 5 Translation Praxis and the Ethical Value of Chivalry in the Caligula Brut
- 6 Imperial Ambitions and the Ethics of Power: Gender, Race, and the Riddarasögur
- 7 Lowland Ethics in the Arthur of the Dutch
- 8 Contesting Royal Power: The Ethics of Good Lordship, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and the March of Wales
- 9 “As egir as any lyoun”: The Ethics of Knight-Horse Relationships in Lybeaus Desconus
- 10 Malory’s Ethical Dinadan: Moderate Masculinity in a Crisis of Hypermasculine Chivalry
- 11 Virtus, Vertues, and Gender: Cultivating a Chivalric Habitus in Thomas Malory’s Tale of Sir Gareth
- 12 Kingly Disguise and (Im)Perception in Three Fifteenth- Century English Romances
- 13 “Adventure? What is That?” Arthurian Ethics in/and the Games We Play
- 14 The Ethics of a New Edition of Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte Darthur – and More Evidence for the Superiority of the Winchester Manuscript
- 15 The Ethics of Writing Guinevere in Modern Historical Fiction
- Afterword
- Index
Summary
Disguise, in romance literature, is a paradoxical motif: a character's behavior whilst in disguise often reveals more about his or her true nature than the behavior he exhibits openly. Kings in medieval romances are in a unique position because the strict pervasive ideology surrounding their political role shapes their public personas and actions. To be a good king is to place the interests of the realm ahead of one's own desires. Thus it is through depicting kings in non-kingly disguise that authors are able to highlight their individual personalities and private desires – and the problems that can arise when a king's public and private identities are discordant (though, of course, kings can and do adopt disguises for other reasons, such as personal safety). Moreover, an effective king must be shrewd and powerful, able to “prevent sedition amongst his magnates” as well as among “royal officials whose interests were pitted against the interests of the great landholders.” It was imperative to the safety and well-being of the realm that a king be impervious to flattery and not be duped by false friends. He needed to be able to see beyond the metaphorical masks that self-serving counselors, subjects, and seeming allies could present to him.
However, while the ideology of kingship provided a model of ethical behavior for English kings that, in theory, should result in a peaceful and politically stable realm, in practice their subjects frequently found themselves faced with absent, incompetent, unpopular, or self- serving leaders. Concerns about the king's public and private behavior, his perspicacity, and his whereabouts were at stake for the people commissioning, writing, and consuming romances. Disguise narratives – both of the king incognito and of kings duped by disguised individuals – grappled with these concerns.
The fifteenth century was a time of great political upheaval in England. The reign of Henry VI provoked anxieties that the king was heavily influenced by shrewd, dominating magnates who induced violent power struggles within his court. Moreover, the mental health issues and general incompetency of Henry VI and the late fourteenthcentury tyrannical grip of Richard II raised questions about what authority a bad king should wield and whether or not deposition was, in extreme circumstances, a moral action.
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- Ethics in the Arthurian Legend , pp. 271 - 295Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2023