Legends and Heroes

• What is your definition of a legend? What examples can you give of a legend?

• What is your definition of a hero? Is a hero a real person or a fictional person? What are the traits and qualities of a hero (think hero, not tragic hero).

Arthurian Legend

Legend (literary definition)

• Story based in history

• Set in a particular time and place

• Focused on people who might have existed

• Contain exaggerated, magical, or supernatural elements

Arthurian Legend

• Some suggest King Arthur would have lived around the 5th-6th centuries

• Stories were verbally transmitted

• 1st datable reference to King Arthur is in the 9th century

Arthurian Authors

• MANY authors wrote about Arthur

• Sir Thomas Malory• “Le Morte d’Arthur” - 1470s

• Alfred Lord Tennyson• “Idylls of the King” - 1842

Chivalry

• Code of manner, honor, and courtly love

• Duties to countrymen, God, and women

Duties to Countrymen &Fellow Christians

• Virtues such as mercy, courage, valor, fairness

• Protection of the weak and the poor

• Servant-hood of the knight to his lord

• Willing to give one’s life for another’s

Duties to God

• Being faithful to God

• Being faithful to the church

• Protecting the innocent

• Being the champion of good against evil

• Obeying God above the feudal lord

Duties to Women

• Courtly love: the idea that the knight is to serve a lady, and after her all other ladies

• General gentleness and graciousness to all women