Courtesy in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

Courtesy, as it is understood today, is defined more through its affiliation with other words denoting manner, temper and the observance of etiquette than as a concrete attribute to self-presentation delineated by set boundaries. The OED defines it as ‘[c]ourteous behaviour; graceful politeness or considerateness in intercourse with others; courteous disposition’.¹ Grace, politeness and fellow consideration are, no doubt, qualities attached to courtesy, but as the word itself suggests, it once referred to a whole mode of behaviour, the practice of which was upheld in medieval courts.²

Royal and baronial courts are a recurring image in the literature of the Middle Ages. They are as often the site of politics, festivities and social activity as they must have been in real life. Poets of the time write about them and idealise them to the point of making them symbolic. They are often the safe haven from which knights errant depart and to which they return, and sometimes the place of challenges and intrigue. At their most ideal, courts are usually either bastions of good or pits of evil. In MS Cotton Nero A. x., the manuscript in which Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and three other poems are bound together, there are examples of both. In Purity (or Cleanness), King Belshazzar’s court is corrupted and perverse. Its symbolic function is as a place of sin where retribution comes at the hand of God. By contrast, Arthur’s and Bertilak’s courts in Sir Gawain are shown as fundamentally good, hierarchically-structured, ordered and stable. Arthur’s knights are merry and, as the Green Knight himself says, celebrated as ‘Þe wyзtest and þe worþyest of þe worldes kynde’ (v. 261).³ When Gawain arrives at Bertilak’s castle, the host and his servants are also exemplary in their hospitality, careful to treat their guest with the utmost respect and to provide him with the best services.

The prestige of these courts is brought to the fore not by extolling the military prowess of their warriors or the extent of land under their control, but by the adherence to manners and behaviour that beseem a refined household. Courtesy is central to maintaining the good reputation of courts and of the individuals within it. Gawain is the knight who is most renowned for his courteous person – his reputation precedes him wherever he goes. The men in Bertilak’s house call him a ‘fyne fader of nurture’ (v. 919), and endeavour to learn from him some of the art of noble behaviour. Gawain’s virtue is fixed on five points, symbolised by the pentangle on his shield. These are listed by the poet as fraunchyse, felaзschyp, clannes, cortaysye and pité (vv. 652-4). All of these ideals are linked to each other and all are intrinsic to the notion of a perfect knight.

Yet they are not all that the term courtesy stands for. D. S. Brewer analyses the different uses of the word in the works of the Cotton manuscript.⁴ He identifies word groups related to the concept of the courteous. In Patience it is attributed to the divine, particularly emphasizing the inequality of the forgiving God and the undeserving population of Nineveh. The protesting Jonah accuses God of undue mercy, while drawing connections between cortaysye and words like quoynt soffraunce, longe abydyng and late vengaunce. Courtesy here is closely associated with being patient, accepting repentance and withholding retribution, not only on fellows but also on those who might be of lesser status. This is not to be seen as the full range of meaning of courtesy, but as one facet of its collective ideal. In essence, it requires the courteous knight or courtier to be accepting of repenting wrong-doers, an effort only achieved through restraint and self-control.

Moderation is also central to courtesy. Mesure is a term used to signify temperate disposition, a mastery of one’s passions in speech and act. In an essay on the concept of courtesy in the troubadours’ poetry, Alexander J. Denomy provides a particularly relevant example of the denunciation of vanity. He writes:

There is one vice that is obnoxious to the courtly and which the troubadours single out as uncouth and base: a breach of mesura. That is pride and its external manifestation, boasting and vainglory. In a violent attack on Piere d’Auvergne and his boastful claim that he was the perfect poet, Bernard Marti castigates him for his self-glorification. Excessive self-praise is not the work of a courtly man.⁵

Verbal restraint is key. Excessive boastfulness is still looked upon disapprovingly today and may result in the person being seen as ridiculous, but in the Middle Ages it was considered so seriously as to be a mark of discourtesy in one’s personality. In Sir Gawain, remarkable mesure is shown by the knight during the temptation trial. The lady repeatedly reminds him of his reputation as the most courteous of knights, to coax him into living up to those expectations and succumb to her wooing. In return he never confirms it; rather, he negates what she says in what may appear to be excessive humility. An example from their exchange on the first morning should suffice in illustrating this point. The lady says:

For I wene wel, iwysse, Sir Wowen зe are,

Þat alle þe worlde worchipeз quere-so зe ride;

Your honour, your hendelayk is hendely praysed

With lordeз, wyth ladyes, with alle þat lyf bere. (vv. 1226-9)⁶

To which he, while assumably fully knowledgeable of his reputation,⁷ replies:

‘In god faith,’ quoþ Gawayn, ‘gayn hit me þynkkeз,

Þaз I be not now he þat зe of speken;

To reche to such reuerence as зe reherce here

I am wyзe vnworþy, I wot wel myseluen. (vv. 1241-4)⁸

Gawain manages to keep the difficult balance between refusing her advances and not offending her outright. Turning her down flatly would be a breach of courtesy, even though it is the right thing to do both morally and in relation to the later outcome of the test. He refrains from acknowledging his praiseworthy reputation because it would put him in a more difficult position, but also because he considers it a violation of mesure.

The elaborate way of speaking that Gawain and the lady use is also important. It is the same kind of ‘luf-talkyng’ (v. 927) that the men in Bertilak’s castle wish to learn from the Arthurian knight. The act of talking serves more than a communicative function in the Middle Ages. As Brewer notes, ‘not all speech is courteous, but one of the chief ways that courtesy is made known is with speech’.⁹ It is clear that self-presentation at the time relies a lot upon one’s choice of words and the manner in which one utters them. The faculty of speech is regarded as a gift, but also as a potential instrument of evil and a means of committing sin. Various categorizations of the vices of the tongue exist in early sermons and compendia of moral theology. A few apt examples are presented here:

The monk Defensor recognises at least six [sins of the tongue] –loquacity (the abuse of silence), vainglory, swearing, lying, detraction, idle talk—while Taio educes loquacity (with many subtypes), perverse talk, whispering, and lying.

Saint Valerianus (8^th cent.), in his homilies “De oris insolentia” and “De otiosis verbis,” ranges over many vices of the tongue: loquacity, harsh words, taciturnity, foul words, boasting, evil talk, falsehood, lying, slander, detraction, joking, and theatre. Bede’s exposition of Chapter 3 of the Epistle of James summarises the vices of the tongue in one passage as fraud, detraction, cursing, pride, boasting, excuses for sin, flattering, dissension, heresy, lying, perjury, and otiose or superfluous talk.¹⁰

Although the lists are not constant and allow for some variation, there is enough consistency to show that speech was the subject of strict and idealistic moral codes. The above examples date back to several centuries before the estimated time of composition of Sir Gawain, therefore it must be kept in mind that these were not contemporary guides to proper behaviour, neither to lords and ladies of the fourteenth-century nor to poets. The influence of these texts, however, is still evident in other works closer to the Gawain-poet’s time that praise Gawain’s courtesy in terms of his proper use of speech. The Roman de la Rose contrasts his reputation with that of Sir Kay, Arthur’s foster-brother:

‘Then guard yourself from telling what you hear

That better were untold; ‘tis not the part

Of worthy men to gossip scandalously.

Notorious and hated was Sir Kay,

The Seneschal, just for his mockery;

While Sir Gawain for courtesy was praised.¹¹

The Roman dates back to the thirteenth-century, but Chaucer is definitely a contemporary of the Gawain-poet. In ‘The Squire’s Tale’, he emphasises Gawain’s perfection in the art of courteous speech:

As wel in speche as in countenaunce,

That Gawayn, with his olde curteisye,

Though he were comen ageyn out of fairye,

Ne koude hym nat amende with a word.¹²

In the temptation scenes, Bertilak’s wife attempts to use the conventions of courtesy to pressure the knight into compliance. Brewer makes a valid observation about this. He writes, ‘[p]erhaps the most interesting general consideration […] is the lady’s attempt to identify courtesy with love, and Gawain’s successful refusal’.¹³ The association of courtesy and amour courtois is an old one, finding its origin in the lyrics of French troubadour poetry. In this verse, courtliness is usually denoted by the words cortesia or cortezia, terms which refer to a code of conduct both for the poet-lover and for the lady he courts. The relationship between the admirer and the beloved is complex and paradoxical, because it has to base itself on unfulfilled desire. The courter fawns on the lady: if he is a poet, by writing verse in her honour; if a knight, by jousting or performing other feats in her name. In return, she grants him her favour and gives him tokens of her love and loyalty. The relationship has to be unequal, with the courter being of inferior status. Idealistically, this impedes the fulfilment of sexual desire, and perpetuates the lovers’ amorous attentions. The paradox of amour courtois is neatly captured in writing by Alexander Denomy:

In its purest form, it eschews physical possession because, once consummated, desire decreases and tends to vanish. On the contrary, desire for union is to be intensified, fanned, and inflamed by every physical delight short of carnal possession, because it is desire which is the means to the end and purpose of Courtly Love: the ennobling of the lover. Despite the sensuality that such love implies in Christian eyes, for the troubadours such love was spiritual in that it sought a union of hearts and minds rather than of bodies; it was a virtuous love in so far as it was the source of all natural virtue and worth.¹⁴

The connection made between virtue and love is significant for cortezia, since its aim is for the courtier to appear, and be, virtuous. The practices of love-speech and token-giving become important. In Sir Gawain, the knight and lady adhere to these customs, which is partly the reason he does not decline her gift of the green lace.¹⁵

Cortezia and courtesy, however, are not interchangeable. The former is more specific to behaviour during courtship, because the troubadours are more concerned with love-making than with the general concept of courtly behaviour. It is more easily associated with notions of proper conduct in matters of the heart and between two people rather than in courtly social milieux. Cortezia is nonetheless a value which knights and nobles, and Gawain, cherish and uphold. The difference between the two concepts is best brought out in this sentence, which summarises it succinctly: ‘cortezia is an ideal and a virtue of the courtly lover; courtoisie is the virtue and the ideal of the chevalier’.¹⁶

Endnotes

¹ See courtesy in The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, ed. by C. T. Onions, 3rd edn (London: Oxford University Press, 1944), p. 411.

² The word’s connection to French and to the works of the troubadours is discussed later in this section.

³ The modern English translation, in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, trans. by J. R. R. Tolkien, ed. by Christopher Tolkien (London: HarperCollins, 2006), p. 24, reads: ‘most eager and honourable of the earth’s people[.]’ All translations to modern English from here onwards are taken from this edition.

⁴ For a detailed survey of the uses of courtesy in the poems of the Cotton manuscript, see D. S. Brewer, ‘Courtesy and the Gawain-poet’, in Patterns of Love and Courtesy: Essays in Memory of C. S. Lewis, ed. by John Lawlor (London: Edward Arnold, 1966), pp. 54-85.

⁵ Alexander J. Denomy, ‘Courtly Love and Courtliness’, Speculum, 28 (1953), 44-63 (p. 61).

⁶ Modern English translation: ‘For I wot well indeed that Sir Wawain you are, | to whom all men pay homage wherever you ride; | your honour, your courtesy, by the courteous is praised, | by lords, by ladies, by all living people’ (p. 53).

⁷ When the lady reproves Gawain for not kissing her before she leaves, he shows much concern ‘lest he hade fayled in fourme of his castes’ (v. 1295). He is eager to maintain his reputation.

⁸ Modern English translation: ‘ ‘Upon my word,’ said Gawain, ‘that is well, I guess; | though I am not now he of whom you are speaking – | to attain to such honour as here you tell of | I am a knight unworthy, as well indeed I know –’ (p. 54).

⁹ D. S. Brewer, p. 61.

¹⁰ Both passages are taken from Mark D. Johnston, ‘The Treatment of Speech in Medieval Ethical and Courtesy Literature’, Rhetorica, 4 (1986), 21-46 (pp. 26-27). The examples provided are originally in Latin.

¹¹ Lines quoted by Johnston, p. 35.

¹² Lines quoted by Tolkien and Gordon in an endnote to lines 916ff., p. 97.

¹³ D. S. Brewer, p. 75.

¹⁴ Denomy, p. 44.

¹⁵ It is important to note that Bertilak’s wife is somewhat lacking in courteous behaviour at some points in the bedchamber scenes. Also, Gawain’s inward motive for accepting the lace is fear for his own life, but outwardly he is acting according to the custom of token-exchange.

¹⁶ Denomy, p. 63.

References

Books

Brewer, D. S., ‘Courtesy and the Gawain-poet’, in Patterns of Love and Courtesy: Essays in Memory of C. S. Lewis, ed. by John Lawlor (London: Edward Arnold, 1966), pp. 54-85

Onions, C. T., ed., The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, 3rd edn (London: Oxford University Press, 1944)

Tolkien, J. R. R., trans., Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, ed. by Christopher Tolkien (London: HarperCollins, 2006)

Tolkien, J. R. R., and E. V. Gordon, eds., Sir Gawain & the Green Knight (London: Oxford University Press, 1925)

Journals

Denomy, Alexander J., ‘Courtly Love and Courtliness’, Speculum, 28 (1953), 44-63

Johnston, Mark D., ‘The Treatment of Speech in Medieval Ethical and Courtesy Literature’, Rhetorica, 4 (1986), 21-46

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