Kaeuper R.W. - Chivalry and violence in medieval europe (1999)(en)

Ôin the splendor of its beauty like the throne of the realm; in the midst of the fatherland it called for safety and justice everywhere in the land through security and peace, right and lawsÕ.34

At the end of his account Galbert is left puzzling over how he might Þnd the dispensation of God in the complex and violent actions of men.

Context: Socio-Economic and Institutional Change

ConÞdence in the evidence provided by our three witnesses increases when we review two features of the general environment within which they lived and worked. The very pace and consequences of change in the Central Middle Ages forced basic questions about order into the forefront of the thinking and acting of all those in any position of awareness or responsibility, and led to the creation of important institutions. An age vibrant with as much change as noted historians Þnd in these centuries would necessarily devote a good deal of energy to securing order, reducing disruptive violence, and Þnding ways of resolving disputes. If even calmer times yield such a channelling of energies, the need could only be greater when one social, economic, political, and religious catalyst after another was actively at work speeding the rate of reaction.

The exact measurement of demographic growth (to take an obvious and important example) is likely to continue to elude scholars, but the fact of a signiÞcant increase in population commands general agreement.35 Historians have fought even longer over theories of the nature of urban origins, but the fact of a signiÞcant urbanization of Europe in this period stands beyond dispute.36 That this phenomenon rested on an economic transformation likewise seems established, though the details are again a matter of contention.37

By the year 1000, moreover, people over a wide stretch of Europe faced the necessity of political reconstruction almost from the ground up. The order tentatively set in place by the family of Charlemagne had fractured time and again into increasingly localized units, which constituted the only political units retaining anything like effective governing power and what might pass for loyalty or at least acquiescence from those governed.38 By the age of Orderic, Suger, and Galbert, as we have seen, the work of political

34Ross, tr., Murder, 167; Rider, ed., De multro, 86.

35Overviews, with many sources cited, in Pounds, Economic History, ch. 3, and Fossier, Enfance de lÕEurope, I, 87Ð287.

36Surveyed in Ennen, The Medieval Town.

37Duby, Early Growth of the European Economy; Fossier, Enfance de lÕEurope.

38Analysis of the scholarship written during the last half century on all aspects of the Carolingian world appears in Sullivan, ÔThe Carolingian AgeÕ.

reconstruction was well under way in northwestern Europe; in another generation or two it would be considerably advanced.39

Growth in political frameworks relied of necessity on supportive public opinion, or at least on the good will of those levels of society whose opinion counted. Measures to secure public order, in other words, could scarcely have been imposed simply from the top down, without the foundation of fairly widespread support, generated by real concern about basic questions of order. Both the reforming Church and the emerging State took on increasingly institutionalized form during the High Middle Ages, and in the process considerably expanded their role as guarantors of acceptable levels of order. Clearly, large numbers of the people whose opinion mattered in this society had some investment in peace and order and often backed institutions of government that might help achieve these goals.40

On the early edge of this period the Church, despairing of kings who no longer seemed able to play this role, tried to secure a minimal level of peace through its own councils, generating what historians have long termed the Peace Movement, beginning in the late tenth century.41

The movement for reform in the Church which began in the late eleventh century led, among its many signiÞcant results, to an increased emphasis on effective papal administration; a growing network of courts and system of appeals brought papal judicial inßuence across the Alps; the canon law and a framework of ecclesiastical courts grew both in strength and outreach into society; a system of taxation siphoned off some portion of the wealth of Þeld and town to fundÑalways inadequately though, it seemed to clerical ofÞcialsÑthe growth of ecclesiastical administration at all levels. The sheer volume of documentation produced at the centre in Rome, if plotted on a graph, rises inexorably.42

At about the same time the growing power of kingship and the equally dramatic extension of its social role have led historians to analyse the medieval origins of the modern state as an outstanding feature of high medieval society.43

39 See Hallam, Capetian France; Reynolds, Kingdoms and Communities; Strayer, Medieval Origins; Baldwin, Philip Augustus. England, as so often, proves to be a special case, building on Anglo-Saxon foundations: see James Campbell, ÔReßections on the English GovernmentÕ; Chibnall, Anglo-Norman England .

40One of the arguments in Kaeuper, War, Justice, and Public Order.

41Some of the recent scholarship, and the contentions and debates it entails, appear in Head and Landes, eds, The Peace of God.

42Southern, Western Society and the Church; Morris, The Papal Monarchy; I. S. Robinson, The Papacy; see the graph in Clanchy, From Memory to Written Record, 44. The ideological stance of the post-Gregorian ecclesiastical hierarchy with regard to violence, sanctiÞed and otherwise, will concern us later.

43See especially Strayer, Medieval Origins. Cf. the wide-ranging essays in Gouron and Rigaudiere, eds, Renaissance du pouvoir legislatif .

Evidence from Chivalric Literature

One Þnal source of evidence shows perceptions of order and violence: the vast body of chivalric literature.48 Even a brief, initial sampling can reveal patterns of thought, for these texts drew on the continuous experience of daily life, on collective memories and imagination. Since we can never recover all this particular experience in detail, it is all the more important that we take into account the powerful cumulative traces of experience in literature. Examining this literature puts us in touch with a vast store of relevant human experience; moreover, it obviously attempts to shape attitudes. No simple mirror reßecting society, it is itself an active social force, identifying basic issues, asking probing questions, sometimes suggesting constructive change.

Almost without fail these works give prominence to acts of disruptive violence and problems of control. Complexity characterizes the point of view: even more than in the histories we have already sampled, attitudes about violence come strongly mixed. Belief in the right kind of violence carried out vigorously by the right people is a cornerstone of this literature. Yet aggression and the disruptive potentiality of violence is a serious issue for these writers no less than for the historians. This signiÞcant fact has seldom been analysed.

What troubles these writers (echoing our three historians) is not usually violence in the abstract, nor war simply conceived as one sovereign or even one seigneur marshalling his forces against another. Rather, the issue is how to carry on daily living with enough security and peacefulness to make civilized life possible; the world seems almost Hobbesian, with violence carried out on any scale possible to achieve any end desired.

In confronting such issues, a writer sometimes creates an image of unusual power and vividness, conveying across the centuries the elemental fear created by knightly violence. The author of the Perlesvaus (written in the early years of the thirteenth century) produces just such an image in the huge knights in black armour who appear more than once in the pages of his romance.49 We

48The issues involved in using this literature are discussed in the second section of Chapter 2.

49The several quotations that follow come from Bryant, tr., Perlesvaus, 144, 176Ð8, 221; for the original French, see Nitze and Jenkins, eds, Perlesvaus, 222Ð3; 274Ð8; 344. The earliest appearance of these knights, or some men very much like them, comes near the opening of the romance when King Arthur Þghts a black knight with a ßaming lance at the Chapel of St Augustine. Mysterious knights appear on the scene to hack this knight into fragments after Arthur defeats him; they similarly cut apart one of their company who failed to kill or capture Arthur. This company is not, however, described as being black, nor carrying ßaming weaponry. Bryant, Perlesvaus, 27Ð30; Nitze and Jenkins, Perlesvaus, 38Ð40. Black knights on black horses appear again, issuing from the Castle of the Black Hermit, later identiÞed as Hell. Bryant, Perlesvaus, 37, 73, Nitze and Jenkins, Perlesvaus, 55, 109. The black knights are later identiÞed as spirits of those who died Ôsanz repentanceÕ or as Ôungodly demonsÕ. Nitze and Jenkins, Perlesvaus, 222, 345.

Þrst see these dread Þgures through the eyes of PercevalÕs sister when she comes to the Perilous Cemetery:

As the maiden peered around the graveyard from where she stood among the tombs, she saw that it was surrounded by knights, all black, with burning, ßaming lances, and they came at each other with such a din and tumult that it seemed as though the whole forest were crumbling. Many wielded swords as red as ßame, and were attacking one another and hewing off hands and feet and noses and heads and faces; the sound of their blows was great indeed.

Later in the story, when Arthur, Lancelot, and Gawain journey on a Grail pilgrimage, they Þnd themselves in the midst of a dense forest without the accommodation that usually appears in such stories as if on cue. After sending a squire up a tree to try to discover some sign of civilized life and hospitality in the engulÞng darkness, they move towards an open Þre he has sighted in the distance. The Þre is burning inexplicably, they Þnd, in the ruined courtyard of a fortiÞed but deserted manor house.

When they send the squire in search of food for the horses, he returns in utter terror, having in the dark stumbled into a chamber Þlled with fragments of butchered knightsÕ bodies. Suddenly a maiden appears in the courtyard, bearing on her shoulders half a dead man, the latest addition to the grisly collection the squire discovered within. For her sins against knighthood this unfortunate maiden has had to Ôcarry to that chamber all the knights who were killed in this forest and guard them here at the manor, all alone without companyÕ. She warns the Round Table companions against a fearsome band of knights who will come at night, Ôblack they are, and foul and terrible, and noone knows where they come from. They Þght one another furiously, and the combat is long.Õ On her advice, Lancelot draws a circle all around the house with his swordÑjust in time, for the demon knights

came galloping through the forest, at such a furious speed that it sounded as though the forest were being uprooted. Then they rode into the manor, clutching blazing Þrebrands which they hurled at one another; into the house they rode, Þghting, and made as if to approach the knights, but they could not go near them, and had to aim the Þrebrands at the king and his company from a distance.

Though the maiden warns Lancelot not to step outside the protective magic of his circle, with characteristic valour he attacks the knights. Inspired by his example, Arthur and Gawain join in; swords swing, sparks and hot coals ßy, the evil is defeated. As the swords of the heroes cut through them, Ôthey screamed like demons and the whole forest resounded, and as they fell to the ground and could endure no more, both they and their horses turned to Þlth and ashes, and black demons rose from their bodies in the form of crowsÕ.

1091, while returning from a visit to a sick parishioner. Hearing them approach, Walchelin mistook the noise to mean a troublesome contemporary force, the household troops of Robert of Bell•me (OrdericÕs b•te noire), on their way to the siege of Courcy, and feared being Ôshamefully robbedÕ. His initial fear is useful evidence in itself.

What happened was yet more terrifying, however, for he saw pass before him in the clear moonlight not an army of mortals, but four troops of tormented spirits: Þrst commoners on foot, then women riding sidesaddle, then a great troop of clergy and monks, all groaning under torments. The last troop was Ôa great army of knights, in which no colour was visible save blackness and ßickering Þre. All rode upon huge horses, fully armed as if they were galloping to battle and carrying jet-black standards.Õ Wanting proof that he had actually seen ÔHerlechinÕs rabbleÕ. Walchelin foolishly tried to seize one of the coal-black horses, which easily galloped off. His yet more foolish second attempt provoked an attack by four of the demon knights. Orderic assures us that he saw the scar on the priestÕs throat caused by the knightÕs grasp, Ôburning him like ÞreÕ. One of the knights proved to be the clericÕs dead brother, who spared Walchelin, told him of the torments the ghostly knights suffer, and begged for his priestly prayers as his hope for relief:

I have endured severe punishment for the great sins with which I am heavily burdened. The arms which we bear are red-hot, and offend us with an appalling stench, weighing us down with intolerable weight, and burning with everlasting Þre. Up to now I have suffered unspeakable torture from those punishments. But when you were ordained in England and sang your Þrst Mass for the faithful departed your father Ralph escaped from his punishments and my shield, which caused me great pain, fell from me. As you see I still carry this sword, but I look in faith for release from this burden within the year.

Walchelin noticed what seemed to him Ôa mass of blood like a human headÕ around his brotherÕs heels where his knightly spurs would attach. It is not blood, he learns, but Þre, burning and weighing down the knight as if he were carrying the Mont Saint-Michel. His brother explains: ÔBecause I used bright, sharp spurs in my eager haste to shed blood I am justly condemned to carry this enormous load on my heels, which is such an intolerable burden that I cannot convey to anyone the extent of my sufferings.Õ The knightÕs message is clear: ÔLiving men should constantly have these things in mind.Õ It seems likely that the author of the Perlesvaus, a century later, had them much in mind. Both he and Orderic testify vividly to a fear of knightly violence at the deepest level of human psychology.

Now begin the adventures and marvels of the Kingdom of Adventures which will not cease until a high price is paid, for soiled, befouled hands having touched the Holy Lance and wounded the most honored of princes and the High Master will avenge it on those who have not deserved it.55

Balain has, of course, seized the sacred lance that pierced the side of Christ, the Lance of Longinus, and has used it against the king into whose care God had entrusted the keeping of the Holy Grail.

What follows may remind modern readers of an atomic bomb explosion, with rings of gradually decreasing devastation. A great part of the castle wall falls; hundreds within the castle die from pure fear; in the surrounding town many die and others are maimed and wounded as houses tumble into rubble; no one dares to enter the castle for several days, as a sense of divine wrath akin to radiation lingers. Merlin Þnally leads people back into the site, accompanied by a priest wearing Ôthe armour of Jesus ChristÕ, which alone will guarantee them safe entry. Finding Balain, Merlin leads him out, even providing him with the necessary mount. Everywhere he rides the prospect is cheerless:

As he rode through the land, he found the trees down and broken and grain destroyed and all things laid waste, as if lightning had struck in each place, and unquestionably it had struck in many places, though not everywhere. He found half the people in the villages dead, both bourgeois and knights, and he found laborers dead in the Þelds. What can I tell you? He found the kingdom of Listinois so totally destroyed that it was later called by everyone the Kingdom of Waste Land and the Kingdom of Strange Land, because everywhere the land had become so strange and wasted.56

So powerful and complex an incident as the Dolorous Stroke can only be considered a polyvalent symbol. Yet we can see immediately its signiÞcance for our enquiry. A man who is recognized as one of the best knights in the world takes perhaps understandable vengeance for unprovoked attacks. Fleeing for his life, weaponless, he commits the great sin. A knight, whatever his good qualities, has laid profane hands on the weapon that pierced God in the course of divine redemption and has used it in his private quarrel to wound one of his fellow knights and one of GodÕs chosen agents. Devastation, like lightningÑ like warÑblots out or blights the lives of innocent people throughout an entire region. Pure knightly prowess, highly praised at the opening of this story, has produced these stunning results near its close.

Is such evidence representative or merely exceptional? Extensive reading in chivalric literature provides a convincing answer, for these works are Þlled

55Asher, tr., Merlin Continuation, 212; Bogdanow, Romance of the Grail, 246, supplies the passage quoted, on one of the pages of the old French text missing in Paris and Uhlric, eds. Merlin, II.

56Asher, Merlin Continuation, 214; Paris and Uhlric, Merlin, II, 30.