[Fr. Walwain (Brut), Gauvain, Gaugain; Lat. Walganus, Walwanus; Dutch, Walwein, Welsh, Gwalchmei]. Son of King Loth of Orkney, and nephew to Arthur on his mothers side, the most famous hero of Arthurian romance. The first mention of his name is in a passage of William of Malmesbury, recording the discovery of his tomb in the province of Ros in Wales. He is there described as Walwen qui fuit haud degener Arturis ex sorore nepos. Here he is said to have reigned over Galloway; and there is certainly some connection, the character of which is now not easy to determine, between the two. In the later Historia of Geoffrey of Monmouth, and its French translation by Wace, Gawain plays an important and pseudo-historic rôle. On the receipt by Arthur of the insulting message of the Roman emperor, demanding tribute, it is he who is despatched as ambassador to the enemys camp, where his arrogant and insulting behaviour brings about the outbreak of hostilities. On receipt of the tidings of Mordreds treachery, Gawain accompanies Arthur to England, and is slain in the battle which ensues on their landing. Wace, however, evidently knew more of Gawain than he has included in his translation, for he speaks of him as
Li quens Walwains | |
Qui tant fu preudom de ses mains | |
(11. 9,05758). |
Prous fu et de mult grant mesure, | |
Dorgoil et de forfait not qure | |
Plus vaut faire quil ne dist | |
Et plus doner quil ne pramist | |
(10. 106109). |
The truth appears to be that Gawain, the Celtic and mythic origin of whose character was frankly admitted by the late M. Gaston Paris, belongs to the very earliest stage of Arthurian tradition, long antedating the crystallization of such tradition into literary form. He was certainly known in Italy at a very early date; Professor Rajna has found the names of Arthur and Gawain in charters of the early 12th century, the bearers of those names being then grown to manhood; and Gawain is figured in the architrave of the north doorway of Modena cathedral, a 12th-century building. Recent discoveries have made it practically certain that there existed, prior to the extant romances, a collection of short episodic poems, devoted to the glorification of Arthurs famous nephew and his immediate kin (his brother Ghaeris, or Gareth, and his son Guinglain), the authorship of which was attributed to a Welshman, Bleheris; fragments of this collection have been preserved to us alike in the first continuation of Chrétien de Troyes Perceval, due to Wauchier de Denain, and in our vernacular Gawain poems. Among these Bleheris poems was one dealing with Gawains adventures at the Grail castle, where the Grail is represented as non-Christian, and presents features strongly reminiscent of the ancient Nature mysteries. There is good ground for believing that as Grail quester and winner, Gawain preceded alike Perceval and Galahad, and that the solution of the mysterious Grail problem is to be sought rather in the tales connected with the older hero than in those devoted to the glorification of the younger knights. The explanation of the very perplexing changes which the character of Gawain has undergone appears to lie in a misunderstanding of the original sources of that character. Whether or no Gawain was a sun-hero, and he certainly possessed some of the featureswe are constantly told how his strength waxed with the waxing of the sun till noontide, and then gradually decreased; he owned a steed known by a definite name le Gringalet; and a light-giving sword, Escalibur (which, as a rule, is represented as belonging to Gawain, not to Arthur)all traits of a sun-herohe certainly has much in common with the primitive Irish hero Cuchullin. The famous head-cutting challenge, so admirably told in Syr Gawayne and the Grene Knighte, was originally connected with the Irish champion. Nor was the lady of Gawains love a mortal maiden, but the queen of the other-world. In Irish tradition the other-world is often represented as an island, inhabited by women only; and it is this Isle of Maidens that Gawain visits in Diu Crone; returning therefrom dowered with the gift of eternal youth. The Chastel Merveilleus adventure, related at length by Chrétien and Wolfram is undoubtedly such an other-world story. It seems probable that it was this connection which won for Gawain the title of the Maidens Knight, a title for which no satisfactory explanation is ever given. When the source of the name was forgotten its meaning was not unnaturally misinterpreted, and gained for Gawain the reputation of a facile morality, which was exaggerated by the pious compilers of the later Grail romances into persistent and aggravated wrongdoing; at the same time it is to be noted that Gawain is never like Tristan and Lancelot, the hero of an illicit connection maintained under circumstances of falsehood and treachery. Gawain, however, belonged to the pre-Christian stage of Grail tradition, and it is not surprising that writers, bent on spiritual edification, found him somewhat of a stumbling-block. Chaucer, when he spoke of Gawain coming again out of faërie, spoke better than he knew; the home of that very gallant and courteous knight is indeed Fairy-land, and the true Gawain-tradition is informed with fairy glamour and grace.
See Syr Gawayne, the English poems relative to that hero, edited by Sir Frederick Madden for the Bannatyne Club, 1839 (out of print and difficult to procure); Histoire littéraire de la France, vol. xxx.; introduction and summary of episodic Gawain poems by Gaston Paris; The Legend of Sir Gawain, by Jessie L. Weston, Grimm Library, vol. vii.; The Legend of Sir Perceval, by Jessie L. Weston, Grimm Library, vol. xvii.; Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Sir Gawain at the Grail Castle and Sir Gawain and the Lady of Lys, vols. i., vi. and vii. of Arthurian Romances (Nutt). See also The Age of Chivalry.