The Stanzaic Morte Arthur is a MIDDLE ENGLISH
poem composed probably in the North Midlands
area of England in the middle of the 14th century.
As the title suggests, the poem narrates the events
leading up to the death of King ARTHUR and is an
important link in the Arthurian tradition, drawing
on a French source, Mort Artu, and ultimately influencing
Thomas MALORY in the final two tales of
his 15th-century Le MORTE DARTHUR.
The poem comprises 3,969 lines and survives in
one manuscript,Harley 2252 in the British Library.
The manuscript is a miscellany, and the section
containing the poem can be dated between 1460
and 1480. Generally, the poem’s eight-line stanzas
have four-stress iambic lines, with a rhyme scheme
of abababab, although the number of lines in the
stanzas varies at points, as does the rhyme scheme.
The poem’s beginning positions the action after
the quest of the Holy Grail, as Arthur is urged by the
queen to host a tournament to boost what she alleges
is the waning honor of the Round Table. The
tournament at Winchester brings the Lord of Ascolot
and results in his daughter’s falling in love with
LANCELOT. Ultimately, her love goes unrequited as
Lancelot can only love Queen GUENEVERE
(“Gaynor” in this poem), but before the maid’s
death resulting from the discovery that Lancelot
could not love her, the queen is so distraught by the
appearance of a relationship between the two that
she sends Lancelot away. Consequently, when the
queen is falsely accused of poisoning a knight, she
has no one to champion her against the charges of
the dead knight’s brother, Sir Mador. Her piteous
appeal to the knights whom she had served is an example
of the dramatic scenes that pervade this
poem. Although Bors pledges to fight for her should
no other knight offer, Lancelot returns and defeats
Sir Mador, grants him mercy, and Sir Mador forgives
his brother’s death for the sake of Lancelot,
who, given his reputation as a knight, honors him by
fighting with him.At this point, the court considers
how the poisoning could have occurred, and upon
torture, one squire who served that day admits his
guilt, and Guenevere is therefore exonerated.
Lancelot’s restoration to the Round Table is
short-lived, however, as the poem progresses and
Agravain and Mordred plot to expose to Arthur
the affair of Guenevere and Lancelot. Brothers
GAWAIN, Gaheriet, and Gaheries disagree, but
Agravain and Mordred are determined and they
disclose it to Arthur. They set a trap for the lovers
by purporting to leave them alone in the castle,
and when Lancelot is caught within the queen’s
bower without his armor, he attacks one knight,
arms himself, then defeats the remaining knights
and flees. A pivotal part of the poem occurs next
when the court determines to burn the queen for
her disloyalty to Arthur. Reluctantly, Gaheriet and
Gaheries obey the king’s orders to stand guard over
her and are thus, unwittingly, slain by Lancelot
when he returns to rescue Guenevere. It is this unintentional
double murder that turns Gawain irrevocably
against Lancelot and is the underlying
impetus for the remainder of the action of the
poem. Gawain’s relentless determination to avenge
his brothers death by either killing Lancelot or
dying in the process results in multiple battles and
Lancelot’s exile to the Continent.
Subsequent warring with Lancelot in France
leaves Arthur’s kingdom in the hands of his son,
Mordred, who, unaccountably in this poem, betrays
Arthur, acts as ruler in his absence and attempts
not only to depose him and usurp the
kingdom, but to marry his queen as well. Guenevere
escapes to a tower where she barricades herself
against Mordred, Arthur returns to fight Mordred
and reclaim his land, and Gawain is struck dead in
the penultimate battle. Arthur mourns Gawain
and is motivated by a dream vision to appeal to
Mordred for peace until Lancelot can arrive to battle
alongside Arthur. In the meeting to discuss a
truce, however, a knight strikes at an adder and the
two sides, both deeply distrusting one another, believe
the other has attacked, and they begin to
fight.Arthur kills Mordred and barely escapes with
his own life.After Bedivere returns Excalibur to the
sea as Arthur directs, Arthur is transported to
Avalon by three ladies. Bedivere discovers a grave
he believes to be Arthur’s based on the report of
the hermit and mourns the loss of his lord.
The poem does not end with the death of
Arthur, however. The poem follows Lancelot as he
arrives in England to find the Round Table in ruin,
and charts his meeting with Guenevere, their joint
repentance of their sin, and his penance at a chapel
for seven years.He is eventually joined by Bors and
other knights. Thus the Round Table is dissolved
and the knights dedicate their service, in the absent
of their king, to God.When Lancelot dies, the remaining
knights are joined by Ector, Lancelot’s
brother,who mourns Lancelot in another dramatic
scene. In hermit’s clothes, they advance to Aumsbury
where they find Queen Guenevere dead. She is
buried beside the grave purported to be Arthur’s
and the poem thus ends with her death.
Scholars have previously commented on the absence
of Fortune in the Stanzaic Morte Arthur and
its focus instead on the impetus for the action of
individual deeeds, as well as the psychological
ramifications of the events upon its characters.
Human error plays a role, as well, in Lancelot’s unintentional
killing of Gawain’s brothers, and the
presence of the adder at the battle.
The Stanzaic Morte Arthur is an important work
for Arthurian scholars in that it, along with the ALLITERATIVE
MORTE ARTHURE, represents part of the
English tradition of Arthurian literature prior to
the works of Sir Thomas Malory,which synthesized
so many of both the French and the English texts.
Malory drew heavily from the Stanzaic Morte
Arthur and the French prose Mort Artu (last ro-
mance of the VULGATE CYCLE and the source for the
stanzaic poem, which condensed much of it) in
constructing the books of “Launcelot and Gwenyvere”
and “The Death of Arthur.” Like the author
of the Stanzaic Morte Arthur, Malory also condensed
much of his French romance sources, possible
evidence that he was influenced by the example
set by the stanzaic Morte. Because Malory shaped
the Arthurian tradition and influenced subsequent
writers, the effect of the Stanzaic Morte Arthur on
him and his last two tales in Le Morte Darthur
demonstrates the poem’s importance in literary
history, in addition to the appeal of the text itself.
Bibliography
Barron,W. R. J. English Medieval Romance. London:
Longman, 1987.
Benson, Larry Dean, ed. King Arthur’s Death: The
Middle English Stanzaic Morte Arthur and Alliterative
Morte Arthure. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill,
1974.
Knopp, Sherron E. “Artistic Design in the Stanzaic
Morte Arthur,” ELH 45 (1978): 563–582.
Wertime, Richard A. “The Theme and Structure of
the Stanzaic Morte Arthur,” PMLA 87 (1972):
1075–1082.
Michelle Palmer