The Once and Future Queen

Chapter One-1

CHAPTER ONE

An Overview of the Character

Literary Identity vs. Historical Fact

Before we delve deep into history, it will be helpful to have a refresher of what the Arthurian tradition tells us about Guinevere. In relation to other characters such as Arthur, Lancelot, and Merlin, we know precious little about Guinevere. Nevertheless, there are some constants. Nearly all versions of the story agree on these facts:

She was the wife of Arthur and the queen of Camelot.

At some point, she takes a lover in an adulterous affair. Sometimes he is Mordred or Bedivere, but most commonly after the twelfth century, he is Lancelot.

One or more times during the story, she is kidnapped by Malegant/Mordred/Melwas/Kay, depending on the tradition. Sometimes she suffers rape and/or abuse at his hands. Most of the time her rescuer is Lancelot, but in a few versions, it is Arthur. This element is believed to have its basis in “a Celtic narrative in which a fairy leaves her otherworldly mate to become the wife of a mortal only to be reclaimed later by her original partner.”12

For her crimes, which vary from adultery and treason to witchcraft, she is sentenced to burn at the stake.

Lancelot rescues her. Oftentimes, Arthur follows the couple, leaving Mordred free to take over Camelot. The ensuing power struggle leads to the battle of Camlann, where both men are killed.

Like the rest of the Arthurian legend, scholars believe most of this is the fantasy of literature, rather than historical fact. Historically, we know that someone did gather the British tribes in a coordinated defense against and defeat of the invading Saxons sometime between 490 and 530 CE that resulted in a period of peace. This information comes to us from two ancient historians, a monk named Gildas who wrote De Excidio Britanniae (The Ruin of Britain) in the mid-500s and Nennius, who gives us the basic story: “The twelfth [battle of King Arthur] was a most severe contest, when Arthur penetrated to the Hill of Badon. In this engagement nine hundred and forty fell by his hand alone, no one but the Lord affording him assistance.”13 However, this is as much as we can say with any certainty.

If Arthur lived, chances are good he had a wife, but her name and biographical details would have been different. As John and Caitlin Matthews write:

Despite efforts on the part of some scholars to identify Guinevere with an actual historical woman, there is no conclusive evidence to support this…. The version in the Historia [The History of the Kings of Britain by Geoffrey of Monmouth] is plausible, since it is likely that Arthur would have known Guinevere as a child, growing up in the court of Cador and might even have fallen for her then—making his choice (other than her renowned beauty and her Roman blood) a reasonable one…[but] as ever with these accounts, we are almost certainly seeing a mixture of real and legendary material, so that there may indeed have been a real person named Guinevere, who might indeed have been married to Arthur, even though we have no firm evidence of this.14

As Arthurian scholar Tyler Tichelaar points out in his book King Arthur’s Children, the old Welsh stories are likely closest to the truth. “If a historical Guinevere ever lived, she probably was mother to Arthur’s children, did not commit adultery, and died before Camlann, meaning she was innocent of all the charges brought against her.”15

How Many Guineveres Were There?

Asking this question of any other character might seem odd, but it is a valid question when speaking of Guinevere because the answer varies. We will delve into this more in depth later, but for now, it is enough to note that there may only have been one or as many as three.

Welsh tradition is the source of the three Guineveres. “There is a long tradition of Arthur having married three women named Guinevere,” write John and Caitlin Matthews in King Arthur: Many Faces, One Hero.16 It is well-documented that the Welsh—and the Celtic people before them—loved memorializing things in threes, so the three Guineveres may well be a holdover from this tradition. In the Welsh Triads, we find “Three Great Queens of Arthur’s Court: Gwehywfar daughter of Cywyrd Gwent, and Gwehywfar daughter of Gwyther ap Greidawl, and Gwehywfar daughter of Gogfran the Giant.”17 For many years, this was explained away as tradition, but now modern feminist scholars such as Caitlin Matthews argue the three Guineveres represent the triune goddess who is Maiden, Mother, and Crone, while scholars Barbara Gordon-Wise and Shulamith Shahar point out that Guinevere fulfills a very different triplicate role, that of The Virgin Mary/Eve/Mary Magdalene. As Arthur’s queen, she is expected to be a paragon of virtue like The Virgin Mary. However, through her affair with Lancelot, she becomes the fallen Eve. But later through her repentance, she is like Mary Magdalene.18

The concept of two Guineveres comes to us from Triad 53 of the Welsh Triads, where Gwenhwyfawr strikes Gwenhwyfach. This brief mention was greatly expanded by the Cistercian monks who penned the Vulgate Cycle of Arthurian legend. In these tales, the two Guineveres are twins conceived on the same night by the same father but by different mothers. The True Guinevere was protected by Lancelot, while The False takes Guinevere’s place for a while, before eventually betraying King Arthur. It is interesting to note that while tradition identifies them as The True and The False, they are never actually called that in the text. One is known as Gwenhwy-fawr, or “Gwenhwy the Great,” while the other is Gwenhwy-fach, or “Gwenhwy the less.”19

One Guinevere is the tradition that most people are familiar with. Even here, there is a scholarly debate about what she may represent. Arthurian and Celtic scholar John Matthews argues that Guinevere and Morgan are two sides to one coin, the positive and negative aspects of sovereignty, as well as the light and dark aspects of the Goddess.20 This is a relatively modern argument that has entered the Arthurian sphere in the wake of the feminist movement of the 1970s-1990s that connects the female members of Camelot’s court to an ancient goddess who may have been worshiped in Celtic Britain or may be a product of the New Age movement.

Guinevere’s Lineage and Family

It is telling that no matter the tradition, Guinevere is identified by the man she is most closely related to, usually her father. There is never a mention of her mother, as power and property were handed down through the male line and women were considered property with no personal identity during the Middle Ages. Plus, medieval tales were written by men primarily for consumption by other men (as well as some women at the court), and few would have cared about her female relatives in a male-dominated society.

In one of the earliest works mentioning Guinevere, Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain (1136), all we know is that she is of Roman lineage. By 1485, when Le Morte d’Arthur was published, Guinevere is commonly identified as the daughter of King Leodgrance of Cameliard, while Welsh tradition calls her father Gogrvan or Ocvran and the 1220 German poem Diu Crone identifies her father as King Garlin of Gore. In the 1801 play The Fairy of the Lake (1801), John Thelwall makes her the daughter of Vortigern. Regardless of Guinevere’s father’s identity, the authors make it clear that Guinevere is of noble descent and a worthy wife for the high king.

Some traditions mention siblings of Guinevere. As noted above, the most well-known is that of her sister/twin in Welsh legend. This sister struck Guinevere, leading to the battle of Camlann. Both Welsh tradition and French romance give Guinevere an identical half-sister who takes her place for a while. In the German Diu Crone, she has a brother called Gotegrin, while in the 1980s retellings Firelord (1980) and Beloved Exile (1984), both by Parke Godwin, she has a brother named Peredur. In a twist not seen elsewhere in the Arthurian legend, in some versions of Wace’s Roman de Brut (1155), Guinevere is Mordred’s sister.21 This is unusual because elsewhere in Arthurian legend, Mordred is only connected to Arthur, being his nephew or son.

Guinevere’s Children and Lovers

Thanks to the pervasive influence of medieval works much as Le Morte d’Arthur, modern readers tend to think of Guinevere as barren, but in a few instances, she has children. In some parts of Welsh poetic tradition, Guinevere is Arthur’s second wife, and in the Historia Brittonum he has a son named Amr or Anir but Guinevere is not mentioned, so this child may be from another marriage or it may be that the author didn’t think it was important to mention the mother’s identity.

Welsh tradition, as well the French Lanzelet and Perlesvaus, name Guinevere’s son Llacheu or Loholt. The poem Morte Arthure (not to be confused with Malory’s work of a similar name) says Guinevere and Mordred were the parents of two unnamed sons after she married Mordred during his revolt. Finally, the 1898 work The Birth of Galahad by Richard Hovey makes Guinevere the mother of Galahad with Lancelot.

Guinevere as an unfaithful wife seems to be an ancient tradition. In his 1891 book Studies in Arthurian Legend, John Rhys says that in some parts of Wales, to call a girl Gwenhwyvar is “as much as to suggest she is no better than she should be,”22 that is to call her s****l morals into question. He goes on to note that “in the literature of the Welsh, her guilt is rather assumed than proved; but it is quite possible that popular tales dwelling on her levity have been lost.”23

Lancelot is, of course, Guinevere’s most famous lover. Their affair was most likely created at the urging of Marie of France, Countess of Champagne, who was the patron of Chrétien de Troyes in the twelfth century. Scholars believe Chrétien was not entirely comfortable with the addition to the story, but he had no choice but to include it because the countess desired it to be included. Her motivations are even less clear. It may be that because she promoted the idea of courtly love in her court, Marie de France wished to make the pair an example of its ideal fulfillment.

The next most popular lover for Guinevere is Kay, who is in many traditions Arthur’s foster brother and/or right-hand man, much like Lancelot is in later versions. Guinevere’s affair with him is implied in the Welsh stories. If he was as close to Arthur as the stories seem to indicate, his betrayal would have been a great blow to the king, perhaps even more so than that dealt by Lancelot.

Other traditions give Guinevere a variety of lovers, with names both familiar and obscure. In Lanzelet (1195), it is Gawain. In Chrétien de Troyes’ story Erec (1170) a knight called Guiamor leaves Morgan for Guinevere. Marie de France’s lay (a type of poem) Lanval (1170-1215) has Guinevere make a s****l offer to a knight named Lanval, but he refuses her. The French also implicate knights named Claris (in Claris et Laris written in1268) and Yder (in The Romance of Yder, written at the end of the twelfth or beginning of the thirteenth century). Many modern authors, including Rosemary Sutcliff and Mary Stewart, make Bedivere the guilty party, thus implicating another of Arthur’s closest friends.

Why is there such a long and varied tradition of Guinevere’s unfaithfulness? In some of the earliest Arthurian stories, King Arthur is a tyrant to whom it would not be easy being married. But one of the strongest arguments, one we will see played out later as we explore the evolution of the legend, is that the authors needed a reason for the downfall of Camelot. They purposefully painted King Arthur as an ideal king and needed a plausible reason for their perfect hero to be defeated and betrayed by Mordred. Guinevere was a convenient scapegoat.

In addition, when medieval monks got hold of the story in the twelfth century, they used it to caution their readers against the dangers of the female temptress. As we will see, under their pens, Guinevere became conflated with Eve, another sinful woman whose weakness led to the downfall of a utopian paradise. By so closely aligning the two women, they imparted to their readers the need to be wary of the sins of the flesh, lest they, too, be brought low.