Searching for Sir Gareth's Origins

by Jessica Smith

 

            Of the many knights in Arthurian stories, Sir Gareth stands out as a unique and much liked character because he is the link between the Lancelot and Gawain parties that make up the Round Table knights.  Although he is a minor knight in Arthurian lore, he was one of the best and merited attention and admiration.  However he as a character did not enter into Arthurian legend until many hundreds of years after this tradition was started.  Going through the stories chronologically by date written, it is almost a shock when Gareth finally does show up.  His sudden appearance in Malory's work, Morte de Arthur, raises the question of where Malory got this character.  It seems unlikely that Malory invented this knight because his book is a basic rewrite of Arthurian stories with a 15th century twist and a Lancelot bias.  Making up only one character to insert into the flow of stories makes no sense.  The most probable cause of the creation of Gareth was the very growth and spread of Arthurian lore. As the stories were passed from culture to culture, they evolved in style and manner.  Sir Gareth was the work of hundred of years of story telling which slowly added more princes to the house of Orkney until there were four altogether.  Therefore, Gareth came directly out of his eldest and most famous brother, Gawain, as a result of cultural adaptation and misunderstandings of the written form.

            Using Gawain as a starting point, it immediately divides into two plausible theories.  The first and most popular reasoning was that he came from the real, historical house of Orkney.  As a prince of Orkney during the age of Arthur, Gawain can be placed as a prince of Lothian, which is also known as Gododdin.  The particular real life person who was most often credited as the origin of Gawain is the prince Gwalchmei of Gododdin.  This prince is the son of King Loth of Gododdin, which corresponds with Gawain's father, King Lot.  Also, this prince is documented as being alive during the 500's, which is also considered the age of Arthur (Britannia.com "Gawain..." 1).  Now, it has been suggested that another prince of Gododdin inspired Garehis and Gareth, Prince Gwalchafed, but little is known about him (Britannia.com "Sir Gwalchafed..." 1).  Looking through the family line of this house, I have yet to discover a Gwalchafed.  He may be a bastard son or a cousin.  However, the meaning of the names Gwalchmei and Gwalchafed are very similar.  Both are predatory birds of summer.  Gwalchmei means "hawk of summer", and Gwalchafed means "falcon of summer".  It may be just a coincidence that these names are so close in meaning, but they may both indicate the same person and that these two different spellings inspired more than one fictional prince of Orkney.

            The other theory, in direct contrast with this early popular idea, stated that the real precursor of Gawain was the Irish hero Cuchulinn, not the welsh prince Gwalchmei.  Loomis disagreed with the idea that Gwalchmei was the origin of Gawain because those two names did not appear to have a pattern of descent or cultural adaptation.  Also, he argued that the very meaning of Gwalchmei's name does not make sense for Gawain because it was never connected to any of Gawain's adventures or character traits ("Gawain, Gwri, ..." 385).  In fact, one of the earliest tales in which Gwalchmei appears as a character, Kulchweh and Olwen, he played a very minor role.  He is mentioned only in two passages, and one of those passages is merely a list of warriors.  Only because in the second passage the story says that "He was Arthur's first nephew, his sister's son" can the Welsh prince be connected to Gawain (Gerritson 151).  Prince Gwalchmei has the lineage, but lacks any connection to the tales of Sir Gawain in Arthurian legend.

            The insertion of Gwalchmei, on closer inspection, is nothing more than political intrigue.  Because this name is only mentioned a few times and does not have much to do with the story itself, it was suggested that the name Gwalchmei was inserted into to tale around the 11th century due to rising power of a man by that name (Gerritsen 151-152).  Loomis also pointed out that this prince played no part in Welsh tales untouched by the "Continental romances" ("Gawain, Gwri..." 385).  A further reason for why Gwalchmei might have been added into Arthurian legend was the Anglo-Saxon need for a counter part to France 's Roland in the lineage game the nobles played (Gerritsen 154).  Gwalchmei appears to be nothing more than a secondary add in to the lore process in order to help the current rulers of Britain to appear like they had older royal lines than the French nobles.  The Welsh prince, Gwalchmei, was too separate from the character of Gawain and mentioned much too late to be the origin of Arthur's first nephew.

            Loomis based his theory of Cuchulinn as the precursor of Gawain on phonetics, and story similarities.  Going back to Cuchulinn, similarities between the Gawain character and this Celtic hero can be found.  First of all, the lineages both Cuchulinn and Gawain are similar.  Cuchulinn's father carried the name Lug.  Gawain's father's name was Loth or Lot .  The suggested intermediate between these two names is the Welsh Lloch or Llwch Llawynnawc (Loomis "Gawain, Gwri, ..." 386).  So, far from being the source, Welsh tales acted as the connection between Celtic myth and Arthurian legend.  Also, the physical qualities of Gawain reflected the same of Cuchulinn.  Both men had blond hair.  "Cuchulinn's upper most crown of hair was like a golden circlet, each hair a shining strand" (Loomis "Gawain, Gwri, ...." 389). Also, following this particular similar characteristic, a linking character between these two warriors can be found.  Gwallt Avwyn, from the very same story Gwachmei was first found, Kulchweh and Olwen, has a name that comes close to meaning golden hair, the name Gwair Gwallt Avwyn.  "Gwallt Avwyn means "Hair Like Reins," and is like Gwallt Euryn, "Golden Hair"..." (388-389).   Also, all three characters where put out to fosterage (389). Another point was that "if Gawain is traced back through the earliest Continental form of his name, Galvagin, it will lead to Gwallt Avwyn (395).  Cuchulinn, unlike Gwalchmei, had a possible character dissent to link him to Gawain through family and physical characteristics. 

            In the stories of Cuchulinn, similarities can be found between Gawain's adventures and his.  Firstly, the Arthurian tale, "Gawain and the Green Knight", has the beheading test theme that can be found in one of Cuchulinn's stories.  Both men face an adventure in which they have to face the main theme of beheading.  Also, the situation in Kulchweh and Olwen has Cuchulinn confronting King Arthur about the need the king has to authorize the quest to gain the daughter of the giant Ysbadden(Gerritsen 151).  This scene is reminiscent of Gawain calling Arthur to arms against Lancelot because he took Guinevere.  It is also similar in that Ysbadden sets impossible seeming quests for Cuchulinn and that a knight gives Gawain a hard, impossible seeming riddle to solve "What is it that women most desire?"  In the impossible challenge quest, both Cuchulinn and Gawain end up getting married.  Other Cuchulinn stories, such as "The Abduction of Blathnat" and "The Night in Curoi's Castle" appear in various forms in Arthurian legend (Loomis "Gawain, Gwri...." 384).  It appears that Cuchulinn's adventures are source material for the adventures of a number of Arthurian knights.  Gawain, though, seems to receive a lot from Cuchulinn in his character deportment (calling out the king on what is honorable) and similar adventures. 

            Cuchulinn is the precursor of Gawain, but the intermediate link between the two characters is actually a pair of men.  Kulchweh and Olwen actually has both a Gware Gwallt Euryn and a Gwrvan Gwallt Avwyn (Loomis Gawain, Gwri, ..." 388).  These two characters are thought to be the same man, but because of scribal errors was split in two separate identities.  As a result, later scribes attributed two sons to King Loth, instead of the original one.  Also, even if Gwalchmei was mistaken for the beginnings of Gawain in these early scribes, the names Gwalchmei mab gwyar and Gwalhauet mab gwar in the list of over 220 knights in Kulchweh and Olwen would still make then think there were two princes born of King Loth (Gerritsen 151).  Another point to add in the multiplying sons of Loth phenomenon was that many of the monk scribes who made copies of the stories were barely literate and that making books was very expensive.  The very reason for the brothers of Gawain may be that a monk either wrote down Gawain's name wrong and did not notice or did not care to waste precious paper to correct it. 

            Also, the very spread of Arthurian legend from Brittan to continental Europe and back again may have broke Gawain into different characters.  Just in the Irish tradition alone, Gawain was divided into two characters.  As the stories spread and were adapted to each culture's beliefs and values, Celtic lore was transformed into Arthurian legend.  Each new language the tales were translated into added its own transitional changes to the names.  In one case, the varying dialects in France resulted in different names for Gawain in the southern part of France from the northern part.  In the north ,derived from the Latin form, Walganus("Gawain..." Britannia.com 1), Walwain was Arthur's nephew, and in the south, where a practice of changing w's into g's, came up with Gauvain (Gerritsen 158). 

            The break in Gawain as a character began early as demonstrated in Kulchweh and Olwen.  As other languages adopted the secondary names of Gawain into their customs of spelling, more brothers of Gawain began to appear.  From Gwrvan and Gwalhauet eventually came Gaherit and Gaheris.  When the French versions of the tales cycled back into Britain, the Anglo-Saxon people modified the names with their language customs, changing names like Ga(h)eret to Gareth because the th sound was a hard t sound (Loomis "Malory's Beaumains" 659).  So, for the Normans , Gaheret and Gareth were the same man until people began reading them as different men. 

            Gawain, as the first and crown prince of Orkney, set the template for his future brothers.  In fact, each brother could be a distillation of a particular attribute of Gawain himself.  Looking at his brothers Agravaine and Gaheris, more negative aspects are concentrated upon as character attributes.  Agravaine conspired with Mordred (who sometimes is his brother too) against Lancelot (Malory 468).  In some parts of the legend he is seen as a very bad knight who attacks people on the road for negative reasons.  Agravaine and Gaheris together killed their mother when they discovered her adultery.  Both of these brothers are emotional and judgmental.  These brothers have very little patience or forgiveness.  Meanwhile, in direct contrast, Gareth is practically the very embodiment of patience, stalwart loyalty and forgiveness.  Gawain appears to be more of a mixture of his brothers in temperament.  He has shown all of these qualities in the course of his actions and adventures.  So, if Gawain came before his brothers entered Arthurian lore, it would appear that each brother was drawn out of Gawain himself as a less complicated character with simpler temperaments.

            Gaheris was the first official brother of Gawain in the development of Arthurian lore.  He still retained quite a few qualities of Gawain, including seeking to revenge his father's murder by killing the man responsible.  That was a joint operation with Gawain, Agravaine and Gaheris.  However, Gaheris was also credited with discovering his mother in bed with the son of King Lot's murderer.  In a fit of rage, Gaheris cut off his mother's head.  But Gaheris also was given parts that made him look good, such as his part in Gareth's tale which landed him with a lady wife.  He could not be all that bad if he merited the love and affection of a lady.

            Agravaine seems to be most polarized as an evil character out of all the brothers.  Not only does he participate in the dishonorable ganging up on the murderer of King Lot, his plotting with Mordred to discredit and ruin Lancelot undermined King Arthur's court.  Some tales gives Agravaine a reason for his foul tempered hatred of Lancelot, but many do not.  In Maloy's Le Morte d'Arthur, Lancelot beats both Agravaine and Mordred while they were traveling together and basically causing problems for others (102).  He never got over Lancelot defeating him and his comrade, so he started watching for any opportunity to ruin Lancelot in the eyes of the court.  The overall character of Agravaine is made out to be an evil-tempered, grudge holding man whose self importance was more important than the welfare of the entire court.

            The last brother of Gawain to develop was Gareth.  Like Agravaine, he was a highly polarized character, only in the opposite direction.  Gareth was a truly remarkable knight in deed and character.  In Malory's story "Beaumains", Gareth wishes to win his own way into Arthur's court and so arrives before Arthur as an unknown individual.  However, this fair unknown theme is also part of Gawain's early tales, only Gawain was with holding his lineage because he truly did not know it.  By giving Gareth a more deliberate and self-imposed fair unknown situation, his very character is raised as something more noble and honorable than Gawain's previous situation in early lore.

           However, Gareth not only had control over his name, he had the desire to prove himself worthy to be a knight without nepotism.  This is basically the main Faire unknown theme in which the "test is merely that of mingling with the lover classes [and] doing common work" (Ringel 34).   His trials in this tale make him out to be a very tolerant and long suffering knight because he continues to escort and help a damsel who continually insults him.  "Gareth proved his humility, courtesy, and above all a loyal knightly willingness to serve, as he continued to serve Lynet despite her harsh reproaches" (Gordon 207).  This part seems to have picked up part of its theme from Chrétien's "The Knight of the Cart", in which Lancelot put up with the harping damsel he swore to follow.  From this comparison, it is almost like Gareth is made up of the best parts of Lancelot and Gawain.  In fact, Gareth may have even been a more effective fighter than Lancelot in battle because in Gareth's tale Lancelot, marveling at Gareth's fighting technique, who asked to end the sparring match (Malory 142).  As far as ranking in overall knightly character and positive qualities, Gareth could out rank Lancelot.  Gareth was a knight who was unmarked by the wrath and vengeful rage that swept his brothers and the ugly adultery shame of Lancelot. 

            The fact that Gawain's brothers turned out the way they did points to splitting in the character.  Most sources agree that all the princes of Orkney resulted from splits in Gawain's character.  First Gawain was split into Gawain and Gaheris.  Gaheris retained much of Gawain's complexity but would lack many of his trials, therefore marking him as the younger, less tested knight.  But when Gaheris was further broken down into more princes of Orkney, the resulting knights became polarized.  However, Gareth, as the last brother of Orkney to come into the legend, is sometimes fused with Gaheris as a character while in other tales they are brothers ("Gareth" 176).  This again, is probably due to the way that the Anglo-Saxon people translated the meaning of Gaherit and Gareth as being the same.  Everything that was good was poured into Gareth's personality, and all that was evil about Gaheris was further concentrated in Agravaine. 

            However, it appears that more than just Gareth's brothers and Sir Lancelot influenced Gareth's character development.  Just like the Norman conquerors of Brittan adapted Arthurian legend to fit their political needs, Gareth appears to have a 15th century counter part.  Loomis admitted that "Beaumains...strangely resembles that of Malory's patron [Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick], although he affirmed that no one can prove that the events of this man's life could have influenced Gareth's adventures ("Malory's Beaumains" 656).  Lynn S. Martin, however, disagrees.  He argued that certain features in Malory's tale centering on Gareth were very likely impacted by this Earl.  Richard Beauchamp had apparently went out on his own Arthurian imitated quest by issuing challenges to three French knights, fighting each of them anonymously and winning every joust (Martin 519).  Also, the name Beaumains was thought by Vinaver to be added to the text by Malory as a tribute to Richard Beauchamp, but Loomis argued that too much of Arthurian lore was made up of the kind of battles that made up a chunk of Gareth's tale (Martin 518).  The historical records and chronicles of Malory's day do not back up the Richard Beauchamp theory.  Beauchamp's three-day tournament was only mentioned in Warwick Rolls, written between 1483 and 1485 .  A more detailed account was found in Pageant of the Birth, Life and Death of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick , but cannot be proved as a work by the same author who wrote Warwick Rolls, Rhous (Martin 519).  Also, this account seems to be a combination of two different accounts, so the veracity is uncertain both in authorship and content.  With very little historical proof backing, Richard Beauchamp as a Gareth model is a very shaky link.  Even Malory's writing habits did not fit this idea because he mostly used a single source for his stories and merely omitted and added details to make the story work with the whole body of his Le Morte d'Arthur (Martin 517).  Loomis even added that there was a fifty year gap between the event itself and the writing of Gareth's tale and that Richard Beauchamp had been dead for many years before Malory even started writing his book ("Malory's Beaumains" 656).  So, even if such an event took place, Malory had little to gain by making a tribute of Gareth's tale. 

            The most aggravating part in discovering the true development of Gareth as a separate knight from his brother Gaheris is that Malory's source for his "Beuamains" is unknown.  Most scholars seem to agree that Malory must have used a lost French tale.  Loomis is one of the scholars who share this opinion.  One scholar, Write, claims that the tale was a minor French tale over Gaheris' knighthood and that Malory invented some details of his own to make the story fit better with his own knightly prowess criteria (571).  Martin, however, argued that the overall feel of the tale was English (Martin 518).  Going back to Loomis' assertion that the name spelling for Gareth was created through Anglo-Saxon language treatments, it seems more likely that Martin was correct about the missing story being English.  However, another argument supporting the idea of both a missing French story and a missing English story was that the corruption of the name Gaheriet proved a decent pattern of a Celtic myth to 13th century French then into Norman before Malory even touched Gareth's story ( Taylor 508).  Also, because the tale is a missing story which apparently did not survive the ravages of time, trying to decide whether to give credit to the French or the English is mere speculation.  This lost text may have proved whether or not Malory was the first to give Gareth a major role in Arthurian legend, but because it is missing, the answer of who was first to make Gareth into a mainstream knight remains frustratingly inconclusive.

           Gareth was a late addition to Arthurian lore whose predecessors had a huge effect on his character and very name.  Working backwards, the closest link to Gareth in character development was Gaheris.  This character was linked through some similar adventures and by the fact that sometimes both names were used as exchangeable pieces to mean the character, that of the second oldest Orkney prince.  The spelling of Gareth was an Anglo-Saxon contribution to the lore after translating a French form of Gaheris, Gaherit.  The French most likely adapted a Latin or Dutch form of the two Gwallts or the two sons of Gwyar, Gwalchmei and Gwalhauet, found in Kulchweh and Olwen.  From this story came the beginning of the splitting in the character that would later be known as Gawain.  Directly connected to the Gwallts in Kulchweh and Olwen, is the ancient Irish hero Cuchulinn.  They are connected through character details, such as golden hair, and adventures.  Along every step towards the initiation of Gareth into Arthurian legend, different cultures took the stories and changed them to fit their cultures so that the magic done by the heroes in Cuchulinn's tales are replaced by men whose main and only important skills were prowess in arms.  Also, the legend was shaped by the political situation between the French and the British in the strategy game of decided whose blood was the noblest because it was most ancient.  The tenuous link of Gareth to Richard Beauchamp may be yet another example of political intrigue in which Malory was seeking to gain some support from a fan of the Earl of Warwick.  The final clues to who was responsible for the finished product of Gareth may never be found, but one thing that does stand out in Gareth's development was the major interaction between continental Europe and Britain which created the popular Arthurian tradition.  Gareth was created through the distillation of all that was considered noble and good qualities in a knight by the general consensus of most of Europe , a process that was nearly a thousand years in the making.

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Ringel, Faye J.  "Pluto's Kitchen:  The Initiantion of Sir Gareth".  Arthurian Interpretations  1 (2002): 29-38

 

Taylor, Paul Beekman.  "Myths and etymologies behind Malory's Gareth".  English Studies, 78 (1997): 506-13.

Wright, Thomas L.  "On the Genesis of Malory's Gareth".  Speculum 57 (1982): 569-82.