Idylls of the King

by Alfred Tennyson

  361. Avaunt: the order to be off.

  362. vizor: upper portion of the front part of the helmet.

  387. lay: short lyric or narrative poem intended to be sung.

  411. postern portal: gate at the back.

  419–26. Malory iv 22: ‘And then it was in the moneth of May, that she and sir Gawaine went out of the castle and supped in a pavilion, and there was a bed made, and there sir Gawaine and the lady Ettard went to bed together, and in another pavilion she layed her damosels, and in the third pavilion shee laid part of her knights; for then she had no dread nor feare of sir Pelleas. And there sir Gawaine lay with her, doing his pleasure in that pavilion two daies and two nights, against the faithfull promise that he made to sir Pelleas. And on the third day in the morning early sir Pelleas armed him, for he had not slept sith that sir Gawaine departed from him; for sir Gawaine had promised him by the faith of his body to come unto him to his pavilion by the priory within the space of a day and a night. Then sir Pelleas mounted on horsebacke, and came to the pavilions that stood without the castle, and found in the first pavilion three knights in their beds, and three squires lying at their feete. Then went he to the second pavilion, and found foure gentlewomen lying in foure beds. And then hee went to the third pavilion, and found sir Gawaine lying in a bed with his lady Ettard, and either clipping other in armes.’

  421. lurdane: ‘from Old French lourdin, heavy’ (T.). Worthless, ill-bred, lazy.

  427–46. Malory iv 22: ‘And when he saw that, his heart almost brast for sorrow, and said, “Alas! that ever a knight should bee found so false.” And then he tooke his horse, and might no longer abide for sorrow. And when he had ridden nigh halfe a mile, he turned againe and thought to sley them both, and when he saw them both lye so fast sleeping, unneth hee might hold him on horsebacke for sorrow, and said thus to himselfe, “Though this knight be never so false, I will not sley him sleeping, for I will never destroy the high order of knighthood.” And therewith hee departed againe, and left them sleeping. And or hee had riden halfe a mile he returned againe, and thought then to sley them both, making the greatest sorrow that any man might make. And when he cam to the pavilions he tied his horse to a tree, and pulled out his sword naked in his hand, and went straight to them wher as they lay together, and yet he thought that it were great shame for him to sley them sleeping, and laid the naked sword overthwart both their throates, and then hee tooke his horse, and rod foorth his way.’

  446. And the sword of the tourney across her throat: ‘The line gives the quiver of the sword across their throats’ (T.).

  tourney: tournament.

  476. rowel: wheel or disk at the end of a spur.

  478–82. Malory iv 22: ‘And then sir Gawaine and the lady Ettard wakned out of their sleepe, and found the naked sword overthwart both their throates. Then she knew well that it was sir Pelleas sword. “Alas!” said she to sir Gawaine, “ye have betraied me and sir Pelleas also, for yee told me that yee have slaine him, and now I know well it is not so, he is on live. And if sir Pelleas had beene as uncourteous to you as you have beene to him, ye had beene a dead knight, but ye have deceived me and betraied me falsly, that all ladies and damosels may beware by you and me.”’

  482. he that tells the tale: Malory.

  482–6. Malory iv 22, where the Lady of the Lake ‘cast such an enchantment upon her (Ettarre), that shee loved him out of measure, that well nigh shee was out of her mind. “Oh, Lord Jesus,” said the lady Ettard, “how is it befallen me that I now love him which I before most hated of all men living?” “This is the rightwise (righteous) judgement of God,” said the damosell of the lake.’ Pelleas then spurns Ettarre: ‘So the lady Ettard died for sorrow, and the damosell of the lake rejoyced sir Pelleas, and loved together during their lives.’ Tennyson completely changes this ending, and continues the tale of the bitter and violent Sir Pelleas in ‘The Last Tournament’.

  491–527. The episode concerning Percivale is Tennyson’s addition.

  508. the morning start/Reel’d in the smoke, brake into flame, and fell: Revelation viii 10: ‘and there fell a great star from heaven burning as it were a lamp.’

  558. blaze: publish, make known.

  566. disedge: to blunt, dull.

  585. unfrowardly: without perversity. Tennyson’s coinage.

  The Last Tournament

  Published in Contemporary Review, December 1871, then 1872. Being written November 1870, completed 21 May 1871. Essentially original, with a few borrowings from Malory.

  1–2. Dagonet, the fool, whom Gawain in his mood/Had made mock-knight of Arthur’s Table Round: No equivalent in Malory. In Malory x 12 Arthur himself knighted Dagonet.

  6. carcanet: ornamental collar or necklace.

  25. Nestling: based on the story of Nesting, a legend of King Alfred, told in Sharon Turner’s History.

  37. Those diamonds that I rescued from the tarn: see LE 34–55

  43. Slid from my hands: cf. LE 1225–7: ‘Saying which she seized/And, thro’ the casement standing wide for heat,/Flung them.’

  66. Yet strangers to the tongue: ‘rough’ (T.).

  blunt stump: ‘where the hand had been cut off and the stump had been pitched’ (T.). Cf. PE 330–31: ‘But I will slice him handless by the wrist,/And let my lady sear the stump for him.’

  69. table-knight: derogatory for knight of the Round Table, suggesting membership only for bed and board.

  70. the Red Knight: ‘Pelleas’ (T.).

  89. seneschal: steward.

  90. curiously, carefully.

  98. Make their last head like Satan in the North: Isaiah xiv 13.

  115–16. oft I seem as he/Of whom was written, ‘A sound is in his ears’: Job xv 20–21: ‘The wicked man travaileth with pain all his days, and the number of years is hidden to the oppressor. A dreadful sound is in his ears: in prosperity the destroyer shall come upon him.’

  125. Reel back into the beast: cf. PA 25–6: ‘and all my realm/Reels back into the beast’.

  132–3. ‘Where is he who knows?/From the great deep to the great deep he goes’: quotation of the last two lines of Merlin’s song, CA 409–10. The last line of it is repeated, PA 445.

  143. lists: place or scene of combat or contest.

  144. double-dragon’d chair, described LE 435–6.

  150. vail’d: ‘drooped’ (T.). Hallam Tennyson compares Hamlet I ii 70–71: ‘Do not ever with thy vailèd lids/Seek for thy noble father in the dust.’

  153. ‘The autumn of the Round Table’(T.).

  166. Modred, a narrow face: cf. G 62: ‘Modred’s narrow foxy face’.

  173–4. and on shield/A spear, a harp, a bugle: ‘He was a harper and hunter’ (T.). Malory viii 3: Tristram ‘learned to be an harper passing all other, that there was none such called in no countrey. And so in harping and on instruments of musike’hee applied him in his youth for to learne, and after as hee growed in his might and strength, he laboured ever in hunting and hawking.’

  177. of the Woods: the title is Tennyson’s addition.

  178–9. Whom Lancelot knew, had held sometime with pain/His own against him: the incident occurs in Malory ix 33.

  182. dinted: impressed or driven in with force.

  192. Art thou the purest, brother?: referring to 11. 49–50: ‘Perchance – who knows? – the purest of thy knights/May win them for the purest of my maids.’

  200. belike: probably, perhaps.

  201. trow: trust, have confidence in.

  202. Right arm of Arthur in the battlefield: cf. G’426 where Arthur himself speaks of Lancelot as ‘my right arm’.

  205–12. ‘It was the law to give the prize to some lady on the field, but the laws are broken, and Tristram the courteous has lost his courtesy, for the great sin of Lancelot was sapping the Round Table’ (T.).

  206. Caracole: horseman’s execution of a half-turn or wheel to right or left.

  214. pettish: peevish, petulant.

  220. The snowdrop only: ‘Because they were d
ressed in white’ (T.).

  226. for he that tells the tale: Tennyson, because of the following simile.

  227–31. ‘Seen by me at Mürren in Switzerland’ (T.).

  234. kingcup: buttercup.

  250. catch: a round.

  257. liefer, rather.

  265. Her daintier namesake down in Brittany. ‘I solt of the white hands’ (T.).

  270. shell: ‘husk’ (T.).

  305. smuttier than blasted grain: blacker than blighted or diseased grain. Smut is a blackening disease of cereals.

  309. A naked aught: naught, a worthless thing.

  322. a Paynim harper. ‘Orpheus’ (T.).

  332–3. Dost thou know the star/We call the harp of Arthur up in heaven? ‘Lyra’ (T.). See GL 1281.

  343. The black king’s highway. Pluto’s, the god of the nether world.

  345. the great lake of fire: Revelation xix 20.

  355–6. Conceits himself as God that he can make/’Figs out of thistles: Matthew vii 16: ‘Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?’

  357. burning spurge: ‘The juice of the common spurge’ (T.). The acrid juice of this plant is purgative.

  366. outer eye: ‘the hunter’s eye’ (T.).

  371. slot: ‘trail’ (T.).

  fewmets: ‘droppings’ (T.).

  375. lodge: hunter’s lodge.

  385. bode: waited.

  392. tonguesters: Tennyson’s coinage for talkative persons, gossips.

  399. Who served him well with those white hands of hers: nursed him back to health.

  421. plash: splash.

  sallowy. having willows.

  423. machicolated: machicolation: an opening between the corbels which support a projecting parapet, or in the vault of a portal, through which combustibles, molten lead, stones, etc., were dropped on the heads of the assailants.

  431. and on the boughs a shield/Showing a shower of blood in a field noir, to have a shield hung up is a knightly disgrace.

  field noir, black background.

  428–35. Malory vii 15: ‘And when they came neare the siege, sir Beau-mains espied upon great trees, as hee rode, how there hung goodly armed knights by the neckes, and their shields about their neckes with their swords, and gilted spurres upon their heeles, and so there hung shamefully nigh forty knights with rich armes.’ Later in the chapter is the horn and a knight in blood red armour.

  443–53. Modelled on a speech of the Red Knight to Gareth, Malory vii 17: ‘“Sir, I loved once a lady, a faire damosell, and shee had her brother slaine, and shee said it was sir Launcelot du Lake, or sir Gawaine, and shee prayed mee that, as I loved her heartily, that I would make her a promise by the faith of my knighthood, for to labour dayly in armes unto the time that I had met with one of them, and all that I might overcome, that I should put them to a villainous death; and this is the cause that I have put all these good knights to death, and so I ensured her to doe all this villanie unto king Arthurs knights, and that I should take vengance upon al his knights.” ’

  445. clipt: eradicated.

  455. the name: ‘Pelleas’ (T.).

  456. darkling: obscurely.

  461–6. ‘As I have heard and seen the sea on the shore of Mablethorpe’ (T.).

  479. Alioth and Alcor, ‘two stars in the Great Bear’ (T.).

  479–81. Red-pulsing up… as the water Moab saw: 2 Kings iii 22: ‘And the sun shone upon the water, and the Moabites saw the water on the other side as red as blood.’

  485. pain was lord: cf. 1. 239.

  495. she: ‘his wife’ (T.).

  501. roky. ‘misty’ (T.).

  belling: bellowing.

  509. the spiring stone that scaled about her tower. ‘Winding stone staircase’ (T.).

  553. Sailing from Ireland: ‘Tristram had told his uncle Mark of the beauty of Isolt, when he saw her in Ireland, so Mark demanded her hand in marriage, which he obtained. Then Mark sent Tristram to fetch her as in my Idylls Arthur sent Lancelot for Guinevere’ (T.).

  555. dole: allotment, portion.

  570. leading-strings: strings with which children used to be guided and supported when learning to walk, hence ‘to sin in leading strings’ means sin as an infant.

  590. unguent: ointment.

  611. levin-brand: lightning bolt, from Faerie Queene VII vi 30.

  620. leman: paramour, unlawful lover or mistress.

  627. swineherd’s malkin in the mast: ‘Slut among the beech nuts’ (T.). malkin: an untidy female, especially a servant or country wench.

  658. Man, is he man at allí: cf. Vivien’s words, M V 779: ‘Man! is he man at all’.

  664. that weird legend of his birth: see C A 359–410, GL 487–96.

  665. Merlin’s mystic babble about his end: see C A 410, PA 445.

  668. Michael trampling Satan: Revelation xii 7.

  672. Believed himself a greater than himself. ‘When the man had an ideal before him’ (T.).

  692–3. The ptarmigan that whitens ere his hour/Woos his own end: ‘Seen by me inthe Museum at Christiania in Norway’ (T.).

  ptarmigan: bird of the grouse family inhabiting high altitudes.

  695. yaffingale: ‘old word, and still provincial for the green wood-pecker (so called from its laughter). In Sussex “yaffel” (T.).

  696. we love but while we may. echoing 11. 275, 281.

  703. closes: encloses, contains.

  707. saw: wise saying.

  711. apple: Adam’s apple.

  723. craven shifts: cowardly tricks.

  725–32. ‘Like an old Gaelic song-the two stars symbolic of the two Isolts’ (T.).

  738–9. but the red fruit/Grown on a magic oak-tree in mid-heaven: see 11. 10–28.

  748. ‘Mark’s way,’ said Mark, and clove him thro’ the brain: Malory xx 6: ‘“That is hard to doe,” said sir Launcelot, “for by sir Tristram I may have a warning; for when, by meanes of the treatise, sir Tristram brought againe La beale Isoud unto king Marke from Joyous-gard, looke what fell on the end, how shamefully that false traitour king Marke slew that noble knight as he sat harping before his lady La beale Isoud, with a sharpe grounded glaive thrust him behind to the heart.” ’

  Guinevere

  Published 1859. Begun 9 July, 1857 and completed by 15 March 1858. Largely original, with setting only from Malory xxi 7.

  1 – 2 Queen Guinevere had fled the court, and sat/ There in the holy house at Almesbury. Malory xxi 7: ‘And when queene Guenever understood that her lord king Arthur was slaine, and all the noble knights, sir Modred and all the remnant, then shee stole away and five ladies with her; and so shee went to Almesbury, and there shee let make her selfe a nunne and ware white cloathes and blacke. And great pennance shee tooke as ever did sin-full lady in this land; and never creature could make her merry, but lived in fastings, prayers, and almes deedes, that all manner of people mer-vailed how vertuously shee was changed. Now leave wee queene Guenever in Almesbury, that was a nunne in white cloathes and blacke; and there shee was abbesse and ruler, as reason would.’

  10. subtle beast: Genesis iii 1: ‘Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made.’

  11. couchant: heraldic term for lying with the body resting on the legs and with head lifted up.

  15. Lords of the White Horse: the Saxons.

  16. Hengist: Saxon leader.

  20. Were sharpen’d’by strong hate for Lancelot: as in Malory.

  21–52. Tennyson’s addition. There is no such incident in Malory or elsewhere.

  23. a-maying: celebrating May Day.

  27–28. who sat betwixt her best/Enid, and lissome Vivien: Tennyson runs together previously separate Arthurian traditions in juxtaposing Enid (from the Welsh Mabinogion) and Vivien (who as Nimue stems from Malory).

  32. colewort: cabbage.

  41. halt: lame.

  45. holp: helped.

  55—6. Then shudder’d, as the village wife who cries/’I shudder, some one steps across my grave’:
based on an item in Francis Grose’s A Provincial Glossary: ‘A person being suddenly taken with a shivering, is a sign that someone has just then walked over the spot of their future grave.’

  61. front: face.

  62. Modred’s narrow foxy face: cf. LT 166: ‘Modred, a narrow face’.

  91–3. As in Malory.

  97–8. Vivien, lurking, heard./She told Sir Modred: line inserted in 1890 as Tennyson’s last link in his pattern.

  102–24. Based on Malory xx 1–4.

  125. Love-loyal to the least wish of the Queen: see LE 89 for the identical formula.

  127. weald: wooded district or open country.

  132. the Raven: emblem of the Saxons, and a symbol of destruction.

  134. Heathen of the Northern Sea: Saxons.

  147. housel: ‘Anglo-Saxon husel, the Eucharist’ (T.).

  157. brook’d: tolerated.

  163. list: desire.

  166–77. Based on Matthew xxv 1–13, the parable of the virgins.

  223. prate: profitless or irrelevant talk.

  262–4. for every knight/Had whatsoever meat he longed for served/By hands unseen: compare the appearance of the Grail in Camelot, Malory xiii 7: ‘and there was all the hall fulfilled with great odours, and every knight had such meat and drink as he best loved in this world’.

  265–7. Down in the cellars merry bloated things)’Shoulder’d the spigot, straddling on the butts/While the wine ran: suggested by a detail in T. Crofton Croker’s Fairy Legends: ‘and on advancing perceived a little figure, about six inches in height, seated astride upon the pipe of the oldest port in the place, and bearing a spigot upon his shoulder’.