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THE ROMANCE OF TRISTAN AND ISEULT

RETOLD BY JOSEPH BÉDIER

RENDERED INTO ENGLISH BY HILAIRE BELLOC

COMPLETED & RESTORED BY VINCENT NICOLOSI

TRANSLATION ASSISTANCE BY VITTORIO RINTOUL & WILLIAM G. BECKFORD

This Fonthill Press edition includes the original

PREFACE BY GASTON PARIS

& ON THE NATURE OF

THE LEGEND OF TRISTAN AND ISEULT

By Joseph Bédier’s Essay based on Susan Hilles Taber’s translation

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FONTHILL PRESS EDITION 2011

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Fonthill Press LLC.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Bédier, Joseph 1864–1938 [Bédier, English]

[Roman de Tristan et Iseult, English] The Romance of Tristan and Iseult / Retold by Joseph Bédier

Translation by Hilaire Belloc Completed by Vincent Nicolosi

Translation Assistance by Vittorio Rintoul & William Beckford Fonthill Press LLC edition

US International Standard Book Number: 978-0-9844677-0-9 1. Tristan and Iseult—Legends—Romances

2. Tristan—Romances—Adaptation 3. Iseult—Romances—Adaptation

4. Arthurian Romances—Adaptations

Copyright © 2011 by Fonthill Press LLC

Manufactured in the United States of America

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“LE ROMAN DE TRISTAN ET ISEUT”

BY M. JOSEPH BÉDIER WAS CROWNED BY THE FRENCH ACADEMY

En vos ma mort, en vos ma vie

MMXI

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One could sooner dry up The deep sea

And hold back its waves Than I could restrain

Myself from loving you; For my thoughts,

My memories, my pleasures— All my desires are perpetually

Of you, whom I can neither forsake, Nor even briefly forget.

Guillaume de Machaut

They would share one death and one life, one sorrow and one joy.

Gottfried von Strassburg

Life was so weighed down by the emptiness of the great forests and by the mystery of all things, and by the greatness of its own desires, and, as I think, by the loneliness of much beauty; and seemed so little and so fragile and so brief, that nothing could be more sweet in the memory than a tale

that ended in death and parting, and than a wild and beautiful lamentation.

William Butler Yeats

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Contents

Foreword by William Beckford

Introduction by Vincent Nicolosi

Preface by Gaston Paris

Notes on the Sources by Joseph Bédier

The Romance of Tristan and Iseult

Part the First

The Childhood of Tristan

The Morholt Out of Ireland

The Quest of the Lady with the Hair of Gold

The Philtre

Brangien Delivered to the Serfs

The Tall Pine-Tree Joseph Bédier

The Dwarf Frocin

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The Chantry Leap

Part the Second

The Wood of Morois

Ogrin the Hermit

At the Ford of Providence

The Ordeal by Iron

Part the Third

The Song of the Nightingale

The Little Faëry Bell

Iseult of the White Hands

Kaherdin

Dinas of Lidan

The Madness of Tristan

Death

On the Nature of the Legend of Tristan and Iseult

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Foreword

We believe this Fonthill Press edition of Joseph Bédier’s The Romance of Tristan and Iseult is the most complete version available in the English language to date. And such a volume is long overdue.

Joseph Bédier published Le Roman de Tristan et Iseut in 1900 in Paris. A few years later Hilaire Belloc first introduced the English-speaking world to this marvelous tale with his equally marvelous translation. Or rather, he introduced the English-speaking world to part of this tale. One definite shortcoming of Belloc’s otherwise compelling and exquisite translation is that he omitted so very much; in fact, he omitted, suppressed, four chapters, either in their entirety or in part, along with a scattering of sections, phrases, and single words. Many, if not most, of Belloc’s omissions were inexplicable, if not downright eccentric, though he obviously found other passages indelicate. Decades later, and decades ago, Paul Rosenfeld restored many of Belloc’s omissions. But most certainly not all. Likewise, where needed, we have made corrections in the text, as when Belloc translates qu’il garnit de froment as “he packed corn” as opposed to “he packed wheat.” (Historically, Tristan of course could not have known anything of corn, for the introduction of maize to the Europeans was centuries away, in November of 1492, when Columbus first visited Cuba.)

One omission in both the early and later English versions was Gaston Paris’s insightful preface, which is as timely today as it was in 1900. In this Fonthill edition we have restored the missing preface. Likewise, we have restored the use of short introductory inscriptions that once preceded each chapter.

We are also pleased to include here Joseph Bédier’s essay “On the Nature of the Legend of Tristan and Iseult.” It appeared after the original volume, though it seems helpful.

We decided early on—guided by Bédier—that this would be a volume

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for general readers, for lovers of literature, and simply and mostly for lovers; although we have referenced things both preceding and following the Romance, you will not find the text encumbered by footnotes. Vincent Nicolosi, in whose voice Belloc’s suppressed sections now speak, has also written some introductory notes, filling in some areas about the Celts. In all, Fonthill has endeavored to make available, finally, a full and more complete restoration of this most wonderful story, The Romance of Tristan and Iseult, and to do so in an exquisite, archival edition, one very much like the tale itself: digne des âges—worthy of the ages.

William Beckford, Publisher Fonthill Press

New York

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Introduction

The eminent playwright, scholar, and translator Lewis Galantiere said of Tristan and Iseult: “Theirs is incomparably the greatest love story in the world.” And Jean-Charles Payen, renowned scholar of the French Academy, regarded Tristan and Iseult as the most beautiful love story of all time. Certainly, in calamity and ardor this supreme tale of youthful passion and forbidden love ranks with Romeo and Juliet, predating even the source of the play’s provenance by centuries. In epic scope and intensity—spanning years and kingdoms—the legend of Tristan and Iseult, the beautiful and the doomed, stands without parallel. Like Romeo and Juliet this perennial tale is voluptuous and brutal, grave and archetypical, speaking in lovely and charming utterances, everlastingly, across the centuries.

As with so many myths and legends, the origins of Tristan and Iseult* are about as tangible as dreams and have vanished into remote history. Curious leavings remain. To this day the sixth century Tristan Stone stands lonely and weathered in Cornwall, in southwestern England, bearing an inscription now worn to the point of ghostly: Drustans hic iacet Cunomori filius—“Here lies Drustanus son of Cunomorus.” Was this Drustanus the Tristan of legend? Where does myth end and history begin? Did a blurred confluence once exist between the two? Doubtless, the truth will forever remain cloaked in Celtic mist, and mystery becomes the legend. We wonder too at the elusive juncture of folklore and the past, between the mystical and the geographic. Tintagel Castle, seat of King Mark’s court and place of King Arthur’s conception, now stands in windswept ruins on cliffs above the Atlantic, where solitude and evanescence are aspects of earth, sea, and sky. And the Isle of St Samson, where Tristan engaged and slew the Morholt, remains as desolate now as a thousand years ago when these or similar events were dreamed of or somewhat transpired. The twelfth century French poet Béroul, upon whose Tristan Joseph Bédier

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based much of his Romance, includes various recognizable locations in Cornwall for major and minor events of the story. Oliver Padel, authority on English place names and professor of Celtic studies, cites the wood of Morois—into which the lovers flee in exile—as extant even today, at least in part, as the woodlands hard by the manor of Moresk, in the parish of St Clement. Mr. Padel locates the Ford of Providence (in Béroul le Mal Pas) —where Iseult crosses in the arms of her lover disguised as a pilgrim— appropriately enough, as the village of Malpas, where the rivers Truro and Tresillian converge; and the high hunting grounds known as the White Lands (in Béroul la Blanche Lande) lie to the west. While the Isle of St Samson—where Tristan fights and kills the Morholt—is a goodly distance from Tintagel, nevertheless, many of the riding and walking distances correspond, and in Medieval times two markets selling lavish goods were found across from St Michael’s Mount, to which the hermit Ogrin journeys, on his crutch, to buy exquisite apparel and a palfrey for the Queen’s return to the Court of King Mark, from her exigencies in the wilderness.

The tale, with its roots in the wild borderlands of the world, and in Celtic magic, appears to have spread from Cornwall into Wales and throughout the British Isles, to Brittany and thence through the rest of France, to Germany, and northward into Scandinavia and Europe. Surely the legend arrived on American shores long ago in the anamnesis of early European settlers, though in the New World the tale did not gain much currency until the twentieth century. Along the way, or even from the time of its origins, the legend gleaned or mirrored aspects of the faraway and the not so faraway: Tristan’s early voyage of chance and healing, casting his fate to the sea as he lay dying of the Morholt’s poison, resonates with St Brendan’s voyage, for he yielded sail and rudder to God; the quest for the lady with the golden hair echoes a story in the Welsh Mabinogion, wherein Emperor Maximus dreams of a beautiful maiden and sends envoys in quest of her; and the lovers’ flight into the forest parallels the Old Irish Aitheda. We also see parallels in remote Greek legends, in Perseus and Theseus. Tristan slays a dragon in Ireland and receives from the King his daughter Iseult, and Perseus slays the Gorgon Medusa and then the sea monster about to devour Andromeda, whom he then claims and carries home. After slaying the Minotaur and thus saving the youth of Athens, Theseus, under a curse of forgetfulness and beneath a black sail, returns to Athens, inadvertently issuing false tidings to his father, thereby causing Aegeus to hurl himself into the sea, which now bears his name; centuries and epochs later, upon that cloud-coloured other-sea, beyond the

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Pillars of Hercules, a sail appears, and deceit and false tidings in turn bring death to Tristan. More subtle parallels exist. Perseus, Theseus, and Tristan are slight of build, but each possesses superhuman strength, skills, and cunning, thus enabling his feats. They seem demigods as much as heroes, and in their legends we perceive an intercourse with the supernatural, the bestowment of divine and marvelous favors.

In his preface to The Romance of Tristan and Iseult, Gaston Paris indicates that the concept of the love potion with its tumultuous results bewildered men and ladies of the Medieval French courts, where ideals regarding love and comportment contrasted sharply with the ferocity and seizure found in the lush passions of this tale. But the Celts—scattered along the outer edges of the world, in their harsh lands of seashores and peninsulas, rocks and highlands—maintained with the forests and the seas an ancient pre-Christian affinity linking them to the great mystery inherent in nature, and thus to the subterranean echelons of the world. In such a people we find an atavistic predisposition to the supernal. In such realms dragons prowl and giants lurk in caves, love gifts arrive from Avalon, and the sea is aware of her mariners, giving no rest to abductors of God’s favored one, the child Tristan. An evil dwarf scatters flour upon a floor and reads immediate goings-on in the stars; thus the heavens are usurped as a celestial, telltale looking glass disclosing amorous escapades transpiring within bedchambers, or within palisades. Amidst these pagan possibilities, the remote and silent God of Abraham and the Church watches, intervening when He sees fit (or not intervening when He sees fit) in the lives and concealments of the adulterous lovers, to whom He extends not simply dispensation, but benediction. Tristan leaps from the window of a “chantry, sea-facing on a sheer and windy cliff towering above the waves; the illuminated windows in the apse, the handiwork of a saint long ago”—and his survival, unscathed, is miraculous. Perhaps less spectacular, but no less evident: the design and coincidence enabling Tristan’s immediate rescue of Iseult and their consequent flight into the wilderness, the wood of Morois. To prove her innocence of unholy love in the presence of King Mark, King Arthur, and their assembled knights, Iseult concocts a scheme involving her lover disguised as a weary pilgrim, and swears an oath to God, who accepts and guards her subterfuge, enabling her to grasp unscathed the red-hot iron. Here the lovers—at once errant and devout (more or less)—are God-watched; here God, sympathetic, abjures His own Commandment and abets the lovers’ lack of repentance and profane and passionate intentions—so sympathetically inclined is He to His favored sinners, to His lost ones, perpetually doomed

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by the magical potion/ poison they inadvertently shared upon the high seas. Here love evokes a primal, even savage state where, by enchantment gone awry, the lovers are ripped from their intended lives and cultural duties and flung into a destiny beyond the outer fringes of existence. Here love links the arboreal and the sacred, returning the lovers to a wild and primitive center where dangers are most potent and lethal, where love consumes sacred oaths and cultural ideals while the lovers, in love’s embrace, fall to ruin. Nevertheless, and throughout Tristan and Iseult, the supernal communes with the sensual; indeed, the lovers themselves are a bit godlike, as must be anyone ill fated yet valiantly contending with destiny. We can imagine Iseult’s solar radiance and Tristan’s Apollonian physicality—their extraordinary beauty and loveliness of form and feature —arousing devotion and jealousies among gods of an earlier time. So too can we imagine solicitations of a varied sort in the Athens of Praxiteles, the Rome of Catullus or Hadrian, and the Florence of Cellini and Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Botticelli. And yet we likewise see mixed within the richness of this tale—even if only at its hermetic fringes—the brooding abstract meditation, of which Yeats speaks, that lures men from visible beauty.

Like Romeo and Juliet, the forbidden love of Tristan and Iseult is, if anything, passionately requited, and yet within the Tristan tale we also see what Ernest Renan regarded as the Celts’ “invincible need of illusion,” the wild pursuit “of the unknown, an endless quest after an object ever flying from desire.” Ever driven by ever-insatiable passion, their love ever unattainable even when attained, their passion a restless evanescence, the impossible ever outlasts the possible and flees before them, even as they embrace. Their love is forever a lost cause, the end awaiting them from the beginning. In the wilderness, in the wood of Morois, their love becomes an arduous Eden, an unredeeming Purgatory, an isolated, outlaw realm of eroticized melancholy and exile—a shutting in and a shutting out of the world. Like the Celtic people, they live a defiant, secluded life. While their story is not a tragedy in the classical sense—after all, their fate arises from the potion, not from inner flaws—nevertheless, they are tormented by a pervading sense of disunion and variance, by disjuncture from their duties and culture. As a knight, Tristan owes honor and fidelity to his uncle, King Mark, on whose behalf he risks his life: once against the Morholt, for the King and the people of Cornwall, and again by his return to Ireland to claim for his King the Lady with the Hair of Gold. Against the laws of God and Rome, and against his own will and wishes, Tristan takes Iseult, his King’s betrothed, on the high seas—and she takes him—and they

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continue to love and enjoy bliss in stolen moments long after Iseult becomes Mark’s wife. Considering the ideals of knighthood and codes of chivalry, of pledged loyalty to the King, one may assume without overmuch conjecture or license that the lovers, although pure of repentance, nonetheless suffer misgivings in spite of the fervor of their adamancy. Tristan becomes a master of disguises: as a leper, a pilgrim, a fisherman, a madman, and a fool—each so antithetical to be debasing to his true identity as a Knight and heir to the Kingdom of Lyonesse. From the very first the lovers become cunning and clandestine renegades— compelled to adultery by mischance, and thus to deception and treason— adept, arch innocents doomed by passion they did not seek, but which has flung them into each other’s arms, and by which they must remain forever intoxicated even unto death, and thereafter.

Centuries earlier Valerius Maximus wrote of the Celts: “They would fain make us believe that the souls of men are immortal.” Indeed, the sense of a life beyond the grave awaiting Tristan and Iseult haunts this most sensuous and passionate of earthly tales, and all the while and at last the doomed lovers’ faith in the “fortunate land,” the “happy land of the living,” a “palace of crystal, all compact of roses and morning,” of Elysium, is their lone enduring hope, their solitary aspiration toward the fulfillment of a future united. Knowing from the very first that their love will end in elegy, death becomes for them the ultimate anticipated elopement. Recipients of miracles and coincidence, the lovers are keenly aware of Divine favor, thus of their putative celestial exemption from codes binding and regulating society and human life on earth—or if that goes too far, then their exemption from Divine wrath and retribution. Even in the wood of Morois, after the King has called upon the sleeping lovers unawares, even thereafter in their contrite midnight meditations filled with remorse for each other, they scarcely acknowledge or even consider their grave sin of adultery—a sin against God and ordered culture. For their exemption accrues from the potion, imbuing the lovers with a sense of absolution, and therefore liberty. It is a sense of absolution shared by the narrator, by the common folk of Tintagel and the lords alike—with the exception, of course, of the four felons and a woodsman, who suffer almost celestially assured vengeance for their transgressions and annoyances against the sinful lovers. The hermit Ogrin adjures Tristan and Iseult to repent, but no repentance do they feel. Tristan’s request to prove his innocence via trial-by-arms is surely prompted by his assurance not only of his own valor, prowess, and godlike invincibility, but also, if not more so, by his utter faith in God’s sanction—just as Iseult’s faith led her

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with open hands to the brazier, with its red-hot iron. And yet, to say the least, their devotion scarcely leads the lovers to pieties of any sort and most certainly not to the foot of a confessor—excepting the hermit Ogrin, to whom they really have nothing they care to confess. Thus Tristan’s and Iseult’s faith—their outward manifestation of faith—is both cursory and profound, yet their unwavering conviction leads them toward a sense of immortality.

We see the lovers’ notion of immortality change over time, corresponding with their distance from, and the gradual imminence of, death. There is that beautiful moment at night’s end in the orchard wherein Iseult recalls seafarers’ lore that Tintagel Castle is fairy, that twice a year, winter and summer, it wholly vanishes away. So she believes it has vanished now, and that she and Tristan are in the enchanted orchard of which the harpers sing. To her lover she says, “A wall of air encircles it on all sides; trees flower from the fragrant earth; and here the hero lives without age in his friend’s arms, and no hostile power can breach the wall of air.”

Thus in Iseult’s mind, in her vision, immortality eclipses and overspreads time and place—the present at Tintagel Castle—enhanced and aeonian, a fragrant earth where lovers embrace forever—looming even now, at least in conception, in daybreak’s mists. But even as she speaks, Tintagel’s sentinels bugle dawn from its ramparts.* Upon this same occasion, Tristan speaks of immortality awaiting them, elsewhere, timelessness in another time:

“No, already the wall of air lies shattered, and this is not the enchanted orchard of which the harpers sing. But one day, friend, we shall go forth together to a fortunate land from which none ever returns. There rises a castle of white marble; in each of its thousand windows, a lighted candle burns and a minstrel plays soft melodies without end; there the sun does not show his face but none regrets his light, for that is the happy land of the living.”

This enchanted world of gentle music and candles burning in palace windows, of radiant, Dionysian darkness where “the sun does not show his face” is Tristan’s early vision of their shared immortality: like Iseult’s, an ideal afterlife for sensuous young lovers, ever forced into the shadows and doomed to die young. Both conceptions are more Celtic than Christian and certainly do not reflect the doctrines of the early Church. Nowhere lurks even a hint of the long, slumbering wait for Resurrection upon the Second

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Coming, as anticipated by the early Fathers of the Church; nor lurks for the lovers—powerless over their adultery—any thought of reconsignment to Purgatory, after long-suffering torment, hiding, separation, and ceaseless longing during their earthly time. Rather, a Druidic afterlife, as the Roman poet Marcus Annaeus Lucanus wrote of the Celts in his Pharsalia (I. 456– 7): Pallida regna petunt: regit idem spiritus artus orbe alio—“Pale kingdoms they seek: the same spirit guides limbs in another world.”

As time passes and their lives darken toward death, radiance enters their pending eternity. When Tristan, ever more adept at stratagems of disguise and concealment, crosses the sea in mad desperation—first disguised as a fisherman and then as a madman, a fool—for what is to be his last temporal reunion with Iseult, he makes the rather bawdy offer of his nonexistent sister, Brunehild, in exchange to King Mark for Iseult—the sort of insolent advance that a madman could, apparently (at least in this case), make with a jester’s impunity to a sovereign in a Medieval court. Indeed, the King laughs and asks, “Fool, if I gave you the Queen, where would you take her, pray?”

“Oh! very high, between the clouds and heaven, into a fair chamber glazed. The beams of the sun shine through, yet the winds bring no troubles at all. There would I bear the Queen into my palace of crystal, all compact of roses and morning.”

This celestial setting, so near to heaven (but not in heaven), is a radiant and florescent paradise this side of Paradise, an island-like palace in the empyrean, in proximity to the sun—a place of roses, crystal-light, and morning: very different indeed from the emptiness of the lovers’ lives on earth, where their love is forever a tomorrowless future. Tristan’s vision, his seeming ravings—“the chamber glazed...the palace of crystal”—an ethereal place in compensation for their earthly woes—also reminds us of the allure crystal and glass held for the Celts, the requisition of light. In Celtic essence, glass and things lucent bore tangible associations with Elysium, which is still manifest to us today in their lore and the relics of their craftsmanship. Even the Isle of Avalon—an otherworldly island to the west, always to the west—evinces the Celtic fascination with things lucent and fuses with Elysium, and thus with the Divine. For centuries Avalon has been associated with Glastonbury; according to the Medieval chronicler Giraldus Cambrensis, in antiquity what is now Glastonbury was, in Brythonic, Inis Gutrin—in Latin, Insula Vitrea: “Island of Glass.” From this the invading Saxons thereafter called the place Glastingeburi;

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glas in Saxon is vitrum in Latin, and buri is castrum: thus, “glass castle.”* Hence, Tristan’s mad vision of Elysium, to which he will carry his beloved Iseult, obliquely touches upon the shores of Avalon—ever associated with immortal beings and life everlasting.

The lovers’ final reunion ensues; in their last embrace, their ultimate earthly parting, each evokes eternity, immortality, and escape from the deathly confines of tragic love. Iseult speaks of the “fortunate land,” “the blessed land;” Tristan, of the “Fortunate Land of the Living.” Elysium in the offing:

Tristan took Iseult in his arms: “Friend, I must fly now, for soon I will be discovered. I must hasten forth and may never return. My death is near: far from you, I die of my desire.”

“Friend, close your arms about me and hold me so tightly that our hearts shall break in one final embrace and our souls fly away forever, free at last! Take me now to that fortunate land you spoke of once, that blessed land of no return, where singers ceaselessly sing their sweet songs. Take me there! Take me there now!”

“Soon, friend, soon I shall take you to the Fortunate Land of the Living. Our time is near. We have tasted all misery, all joy, and the time approaches when all shall be finished…”

Thus our lovers depart yet again, each from the other, as their tragic story wends toward death inevitable, and toward their hopes for sanction in immortality.

Their last desperate attempt at reunion, in this life, thwarted: Tristan, dying of poison from his last heroic wound, supine—at first on a litter, gazing westward from the rocky windswept coast of Brittany, and then even more abated in his bed chamber, waiting in futility for deliverance from his lover; and Iseult, beneath the white sail, countered by God; or, if that sounds too pious, by Fate: the depriving winds, the ocean swells—the forces of earth.

And in terminus, too, countered by deception of a kind they themselves mastered long before, and now, at last, are mastered by.

Vincent Nicolosi

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Preface

I am pleased to introduce readers to the most recent poem engendered by the timeless legend of Tristan and Iseult. This new work is indeed a poem, even if written in prose of exquisite simplicity. Monsieur Joseph Bédier is a worthy successor of the troubadours of old who so long ago poured into words the intoxicating drink by which the Cornwall lovers tasted love and death. His tale retells the saga of the lovers’ lives and enchantment as they emanated centuries ago from the depths of Celtic dreams: their joys and sorrows, and at last their deaths.

By dint of sympathetic imagination and patient erudition Monsieur Bédier has resurrected this marvelous tale, conjuring its very soul and essence, unraveling its tender emotions, allowing himself to be overwhelmed by a legend which, in part, seems to have charmed itself into existence. If a complete French composition of the story had survived,* then doubtless M. Bédier would have produced just a faithful translation in order to familiarize contemporary readers with this legend. But the tale’s singular fate, to reach us only in assorted scattered fragments, forced him to take a more active role, and that role required far more than simply a scholar; it required a poet.

The Tristan novels we know of, which should all be of great length, those of Chrétien de Troyes and La Chèvre, perished entirely; from Béroul we have about three thousand lines of verse, and as many from Thomas; and fifteen hundred lines attributed to an anonymous poet. Then there are foreign translations, three of which completely deliver the work of Thomas in terms of substance, but not form, including one that gives us a poem very similar to that of Béroul’s, sometimes with very choice allusions. And then there are small sporadic poems, and finally the dense novel in prose, in which fragments of old poems have been preserved in a constant jumble, further swelled over time by successive editors.

What could one do with such a heap of debris if one wished to restore a

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collapsed structure? Two paths lay open: focus on Thomas or on Béroul. The first path had the advantage of leading surely to the return of a complete and consistent narrative, thanks to foreign translations. Its drawback: it only recovered “the newest of the ancient” Tristan poems, one in which the old barbarous element had been completely assimilated into the spirit and works of Anglo-French chivalrous society. M. Bédier chose the latter course, much more difficult but more tempting for its art and knowledge, and more suitable to the purpose intended: to revive the legend of Tristan in its most ancient form for us, readers of a far later time. Thus, he started by translating as closely as he could the surviving Béroul fragment, which commences and takes place in about the middle of the story. Having penetrated the spirit of the old storyteller, having assimilated Béroul’s simple way of feeling, his simple way of thinking, at times to the point of capturing the old poet’s sometimes awkward, childlike grace and style, M. Bédier reconstructed a head and limbs on a torso, not by simple mechanical juxtaposition, but by a kind of organic regeneration of the sort displayed by some creatures which, when mutilated, enable them to call forth an inner force, re-engendering themselves to their former perfect form. As we know, regeneration is successful when the body is primitive and less developed. Indeed, this was the case for Béroul. He was assimilating elements from all sources, sometimes quite disparate, but this disparity seems not to have troubled him, especially since he often labored an adaptation, a part, to bring a oneness to the whole, a consistent surface.

Here our “modern Béroul” proceeds in the same manner. From the anonymous fragment that comes after the Béroul fragment, from the German translation of a poem similar to that of Béroul, from Thomas and his translators, from allusions and sporadic poems, from the prose novel itself, M. Bédier had enough to recreate a beginning for the remaining excerpt, a continuation and an end, always seeking, among the many variants of the story, the one best suited to the spirit and tone of the authentic excerpt. Then—and this is the wisest and most delicate effort of his art—he tried to give all these disparate bits and pieces the consistent form and colour that Béroul would have given them. Certainly, I cannot swear how similar the lost portions of Béroul’s poem would have been to M. Bédier’s Romance, but I shall aver that, if the old poet returned today and inquired what had become of his work, he would be astonished to see the extent of devotion, intelligence, labor, and indeed success with which M. Bédier lifted his fragment from the abyss and, from a single chunk of debris, managed to recreate a story that is probably even more complete, more brilliant, and brighter than it was when Béroul’s poem first embarked

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upon its way so very long ago. Thus, a French poem of the mid-twelfth century, recomposed in the late

nineteenth century, constitutes M. Bédier’s timeless lyrical tale. This is an appropriate way to introduce readers to the modern story of Tristan and Iseult, for it was by donning attire of the twelfth century that the tale once gripped the imaginations of all, because all shapes it assumes travel back to the first French form; thus we see Tristan in the armour of knighthood and Iseult in the long straight attire of statues in our cathedrals. However, this French and chivalrous costume is not the original suit; it belongs no more to our heroes than to those of Greece and Rome who were sometimes depicted, during the Middle Ages, donned in the contemporary dress of that far later age. Such anachronisms can be observed here and there in more than one feature retained by the adapters. Béroul in particular, who rejoiced in having deleted some vestiges of the original barbarism, allowed many other instances to survive in his tale; Thomas himself, the most careful observer of the rules of courtesy, here and there opens strange perspectives on the true character of his heroes and the milieu in which they move. By combining the often very fugitive information of French storytellers, we come to glimpse what may have been that primeval poem for the Celts, its whole cradled by the sea and enveloped in the forest, whose hero, rather a demigod than a human being, was presented as master or even originator of all barbaric arts: killer of deer and boar, expert on the crafts of venery, unmatched wrestler and agile leaper of palisades, intrepid navigator, the best harpist and lyrist, peerless mimic of songbirds, and additionally, of course, invincible warrior, slayer of monsters, ruthless vindicator and defender of the faithful, living an almost superhuman life, constant object of admiration, dedication, and desire. This archetype was certainly cast early in the Celtic world—and the hero could only be completed by love.

I scarcely need to repeat here the source and nature of the passion that binds the lovers in the legend of Tristan and Iseult, which likewise makes the legend, in its various forms, an incomparable love epic. I only remind that the idea of symbolizing involuntary, insatiable, and eternal love by this drink, this bewitching potion whose action—and this is what separates it from other ordinary potions—continues throughout life and persists even after death, that this idea, which gives this love story its fatal and mysterious nature, obviously has its origin in ancient magic practices of the Celtic world. I do not wish to dwell further on the barbarous manners and feelings that I mentioned earlier, which make every moment so singular and powerful in the quiet recital of French storytellers. Naturally,

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M. Bédier has collected them with a predilection to complete Béroul’s work in his assiduous mosaic recreation. The story that our French poets of the twelfth century told their contemporaries was unusually foreign to the environment in which they spread the tale, and where they attempted to integrate it, in vain.*

What motivated bards and troubadours to carry the poem to other lands, what attracted listeners to Tristan and Iseult and held them in sway in spite of possible difficulties and obscurities entailed by the poem’s octosyllabic verses, indeed, what won for the legend unprecedented popularity throughout the Romano-Germanic world is the force that animates it from beginning to end and circulates throughout all its episodes as the “love potion” flowing through the veins of the two heroes—which is to say, essentially: the idea of inevitable love that knows no rules and rises above all laws. Embodied in two exceptional people, this inevitability resonates within the profound and secret feelings of so many men and women, and the inexorableness of this love has itself seized hearts, purified within the legend by suffering and enshrined, at last, in death. In the midst of the fragility of human feelings and the repeated disappointments from an ever renewed illusion, Tristan and Iseult, riveted from the start by a mysteriously inseparable relationship, battered by and enduring all the storms that assail them, try in vain to free themselves and eventually prevail in a final and eternal embrace. The lovers appeared, and still appear, as the incarnation of an ideal, whose multifaceted aspects reflect man’s stubborn desire for fulfillment. If this ideal is one of the most attractive and moving, it is also one of the most dangerous: doubtless through the centuries the story of Tristan and Iseult has injected a subtle poison into more than one unwary soul; even today, prepared by a conjurer who has assumed modern power with this musical incantation, the love potion will certainly disturb once again and perhaps mislead more than one credulous heart. However, no ideal exists whose charm is without peril, and yet, one cannot deprive life of ideals without sentencing it to triviality or dull despair. When one sails by the caves of the Sirens, one must know to hold firmly to the mast—without renouncing to hear the divine and blissful song of the superhuman.

Moreover, if the appeal of the old poem survives in the “renewal” that we are going to read, then the danger it posed to Béroul’s contemporaries is attenuated in our own age. Passions are particularly contagious when they rise amid like souls: for distant and different souls, if not in substance, then at least in the external conditions of their activity, passions keep all their grandeur and beauty, but lose much of their suggestive power.

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Béroul’s Tristan and Iseult, brought back to life by M. Bédier with their yesteryear costumes and manners, with their ways of living, of feeling and speaking, half barbaric, half Medieval, will be to modern readers like the characters in an old display window, bearing stiff gestures and naive expressions in an enigmatic tableau. Yet, within this image marked by the special patina of an age, as if the evening sun were glowing upon the window, one sees shining passion, equally requited, illuminating and causing the tale to glow as a whole. A meditation on the eternal motives and disorders of the heart, portrayed by figures in archaic garb—this is the essence of Béroul’s poem, as restored by M. Bédier. There is already plenty to charm curious readers, both with history and poetry. But what will be discovered with delight only upon reading this classical work are the spellbinding details, the mysterious and legendary beauty of some episodes, the happy invention of more modern episodes, the unexpected situations and feelings, everything that makes this poem a unique blend of immemorial dilapidation and ever renewed freshness, of Celtic melancholy and French charm, of powerful naturalism and astute psychology. I have no doubt that, among our contemporaries, and those who come after us, the tale will find the same success it obtained from our ancestors at the time of the Crusades. Truly it belongs to the “world literature” mentioned by Goethe*; the tale once disappeared by undeserved bad luck: we, and those who come after us, must be infinitely grateful to Monsieur Joseph Bédier for his revival of the Romance.

Gaston Paris, 1900 Translator: Vittorio Rintoul

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Notes on the Sources *

As Monsieur G. Paris has so kindly noted, I have in this work endeavored to avoid a mixture of the ancient and the modern. To elude disparities and anachronisms, to evade ornaments and overstatements and, by dint of historical and critical sympathy, to disallow the imposition of current modes and conceptions upon ancient ways of thinking and feeling; such has been my intention, my endeavor and, alas, doubtless my delusion. My text’s sources are quite mixed, and if I were to indicate each throughout, I would burden this little book with an over encumbrance of footnotes. Nevertheless, I owe the reader these general indications:

The surviving fragments of most of the ancient French poems were published by Francisque Michel as Tristan, recueil de ce qui reste des poèmes relatifs à ses aventures (Paris: Techener, 1835–1839).

“The Childhood of Tristan” is a highly abridged abstract of various poems, but mostly from Thomas [of Britain], as he is represented by his numerous traditional and foreign adaptations. “The Morholt Out of Ireland” and “The Quest of the Lady with the Golden Hair” are based on Eilhart von Oberg (Lichtenstein, Strasbourg, 1878). “The Philtre” on the whole follows tradition, especially after Eilhart, though some features are derived from Gottfried von Strasbourg (ed. W. Golther: Berlin and Stuttgart, 1888). “Brangien Delivered to the Serfs” is based on Eilhart. “The Tall Pine-Tree”: in the midst of this chapter, wherein Iseult arrives for her rendezvous under the pine, the story takes up where Béroul’s fragment commences, and we follow him faithfully through: “The Dwarf Frocin”, “The Chantry Leap”, “The Wood of Morois”, “Ogrin the Hermit”, “At the Ford of Providence”—with occasional interpretations, ventured to and fro, according to Eilhart and various traditional sources. “The Ordeal by Iron”: this is a very free summary of the anonymous fragment following the fragment of Béroul. “The Voice of the Nightingale”: inserted according to the didactic poem of the thirteenth century, the Le Domnei

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des Amanz. “The Faëry Bell”: adapted from Gottfried von Strasbourg. “Iseult of the White Hands”, “Kaherdin”, and “Dinas of Liden”, the episodes of Kaherdin and Tristan as lepers [(sic) pilgrims] are borrowed from Thomas and the rest is treated in general, according Eilhart. “The Madness of Tristan” is a rearrangement of a short French poem that treats the episode independently. “Death” is translated from Thomas; certain episodes are taken from Eilhart and a French romance in prose, contained in manuscript 103 of the Bibliothèque Nationale [Paris].

Joseph Bédier

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Part the First

I know, he said, when you embark upon that ship, a storm and a contrary wind shall come upon you.

The Venerable Bede

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The Childhood of Tristan

No youth more fortunate of gifts was ever born to woman. In beauty, all about him was exceedingly rare, and he was most exquisite of mind and manners. Alas, fair Fortune likewise marked him for unassailable calamity.

Gottfried von Strassburg

M Y LORDS, IF YOU WOULD HEAR A HIGH TALE OF LOVE AND OF death, here is that of Tristan and Queen Iseult; how to their full joy, but to their sorrow also, they loved each other, and how at last they died of that love together upon a single day; she by him and he by her.

Long ago, when Mark was King over Cornwall, Rivalen, King of Lyonesse, heard that Mark’s enemies waged war upon him; so he crossed the sea to bring him aid; and so faithfully did he serve with counsel and sword that Mark gave him his sister Blanchefleur, whom King Rivalen loved most marvelously.

He wed her in Tintagel Minster, but hardly was she wed when the news came to him that his old enemy Duke Morgan had fallen on Lyonesse and was wasting town and field. Then Rivalen manned his ships in haste, and took Blanchefleur with him to his far land; but she was with child. He landed below his Castle of Kanoël and gave the Queen in ward to his Marshal Rohalt, and after that set off to wage his war.

Blanchefleur waited for him continually, but he did not return, till she learnt upon a day that Duke Morgan had killed him in foul ambush. She did not weep: she made no cry or lamentation, but her limbs failed her and

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she grew weak, and her soul was filled with a strong desire to be rid of the flesh. Rohalt tried to soothe her: “Queen,” said he, “nothing can be gained in the laying of grief upon grief. Those who are born, must they not die as well? May God receive the dead and preserve the living!”

But she would not hear. Three days she awaited reunion with her lord, and on the fourth she brought forth a son; and taking him in her arms she said: “Little son, I have longed a while to see you, and now I see you the fairest child ever a woman bore. In sorrow came I hither, in sorrow did I bring you forth, and in sorrow has your first feast day come and gone. And as by sorrow you came into the world, your name shall be called Tristan; that is, child of sorrows.”

After she said these words she kissed him, and immediately she died. Rohalt, keeper of faith, took the child, but already Duke Morgan’s men

besieged the Castle of Kanoël all round about. How could Roholt have waged a long war? There is a wise saying: “Fool-hardy was never hardy,” and he was compelled to yield to Duke Morgan at his mercy: but for fear that Morgan might slay Rivalen’s heir, the Marshal concealed Tristan amongst his own sons.

When seven years passed and the time came to take the child from the women, Rohalt placed Tristan under a good master, the Squire Gorvenal, and Gorvenal taught him in a few years the arts that go with Barony. He taught him the use of lance and sword, and escutcheon and bow, and how to cast stone quoits and to leap wide dykes: and he taught him to hate every lie and felony and keep his given word; and he taught him the various kinds of song and harp-playing, and the hunter’s craft; and when the child rode amongst the young squires you would have said that he and his horse and his armour were one. To see him so noble and so proud, broad in the shoulders, lean of flank, loyal, strong and right, all men glorified Rohalt in such a son. But Rohalt remembering Rivalen and Blanchefleur (of whose youth and grace all this was a resurrection) loved Tristan indeed as a son, but in his heart revered him as his lord.

Now all his joy was snatched from him on a day when certain merchants of Norway, having lured Tristan to their ship, bore him away as a rich prize, though Tristan fought hard, as a young wolf struggles, caught in a snare. But it is a truth well proved, and every sailor knows it, that the sea will hardly bear a felon ship, and gives no aid to rapine. The sea rose and cast a dark storm round the ship and drove it eight days and eight nights hither and yon, till the mariners caught through the mist a coast of awful cliffs and sea-ward rocks whereon the sea would have ground their hull to pieces: then they did penance, knowing that the anger of the sea came of

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the lad, whom they had stolen in an evil hour, and they vowed his deliverance and made ready a boat to put him, if it might be, ashore. Then the wind and sea fell and the sky shone, and as the ship of Norway grew small in the offing, a gentle tide drew Tristan onward and set the boat upon a beach of sand.

Painfully he climbed the cliff and saw a lonely rolling heath and a forest stretching out and beyond, endlessly away. And he wept, remembering Gorvenal, his father, and the land of Lyonesse. Then the distant cry of a hunt, with horse and hound, came suddenly and lifted his heart, and a tall stag broke cover at the forest edge. The pack and the hunt streamed after it with a tumult of cries and winding horns, but just as the hounds were racing clustered at the haunch, the quarry turned to bay at a stone’s throw from Tristan; a huntsman gave him the thrust, while all around the hunt had gathered and was winding the kill. But Tristan, seeing by the gesture of the huntsman that he made to cut the neck of the stag, cried out: “My lord, what would you do? Is it fitting to cut up so noble a beast like any farm-yard hog? Is that the custom of this country?”

And the huntsman answered: “Fair friend, what startles you? Why yes, first I take off the head of a stag, and then I cut it into quarters and we carry it on our saddle bows to King Mark, our lord: so do we, and so since the days of the first huntsmen have done the Cornish men. If, however, you know of some nobler custom, teach it to us: take this knife and we will learn willingly.”

Then Tristan knelt and skinned the stag before he cut it up, and quartered it all in order leaving the crow-bone all whole, as is meet, and putting aside at the end the head, the haunch, the tongue and the great heart’s vein; and the huntsmen and the kennel hinds stood over him with delight, and the Master Huntsman said: “Friend, these are good ways. In what land learnt you them? Tell us your country and your name.”

“Good lord, my name is Tristan, and I learnt these ways in my country of Lyonesse.”

“Tristan,” said the Master Huntsman, “God reward the father that brought you up so nobly; doubtless he is a baron, rich and strong.”

Now Tristan knew both speech and silence, and he answered: “No, lord; my father is a burgess. I left his home unbeknownst upon a ship that trafficked to a far place, for I wish to learn the ways of men in foreign lands. But if you will accept me of the hunt I will follow you gladly and teach you other crafts of venery.”

“Fair Tristan, I marvel there should be a land where a burgess’ son can know what a knight’s son knows not elsewhere, but come with us since

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you will it; and welcome: we will bring you to King Mark, our lord.” Tristan completed his task; to the dogs he gave the heart, the head, offal

and ears; and he taught the hunt how the skinning and the ordering should be done. Then he thrust the pieces upon pikes and gave them to this huntsman and to that to carry, to one the snout, to another the haunch, to another the flank, and to another the chine; and he taught them how to ride by twos in rank, according to the dignity of the pieces each might bear.

So they took the road and spoke together, till they came upon a great castle and round it fields and orchards, and living waters and fish ponds and plough lands, and many ships lay anchored in the haven, for that castle stood high above the sea. It was well walled against assault and all engines of war, and its keep, which the giants of old had built long ago, was compact of great stones, like a chessboard of vert and azure.

And when Tristan asked its name: “Good liege,” they said, “we call it Tintagel.”

And Tristan cried out: “Tintagel! Blessed be thou of God, and blessed be they that dwell within thee.”

(Therein, my lords, had Rivalen taken Blanchefleur to wife, though their son knew it not.)

When they came before the keep the horns brought the barons to the gates and King Mark himself. And when the Master Huntsman had told him all the story, and King Mark marveled at the good order of the cavalcade, and the cutting of the stag, and the high art of venery in all, yet most he wondered at the stranger boy, and still gazed upon him, troubled and wondering whence came his tenderness, and his heart would answer him nothing; but, my lords, it was blood that spoke, and the love he had long since borne his sister Blanchefleur.

That evening, when the boards were cleared, a singer out of Wales, a master, came forward among the barons in Hall and sang a harper’s song, and as this minstrel touched the strings of his harp, Tristan who sat at the King’s feet, spoke thus to him: “Oh master, that is the first of songs! The Bretons of old wove it once to chant the loves of Graëlent. And the melody is rare and rare are the words: master, your voice is subtle: harp us that well.”

But when the Welshman had sung, he answered: “Boy, what do you know of the craft of music? If the burgesses of Lyonesse teach their sons harp—play also, and rotes and viols too, rise, and take this harp and show your skill.”

Then Tristan took the harp and sang so well that the barons softened as they heard, and King Mark marveled at the harper from Lyonesse whither

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so long ago Rivalen had taken Blanchefleur away. When the song ended, the King was silent a long space, but he said at

last: “Son, blessed be the master that taught thee, and blessed be thou of God: for God loves good singers. Their voices and the voice of the harp enter the souls of men and wake dear memories and cause them to forget many a mourning and many a sin. For our joy did you come to this roof, stay near us a long time, friend.”

And Tristan answered: “Very willingly shall I serve you, sire, as your harper, your huntsman and your liege.”

And so he did, and for three years a mutual love grew in their hearts. By day Tristan followed King Mark at pleas and in saddle; by night he slept in the royal room with the counsellors and peers, and if the King were sad, Tristan would harp to him to soothe his care. The barons also cherished him, and (as you shall learn) Dinas of Lidan, the seneschal, beyond all others. And more tenderly than the barons and than Dinas, did the King love him. But Tristan could not forget, neither Rohalt his father, nor his master Gorvenal, nor the land of Lyonesse.

My lords, a teller that would please, should not stretch his tale too long, and truly this tale is so various and so high that it needs no straining. Then let me shortly tell how Rohalt himself, after long wandering by sea and land, came into Cornwall, and found Tristan, and showing the King the garnet that once was Blanchefleur’s, said: “King Mark, here is your nephew Tristan, son of your sister Blanchefleur and of King Rivalen. Duke Morgan holds his land most wrongfully; it is time such land came back to its rightful lord.”

And Tristan (in a word) when his uncle had armed him knight, crossed the sea, and was hailed of his father’s vassals, and killed Rivalen’s slayer and was reseized of his land.

Then remembering how King Mark could no longer live in joy without him, and as the nobility of his nature ever revealed to him the wisest course, he summoned his council and his barons and said: “Lords of the Lyonesse, I have retaken this place and avenged King Rivalen by the help of God and of you. Thus I have rendered to my father what is his by right. But two men, Rohalt and King Mark of Cornwall, nourished me, an orphan, and a wandering boy. So should I call them also fathers. To those, too, must I not also render what is due them? Now a free man has two possessions thoroughly his own, his body and his land. To Rohalt then, here, I will release my land. Do you hold it, Father, and your son shall hold it after you. But my body I give up to King Mark. I shall leave this country, dear though it be, and in Cornwall I shall serve King Mark as my

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lord. Such is my judgment, but you, my lords of Lyonesse, are my lieges, and owe me counsel; if then, some one of you will counsel me another way, let him rise and speak.”

But all the barons praised him, though they wept; and taking with him Gorvenal only, Tristan set sail for King Mark’s land.

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The Morholt Out of Ireland

“Lord King, by your leave I shall do battle.”

Eilhat d’Oberg

W HEN TRISTAN RETURNED TO THAT LAND, KING MARK AND all his Barony were mourning; for the King of Ireland had manned a fleet to ravage Cornwall, should King Mark refuse, as he had refused these fifteen years, to pay a tribute his fathers had paid.

Now at that time certain old treaties yet existed giving the men of Ireland the right to burden the men of Cornwall with levies: one year three hundred pounds of copper, another year that same measure in silver, and on the third—gold of equal measure. When the fourth year circled round again: three hundred youths and three hundred maidens fair, of fifteen years of age, determined by lots, amongst the Cornish folk. That year this King of Ireland again sent to Tintagel, to carry his summons, a giant knight; the Morholt, whose sister he had wed, and whom no man had yet been able to overcome: so King Mark had summoned all the barons of his land to council, by letters sealed.

On the day assigned, when the barons were gathered in hall, and when the King had taken his throne, the Morholt spoke these words: “King Mark, hear for the last time the summons of the King of Ireland, my lord. He arraigns you to pay at last that which you have owed so long, and because you have refused too long, already he bids you give over to me this day three hundred youths and three hundred maidens drawn by lot from among the Cornish folk. My ship, anchored in Tintagel Haven, shall

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bear them away to Ireland to be our serfs. However, as well it should be— and I expect that you, King Mark, will not forbear it—if any of your barons so wishes to prove through trial of combat that the King of Ireland wrongly receives this tribute, then I shall meet his wager. Which among you, my Cornish lords, will fight to redeem this land?”

The barons glanced amongst each other, and bowed their heads. This one to himself said: “Behold, unhappy man, the stature of the Morholt of Ireland. Alone he is stronger than four robust men. And behold his sword; you know, through all the years since yet the King of Ireland has sent this giant to do his bidding, his sword has by sorcery severed the heads of the boldest champions. Weakling, does it avail you to court death too? To what end would you tempt God?”

This other to himself said, “My dear sons, I did not raise you to become serfs in Ireland; nor you dear daughters, to be sent to harlotry. If my death would save you, then so be it. But I would die and leave your mother widowed, and still the Morholt would bear you away to Ireland.”

Again the Morholt cried out: “Lords of Cornwell, which among you will accept my challenge? I offer you honor in noble battle waged. Three days hence, we shall sail for the Isle of St Samson, in the offing of Tintagel. There you and I shall fight in solitary battle, and honor will befall the kinsmen of he who wages this battle. Who amongst you, then, is champion?”

But still all remained silent, for the Morholt was like a gyrfalcon shut up in a cage with small, cowering birds; when he enters, all fall mute with fear.

For the third time the Morholt spoke: “Well then, rare and gallant knights of Cornwall, since you see it as the more noble course, draw your lots and bring forth your children, so that I may bear them away to serfdom in Ireland—though till now, hardly did I believe this was a land inhabited solely by peasants.”

Then Tristan knelt at the feet of King Mark and said: “Lord King, by your leave I shall do battle.”

And in vain would King Mark have turned him from his purpose, thinking, how could even valour save so young a knight? But the youth threw down his gage to the Morholt, and the Morholt took up the gage.

On the appointed day Tristan had himself clad for a great feat of arms in a hauberk and in his helmet of burnished steel. With pity the barons wept for the valiant young knight—and for the disgrace they brought upon themselves. “Ah, Tristan,” said they amongst themselves, “brave baron

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and beautiful youth, why have I not, rather more than you, acceded to this battle? My death would sow far less sorrow upon this earth than yours.”

The bells of Tintagel pealed, and all assembled, those highborn and those of low degree, the old men, the women and children, all weeping and praying, escorted Tristan to the shore. But deep in their despair, they harbored hope; for hope flowers even within dire pastures.

Thus from Tintagel Tristan embarked alone to the Isle of St Samson, where the knights would wage their solitary battle. Now the Morholt had hoisted to his mast a sail of rich purple, and coming fast to land, he moored his boat on the shore. And Tristan with his foot pushed his own boat adrift, back into the sea.

“Vassal, what is it you do?” the Morholt asked. “Why have you not moored your boat to the land, as I have done?”

Tristan replied, “Vassal, why bother? Only one of us will go hence alive. A single bark will serve.”

And each rousing the other to the fray, they passed into the isle. No man saw the sharp combat; but thrice did the salt sea-breeze waft, or

seemed to waft, a cry of fury and clash of arms to the land. Then in mourning the women beat their palms in chorus, while the companions of the Morholt amassed before their tents, laughing at their sorrow.

Then at last toward the hour of noon the purple sail showed far off; the Irish boat appeared from the island shore, and there rose a clamour of despair: “The Morholt! The Morholt!”

When suddenly, as the boat grew larger on the sight and topped a wave, they saw a knight standing on the prow, each of his fists brandishing a sword, and that knight was Tristan. Immediately twenty boats set forth to welcome him, and the young men flung themselves into the sea and swam to meet the victor. The good knight leapt ashore, and as the mothers kissed the steel upon his feet, he cried to the Morholt’s men: “My lords of Ireland, the Morholt fought well. See here, my sword is broken and a splinter of it stands fast in his skull. Take you that steel splinter, my lords; that splinter is Cornwall’s tribute to Ireland.”

Then he went up to Tintagel and as he went the people he had freed waved green boughs, and rich cloths were hung at the windows. But when Tristan reached the castle amid the pealing bells and songs of jubilation, amid the horns and trumpets sounding about him so lusty that one could not have heard God had He thundered above them, he drooped in the arms of King Mark, for the blood ran from his wound.

The Morholt’s men, they landed in Ireland quite cast down. For when ever he returned to Whitehaven the Morholt had been wont to take joy in

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the sight of his clan upon the shore, of the Queen his sister, and of his niece Iseult the Fair, whose golden hair and beauty shown more brilliantly than the sun at dawn. Tenderly had they cherished him of old, and had he taken some wound, they healed him, for they were skilled in balms and potions. But now their magic was vain, for he lay dead, sewn in a shroud of deer hide and the splinter of the foreign brand yet stood in his skull, till Iseult plucked it out and shut it in an ivory coffer, precious as a reliquary. They led the women in funeral lamentations and, bending over the great corpse, mother and daughter ceaselessly repeated the illustrious deeds of their beloved dead; likewise did they hurl anathema upon the name of the slayer, Tristan of Lyonesse.

From that day hence Iseult the Fair knew and hated the name of Tristan of Lyonesse.

But over in Tintagel, Tristan languished, for there trickled a poisonous blood from his wound. The doctors found that the Morholt had thrust into his loin a poisoned barb, and as their potions and their theriac could never heal him, they left him in the hands of God. So hateful a stench rose from his wound that all his dearest friends fled him, all save King Mark, Gorvenal and Dinas of Lidan. Always they could stay near his couch for their love overcame their abhorrence. At last Tristan had himself carried to a sea-facing hut, and there he awaited death. He thought: “Have you thus abandoned me, King Mark, I who saved the honor of your land? But no, it is not so, for I know, fair uncle, that you would lay down your life for me, but what can your love avail me now? For I must die; but it is good to see the sun and my heart is still high. I would like to try the sea that brings all chances…I would have the sea bear me far off, alone, to what land no matter, so that it heal me of my wound. And perhaps one day I shall serve you again, fair uncle, as your harper, your huntsman, and your faithful liege.”

He begged so long that King Mark accepted his desire. He bore him into a boat with neither sail nor oar, and Tristan wished that his harp only should be placed beside him: for sails he could not lift, nor oar ply, nor sword wield; and as a seaman on some long voyage casts to the sea a beloved companion dead, so Gorvenal pushed out to sea that boat where his dear son lay; and the sea drew him away.

For seven days and seven nights the sea so drew him; at times to charm his grief, he harped; and when at last the sea brought him near a shore where fishermen had left their port that night to fish far out, they heard as they rowed a sweet and strong and living tune floating above the sea, and feathering their oars, they listened.

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In the first whiteness of the dawn they saw the boat in the mists: “Just so,” said they, “did celestial music attend St Brendan’s ship as he sailed to the Fortunate Isles over a milk-white sea.”

She went at random and nothing seemed to live in her except the voice of the harp. But as they neared, the air grew weaker and died; and when they hailed her, Tristan’s hands had fallen lifeless on the strings though they still trembled. The fishermen took him in and bore him back to port, to their lady who was merciful and perhaps would heal him.

It was that same port of Whitehaven where the Morholt now lay in his grave, and their lady was Iseult the Fair.

She alone, being skilled in philtres, could save Tristan, but she alone wished him dead. When Tristan knew himself again (for her art restored him) he knew himself to be in the land of peril. But he was yet strong to hold his own and found good crafty words. He told a tale of how he was a seer that had taken passage on a merchant ship and sailed to Iberia to learn the art of reading the stars—of how pirates had boarded the ship and of how, though wounded, he had fled into that boat.

He was believed, nor did any of the Morholt’s men know his face again, so hardly had the poison used him. But when, after forty days, Iseult of the Golden Hair had all but healed him, when already his limbs had recovered and the grace of youth returned, he knew he must escape, and he fled and after many dangers he came again before Mark, the King.

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The Quest of the Lady with the Hair of Gold

Thus good and bad, triumph and disaster, pleasure and pain, were perpetual accomplices within one heart.

Gottfried von Strassburg

M Y LORDS, THERE WERE IN THE COURT OF KING MARK FOUR barons, the basest of men, who hated Tristan with a hard hate, for his greatness and for the tender love the King bore him. And well do I know their names: Andret, Guenelon, Gondoïne and Denoalen; like Tristan, Duke Andret was nephew to King Mark. They knew that the King had intent to grow old childless and to leave his land to Tristan; and their envy swelled and by lies they angered the chief men of Cornwall against Tristan. They said: “There have been too many marvels in the life of this young man, but you are men of great prudence and rationality, and doubtless can explain them. It was marvel enough that he vanquished the Morholt, but by what sorcery did he try the sea alone at the point of death, or which of us, my lords, could voyage without oars and mast or sail? They say that warlocks can. It was sure a warlock feat, and that is a warlock harp of his pours poison daily into the King’s heart. See how he has bent that heart by power and chain of sorcery! He will be king yet, my lords, and you will hold your lands of a wizard.”

They brought over the greater part of the barons, for many men are unaware that what seems solely within the sorcerer’s power to conjure, the heart too can bring forth by powers of boldness and love and venture. These pressed King Mark to take to wife some king’s daughter who should give him an heir, else they threatened to return each man into his castle

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give him an heir, else they threatened to return each man into his castle keep and wage him war. But the King turned against them and swore in his heart that so long as his dear nephew lived, no king’s daughter should come to his bed. Then in his turn did Tristan (in his shame—to be thought to serve for greed of his uncle’s kingdom) threaten that if the King yielded not to his barons, he would himself go over sea and serve some great king. At this, King Mark made a term with his barons and gave them forty days to hear his decision.

On the appointed day he waited alone in his chamber and sadly mused: “Where shall I find a king’s daughter so fair and yet so distant that I may feign to wish her my wife?”

Just then by his window that looked out upon the sea, two building swallows fluttered in, quarrelling together. Then, startled, they flew out, but as they did so, they let fall from their beaks a woman’s hair, long and fine, and shining like a beam of golden light.

King Mark took up that strand of golden hair, and called his barons and Tristan and said: “To please you, lords, I will take a wife; but you must seek her whom I have chosen.”

“Fair lord, we wish it all,” they said, “and who may she be?” “Why,” said he, “she whose hair this is; nor will I take another.” “And whence, lord King, comes this Hair of Gold; who brought it and

from what land?” “It comes, my lords, from the Lady with the Hair of Gold; the swallows

brought it to me. They know from what land it came.” Then the barons saw themselves mocked and cheated, and they turned

with sneers to Tristan, for they thought him to have counselled the trick. But Tristan, when he looked on the Hair of Gold, remembered Iseult the Fair and smiled and said: “King Mark, can you not see that the doubts of these lords shame me? You have designed in vain. I shall go seek the Lady with the Hair of Gold. Know King Mark that the search is perilous and my return from that country will be more difficult than from the island where I slew the Morholt; nevertheless, my uncle, I would once more put my body and my life into peril for you; and so that your barons may know I love you loyally, I take this oath: to die on the adventure or to bring back to this castle of Tintagel the Queen with that fair hair.”

He fitted out a great ship and loaded it with wheat and wine, with honey and all manner of good things; he manned it with Gorvenal and a hundred young knights of high birth, chosen among the bravest, and he clothed them in coats of home-spun and in hair cloth so that they seemed merchants only: but under the deck he hid rich cloth of gold and scarlet as

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for a great king’s messengers. When the ship had taken the sea the helmsman asked him: “Lord, to

what land shall I steer?” “Sir,” said he, “steer for Ireland, straight for Whitehaven harbour.” The helmsman shuddered. Did Tristan not know that, since the slaying

of the Morholt, the King of Ireland harried Cornish ships, seized the mariners and hung them at the crossroads?

Nevertheless, the helmsman obeyed and achieved the perilous land. At first Tristan made believe to the men of Whitehaven that his friends

were merchants of England come peacefully to barter; but as these strange merchants passed the day in the useless games of draughts and chess, and seemed to know dice better than the bargain price of wheat, Tristan feared discovery and knew not how to pursue his quest.

Now it chanced once upon the break of day that he heard a cry so terrible that one would have called it a demon’s cry; nor had he ever heard a brute bellow in such wise, so awful and strange it seemed. He called a woman who passed by the harbour, and said: “Tell me, lady, whence comes that voice I have heard, and hide me nothing.”

“My lord,” said she, “I will tell you truly. It is the roar of a dragon, the most terrible and dauntless upon earth. Daily it leaves its den and stands at one of the gates of the city: nor can any come out or go in till a maiden has been given up to it; and when it has her in its claws it devours her in less time than it takes to pray a Pater Noster.”

“Lady,” said Tristan, “make no mock of me, but tell me outright: can a man born of woman kill this thing?”

“Fair sir, and gentle,” said she, “I cannot say; but this is sure: twenty knights have tried and run the venture, because the King of Ireland has published it that he will give his daughter, Iseult the Fair, to whomsoever shall kill the monster; but it has devoured them all.”

Tristan left the woman and returning to his ship armed himself in secret, and it was a fine sight to see so noble a charger and so good a knight come out from such a merchant-hull: but the haven was empty of folk, for the dawn had barely broken and none saw him as he rode to the gate. And hardly had he passed it, when he met suddenly five men at full gallop flying towards the town. Tristan seized one by his hair, as he passed, and dragged him over his mount’s crupper and held him fast: “God save you, my lord,” said he, “and whence does the dragon come?” And when the other had shown him by what road, he let him go.

As the monster neared, he showed the head of a bear and red eyes like coals of fire and hairy tufted ears, lion’s claws, a serpent’s tail, and a

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griffin’s body. Tristan charged his horse at him so strongly that, though the beast’s

mane stood with fright yet he drove at the dragon: his lance struck its scales and shivered. Then Tristan drew his sword and struck at the dragon’s head, but he did not so much as cut the hide. The beast felt the blow: with its claws he dragged at the shield and broke it from the arm; then, his breast unshielded, Tristan used the sword again and struck so strongly that the air rang all round about: but in vain, for he could not wound and meanwhile the dragon vomited from his nostrils two streams of loathsome flames, and Tristan’s helm blackened like a cinder and his horse stumbled and fell down and died; but Tristan standing on his feet thrust his sword right into the beast’s jaws, and split its heart in two. For one last time the dragon made its horrible shriek and died.

Then he cut out the tongue and put it into his hose, but as the poison came against his flesh, the hero fainted and fell in the high grass that bordered the marsh around.

Now the man he had stopped in flight was Aguyngùerran the Red, with his braided red hair—the seneschal of Ireland, and he desired Iseult the Fair: and though he was a coward, he had dared so far as to return with his companions secretly, and as he found the dragon slain, the horse dead, the shield shattered, he thought the victor had crawled off and died in some forsaken place, and so he cut off the dragon’s head and bore it to the King to claim the great reward.

The King could credit his prowess but hardly, yet wished justice done and summoned his vassals to court, so that there, before the Barony assembled, the seneschal should furnish proof of his victory won.

When Iseult the Fair heard that she was to be given to this coward, first she laughed, and then she wailed. But on the morrow, doubting some trick, she took with her Perinis her squire and Brangien her maid, and all three rode unbeknownst towards the dragon’s lair: and Iseult saw such a trail on the road as made her wonder—for the hoofs that made it had never been shod in her land. Then she came on the dragon, headless, and a dead horse beside him: nor was the horse harnessed in the fashion of Ireland. Some foreign man had slain the beast, but they knew not whether he still lived or no.

They sought him long, Iseult and Perinis and Brangien together, till at last Brangien saw the helm glittering in the marshy grass: and Tristan still breathed. Perinis put him on his horse and bore him secretly to the women’s rooms. There Iseult told her mother the tale and left the hero with her, and as the Queen unharnessed him, the dragon’s tongue fell from his

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boot of steel. Then, the Queen of Ireland revived him by the virtue of an herb and said: “Stranger, I know you for the true slayer of the dragon: but our seneschal, a felon, cut off its head and claims my daughter Iseult for his wage; will you be ready two days hence to give him the lie in battle?”

“Queen,” said he, “the time is short, but you, I think, can cure me in two days. Upon the dragon I conquered Iseult, and on the seneschal perhaps I shall reconquer her.”

Then the Queen brewed him strong brews, and on the morrow Iseult the Fair made ready his bath and anointed him with a balm conjured by her mother. As her gaze returned and lingered on the face of the wounded, she began to think, “Surely, if his prowess equals his beauty, then my champion wages a most valiant battle.” And revived by the warmth of the water and the strength of the spices, Tristan likewise regarded Iseult the Fair, and through his mind ran the thought: “So I have found the Queen of the Hair of Gold.” And thinking this, he smiled at his find. Iseult, noting this, wondered in turn, “Why does this stranger smile to himself as such? Have I committed an unsuitable act? Have I neglected some service that a maiden owes her guest? Ah, perhaps he smiles thinking I have forgotten to burnish his armour, tarnished by venom.”

So she came to where Tristan’s armour had been laid aside. “This helmet is of the finest steel,” thought she, “and will not fail in its hour of need. And this hauberk, just as strong as it is light, and worthy of a great lord.” And then she regarded the sword by its hilt, thinking, “Truly, this is a most beautiful weapon, one befitting the greatest of barons.” To wipe it clean and burnish the steel, she drew the bloodied blade from its rich sheath, noting its dents and notches. As she did, she examined the gap along its length, from which a sliver of steel was missing, and she mused in wonder, “Could this be the blade from whence came the steel splinter that lodged in the Morholt’s skull?” She balanced a moment in doubt, then she went to where she kept the steel she had found in the skull and put it to the sword, and it fitted so that the join was hardly seen.

She ran to where Tristan lay wounded in his bath, and with the sword above him she cried: “You are that Tristan of the Lyonesse, who killed the Morholt, my mother’s brother, and now you shall die in your turn.”

Tristan strained to ward the blow, but he was too weak; his wit, however, stood firm in spite of evil and he said: “So be it, let me die: but to save yourself long memories, listen awhile. King’s daughter, my life is not only in your power but is yours of right. My life is yours because you have twice returned it me. Once, long ago: for I was the wounded harper whom you healed of the poison of the Morholt’s shaft. Nor repent the

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healing: were not these wounds had in fair fight? Did I kill the Morholt by treachery? Had he not defied me and was I not held to the defence of my body? And now this second time also you have saved me. It was for you I fought the beast…

“But let us leave these things. I would but show you how my life is your own. Kill me then, and win praise and glory. Doubtless, when lying in the arms of the valiant seneschal, you will sweetly regard your wounded guest, who risked his life to conquer you, and whom you slew defenceless in his bath.”

Iseult replied: “I hear strange words. Why should he that killed the Morholt seek me also, his niece? Doubtless because the Morholt came for a tribute of maidens from Cornwall, so you came to boast returning that you had brought back the maiden who was nearest to him, to Cornwall, a slave.”

“King’s daughter,” said Tristan, “No…One day two swallows flew, and flew to Tintagel and bore one hair out of all your hairs of gold, and I thought they brought me goodwill and peace, so I came to find you over- seas. So I braved the monster and its venom. See here, amid the threads of gold upon my coat your hair is sewn: the threads are tarnished, but your bright hair still shines.”

Iseult put down the sword and taking up the Coat of Arms she saw upon it the Hair of Gold and was silent a long space, till she kissed him on the lips to prove peace, and she put rich garments over him.

On the day of the barons’ assembly, Tristan sent Perinis privily to his ship to summon his companions that they should come to court adorned as befitted the envoys of a great king, for he hoped to fulfill his adventure that very day. By now, Gorvenal and the hundred knights had grieved through four days, thinking Tristan lost, and they delighted in the tidings.

One by one the hundred knights passed into the hall where all the barons of Ireland stood; they entered in silence and sat all in rank together: gems gleaming on their scarlet and purple.

The Irish said amongst themselves: “Who are these lords so splendidly arrayed? Whosoever knows them? From whence came they? Behold their sumptuous cloaks trimmed in sable and embroidery. Behold their shimmering sword hilts, the broaches buckling their cloaks, decorated with emeralds and rubies, beryl, and with gems whose very names we know not. Whosoever has seen splendor equal to theirs? From whence cometh these lords? Who are they?”

But the hundred knights remained in silence, nor did they stir from their seats, no matter who entered.

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When the King had taken his throne, the seneschal arose to prove by witness and by arms that he had slain the dragon, and that Iseult was thus won. Then Iseult bowed to her father and said: “King, I have here a man who challenges your seneschal for lies and felony. Promise that you will pardon this man all his past deeds, no matter what they were, for he stands to prove that he and none other slew the dragon, and grant him forgiveness and your peace.”

The King reflected and did not hasten his reply, and as he thought, the barons began to clamor and to shout en masse, “Grant it, Sire, grant it!”

The King said, “I grant it.” But Iseult knelt at his feet and said, “Father, first give me the kiss of

peace and forgiveness, as a sign that you will give him the same.” Then she found Tristan and led him before the Barony. And as he

entered the hall the hundred knights rose all together, and crossed their arms upon their breasts and bowed, so the Irish knew that he was their lord.

But amongst the Irish many knew him again and cried, “Tristan of Lyonesse that slew the Morholt!” They drew their swords and clamoured for death. But Iseult cried: “King, kiss this man upon the lips as was your oath.”

And the King kissed him upon the lips, and the clamour fell. Then Tristan showed the dragon’s tongue and offered the seneschal

battle, but the seneschal looked at his face and dared not. Then Tristan said: “My lords, you have said it, and it is truth: I killed the

Morholt. But I crossed the sea to offer you a good blood-fine, to ransom that deed and get me quit of it.

“I put my body in peril of death and rid you of the beast and have so conquered Iseult the Fair, and having conquered her I will bear her away on my ship.

“But that these lands of Cornwall and Ireland may know no more hatred, but love only, learn that King Mark, my lord, will marry her. Here stand a hundred knights of high name, who all will swear with an oath upon the relics of the holy saints, that King Mark sends you by their embassy offer of peace and of brotherhood and goodwill; and that he would by your courtesy hold Iseult as his honored wife, and that he would have all the men of Cornwall serve her as their Queen.”

When the lords of Ireland heard this, they acclaimed it, and the King also was content.

Then, since that treaty and alliance was to be made, the King, her father, took Iseult by the hand and asked of Tristan that he should take an oath; to

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wit, that he would lead her loyally to his lord, and Tristan took that oath and swore it before the knights and the Barony of Ireland assembled. Iseult trembled with shame and anguish. So, Tristan having conquered her, now disdained her. That fine tale of the hair of gold was but a lie, for into the arms of another would he deliver her.

Then the King put Iseult’s right hand into Tristan’s right hand, and Tristan held it for a space in token of seizin for the King of Cornwall.

So, for the love of King Mark, did Tristan conquer the Queen of the Hair of Gold.