Re: disc: ONE Peerage, Different Orders, or No Order (fwd)

[Lance Harrop <lharrop@mrj.com>]

Poster: Lance Harrop <lharrop@mrj.com>


Lord Pedro,
> 
> > > If anything, the Garter was an attempt to revive the Round Table by
> > > the romance-stricken Edward III.
> 
> I dunno. Gautier's work on chivalry, though partially tainted
> with _revanchisme_ (more or less to be expected from a vet of the
> Franco-Prussian War), relied heavily on them. The romances set a
> pattern of behavior, and, in a way, became a sort of "Bible" to
> the "cult of chivalry," to use Maurice Keen's terms. In fact,
> given the overlap of romance and biography in such works as Petit
> Jehan de Saintre, the Life of the Unconquerable Don Pero Nino,
> and biographies of the Black Prince and his contemporary,
> Warwick, it's kind of hard to say whether art was imitating life,
> or the other way around!

I am trying to decide whether to concede your point...

..but just this instead.  Is the model for a real knight not William (the) 
Marshal, who made his fortune fighting tourneys and ably served Henry II, 
Richard and John?  It is certainly hard to argue against Don Pero Nino, 
having quoted him (I believe it was him anyway) in a poem I once wrote.  
But the fact is that late period Chivalry (that is, the collection of 
knights) was reaching back to an ideal just as we are in the Society.  

In the end, it gets down to that joke:

1.  We are recreating the knighthood of the Great Knights like William 
Marshal,

2.  No!  we are recreating the knights of the late middle ages recreating 
the Great Knights like William Marshal,

3.  No, no!  We are recreating the Victorians recreating the tourneys of 
the knights of the late middle ages recreating the Great Knights like 
William Marshal,

4.  No, no, no!  We are recreating a group of Berkeley students 
recreating a group of Victorians recreating the tourneys fo the knights 
of the late middle ages recreating the great knights like William Marshal.

Seriously,

Leifr Johansson
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