Devoir de Philosophie

King Arthur

Publié le 25/03/2011

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Arthur was Uther Pendragon and Igraine’s son. However his mother had a baby girl, Morgan from her previous marriage with Gorlois the Duke of Tintagel. King Uther Pendragon gave his baby to his wizard, Merlin.

Merlin sent Arthur away to be raised in the countryside by Sir Ector. He grew up with his foster brother, Kay.

When King Uther died, no-one knew he had a son. So there were lots of troubles to know who could be the King of Britain.

 

One day, a mysterious stone magically appeared. Out of the stone came a sword, Excalibur. Who ever pulled the sword from the stone was the rightful King of Britain. A lot of knights, lords tried to pull the sword off but they all failed. However, Arthur pulled easily the sword from the stone. So Arthur began King of Britain.

 

Arthur set up his Royal palace at Camelot. He married Princess Guinevere. The bravest of Britain’s knights were allowed to sit at the round table. They were known as the “Knights of the Round Table”. Around this table, there were famous knights like Lancelot of the Lake, Perceval, Bors, Gawin and Galahad. Around the Round Table there is empty seat The Perilous Seat for the knight who will find the Holy Grail.

 

 The Quest of the Holy Grail

I. The Discovery of the Holy Grail

 

The day before Whit Sunday, Galaad got a knighthood from Lancelot. On Whit Sunday, Galaad appeared in front of Arthur and passed two tests which designed him as the knight who would achieve the adventures of Great-Britain.

 

The same day, Arthur and all the Knights of the Round Table (150) were gathered together in Camelot. The Holy Grail appeared them, to cover by a white material in the middle of a white light. When the Knights saw this light, all of them were speechless. After this apparition, Merlin explained to everybody that this cup is an essential element for the harmony between men. He said that the Holy Grail must be found by one of the Knights of the Round Table. So all the Knights swore to look for the Grail.

 

Because of their fantastic exploits, Lancelot of the Lake, Perceval, Bors, Gawin and Galahad were the better knights to carry out the quest of The Holy Grail.

 

II.

 

Every Holy Grail’s adventure is an illustration of each of God’s Ten Commandments or the chivalrous life’s ideal. Every Holy Grail’s adventure is like this:

A knight arrives somewhere to confront supernaturals events. When he had braved these, he meets a hermit, an abbot or a widow who explain to him an interpretation of the adventure. The adventure’s interpretation is learning experience for the knight.

 

The knights are divided in two categories:

The pures knights like Galah, Bohort, Perceval and the sinners like Gawin and Lancelot.

 

The aim of the Holy Grail’s adventures is to test the pures’ qualities and help the sinners become aware of theirs sins. Some of them understand that they are sinners and that they have no chance to find or see the Holy Grail. Lancelot is a sinner because he loves Arthur’s wife, Guenevere, and this love is shared. Lancelot decides to repent but Gawin is a sinner too, but doesn’t want to repent. So Gawin loses the chance to see and find the Holy Grail.

 

Galaad is the son of Lancelot and Ellan, Fisher king’s daughter. He’s the good knight because he’s the only one who can sit on The Perilous Seat, he’s pure and virgin.

 

III. The Fisher King

 

The search for the Grail became the principal quest of the knights of King Arthur. It was believed to be kept in a mysterious castle surrounded by a wasteland and guarded by a custodian called the Fisher King, a descendant of Joseph of Arimathea. He suffered from a wound that would not heal.

 

The story of the Fisher King has lot of different versions, but in every version, he got a wound. Since he got his wound, his kingdom seems to share his sufferings and the lands of the kingdom became sterile. Knights came from different backgrounds to heal him, but only the good knight could heal the Fisher King. The recovery of the King depended on a certain question being asked and the knight had to answer correctly but no one answered correctly or in others versions the Fisher King needed the Christ’s blood to be healed. In the first story, it was Perceval but in the next versions it was Galaad accompanied by Perceval and Bors who had treated the Fisher King.

 

When Galaad, Perceval and Bors made their way to the castle, they found the Fisher King wounded and Galaad cured him and answered correctly the question asked by the Fisher King or he had cured him thanks to the Christ’s Blood on the Holy Spear. (The holy Spear is the spear which had pierced the right side of Christ during his crucifixion.) He’s the one, at the end of the quest, who could look at the Holy Grail and take it.

 

After the King was healed and the desert land he ruled over began to blossom, the three knights took the grail away to Sarras, a holy city in the East. In one version Galaad died a holy death after having been crowned King of Sarras or he died because he had seen within the Grail and what he had seen, he couldn’t live with. Bors returned to Camelot to tell King Arthur the story of the quest.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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