Sir Gawain’s Deeds of Arms: The Middle English Romance as Martial Instruction

Abstract

Recent decades have witnessed a growing interest in medieval European martial arts, resulting in scholars, and martial arts practitioners studying historical fencing treatises in hopes of recreating combat systems of the period. Unfortunately, none such treatises of English origin survive. However, a well-documented history of cultural and material exchange between the Continent and England, suggests that a careful examination of selected Middle English romances may unveil a literary record of a possible transmission of those martial systems to England. As one analyses the depictions of formal combat in assorted Middle English romances devoted to the exploits of Sir Gawain it becomes evident that some of them bear an uncanny resemblance to the contents of certain continental fight books. Such comparison may reveal a particular role Sir Gawain may have had in the English chivalric tradition, that of a purveyor of martial teachings and an instructive model of the performative mode of chivalry.