In
the high middle ages, European writers produced an enormous corpus of
literature dealing with human emotion and relationships in ways that had never
been seen before. There was an
explosion in the production of secular work as the medieval mind sought to
write down their older oral traditions and appropriate these tales in a new
genre. The development of the courtly
romance can be framed by an evolution in the ideals that medieval people
possessed regarding love, sex, and marriage. A shared ideology of a specific approach to courtship can be
traced across many of these tales.
In particular, there is a continuous preoccupation with meditating upon
the importance of silence versus communication within the arena of love. It is in fact astonishing just how much
was written about silence during the medieval period. In particular, lais detailing the romantic and sexual
exploits of Arthurian characters quite clearly illustrate this tension between
speaking up and keeping silence within the format of fin’ amour. The
stories of Lanval, Erec and Enide, and Peredur Son of Efrog similarly function to reinforce the chivalric
ideal of silence and the troubadour ideal of secrecy in medieval romantic
relationships, while exploring the circumstances in which it is acceptable or
even more virtuous to speak up.
The
authors of such courtly texts were acutely aware of these ideals and tensions
as well as their place within the works that they produced. Often right from the outset the authors
speak up on silence, bringing it to the forefront in the minds of their audiences. Marie de France, for example, begins
her prologue as such with a declaration.
Whoever has received knowledge
and eloquence in speech from God
should not be silent or secretive
but demonstrate it willingly.
[i]
In this way Marie de France clearly makes her readers aware
of the importance of this theme throughout the lais that she is preparing to
convey. Similarly, Chretien De
Troyes states his goals in his prologue to the story of Erec and Enide.
So Chretien de Troyes does say
that everyone, in every way,
must think and do all in his reach
so he may rightly speak and teach.
[ii]
This common practice of beginning tales of love by reminding
the audience to speak up then seems to make the following meditations on the
importance of silence seem rather counterintuitive. However, the telling of Arthurian romances show that the
relationship between silence and speech, secrecy and knowledge, is much more
complicated than just declaring one course of action to always be the more
virtuous of the two. The
righteousness of an individual and their worthiness is defined instead not by
their ability to remain constant, but to correctly choose in each situation
whether is it best to speak up or remain silent.
An
excellent example of the interplay and co-dependence between silence and speech
can be found within the compilation of lais recorded by Chretien de
Troyes. One of these late twelfth
century lais is the story of the knight Erec and his lady Enide. Much of the tale revolves simply upon
Erec’s demand that Enide remain silent throughout their journey back to King
Arthur’s court for the purpose of restoring Erec’s reputation as a chivalrous
and honorable knight. As they
depart, Erec explicitly commands his wife not so speak.
Ride at high speed and do not
venture
to have the insolence and nerve
to tell me what you may observe.
I order you not to address
A single word to me, unless
I’ve spoken first, and to proceed
Along the roadway at high speed.
In perfect safety you will ride.
[iii]
Erec, seeking to win back his honor, looks to protect his
wife from all danger and accomplish any task without her help. Of course the command is not so easily
followed, and as the two venture forth, they encounter four situations in which
Enide, observing danger that her husband does not, must go through an intense
internal dialogue and internal struggle to decide whether or not to keep her
silence as she was commanded, or to speak up and share her knowledge with him
even if it means risking his wrath.
The first trial comes with the arrival of the three robbers. Enide weighs the advantages and
disadvantages of speaking up, and concludes that speaking up in the more
virtuous of her choices with the following declaration;
Am I a coward? Is it hard,
too hard, to dare to tell him this?
I shall not show such cowardice.
I’ll tell him what is taking place.
[iv]
Although Erec feels slighted and that his wife does not
respect him when she risks his anger to warn him of the approaching danger, the
move does indeed result in the couple’s survival. While Erec may show his courage through actions and deeds,
Enide shows equal courage in words.
When these actions are repeated again but with five robbers, Enide
speaks up again with similar results.
She muses afterwards that although she felt that she had knowledge to
share with her husband when she warned him of attack, she was wrong in thinking
so, and in actuality it as she who was lacking in knowledge.
I never should have showed such
nerve,
pride, or presumption as I’ve
shown.
I could undoubtedly have known
there was no knight that could outdo
Enide continues to reproach herself as such, saying “Cursed
be my tongue,/the pride and outrage it proclaimed,” yet she will again break
her silence out of fear for her husband’s life when he is in danger of being
murdered by Count Galoain.
[vi] The cycle is repeated, and finally Erec
is attacked by Guivert the Small.
This time Enide’s reasoning and conclusion is the same, and she warns
him of the danger. This time
however, Erec’s anger is followed by the admission that
…he would never cause her hurt
and knew, for all his menacing,
she loved him more than anything,
and loved her too with all his
might.
[vii]
This admission from Erec is surprising for two reasons:
firstly, because the audience is almost solely acquainted with Enide’s inner
monologue, and secondly, because it Erec is finally admitting that although he
demanded loyalty through silence, she choose to actively express her loyalty by
disregarding his commands out of love.
Similarly,
another twelfth century tale of Arthurian romance makes the same
assertions. Marie de France’s lais
of
Lanval deals with same tension
between the obligation one has to keep silent and the contradicting obligation
to speak up. This time, however,
the tale follows a familiar courtly pattern in which love is meant only to
prosper in secrecy. This opinion
was widely held, and contemporary writers such as Andreas Capellanus claimed
that it was in fact a rule that “when made public love rarely endures.”
[viii] In this tale, the knight Lanval falls
in love with a nameless magical woman, who pleads with him as follows:
‘Love,’ she said, ‘I admonish you
now,
I command and beg you,
do not let any many know about
this.
I shall tell you why:
you would lose me for good
if this love were known;
you would never see me again
Lanval keeps his promise out of the love he has for his lady
and enjoys her company for some time.
However, when approached the queen and confronted with the problem of
denying her love in order to remain true to his lover and his king, Lanval
simply finds himself unable to withhold his secret. He reproaches the queen and denies her, but in doing so he
breaks his oath of silence to his lady and looses her. Here, his attempts to “speak to her
love” and explain that he revealed their relationship due to his affection for
her utterly fails.
[x] Lanval deeply regrets his mistake, and
“he cursed his heart and his mouth.”
[xi] Even the king’s demands that he “speak
the truth” to defend himself against the queens vengeful accusations fail to
persuade the knight to speak again of his love, even though he has no further
reason to keep it a secret since she had already abandoned him.
[xii] However, his continued loyalty sways
his lover, and she returns to defend him.
In this way silence is held up as a virtue and secrecy is shown to be a
necessity of love. As Enide
realizes in Chretien de Troyes story, sometimes is best to fall back on silence
when words have failed.
[xiii]
In
contrast, the later fourteenth century Arthurian romance of
Peredur, Son
of Efrog as recorded in
The
Mabinogion shows that the only way to attain love is to hold one’s
tongue. Peredur learns early on
from his uncle that it is advisable and most courteous to keep questions and
commentary to oneself.
[xiv] The young knight takes this to heart,
and for the rest of the story represents a shining example of virtuous
silence. When at one point, he is
so enthralled in thoughts of love that even when attacked by an entire retinue
of knights, “Peredur was thinking so hard about the woman he loved best that he
gave no answer” to the questions and taunts of his many attackers.
[xv] Indeed, Arthur views this silence due
to a preoccupation with love as virtuous, and this wins Peredur honor and
prestige at court. His reputation
as secretive yet loyal lover is only increased by his next adventure. When Angharad Law Eurog rebukes his
advances, he chooses to prove his love retreating again into utter
silence. Although Peredur declares
that “By my faith sister,…you are a dear, lovely girl. And I could love you best of all women
if you wished,” Angharad Law Eurog replied “I give my world,…I do not love you
and I will never want you, ever.”
In response Peredur swears an oath of silence, promising “I give my
word…that I will never utter a word to any Christian until you confess that you
love me best of men.”
[xvi] This ritualistic exchange of explicit
oaths pits the two against each other, and although Peredur does speak, he only
converses with individuals who were never properly baptized. He is relieved to discover that this
loophole allowed him to keep his promise, and again retreats into silence.
[xvii] In the next episode, Peredur challenges
and defeats his rival, Sir Cai, and earns himself the title of the Mute
Knight. Angharad Law Eurog, not
recognizing him, is impressed by his valor in this battle, and admits
Between me and God, lord, it is a shame
that you cannot speak. An if you
could, I would love you best of men.
And by my faith, even though you cannot speak, I will still love you
best.
[xviii]
Having achieved his goal, Peredur’s oath is fulfilled, and
he replies “May God repay you, sister.
By my faith, I love you too.”
[xix] In so doing he reveals his identity to
his love, wins her heart, and wins himself a place at King Arthur’s court. With this tale Peredur’s character
becomes the perhaps one of the most compelling illustrations of ideal silent
love in Arthurian legend.
Indeed,
in although going the way of silence proved in most cases to be the safer
method. Even Enide, a proponent of
speaking up and communicating in order to prove one’s love, admits that words
are tricky things, and even “She knew how to intoxicate/a fool by words when of
such a mind.”
[xx] It is a paradox, explains Howard Bloch,
and a powerful one, “that love only exists to the degree that it is a secret;
that secret love only exists to the degree that it is revealed; and revealed,
it is no longer love.” He explains
that “at the center of the courtly code of discretion and of almost every tale
of so-called hidden love lies the logic of the poetry that transgresses what it
posits.”
[xxi] In this way, medieval authors of
courtly romance such as Chretien de Troyes and Marie de France present the
audience with contradictory ideals of love.
The
repetitive act of breaking silence that results in a successful courtship in
spite of the breach time and again illustrates that although discretion is
highly prized, the communication of useful knowledge is also righteous as long
as it can be justified in that it benefits the relationship or expresses loyalty
in some way. Howard Bloch asserts
that although silence valued, “a promise, like a confession, can never be
contained; it is meant to be broken.”
[xxii] Arthurian romances exemplify this
assertion that “the logic of a broken promise…is, within the context of
medieval poetics, that of the courtly poetry itself.”
[xxiii]
Thus the tales of Lanval, Erec et Enide, and Peredur Son of Efrog all illustrate an
essential component of medieval courtly romantic literature. In all three examples the authors focus
in on what it means to break an oath of silence, in which situations it is
acceptable, and how the choice between silence and speech may influence the
outcome of a relationship. For
example, while the Mabinogion’s tale of Peredur Son of Efrog glorifies his reputation as the Mute Knight,
it is important to note that he speaks after making his oath, and only because
of a circumstantial fact that he discovers later on does he realize that he has
kept his promise. In this way for
part of the story his silence is unintentional. However, once he discovers this, Peredur decides to redouble
his efforts and speak not one word more until he has achieved his goal. The tale in this way expresses that
slip-ups in the ritual of romantic courtly silence can be considered completely
acceptable if under the right circumstances. In Chretien de Troyes telling of Erec and Enide, the author meditates on the balance between two
virtues—silence and risking an oath of silence in a further act of love. Indeed, Enide knowingly breaks Erec’s
command to not speak one word to him during their journey, but she judges that
she would rather anger him and loose his love than watch him die. She risks his wrath and conveys
precious knowledge to him, which greatly annoys the knight although he forgives
her, admitting that she was only trying to help him out of love and loyalty to
her husband. Finally, in Marie de
France’s telling to Lanval, she analyzes how discretion and loyalty work often
against, but in some circumstances with each other. While Lanval completely disregards his love’s demands
and a moment of anger reveals their love to the queen, he so greatly regrets
that he has betrayed his lover that he risks being dishonored and exiled in an
attempt to not divulge any more information about their relation even though
she had already forsaken him. However,
the strength and purity of Lanval’s love for the lady saves him from disgrace
when she takes pity upon him and rescues him by revealing herself to all of
King Arthur’s court. In this manner
many writers of courtly romance created contradictions that helped to
illustrate the medieval understanding of the relationship between these silence
and speech.
Many other Arthurian legends were
retold in the format of the courtly romance, in many cases they similarly
examined the tension that existed between silence and speech as well as secrecy
and revelation. Meditating upon
the contradictory natures of the two choices any lover is faced with, medieval authors
sought to discover in which situations the each option was most virtuous. Chretien de Troyes Erec and Enide, Marie de France’s Lanval, and the Mabinogion’s Peredur Son of Efrog
are each excellent examples of such interests. The three contemporary renditions of Arthurian myths all
function to explore different aspects of fin’
amour and the ideals presented within the corpus of medieval courtly
romantic literature.
Significantly, these three texts each illustrate the very relatable
human experience of deciding between two difficult and oppositional choices in
an attempt to successfully navigate intimate personal relationships.
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