[told by Arthur]
This story goes back a good many years, to when I'd recently got married to Guinevere, and we were sitting around the Round Table on New Year's Eve, with the knights who'd come to join me at Camelot. This was in the early days, and many of the heroes you'll have heard of, like Sir Galahad and Sir Percival, weren't even born yet. When I'd got started, my court had mainly consisted of Sir Kay and Merlyn and me, and some of our old friends like King Pellinore, but now knights were starting to come from all over Europe to join the Order of the Round Table and fight for justice against the rule of brute force. Sir Lancelot had come from France, and three of my nephews from Orkney: Sir Gawain and Sir Agravain, who were nineteen and eighteen and had only just been knighted, plus their next brother, Gaheris, who was serving as Gawain's squire. I wished Gareth, the fourth brother, could have been celebrating Hogmanay with us as well, but he'd decided to stay home for a few years longer, so that he could look after his little brother Mordred, because my sister Morgause seemed to have lost interest in the baby as soon as he was weaned. It must have been hard for Gareth, because the older four boys had been very close, but that was why he couldn't bear to think of Mordred growing up not knowing any of his brothers.
Anyway, it was New Year's Eve, and the servants had brought us a beautiful dinner, but I was too restless to eat anything. We'd been doing nothing since Christmas but eat and drink, dance and play games, and tell stories and sing songs, and it had all been great fun, but after a week of it, I wanted more than fun. I wanted adventure; I wanted a challenge; I wanted to see what the next year was going to bring. In other words, I was an idiot who didn't know when I was well off.
Well, while I was sitting there, so impatient that I could barely sit still, and the main course was being cleared away and Guinevere was asking me if I wanted to save the leftover vegetables for bubble-and-squeak tomorrow, suddenly a huge man on a huge horse rode into the middle of the hall. He was as big as a troll, but most of the trolls I'd met were made of granite or limestone, whereas this one shone as though he'd been carved out of a giant emerald. He was bright green all over, wearing a green fur robe and green jewellery, and sitting on a vast green charger with a green saddle and enamelled green stirrups, and carrying a holly bough in one hand and a ferocious green axe in the other.
The strange thing was that he didn't look rough and wild exactly, the way a troll or a giant does, but he didn't look quite like a gentleman either. His green riding-breeches were beautifully tailored and obviously made of expensive cloth, but his green feet were bare. His huge green beard and his long green hair hung down to his elbows and were as thick as an evergreen shrub, but they were carefully combed and neatly trimmed. He wasn't wearing any armour, and, with all his gold and emerald jewellery, and the intricate gold embroidery on his green velvet coat under the fur robe, and the way he'd plaited his horse's green mane with dozens of fine gold wires, he almost looked a bit of a dandy. And yet he was armed with the biggest, grimmest battle-axe I'd ever seen, but even the axe-handle was decorated with pretty patterns and inlaid with gold.
For a few minutes we were too awestruck to speak, but eventually I found my voice and said, 'Happy New Year! Are you joining us for dinner?'
The Green Knight stared down at me, and said, 'No, that is not my purpose. And yet I do not come in war either, but merely to play a game with one of the knights here. If any man dares, he may strike me one blow as hard as he can, with my own axe. But after that, he must come to me in a year and a day, and I will strike him one blow in return. Does any accept my challenge?'
I said, 'Are you sure you wouldn't rather sit down and have a drink? Nobody wants to celebrate the New Year with mindless violence.' But when the Green Knight laughed at me and said we were all cowards, I was furious, and stood up and said, 'Well, if that's the way you want it, give me the axe!' So the Green Knight handed it to me, and dismounted and knelt on the floor so that I could reach his neck more easily, and kept on smiling as if to say, 'Come on, let's see what you can do!'
But at this point, Gawain said, 'Excuse me, but would you mind if I answered our visitor's challenge? Only you're the King, so you're too valuable to risk, but I'm expendable – after all, everyone knows I'm only here because I'm your nephew!'
He was joking, of course – he knew perfectly well that I don't think anyone is expendable – but now Kay was standing up as well, pale and trembling but saying, 'Why can't I fight the troll? I'm not having people say I'm only here because I'm your foster-brother!'
I said, 'Well, we can't all take him on in single combat! Let Gawain have a go.'
So Gawain took hold of the axe, but before he raised it, he asked, 'Sir, will you tell me your name and where you live? Otherwise, it's going to be a bit difficult to come to your house for the return match.'
But the Green Knight said, 'Just get on with it! If I live, I'll tell you after you've struck me, and if you kill me now, you won't need to find me next year, will you? Now come on, unless you're afraid!' And he bowed his head and lifted up all his long green hair to expose the back of his neck, and Gawain chopped off his head with a single blow. It rolled several yards across the hall, leaving a trail of bright red drops of blood looking like holly-berries against the green skin, and then the Green Knight groped his way over to it, picked it up by the hair, and said, 'Not bad, for a beginner.' He dangled his head until it was level with Gawain, and said, 'See you in a year and a day. Just ask for the Knight of the Green Chapel.'
Gawain said, 'Do you want me to bring the axe back?'
But the Green Knight said, 'No, keep it as a present. I've got plenty more.' And he jumped back on his horse and rode off, with the holly-branch in one hand and his head in the other. We stared down at the muddy hoof-prints and the trail of blood on the floor, and then Guinevere said, 'Well, we've had an adventure; now do you want your dinner?'
Gawain was all for setting off on his quest after Easter, but Guinevere and I managed to persuade him to stay for most of the year. We knew he probably wouldn't survive this quest, so we wanted to him to enjoy one more spring, one more summer, and then one more harvest-time, with us in peace. I was ashamed of myself for throwing away my friend's life, not for some worthwhile cause but in a silly party game, but Gawain said that there was nothing silly about keeping his word, and that he would be nothing at all if he broke his promise. In the end, he decided to stay with us until Halloween and ride out on All Saints' Day, to give himself two months. He was very insistent that he had to meet his fate alone, with only his horse Gringolet for company; no-one, not even Agravain or Gaheris, was allowed to ride with him.
Before he left, Guinevere and I decided to give him an early Christmas present. Up till then, Gawain had borne a shield with the same emblem as all his clan, a thistle, to show that the men of Orkney were tough and prickly and that no-one laid a hand on them without regretting it, and that, even if they were cut down, they'd keep coming back. But we thought he deserved a nobler symbol now, and so we had a new shield made for him, red with a golden five-point star.
Agravain suggested having a picture of the Virgin Mary painted on the inside, because she was Gawain's favourite saint. Gawain had explained to me that when he felt afraid, he thought of how frightened Mary must have been when the angel told her she was pregnant, and she knew that Joseph might abandon her and she might have to undergo trial by ordeal and then be stoned to death, but how she was still brave and proud to be the mother of the Messiah. And, Gawain said, if a young lass like Mary could conquer her fear, so could he.
Guinevere made up a poem for when we presented the new shield to Gawain, explaining why the five-point star suited him. It went something like this:
For firstly he was firm in his five fingers.
For secondly he was sharp in his five senses.
For thirdly he trusted in the Five Wounds of Christ.
For fourthly he rejoiced in the Five Joys of Mary.
For fifthly he was full of faithfulness and friendliness, courage and courtesy and self-control.
When Guinevere read this to Gawain, he blushed and said, 'But that makes it sound as though I'm better than other people! I mean, it's very kind of you, but I can't go round showing off like this!'
Guinevere kissed him and said, 'Sweetest nephew, it's all true – well, except maybe the bit about courtesy! Don't you know that if a lady offers you a present, whatever it is, it's a point of courtesy to accept it graciously?'
Gawain said, 'What: any present?' and Guinevere said, 'Yes: absolutely anything. And if a lady asks you to do anything for you, you are honour-bound to do it, just as if the Virgin Mary herself had asked you.'
We should have remembered how literal Gawain could be about blanket statements like that.
