Chivalry: You're Doing It Wrong (Series, Part 3)

Part 3: Generosity

Warning: Spoilers

Sir Gawain’s main fault in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is his failure to give his host the magical green girdle (ribbon) he won.  In this respect, his failure is a failure of generosity.  This failure was a lot worse back then than it is now, so much so that Middle English had words that helped describe the situation that we no longer have. 

There was troth, the keeping of one’s word.  This word had the connotations that integrity does today.  By breaking his word, Sir Gawain did not keep his troth with his host. 

There was also the concept of comitatus, the reciprocal relationship between a superior and his charges.  This could be between a king and his knights, a lord and his vassals, a husband and his wife, a host and his guest, a father and his children, etc.  In a comitatus relationship, the superior gives his charges gifts and serves as an example to them, and in return his underlings are loyal to him, protect him, and bring him the spoils of their conquests. 

Because Sir Gawain did not bring his host the item he had won even after he had promised to do so, he also broke the comitatus bond.

However, it seems like this is the only instance that Sir Gawain is not generous.  Usually, he is generous to a fault.  He volunteers his life to protect his king.  Because he considers them winnings, he gives Lord Bertilak the kisses he won from Lord Bertilak’s wife, despite his winning them being an admission of sorts that he has been flirting with her. 

Yet when Sir Gawain has to choose between generosity and life, he chooses life.

We can’t really blame Sir Gawain for this.  The Green Knight says that his real fault is loving his life too much, and that he cannot fault Sir Gawain for that.  As a reader, I wasn’t sure what to think about this.  On the one hand, it does seem a little ridiculous to hold Sir Gawain to the standards of a Christmas party game when his life is at stake.  On the other hand, it is somewhat shocking that a knight as virtuous as Sir Gawain fails a test as simple as generosity.

The poem shows that generosity, though highly valuable, is not always possible.  Sometimes pragmatism must take precedent.  The Green Knight cannot fault Gawain for loving his life more than generosity, and neither should we.