The Ladies of the Lake

Hey there! How are you? I hope you all had a wonderful Halloween!

I mentioned in an earlier post that there was more than one Lady of the Lake in Arthurian legend. In this post I'm going to take a closer look at them.

The Lady of the Lake is a figure who shows up quite often in Arthurian Legend. The Lady is almost always a helpful figure to King Arthur. It was a Lady of the Lake who gave Arthur the magic sword Excalibur, which helped grant him the right to rule. (Of course, to quote Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail: "strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government".) Upon King Arthur's death, Excalibur is returned to a Lady of the Lake by one of his knights. A Lady of the Lake is also responsible for helping Lancelot rise to such prominence in King Arthur's court – although, given his eventual betrayal of King Arthur, that might not be such a good thing. King Arthur's body is escorted to the mystical land of Avalon by several women, one of whom is a Lady of the Lake.

Interestingly, women with the title of the Lady of the Lake are also sometimes quite nefarious and evil. I mentioned in my post about Merlin that a Lady of the Lake named Nimue used Merlin to learn magic and then trapped him in a tree, leaving him to die. Not something you'd think an ally of Arthur would do, right? Before that happens, another figure called the Lady of the Lake shows up at King Arthur's court and is beheaded by a knight named Balin. According to Balin (whose tale is backed up by Merlin), the Lady of the Lake had killed his mother. According the the Lady of the Lake (before she was killed), Balin had killed her brother. The best part? The Lady who gets decapitated is the same Lady who gave Arthur Excalibur! So who, exactly, is the sword returned to after Arthur's death?

As you can see, the Lady of the Lake is a figure who seems to have multiple aspects. Shortly after one dies, another woman with the same title appears. To me, the simplest explanation of the many Ladies is that there's more than one lake in Britain; ergo, there might be many Ladies of the Lake. These ladies go by quite a few names as authors attempt to differentiate them from one another. The names I've heard most often are Nimue, Nineve, Vivianne, and Elaine.

One of my favorite stories about a Lady of the Lake is about a knight named Pelleas. Pelleas had fallen in love with a woman of noble blood named Ettard, but she spurned him and wanted nothing to do with him. The knight was so in love that he allowed himself to be taken captive by Ettard's guards every day. They took him back to her castle and beat him, but Pelleas thought the pain was worth it because each day he got to see Ettard for a few minutes.

It happened that a knight named Gawain, one of King Arthur's knights, came upon Pelleas as Ettard's guards were capturing him. Gawain fought them off and asked Pelleas why he was allowing himself to be so beaten. Upon hearing Pelleas' story, Gawain was moved and promised to go and woo Ettard for the other knight. Gawain swore that he would win Ettard's favor and her hand in marriage, and then give her to Pelleas to marry.

Well, the first part of Gawain's plan worked out alright. He won Ettard's favor. Unfortunately for Pelleas, Gawain fell in love with Ettard and completely forgot about his oath. He wooed the woman for himself, not for Pelleas.

After a few days had passed without word from Gawain, Pelleas went to find out what was going on. 

He walked in to find Gawain and Ettard asleep in one another's arms. Filled with rage at the betrayal, Pelleas drew his sword and prepared to kill the duo – but he couldn't bring himself to do it. His love for Ettard was too great. Instead, the knight left his sword beside them and went home. He dismissed his servants and resolved that he would starve himself to death.

When Ettard and Gawain woke up, she immediately recognized Pelleas' sword. Both were ashamed by their betrayal of the knight.

As it happened, one of Pelleas' servants happened across Nineve, a Lady of the Lake. She asked where he was going, and the servant explained everything that had happened to his master. Nineve was enraged and demanded that the servant take her to Pelleas. Upon seeing his sorrow, she cast him into an enchanted sleep. Nineve then went and fetched Ettard, and shamed her for having broken Pelleas' heart.

(This version calls her Nimue, for some reason.)

But Nineve was not done. She cast a spell on Ettard that made her love Pelleas as much as he had loved her. Ettard flung herself to her knees beside Pelleas, crying for the pain she had inflicted upon her beloved. This woke up Pelleas, who opened his eyes and found that he quite hated Ettard for her treatment of him.

The story ends with Ettard dying of a broken heart. Pelleas leaves the country along with Nineve. He falls in love with the Lady of the Lake, and the two marry. They have a son together, and live happily ever after.

I'm not sure why I like the story so much. I think it might be because Nineve was so furious at the way Ettard had been messing with Pelleas' heart. It just makes me happy!

What did you guys think?

I'm sorry to post and run, but NaNoWriMo has begun and between that and school I am crazy busy.  (Don't know what NaNoWriMo is?  It's short for National Novel Writing Month.  During the month of November writers are challenged to write 50,000 words.  I've done it for four years now - both of my books were written during NaNoWriMo.)  I've got posts planned for the rest of the month, but I'm not sure how many more will be about Arthurian legend.  I'll keep you posted as I learn more!

I'll see you next week!