Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Introduction
- How Perceforest earned his name
- The Perilous Temple
- The Adventures of Claudius and Estonné
- The Wonders at Gadifer's Coronation
- King Gadifer's Wound
- Zephir the Trickster
- Troylus in love
- A New Order of Chivalry – the ‘Franc Palais’
- The God of the Sheer Mountain
- The Fish-Knights
- The Sleeping Beauty
- The Marvellous Child
- The Death of Caesar
- The Adventure of the Red Sword
How Perceforest earned his name
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2013
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Introduction
- How Perceforest earned his name
- The Perilous Temple
- The Adventures of Claudius and Estonné
- The Wonders at Gadifer's Coronation
- King Gadifer's Wound
- Zephir the Trickster
- Troylus in love
- A New Order of Chivalry – the ‘Franc Palais’
- The God of the Sheer Mountain
- The Fish-Knights
- The Sleeping Beauty
- The Marvellous Child
- The Death of Caesar
- The Adventure of the Red Sword
Summary
Newly crowned king of England by Alexander, Betis is warned repeatedly that the forests of the land are infested by an ‘evil clan’ headed by Darnant the Enchanter. Their most damning crimes are the offences they commit against women, and they are adept at using magic as a weapon. Betis is about to commission the building of a new castle on the site of the land's first tournament, but…
‘My lord,’ Nicorant replied, ‘I'll do all you command except fetch timber from the forest! No workman would dare go there to cut or fell: he'd be lost in an instant, spirited away by the enchanters who dwell there!’
‘Go and buy the stone, Nicorant,’ said King Betis, ‘and I'll see to the forest!’
A little later, Betis fell asleep after dinner in the warmth of the afternoon; and he dreamed that the dwarf who'd directed him to the place of his coronation appeared before him and said:
‘Cowardly king! How shameful it is that you don't go and see the wonders in the forest!’
The king was so angry at being called a coward that he shook with rage and awoke. But then he reconsidered: perhaps he was a cowardly king indeed! He summoned a squire to harness his horse – and quietly, so that the queen wouldn't know – and then donned an unmarked surcoat and hid his shield in a cloth cover, and set off into the forest without anyone knowing he'd gone.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- A Perceforest ReaderSelected Episodes from Perceforest: The Prehistory of Arthur's Britain, pp. 5 - 10Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2012