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
The Fish-Knights
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
The author of Perceforest sends his knights out to confront a world of amazing beauty and awesome marvels. The complexity of the created world, and the author's fascination with it, are nowhere expressed as startlingly as in an adventure encountered by ‘the White Knight’ – King Perceforest's son Betidés – when he's stranded on a distant island.
He searched the isle in vain for any sign of habitation. Then, as he wandered down to the winter sea and came to the shore, he saw the most extraordinary fishes come leaping from the water on to dry land. One of them had a head like an ox with a long horn, and it was all hairy; it had four legs, too, and although they were only two feet long its body and tail were as big as a bull's. There were several fish like horned sheep, all covered in hair except for their fish-like tails. Other fish were like stags and there were many like bears – except they had short legs; and all these fish leapt from the sea and, in the White Knight's presence, started feeding on grass and roots and the leaves of trees, each according to its nature. As soon as they were done they plunged back in the sea, leaving the young knight utterly amazed.
With no sign of life anywhere on the island Betidés had nothing to eat. By the next day he was desperately hungry.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- A Perceforest ReaderSelected Episodes from Perceforest: The Prehistory of Arthur's Britain, pp. 63 - 66Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2012