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 Death of Caesar
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 draws material from many sources, linking his prehistory of Arthurian Britain to numerous existing traditions and histories. In the following episode, he makes the murder of Julius Caesar an act of revenge for his destruction of Britain. Caesar has led an invasion in which the Romans have annihilated Perceforest's forces in an epic battle and devastated the whole kingdom. The young knight Ourseau, although raised as a Roman, has discovered he's the grandson of King Gadifer of Scotland and his wife the Fairy Queen, and that his father's brother was killed in the battle by Caesar himself. The Fairy Queen wants Ourseau to avenge his uncle's death with the head of Caesar's lance which dealt the mortal wound. She has recovered it from his uncle's body, and given it to Ourseau to carry back to Rome, where his father greets him with the utmost joy.
But he had grave news: ‘Dear son, you've lost your mother and your dear grandfather – and two of your brothers also: they were killed in a battle fought by the senators against Julius Caesar who's lately returned from Gaul.’
‘Truly, honoured father,’ said Ourseau, ‘it's not the first harm Caesar's inflicted on those close to us.’ And he told his father how, as he had bidden him, he'd gone to Britain to learn the truth about their ancestry, and found that Caesar had devastated the land.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- A Perceforest ReaderSelected Episodes from Perceforest: The Prehistory of Arthur's Britain, pp. 93 - 99Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2012