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In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Gawain begins as the icon of a perfect

Christian knight, but the Green Knights challenge forces him to realize that his ideal of perfection is unattainable and change his outlook. In King Arthur, Arthur begins not as the icon but as a Roman general whose allegiance is to Rome, not to Britain. Arthurs eventual disillusionment with Rome allows him to truly realize his ideal of freedom and become the icon of King Arthur. While Gawain begins as the icon of the perfect knight and through a disillusionment realizes his ideal is unattainable, Arthur goes the other way, beginning as a Roman general but through a disillusionment realizing how to attain his ideal of freedom and becoming the icon: King Arthur.! ! Gawain begins the story as as the icon of a Christian knight, embodied by the

pentangle on his shield. !

Hit is a syngne !at Salamon set sumquyle" In bytoknyng of traw!e, bi tytle !at hit habbez," For hit is a gure !at haldez fyue poyntez," And vche lyne vmbelappez and loukez in o!er," And ayquere hit is endelez; and Englych hit callen" Oueral, as I here, !e endeles knot." For!y hit acordez to !is kny#t and to his cler armez," For ay faythful in fyue and sere fyue sy!ez." (625)"

The symbol is a perfect endless knot, representing Gawains perfection. The pentangle does not break at any point and neither do Gawains values; the ve points of the star representing the ve values he awlessly upholds. The symbols religious origin, its connection to Solomon, ties in with Gawains perfection as a Christian as well as a knight. Gawains claim to perfection spans further than what would be expected of just his knightly identity as it incorporates his personal morality as well. He is described as awless in his ves wits and with his ve ngers, wisdom and strength - courtly ideals, but he also honors the ve wounds of Christ and the ve joys Mary had of her child "1

Christian ideals. By placing both courtly and Christian ideals on his shield and therefore in public, he must now uphold both perfect chivalry and perfect morality in order to live up to the perfection he claims. While this is a near impossible task, Gawain succeeds at it for a while until, ultimately, he is forced by the Green Knight to choose between violating one or the other: either choice breaking his perfection.! ! Arthur begins his story not as the icon of the great King of Britain he is now

thought of as but is rather portrayed as more Roman than British. The Bishop greets him with these words: Arthur Castus. Your father's image. (King Arthur) Arthurs father was a Roman while his mother was a Briton. Therefore, establishing Arthur as like his father presents him as a Roman. Arthur certainly presents himself in a Roman manner to the Britons; Guinevere calls him The famous Briton who kills his own people. (King Arthur) When the Bishop implies Arthurs disloyalty to Rome because of his reluctance to force his men to go on one last mission, Arthur replies: Everything I've done has been for the Church and for Rome. (King Arthur) While we see Arthurs devotion to Rome, we also begin to see his frustration with it slowly growing. While the ideals that Gawain seeks to uphold are in chivalry and morality, the ideal that Arthur believes in is freedom. Before Arthur reaches the iconic status of King Arthur who promotes freedom for all, he approaches this ideal in a very Roman way. When he speaks of freedom, he speaks of Pelagius, his Roman teacher from childhood. He took my father's place for me. His teachings on free will and equality have been a great inuence. I look forward to our reunion in Rome. (King Arthur) Arthurs thoughts are with Rome. The ideal of freedom does not stand on its own in his mind - to him it is still a lesson from Rome. His home, the place he hopes to end up, is in Rome. Only once Arthur becomes

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disillusioned with Rome, does he move from his fathers roots to his mothers and begins to become the iconic King of the Britons.! ! Both Arthur and Gawain experience status-changing disillusionments. In

Gawains case, this disillusionment is brought upon the by the words of Bertilak. Bertilak and his wife cleverly force Gawain into a situation where he must violate either his morality, his promise to Lady Bertilak, or his agreement with Bertilak himself. Gawain chooses the option that will help him live, but he still falls from his iconic status of perfection as a result. !
As perle bi !e quite pese is of prys more," So is Gawayn, in god fayth, bi o!er gay kny#tez." Bot here yow lakked a lyttel, sir, and lewt yow wonted;" Bot !at watz for no wylyde werke, ne wowyng nau!er," Bot for #e lufed your lyf; !e lasse I yow blame.'" (2364)"

Bertilak does not condemn Gawain, but rather calls his the greatest of all knights - a pearl among peas. He does not blame Gawain for his decision at all because he was trying to save his life but because he says that Gawain lacked a little, even that tiny recognition of imperfection crushes Gawains status as the perfect knight. Gawain realizes that he has failed to live up to what the pentangle represents, exclaiming Corsed worth cowarddyse and couetyse bo#e! (2374) He blames himself for failing in both courtesy (cowardice) and morality (covetousness). Now disillusioned with his own perfection, Gawain can no longer look at himself as an icon of the perfect knight.! ! The disillusionment Arthur experiences is of his view of Rome. Interestingly, the

revelation comes from the words of Alecto, the Roman boy Arthur must save as his nal service to Rome. !

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Arthur: Pelagius, a man as close to me as any, is there now, teaching that all men are free, equal. And that each of us has the right to choose his own destiny. Alecto: Teach? How? They killed Pelagius a year past. Germanius and the others were damned by his teachings. They had him excommunicated and killed. The Rome you talk of doesn't exist, except in your dreams. (King Arthur)!

Arthur once again shows his association of Rome with the ideal of freedom but Alecto forces him to remove this association. Just as Bertilak forces Gawain to realize his view of a perfect knight does not exist, Alecto forces Arthur to realize that his view of a free Rome does not exist. No longer viewing Rome as a society that champions freedom for all men, coupled with Romes oppression of him and his knights and Marius oppression of the Pagans, Arthur moves away from his Roman roots and towards his British roots. As he stops being viewed as a Roman, he moves toward the icon of King Arthur.! ! At the end of Gawains story, he is humbled by his realization that he cannot be

perfect and instead of the icon of a perfect knight, he represents a mere man. !
Bot in syngne of my surfet I schal se hit ofte," When I ride in renoun, remorde to myseluen" $e faut and !e fayntyse of !e esche crabbed," How tender hit is to entyse teches of fyl!e;" And !us, quen pryde schal me pryk for prowes of armes," $e loke to !is luf-lace schal le!e my hert." (2433)"

Replacing his pentangle, Gawains symbol is now the very girdle which caused him to fail. He displays it as a sign of his fault: a reminder that he, like all men, is imperfect. He connects the symbol to religion just as he did his prior symbol, suggesting that reminding himself of his failures will moderate his pride. This implies that his symbol of modesty fullls the Christian ideal even more than the symbol of perfection did. Gawain nishes his story not as an icon but as a human being: no longer ashamed of being afraid to die, and aware that in his life there will be failures.!

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Arthurs new allegiance to his British roots causes him to fend off the Saxons for

his people. In his speech to his knights before the battle, he says: Knights, the gift of freedom is yours by right. But the home we seek resides not in some distant land. It's in us and in our actions on this day. If this be our destiny, then so be it. But let history remember that as free men we chose to make it so. (King Arthur) By ghting for themselves, Arthur and his knights realize the ideal of freedom more than they ever have ghting for Rome. Home for Arthur is no longer Rome as it was at the beginning, it is Britain - marking his shift from a Roman to a Briton. After Arthur successfully leads his knights against the Saxon invasion, during his wedding to Guinevere this is said: Freedom. Arthur. Guinevere. Our people are one. As you are Let every man, woman, child bear witness that from this day all Britons will be united in one common cause. (King Arthur) By properly embracing the ideal of freedom, and by uniting the people of Briton, Arthur becomes the icon we know him as. In the nal line of the lm, Arthur is at last refereed to as King Arthur.! ! Although Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and King Arthur are completely

different representations of the Arthurian Knights both in time period and in method, the stories still share parallels. Both Arthur and Gawain are devoted to certain ideals, Gawain to chivalry and morality and Arthur to freedom, and both experience disillusionments that fundamentally alter their outlook. While Gawain begins as the icon, perfectly embracing the ideals he is devoted to, after his disillusionment he ends the story as a mere man. Arthur takes the opposite path, beginning as a relatively insignicant Roman ofcer but because of his disillusionment, embracing his ideal, and becoming the icon: King Arthur.$

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Work Cited!

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Cawley, A. C., and J. J. Anderson. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight ; Pearl ; Cleanness ; Patience. London: J.M. Dent, 1996. Print.! King Arthur. Dir. Antoine Fuqua. Perf. Clive Owen, Ioan Gruffudd and Keira Knightley. Touchstone Pictures, 2004. DVD.