This was to be his first sword-fight. He took so wide a sweep for his charge that from the shock of his onset both horses were ungirdied. Their belly-girths snapped, and each recoiled on its quarters. Those who had bestridden them had not forgotten their swords – they found them in their sheaths. Kingrun was wounded in his arms and chest. This joust was a sad blow to the prestige he had enjoyed till this day, when his pride was quenched. He was reputed to have the strength and courage to unhorse any half-dozen knights who took the field against him. Yet Parzival’s doughty sword-arm returned his blows to such effect that Kingrun the Seneschal had the bizarre impression that a mangonel was battering him with its missiles. – It was no such assault that brought him low, but a sword clanging through his helmet. Parzival hurled him to the ground and thrust his knee against his chest, and Kingrun offered him what had been offered to no other man – his surrender. Yet his adversary declined it and told him to submit to Gurnemanz.
‘Oh, no, my lord! Rather put me to death. I killed his son, I took the life of Schenteflurs. God has vouchsafed you much honour. Wherever it is reported that you have proved your strength on me and had me at your mercy, people will say success has come your way.’
‘I will allow you another choice,’ replied young Parzival. ‘Make your submission to the Queen, on whom your lord’s enmity has inflicted much suffering.’
‘That would mean my end. They would mince me with their swords as fine as motes dancing in a sunbeam! I have mortified many a brave man there within the walls.’
‘Then take your knightly parole from this plain to the land of Britain, to a maiden who for my sake suffered what, by all that is right and proper, she ought never to have been subjected to. And tell her that whatever happens to me she will never see me joyful till I have avenged her somewhere or other where I will bore through someone’s shield. Give Arthur and his wife, the two of them, my compliments – not forgetting all the Household – and tell them that I shall not return till I have wiped out the dishonour which I share with the lady who greeted me with laughter and endured such violence for it. Tell that lady I am her most humble devoted servitor.’
This command was complied with, and the warriors were seen to take leave of one another.
The citizens’ champion made his way back on foot to where his mount had been caught. He was to deliver them in due course. The outer army was bewildered at Kingrun’s utter defeat. Parzival was escorted into the Queen’s presence. She warmly embraced him and holding him close she said ‘Never in this world shall I be the wife of any man but him whom I have embraced!’ She helped them unarm him and showed him all possible attention.
After his great exertion a wretched breakfast was served. The men of the fortress hurried in to swear fealty to him, declaring he must be their lord. The Queen capped this by saying that in view of his splendid victory over Kingrun he must be her lover.
Now two gleaming sails were made out from the top of the ramparts! They belonged to vessels driven smack into port by a gale. Their bottoms were laden in a way to delight the denizens – their sole cargo was food. In His wisdom God had so ordained it.
The famished crowd poured at great speed from the fortifications down towards the ships to pillage them. They could have sped like leaves before the wind, these people so lean and shrunken and scant of flesh, they had so little stuffing in their hides. But the Queen’s Marshal placed the ships under his protection and forbade any to touch them on pain of the gallows. He led the merchants to the city and into the presence of his lord.
Parzival ordered them to be paid double the price of their wares, but the merchants judged it too high and so they were reimbursed for their outlay. Once again fat dripped on to the castle-dwellers’ coals. Now I should love to be a mercenary there, for nobody is drinking beer: they have wine and food in plenty.
Faultless Parzival proceeded as follows. He first shared out the victuals neatly himself. He then asked the notables present to be seated. He did not wish them to gorge themselves on empty stomachs, so he gave them enough and no more, and they were pleased to follow his advice. He gave them some more in the evening, steady affable man that he was.
A question. Would they celebrate their nuptials? He and the Queen answered ‘Yes’. He lay with such restraint as would not suit many women nowadays, were they so treated. Consider, that to torment a man with desire they offset their modest behaviour by dressing provocatively! In the presence of strangers they behave demurely, but their inward desires clash with their outward show. Their caresses give their lovers secret pain. But a loyal and constant man who has always used restraint knows how to spare his mistress’s feelings. He thinks, as may well be true, ‘I have served this lady all my days for her reward. Now she has offered me solace, and I am lying here. Once upon a time it would have been enough to be allowed to touch her gown with my bare hand. If I were now to demand possession I should be disloyal to myself to exert it. Ought I to exact this tribute and inflict deep shame on us both? At bedtime sweet airy nothings best suit a gentlewoman’s nature.’ It was with such thoughts as these that the Waleis lay beside his bride.
‘Red Knight’ though they called him he inspired little terror: he left the Queen a maiden. Yet she thought she was his wife, and for love of her handsome husband put up her hair in a fillet! Then, this virgin bride bestowed her lands and castles on him, for he was the darling of her heart.
For two days they remained thus with one another, happy in their liking, till the third night. He often thought of embracing, as his mother had advised him, and Gurnemanz too had explained to him that man and woman are all one. They entwined their arms and legs, and if you will allow me to say so he found what is sweet when near. Together they observed the old custom ever-new. They were happy, not too sad.
Now listen to how Clamide, who was approaching with powerful forces, was dispirited by the news. A page whose horse’s flanks were torn by the spurs reported to him without preamble, ‘On the plain below Belrepeire an encounter has taken place, quite a fierce one. The Seneschal has been defeated by a knight. Kingrun, commander of our army, is on his way to Arthur the Briton. The mercenaries are maintaining their position below the city according to his last orders on leaving. You and your two armies will find Belrepeire well defended. Within, there is a noble knight who has no other wish than to fight. All your soldiers declare that the Queen has sent for Ither of Cucumerlant of the Table Round. His blazon came out to joust and was borne with great distinction.’
‘Condwiramurs shall have me and I her and her lands!’ snapped Clamide to his page. ‘My Seneschal Kingrun sent me reliable news that they would soon be forced by starvation to yield the city, and that the Queen would offer me her noble love.’ Ill will was all the page earned there.
The King rode on with his army, and now a knight came riding towards them who had not spared horseflesh either, and he told them the same story. Clamide’s gay and martial spirits flagged. It came as a great blow to him. But then a certain prince, one of the King’s men, spoke up. ‘Kingrun did not fight as our champion. He fought entirely on his own account. Suppose he had been killed. Would that be any reason why two armies should lose heart – this, and that before the city?’ He begged his lord not to despond. ‘We must try again! If they have a mind to fight we shall give them plenty and put an end to their jubilation. Urge on your kinsmen and vassals and attack the city under two standards. We shall be able to make our way to them on horseback along the slope, and we shall attack the Gates on foot. I swear we shall pay them back for our defeat!’
Such was the advice given by Galogandres, Duke of Gippones. He brought those of the fortress to a sad pass. Yet en ravanche he met his death at their outworks, as did Count Narant, the illustrious prince from Ukerlant, and many a knight of slender means whose bodies were borne from the field. But now learn further how the citizens looked to their outer defences. They took long tree-trunks and thrust strong stakes into them, much to the torment of their assailants, for they le
t them down on ropes, and the logs then turned on pulleys! This had all been devised after Kingrun’s defeat, before Clamide launched his attack on them. Moreover, Greek fire had come to their land with the provisions. The besiegers’ engines were burnt down, their scaling-towers and mangonels – whatever had come on wheels – their chevaux de frise, the ‘cats’ in the fosses. True to its nature, fire utterly erased them.
Kingrun the Seneschal had meantime arrived in Britain and found King Arthur at Karminal, as his hunting-lodge in Brizljan was called. Here he did as Parzival had instructed him when he sent him as a prisoner, and offered his submission to Lady Cunneware de Lalant. The young lady was delighted that the man they called the Red Knight had taken up her cause so sympathetically.
The news of this event spread everywhere. The vanquished noble presented himself to the King. To Arthur and his court he then delivered the message addressed to them. Keie gave a sudden start and turned crimson. ‘So you are Kingrun?’ he managed to say. ‘Ah me, how many Britons you have overwhelmed, my Lord Seneschal of Clamide! Though I may never win your subduer’s favour, you shall profit from your high office. For we are Lords of the Cauldron, I here and you there in Brandigan. By your noblesse, help me with large pancakes to win Cunneware’s good graces.’
He offered her no other amends. But let that pass, and hear how it continues where we left the story.
Clamide arrived before the walls of Belrepeire, and it came to a mighty assault. The besieged resisted die besiegers, they were in good heart and sinew. These warriors showed themselves most warlike and so made themselves masters of the field. Their sovereign Parzival fought in advance of his men. The Gates were left wide open. His arms flailed with his blows, his sword went clanging through hard helmets. Any knights he felled there met trouble enough – they were acquainted with it at the gussets of their hauberks, for the burghers avenged themselves by stabbing them through the slits, till Parzival forbade them. When they learned of his displeasure they took twenty of them alive before withdrawing from the fray.
It became abundantly clear to Parzival that Clamide and his company were declining battle at the Gates and that he was fighting in some other place. The stout-hearted youth thus made for the rough country. He spurred in a wide sweep towards the King’s standard. From now on, Clamide’s hire was dearly earned! Those of the city fought to such effect that their tough shields were whittled away from their grips. Parzival’s was reduced to nothing by shots and blows. Small joy though the attackers might have of it, they all acclaimed him as a paragon. Their standard-bearer Galogandres, who had been giving the army a fine lead, fell dead beside his King. Then Clamide himself was in peril, so that he and his were alarmed. Clamide called off the attack. The battle-seasoned army of the city had won the advantage and glory!
Noble Parzival gave orders for the prisoners to be well cared for till the third morning. The outer army were a prey to anxiety. Then the proud, gay young lord took the captives’ parole. ‘Come back, good people, when I summon you,’ he said. He commanded their armour to be sequestered, and they rejoined their army beyond the walls. Although those returning were flushed with wine, the Outers said ‘You must be famished, poor people.’
‘Don’t waste your pity on us!’ replied the others. ‘There is such an abundance of food in there that if you camped here for a year they would maintain you as well as themselves, depend upon it. The Queen has the handsomest husband that ever won title to the Shield. He has all the marks of high descent. In his hands the honour of the whole Order of Chivalry is in safe keeping.’
When Clamide heard this he was seized with regret for all his toil. He sent in envoys to announce that whoever he might be who shared the Queen’s couch ‘if he is eligible for single combat and has been recognized by her as one who dares to defend both her and her lands in duel with me, then let there be a truce between die armies.’
Parzival was delighted that the embassy had been addressed to him with an eye to his fighting alone. Said die dauntless young man: ‘Let my honour stand as pledge for it that no man of the inner army shall take die field for any danger I may be in.’
This truce was fixed between the fosse and the outer army. Then this bellicose pair of blacksmiths donned their armour. The King of Brandigan mounted a barded castilian called ‘Guverjorz’ which together with rich gifts had been sent to Clamide across Lake Uker from the north by his maternal kinsman Grigorz, King of Ipotente. Count Narant had brought it, together with a thousand men-at-arms fully equipped but for escutcheon. Their pay had been settled for two whole years ahead, if the tale informs us truly. Grigorz sent him five hundred dashing knights, each with his helmet laced ready for action and well tried in battle. Thereupon Clamide’s forces had invested Belrepeire by land and sea so closely that the denizens, inevitably, suffered hardship.
Parzival now rode out to the field of the ordeal, where God was to make clear whether He wished to leave him King Tampenteire’s daughter. He came on proudly, with his mount at no less than the gallop as prelude to the charge! His horse was well armed against the worst – housings of red samite were draped over its steel barding. He himself showed a red shield and red surcoat.
Clamide began the duel. He brought with him a short, uncut lance with which to unseat his man in the joust and with it took a long sweep for his charge. Guverjorz leapt headlong to the attack, and between them these beardless youths made a fine joust of it, neither missing his mark. No harder duel was ever fought by man or beast – the two chargers were steaming from their toil.
They fought till their mounts could do no more, so they dropped down beside them as one man, each bent on striking fire from helmets. There was no downing tools for them, they had work on hand! Their shields vanished in clouds of chips, as though they were playing at Tossing Feathers on the Wind! Nevertheless, the son of Gahmuret was still unwearied in any of his limbs. Then it seemed to Clamide as if the truce had been broken from the direction of the city. He asked his adversary to mind his honour and save him from mangonel-shot! Mighty blows were falling on him equal to any stones from a mangonel. But the lord of the land replied: ‘I do not think you are being bombarded by mangonels. I have pledged my word against that. If you would submit to my protection this sling would not smash your ribs, head or thighbones.’
Clamide was succumbing to fatigue, little though he liked it. Victory won, victory lost, was being decided there for each of them. However, King Clamide first was seen in defeat, for blood spurted through his nose and ears, painting the ground red, when Parzival snatched and rammed him down. He quickly bared Clamide’s head of helmet and coif, and the vanquished man sat waiting for his death-blow.
‘My wife can now go free of your molestation,’ said the victor. ‘Learn what it is to the!’
‘No, no, worthy, gallant knight! Your honour has been proved on me thirty times over. Where could you reap greater glory? Condwiramurs has cause to declare me a luckless man, while your fortunes have prospered. Your country has been saved. But as when a ship is baled or unballasted and is all the lighter for it, my power is of shallower draught, my manly zest is at an ebb. Why should you kill me? I am bound to bequeath disgrace to all my descendants. You have the glory and advantage. What need is there to do more to me? I suffer living death now that I am parted from the woman who has always encompassed me, heart and mind, in her dominion, while I have had no return. As a result, unfortunate that I am, I must yield her and her lands to you, without let or hindrance.’
Then the man who had won the victory remembered Gurnemanz’s counsel that a brave and gallant man should be ready to show mercy, and followed it thus.
‘I will not exempt you from taking your submission to Liaze’s father,’ he said to Clamide.
‘Oh, no, sir, I have done him mortal wrong! I killed his son. You should not deal with me in this fashion. Schenteflurs too fought me over Condwiramurs, and if my Seneschal had not come to my aid would have killed me. Gurnemanz de Graharz sent him to Brobarz with a fine fo
rce of men: nine hundred proven knights all mounted on barded horses who acquitted themselves well in knightly exploits, and fifteen hundred men-at-arms whose equipment was complete but for the escutcheon when I met them in battle. I thought his army excessive, and in the event scarcely enough of them got back to ensure a new crop. Since then I myself have lost knights in greater number. I am now beggared of honour and contentment. What more do you want of me?’
‘I will abate your fears. Go to the land of the Britons, where Kingrun has gone before you, to Arthur of Britain. Give him my respects and ask his sympathy for an insult I took away with me. A young lady laughed to see me. Nothing ever grieved me so much as when she was thrashed because of me. Tell her that it still rankles with me. Offer her your submission and do whatever she commands you – or receive your death here and now!’
‘If that is the choice, I will not call it into question,’ replied the King of Brandigan, ‘I elect for the journey.’ After swearing his oath, the man who had come to grief through his own arrogance left the field. The hero Parzival went to where his weary steed was waiting. He whose foot had never sought the stirrup leapt up without it on this occasion too and set the shavings of his shield a-swirling.
The defenders were delighted at the outcome, but the besieging army saw only cause for grief. King Clamide was aching in flesh and bone. They led him to his companions, and he sent the dead to their rest on biers. Then the foreigners left that land. Noble Clamide rode across country towards Löver.
The whole Table Round without exception were at Dianazdrun with Arthur the Briton. Unless I have lied to you, the plain of Dianazdrun must have admitted of more tent-poles than there are tree-trunks in the Spessart – with such retinue had Arthur camped for the Whitsun festival together with many ladies. Many pennants and shields, their charges unquartered, were on display there. Nowadays it would be thought a grand affair. Who could make all the stuffs for the travel-robes of such a host of ladies? Then, too, a lady was apt to think she would lose esteem if she did not have her gallant there. I would most certainly not have brought my wife to such a concourse – there were so many young bloods there! I should have been afraid of jostling strangers. Someone or other would have whispered to her that her charms were stabbing him and blotting out his joy, and that if she would end his pangs he would serve her before and after. Rather than that I would hurry away with her.