William Marshal, Lancelot, and the Issue of Chivalric Identity

In searching for a better understanding of chivalric identity, we might well begin in the year 1911. Though perhaps not a date that often attracts medievalists' close consideration, 1911 repays attention, for in that year the first Handbook for Boys was published by the Boy Scouts of America.1 This original Handbook (a facsimile of which I obtained via the Internet) presented in Chapter VI a concise "History of Chivalry," sixteen pages packed with enthusiastic explanation and wonderful illustrations. That first edition (the title page appears as Fig. 1, overleaf) numbered 300,000 copies; the print run climbed tenfold to three million in the second edition of 1914, so that the Handbook had circulated in a good many copies by 1925, when, sadly, the chapter on chivalry vanished. By then, I believe, it had done its work on an entire generation or more. We may be interested in the 1911 Handbook, however, more as a reflection than as a cause. The underlying conception of chivalry it presented was not the Handbook's own creation, but rather a splendidly American twist on views solidly established in the Victorian world. A few illustrations and quotations from the text will make the point better than any summary. The account opens with a representation of an "Ancient Knight" (Fig. 2) and these words: A little over fifteen hundred years ago the great order of knighthood and chivalry was founded. The reason for this was the feeling on the part of the best men of that day that it was the duty of the stronger to help the weak. (237) If the date raises eyebrows—chivalry beginning in the fifth century—even some modern accounts preserve the sentiment that chivalry was beneficent and protective. Yet, as the Handbook history qualifies the picture: [End Page 1] Click for larger view Figure 1