Sir
Thomas Malory
Le
Morte Darthur is undoubtedly the last definitive interpretation of the
Arthurian myth before the dawn of the English Renaissance. Yet the
identity of its author, Sir Thomas Malory, the knight prisoner, remains as
elusive and as mysterious as the knights who inhabit his book. How can the
extoller of knightly honor, courtly love and chivalric duty be himself
accused of robbery, extortion, attempted murder and rape -- felonious acts
which belie those noble sentiments expressed throughout the pages of the Morte?
So the question arises -- who is the historical Sir Thomas Malory and
how can we account for the massive discrepancy between the man and his
work?
Sir Thomas Malory of Newbold Revel in
Warwickshire "was born into a gentry family that had lived for
centuries in the English Midlands near the point where Warwickshire,
Leicestershire, and Northamptonshire meet. His father, John Malory, was an
esquire with land in all three counties, but was primarily a Warwickshire
man, being twice sheriff, five times M.P. and for many years a justice of
the peace for that county. John married Philippa Chetwynd... and they had
at least three daughters, and one son, Thomas, who was probably born
within a year either way of 1416" (Field 115).
Of Sir Thomas Malory¡¦s early years,
"almost nothing is known." As a young man of 23, records
reveal that he was a "respectable country landowner with a growing
interest in politics" (115). He "dealt in land, witnessed deeds
for his neighbours, acted as a parliamentary elector, and by 1441 had
become a knight" (115). As P.J.C.Field notes: "In late medieval
England, taking up knighthood could be expensive, and doing so may imply
political and social ambition" (115). Sir Thomas married Elizabeth
Walsh of Wanlip in Leicestershire, who later bore him a son, Robert.
Perhaps something of the mythically infamous rogue breaks through this
concordant scene when in 1443, Malory was "charged with wounding and
imprisoning Thomas Smith and stealing his goods, but the charge apparently
fell through" (115). However, in 1445, he "was elected M.P. for
Warwickshire" and served "on commissions to assess
tax-exemptions in the county" (115).
The year 1449 "was a time of
increasing division and unrest in the country, which was eventually to
lead to civil war" (116). Up to this time, Malory¡¦s life seems to
have all the markings of a traditional country gentleman, but then
"with the new decade," observes Field, "Malory¡¦s life,
for no known reason, underwent a startling change" (116). What this
change entailed is obvious from the following account, but the impetus
behind it remains enigmatic, although party politics, as usual, may have
played a pivotal role.
On January 4, 1450, "[Malory] and 26
other armed men were said to have laid an ambush for [the Duke of]
Buckingham in the Abbot of Combe's woods near Newbold Revel" (116).
On May 23, 1450, Malory
"allegedly rapes Joan Smith at Coventry. The charge is not of
abduction but of rape in the modern sense: it says cum ea carnaliter
concubit, ¡¥he carnally lay with her.¡¦ It was, however, brought not
by Joan under common law, but by her husband under a statute of Richard II
intended to make elopement into rape even when the woman consented"
(121).
On May 31, 1450, Malory "allegedly
extorts money by threats from two residents of Monks Kirby" (121).
On August 6, 1450 Malory "allegedly
rapes Joan Smith again and steals 40 pounds worth of goods from her
husband in Coventry" (121).
On August 31, 1450, Malory "allegedly
commits extortion from a third Monks Kirby resident"(121).
On March 5, 1451, a warrant is issued for
his arrest, and a few weeks later "he and various accomplices were
alleged to have stolen cattle in Warwickshire -- 7 cows, 2 calves, 335
sheep, and a cart worth 22 pounds at Cosford, Warwickshire (116-22).
Buckingham, taking with him 60 men from Warwickshire, attempts to
apprehend Malory, but "in the meantime Malory apparently raided
Buckingham's hunting lodge, killed his deer, and did an enormous amount of
damage" -- 500 pounds worth (116-22).
Malory was finally "arrested and
imprisoned at Coleshill, but after two days escaped by swimming the moat
[at night]. He then reportedly twice raided Combe Abbey with a large band
of [one hundred] men, breaking down doors, insulting the monks, and
stealing a great deal of money" (116-22). By January 1452, Malory
"was in prison in London, where he spent most of the next eight years
waiting for a trial that never came" (116).
Yet Malory¡¦s adventures continued. He was
"bailed out several times, and on one occasion seems to have joined
an old crony on a horse-stealing expedition across East Anglia that ended
in Colchester jail. He escaped from there too, ¡¥using swords, daggers,
and langues-de-boeuf¡¦ (a kind of halberd), but was recaptured and
returned to prison in London. After this date he was shifted frequently
from prison to prison, and the penalties put on his jailers for his secure
keeping reached a record for medieval England" (116-7).
"During Henry VI's insanity, when
the Duke of York was Lord Protector, Malory was given a royal
pardon," which the court dismissed. Once the Yorkists invaded in 1460
and had expelled the Lancastrians, Malory was "freed and pardoned. He
was never tried on any of the charges brought against him" (117).
Malory repaid his deliverers by taking
"part in Edward IV and the Earl of Warwick's expedition against the
castles of Alnwick, Bamburgh, and Dunstanborough..., which the
Lancastrians had seized. The castles were taken, and Malory settled down
to a more peaceful life" (117-26).
Yet, Malory seems to have "changed
sides" once more. In 1468 and again in 1470, "he was named in
lists of irreconcilable Lancastrians who were excluded from royal pardons
for any crimes they might have committed. Most of those excluded were at
liberty; but the Morte Darthur shows us that Malory was in prison,
completing his work" (117).
In October 1470, when the Lancastrians
returned to power, "among their first acts was freeing those of their
party who were in London prisons. Six months later, Sir Thomas Malory of
Newbold Revel died and was buried under a marble tombstone in Greyfriars,
Newgate, which, despite its proximity to one of the jails in which he had
been imprisoned, was the most fashionable church in London. On the day of
Malory's death, King Edward landed in Yorkshire, and two months later the
Yorkists were back in power" (11 7).
Although "the original tombstone was
destroyed, ... its inscription survives in this early sixteenth-century
transcript, which calls [Malory] valens miles (¡¥a valiant
knight¡¦) of the parish of Monks Kirby in Warwickshire and says he died
on 14 March 1470, which (since the year began on 25 March) is what is now
called 1471" (126). And so, the ambiguity, contradiction, and paradox
which surround the man remain.
Work Cited
Field, P.J.C. "Malory¡¦s Life Records." A Companion to
Malory. Ed. Elizabeth Archibald and
A.S.G. Edwards. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1996. 115-30.
(Source: Sir
Thomas Malory Society)
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