Tuesday, March 17, 2015

A Fine and Terrible Mystery - Episode 7: Special Forces


This is episode 7 in a series of posts researching the mystery of the dramatic life of Sir Thomas Malory, author of Le Mort d’Arthur.  Episode 1 can be found here.
 
Mark Bowden’s 1999 important and tragic history Black Hawk Down snapshots the US military at a critical period of transition.  He implicitly captures the rise of the small, modern special forces unit, the practical necessity such units meet, and  the stress they placed on larger, conventionally organized parts of the military and their culture at the time.  Within such units, rank and chain of command were less important and relevant than the flexible, varying organization and strategy such units adopted internally to accomplish their difficult missions.  Outwardly, their sometime disregard for military rules of dress and grooming was a source of stress for officers working to maintain traditional standards.



The 15th century was also a period of military transition.  At Agincourt in 1415, Henry V’s army consisted of 5,000 archers and 900 men-at-arms of which as many as 10% were knights.   Later, in 1439, the Earl of Huntingdon’s expedition to recover Gascony, which Sir Thomas Malory could have participated in, consisted of 2,009 archers, 300 men-at-arms of which 2 were knight bannerets and 6 were knights, roughly 3%.  Since Crecy the percentages of knights and men-at-arms generally in English armies was declining.  There were multiple reasons.  Knights were required to maintain at least £40 per year of property income and to be equivalently compensated for military service whereas an esquire was compensated at £18 for performing the same tactical role.  And there may have been a cultural issue as well.  Beverly Kennedy in Knighthood in the Morte Darthur contrasts two views of late medieval knighthood.  In Libro del orden de caballeria, Ramon Lull sees knighthood as a divinely ordained office as old as human society itself with independent social  obligations for rule and judgment as well as the military obligations.  In contrast, Christine de Pizan provides very practical advice in Livre des fais d’armes et de la chevalerie for participating as a member of a contemporary medieval force and filling a functional military role.  Knights were complicated with ambiguous, changing moral and ethical responsibilities.  Knights may have had unique value as officers but esquires were probably more adaptable and easier to command.

This is important context for Sir Thomas Malory.  His father had acquired a distraint of knighthood to relieve himself of the obligation.  In contrast, Sir Thomas’ pursuit of knighthood, which he finally achieved sometime around the age of 39, was not a social obligation, nor was it implicit for someone in his social situation but it was an apparent life goal.  There are many possible motivations, including the pursuit of status, but, for what it’s worth, status alone is rarely the motivation for knighthood in Le Mort d’Arthur:  more often it is a platform for service and accomplishment, which Lull would have fully understood.  This is clear, but circumstantial evidence of Malory possessing a personal sense of noblesse oblige.

William Caxton, who published Le Mort d’Arthur also published Ramon Lull and Christine de Pizan, chivalric luminaries.  He was very careful to publish authors of whose audience he was confident.  Caxton’s choice to include Malory in his select company may also be circumstantial evidence alluding to his character.
 
Previously, I’ve mentioned Eric Jager’s The Last Duel, the story of the last judicial combat to the death in France.  Interestingly, it was between a knight and man-at-arms and the issue under such terrible arbitration was the rape of a woman.  The coincidences and social parallels and contrasts with the accusations against Malory deserve more time and I’ll come back to it in future posts.


Episode 8 is here

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