Lady Bertilak is a character in the medieval poem
Sir Gawain and the Green KnightSir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late 14th-century Middle English alliterative romance outlining an adventure of Sir Gawain, a knight of King Arthur's Round Table. In the poem, Sir Gawain accepts a challenge from a mysterious warrior who is completely green, from his clothes and hair to his...
. She is ordered by her husband, the
Green KnightThe Green Knight is a character in the 14th-century Arthurian poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and the related work The Greene Knight. His true name is revealed to be Bercilak de Hautdesert in Sir Gawain, while The Greene Knight names him "Bredbeddle"...
, or Lord Bertilak, to test Sir Gawain's purity.
Analysis
The lady of the house, Lady Bercilak, is one of the most important characters in the poem
Sir Gawain and the Green KnightSir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late 14th-century Middle English alliterative romance outlining an adventure of Sir Gawain, a knight of King Arthur's Round Table. In the poem, Sir Gawain accepts a challenge from a mysterious warrior who is completely green, from his clothes and hair to his...
. In company, she always appears with a
croneThe crone is a stock character in folklore and fairy tale, an old woman who is usually disagreeable, malicious, or sinister in manner, often with magical or supernatural associations that can make her either helpful or obstructing. She is marginalized by her exclusion from the reproductive cycle,...
beside her (who later turns out to be Gawain's aunt). The two women bracket feminine vulnerability and strength, in youth and age, and they are always together. The master of the manor (Bercilak) insists that Gawain socialize freely and sit between the two women at their dinners, and Gawain finds them most hospitable.
However, she comes alone to Gawain's chambers on three mornings in a row, each time in a more alluring form, with her last appearance being with a simple gown, her hair uncovered, and without
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. Each time, she comes to Gawain's bed around dawn, when Gawain is sleeping, and she plays elaborately witty games of courtship and seduction with him. She is not quite what one may expect from a lady of a household. Her “active sexual role is hardly more representative of romance heroines than of real medieval women.” Claiming one hundred and twenty two lines of speech, she plays a quintessential role in testing Sir Gawain’s honour, loyalty, and most importantly his honesty through her sexual innuendoes, where she becomes “a potent threat to the exclusively masculine code of knightly behaviour.” Most interesting about these scenes is the dilemma Sir Gawain faces, where he must be courteous to Lady Bertilak (Knightly Code), and at the same time he must be loyal to his host. The twist occurs when Sir Gawain realizes that Lady Bertilak has been used as a tool of seduction, by her husband, in order to test Sir Gawain. This betrayal leads Sir Gawain to a twenty-one line “attack of all women for their deceptiveness and treachery.” Her character proves to be the most imperative role in the poem, for without her, the scheme against Sir Gawain would have not transpired.