Morgause, known in earlier works as
Anna, is the sister or half-sister of
King ArthurKing Arthur is a legendary British leader who, according to medieval histories and romances, led the defense of Britain against the Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and his historical existence is debated...
in the Arthurian legend. In her earliest appearance she is Arthur's full sister by
Uther PendragonUther Pendragon is a legendary king of sub-Roman Britain and the father of King Arthur.A few minor references to Uther appear in Old Welsh poems, but his biography was first written down by Geoffrey of Monmouth in his Historia Regum Britanniae , and Geoffrey's account of the character was used in...
and
IgraineIn Arthurian legend, Igraine is the mother of King Arthur. She becomes the wife of Uther Pendragon, but her first husband was Gorlois; her daughters...
; and is the mother of the heroic
GawainGawain is King Arthur's nephew and a Knight of the Round Table who appears very early in the Arthurian legend's development. He is one of a select number of Round Table members to be referred to as the greatest knight, most notably in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight...
and the villainous
MordredMordred or Modred is a character in the Arthurian legend, known as a notorious traitor who fought King Arthur at the Battle of Camlann, where he was killed and Arthur fatally wounded. Tradition varies on his relationship to Arthur, but he is best known today as Arthur's illegitimate son by his...
. In later works she is the daughter of Igraine by her first husband,
GorloisGorlois was a Duke of Cornwall and Igraine's first husband before her marriage to Uther Pendragon, according to the Arthurian legend. Later versions give him a number of children, the most famous of which are Elaine, Morgause or Anna, and Morgan le Fay....
, and she becomes pregnant with Mordred after sleeping with Arthur while they were unaware of their relation.
Morgause, known in earlier works as
Anna, is the sister or half-sister of
King ArthurKing Arthur is a legendary British leader who, according to medieval histories and romances, led the defense of Britain against the Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and his historical existence is debated...
in the Arthurian legend. In her earliest appearance she is Arthur's full sister by
Uther PendragonUther Pendragon is a legendary king of sub-Roman Britain and the father of King Arthur.A few minor references to Uther appear in Old Welsh poems, but his biography was first written down by Geoffrey of Monmouth in his Historia Regum Britanniae , and Geoffrey's account of the character was used in...
and
IgraineIn Arthurian legend, Igraine is the mother of King Arthur. She becomes the wife of Uther Pendragon, but her first husband was Gorlois; her daughters...
; and is the mother of the heroic
GawainGawain is King Arthur's nephew and a Knight of the Round Table who appears very early in the Arthurian legend's development. He is one of a select number of Round Table members to be referred to as the greatest knight, most notably in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight...
and the villainous
MordredMordred or Modred is a character in the Arthurian legend, known as a notorious traitor who fought King Arthur at the Battle of Camlann, where he was killed and Arthur fatally wounded. Tradition varies on his relationship to Arthur, but he is best known today as Arthur's illegitimate son by his...
. In later works she is the daughter of Igraine by her first husband,
GorloisGorlois was a Duke of Cornwall and Igraine's first husband before her marriage to Uther Pendragon, according to the Arthurian legend. Later versions give him a number of children, the most famous of which are Elaine, Morgause or Anna, and Morgan le Fay....
, and she becomes pregnant with Mordred after sleeping with Arthur while they were unaware of their relation. Her husband is
King LotLot or Loth is king of Lothian, Orkney, and sometimes Norway in the Arthurian legend. He is King Arthur's brother-in-law and early enemy. The character is possibly derived from a historical personage....
, an enemy of Arthur in the rebellions following Arthur's coronation.
Her other siblings include sisters
Elaine-Elaine of Carbonek:Elaine of Carbonek is the daughter of Pelles, the Fisher King and Lord of Carbonek...
and
Morgan le FayMorgan le Fay, alternatively known as Morgane, Morgaine, Morgana and other variants, is a powerful sorceress in the Arthurian legend. Early works featuring Morgan do not elaborate her character beyond her role as a fay or magician...
. The later material gives her five children, all sons, while earlier works named daughters as well. From eldest to youngest, the sons of Morgause are
GawainGawain is King Arthur's nephew and a Knight of the Round Table who appears very early in the Arthurian legend's development. He is one of a select number of Round Table members to be referred to as the greatest knight, most notably in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight...
, who becomes one of King Arthur's greatest knights, Agravaine, a wretched traitor,
GaherisGaheris is a figure of Arthurian legend, a knight of the Round Table, and a son of Morgause and King Lot of Orkney and Lothian. His brothers are Gawain, Agravaine, Gareth and Mordred, a half-brother. His mother is a daughter of Gorlois and Igraine, and a sister of Elaine and Morgan le Fay...
,
GarethSir Gareth - Knight of the Round Table in Arthurian Legend. He was the youngest son of Lot and of Morgause, King Arthur's half-sister, thus making him Arthur's nephew, as well as brother to Gawain, Agravaine, Gaheris, and half brother of Mordred...
, a gentle and loving knight, and Mordred, her son with Arthur. Her children play key roles in the story of Arthur and his kingdom. She is active in
Thomas MalorySir Thomas Malory was an English writer, the author or compiler of Le Morte d'Arthur. The antiquary John Leland believed him to be Welsh, but most modern scholarship assumes that he was Sir Thomas Malory of Newbold Revel in Warwickshire...
's
Le Morte d'ArthurLe Morte d'Arthur is Sir Thomas Malory's compilation of some French and English Arthurian romances...
, and the
VulgateThe Lancelot-Grail, also known as the Prose Lancelot, the Vulgate Cycle, or the Pseudo-Map Cycle, is a major source of Arthurian legend written in French. It is a series of five prose volumes that tell the story of the quest for the Holy Grail and the romance of Lancelot and Guinevere...
and Post-Vulgate versions of
Merlin.
In
Le Morte d'Arthur and the Post-Vulgate, her husband is killed by King Pellinore in battle, starting a blood feud between the families of Pellinore and Lot. Pellinore is killed by Gawain and Gaheris, and Morgause later has an affair with
LamorakLamorak is a Knight of the Round Table in Arthurian legend. He is the son of King Pellinore and the brother of Tor, Aglovale, Percival, the Grail maiden Dindrane and sometimes others. He makes his first appearance in the Prose Tristan, and shows up in later works like the Post-Vulgate Cycle and Sir...
, son of Pellinore and one of the best knights of the
Round TableThe Round Table is King Arthur's famed table in the Arthurian legend, around which he and his Knights congregate. As its name suggests, it has no head, implying that everyone who sits there has equal status. The table was first described in 1155 by Wace, who relied on previous depictions of...
. Her son Gaheris catches them together, and kills Morgause in bed, though he lets Lamorak go. Thinking it is Lamorak who killed their mother, Gawain, Agravain, and Mordred (Gareth takes no part) join Gaheris to ambush Lamorak and kill him. The brothers do eventually find out that Gaheris was the real killer, and he is banished from the court (though he appears later in the narrative).
In modern variations, Morgause's character is sometimes combined with Morgan le Fay's, and her role as the mother of Mordred is transferred to Morgan.
T. H. WhiteTerence Hanbury White was an English author best known for his sequence of Arthurian novels, The Once and Future King, first published together in 1958.-Biography:...
named one of the four volumes in
The Once and Future KingThe Once and Future King is an Arthurian fantasy novel written by T. H. White. It was first published in 1958 and is mostly a composite of earlier works....
,
The Queen of Air and DarknessThe Queen of Air and Darkness, originally titled The Witch in the Wood, is a novel by English writer T. H. White. It is the second book in his epic work, The Once and Future King...
, in reference to Morgause, who is a major figure in the book. A later section deals with Morgause's death at the hands of her own son; White transfers the crime to Agravaine rather than Gaheris.
Marion Zimmer BradleyMarion Eleanor Zimmer Bradley was an American author of fantasy novels such as The Mists of Avalon and the Darkover series, often with a feminist outlook. Her first child, David R...
in her novel
The Mists of AvalonThe Mists of Avalon is a 1982 novel by Marion Zimmer Bradley, in which she relates the Arthurian legends from the perspective of the female characters.-Plot introduction:...
made Morgause the sister of
IgraineIn Arthurian legend, Igraine is the mother of King Arthur. She becomes the wife of Uther Pendragon, but her first husband was Gorlois; her daughters...
and Viviane and the aunt of Morgan le Fay. After Morgaine delivers
MordredMordred or Modred is a character in the Arthurian legend, known as a notorious traitor who fought King Arthur at the Battle of Camlann, where he was killed and Arthur fatally wounded. Tradition varies on his relationship to Arthur, but he is best known today as Arthur's illegitimate son by his...
, Morgause takes Mordred as a foster child and rears him for Morgaine. In the film adaptation, Morgause attempts to kill the child until she tricks Morgaine into revealing
MordredMordred or Modred is a character in the Arthurian legend, known as a notorious traitor who fought King Arthur at the Battle of Camlann, where he was killed and Arthur fatally wounded. Tradition varies on his relationship to Arthur, but he is best known today as Arthur's illegitimate son by his...
's parentage. She then decides to raise him as her own, thus taking on the role of mother to the infant.
In
Gerald MorrisGerald Morris is an American author. Morris is known for his series of stories for preteen and teen readers based in the Middle Ages during the time of King Arthur...
's
Squire's Tale series she is the widow of King Lot, mother of his four sons, and an
incarnationIncarnation which literally means embodied in flesh or taking on flesh, refers to the conception and birth of a sentient creature who is the material manifestation of an entity or force whose original nature is immaterial....
or
avatarIn Hinduism, Avatar or Avatara usually implies a deliberate descent from higher spiritual realms to lower realms of existence for special purposes, often translated into English as incarnation.Avatars that are of importance are mainly those of the Supreme Being...
of "the Enchantress," bent on ruling the world of men by removing the world's kings and princes. She is defeated at the end of the first book,
The Squire's Tale, by Sir Gawain's squire; in a subsequent book,
The Princess, the Crone, and the Dung-Cart Knight, she is revealed to be still alive and still plotting.
In
Patricia Kennealy-MorrisonPatricia Kennealy-Morrison is an American author of rock criticism, an autobiography, and science fiction/fantasy novels. Most of her books are part of her series, The Keltiad. She has also published in anthologies and periodicals...
's
KeltiadThe Keltiad is a body of fantasy works written by Patricia Kennealy-Morrison. Currently there are eight novels in the series.The books are set in a star system far from our own, where various Celtic peoples emigrated after the rise of Christianity and the purge of the Old Religion that followed...
, she appears as the evil Marguessan, attempted usurper of the Throne of Scone and twin sister to Morgan.