"The Boy and the Mantle" is
Child ballad number 29, (Roud #3961) an
Arthurian
King Arthur ( cy, Brenin Arthur, kw, Arthur Gernow, br, Roue Arzhur) is a legendary king of Britain, and a central figure in the medieval literary tradition known as the Matter of Britain.
In the earliest traditions, Arthur appears as a ...
story.
Unlike the ballads before it, and like "
King Arthur and King Cornwall" and "
The Marriage of Sir Gawain
"The Marriage of Sir Gawain" is an English Arthurian ballad, collected as Child Ballad 31. Found in the Percy Folio, it is a fragmented account of the story of Sir Gawain and the loathly lady, which has been preserved in fuller form in the medie ...
" immediately after it in the collection, this is not a folk ballad but a song from professional minstrels.
Synopsis
A boy comes to
King Arthur's court with an
enchanted mantle that can not be worn by an unfaithful wife.
Guinevere dons it, and so does every other lady in the court; only one can wear it, and only after she confesses to kissing her husband before their marriage. Other boys also bring a wild boar, that can not be cut by a cuckold's knife, and a cup that a cuckold can not drink from without spilling it, and these also reveal that every wife at court has been unfaithful.
Motifs
The magical test of fidelity which virtually every woman fails is a common motif, being found first in
fabliau
A ''fabliau'' (; plural ''fabliaux'') is a comic, often anonymous tale written by jongleurs in northeast France between c. 1150 and 1400. They are generally characterized by sexual and scatological obscenity, and by a set of contrary attitudesâ ...
and romances, such as ''
The Faerie Queene
''The Faerie Queene'' is an English epic poem by Edmund Spenser. Books IIII were first published in 1590, then republished in 1596 together with books IVVI. ''The Faerie Queene'' is notable for its form: at over 36,000 lines and over 4,000 sta ...
'', where Florimel's girdle fits the pattern, and ''
Amadis of Gaul'', where no one unfaithful to his or her first love can pass an archway.
[Francis James Child, ''The English and Scottish Popular Ballads'', v 1, p 256-67, Dover Publications, New York 1965]
See also
*
List of the Child Ballads
The Child Ballads is the colloquial name given to a collection of 305 ballads collected in the 19th century by Francis James Child
Francis James Child (February 1, 1825 – September 11, 1896) was an American scholar, educator, and folklorist, ...
References
Arthurian literature in English
Child Ballads
Year of song unknown
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