MEDIEVAL CHIVALRY Dr. Richard Abels, The United States Naval Academy Medieval chivalry is best defined as an aristocratic ethos that prescribed what qualities and attributes a knight ought to possess, and which helped distinguish the military aristocracy of Western Europe in the twelfth through fifteenth centuries from rich commoners and identify them as a social elite. Rather than think of it as an established code, it is best to envision chivalry as an evolving and disputed ethos that lacked a single agreed upon meaning. Medieval chivalry, or at least the nineteenth-century understanding of it, has influenced modern, romantic conceptions of honor, especially military honor. Marine Corps seems especially attune to this, as evidenced by its recruiting commercials: Once there were men who knew the meaning of honor [visual: closeup of a knight and his sword]--there still are, the Marines! [knights sword becomes Marine sword, closeup of a Marine]. The ideal of chivalry has attracted generations of young people to the military life. It underlies such movies as An Officer and a Gentleman, Top Gun, and even Rambo. Chivalry, in each of its incarnations, is an ethical system that emphasizes personal honor. As Maurice Keen wrote: the most important legacy of chivalry to later times was its conception of honour ... Transaction of honour, a contemporary anthropologist has said, provide ... a nexus between the ideals of society and their reproduction in the actions of individuals--honour commits men to act as they should... Chivalrys most profound influence lay in just this, in setting the seal of approbation on norms of conduct, recognized as noble when reproduced in individual act and style. (Chivalry 249) Chivalry helped fashion the nineteenth-century ideal of the gentleman, in which concepts of courtliness/courtesy, skills in games and war, courage (especially in combat), loyalty to friends, personal honor (public approbation/esteem tied to the avoidance of anything shameful and commitment to doing the right thing, even if it meant risking life and limb), the idea of the constant quest to improve on achievement (M. Keen 15), and individualism were tied together. Chivalry also shaped one aspect of romantic love: the idea that the male could win/be worthy of his lady love by winning approbation through noble/honorable acts.
Posted on: Tue, 03 Dec 2013 14:51:27 +0000
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