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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
A 4 page paper which compares and contrasts the two medieval considerations of love and marriage. Bibliography lists 4 sources.
Page Count:
4 pages (~225 words per page)
File: TG15_TGwifgaw.rtf
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Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
Marriage, Medieval Style by Tracy Gregory, November 2001 -- properly! Back in the days of King
Arthur and the Round Table, medieval society dictated that men and women were supposed to act in a certain way. Men were expected to be chivalrous, heroic and noble,
while women were expected to be docile, obedient, and most of all, breathtakingly beautiful. At least these are the perceptions offered by two works of the fourteenth century, Geoffrey
Chaucers "The Wife of Baths Tale" featured in the collection The Canterbury Tales, and the anonymously-written text, "The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnell(e)." Both works are satirical
examinations of the medieval concept of courtly love, or the rules and regulations that dictated male and female behavior both in society and in their personal lives. The similarities between
the two works are uncanny, to put it mildly. In "The Wife of Baths Tale," a knight has been convicted of rape, and his fate is in the hands
of King Arthurs wife, Queen Guinevere. Rather than carrying out the immediate punishment of death, Guinevere decides to give the knight a temporary reprieve. She gave him one
year and one day to determine what a woman desires. If he was able to successfully answer the Queens riddle, his life would be spared. The knight immediately
set off on his quest, and is told by the first woman he meets that, "A man shall win us best with flatterye" (76). The knight, skeptical, seeks other
responses. Another woman claimed that women really desired to be trusted to keep a secret, but the knight remained unconvinced that this was a collective desire shared by all
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