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| Tristan | |
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| Tristan and Iseult character | |
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| In-universe information | |
| Title | Sir |
| Occupation | Knight (Knight of the Round Table in the prose tradition) |
| Family | Meliodas,Mark |
| Significantother | Iseult(s) |
| Nationality | Cornish |
Tristan (Latin/Brythonic: Drustanus;Welsh:Trystan;Italian:Tristano), also known asTristran orTristram and similar names, is thefolk hero of the legend ofTristan and Iseult.[1] While escorting the Irish princessIseult to wed Tristan's uncle, KingMark of Cornwall, Tristan and Iseult accidentally drink alove potion during the journey and fall in love, beginning an adulterous relationship that eventually leads to Tristan's banishment and death.
The character's first recorded appearance is in the 12th-century poetic tellings initiated byBéroul andThomas of Britain, which were eventually vastly expanded in the later tradition from the vastProseTristan. In later versions of his story he is featured inArthurian legend, including the seminal compilationLe Morte d'Arthur, as a greatKnight of the Round Table and friend ofLancelot.
The historical roots of Tristan are unclear; his association with Cornwall may originate from the Tristan Stone, a 6th-century granite pillar in Cornwall inscribed with the nameDrustanus (a variant ofTristan). He has been depicted in numerous historical and modern works of literature, music, and cinema.
The ancientBrittonic nameTristan appears to mean "clanking swords of iron". The more recentRomance languages version, including French, has beenparetymologically associated with "sadness", as withLatintristis "sad" orOld Frenchtriste "sad". In the GermanTristan und Isolde (1210), when his mother learns that her husband has been killed in battle, she dies in childbirth and the orphaned baby is named "Tristan" because of the sorrowful circumstances of his birth.
The quasi-historical, semi-legendaryPictish Chronicle (probably late 10th century) presents several ancientPictish kings by the name ofDrest orDrust. ThePicts are believed to have lived in present-day Scotland far to the northwest of Cornwall. The formDrustanus is merelyDrust or hypocoristicDrustan rendered into Latin. The name may have originated with an ancient legend regarding a Pictish king who slew a giant in the distant past, which had spread throughout Britaincome from a 6th-century Pictish saintDrostan who bore another form of the name,[2] or it may have migrated northwards from the southwest due to the fame of the legend ofKing Arthur. There was a Tristan who bore witness to a legal document at theSwabianAbbey of Saint Gall in 807.
The philologistSigmund Eisner came to the conclusion that the nameTristan comes from Drust, son ofTalorc. This Drust is probably otherwise unknown to us, because the sons of Pictish kings never became kings themselves.[3] According to Eisner, the legend of Tristan as we know it was gathered together by an author living inNorth Britain around the early 8th century and associated with earlyCeltic monasticism.[4] Eisner explains that Irish monks of this time would have been familiar with the Greek and Roman narratives that the legend borrows from, such asPyramus and Thisbe. They would also have been familiar with theCeltic elements of the story such as inThe Pursuit of Diarmuid and Gráinne. Eisner concludes that "the author of the Tristan story used the names and some of the local traditions of his own recent past. To these figures he attached adventures which had been handed down fromRoman andGreek mythology. He lived in the north of Britain, was associated with a monastery, and started the first rendition of the Tristan story on its travels to wherever it has been found."[4]
In the story ofTristan and Iseult, Tristan is the nephew of KingMark of Cornwall, sent to bringIseult fromIreland to wed the king. He and Iseult accidentally consume a love potion while en route and fall helplessly in love with each other.[2] The pair then undergoes numerous trials that test their secret affair, before the tragic end.[5]
Tristan made his first recorded appearance in the 12th century in British mythology circulating in the north of France and theKingdom of Brittany.[6] This region had close ancestral and cultural links with Wales, Cornwall andDevon by way of the ancient British kingdom ofDumnonia, as made clear in the story itself. The name Tristan originates from relatedCornish andBreton languages, both of which areP-Celtic likeWelsh. Although the oldest stories concerning Tristan are lost, some of the derivatives still exist.
Most early versions fall into one of two branches. The "common", more primitive branch involves the French and German poetry ofBéroul andEilhart von Oberge. The more substantial "courtly" branch is represented in the retelling byThomas of Britain'sTristan and his German successorGottfried von Strassburg, and the following works such as theFolie Tristan d'Oxford and the poems byHeinrich von Freiberg andUlrich von Türheim. Thomas draws on theRoman de Brut for historical details, and follows its example in matters of style.[7] Gottfried draws more on the learned tradition of medieval humanism than on the chivalric ethos shared by his literary contemporaries.
In the 13th century, during the great period of prose romances, theRoman de Tristan en prose, or theProseTristan, became one of the most popular works of its time. This long, sprawling, and oftenlyrical work (the modern edition takes up thirteen volumes) follows Tristan from the traditional legend into the realm of Arthur where Tristan participates in the quest for theHoly Grail. An important innovation of the novel is that Tristan, pursued by the hatred of King Mark, must take refuge in the kingdom ofLogres and the court of King Arthur. From now on, he leads the life of aknight-errant, performing the greatest chivalric exploits that place him among the best Arthurian knights. Its great success spawned many Italian (such as theTavola Ritonda) and other rewrites and influenced works. Among these was the FrenchPost-Vulgate Cycle that combined it with a shortened version of theVulgate Cycle, elements of which itself had been earlier used in the ProseTristan.
In Gottfried's version, Tristan is the son of QueenBlancheflor and King Rivalen. In the tellings since the ProseTristan, his parents are Queen Helyabel (English Elizabeth, also known as Eliabel and as Eliabella in Italy) andMeliodas, King ofLyonesse.
A son of Tristan and Iseult (Iseut) is the eponymous hero of the 14th-century French romanceYsaÿe le Triste (Ysaye the Sad).[8]I Due Tristani ("The Two Tristans"), a 1555 Italian adaptation of the SpanishDon Tristan de Leonis, features another son of Tristan,Tristan the Younger. It emphasized romantic themes, following a trend of interest in more sentimental novels.[9][10]
Thomas Malory incorporated two different versions of the ProseTristan (in a highly shortened form, cutting great most of the material) into his own English-language compilationLe Morte d'Arthur in the sectionThe Book of Sir Tristram de Lyones (The Fyrste and the Secunde Boke of Syr Trystrams de Lyones) where Tristan (whom Malory calls Tristram, originally written as Trystram) plays the role of a counter-hero toLancelot.[11] Of all the knights, Tristan most resembles Lancelot as he too loves a queen, the wife of another. Tristan is even considered to be as strong and able a knight as Lancelot, including the fulfillment ofMerlin's prophecy for the two of them to engage in the greatest duel between any knights before or after, although neither kills the other and they become beloved friends. According to Sidney M. Johnson, "the depiction of their chivalric prowess eclipses, for large sections of the narratives, their love for their respective queens."[12] His other friends and companions includeDinadan andLamorak.
In Malory's telling, following the ProseTristan, the mother of Tristan, Cornish queen Elizabeth, dies during childbirth while desperately searching for his father King Meliodas after he was kidnapped by an enchantress (of a fairy kind in the original, unspecified by Malory) to be her lover. The young Tristan meets and falls in love with the Irish princess la Belle Isolde ("the Beautiful Iseult") after killing her brother,Morholt. His uncle, King Mark, jealous of Tristan and seeking to undermine him, seeks marriage to Isolde for just such a hateful purpose, going so far as to ask Tristan to go and seek her hand on his behalf (which Tristan, understanding that to be his knightly duty, does). Because of Mark's treacherous behaviour, Tristan takes Isolde from him and lives with her for some time in Lancelot's castleJoyous Gard, but he then returns Isolde to Mark. Nonetheless, Mark ends up ambushing and mortally injuring Tristan while he is harping (Tristan is noted in the book as one of the greatest of musicians and falconers), using a lance that had been given to him by the vengeful enchantressMorgan, whose lover had been slain by Tristan.
Béroul's Norman FrenchRomance of Tristan and Iseult, possibly the earliest extant version,[13][14] is notable for its very specific geographical locations in Cornwall. Another strange aspect is Tristan's home-kingdom, Lyonesse (Leonois), for whose existence there is no evidence. However, there were two places calledLeonais: one inBrittany, the other the Old French transcription ofLothian. Regardless, Tristan being a prince of Lothian would make his name more sensible, Lothian being on the borderlands of the Pictish High-Kingship (and once a part of Pictish territory; Tristan may in fact have been a Pictish prince under a British king). There are also records of a Turstan Crectune, whose name gave the Lothian village ofCrichton its name. KingDavid I of Scotland granted lands to Turstan Crectune in 1128. One other suggestion sees Tristan as adopted into the family of Mark of Cornwall – a historical practice attested in Roman law.
Possible evidence for his roots inSouth West England is the 6th-century inscribed granite pillar known asThe Tristan Stone, orThe Longstone (Cornish:Menhir, meaninglong stone), set beside the road leading toFowey in Cornwall. It measures some 2.13 m (7 feet) in height and has been set in a modern concrete base. Until the 1980s it was in its original position some yards from the coastal road in a field near the turn down to the small harbour ofPolkerris. It was then closer toCastle Dore and may have been the origin of the association of this site with the story of the tragic love of Tristan and Iseult. There is aTau cross on one side and a Latin inscription on the other side, now much worn, reading:[15]
DRVSTANVS HIC IACIT
CVNOMORI FILIVS
[Drustanus lies here, son of Cunomorus]
It has been suggested, and is confidently asserted on the plaque by the stone, that the characters referred to are Tristan, of which Drustan is a variant and Cynvawr Latinized to Cunomorus. Cynvawr, in turn, is said by the 9th-century authorNennius, who compiled an early pseudo-historical account of King Arthur, to be identified with King Mark known in alias 'QVONOMORVS'. Around 1540,John Leland recorded a third line now missing: CVM DOMINA OUSILLA ('with the lady Ousilla': Ousilla is conceivably a latinisation of the CornishEselt), but missed the badly weathered first line ('DRUSTANVS HIC IACIT') which has ledCraig Weatherhill to speculate that this third line could have been lost by stone fracture,[16] but which has also led Goulven Peron to propose to see 'OUSILLA' as a particular reading of 'DRUSTANVS'.[17]
In 1534 appearedCoronica nueuamente emendafa y ariadida del been cavallero don Tristan de Leonis y del rey don Tristan de Leonis el joven su hijo ("Newly Revised and Expanded Chronicle of the Great Knight Sir Tristan of Leonis and His Son, King Tristan of Leonis, the Younger"), a reworking of the Libro, followed by a sequel recounting the adventures of the lovers' children, Tristan and Yseo. .... It was translated into Italian asI due Tristani ("The Two Tristans") and published in 1555 in Venice.
Amongst all the extant romances, Beroul'sTristan has a special claim on our attention not merely because it happens to be the oldest but because it comes closest to preserving what may be called the raw material of the legend.
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