Arthurian Legends

Simplified Plots to Arthurian Legends

We looked at the plots of Arthurian legends to see if their were any similarities between the tales of the various Knights. The children picked out common elements like the quest was often for a holy/magical item or to rescue someone and that the Knight in the story often didn't follow the code of chivalry and so he failed to complete his quest. Two example plots are given below.

Sir Gawain and the Holy Grail

Jealous knight Sir Gawain set out to find the Holy Grail.

He rode through land but couldn't find any adventures. Nothing happened. It was really boring.
One day he came across a castle guarded by seven knights. Because he was bored Gawain picked a fight with them and ended up killing all seven.

He came across a monastery and met a monk there. He bragged to this monk about how good a knight he was and that he'd killed the seven knights he'd met earlier. The monk wasn't impressed at all and sent him on his way.
What Gawain didn't know was that the monastery he'd been in was the very one that held the Holy Grail. By being boastful he had missed his opportunity to get his hands on it and bring it back to Camelot.

Gawain spent the rest of his life wandering around looking for the Holy Grail. He kept getting into fights with anyone he met and one day he accidentally killed his brother!

Sir and the Holy Spear

Sir Varlan went on a quest to find the Holly Spear to help King Arthur defeat his enemies.

He met a king fishing by a river bank. The Fisher King invited Sir Varlan back to have dinner with him.
Rule: Knights should take off their armour and sword before sitting down to eat. Sir Varlan had done so.
A knight with a dragon on his shield barged into Sir Varlan at the table and started insulting him.
Sir Varlan got angry and attacked the knight.
Varlan didn't have a sword or armour. The dragon knight was wearing his.
Varlan looked round and grabbed a spear that he saw behind the throne. The Fisher King told him not to use it.
Varlan didn't listen. He attacked the dragon knight with the spear. As he attacked him the spear broke.
There was a flash of light and Varlan found himself on the riverbank with the broken spear. The spear was the one that he had been looking for!

Varlan had to return to Camelot. He had found the spear but, because he hadn't listened to the Fisher King, he had broken it and made it useless.