Carrefours idéologiques de la royauté arthurienne

Abstract

Studying four passages from Erec et Enide, the Continuation Gauvain, the Didot-Perceval and the Mort le roi Artu, this article tries to understand the relations between the king and his counsellors and to apprehend the ideological components of the "arthurian" ideology: the indo-european, the Christian and the feudal. We can thus consider that the harmony of Arthur's court is very different from a mere feudal consensus. The king, essentially truthful, stands for the consciousness and the display of a universal order which transcends the socio-political one although it takes the latter's appearance. That is why Arthur would lose his true nature if he had a spécifie will-power. So, when the individual aspirations begin to develop, the system gets out of order. The end of the enchantments characterizes the transition from the idéal to the historical and feudal reality: the arthurian kingship is therefore doomed.