Set in medieval England—a time and place where society greatly valued knightly heroism—and borrowing from the conventions of medieval chivalric romance, Ivanhoe spends a great deal of time examining the values of men like Wilfred of Ivanhoe, King Richard (the Black Knight), Sir Brian de Bois-Guilbert, and Maurice De Bracy. At one point or other, each one explains what he believes in and what he fights for. And although there are general points of agreement in their value systems—for example, showing courage and loyalty, honoring one’s promises, and celebrating love as a high virtue—there are yet more points of disagreement. And sometimes supposedly good values, like religious faith, lead to bad outcomes like holy wars and religious persecution. By allowing its characters to debate the meaning and value of chivalry and by dramatizing its failures, the book develops a vivid and dynamic picture of chivalry that is neither wholly good nor wholly corrupt.
On the one hand, chivalry fosters noble values. It can encourage mercy, as when King Richard exiles and imprisons Prince John, De Bracy, and Waldemar Fitzurse rather than executing them. It encourages the powerful and virtuous, like Ivanhoe, to defend the weak and persecuted, like Isaac and Rebecca. And it channels the potential for violence among a deeply divided nobility into the pageantry and display of tournaments rather than frequent civil wars. But on the other hand, its alleged values sometimes turn into vices: violence, pride, and ambition underwrite the entire system, leading to religious wars like the crusades; and underwriting abuses of power by men who, like Sir Brian and the Templars, believe their strength allows them to take what they want, from beautiful women to political power. Simply put, Ivanhoe argues that chivalry has merit as a set of ideals, but that the values are only as good (or bad) as the person who holds them. And, by portraying a genuine, unresolved debate about the merits of chivalry, the book suggests that a just and stable world requires ongoing, intentional debate and effort. No system—of government, of morals, of love ethics, or anything else—should be accepted blindly as the only solution to bringing order to the world.
Related Themes from Other Texts
The Merits of Chivalry ThemeTracker
The Merits of Chivalry Quotes in Ivanhoe
“By St Dunstan,” answered Gurth, “thou speakest but sad truths; little is left to us but the air we breathe, and that appears to have been reserved with much hesitation, clearly for the purpose of enabling us to endure the tasks they lay upon our shoulders. The finest and fattest is for their board; the loveliest is for their couch; the best and bravest supply their foreign masters with soldiers, and whiten distant land with their bones, leaving few here who have either will or power to protect the unfortunate Saxon. God’s blessing on our master Cedric, he hath done the work of a man in standing in the gap; but Reginald Front-de-Boeuf is coming down to this country in person, and we shall soon see how little Cedric’s trouble will avail him.”
“I would soon have beat him into courtesy,” observed Brian; “I am accustomed to deal with such spirits: Our Turkish captives are as fierce and intractable as Odin himself could have been; yet two months in my household, under the management of my master of slaves, has made them humble, submissive, serviceable, and observant of your will. Marry, sir, you must beware of the poison and the dagger, for they use either with free will when you give them the slightest opportunity.”
“Aye, but,” answered Prior Aymer, “every land hath its own manners and fashions; and, besides that beating this fellow could procure us no information could respecting the road to Cedric’s house, it would have been sure to have established a quarrel betwixt you and him had we found our way thither.”
While Isaac thus stood an outcast in the present society, like his people among the nations, looking in vain for welcome or resting place, the Pilgrim who sat by the chimney took compassion upon him, and resigned his seat, saying briefly, “Old man, my garments are dried, my hunger is appeased, thou art both wet and fasting.” So saying, he gathered together, and brought to a flame, the decaying brands which lay scattered on the ample hearth; took form the larger board a mess of pottage and seethed kid, placed it upon the small table at which he himself had supped, and without waiting the Jew’s thanks, went to the other side of the hall;—whether from unwillingness to hold more close communication with the object of his benevolence, or from a wish to draw near to the upper end of the table, seemed uncertain.
“Ay,” answered Isaac, “but if the tyrant lays hold on them as he did to-day and compels me to smile while he is robbing me—O daughter, disinherited and wandering as we are, the worst evil that befalls our race is, that when we are wronged and plundered, all the world laughs around, and we are compelled to suppress our sense of injury and to smile tamely, when we should revenge bravely.”
“Think not thus of it, my father,” said Rebecca; “we also have advantages. These Gentiles, cruel and oppressive as they are, are in some sort dependent on the dispersed children of Zion, whom they despise and persecute. Without the aid of our wealth, they could neither furnish forth their hosts in war, nor their triumphs in peace; and the gold which we lend them returns with increase to our coffers.”
Meantime the clang of the blows, and the shouts of the combatants, mixed fearfully with the sound of the trumpets, and drowned the groans of those who fell, and lay rolling defenseless beneath the feet of the horses. The splendid armor of the combatants was now faced with dust and blood, and gave way at every stroke of the sword and battle-axe. The gay plumage, shorn from the crests, drifted upon the breeze like snow-flakes. All that was beautiful and graceful in the marital array had disappeared, and what was now visible was only calculated to awake terror or compassion.
Yet such is the force of habit, that not only the vulgar spectators, who are naturally attracted by sights of horror, but even the ladies who crowded the galleries, saw the conflict with thrilling interest certainly, but without a wish to withdraw their eyes from a sight so terrible.
[I]t was the misfortune of this Prince, that his levity and petulance were perpetually breaking out, and undoing all that had been gained by his previous dissimulation.
Of this fickle temper he gave a memorable example in Ireland […]. Upon this occasion, the Irish chieftains contended which should first offer to the young Prince their loyal homage and the kiss of peace. But, instead of receiving their salutations with courtesy, John and his petulant attendants could not resist the temptation of pulling the long beards of the Irish chieftains, a conduct which, as might have been expected, was highly resented by these insulted dignitaries, and produced fatal consequences to the English domination of Ireland.
No spider ever took more pains to repair the shattered meshes of his web, than did Waldemar Fitzurse to reunite and combine the scattered members of Prince John’s cabal. Few of these were attached to him from inclination, and none from personal attachment. It was therefore necessary […to] open to them new prospects of advantage, and remind them of those which they presently enjoyed. To the young and wild nobles, he held out the prospect of unpunished license and uncontrolled revelry; to the ambitions, that of power, and to the covetous, that of increased wealth and extended domains. The leaders of the mercenaries received a donation in gold; an argument most persuasive to their minds, and without which all others would have proved in vain. Promises were still more liberally distributed than money by this active agent; […] nothing was left undone that could determine the wavering, or animate the disheartened.
Joy to the fair! whose constant knight
Her favour fired to feats of might;
Unnoted shall she not remain
Where meet the bright and noble train;
Minstrel shall sing and herald tell—
‘Mark yonder maid of beauty well,
’Tis she for whose bright eyes was won
The listed field at Ascalon!
‘Note well her smile!—it edged the blade
Which fifty wives to widows made,
When, vain his strength and Mahound’s spell,
Iconium’s turban’d soldan fell.
See’st thou her locks, whose sunny glow
Half shows, half shades, her neck of snow?
Twines not of them one golden thread,
But for its sake a Paynim bled.’
Joy to the fair!—my name unknown,
Each deed, and all its praise, thine own;
Then, oh! Unbar this churlish gate,
The night-dew falls, the hour is late,
Inured to Syria’s glowing breath,
I feel the north breeze chill as death;
Let grateful love quell maiden shame,
And grant him bliss who brings thee fame.
“By the mass, thou meanest the fair Jewess,” said De Bracy.
“And if I do,” said Bois-Guilbert, “who shall gainsay me?”
“No one that I know,” said De Bracy, “unless it be your vow of celibacy, or a check of conscience for an intrigue with a Jewess.”
“For my vow,” said the Templar, “our grand master hath granted me a dispensation. And for my conscience, a man that has slain three hundred Saracens, need not reckon up every little failing[…].”
“Thou knowest best thine own privileges,” said De Bracy. “Yet, I would have sworn thy thought had been more on the old usurer’s money bags […].”
“I can admire both,” answered the Templar; “besides, the old Jew is but half prize. […] I must have something that I can term exclusively my own by this foray of ours, and I have fixed on the lovely Jewess as my peculiar prize.”
“Alas! fair Rowena,” returned De Bracy, “you are in the presence of your captive, not your jailor, and it is from your fair eyes that De Bracy must receive that doom which you fondly expect from him.”
“I know you not, sir,” said the lady, drawing herself up with all the pride of offended rank and beauty; “I know you not—and the insolent familiarity with which you apply to me the jargon of a troubadour, forms no apology for the violence of a robber.”
“To thyself, fair maid […] to thine own charms be ascribed what’er I have done which passed the respect due to her, whom I have chosen as queen of my heart and loadstar of my eyes.”
“I repeat to you, Sir Knight, that I know you not, and that no man wearing chain and spurs ought thus to intrude himself upon the presence of an unprotected lady.”
“Glory?” continued Rebecca; “alas, it is the rusted mail which hangs as a hatchment over the champion’s dim and mouldering tomb—is the defaced sculpture of the inscription with which the ignorant monk can hardly read to the inquiring pilgrim—are these sufficient rewards for the sacrifice of every kindly affection, for a life spent miserably that ye make others miserable? Or is there such virtue in the rude rhymes of a wandering bard, that domestic love, kindly affection, peace and happiness are so wildly bartered, to become the hero of these ballads which vagabond minstrels sing to drunken churls over their evening ale?”
[…] “Thou speakest, maiden of thou knowest not what. Thou wouldst quench the pure light of chivalry, which alone distinguishes the noble from the base, the gentle knight from the churl and the savage; which rates our life far, far beneath the pitch of our honor […].”
At this moment the door of the apartment flew open, and the Templar presented himself […]. “I have found thee,” he said to Rebecca; “thou shalt prove I will keep my word to share weal and woe with thee—There is but one path to safety […] up, and instantly follow me.”
“Alone,” answered Rebecca, “I will not follow thee […]—save my aged father—save this wounded knight.”
“A knight,” answered the Templar […], “a knight […] must encounter his fate […], and who recks how or where a Jew meets with his?”
“Savage warrior,” replied Rebecca, “rather will I perish in the flames than accept safety from thee!”
“Thou shalt not chuse, Rebecca—once didst thou foil me, but never mortal did so twice.”
So saying, he seized on the terrified maiden, who filled the air with her shrieks, and bore her out of the room in his arms […].
“Nay, beshrew thee, man, up with thee! I am English-born, and love no such eastern prostrations—Kneel to God, and not to a poor sinner like me.”
“Ay, Jew,” said Prior Aymer, “kneel to God, as represented in the servant of his later, and who knoweth, with thy sincere repentance and due gifts to the shrine of Saint Robert, what grace thou mayest acquire for thyself and thy daughter Rebecca? I grieve for the maiden, for she is [beautiful…]. Also Brian de Bois-Guilbert is one with whom I may do much—bethink thee how thou canst deserve my good word with him.”
“Alas! alas!” said the Jew, “on every hand the spoilers arise against me […].”
“And what else should be the lot of an accursed race?” answered the Prior; “for what saith holy writ […]—I will give their women to strangers […] and their treasures to others.”
“Thus,” said Rebecca, “do men throw on fate the issue of their own wild passions. But I do forgive thee, Bois-Guilbert, though the author of my early death. There are noble things which cross over they powerful mind; but it is the garden of the sluggard, and the weeds have rushed up, and conspired to choak the fair and wholesome blossom.”
“Yet,” said the Templar, “I am, Rebecca, as thou hast spoken me, untaught, untamed—and proud, that, amidst a shoal of empty fools and crafty bigots, I have retained the pre-eminent fortitude that places me above them. I have been a child of battle from youth upward, high in my views, steady and inflexible in pursuing them. Such must I remain—proud, inflexible, and unchanging; and of this the world shall have proof.—But thou forgivest me, Rebecca?”
“As freely as ever victim forgave her executioner.”
“And Richard Plantagenet,” said the King, desires no more fame than his good lance and sword may acquire him—and Richard Plantagenet is prouder of achieving an adventure, with only his good sword, and his good arm to speed, than if he led to battle a host of an hundred thousand armed men.”
“But your kingdom, my lord,” said Ivanhoe, “your kingdom is threatened with dissolution and civil war—your subjects menaced by every species of evil, if deprived of their sovereign in some of these dangers which it is your daily pleasure to incur, and from which you have but this moment narrowly escaped.”
Novelty in society and in adventure was the zest of life to Richard Coeur de Lion, and it had its highest relish when enhanced by dangers encountered and surmounted. In the lion-hearted King, the brilliant, but useless character, of a knight of romance, was in great measure realized; and the personal glory which he acquired by his own deeds of arms, was far more dear to his excited imagination than that which a course of policy and wisdom would have spread around his government. Accordingly, his reign was like the course of a brilliant and rapid meteor […]; his feats of chivalry furnishing themes for bards and minstrels, but affording none of those solid benefits to his country on which history loves to pause […]. But in his present company Richard shewed to the greatest imaginable advantage. He was gay, good-humored, liberal, and fond of manhood in every rank of life.
It was a scene of bustle and life, as if the whole vicinage had poured forth its inhabitants to a village wake, or rural feast. But the evident desire to look on blood and death, is not peculiar to these dark ages; though in the gladiatorial exercise of single combat and general tourney, they were habituated to the blood spectacle of brave men falling by each other’s hands. Even in our own days, when morals are better understood, an execution, a bruising match between two professors, a riot, or a meeting of radical reformers, collects at considerable hazard to themselves an immense crowd of spectators, otherwise little interested, excepting to see how matters are to be conducted, and whether the heroes of the day are, in the heroic language of insurgent tailors, flints or dunghills.
