A black knight is a soldier or knight who either is not
bound to a specific liege or does not want his liege, or himself, to be identified and so
does not bear any heraldic standards or has blackened them out.
Since heraldic standards were carefully regulated by one official body or other (such as the Scottish Lord Lyon King of Arms or the English College of Arms),
a fighting man who had not obtained a standard (through inheritance or endowment by a liege) would have no colors or devices to
represent him. These would-be knights were often freelance soldiers. Because they usually
lacked a squire or page to care for their armor, they would paint it black to prevent rust. An
experienced and equipped soldier without a specific fealty was a wild card and an organized force
of them could pose a serious problem for kings. This sort of dispossessed status ran contrary to the entire system of
feudalism and this condition was looked upon with disfavor. This disfavoring viewpoint is a
contributing factor towards the pejorative usage of the term.
The more commonly used, and negative reference, is that of a soldier or knight who has purposely hidden their standards.
Knights involved in risky political intrigues or activities unbecoming of a man of station would blacken their shields so as to
not be easily identified.
In fiction
The last quality of the Black Knights (survived in later pop culture, fairytales and fantasy stories) is that Black Knights
are solitary knights; master fighters but usually evil. They sometimes appear to have supernatural powers or serve a wizard. The
first appearance of such a character was The Black Knight in
Arthurian legend.[citation needed] This use of the Black Knight has turned them into something of a
stock character.
In Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe,
King Richard wears black armor and initially goes by "le Noir Fainéant",
meaning "the black sluggard."
In Monty Python and the Holy Grail, there is a scene involving
The Black Knight which has now become one of the most famous sketches from
the film.
See also
This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
