Gabrielle

This article or section has multiple issues. Please help improve the article or discuss these issues on the talk page. It contains a plot summary that may be too long or overly detailed. Tagged since October 2008. It may contain original research or unverifiable claims. Tagged since September 2008. It describes a work or element of fiction in a primarily in-universe style that may require cleanup. Tagged since September 2008. It may require general cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Tagged since September 2008.

Gabrielle
Renée O'Connor as Gabrielle
First appearance	Sins of the Past
Last appearance	A Friend in Need, part 2
Created by	Robert Tapert
Portrayed by	Renée O'Connor
Information
Species	Human
Occupation	Warrior, Bard
Affiliation	Xena, Hope, Lila, Joxer, Eli, Perdicas, the Amazons

Gabrielle is a fictional character in Xena: Warrior Princess, played by Renée O'Connor. She is referred to, by fans, as the Battling Bard of Potidaea. Her trademark weapons are the Amazon fighting staff and, later, the sais.

Renée O'Connor was chosen to play the role after she impressed producers with her performance in the Hercules television movie The Lost Kingdom.^[1]

Her name is the feminine of Gabriel, from the Hebrew, which means "messenger of God". That is the name of the chief of Archangels, and during the show, Gabrielle becomes an Archangel. While Gabrielle is typically a French given name, it has a grammatically correct Greek feminine ending and contains no anti-Greek sounds (pronounced as Gab-ree-el-lay).^[2] Also, the Greek version of "Gabrielle" is Γαβριήλα, (Gavrila).

In the two musical episodes,^[3][4] Gabrielle's singing voice was provided by Susan Wood.^[5] In the episode "Lyre, Lyre, Hearts on Fire", though, Renée sung in two songs: "War" (just choruses) and "Gettin' Ready" (actually rapping).

Character history

Gabrielle - from farm girl to warrior

Gabrielle is an innocent farm girl at the start of the series.

When Gabrielle first meets the Warrior Princess, Xena, she is a farm girl living in the village of Potidaea. She and her sister Lila, along with several other village girls, have been kidnapped by the men of the warlord, Draco, to be sold as slaves. Xena intervenes and rescues them. Awed by her fighting skills, Gabrielle decides that she wants to become a warrior too. She also wants to avoid the marriage that her parents, Herodotus and Hecuba, have arranged for her with her childhood friend Perdicas. Gabrielle insists on following an initially reluctant Xena on the road.^[6] The two women soon develop a strong bond of love and friendship. Over the six years of the series, Gabrielle evolves from a naive, idealistic teenager into a fully fledged, but deeply conflicted warrior fighting alongside Xena.

Gabrielle becomes an Amazon when she defends a dying Amazon Princess during an ambush. Before she dies, the Princess Terreis passes her "right of caste" to Gabrielle, and Gabrielle inherits her rank and possessions. This leaves Gabrielle the heiress presumptive to the Amazon Queen, Melosa.^[7] Melosa's adopted daughter Velasca, becomes a rival for the position of Queen of the Amazons after Melosa's death, but Velasca's schemes (which include aspirations to godhood) are foiled by Xena and Gabrielle.^[8] As Gabrielle wishes to travel with Xena rather than rule the Amazons, she appoints her friend Ephiny to act as Amazon Queen in her place.^[7]

Gabrielle learns how to fight with a fighting staff from the Amazons.^[7] With Xena's encouragement, she develops a philosophy of fighting for the Greater Good without killing.

About a year after meeting Xena, Gabrielle encounters Perdicas again and decides to marry him. The morning after their wedding, he is murdered by Xena's nemesis, Callisto. Gabrielle's grief and anger tests her ideals of reverence for life, but she nonetheless resists the impulse to kill Callisto.^[9] During this period, Gabrielle's strong commitment to peacemaking and compassion often serves as a counterbalance to Xena's warrior nature.

When helping to defend Britannia against Caesar, Gabrielle comes into contact with an evil cult that tricks her into killing one of its priestesses, Meridian. The loss of Gabrielle's "blood innocence" enables the evil god Dahak to impregnate her.^[10] After a pregnancy that lasts only a few days, Gabrielle gives birth to a girl she names Hope. After becoming convinced that the baby is simply a vessel for Dahak, Xena wants to kill Hope. Gabrielle manages to save her daughter by putting her in a basket and sending her downriver.^[11]

Several months later, Gabrielle finds Hope again, now looking like a nine-year-old, and already in the process of helping her father, Dahak, implement his plan to take over the world. Hope allies herself with Xena's enemy, Callisto. In revenge for Xena's attempt to kill her as a baby, Hope murders Xena's son, Solan. This forces Gabrielle to accept that Hope is indeed evil. She kills her daughter by giving her poison,^[12] an act that continues to haunt Gabrielle throughout the series. She holds herself responsible for Solan's death, as well as for betraying Xena a second time, even after reconciliation with Xena is effected through their musical journey in the Land of Illusia.^[13] When she once again encounters Hope,^[14] who was saved from the funeral pyre by her father, Gabrielle sacrifices herself to save Xena by jumping into a lava pit and taking Hope with her.^[15] Gabrielle mysteriously survives the fall, and is later reunited with Xena.^[16] It is later revealed that Ares saved Gabrielle, with plans to use her as a bargaining chip against Xena.

After her first kill,^[10] and the traumatic events with Hope that followed it,^[12] Gabrielle temporarily embraces complete pacifism as an alternative to fighting by Xena's side. She and Xena travel to India, where they encounter a series of false prophets and gurus, as well as a genuine healer and teacher, Eli.^[17] Eli claims to have found enlightenment and Gabrielle becomes interested in his philosophy of non-violence and inner peace, which he calls the Way of Love. Gabrielle attempts to follow Eli's way, and throws away her staff under his influence.^[18] However, when Xena is in the midst of a battle with the Romans in an effort to rescue Gabrielle, Eli, and a group of prisoners, Callisto uses Xena's own chakram against her, breaking her back. Gabrielle chooses to fight to save Xena and even kills some of the soldiers herself. Before their crucifixion, Gabrielle tells Xena that she had chosen "The Way of Friendship".^[19]

Gabrielle with her sais in season 5.

After being crucified, Gabrielle and Xena ascend into Heaven, but are soon ambushed by demons.^[20] The demons are able to take Gabrielle to Hell, where she comes face to face with the demonic form of Callisto. Xena and a group of Archangels are able to rescue Gabrielle from Hell before Gabrielle can fall to the darkness. She then learns that Xena has taken Callisto's place in Hell. She eventually forgives Callisto for the murder of Perdicas, and that act of forgiveness grants her the right to join the Archangels in battle. During her fight with the demon-Xena, they are restored to life by Eli.^[20]

At this time, Gabrielle accepts her new path as a warrior and acquires a pair of sai, which become her signature weapon thereafter.^[21] Xena's pregnancy, revealed shortly after the duo's return to life, further forces Gabrielle to fight and sometimes protect Xena. On two occasions, the god of war Ares, impressed by Gabrielle's new warrior skills, tries to recruit her to his side, but Gabrielle always resists.^[22]

Gabrielle and Xena sleep in an ice cave for 25 years after Ares places them there because he mistakenly believes they are dead.^[23] After waking up, Gabrielle discovers that her parents have been killed by the North African warlord Gurkhan, who has also kidnapped her niece, Sara, for his harem.^[24] Around this time, Gabrielle develops a close friendship with Joxer's eldest son Virgil, who shares many of her traits as a bard and warrior. Gabrielle struggles with the issue of seeking vengeance against Gurkhan.^[24] She is often troubled by her role as a warrior, particularly when she has to lead her Amazon tribe into a high-casualty battle against a superior army, led by the demigod Bellerophon, to rescue a fellow Amazon queen. Despite the success of the mission, Gabrielle tells Xena, "With each battle, I lose more of myself".^[25]

The series' final scene finds her on a ship headed to Egypt, where she intends to continue the fight for the Greater Good, with Xena accompanying her in spirit.^[26]

The Battling Bard of Potidaea

When I first met you, you barely had the skill to skip a rock. I guess Xena's been a positive influence on ya after all.

—Ares, Seeds of Faith

Gabrielle starts the series as a young girl who more or less stands behind Xena, and relies on Xena to protect her.^[6] Later on in the series, she acquires a fighting staff from the Greek Amazons,^[7] and starts to use it as both a defensive, as well as an offensive weapon, displaying some skill in using the staff.^[27] As the series goes on, Gabrielle's skills with the staff continue to develop. In one episode, Gabrielle takes on numerous soldiers single-handedly in an attempt to rescue Xena's presumably dead body.^[28] Two episodes later she is seen blocking an arrow in flight with her staff.^[29] Later on, Gabrielle also adds kicks and minor acrobatics to her fighting abilities.

While in India, Gabrielle is thrown through time by a Darsham to save Xena's soul. It is said that their souls are together throughout time.^[30] In this next life Xena is the Mother of Peace, Arminestra and Gabrielle is Shakti, a Warrior Prince of India.^[30] At the end of season 4, Gabrielle shows a leap in her warrior abilities. After months of following her path of the Way of Love,^[18] Gabrielle picks up the sword of a paralyzed Xena and fights off a large group of Roman soldiers, killing several of them.^[19]

By season 5, Gabrielle starts to fight with her sais,^[21] incorporating more acrobatic abilities, such as performing a wall run and back flip.^[31] In addition to sais and sometimes a new casual staff, she can use a large array of weapons with proficiency. Gabrielle also fights against warriors with notable skill; she defeats the warrior Mavican^[22] and stands against Ares and Hades (two gods) in battle for a period of time, before they defeat her. She also fights in a sword duel with Brutus, Caesar's former right hand and one of the leaders of Rome, eventually killing him.^[32] Gabrielle's abilities throughout the series are noticed by the God of War who seeks her out as his new protégée. It is mentioned later by Gabrielle that Xena trained her throughout the years, although there have only been a few episodes that actually show Xena giving her any sort of martial arts training. One of Gabrielle's biggest fights in the series is her fight against fellow Amazon queen, Varia. They fight in an enclosed arena in a match in which Eve's life is at stake, and they appeared to be at a stand-off before she is beaten by Varia^[33]. Gabrielle takes the loss graciously and continues to grow in skill over the remaining season.

Characterization

Gabrielle's bardic skills appear to be natural and self-taught. In the opening episode, she displays a remarkable ability to talk her way out of fearsome or difficult situations: she talks a cyclops out of eating her, and makes an ally of him; talks an old man into giving her a lift; talks a violent crowd out of killing Xena; and talks her way into joining Xena as her traveling partner.^[6]

Besides her persuasive ability, she also reads and writes - rare skills for that time, loves to tell stories, and has some musical ability. As she travels with Xena, she records their adventures on a series of scrolls, with an eye for flair and drama. Occasionally her tendency to exaggerate and glamorize the facts gets her into trouble.^[34] She is also shown telling stories for money in an inn. In other episodes she wins a place in the Athens City Academy for the Performing Bards,^[35] is a famous playwright, is a theatrical director,^[36] plays the pan pipes with considerable skill,^[37] and is the only person able to recite a magical scroll with the correct accents.^[38]

Despite Gabrielle's ascendancy as a warrior, her role as a bard remains important. About a year into her travels with Xena, her scrolls about Xena's exploits begin to gain popularity, apparently helping, according to Ares, turn Xena into a legend. After their 25-year sleep, Gabrielle finds out that her stories had been read as far away as North Africa where they were popular among nomad tribes.^[39]

According to an episode set in modern times, Gabrielle's scrolls were preserved for thousands of years and later discovered by modern archeologists. They found their way to Hollywood, where they formed the basis of the television series.^[40]

Discoveries and inventions

Along with Xena, occasionally, Gabrielle is known to be credited with a variety of discoveries and inventions. This stems from Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, wherein Iolaus noted that Hercules was always right and made several realizations throughout the series, albeit anachronistic (e.g., the earth is round).

• Gabrielle thinks the Big Dipper looks like a Bear, presumably leading eventually to its Latin name Ursa Major. ("A Day In The Life" S02E15).
• Gabrielle successfully pioneers the custom of Santa Claus bringing down gifts during Solstice Eve, by encouraging Senticles to hand out toys to children in the kingdom where winter celebrations are banned. ("A Solstice Carol" S02E09)
• Gabrielle is responsible for the creation of the game of charades. ("Forgiven" S03E14)
• Gabrielle thought up the idea of Pinocchio. ("If The Shoe Fits" S04E12)
• Gabrielle postulated atomic theory. ("The Deliverer" S0304)
• Gabrielle postulated the Theory of evolution. ("The Price" S02E20)
• Gabrielle encouraged and gave story-telling advice to Homer. ("Athens City Academy of the Performing Bards" S01E13)
• Gabrielle coined the phrase "love is blind." ("A Comedy Of Eros" S02E22)

References