| World Mythology Dictionary: Tristan |
(European mythology)
For the trouvères, the troubadours of medieval France, Tristan was the ideal lover. They acquired the legend of Tristan and Iseult from Brittany, but its ancestry reaches back through Cornwall, Wales, Ireland, and Scotland to an unknown era. Elopements and wooings were a favourite theme of Celtic mythology.
Dictionary:
Tris·tan (trĭs'tən, -tän', -tăn')  or Tris·tram
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| French Literature Companion: Tristan |
Hero of one of the most influential legends in French literature, whose love for Iseut provided a model for adulterous love (both courtly and tragic) throughout the Middle Ages and down to the present day. Tristan's influence has been felt by lyric poets, romance writers, and novelists, as well as by non-literary artists. A comparison of the surviving 12th- and 13th-c. versions allows us to extrapolate the following underlying narrative scheme.
The nephew of King Mark of Cornwall, Tristan defends Mark's kingdom in judicial combat and kills the Irish champion, Morholt, who had come to claim a regular tribute of Cornish boys and girls. Later Tristan, who is Mark's heir, is instrumental in organizing his uncle's marriage with Iseut, princess of Ireland and Morholt's niece, but as a result of drinking a magic potion accidentally served by Iseut's maid Brangien, the nephew and the uncle's bride find themselves fatally committed to loving each other. There are several attempts by members of Mark's court to trap the pair and have them condemned; Mark's attitude is unstable, swinging from almost farcical jealousy (when he climbs a tree to spy on them) to a naïvely loving trust. The couple undergo a period of banishment together, and Iseut has to undergo trial by oath and ordeal; eventually Tristan is exiled to Brittany, where he marries a second Iseut but never consummates his marriage. Tristan dies of grief, succumbing to a poisoned wound when, out of jealousy, his wife lies and tells him that Iseut la Blonde has refused to come to tend him. Iseut arrives to find Tristan dead, and herself dies of a broken heart. They are buried next to each other and a dog-rose and a vine grow from their graves, intertwining inseparably.
The origins of the legend seem to lie with the Picts of eastern Scotland. Tristan's name has been associated with Drust, a Pictish prince of the 8th c.; his home, Loonois, identified with Lothian; and the forest of Morrois, to which the lovers flee when condemned to death, with Moray. However, by the 12th c. the story is firmly located in Cornwall and Brittany, Tristan's own land being Léon (Finistère). The hero's name is now explained by his being an orphan, whose mother died giving birth to him. He is thus destined to sorrow (‘tristesse’).
Two full-length versions of his legend in verse survive from the 12th c., fragmentary texts by Béroul (4, 400 continuous lines in one manuscript) and Thomas (3, 080 lines in all, in seven fragmentary manuscripts, two of which were lost at the end of the 19th c.); a third by Chrétien de Troyes (who refers to his version as being ‘about King Mark and Iseut la Blonde’) is lost. Béroul's version dates probably from the 1160s, though it has been placed in the 1190s, and is usually considered the ‘non-courtly’ version because of the comparative barbarity of some of the scenes, the bloodthirstiness exhibited by all characters in the pursuit of vengeance, and the survival of many folkore elements (Mark has horse's ears, Tristan is skilled in woodcraft, an important role is given to an astrologer-dwarf). Certainly Béroul was working in the oral tradition, as witness some of the inconsistencies of his text (the evil trinity of barons hounding the lovers is permanently reconstituted, even after one or other has been killed), but the scenes with King Arthur, the use of terms like losengier (tale-bearer), and the role of Brangien as go-between show that he was familiar with courtly literature. Also, although in Béroul the love potion acts as an instrument of external destiny robbing the lovers of any choice, he also uses it to conduct a debate on the role of intention in crime and sin, indicating that he was aware of contemporary learned controversy and probably working in courtly rather than popular circles.
The version by Thomas, dated to the 1170s, is normally described as the ‘courtly’ version, since the love between Tristan and Iseut is only partly determined by the potion, which is given a largely symbolic role in this text, thereby ensuring at least a measure of that free choice by the lovers which was considered vital to a genuinely ‘courtly’ relationship. Thomas also devotes much space to exploring the psychology of his characters through the kinds of interior debate favoured by the romans d'antiquité and Chrétien de Troyes. His version smooths out many of the violent edges of the Béroul version: the harsh life of outlaws led by the lovers in the forest of Morrois is replaced by an idyllic existence in a cave (an episode not extant in the surviving fragments); and later, in Brittany following his marriage, Tristan organizes a veritable chapel to his love in a grotto, complete with statues which he contemplates in a transport of adoration that gives concrete expression to the inherent fetishism of fin'amor. Tristan's marriage to a second Iseut, and his final death from a wound suffered serving the love of a second Tristan, permit the exploration of many facets of love, including the relationship between love, marriage, and jealousy and the place of adventure in love-service.
Tristan's periods of exile allowed many writers to invent episodes to fill this part of the biography. Marie de France's Chevrefoil tells of a meeting in the forest as Iseut travels to court. The substance of the meeting is a brief interview, but the significance of the text lies in the characters carved on the hazel twig with which Tristan attracts Iseut's attention (a transposition into the 12th-c. French text of magic ogham or runic engravings), and in the symbol of the symbiotic existence of the honeysuckle and the hazel, which Tristan evokes.
Two writers of the early 13th c. composed versions of the Folie Tristan, in which Tristan, mad with love, disguises himself as a fool to return to court and exploits the privileges of his assumed role to recount in the presence of Mark significant episodes from his love for Iseut, who also hears them, the ultimate purpose being to gain a private meeting with his mistress. The texts, identified by the libraries which now house the manuscripts, are related, one to Béroul's version (Folie de Berne), one to Thomas's (Folie d'Oxford). Our knowledge of the fragmentary 12th-c. texts is completed by two translations into German (by Eilhard von Oberge and Gottfried von Strasburg) and by the Norse Tristrams saga ok Isonde. In the 13th c., under the influence of the prose Lancelot, the story of Tristan was developed in a vast prose romance (composed c.1230), in which the original tale is dwarfed by a long Arthurian elaboration. Far from fleeing to the Morrois, the lovers now remove themselves to Logres, where Tristan fights in a series of tournaments in which his chief opponent is a Saracen, Palamedés, also in love with Iseut, and his inseparable companion is Dinadan, a brave but cynical knight never slow to pour scorn on chivalric convention. Tristan also becomes a knight of the Round Table and participates in the Quest for the Grail before leaving Logres to allow the inevitable denouement.
[Philip Bennett]
Bibliography
| Celtic Mythology: Tristan |
Cornish knight, lover of Iseult, whose story became attached to the court of King Arthur. Modern commentators trace several antecedents of Tristan's name, the earliest being the ‘Tristan Stone’, a monolith near Fowey, Cornwall, 30 miles S of Tintagel, with a Latin inscription (6th cent.?) to Drustanus. The Welsh Triads (12th cent.) associates Drystan, a name of apparent Pictish origin, with a person named March. Drystan, in turn, has been linked to Drust or Drustan, an obscure Pictish king who died in 780. Marie de France's Lai du Chèvrefeuil (c.1160) depicts an already existing Tristan-Iseult union but does not place it at Arthur's court. About the same time Thomas of Britain did place the lovers within Arthuriana in his Anglo-Norman verse Tristan, most of which does not survive. Three later texts, Gottfried von Strassburg's Tristan (c.1210), Eilhart von Oberg's Tristrant (c.1175), and Béroul's Tristan (c.1170), shape the narrative as it has survived since medieval times. Tristan is sent to Ireland to bring back Iseult, betrothed to his uncle, King Mark, whom the girl has never seen. Iseult's mother, hoping that her daughter will find love in an arranged marriage, prepares a potion which she entrusts to a nurse, Brangwain. En route the young people drink the potion by mistake and soon consummate their love. Many intrigues and digressions follow, but Iseult eventually returns to Mark while Tristan goes into exile. While abroad in Brittany, Tristan marries but does not sleep with Iseult of the White Hands, who jealously tells her mortally wounded husband that the true Iseult is not on a vessel he is awaiting and so causes him to die of despair before he can finally be reunited with her.
While much of the prestige still accorded the Tristan story comes from its being seen as an important expression of the ideals of romantic love first propounded by the Provençal troubadours of the 12th century, the outlines of its love triangle have many international correlatives, notably in the medieval Arab story of Kais and Lobna. The often-cited Celtic counterparts are Tóraigheacht Dhiarmada agus Ghráinne [The Pursuit of Diarmait and Gráinne] and the Deirdre story.
Bibliography
| Wikipedia: Tristan |
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This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (January 2009) |
Tristan (Latin/Brythonic: Drustanus; Welsh: Drystan; also known as Tristran, Tristram, etc.) is one of the main characters of the Tristan and Iseult story, a Cornish hero and one of the Knights of the Round Table featuring in the Matter of Britain. He is the son of Blancheflor and Rivalen (in later versions Isabelle and Meliodas), and the nephew of King Mark of Cornwall, sent to fetch Iseult back from Ireland to wed the king. However, he and Iseult accidentally consume a love potion while en route and fall helplessly in love. The pair undergo numerous trials that test their secret affair.
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Tristan makes his first medieval appearance in the early twelfth century in Celtic folklore circulating in the north of France. Although the oldest stories concerning Tristan are lost, some of the derivatives still exist. Most early versions fall into one of two branches, "courtly" branch represented in the retellings of the Anglo-Norman poet Thomas of Britain and his German successor Gottfried von Strassburg, and the "common" branch, including the works of the French poet Béroul and the German poet Eilhart von Oberge.
Arthurian romancier Chrétien de Troyes mentions in his poem Cligès that he composed his own account of the story; however, there are no surviving copies or records of any such text. In the thirteenth century, during the great period of prose romances, Tristan en prose or Prose Tristan appeared and was one of the most popular romances of its time. This long, sprawling, and often lyrical work (the modern edition takes up thirteen volumes) follows Tristan from the traditional legend into the realm of King Arthur where Tristan participates in the Quest for the Holy Grail. In the fifteenth century, Sir Thomas Malory shortened this French version into his own take, The Book of Sir Tristram de Lyones, found in his Le Morte D'Arthur.
There are strange aspects to Tristan, such as his Pictish name. Drust is a very common name of Pictish kings, and Drustanus is merely Drust rendered into Latin. It may have originated from an ancient legend regarding a Pictish king who slew a giant in the distant past, which had spread throughout the isles. The name may also come from a sixth-century Pictish saint who bore another form of the name. In addition, interestingly, there was a Tristan who bore witness to a legal document at the Swabian Abbey of St. Gall in 807.
Another strange aspect is his kingdom, Lyonesse, for whose existence there is no evidence. However there were two places called Leonais: one in Brittany, the other the Old French transcription of Lothian. However, the Islands of Scilly have also been proposed to be this place, since they were possibly one island until Roman times and several islands are interconnected at low tide. Regardless, Tristan being a prince of Lothian would make his name more sensible, Lothian being on the borderlands of the Pictish High-Kingship (and once was a part of Pictish territory; Tristan may in fact have been a Pictish prince under a British King). One suggestion, although very unlikely, is that he could have been adopted into the family of Mark of Cornwall, historically a practice attested in Roman law.
Evidence for his Cornish roots are testified by the 5th century inscribed stone found in the county. Beside the road leading to Fowey in Cornwall stands a weathered stone measuring some 7 feet in height and now set in a modern concrete base. It was once much closer to Castle Dore and may have been the origin of the association of this site with the story of the tragic love of Tristan and Iseult. There is a Latin inscription on the stone, now much worn, which can be restored with only a little judicial guesswork to read:
Drustans hic iacet Cunomori filius
This means: Drustanus lies here, the son of Cunomorus
It has been suggested that the characters referred to are Tristan, the nephew of Mark - Drustan being a recognized variant of the hero's name and Cunomorus being a Latinization of Cynvawr. Cynvawr, in turn, is said by the ninth-century author Nennius, who compiled the best historical account of Arthur, to be identified with King Mark.
The writer Sigmund Eisner concluded that the name Tristan comes from Drust, son of Talorc, but that the legend of Tristan as we know it now was gathered together by an Irish educated member of the monastic system in North Britain around the early eighth century. .[1] Eisner explains that a member of the Irish monastic system at this time would be familiar with all of the Greek and Roman narratives that the legend borrows from such as Pyramus and Thisbe but also familiar with the Celtic elements of the story such as The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Gráinne. Eisner concludes that “the author of the Tristan story used the names and some of the local traditions of his own recent past. To these figures he attached adventures which had been handed down from Roman and Greek mythology. He lived in the north of Britain, was associated with a monastery, and started the first rendition of the Tristan story on its travels to wherever it has been found.”[2]
In 1857–59, Richard Wagner composed the opera Tristan and Isolde, now considered one of the most influential pieces of music of the 19th century. In his work, Tristan is portrayed as a doomed romantic figure.
Algernon Charles Swinburne wrote an epic poem Tristram of Lyonesse. The story has also been adapted into film many times. [1] The most recent is the American version entitled Tristan & Isolde, produced by Tony and Ridley Scott, written by Dean Georgaris, directed by Kevin Reynolds, and starring James Franco and Sophia Myles. The legend of Tristan has also been represented through the song of the same name by English musician Patrick Wolf, which was the lead single from the 2005 album, 'Wind in the Wires'.
Tristan plays a prominent role in the comic book series Camelot 3000, in which he is reincarnated in A.D. 3000 as a woman and subsequently struggles to come to terms with his new body and identity and to reconcile them in turn with his previous notions of gender roles and of his own sexuality.
Russian composer Nikita Koshkin wrote a classical guitar solo entitled Tristan Playing the Lute in 1983. Tristan Playing the Lute evokes the spirit of Tristan from the legend of "Tristan and Isolde", set in a playful adaptation of traditional English lute music, at least initially. According to Koshkin:
"Tristan was written as a musical joke. It was a period when I was fond of all the stories about King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table. Tristan was not only a great fighter, but he also played many musical instruments and had a beautiful singing voice. This is why I thought he could be the subject of a piece to suggest the process of improvising in a characteristic early style that then begins to change to futuristic musical ideas. The first section of the piece is clearly ancient in style; the second is more modern; then the third introduces elements of Eastern music as well as some rock riffs. The idea is that Tristan, during his improvising, is building musical bridges to the future."
In the 2004 film, King Arthur, based on the Sarmatian connection theory of origin for the Arthurian legends, Tristan (Mads Mikkelsen) is a prominent member of the knights, who are Sarmatians serving under a half-Roman Arthur in the 5th century. Tristan is a cavalry archer, able to make amazing shots with his bow, similar to a mongol bow, and uses a sword similar to a dao. It seems that he finds a pleasure in killing and is quite good at it. He has a pet hawk, which he greatly treasures and uses as a lookout for Arthur and the rest of the knights in the film. He also fulfills the role of a scout and skirmisher. He is killed by Cerdic in single combat in the Battle of Badon Hill.
The film Tristan & Isolde (2006) starred James Franco as Tristan and Thomas Sangster as the child Tristan. The film was produced by Tony Scott and Ridley Scott, written by Dean Georgaris, and directed by Kevin Reynolds.
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 | World Mythology Dictionary. A Dictionary of World Mythology. Copyright © Arthur Cotterell 1979, 1986, 2003. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| French Literature Companion. The New Oxford Companion to Literature in French. Copyright © 1995, 2005 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Celtic Mythology. A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. Copyright © James MacKillop 1998, 2004. All rights reserved. Read more |
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