The quest for costly prizes

Throughout Wolfram Von Eschenbach's Parzival, I've fancied a thread of the ironic whenever Wolfram refers to what is required to maintain a knight in appropriate style. As a knight himself, Wolfram would know better than the poet Troyes what a knight needs and just how much it costs to procure all his equipment and horse(s), as well as bed, board and support for accompanying squires and pages when at home or on the road. And then additionally, money required to maintain a reputation for knightly generosity!

Both Troyes and Wolfram refer to a kingly gift that allows the would-be knight to set out on his adventure and earn honor.

In Parzival, Gahmuret's brother, the King, says, "My father left us both great wealth. I will mark you out an equal share, for I love you from my heart. Dazzling gems, red gold, men, weapons, mounts, clothes — accept as much from me as will let you travel as you please and maintain your name for generosity" (18). The King then gifts "all and more than he had asked: five chargers, picked and tried, strong, swift and spirited, the best in all his lands, numerous vessels of gold and many ingots ... a pile of precious stones ... When the panniers were full, the squires who were in charge of them were clothed in fine tunics and given good mounts" (19).

Conversely, Parzival's mother, although she gifts him, gifts him not with what he needs to become a knight and accrue honour, but with sackcloth and buskins. This leads to him having to steal armour by stripping it off Ither's body, bringing sin and dishonour upon himself.

Probably the wryest comment comes when Duke Lyppaut hears about Gawan's presence outside his castle: "Those engaged in warfare have always been forced to lay hand on costly prizes. The need to pay his mercenaries pressed heavily on honest Lyppaut, so that he at once concluded, 'I must acquire these stores peaceably or otherwise,' and set out after him" (187).

This knowledge of the prohibitive costs of knighthood lends further insight into the mass number of nobility who appear as knights in Parzival. Just about every knight seems to be a king or duke or son of one ... because nobody else could afford to be a knight! Wolfram wittily names and identifies each knight and refers to his lineage to point out the fact that he (not Wolfram) is rich and can easily afford to be one.

A note: The expense of becoming and remaining a knight was so prohibitive that during Henry I's reign of England and parts of France, some paid scutage — a money payment — rather than outfit themselves and report to service. As Christopher Gravett put it, "finance outweighed the ideals of chivalry" (Gravett 46). Not only the armor itself and weapons were expensive, but also well-bred, well-trained warhorses were insanely expensive ... as much as a small airplane might cost today, as one Web site puts it. Little wonder, then, that horses are the single most-stolen (er, acquired) commodity in Troyes' and Wolfram's stories. Chivalric notions rather go out the window when you're a lone knight on foot in heavy armor, hauling around swords and lances, don't they?

Wolfram seems particularly sensitive about this issue of stolen horses, as we see later in Parzival, this acquisition of prizes through combat is not condoned by the sagely hermits/monks we hear from. They condemn Parzival and Gawan for "stealing" armour and horses from their fallen foes. However, as knights, the duo had little other choice because they weren't exactly hauling around bags of gold ingots and precious stones with them to pay for new armour and horses! However, the repetition of horse theft throughout Parzival must make us wonder whether Wolfram's own quite-expensive charger was stolen at least once.

Thus, every knightly quest for adventure — or the Grail — includes also mini-quests for costly prizes to replace lost armor, broken weapons or stolen horses. Without those mini-quests, there could be no continuation of the larger, more important Quest.


Gravett, Christopher. Norman Knight A.D. 950-1204. Osceola, WI: Osprey Publishing, 1993.