The Feast of Pentecost

The Feast of Pentecost:

Today was Pentecost, the 'fiftieth day' after Easter, on which the Holy Spirit was supposed to have descended upon the Apostles. It is the key feast of the year in Arthurian tales, especially in Malory; Arthur is supposed to have required the knights of the round table to reswear their oaths at each feast of Pentecost. I'll render the piece from the Middle English:

[Arthur] charged them never to do outrage nor murder, and always to flee treason; and to give mercy unto him that asked mercy, upon pain of forfeit of their worship and the lordship of king Arthur; and always to do ladies, damsels, and gentlewomen and widows service, to strengthen them in their rights, and never to force them, upon pain of death. Also, that no man fight a duel they knew was wrong, neither for love nor for worldly gain. So unto this were all knights sworn who were of the Table Round, both old and young. "And every yere so were the[y] swome at the high feste of Pentecoste."

So they were sworn; and Tennyson imagines the oath so:

Then the King in low deep tones,
And simple words of great authority,
Bound them by so strait vows to his own self,
That when they rose, knighted from kneeling, some
Were pale as at the passing of a ghost,
Some flush'd, and others dazed, as one who wakes
Half-blinded at the coming of a light.

Yet the company was forgiving. Arthur himself violates this oath on at least one occasion, by taking battle in a quarrel he knows is wrong to obtain his liberty from imprisonment; this is when he fights for Sir Damas, whom he knows to be a false knight and yet who has him in his power. This seems not to have led to any questioning of the king's honor, for he was victorious in combat; his prowess, I suppose, sustained his honor, as did the fact that he enforced justice once he was at liberty and again with sword in hand.

The other feature of the high feast of Pentecost was that Arthur would not go to dine until he had seen some wonder or adventure. That custom is the launching point of several of the greater stories of Le Morte Darthur.

For today's adventure, we spent the morning at the Warrior's Dash, a 5K race coupled with a mild obstacle course. It was a pleasant morning, although I frustrated my running partner, who was also my sister. I didn't realize I was doing it, but she complained afterwards to our mother that we never had any hope of getting a good time, as 'my partner, such a gentleman, was forever stopping to assist women with whatever troubles they were having on the obstacles.' I think it was only three times, and surely couldn't have cost us much time; and anyway, I'm not much of a distance runner anymore, as I warned her before we began. But perhaps she understood this, and was really just using the appearance of a complaint to pay a compliment to our mother.

We finished strong, leaping over the blazing fires at the end of the course. We also feasted, later. It was fun.

Pity about the beer, though. Normally part of the sport is that they have free beer for the runners, but alas! Georgia on a Sunday.