Some manuscript images

The first page of the manuscript of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, currently held in The British Library.  There are four poems bound together in this volume.  The others are Pearl, Cleanness, and Patience.


In this image from the manuscript the Green Knight, mounted on his green horse, holds up his severed head in front of Gawain, who still holds the axe.  Above, Arthur and Guinevere and other people of the court look on.







Here, the sleeping Gawain is visited by the wife of Sir Bertilak as part of the temptation scenes within the poem.












Here the Gawain Poet himself is pictured in an accompaniment to the poem The Pearl.  In his grief at the loss of his daughter, the poet falls asleep alongside the brook he cannot cross.











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