Lamorak
Son of King Pellinore, ranked alongside Launcelot and Tristram as one of the three greatest knights.
Sir Lamorak is one of the most extensively attested knights in Le Morte d'Arthur, with 129 citations spanning Books VII through XX. The son of King Pellinore, he is consistently placed alongside Sir Launcelot and Sir Tristram as one of the three greatest knights of his generation. A damosel's warning names the triad directly: "wert thou as wight as ever was Wade or Launcelot, Tristram, or the good knight Sir Lamorak, thou shalt not pass a pass here that is called the Pass Perilous" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VII, Chapter IX).
Lamorak's career unfolds through three major narrative strands: his martial feats, his love for Queen Morgawse of Orkney, and the blood feud with the Orkney brothers over King Pellinore's death.
In tournament, Lamorak distinguished himself repeatedly. He performed "marvellous deeds of arms" alongside Sir Ironside, the Red Knight of the Red Launds (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VII, Chapter XXIX). He jousted with thirty knights at King Mark's court, where Sir Tristram was commanded to unseat him (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VIII, Chapter XXXIII). Tristram acknowledged Lamorak's exhaustion with characteristic courtesy: "it would grieve me an any knight should keep him fresh and then to strike down a weary knight, for that knight nor horse was never formed that alway might stand or endure" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VIII, Chapter XXXIII).
On the Isle of Servage, Lamorak revealed his full name as Sir Lamorak de Galis, son unto King Pellinore (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VIII, Chapter XXXVIII). He recognized Tristram's "bounty, noblesse, and worship" and repented of his earlier ungentleness toward him (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VIII, Chapter XXXVIII). At the great tournament, Lamorak fought so fiercely that Duke Chaleins charged his knights "in pain of death that none of you touch him; for it were shame to all good knights an that knight were shamed" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XLV). The two kings set upon him, yet he "failed them not, but rushed here and there, smiting on the right hand and on the left, and raced off many helms" until Launcelot himself rode to his aid (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XLV). Queen Guenever received him after the tournament and said: "Sir, well have ye done this day" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XLV).
The feud with the Orkney brothers drives much of Lamorak's story. Gawaine and his brothers hated Lamorak because "we slew his father, King Pellinore, for we deemed that he slew our father, King of Orkney" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XXI). Lamorak countered that his father had not killed theirs: "my father slew not your father, it was Balin le Savage" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XXIV). Their enmity was compounded by Lamorak's relationship with Queen Morgawse, the Orkney brothers' mother. He visited her secretly, tying his horse to a privy postern, going unarmed into a parlour, and then "unto the queen's bed, and she made of him passing great joy, and he of her again, for either loved other passing sore" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XXIV). Sir Gaheris discovered them and struck, but the blood fell on Lamorak -- "the which he loved passing well" -- leaving him "sore abashed and dismayed" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XXIV). Lamorak leapt from the bed "in his shirt as a knight dismayed" and accused Gaheris: "knight of the Table Round, foul and evil have ye done, and to you great shame" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XXIV).
The champion of beauty contests too became entangled in faction. Lamorak declared that "Queen Morgawse of Orkney, mother to Sir Gawaine, and his mother is the fairest queen and lady that beareth the life" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book IX, Chapter XIII), fighting Sir Meliagaunce over the claim. Launcelot intervened to make peace, acknowledging "that Sir Lamorak is as noble a knight as I know, and he hath ought you and us ever good will" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book IX, Chapter XIII).
Lamorak's encounters with King Mark are marked by open contempt. He told a Cornish knight: "ye be of Cornwall, wherein there dwelleth the shamefullest king that is now living, for he is a great enemy to all good knights" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter VIII). He condemned the match between Mark and La Beale Isoud: "It is pity that ever any such false knight-coward as King Mark is, should be matched with such a fair lady" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter VIII). He sent a magic horn to Mark's court in despite of Tristram (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VIII, Chapter XXXIV), prompting the quarrel between the two great knights that was only resolved when they swore never to fight each other again (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book IX, Chapter XI).
Arthur himself feared Lamorak's loss: "God defend that I should lose Sir Lamorak or Sir Tristram, for then twain of my chief knights of the Table Round were gone" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XXIV). Sir Gareth mourned: "God would I had been by, when the noble knight, Sir Lamorak, was slain" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter LVIII). King Pellinore's own lament names his son among his chief griefs: "for the death of my noble son, Sir Lamorak, shall my heart never be glad" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book XI, Chapter X). Even after death, Lamorak's name rallied supporters: "for Sir Lamorak's sake and for Sir Tristram's sake" knights of North Wales and Cornwall joined Launcelot's cause, numbering fourscore (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book XX, Chapter V).
The record presents Lamorak through a tension between supreme martial prowess and fatal political entanglement. His tournament performances are narrated with almost statistical precision -- jousting thirty knights, smiting down four at once, fighting until Launcelot must ride to his rescue (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XLV). Yet every triumph draws the Orkney feud tighter. The more Lamorak distinguishes himself, the more Gawaine's brothers resent him, because his excellence is a living reproach to their murder of his father.
The love for Queen Morgawse operates at the same double register. What the text presents as genuine mutual passion -- "either loved other passing sore" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XXIV) -- functions simultaneously as the deepest possible provocation to the Orkney clan. Lamorak's own response to the crisis is revealing: he accuses Gaheris of shame, not of interruption, suggesting that for Lamorak the dishonour lies in the method of discovery rather than the relationship itself (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XXIV).
The beauty contest with Meliagaunce over Guenever versus Morgawse (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book IX, Chapter XIII) literalizes the factional divide. Lamorak's insistence on Morgawse's superiority is both a genuine position and a political act, and Launcelot's peacemaking acknowledges as much: he does not adjudicate the beauty question but simply asks for friendship (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book IX, Chapter XIII).
Lamorak's relationship with Tristram oscillates between rivalry and deep mutual respect. The horn sent to King Mark was a provocative act (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VIII, Chapter XXXIV), yet on the Isle of Servage Lamorak acknowledged Tristram as peerless "of your bounty, noblesse, and worship" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book VIII, Chapter XXXVIII). Their eventual oath never to fight each other again (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book IX, Chapter XI) is one of Malory's rare moments of chivalric contract between equals.
Launcelot's relationship with Lamorak is more simply protective. He armed himself to help Lamorak at the tournament (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XLV), and at their parting "either wept at their departing" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XLIX). Lamorak's own assessment of his situation is clear-eyed: "an it were not for my lord King Arthur's sake, I should match Sir Gawaine and his brethren well enough" (Le Morte d'Arthur, Book X, Chapter XLIX).
Appears in: Beings, Entities in Le Morte d'Arthur, British Tradition