A To Z Blogging Challenge 2020: K Is For... Sir Kay

Sir Kay breaks his sword. Howard Pyle. Public domain.

Today’s Arthurian character is Sir Kay the Seneschal, known in the later Arthurian stories as Arthur’s foster brother who looks after the kitchens, among other things, basically a quartermaster and administrator, usually shown as a bully and a boor. 

However, I have to admit I have a soft spot for this character. I certainly like him better than Lancelot. The knights who are good at fighting don’t seem to do much else, apart from commit adultery. Reading the story of Lancelot feels, to me at least, like reading a detailed description of a cricket match with swords. When Kay appears, he has something to say or do which tells you about him. He doesn’t do “adventures” for which you have to be good at fighting, though he does manage fine in tournaments.

Okay, so he shoves Gareth in the kitchens and calls him Beaumains in that sneering tone. So, who asked the kid to go incognito? Even his own brothers don’t recognise him, by the way! 

As Sir Kay, today’s hero starts off as Arthur’s foster brother, raised with him in the home of Sir Ector. Newly knighted, he takes part in the competition to see who gets to have a go at drawing the sword from the stone. When he realises he has forgotten his sword, young Arthur goes to fetch it from the lodging, but everyone is off at the jousting and the house is locked. On the way back, he passes this sword stuck in a stone. (In T.H White’s novel, The Once And Future King, he thinks it’s some sort of war memorial) He  may not know what it is, but Kay does. He takes it to his father and says, “Guess what? Here is the sword from the stone, I’m king!” It doesn’t work, of course, as his father is pretty sure he didn’t pull it out himself. 

He does admit, then, that he was lying. It was just a temptation. It also says something about the relationship between the two brothers that Arthur is determined Kay is not going to go without a sword.  In Malory, he is actually described as angry about the lack of a sword, and is going to get one for Kay, whatever it takes. 

It says something more that, when Arthur becomes king, guess who gets a hugely important - vital! - job at Camelot? It’s not that horrible man Lancelot. 

The earlier Kay, called Cei or Cai, is, in fact, one of Arthur’s earliest companions, along with Bedwyr and Gwalchmai/Gawain. He is first mentioned in a tenth century Welsh poem as a sort of superhero who can do all sorts of impressive things, and who also killed the monstrous “Palug’s Cat” which had killed 180 warriors. 

And this guy is a warrior. In Culhwch And Olwen, he is the first of Arthur’s warriors to offer to go on the quest and achieves a number of the impossible tasks which Culhwch has been set. It is said of him that he could keep things he was carrying dry,  a suggestion that he may have been a solar hero at one time. Unfortunately, he doesn’t finish the quest; Arthur composes something satirical about him and loses this amazing warrior. 

He appears in Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History Of The  Kings of Britain, in which he helps Arthur fight the giant of Mont St Michel, and is part of the expedition against the Roman emperor Lucius; Geoffrey kills him off in that war, as does the Alliterative Morte Arthure(which I read at university many years ago). 

But, let’s face it, the Kay we think of immediately is Malory’s or the French romances from which Malory took his stories, the buffoon and bully. So, let’s see some modern interpretations of him.

Rosemary Sutcliff’s Cei, in Sword At Sunset, is a warrior, one of the Companions. He wears cheap jewellery and likes women and tasteless gewgaws. 

In the children’s TV series, Arthur Of The Britons,  he is a Saxon orphan adopted by Celtic chieftain Llud and brought up with Arthur. He is fierce and loyal, passionate about his adopted people, rather than his birth people. In one episode he learns that his fellow Saxons are willing to give him a fair trial and decide on the evidence. 

If you’re interested I think there are some episodes on YouTube.

He appears in Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court, as the knight who captures the novel’s hero, Hank Morgan, and lies about the details. He is sent up, but so is nearly everyone else. 

First edition illustration from Twain’s novel. Public domain.

My favourite version, though, is Phyllis Ann Karr’s Sir Kay, who appears in her short fiction(“Two Bits Of Embroidery”, see my post E is for Elaine)and a novel, Idylls Of The Queen. That novel is based on a very short section of Malory’s Morte, in which Guinevere has given a dinner party at which a knight drops dead after eating a poisoned apple. She is accused of trying to kill Gawain, who loves fruit and is the obvious target. Without a champion she will be sentenced to death, but the only one who can do it, Lancelot,  is missing. 

Phyllis Ann Karr manages to extend this into a novel. There are certainly fantasy elements, but basically, it’s a murder mystery, with Sir Kay as the detective. Kay doesn’t think much of Lancelot, but he does love the Queen. He sets off on his own quest, asking questions of the various suspects and coming to the correct conclusion using his wits, and saving Gawain, who actually is the intended victim, if not by the Queen, who is innocent. It is told in first person by Kay. This is Malory’s universe, but Kay is seen from a different viewpoint. 

Incidentally, Gawain in this novel is still wearing that green belt from Lady Bertilak! (See G Is For Gawain)

So, what do you think of this character? 

See you tomorrow when the subject will be L Is For Lancelot ... and Lynette.