The Cathedral of Reims, in full color

Adorned with 2303 statues, the building is a medieval masterpiece. 

Photo by Jean-Christophe Hanche for the Ville de Reims. 
 
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The Cathedral of Reims, where the kings of France were once crowned, is celebrating its 800th anniversary. Activities in October include spectacular light shows to reproduce the original bright paint of the facade.

If you can't get to France, you can visit the website:
http://www.cathedraledereims.fr/
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Chapter 48 [final part]

[What happened to Gandalin after he awoke.] 

[Detail of the Tower of Lozoya, built in the 1300s in Segovia. The shield belonged to the Aguilar family. Photo by Katheline Vernati-Finn.] 
 
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So as ye hear Amadis was left with the name Beltenebros on that Poor Rock seven leagues in the sea, abandoning the world, honor, and the arms that had brought him such heights, and consumed his days with tears and continuous sorrow. He did not think about the brave Galpano, of the mighty King Abies of Ireland, or of the arrogant Dardan, who Amadis's mighty arm had defeated and killed, along with many others whom this story has told, nor of the famous Apolidon, who not in his own time nor for one hundred years after it had been exceeded by any knight in his skill.

And if Amadis were to be asked about the cause of such destruction, how would he respond? That it had no other cause than the ire and rage of a weak woman, in the same way that the mighty Hercules, brave Sampson, wise Virgil, and not forgetting among them King Solomon, were tormented and subjugated by the same passion, along with many others whom he could mention. With this, would he be forgiven? Certainly not, because the errors of others must be remembered not to repeat them but to avoid and be admonished by them.

Would it be right for such a knight who had been defeated and subjugated for such a trivial cause to find mercy so that he could recover and earn twice the victories than he had won in the past? I would say no, except that the things he did at his peril were of such great benefit to the welfare of others who, after God, had no other helper besides him.

And so God had greater compassion for them than for him, who had defeated all others but could not defeat nor subjugate himself. When he finally arrived at the point of death, the Lord of the world mercifully sent him aid.

But, in order to maintain the order of the story, first we will tell you something of what happened in the meantime. Gandalin, who had been left sleeping in the mountain when his lord Amadis departed, after a long while awoke, and looking everywhere, saw only his own horse. He got up quicky and began to call for Amadis, weeping and searching through the thick brush, but he did not find Amadis nor his horse, and then he was sure that he had departed, he returned to his horse to mount and ride off after him, but he could not find his saddle or reins.

Then he began to curse himself and his fate and the day he was born. Searching here and there, he found them hidden in some very thick brush. He saddled his horse and mounted it and rode five days sleeping in the open air and asking in towns about his lord, but it was all lost effort, and after six days fate guided him to the spring where Amadis had left his arms. He found a tent next to it with two damsels inside, and Gandalin dismounted and asked them if they had seek a knight who carried a shield of gold with two purple lions on it.

They said:

"We did not see such a knight, but that shield and all the exceptionally good arms that went with it we found next to this spring without anyone watching over them."

When he heard this, he said, tearing his hair:

"Oh Holy Mary help me! My lord, the best knight in the world, is dead or lost." He began to mourn, and the damsels felt great pity for him, and he began to say:

"My lord, how badly I protected you, and I ought to be hated by everyone in the world, and I should not even be in this world, since I failed you at such a time! You, my lord, were the one who aided everyone, and now they are without help because now the world and everyone in it is without you. By my failure to protect you, I left you without aid at the moment of your painful death."

And he fell face down on the ground as if dead. The damsels shouted:

"Holy Mary, this squire is dead!"

And they went to bring him to consciousness and they could not, for he fainted again and again, but they spent so much time with him throwing water on his face that they made him come to, and they told him:

"Good squire, do not lose hope for that which ye do not know for certain, for it would do no good for your lord. It would be better for you to search for him until you know if he is dead or alive, for good men with great anguish ought to be strong and not let themselves die of desperation."

Gandalin took strength from these word from the damsels and decided to look for him everywhere until death took him, and he said to the damsels:

"My ladies, where did ye see the arms?"

"We shall gladly tell you," they said. "Know that we were traveling in the company of Sir Guilan the Pensive, who took us and twenty other damsels and knights from the prison of Gandinos the Betrayer, and Guilan did such feats of arms that he defeated all the other protectors of his castle and finally Gandinos. He took us all from prison and made him swear that he would never do such a thing again. The knights and damsels went where they pleased, and we went with Guilan to the lands where we are from.

"Four days ago we arrived at this spring, and when Guilan saw the shield that ye ask about, he felt great sorrow, and dismounted from his horse and said that the shield of the best knight in the world should not be there like that. He picked it up from the ground, weeping, and put it on the branch of that tree and told us to guard it while he looked for who it belonged to. We had these tents brought and Sir Guilan traveled for three days for all this land and found nothing. That night very late he came here and in the morning gave the arms to his squires and he put the sword in his belt and took the shield and said:

" 'By God, shield, a bad exchange it is to leave your lord and go with me!'

"And he said that he was going to the court of King Lisuarte to give those arms to Queen Brisena and have her keep them. And we shall go there as will all those who were prisoners, the women to ask the Queen and the knights the King to reward Sir Guilan for what he did for us.

"Then may God be with you," Gandalin said, "and I, taking your comfort and advice, shall go look for the most wretched and unfortunate man who was ever born, for my life and death belong to him."
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The Rules of Courtly Love

"Love makes an ugly and rude person shine with beauty. It knows how to endow even one of humble birth with nobility, and it can lend humility to the proud." — Andreas Capellanus. 

An ivory mirror case, now in the Louvre, from the 14th century. 
 
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In the 12th century, Marie de Champagne, daughter of King Louis VII of France and Eleanor of Aquitaine, asked Andreas Cappellanus to write a De Amore, a text on courtly love. His three-book treatise included a definition of love and a list of rules for lovers that he said were an expansion of a list from King Arthur's court:

What is love?

Love is a certain inborn suffering derived from the sight of and excessive meditation upon the beauty of the opposite sex, which causes each one to wish above all things the embraces of the other and to carry out all of love's precepts in the other's embrace by common desire....

The Rules of Love

I. Marriage is no real excuse for not loving.

II. Anyone who is not jealous cannot love.

III. No one can be bound by a double love.

IV. It is well known that love is always increasing or decreasing

V. That which a lover takes against the will of his beloved has no relish.

VI. Boys do not love until they arrive at the age of maturity.

VII. When one lover dies, a widowhood of two years is required of the survivor.

VIII. No one should be deprived of love without the very best of reasons.

IX. No one can love except when impelled by the persuasion of love.

X. Love is always a stranger in the home of avarice.

XI. It is not proper to love any woman whom one would be ashamed to seek to marry.

XII. A true lover does not desire to embrace in love anyone except his beloved.

XIII. When made public, love rarely endures.

XIV. The easy attainment of love makes it of little value; difficulty of attainment makes it prized.

XV. Every lover regularly turns pale in the presence of his beloved.

XVI. When a lover suddenly catches sight of his beloved, his heart palpitates.

XVII. A new love puts to flight an old one.

XVIII. Good character alone makes any man worthy of love.

XIX. If love diminishes, it quickly fails and rarely revives.

XX. A man in love is always apprehensive.

XXI. Real jealousy always increases the feeling of love.

XXII. Jealously, and therefore love, are increased when one suspects his beloved.

XXIII. He who is vexed by the thought of love, eats and sleeps very little.

XXIV. Every act of a lover ends in the thought of his beloved.

XXV. A true lover considers nothing good except what he thinks will please his beloved.

XXVI. Love can deny nothing to love.

XXVII. A lover can never have enough of the solaces of his beloved.

XXVIII. A slight presumption causes a lover to suspect his beloved.

XXIX. A man who is vexed by too much passion usually does not love.

XXX. A true lover is constantly and without intermission possessed by the thought of his beloved.

XXXI. Nothing forbids one woman being loved by two men or one man by two women.
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Chapter 48 [middle part]

How Amadis came to be called Beltenebros and went to Poor Rock.

[Detail of the Fiesole Altarpiece painted by Fra Angelico in 1424-1425.] 
 
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Amadis rode all night and the next day until vespers. Then he entered a great meadow at the foot of the mountain, and in it there were two tall trees next to a spring. He went there to give his horse water, for he had ridden all day without finding any, and when he arrived at the spring, he saw a man of religious orders, his hair and beard white, who was giving water to his ass, and who wore a very simple habit of goat hair.

Amadis greeted him and asked if he was a priest. The good man told him that he had been one for a good forty years.

"May God have mercy!" Amadis said. "Now I ask you to remain here tonight and hear my penance, which I need very much."

"In the name of God," the good man said.

Amadis dismounted and put his arms on the ground, took the saddle from his horse, and let it graze in the grass. He removed his armor and knelt in front of the good man and began to kiss his feet. The good man took him by the hand and raised him up to sit next to him and saw how he was the most handsome knight that he had ever seen in his life, but how he was pale and his face and chest were bathed by the tears that he wept. He felt sad for him and said:

"Knight, it seems that ye have great sorrow, and if it is for some sin that ye have done and these tears are repentant, in a good hour ye were born to this world. But if your cause is some temporal thing, which due to your age and looks may be likely, think of God and ask mercy from He who brought you to His service."

And he raised his hand and blessed him and said:

"Now recount all the sins that ye can recall."

Amadis did so, telling him his life story, and left out nothing.

The good man told him:

"Due to your education and the high lineage from which ye come, ye should not kill yourself nor lose anything due you, especially over women, who are easily won and lost. I advise you to cease to think of such things and give up your madness, which ye do not do out of love of God, who is not pleased by such things. Even for worldly reasons ye ought to do so, for no man can nor ought to love someone who does not love him."

"My good lord," Amadis said, "I am injured to such a point that I cannot live much longer, and I beg you, by the mighty Lord whose faith ye keep, that it please you to take me with you for the little time that remains, and I shall take your counsel for my soul, and since now I shall have no need of my arms nor my horse, I shall leave them here and go with you on foot, doing whatever penance ye order. And if ye do not do this, ye do wrong to God, because I shall wander lost on this mountain without finding anyone to help me."

The good man, who saw him so prepared to do good with all his heart, told him:

"Truly, my lord, it is not proper for such a knight to abandon himself, as if all the world has failed you, and much less over a woman, whose love is never more lasting than what they hold in their sight and the words that they hear said to them, and when those pass, then they forget, especially in those false loves they enter into contrary to the service of the Lord. The same sin that engenders them sweet and delightful at first, later makes them cruel and bitter, as now ye have seen.

"And ye are outstanding and have land and lordship over many people, and are a loyal advocate and protector of all men and women who are wronged. Because ye do so much and so rightly, it would be a great misfortune and a harm and loss to the world if ye were to abandon them. I do not know who she is who has brought you to such a state, but it seems to me that if in only one woman were found all the goodness and beauty that were in all others,  such a man as you should not be lost over her."

"My good lord," Amadis said, "I do not seek counsel about that, for I do not need it, but I ask you to advise my soul and that it please you to take me with you, and if ye do not, I have no other remedy but to die on this mountain."

The good man began to weep with great sorrow, and tears fell down his beard, which was long and white, and he said:

"My son and lord, I dwell in a place very isolated and difficult to live in, which is a hermitage  a full seven leagues out in the sea on a high rock with cliffs so sheer that no boat can dock there except in summer. I have lived there thirty years, and he who would live there must leave behind the delights and pleasures of the world. I survive by the alms that people on land give me."

"All that," Amadis said, "is to my liking, and it would please me to pass such little life as remains for me with you. I beg you for the love of God to grant me this."

The good man granted this much against his will, and Amadis told him:

"Now tell me what to do, father, and I shall be obedient in everything."

The good man gave Amadis his blessing and said vespers, then he took bread and fish from his saddlebags and told Amadis to eat, but he did not, although he had spent three days without eating.

The priest said:

"Ye are in my command, and I order you to eat, and if not, your soul will be in great peril if you die."

Then Amadis ate, although very little, for he could not free himself from his great anguish. And when it was time to sleep, the good man lay down on his cloak and Amadis at his feet, but all night he did nothing more that toss and turn and sigh with sorrow. But finally, tired and overcome by exhaustion, he slept, and he dreamed he had been locked in a dark room and could see nothing. He could not find the way out and his heart felt troubled. Then it seemed that his cousin Mabilia and the Damsel of Denmark came to him and before them there was a sunray that took away the darkness and lit the room. They took him by the hands and said:

"My lord, leave this great palace," and they seemed to have great joy, and when he left he saw his lady Oriana surrounded by great tongues of fire, and he shouted:

"Holy Mary, help her!" He ran through the fire but did not feel a thing, and he took her in his arms and carried her to a garden, the most green and beautiful that he had ever seen.

His shouts woke the good man, who took him by the hand and asked him what was the matter. He said:

"My lord, I was sleeping with great anguish and almost died."

"So it seemed by your shouts," he said, "but it is time for us to go."

Then he mounted his ass and got on the road. Amadis went on foot with him, but the good man made him mount his horse, which he did only on orders, and thus they left together as ye hear. Amadis begged him that he grant him a favor that would cost him nothing, which he readily agreed to. Amadis asked him that while he lived with him not to tell anyone who he was nor anything about his situation and not to call him by name but by some other that he chose, and when he was dead, to notify his brothers so that they could take him to his land.

"Your life and death is in God," he said, "and do not speak any more of it, for He will give ye help if ye know Him and serve and love Him as ye ought. But tell me, what name would ye wish to have?"

"The one that ye hold to be good," he said.

The good man looked at him and how handsome and well built he was and how he was suffering, and he said:

"I wish to give ye a name that conforms to your personage and to your anguish, for ye are young and handsome and your life has been placed in bitterness and in gloom. I wish ye to have the name Beltenebros [Handsome Gloom]."

Amadis was pleased and held the good man to be wise for having given him such a reasonable name, and he was called by that name for as long as he lived with him, and for a long time afterwards he was praised by it no less than he was by Amadis for the great things that he did, as shall be told further on.

So speaking about this and other things, they arrived at the sea after night had fallen, and they found a ship there to take the good man to his hermitage. Beltenebros gave his horse to the sailors, and they gave him a leather tunic and tabard of thick brown wool. They boarded the boat and went to the rock, and Beltenebros asked the good man what they called the place when he lived and what his name was.

"The place," he said, "is called Poor Rock, because there no one can live except in great poverty, and my name is Andalod, and I was a very learned cleric and spent my youth in great vanity, but God, by His mercy, made me understand that those who serve Him have great difficulties and obstacles in dealing with people. Due to our weakness, we are inclined to evil instead of good, and that is why I decided to retreat to place with such solitude, where I have spent thirty years and have never left it until now to go to my sister's interment."

Beltenebros was very taken by the solitude and isolation of that place, and thought that dying there would give him some rest. And so they sailed in the ship until they arrived at the rock. The hermit told the sailors:

"Go back."

They returned to shore in their ship, and Beltenebros considered the narrow and blessed life of the good man, and with many tears and groans not from devotion but from hopelessness, he believed that he could live there and bear everything with him for the rest of his life, which sadly would not be long.
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