Lost in Translation: Medieval Romance, the Porous Female Body, Kingship, and Vassalage in Havelok the Dane

Abstract

Medieval romances feature many of the same tropes: reclamation of lost or forsworn titles, martial prowess, bravery squandered, damsels in desperate need of distress or saving. Havelok the Dane participates in these conventions but is a dramatic outlier in the way the author utilizes the female body as trope, narrative plot device, and ultimately as a signifier for kingship itself. The original version, Gaimar’s Estoire des Engleis, emphasizes Havelok’s supernatural and superhuman power, his kingship ordained by God, his birthmark, and his heirs. The English poet changes the source in his translation, dramatically strengthening the plotline around the visceral, physical threats to women. Instead, the increased threat of rape, the fecundity of female bodies, and the “porous” nature of females in the Lay foreground and become the story; the potential and real violence toward the women of the text create the foil to contemporary Arthurian romances.