Marshall University Marshall Digital Scholar Theses, Dissertations and Capstones 1-1-2009 Power, Courtly Love, and a Lack of Heirs : Guinevere and Medieval Queens Jessica Grady
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://mds.marshall.edu/etd Part of the Other Classics Commons Recommended Citation Grady, Jessica, "Power, Courtly Love, and a Lack of Heirs : Guinevere and Medieval Queens" (2009). Theses, Dissertations and Capstones. Paper 69. This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Marshall Digital Scholar. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses, Dissertations and Capstones by an authorized administrator of Marshall Digital Scholar. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Power, Courtly Love, and a Lack of Heirs: Guinevere and Medieval Queens Thesis submitted to the Graduate College of Marshall University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History by Jessica Grady Dr. Laura Michele Diener, Ph.D., Committee Chairperson Dr. David Winter, Ph.D. Dr. William Palmer, Ph.D. Marshall University December 2009 ABSTRACT Power, Courtly Love, and a Lack of Heirs: Guinevere and Medieval Queens by Jessica Grady Authors have given Queen Guinevere of the Arthurian stories a wide variety of personalities; she has been varyingly portrayed as seductive, faithful, “fallen,” powerful, powerless, weak-willed, strong-willed, even as an inheritor of a matriarchal tradition. These personalities span eight centuries and are the products of their respective times and authors much more so than of any historical Guinevere. Despite this, however, threads of similarity run throughout many of the portrayals: she had power in some areas and none in others; she was involved in a courtly romance; and she did not produce an heir to the throne.