[See: Carnival Culture Index]

The Human Animal

The human being is composed of many apparent dichotomies: spiritual and physical, mental and emotional, male and female, human and animal. The metaphysical Fool’s Journey, as told in the Tarot deck, leads the querent - the Questing Grail Knight - through the union of these many opposites, the fulfillment of these polarities.

Machiavelli speaks at great length on this subject in his very Taoist work on political strategy, The Prince (part of a larger literary genre of mirrors for princes):

You should know, then, that there are two ways of contending: one by using laws, the other, force. The first is appropriate for men, the second for animals; but because the former is often ineffective, one must have recourse to the latter. Therefore, a ruler must know well how to imitate beasts as well as employing properly human means. This policy was taught to rulers allegorically by ancient writers: they tell how Achilles and many other ancient rulers were entrusted to Chiron the centaur, to be raised carefully by him. Having a mentor who was half-beast and half-man signifies that a ruler needs to us both natures, and that one without the other is not effective.

Think of Machiavelli’s “prince” as the Fool-made-good, of he who has come to master himself through the application of will. In the Tarot, we could look to the Chariot in the Major Arcana, or the Four Knights of the Lesser Arcana. In the French tradition of Troubadours and Courtly Love, he was the Chevalier (caballero in Spanish): breathed into by God, the warrior-poet whose heart was set aflame by a Love which transcends the ages.

The Big Bad Wolf

The Fool becomes the Chevalier, a knight, through the union of his human and animal natures, and the proper application of each within the world of action. In him lives a partnership of aspects which in most people are a source of much conflict. Having solved this dichotomy within himself though, he is able to direct his energies outward. As such, he becomes an example to others, the perfected “humanimal”, and an ambassador between the human and non-human communities of this world. In classical Catholic symbology, he has a close parallel in St. Francis of Assisi, whose legendary exploits include taming a wolf which was terrorising an Italian city:

Then Francis called out to the creature: “Come to me, Brother Wolf. In the name of Christ, I order you not to hurt anyone.” At that moment the wolf lowered its head and lay down at St. Francis’ feet, meek as a lamb.

St. Francis explained to the wolf that he had been terrorizing the people, killing not only animals, but humans who are made in the image of God. “Brother Wolf,” said Francis, “I want to make peace between you and the people of Gubbio. They will harm you no more and you must no longer harm them. All past crimes are to be forgiven.”

The wolf showed its assent by moving its body and nodding its head. Then to the absolute surprise of the gathering crowd, Francis asked the wolf to make a pledge. As St. Francis extended his hand to receive the pledge, so the wolf extended its front paw and placed it into the saint’s hand. Then Francis commanded the wolf to follow him into town to make a peace pact with the townspeople. The wolf meekly followed St. Francis.

As such, St. Francis and the medieval Chevalier are the exact antithesis to the werewolf of legend, or to the berserker of the Norsemen, who flies into a murderous shamanic trance in battle, giving in wholly to animal nature, rending enemies limb from limb. He is the balanced and balancing woodsman who appears at the end of Little Red Riding Hood to rescue her, his anima - his female soul - from the clutches of an over-abundance of male animal aggressive power.

The Horse Lords

The Horseman reflects not just a union of opposites and self-mastery, but a hold-over from another era of human existence on this planet. The tribes of man grew up alongside their animal brothers. Nomadic peoples followed seasonally the herds they hunted, living amongst them, learning from them a particular way of living: customs & habits which found their outlet amidst the sedentary agricultural life of Europe in the cult of the mounted warrior (which was itself continually re-inforced by wave after wave of marauding “barbarians” from the East).

Horses meant mobility and power. A mounted warrior has strength and range which a man on foot will never match. As such, the medieval horseman dedicated his life to mastering that power through the martial arts of the time: riding, fencing, jousting, archery, etc. Strength in arms in a land ruled by the Law of the Jungle translates to social power. The braves who are powerful enough to protect the tribe and to bring down game in the hunt become heros, nobles. These sovereigns, these princes, these chevaliers, become the seeds of families of strength which pass on their knowledge and traditions from generation to generation, as well as lands, territories and tribal hunting grounds which they have conquered from others.

The career of a knight was costly, requiring personal means in keeping with the station; for a knight had to defray his own expenses in an age when the sovereign had neither treasury nor war budget at his disposal. When land was the only kind of riches, each lord paramount who wished to raise an army divided his domain into military fiefs, the tenant being held to military service at his own personal expense for a fixed number of days (forty in France and in England during the Norman period). These fees, like other feudal grants, became hereditary, and thus developed a noble class, for whom the knightly profession was the only career. Knighthood, however, was not hereditary, though only the sons of a knight were eligible to its ranks. In boyhood they were sent to the court of some noble, where they were trained in the use of horses and weapons, and were taught lessons of courtesy.

To maintain these holdings, of course, required more than just brute force. A ruler doesn’t just pass down rules to the commoners, but acts as a “ruler”, a yardstick, a standard by which other men measure themselves. As a result, the Chevaliers developed a sophisticated code of ethics, a system of honor, a channel for right action within a chaotic world. This is the birth of Chivalry in the West - with a close parallel to Bushido, the Way of the Samurai, in feudal Japan. Through martial exercise, the study of history, strategy, poetry and philosophy, Knights and Lords refined their judgement, become - under ideal conditions - shining examples to men. {See also: Knightly Virtues}

Crusaders, Pilgrims & Merchants

The Catholic Church replaced the Roman Empire in the Middle Ages as the unifying authority among the many tribes, bands, ethnic groups and marauding “barbarians” which dotted the continent. Picking up the reins of power and infrastructure from the Romans, the Church ably positioned itself in the center of medieval life. Though the core Christian message remained quite pacifist, realities on the ground rarely played out that way, thanks to human nature and the lust for power and prestige.

In the ceremonial of conferring knighthood the Church shared, through the blessing of the sword, and by the virtue of this blessing chivalry assumed a religious character. In early Christianity, although Tertullian’s teaching that Christianity and the profession of arms were incompatible was condemned as heretical, the military career was regarded with little favour. In chivalry, religion and the profession of arms were reconciled. This change in attitude on the part of the Church dates, according to some, from the Crusades, when Christian armies were for the first time devoted to a sacred purpose. Even prior to the Crusades, however, an anticipation of this attitude is found in the custom called the “Truce of God”. It was then that the clergy seized upon the opportunity offered by these truces to exact from the rough warriors of feudal times a religious vow to use their weapons chiefly for the protection of the weak and defenseless, especially women and orphans, and of churches. Chivalry, in the new sense, rested on a vow; it was this vow which dignified the soldier, elevated him in his own esteem, and raised him almost to the level of the monk in medieval society.

The founding of the First Crusade saw the Catholic Church officially authorizing the formation of military orders, which were modeled organizationally after religious orders of monks.

Catholic military orders appeared following the First Crusade. The foundation of the Templars in 1118 provided the first in a series of tightly organized military forces which protected the Christian colonies in the Outremer, as well as fighting non-Christians in the Iberian Peninsula and Eastern Europe.

The principal feature of the military order is the combination of military and religious ways of life. Some of them, like the Knights of St John and the Knights of St Thomas, also cared for the sick and poor.

The Crusades, it seems, were not just about maintaining dominance over religious sites in the Middle East, but also about establishing and protecting trade routes. Who better to fill this role than the Chevaliers, heirs to the nomadic hunter-warrior tradition, men of power, prestige and adventure?

What started as an appeal by Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos for western mercenaries to fight the Seljuk Turks in Anatolia quickly turned into a wholesale Western migration and conquest of territory outside of Europe. Both knights and peasants from many nations of Western Europe travelled over land and by sea towards Jerusalem and captured the city in July 1099, establishing the Kingdom of Jerusalem and other Crusader states. Although these gains lasted for less than two hundred years, the First Crusade was a major turning point in the expansion of Western power, as well as the first major step towards reopening international trade in the West since the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

The Knights Templar and the Knights Hospitaller (also, Hospitalier) were two of the most influential military/religious orders, founded to protect and care for pilgrims. The Templars became so wealthy and powerful that the Church eventually disbanded and persecuted them as a threat to Papal power, but not before they laid the foundations for modern banking:

By 1150, the Order’s original mission of guarding pilgrims had changed into a mission of guarding their valuables through an innovative way of issuing letters of credit, an early precursor of modern banking. Pilgrims would visit a Templar house in their home country, depositing their deeds and valuables. The Templars would then give them an encrypted letter which would describe their holdings. While traveling, the pilgrims could present the letter to other Templars along the way, to “withdraw” funds from their account. This kept the pilgrims safe since they were not carrying valuables, and further increased the power of the Templars.

All The King’s Men

With the end of the Crusades and the rise of nation-states in Europe, chivalry gradually lost its religious quality. As the Catholic Encyclopedia describes it, during this third period of chivalry, “honour remains the peculiar worship of knighthood.” What was once a vow to “wage perpetual war against the infidels” gave way to a much more secular dedication:

Like the monastic, the knightly vow bound with common ties warriors of every nation and condition, and enrolled them in a vast brotherhood of manners, ideals, and aims. The secular brotherhood had, like the regular its rule imposing on its members fidelity to their; lords and to their word, fair play on the battlefield, and the observance of the maxims of honour and courtesy. Medieval chivalry, moreover, opened a new chapter in the history of literature. It prepared the way and gave ready currency to an epic and romantic movement in literature reflecting the ideal of knighthood and celebrating its accomplishment and achievements. Provence and Normandy were the chief centres of this kind of literature, which was spread throughout all Europe by the trouvères and troubadours.

During this period, the Encyclopedia continues, “bloody battles alternate with tournaments and gorgeous pageants.” It is this period which gave rise to the intense anima-projection and Bhakti-like devotion to one’s Lady.

This paralleled, in some regards, the rite of initiation into knighthood which took place under the dubbing ceremony. After ritual purification, prayer, fasting, confession and a vigil, a squire knelt before his Lord and Master. Some accounts have the Lord touching a sword on each shoulder of the new knight. Others describe the buffet or colee, a blow struck with the flat of the sword or with the hand sharply against the neck of the knight. The knight may also receive a new name during this ceremony, which parallels practices in religious orders to this day, indicating that there has been a change of personality, that the old life of the initiate is over and a new one, centered around an oath of fealty to one’s Lord, and other vows of chivalric conduct now govern one’s behavior.

Without much of a leap, the dubbing ceremony could be easily seen as a mystical/symbolic decapitation of the knight. As in Voodoo and other traditions, the knight could be thought of as being “possessed” by the Will of his Lord. His Lord becomes his “captain”, literally, “one who stands at the head of” from the Latin, “caput”, head. This is the same as the duty or Dharma revealed by Krishna to Arjuna upon the field of battle. A more modern mythological amplification of this theme is found in the American tale, the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, with its headless horseman, a Hessian mercenary who “lost his head” to a cannonball. He roams the country-side taking the heads of the living. {See also: Ronin, retainer, Hagakure, Ghost Dog}

If the knight sacrificed his “head” (sovereignty) to his Lord and Master then, he sacrificed his heart to his Lady. Between these twin acts of devotion, the Chevalier lets go of some part of himself in exchange for the ability to fully dedicate himself to martial feats and acts of valor: self-mastery. In a sense then, the Chevalier himself becomes a vessel: acting out the Will of his Lord, and defending the Honor of his Lady.

We see this psychological trend reach its apogee in the romances around the Holy Grail. Whatever else it is symbolically vis-a-vis the Da Vinci Code, the Grail in Medieval Europe became, essentially, a container of devotion. It became a fixed reference point (much like the Crucifix) after which a man could quest his whole life long. It became a reason for being, a reason for searching, a reason to keep going, to continually empty oneself, to perfect and to purify oneself.

[Dedicated to Aron Ahlstrom, heavy cavalry & The Strategist, dragoons]