The Red Knight - Sir Ironside

Sir Ironside was not born a villain. He was a knight of great lineage and greater strength, and his cruelty was born not from malice but from a promise sworn to a lady whose brother had been killed by one of Arthur's greatest knights, either Sir Lancelot, the greatest knight in Christendom, or Sir Gawain, the most honoured warrior of the Round Table. She had made him swear a terrible oath: that he would labour daily in arms until he met with one of Arthur's knights, and that all he overcame he would put to a villainous death. To fulfill this vow, Ironside had laid siege to Castle Dangerous, the stronghold of Dame Lionesse, and had hanged nearly forty armed knights by the neck from the trees around her walls, leaving their bodies as a warning to any who would come against him. He wore all-red armour, a red shield, and red harness, so that from a distance he looked like a pillar of blood, and his strength waxed with the sun until noon, when he had the power of seven men in his arm.

When Lynette, the sharp-tongued damsel who was sister to Lionesse, rode to Camelot to beg for a champion, she had hoped for Lancelot or Gawain or Sir Tristan, the greatest knights of the age. Instead Arthur sent her Beaumains, the kitchen knave who had spent a year in Sir Kay's scullery. Lynette reviled him all the way, but Beaumains, who was in truth Gareth of Orkney, Arthur's nephew, defeated the Black Knight, the Green Knight, the Red Knight Perimones, and the Blue Knight Sir Persant of Inde before he reached Castle Dangerous. At the castle, Gareth saw Dame Lionesse at a window and fell in love at once, but the Red Knight of the Red Launds rode out to meet him, and the two fought a battle that would become legend.

From noon until evening the two knights clashed, their swords striking sparks, their shields splitting, their armour falling away in pieces. Ironside fought with the strength of seven men, and Gareth, though he was one of the mightiest warriors of the Orkney house, began to tire. But when Gareth looked up and saw Lionesse watching from the window, her face pale with fear and hope, he found a strength he did not know he possessed. He pressed forward, struck Ironside such a blow that the knight was brought down, and stood over him with sword raised. Ironside yielded and asked for mercy. He explained the promise that had driven him to such cruelty, the lady who had bound him with her oath, and the brother whose death had set him on this path. Gareth, whose heart was as gentle as his arm was strong, spared him and sent him to Camelot to tell the court of Beaumains' deeds.

Ironside's redemption was swift and complete. He rode to Camelot, told King Arthur of the kitchen knight's victories, and was received into the fellowship of the Round Table, the order of knights gathered at Camelot to serve the highest ideals of chivalry. He became a loyal knight of Arthur's court, and his friendship with Gareth grew so deep that when Gareth married Lionesse, Ironside served as the carver at the wedding feast, the knight who had once hanged men from trees now cutting meat for the celebration of love. He was present at the small dinner party that Queen Guinevere, the wife of King Arthur, held for her favourite knights, and he rode with the ten knights who accompanied the queen on the Maying expedition when she was ambushed and abducted by Meliagrance, the knight who would later accuse her of adultery. He even appears among the knights who tried to heal Sir Urre, the wounded Hungarian knight who could only be cured by the touch of the best knight in the world, a quest that would ultimately prove Lancelot's supremacy.

In an earlier tradition, found in the Middle English poem Sir Gawaine and the Carl of Carlisle, Ironside appears as the father of Sir Raynbrown, the Knight of the Green Shield, and as a giant and dragon slayer who owned a steed named Favelhand. In this telling he was always armed, both in winter and in summer, and his name Ironside came from the fact that he never removed his armour. But it is Malory's version that endures, the red-clad tyrant who became a brother in arms, the hanged knights forgiven because they died for a promise, and the warrior who learned that the strongest oath is the one a knight swears to his own honour.