Redcrosse: Accidental Nobility

According to the old wife in Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, gentilesse comes from God alone. Ancestry and birth have no bearing on an individual’s nobility. The first book of Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene focuses on an oafish man called Redcrosse who slowly matures into a chivalrous knight. Though Redcrosse does not fit exactly into the old wife’s mold of a gentleman, he certainly possesses many qualities of nobility by the end of Book One of The Faerie Queene.

When Redcrosse first appears, he is presented as a common man, or as Spenser calls him in his letter to Raleigh, a “clownish person” (626). Since the armor Una lets him try on is representative of the armor Saint Paul describes as the armor of a Christian man, it is only natural to assume that if it does indeed fit, then God willed that Redcrosse be some sort of holy emissary. The armor does in fact fit perfectly; theref

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The third day results in the destruction of the dragon, but Redcrosse does not really deserve the credit. On the second day of battle, Redcrosse emerges refreshed, much to the dragon’s dismay, but the result of this day is no different than the first. The dragon succeeds in knocking Redcrosse into the Tree of Life, which once again heals the knight. This is not merely chance, but Divine Grace. When the duo finally reaches Una’s homeland, the dragon proves to be a difficult foe. He is merely a vessel of God’s Will. If, as the old wife states, gentilesse is granted by God alone, then Redcrosse surely has been the recipient of something akin to gentilesse.

Redcrosse’s healing begins with Duessa’s disrobing. The fall of Redcrosse climaxes when he is forced to fight Orgoglio, a terrible monster. She is shown to be a “fowle deformed wight” (721). Though Redcrosse hoards this massive potential, he is still susceptible to mistakes and poor judgment. Following a brief but dangerous bout with Despair, Redcrosse is taken to the house of Holinesse where he is fully rehabilitated. ore, Redcrosse is equipped with “loins girt about with truth, breastplate of righteousness, feet shod with the gospel of peace, shield of faith, helmet of salvation, and sword of the spirit, which is the word of God” (626). Lucifera, whose name has obvious connotations, manages to put another metaphorical dent in Redcrosse’s holy armor.

Approximate Word count = 624
Approximate Pages = 2 (250 words per page double spaced)

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