A motif is simply a fancy word for theme. I like using it with my students because of its special application to literature and the arts.
One of the most important motifs in King Arthur is the “knightly quest,” which is two-fold. To begin with, there is a literal quest such as saving a damsel in distress. Alongside this, the knight must also undertake a figurative quest, which I refer to as a “quest for virtue.” Every knight, whether it be Sir Gawain, Sir Lancelot, or King Arthur himself, is constantly seeking virtue in his life and struggling to overcome vice in the process.
Before we go any further, it is helpful to define a few terms. The simplest definition of virtue is “a good habit.” While I like this definition, it still needs more. After all, not every good habit can automatically be called a virtue. For example, of course it is “good” to clear your plate from the dinner table, but we probably would not call that a virtue. We would simply call it a good habit.
Virtues, then, need to be placed within their natural Christian context. They are habits of the soul that manifest in our actions. Moreover, they are not something we can simply obtain and move on from. We must do them over and over again so that we embody them.
Faith, hope, and charity, the three theological virtues, figure prominently on the quests, but they might sound a little more Arthurian if we unpack the terms slightly.
Faith can be seen in the knights’ fealty, loyalty, and obedience to God, king, and country.
Likewise, hope is best reflected in the virtue of trust around which the Round Table and the Code of Chivalry are built. Knights forge a trust in one another and further trust that the goodness of their social compact will bear fruit for the realm as a whole.
Finally, charity, more properly defined here as sacrificial love, permeates everything and is most obviously at the heart of chivalry itself, which means helping another in need no matter the cost. A major virtue that goes hand-in-hand with this is humility, as it is a prerequisite of all service.
For every virtue, there is an equal and opposite vice: humility vs. pride; fealty vs. treason; chivalry vs. cravenness; and so on.
To summarize Arthurian quests, a knight must save a damsel or perform some such heroic act, while also trying to overcome a vice, in order to embody a particular virtue. And, even once the quest is complete, there is no guarantee that he will perpetually embody that virtue unless he keeps working at it. Moreover, each knight, including King Arthur, has particular vices he struggles with, making certain virtues his objective.
The literal aspect of each knightly quest is fairly easy for students to objectively measure; either he saves the damsel or not. But the figurative part is very difficult and makes for wonderful debates, which we will get to later. It also makes the knights, fictitious and fantastic though they are, profoundly human.
On a final note, quests were a major motif in medieval literature as a whole, making it an important study for students of the Middle Ages in general. The medieval quest, sometimes characterized as a pilgrimage, was a metaphor for man’s earthly journey to Heaven. At the end of the day, that was what it was all about in the medieval mindset (and in a classical classroom)!