Bors (/ˈbɔːrz/; French: Bohort) is the name of two knights in the Arthurian legend, one the father and one the son. Bors the Elder is the King of Gaunnes or Gaul during the early period of King Arthur's reign, and is King Ban of Benoic's brother. The two first appear in the 13th-century Lancelot-Grail cycle. Bors the Younger later becomes one of the best Knights of the Round Table, and even achieves the Holy Grail.
Bohort of Gaunes is the younger son of King Bohort of Gaunes and younger brother to Lionel. Bohort is first-cousin to Lancelot both through Lionel and Bohort’s father, King Bohort of Gaunes, who is the younger brother of Lancelot’s father King Ban, and through Lionel and Bohort’s mother Evaine, who is sister to Lancelot’s mother Elaine. Bohort may also be a first-cousin to the brothers Bliobleheris and Blanor.
Sir Thomas Malory, in his Le Morte d’Arthur, often refers to Bohort (Bors) as Lancelot’s “nephew”, but the word nephew sometimes meant ‘junior cousin’ in Malory’s time.
The Prose Lancelot[]
Youth[]
Both Lionel and Bohort were stolen from their mother Evaine by Pharien, a knight who is now in the service of King Claudas but was formerly in the service of King Bohort. Pharien raises the two boys in secret, but when King Claudas discover this, Claudas imprisons Pharien and the two boys in a tower. Eventually they are released through the efforts of Saraïde, a damsel of Niniane, the Lady of the Lake. Lionel and Bohort are brought up with Lancelot by Niniane in the magic lake, but do not then learn that Lancelot is their first-cousin. Bohort’s master, as a child, is Lambegue, Pharian’s nephew.
Arrival at Court[]
Bohort arrives at Arthur’s court at Roevant in Mid-August, already knighted, as an anonymous knight in a cart driven by a dwarf. This is during the time when Lancelot has been imprisoned by Meleagant. The anonymous knight can only be freed from the degradation of riding in a cart if another will take his place. No knight of Arthur’s is willing to submit to his. The knight then is driven off by the dwarf, subject to much abuse by the townsfolk.
Gawain, who has not been present is told of this.
The anonymous knight then returns in the cart and dismounts. No knight is willing to have the disgraced knight sit next to him at the banquet and eventually the knight must sit among the squires, until Gawain offers him a seat next to him. Arthur protests and threatens to have Gawain banned from the Round Table. Gawain responds that if riding in a cart so disgraces one, then Lancelot is also disgraced. Arthur has no response.
After the meal, the anonymous knight goes to the king’s stables, takes one of the best horses there, and challenges the knights who blamed Gawain. In the jousting which follows, the knight defeats Sagremor the Foolhardy, Lucan the Wine Steward, Bedwyr the Constable, Girflet, son of Don, and Kay the Seneschal. Arthur blames Gawain for this disgrace but Gawain only replies that there are more shameful knights than he.
A damsel then rides up in a cart driven by a dwarf, and announces she may be freed only if a knight is willing to take her place in the cart. Gawain at once mounts the cart and the damsel steps down. Ten unknown knights suddenly appear leading a palfrey on which the damsel mounts. The damsel announces that the unknown knight has only mounted the cart for Lancelot’s sake, that the knight is 21 years old, had been knighted at Pentecost, and is Lancelot’s first cousin and Lionel's brother. Arthur, in light of the prowess displayed by the knight, has him immediately made a Knight of the Round Table. Arthur then learns that the knight is called Bohort the Exile and that the damsel is Niniane, the Lady of the Lake.
The king and queen ride off after Niniane where the find Gawain, in the middle of town, still in the cart. The queen immediately mounts the cart, freeing Gawain, the king mounts the cart, freeing the queen, and so with all the king’s retinue. From thenceforth no condemned man was ever made to ride in a cart.
Fathering of Helain[]
Bohort fights in a tourney arranged by King Brangoire at the Castle of the Borderland and wins the prize. Twelve other knights are selected who had performed almost as well. Bohort is disarmed and dressed in red silk by King Brangoire’s daughter. In a tent a table is set up at called the Table of the Twelve Peers where the twelve knights are to be seated. In the same tent is a golden seat where Bohort is to be seated. Bohort blushes with embarrassment when he is seated in the golden chair.
King Brangoire’s daughter serves at table, providing the twelve peers and Bohort with a spiced dessert. Bohort now ought to marry King Brangoire’s daughter who is almost a beautiful as the daughter of the Fisher King, but Bohort has vowed to keep himself free from any sexual activity, to remain a virgin. He refuses the woman, as is allowed by the custom. But twelve maidens are selected as husbands of the other twelve knights, in theory selected by Bohort, but really selected by King Brangoire. The maidens name Bohort the Handsome No-good because Bohort has not taken King Brangoire’s daughter for himself.
King Bangoire’s daughter asks each knight in turn what that knight will do for her in return for the service she has done him, and each responds with a vow to perform some absurd feat of valor. Bohort is asked last, and says that King Brandgoire’s daughter may call upon him to defend her at any time. Also, Bohort will seek for Queen Guenevere and abduct the Queen from the escort of any four knights, so long as one of them is not Lancelot.
King Brangoire’s daughter loves Bohort deeply and confesses her grief to her governess. The governess has a magic ring which will inflame man to lust. The governess visits Bohort, who is lying in his bed and tells Bohort that he has wronged King Brangoire’s daughter. The governess places the ring on Bohort’s finger when Bohort has King Brangoire’s daughter in his mind. Bohort’s inclination completely changes. The governess brings Bohort to King Brangoire’s daughter’s bed. Bohort spends the night with her and fathers, by God’s will, a son who will later be known as Helain the White and will become Emperor of Constantinople.
After returning to his own bed, Bohort rubs his hand together and the ring falls off, at which point Bohort regains his normal virginal inclinations.
Bohort Tries to Abduct Queen Guenevere[]
Patrides of the Golden Circlet is the seventh of the thirteen knights who has made a vow to King Brangoire’s daughter. Patrides’ vow is that he will kiss by force any lady traveling under a knight’s protection until he, Patrides, is vanquished. Patrides is successful in this endeavor until he tries to kiss King Bademagu’s daughter who is under Lancelot’s protection. Lancelot defeats Patrides and then learns from him the story of King Brangoire’s tournament. Patrides tells Lancelot that one of the knights made a vow even more foolish than his own, vowing to abduct Guenevere from four knights and also tells Lancelot that Bohort the Exile was named best knight at the tournament, but does no reveal that it was Bohort who was vowed to abduct Guenevere.
When Lancelot returns to court and relates this, Arthur decrees that for the following year he will never venture into the forest without taking the Queen with him, and that the Queen will have an escort of four armed knights: Lancelot of the Lake, Sagremor the Foolhardy, Kay the Seneschal, and Dodinel the Wild.
Bohort comes upon Guenevere and her escort in the forest, apologizes, weeping, for what he is about to do, and seizes Guenevere. Bohort is then forced to joust with Kay, Sagremor, and Dodinel and defeats all three of them. But in the joust with Lancelot, both are wounded, Bohort severely. Lancelot is immediately summoned away by the Old Damsel with the Golden Circlet.
A knight is seen wearing Lancelot’s armor and with a head, hanging from his saddlebow which appears to be Lancelot’s. Guenevere and the knights with her fear that Lancelot has been slain. As a result ten knights set out to find out the truth, the beginning of a quest which continues for years for other reasons, although it is soon learned that Lancelot is alive.
Lionel, who comes to court immediately after the questing knights leave, is taken to see the mysterious wounded knight who attempted to abduct Guenevere. The knight is revealed to be Bohort, now very ill because of the news of Lancelot’s death. Because of his illness, Bohort is not asked about why he had attempted to abduct Guenevere. Bohort eventually recovers and intends to join the other knights in search for news of Lancelot. But Bohort will first go to help the Lady of Galloway who seeks his aid, since neither Gawain nor Lancelot are at court, Lancelot having vanished and thought to be dead and Gawain gone in the quest to discover what has happened to Lancelot.
Bohort’s First Visit to Corbenic[]
Bohort successfully wins in a duel against Mariale on behalf of the Lady of Galloway at the court of King Pelles at Corbenic. During a banquet there, Bohort sees the Holy Grail and also sees King Pelles’ daughter weeping at the table, but she will not tell him why.
The following day, after Bohort has left Corbenek, a damsel blames Bohort for being harbored for two days by King Pelles but never daring to spend the night in the Palace of Aventures.
The Adventure of the Forbidden Hill[]
To accept the adventure of the Forbidden Hill, Bohort must swear that if he slays the knight Eloides, Bohort must take over Eloides’ task as defender of the hill, and kill any knight whom he fights as the hill’s defender, save for close friends of kinsmen. Bohort also includes any Knight of the Round Table. Bohort slew Eloides and then protected the hill for three months until Bohort was overcome by Lancelot. During that time more than forty knights battled Bohort who had always won. Fourteen were spared as being Knights of the Round Table, although Bohort was not aware of their names. These fourteen knights are revealed to be:
Bohort had only barely defeated Gawain, and it is later said that Gawain was already wounded from an earlier battle with Gaheriet when Gawain fought with Bohort.
Bohort Returns to Corbenic[]
Bohort, in his wanderings, returns to Corbenic. Bohort defeats in a duel Brinol of the Hedged Manor who is guarding the bridge to Corbenic. In the castle, Bohort is greeted joyfully by King Pelles and sees Pelles’ daughter with her infant son Galahad and is told that Galahad is Lancelot’s son. A banquet is provided by the Holy Grail. Bohort asks if the place where they are is the Place of Adventures. On learning that it is, Bohort insists on spending the knight in the hall.
In the hall, Bohort sits on the Bed of Wonder, is wounded by a lance in the shoulder, and defeats a stranger knight. When Bohort sits on the bed again, arrow rain on him from the windows of the hall, severely wounding him. Then a lion attacks Bohort, but Bohort slays the lion.
Bohort sees a dragon marked as representing King Arthur fighting with a leopard. Then the leopard vanishes. The dragon thrashes about for a time until from the dragon’s mouth issues as many as a hundred small dragons which attack the large dragon until all the dragons are dead.
A man with a harp appears with two snakes entwined about the man’s neck who keep biting him. The man plays the harp and sings the Lay of Tears which tells how Joseph of Arimathea came to Britain and relates a debate between Joseph and Orpheus the Enchantor who founded the Castle of Enchantments on the Scottish borderlands. The man then bids Bohort depart, for the man may only be freed from the serpents by the promised Good Knight. The man leaves.
A dove with a censer in its beak flies into the chamber from which the Grail had come during the banquet. From the chamber come four young boys followed by an elderly man dressed like a priest, but without a chasuble, carrying a lance from the tip of which drops of blood flow. The man tells Bohort that this is the avenging lance, but that Bohort will know nothing more about it until the Dangerous Seat at the Round Table is filled. If Lancelot had kept himself pure, as Bohort had intended to do, Lancelot would have put all these adventures of an end. The old man returns to the Grail chamber.
At least twelve, poorly-dressed, weeping maidens come from the Grail chamber, but will not explain to Bohort why they are poorly dressed and why they weep. The maidens depart.
Bohort looks into the Grail chamber and sees the Grail and an every-increasing glow, but a sword prevents Bohort from entering the room. The Grail sits on a silver table with white samite covering it. A man dressed like a bishop is kneeling before the table. The man stands up and removes the samite from the Grail. The brightness increases to the point the Bohort is blinded by it and can see nothing. A voice tellS Bohort not to approach closer, for Bohort has seen all that he is worthy to see. If Bohort disobeys, Bohort will lose all power over his limbs and will lie, for the rest of his life, like a block of wood.
Bohort, searching by touch alone, for he cannot see, does not find the bed. Bohort feels that the wounds he had obtained in his duel with the knight are miraculously healed. Not able to locate the bed, Bohort sits on the floor and hears melodies of voices praising God until day dawns and Bohort can see again.
King Pelles enters the room and tells Bohort that it has gone better for Bohort than for anyone who had previously spent the night in the room. Pelles asks if Bohort had seen Pelles’ father, the Maimed King. King Pelles explains that Pelles’ father was maimed by a sword which struck him when Pelles’ father drew it from its scabbard, for the sword was intended only for he who would achieve the adventures of the Holy Grail. The Maimed King will be healed when the Good Knight comes who will anoint the Maimed King’s wounds with blood from the lance that bleeds.
Bohort admits to seeing the lance and King Pelles tells him that the truth of the lance will be revealed to none until the final quest of the Grail.
Bohort in Gaul[]
Bohort, along with Gawain and Hector of the Fens, and five kings, is a leader of the expedition which the Knights of the Round Table undertake against King Claudas. When Arthur and Lancelot enter the war, Claudas flees to Rome and Claudas’ troops surrender.
Arthur intends to make Lancelot king over all of Gaul, but Lancelot refuses. Lancelot does agree to make his half-brother Hector King of Benwick and Lionel King of Gaul. They are both given their kingdoms. Then Lancelot would make Bohort King of Gaunes, but Bohort refuses, not wishing to yet forsake the honor of knighthood for ruling as a rich king. Bohort also considers it would be a “great sin” if so good a knight as Hector were now to forsake knighthood to become a king. Lancelot, who himself will not become a king, is finally convinced. The four cousins will remain simple knights.
In the Queste del Saint Graal[]
Whereas Galahad is a divinely inspired perfect knight, both Perceval and Bohort are continually tested. Perceval fails almost every test but is saved at the last minute by his pure faith. Bohort, on the contrary succeeds in all the tests he encounters.
Bohort is advised by a hermit priest to confess his sins and to eat and drink nothing but bread and water until Bohort comes to the Table of the Holy Grail. Bohort fights for a lady against her sister who is seeking to conquer her lands, winning a duel with the sister’s husband, Priadan the Black. But having done so, Bohort does not attempt to become her husband. Faced with the choice of rescuing his brother Lionel or saving a maiden whom he has never met, but who is about to be raped, Bohort chooses the maiden. When a beautiful maiden demands that Bohort become her husband, he refuses, even when the maiden with twelve young woman threaten to jump to their deaths from a tower, unless Bohort yields. The maidens jumps, but transform into devils and vanish. So it goes.
When Lionel attempts to kill Bohort for not attempting to rescue him. Bohort will not raise a weapon against his brother. A hermit comes to Bohort’s defense, but Lionel kills the hermit. Then their fellow Round Table knight Calogrenant comes to Bohort’s defense, but Lionel kills Calogrenant in the following duel. Seeing that his death is at hand, Bohort draws his sword to defend his life. At that point, a divine voice tells Bohort not to touch Lionel or Bohort will kill his brother, Lionel. A fiery brand falls from heaven to separate the knights.
This tale also appears in the Manessier Continuation of Chrétien de Troyes Perceval, presumably adapted from the Vulgate Quest. This is the only mention of Bohort in any French verse romance.
A voice tells Bohort to go to the sea where Perceval is waiting. In a ship on the sea, Bohort joins with Perceval, and later with Galahad. They move to a second ship, the Ship of Solomon, on which Galahad receives the Sword of the Strange Hangings and learn much from Perceval’s unnamed sister. Eventually they begin their adventures on land again. Perceval’s sister goes to her death to heal, by her blood, a leprous woman. Bohort departs from Galahad and Perceval to save a wounded knight who is fleeing from another knight and his dwarf. Later, Galahad and Perceval separate.
Five years later, Galahad and Perceval meet again. The two of them come across Bohort who has not slept four times in a bed or human dwelling during those five years. Bohort has wandered through unpeopled forests and mountains. The three companions come to Corbenic. Galahad miraculously joins the broken sword, which is given to Bohort.
In the Post-Vulgate Quest and the Longer Prose Tristan it is Palamedes, now a Christian, who meets up with Galahad and Perceval. Bohort arrives at the Grail castle as one of the other other nine knights who come there.
There follows the account of the final Grail banquet, the healing of the Maimed King, and the departure of the three companions across the sea to Sarras. The three companions are imprisoned for a year until the King of Sarras dies. The companions are freed and Galahad is made King of Sarras. After reigning a year, Galahad dies and the Grail is taken to heaven. Perceval becomes a hermit, but Bohort retains his secular clothing for Bohort intends, in the end, to return to Arthur’s Britain. A year and three days later, Perceval dies.
Bohort boards a ship and returns to Arthur’s court, over seven years after he has departed.
In the Mort Artu and Related Works[]
The Mort Artu, as it has survived, refers to some of the events in the Galahad quest, but Bohort is not the religious and pious abstainer seen in that story. Bohort shows no sign of being bothered by Lancelot’s sin with Guenevere and such dislike as Bohort has for Guenevere is because Guenevere has angered and disturbed Lancelot.
The English Stanzaic Morte Arthur tells much the same tale as the French Mort Artu, escept, probably through a mental quirk of the author or someone in the line of tradition that led to it, the deeds of Hector are ascribed to Bohort, and the deeds of Bohort are ascribed to Hector throughout. Malory mostly follows the English version.
It is Bohort who kills Guerrehet in the rescue of Guenevere from the stake. In the English version, Guerrehet is slain by Lancelt.
Although no explicit mention is made of Bohort’s role a preserver of Arthurian tales, the Mort Artu carefully mentions that Lancelot’s heartfelt speech in praise of the country of Logres was only heard by Bohort, who must therefore be taken as the source of it in the Mort Artu.
Once Lancelot returns to Gaul, he makes Hector King of Benwick and Lionel King of Gaunes, himself and Bohort remaining as knights. The Stanzaic Morte Arthur mentions none of this.
After Arthur’s disappearance, and the defeat of Mordred’s sons, Bohort returns to Gaul, leaving Hector in Logres to search for Lancelot. But Bohort returns, with a single squire, to Joyous Gard after Lancelot’s death, to see him buried. Bohort has been advised to be there by a hermit. Thereupon Bohort himself becomes a hermit to stay with the former Archbishop of Canterbury and Bliobliheris.
Fanni Bogdanow in her La Version Post-Vulgate de la Queste del Saint Graal et de la Mort Artu: Troisième partie du Roman du Graal, Tome III, selects as her final version one in which Bohort remains in the hermitage, now known as the Royal Abbey, along with the former Archbishop of Canerbury, Bliobleheris, and Meraugis of Port Lesguez until the two latter have died, and Bohort looks for his own death to follow. Lords come to the abbey from Benwick, Gaunes, and Gaul, and ask that Borhot choose a king to rule them. Bohort indicates that their king ought to be Lancelot, son of Lionel, and then dies.
The archbishop makes a long prayer ending with the wish that he also may die now. The archbishop lies down beside Bohort’s body and the archbishop’s spirit leaves his body. The messengers return to Gaul, summon the barons of Gaul, Benwick, and Gaunes to Paris, and have Lancelot, son of Lionel, made king.
The existence of Lancelot, son of Lionel, only mentioned here, contradicts the statement in the Estoire del Saint Graal and in the Vulgate Quest that Galahad will be the last descendant of King Solomon.
In Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur[]
Bors's heraldry
Thomas Malory appears not to have known the Prose Lancelot and accordingly invents a coming to court of Lancelot and his two cousins in his story of the Roman War as found in the Winchester manuscript only (V.7, spelling modernized):
... for he [Lancelot] and Sir Bors and Sir Lionel was but late afore at an high feast made all three knights.
In his story of the Roman war, Malory assigns to Bohort the deeds which Malory’s source, the English Alliterative Morte Arthure, assigns to Bos of Oxford, presumably because the names are similar. Malory may have thought that the name Bos in his source was a variation of Bors/Bohort and that he was making no change.
In the end of his Tristan story, Malory tells of Bors/Bohort at Corbonec, taken from the Prose Lancelot account, as retold in the version of the Prose Tristan which Malory was using. Malory repeats Bohort’s adventures in the ''Queste del Saint Grall in his own retelling of the work. Similarly in Malory’s retelling of the Mort Artu, save that Malory here follows the English Stanzaic Morte Arthur more closely in interchanging the roles of Bohort and Hector.
Malory makes Lancelot out to be lord of all Gaul and has Lancelot appoint Bohort king of all King Claudas’ lands, which should be Berry.
From the Stanzaic Morte Arthur, Malory takes the tale that Lancelot has the company of a number of Lancelot’s companions and kinsfolk, not just Bliobleheris and Hector, as in the Mort Artu. Hector joins the band only at Lancelot’s funeral in Malory and the Stanzaic Morte Arthur, as usual exchanging the two personages. In the French Mort Artu Hector dies before Lancelot and it is Bohort who miraculously turns up at Lancelot’s funeral.
Malory adds an ending not found elsewhere (XXI.13, spelling modernized):
For the French book maketh mention—and is authorized—that Sir Bors, Sir Ector, Sir Blamour, and Sir Bleoberis went into the Holy Land, thereas Jesu Christ was quick and dead. And anon as they had established their lands, for, the book saith, so Sir Launcelot commanded them to do ere ever he passed out of this world, these four knights did many battles upon the miscreants, or Turks. And there they 〈died〉 upon a Good Friday for God’s sake.
