Class In Sir Gawain And The Green Knight

Class is an integral part of society, and a primary standard for how people view themselves and others within societal parameters. While class has evolved over time from feudalistic hierarchies, to the estates of Chaucer’s time, to the middle class that emerged during the Renaissance period, class has always been a structure of society, trying to evolve to stay relevant and cohesive to the changing periods of time. One of the most prominent staples of modern day class structure is the middle class. Starting with the fragile system of feudalism, and the attempts to quell the beginning dissolution of it during the Norman period, the negatives of it weighed too strongly and a middle class began to emerge, before becoming fully present during

This image of the peasantry of the kingdom coming to awe over the maiden from Avalon it presents the almost comical image of all the peasants stopping everything they were doing to go and fawn over the higher class. As Lanval is designed to be a comical, satirical piece, this can be construed as a jab against the feudalistic system by portraying the lower class as solely there to worship the upper classes, as that is all they are shown doing in the piece. Much like with Lanval, in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight the only real mention of anyone who does not belong to a higher class is when all the people come out to “confer their respects” to Gawain when he arrives at the castle (Norton Anthology of English Literature). Unlike Lanval though, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is not written with a humorous, satirical tone. In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, they attempt to show the positive aspects of the feudal system, primarily through demonstration of how good and just Sir Gawain is. The journey that Sir Gawain goes through in

The Renaissance was a birthplace for new ideas and for new societal ideals, such as the new ideal for men like the Renaissance man. One of the most prevalent and crucial new societal ideals the Renaissance put forward was the now altered social hierarchy. During the Renaissance, the strict class lines formerly found in feudalism, and the three estates began to blur. The Renaissance presented the idea of four classes; those classes were the workers, the middle class, which had now fully emerged into society, the merchants, and the nobles, in order of lowest ranking to highest ranking respectively (“Social Classes of the Renaissance & Renaissance Social Hierarchy”). In stark contrast to the societies that were governed by feudalism and the three estates, this social hierarchy allowed people to afford social mobility by means other than just marriage. It allowed for a society in which people could begin to climb the social ranks by hard work and earning it, rather than just by marrying into higher stature or by devoting one’s service entirely to the church. The exception to this tended to remain the class of nobility, with the highest ranking tending to remain there, passing position down through family lines and marriage; however, the nobility did expand to encompass large business owners (“Social Classes of the Renaissance & Renaissance Social Hierarchy”). This