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Wolves and Ravens and Bears, Oh My! The Northman and the Beasts of Battle

Animal symbolism is an important part of the visual imagery of Robert Eggers’ The Northman, released in 2022. But where do they come from? What do they mean?

King Aurvandill and young
 Hamleth take part in Heimir the Fool’s animalistic ritual in The Northman (2022).

Anyone who has seen The Northman knows that director Robert Eggers is interested in history and mythology. In a recent interview with Slate, he went into considerable detail about the archaeological and literary sources for many of the events and images of his latest film. Snippets of archaeological evidence from the Orkey isles, the Osberg tapestry, and Snorri’s Edda are all woven into his story.[1] It’s also no secret that Eggers’s films lean heavily on animal symbolism: goats and gulls are everywhere in The Vvitch and The Lighthouse.[2] I was therefore surprised that, in his Slate interview, Eggars didn’t touch on one area that seemed ubiquitous in his latest film: the motif known in Old English scholarship as ‘the beasts of battle.’

What are the Beasts of Battle?

Simply put, the ‘beasts of battle’ are the ravens, wolves, and eagles who come to devour the slain on the battlefield. Though they are staples of early Germanic literature, their purpose remains pretty mysterious. When Arnorr Jarlaskald, the 11th century Icelandic poet, commemorated the battle of Nesjar, fought between King Olav Haraldsson and Earl Svein Hakonsson of Lade in 1016, he wrote:

Sandy corpses of [the loser] Sveinn’s men are cast from the south onto the beaches; far and wide people see where bodies float off Jutland. The wolf drags a heap of slain from the water; Olav’s son made fasting forbidden for the eagle; the wolf tears a corpse in the bays.[3]

 Modern illustration of the Battle of Nesjar in 1016.

The beasts help themselves to the dead, and the dead are reduced to food for the beasts. In Egil’s saga, the 11th century poet Egil Skallagrimsson records that his father was a werewolf, who ripped out a man’s throat with his teeth and was nourished by the blood.[4] Even in the complex mythology of the Vikings, carrion eaters are there to consume corpses. The wolf Fenrir, son of Loki and the giantess Angerboda, will be magically chained until Ragnarok (the Norse Doomsday), at which point he will fight and swallow Odin. His purpose is foretold in the Edda, and the very act of chaining him points towards this dark day when he will devour the dead.

The beasts are also a feature of Old English poetry, one of the few markers that hint at literary traditions once shared across northern Europe and now sadly lost. In 991, near the town of Maldon in Essex, England, Earl Byrhtnoth of Mercia led an army into battle to repel his enemy Olaf’s Viking invasion. Byrhynoth suffered a major defeat, which was immortalized a century later in an anonymous poem called ‘The Battle of Maldon.’ In the poem, just before the armies clash, the poet writes that ‘Hremmas wundon, earn æses georn’ (‘ravens circled, eagles eager for food,’ 106-7).[5] They are a dark symbol of fate, of the inevitable slaughter of battle. In fact, the poet calls the Vikings ‘wælwulfas,’ ‘wolves of slaughter’ (96), a role that Amleth inhabits fully in Eggers’ The Northman. Griffith summarized the ‘beasts of battle’ trope thus: ‘in the wake of an army, the dark raven, the dewy-plumaged eagle and the wolf of the forest, eager for slaughter and carrion/food, give voice to their joy.’[6]

Modern illustration of the Battle of Maldon by Rory W. Stapledon.

The Meaning of the Beasts of Battle

But what do these beasts mean? Beyond their bloodlust, what function might they play? Clearly they are closely connected to battle, a terrifying and ever-present reminder of the ultimate price humanity pays for war. But they also seem to be about dying as an act of nourishment. Old Norse poetry was interested in the borders between human culture and the natural world typified by processes like ‘birth, the unpredictable tenor of life (where Fate was operative) and death.’[7] Death and eating carrion are both natural processes, but human conflict is not. By eating the dead, the wolves and ravens bring the human into their natural reality. Death feeds them so that they can thrive; it’s a process of naturalizing humans, but also about a cycle of death and life. One gives life to the other. Of course, the animals are also mythological. As we’ve seen, the wolves have a mythological counterpart in Fenrir, as well as Odin’s wolves Freki and Geri (‘Ravener’ and ‘Greed’). Thor’s ravens Hugin and Munin, who travel the earth each day to bring him wisdom and prophetic knowledge, are supernatural versions of the ravens who fly over the battlefield. So these beasts of battle are part of the mythological story of the Vikings, as well as the natural cycles of life and death.

Detail from the 10th century Gosforth Cross, showing Odin’s son Vidarr fighting the great wolf Fenrir.

In The Northman, Amleth and his father take on the wolf as a totemic animal. In his Slate interview, Eggers acknowledges that young Amleth’s coming-of-age wolf ceremony, led by the Fool in a cave, isn’t drawn from any specific Viking ritual. The setting is derived from a burial chamber found in the Orkney Isles, and the Fool’s ceremonial rattle comes from an archaeological find, and plenty of creative license is taken with them.[8] However, it establishes a connection between Amleth and the wolves from the very beginning of the film. We see him acting as a wolf-pup in the ritual deep in the earth, and then becoming a wolf as a berserker and, as though he were Egill’s own father, ripping out a man’s throat. Historically, berserkers were feared warriors whose ferocity on the battlefield was legendary: they were said to feel no pain. It’s not clear how Viking berserkers developed this immunity—Eggers accounts for it in his film via a trance-inducing ritual. As he torments his uncle, Amleth continues to embody the ferocity and cunning of the wolf. In a revenge tragedy like The Northman, it’s only fitting that the main character’s totemic animal is also a prophetic foretelling of his own death.

The Northman‘s Hamleth, with the ever-present raven (2022).

Amleth’s father is a nobleman called the Raven Lord, and at several moments a black raven appears to remind Amleth of his duty, as though his father is watching over him. His hero’s journey in The Northman is to avenge his father’s death. But the raven was a symbol of wisdom—a creature that can see the present and the future. Its presence hints at the death that follows Amleth. When he reaches Iceland, Amleth kills his uncle’s eldest son and Amleth’s half-brother, Thórir. When Fjölnir finds the body, it is surrounded by hundreds of ravens. Death has come for Fjölnir and his family. The Raven Lord’s vengeance is near at hand. But in the final showdown between Amleth and Fjölnir, there is no winner. Each kills the other. The ravens were waiting for both of them, and they will feed on them in death. Both men are absorbed into the natural world, and their deaths will nourish the carrion-eaters. In fact, their death also ensures the survival of Amleth’s own son and daughter, who are taken to safety by their mother Olga. But the blood that was spilled in their name—Fjölnir’s entire family, his soldiers, his friends—is inescapable.

The animals of The Northman are companions, tribal markers, but also dark omens of the inevitable death to come. Their presence reminds Amleth, and the audience, that death—his death—is always near at hand. Perhaps The Northman is a piece of Viking literature not because of its longships, Thor’s hammers, Valkyries, but because, in the end, the only certainty is Fate.

Early 7th century purse-lid from Sutton Hoo, decorated with wolves and birds of prey.

Will Beattie
PhD Candidate
Medieval Institute
University of Notre Dame

[1]Rebecca Onion, ‘The Real-Life Inspiration Behind The Northman’s Wildest Scenes,’ Slate [Accessed 5/15/22].

[2]Perri Nemiroff, ‘The Lighthouse Director Robert Eggers Teases What the Seagull Means,’ Collider [Accessed 5/12/22]; Padraig Cotter, ‘The Witch’s Black Philip Explained,’ Screenrant [Accessed 5/12/22].

[3]Whaley

[4]Egill’s saga.

[5]Battle of Maldon.

[6]M. S. Griffith, ‘Convention and Originality in the Old English “beasts of battle” typescene, Anglo-Saxon England 22 (1993), 184.

[7]Margaret Clunies Ross, A History of Old Norse Poetry and Poetics (2005), 93.

[8]Onion, ‘The Northman’s Wildest Scenes’ [Accessed 5/15/22].

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Unearthing the Vampire: Succubi, Secrets, and Women’s Monstrosity

Earlier this month, the corpse of a woman with a protruding front tooth and a sickle positioned across her throat was discovered in a 17th-century cemetery near the village of Pien in south-eastern Poland. The sickle was meant to keep the body contained: should the deceased woman have attempted to rise from her grave, the blade would have promptly beheaded her. Coupled with the woman’s prominent incisor, the placement of the sickle suggests that those who tended to her burial may have feared she was a vampire.

Professor Dariusz Poliński from Nicholas Copernicus University observed, “The sickle was not laid flat but placed on the neck in such a way that if the deceased had tried to get up most likely the head would have been cut off or injured.” Photo courtesy of Miroslaw Blicharski and Alexsander Poznan.

The woman was found with the remains of a silk head dressing, which indicates she was someone of high social status, as such a garment would have been an expensive commodity. Of course, this woman would be neither the first aristocrat nor the first woman to be suspected of vampirism.

In addition to the positioning of the sickle and her prominent incisor, a padlock was secured around the big toe of the woman’s left foot, which may be meant to symbolize “the closing of a stage and the impossibility of returning,” according to Poliński. Photo courtesy of Miroslaw Blicharski and Alexsander Poznan.

Elizabeth Báthory was a Hungarian noblewoman and history’s most prolific female serial killer, who tortured and murdered as many as 650 girls and women between 1590 and 1610. Her association with vampirism manifests in the folklore that describes the countess’s ritual of bathing in her virgin victims’ blood to retain her youthful beauty. Neither the number of victims nor her bathing activities are confirmed. Nevertheless, a servant girl testified that she saw the figure recorded in one of Báthory’s private books, and another witness stated that he had seen the countess covered in blood. Colloquially, she became known as the Bloody Countess and, more contemporarily, Lady Dracula. 

A copy of the only known portrait of Elizabeth Báthory, depicting the countess at age 25. The original painting from 1585 has been lost.

Vlad Dracul, the late medieval ruler more commonly known as Vlad the Impaler, derived his namesake from his preferred method of murdering his enemies: impalement, a particularly gruesome form of death where a wood or metal pole is inserted through the body either front to back, such as a stake might be driven through a vampire’s chest, or vertically through the rectum or vagina. The prince purportedly enjoyed dining amongst his dying victims and dipping his bread into their blood.

Portrait of Vlad Dracul by an unknown artist, circa 1560. This painting, like the one of Elizabeth Báthory above, may be a copy.

As Dracul’s surname, which incidentally means dragon, and Transylvanian origins indicate, the intermittent ruler whose brutality spiraled into legend subsequently became a source of inspiration for Bram Stoker’s Dracula character. Another source, Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla, not only preceded Dracula but also, conversely, rendered its vampire antagonist female. Moreover, the novella, set in Austria in the late 1800s, positions Carmilla as a clever seductress whose victims are predominantly male. Although Stoker’s iconic novel all but synonymized the vampire with maleness, Le Fanu’s character reflects the traditional association of vampiric tendencies with femaleness that preceded and pervaded the medieval period.

Depiction of Carmilla and her companion, Laura, whom the novella positions as both a friend and a romantic interest. The illustration, by D. H. Friston, accompanied Carmilla when it was first published as a serial in the literary magazine The Dark Blue between 1871 and 1872.

While sensational news specifically citing vampires did not appear in Britain or Europe until the 1700s, the veil of vampirism shrouded the female body during the medieval period and for centuries prior in many parts of the world. In ancient Mesopotamia, for example, the Assyrians feared a demon goddess known as Lamashtu, a name meaning “she who erases,” who was said to steal infants and suck their blood. Lilith, first wife of Adam turned primordial demon, has a similar reputation. Some stories describe her as a creature who steals babies under the cover of darkness, but she also has sex with men in their dreams and spawns demon offspring with their seed. Lilith’s legacy as a sexually wanton demon of the night seems fitting, as she was the woman who first cohabitated with man but refused subservience. More specifically, Lilith questioned why she should lie beneath her husband during sex, and her resistance reinscribed her as monstrous. She became a succubus, a demon in female form who, essentially, sucks the life from men.

Painting of Lilith produced by John Collier in 1887, which conveys her association with the devil and her sexual proclivity through the intimacy she shares with the snake that embraces her naked body.

In the late Middle Ages, the fear of women’s vampiric nature was embodied by the figure of the succubus and implied throughout the wildly popular treatise De secretis mulierum, or On the Secrets of Women. The misogynistic, pseudo-medical text posited women as polluted physiologically and prone to witchcraft; in turn, it laid the foundation for the 15th-century inquisitorial treatise Malleus maleficarum, or The Hammer of Witches. Witches were also believed to imbibe in blood, particularly when feasting on the bodies of infants.  

Unlike depictions of the incubus, who adopts a male form and engages in sex with willing women, the succubus stalks unconsenting men, often in their sleep. As medieval historian Dyan Elliott explains, “Often a succubus is introduced into a tale so that the holy man can resist it.”[i] Involuntary nocturnal ejaculation served as evidence that a man had been preyed upon by a succubus whilst asleep. As the victim of a rapacious female entity who had extracted semen from his body without permission, the man was absolved of any sin stemming from sexual emission.

In her book Fallen Bodies, Dyan Elliott identifies the life of Saint Anthony as a quintessential depiction of a man who resists the succubus. Painting titled The Torment of Saint Anthony by Michaelango, circa 1487-88, depicts a demon with breasts and a perineal orifice that also functions as the mouth of a second face.

Semen was understood during the medieval period as a substance that was not only life-engendering through its role in conception but also life-sustaining in relation to the maintenance of men’s health. In short, the preservation of semen was vital to the preservation of the male body. Sex, therefore, posed a danger to men, who could become “dried out” if they engaged in sexual activity too frequently. Women, however, were believed to draw strength from the male body during sex by absorbing its heat, as described in the Secrets.[ii] Sapped of both his semen and his own bodily heat, the man was physically drained by intercourse, and the woman ingested his life force. 

The Secrets heightens the vampiric qualities of the female body when it identifies a sign of conception as the feeling of the penis being “sucked into the closure of the vagina,”[iii] emphasizing how the woman’s sexual anatomy acts upon the male body to extract its fluids and does so, seemingly, of its own accord. One of the commentaries that frequently circulated with the text exacerbates this somewhat unsettling sentiment by ascribing desire directly to the female body when the writer states, “The womb sucks in the penis, for it is attracting the sperm because of the great desire it has.”[iv] This is not the only instance where the Secrets suggests that female bodies behave so deliberately. Another commentator explains how “it often happens that a woman conceives if she is in a bath where a man has ejaculated because the vulva strongly attracts the sperm,”[v] whereby the language alludes to the agency possessed by the female body that appears inherently poised to entice and consume the essence of its male counterpart if only for the purposes of reproduction.     

Moreover, the Secrets infers that the vagina itself might bite the man during intercourse when the text warns its readers that women sometimes place iron inside their vaginas with the malicious intention of harming their sexual partner, who then “suffer[s] a large wound and serious infection of the penis.”[vi] The phrase vagina dentata was not coined until psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud connected it with his concept of castration anxiety circa 1900, but the idea of the “toothed vagina” effectively manifests much earlier in a medieval treatise that likens women to succubi who thirst for mortal men and threaten them with their monstrous appetite.

Written and directed by Mitchell Lichtenstein and produced by Joyce Pierpoline, Teeth is a 2007 comedy-horror film that draws upon the concept of the vagina dentata. The film was positively received by critics when it debuted at the Sundance Film Festival and provides a sharp commentary on consent and sexual violence, despite its poor performance at the box office. 

Although women’s relationship with the postmedieval vampire can only be implied in a document that predates the term, women’s correlation with monstrosity could not be clearer. The commentator takes pains to note at an odd point in the text that, “according to Aristotle in the 16th book On Animals, woman is a failed male, that is, the matter that forms a human being will not result in a girl except when nature is impeded in her actions,” so “[i]f a female results, this is because of certain factors hindering the disposition of matter, and thus is has been said that woman is not human, but a monster in nature.”[vii]

As for the female remains recently unearthed in Poland, the skeleton has been relocated to a university for further study. While this woman was not the first to be found buried in a way that suggests her contemporaries feared she might rise from the dead, the placement of the sickle across her throat was unique. She was also spared from mutilation intended to prevent a vampire’s resurrection, which has been observed at other sites. Perhaps those who orchestrated her burial were being politely precautious. After all, if stories had instilled in them that a woman naturally desires to feed on men while she lives, how terrifying that hunger might be once her body was released from restraint by her death.

[i] Dyan Elliott, Fallen Bodies, University of Pennsylvania Press (1999), 53.

[ii] Helen Rodnite Lemay, Women’s Secrets: A Translation of Pseudo-Albertus Magnus’ De Secretis Mulierum with Commentaries, State University of New York Press (1992), 127.

[iii] Lemay, Women’s Secrets, 121.

[iv] Lemay, Women’s Secrets, 121.

[v] Lemay, Women’s Secrets, 66.

[vi] Lemay, Women’s Secrets, 88.

[vii] Lemay, Women’s Secrets, 106.

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Fern: Adapting the Green Knight in Adventure Time

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, the Middle English alliterative Arthurian poem, has long captured the imagination of audiences, medieval and modern. Recently, Valiant Comics has adapted the Sir Gawain and the Green Knight into a comic titled “Immortal Brothers: The Tale of the Green Knight” and brought the poem to modern audiences (2017). The same year, Emily Cheeseman adapted Sir Gawain and the Green Knight into a graphic novel (2017), which was funded by Kickstarter and which is now publicly available online.

Cover image from Emily Cheeseman’s Gawain and the Green Knight (2017).

Film adaptions of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight have also emerged in modern times, including Steven Weeks’ two movies based on the medieval story: Gawain and the Green Knight (1973), and then about a decade later, The Sword of the Valiant: The Legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (1984), which famously features Sir Sean Connery as the Green Knight. While Weeks draws primarily from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in his film adaptations of the medieval poem, he also borrows from other Arthurian legends, such as the tale of Sir Gareth in Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur and Yvain, the Knight of the Lion by Chrétien de Troyes.

The Green Knight (Sean Connery) in Stephen Weeks’ “The Sword of the Valiant: The Legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight” (1984).

Moreover, last year a new film adaption of the poem, titled The Green Knight (2021), directed, written, edited, and produced by David Lowery, was released in theaters. This recent movie adaption of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight drew both praise and opprobrium from critics, prompting me to view and write my own review of the film. The Green Knight stars Dev Patel as Gawain, a nephew of King Arthur in this adaptation, who embarks on an epic quest to test his chivalry and confront the Green Knight.

The Green Knight (Ralph Ineson) in David Lowery’s The Green Knight (A24 Films, 2021).

But today, as I previewed in my previous post on adaptations of Beowulf in modern cartoons, I want to discuss the introduction of a character adaptation of the Green Knight in the final season of Cartoon Network’s Adventure Time. The episode that features and centers the Green Knight is called “Seventeen” (Season 10 Episode 5), in which the plot borrows substantially from the medieval alliterative poem, despite significant redactions and reworking on certain characters and themes from the source text.

Opening image for Adventure Time‘s S10E5 “Seventeen” (2017).

As in the Middle English romance, the episode begins with feasting and a celebration. In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, King Arthur and his court at Camelot are celebrating Christmas and Yuletide. In Adventure Time, the celebration centered on the 17th birthday of Finn the Human, who is also the main hero and one of the primary protagonists of the show, at Princess Bubblegum’s court in the Candy Kingdom. In both the medieval poem and modern cartoon series, the Green Knight rudely barges into court, unannounced, uninvited and riding on his green horse, before offering a green battle axe and proposing a dangerous challenge.

The Green Knight barges into the Candy Court in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

In “Seventeen” when the stranger enters, Finn exclaims “you’re green,” to which the guest responds “I’m the Green Knight.” Like in the medieval poem, Adventure Time‘s Green Knight is exceedingly green, from his armor and clothes, to his hands and face, and even his mount and weapon are all shades of green. The special attention the cartoon gives the green axe and green horse pays homage to the Middle English romance, which contains detailed descriptions of the green man, his green axe and his green steed.

The mysterious Green Knight in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

In both the television series and Middle English poem, the Green Knight’s arrival is shrouded in anticipation and ladened with suspense. Just as in the original poem, the Green Knight in Adventure Time is a mystery knight, come to challenge the champion and test his opponent’s heroism and mettle. In keeping with its source, Adventure Time makes games central to the episode, beginning with the very game featured in the original poem.

The Green Knight gives Finn a birthday axe in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

In Adventure Time, since it is Finn the human’s 17th birthday party, when the Green Knight arrives at the court of Princess Bubblegum, he gifts his green axe to Finn for the occasion. The Green Knight greets Finn by saying: “And before you ask, of course I brought you a birthday present. It’s a battle axe.” The Green Knight follows up with a cryptic caveat “But only if you play me a game for it.” As Gawain does in the Middle English romance, Finn accepts the battle axe and the Green Knight’s challenge, deciding to game with the mysterious guest.

Finn beheads the Green Knight in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

As in Sir Gawain and the Green Night, the first birthday contest in “Seventeen” is a weird beheading game. When Finn asks which game they will play, the Green Knight describes the game: “Oh this game is called all you have to do is strike me with it and it is yours.” Finn struggles with the idea of “axing a stranger” but soon has a revelation. Noting the absence of his partner, Finn assumes that the mysterious Green Knight is nothing more than a birthday prank orchestrated by his best friend Jake, so the hero plays along and is unfazed by the uncanny strangeness of the proposed game. Finn deals what appears to be a death-dealing blow to the neck, decapitating the Green Knight, much like Gawain does in the original poem.

Green Knight grabs its severed head as Jake arrives in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

Again, as in its source, the Green Knight in “Seventeen” proves to be some sort of undead being, able to simply pick up and replace his head after his beheading. It is at this point that Jake arrives, signaling that the Green Knight is not an elaborate birthday hoax by Jake, and what was planned as a fun birthday turns into a fight for his life. Citing fairness, the Green Knight isolates Finn from the rest of his friends so that they cannot aid him, or warn him of any foul play on the part of the Green Knight.

Unlike in the Middle English romance, in “Seventeen” Finn asks for alternative games rather than allowing the Green Knight to return an axe stroke to his neck. This marks the major point of divergence in what follows as a loose adaptation. The stakes are set: if Finn wins, the Green Knight will reveal the mystery of his identity and the Green Knight makes plain his reward, stating, “if I win, chop, chop.”

The green horse interferes with the first game in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

The Green Knight is able to win the first contest through deception and subterfuge, ideas central to the source text as well, and then the Green Knight allows Finn to win the second contest without competing at all, undercutting his heroism. This ultimately proves the only game in which Finn defeats his opponent. Again, the Green Knight has a trick up his sleeve, this time the plan is to allow Finn to expend his energy and strength, giving the Green Knight the upper hand in the decisive game between Bubblegum’s champion and the mysterious guest.

Green Knight is revealed as Fern in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

Finn recognizes the trick immediately, but Finn believes his “robot arm” will continue to provide him with an advantage in the final contest of strength: an arm wrestling match. While Finn is able to compete with the Green Knight until the first mystery is revealed, once the hero learns that the Green Knight is none other than Fern, his formerly deceased, plant-form doppelgänger, he becomes overwhelmed causing him to lose their last game. The surprise of the Green Knight’s identity disarms the hero and allows Fern to easily defeat Finn. Fern, in Green Knight form, smashes his enemy upon the table, breaking it, and leaving Finn on the floor, vulnerable and in shock, as the Green Knight approaches, axe raised and ready to deliver a fatal blow.

Finn as he is about to receive an axe stroke in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

These additional games replace the hunting and bedroom games featured in the Middle English romance, but the narrative of “Seventeen” nevertheless realigns with the original plot as the hero ultimately fails and appears as if he is about to be beheaded by his opponent. In the medieval poem, the Green Knight is revealed to be Bertilak, the lord who houses Gawain and whose wife seduces him. But the double reveal includes the revelation the it was Morgana Le Fay (2446), a witch and King Arthur’s half sister, who sent the Green Knight to Camelot to test the Knights of the Round Table and frighten Queen Guenevere.

Uncle Gumbald, Aunt Lolly & Cousin Chicle are revealed in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

Similarly, in Adventure Time, the Green Knight is a servant of disgruntled, royal relatives. In “Seventeen,” the Green Knight is called off by his own steed, which is shown to be a mechanical horse in which three treacherous relations of Princess Bubblegum are hidden: Uncle Gumbald, Aunt Lolly and Cousin Chicle. The double mystery aspect of the cartoon mirrors the medieval poem’s dual reveal at the end of narrative, in both cases returning focus to intrafamily power struggles over the throne while simultaneously demonstrating the limitations of chivalry and the dangers of hubris. By the end, in both Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and “Seventeen” the royal champions are bested by the Green Knight, although in Adventure Time, the Vampire Queen Marceline is there to step in and scare off the intruders, causing the Green Knight to retreat into the night.

Marceline vs the Green Knight in S10E5 of Adventure Time, “Seventeen” (2017).

The way in which Adventure Time creatively adapts and reinvents Sir Gawain and the Green Knight for a broad modern audience carries forward the medievalism from “The Wild Hunt” (Season 10 Episode 1). Although at times the episode deviates dramatically from its source, Adventure Time makes the complex (at times enigmatic) medieval story both accessible and comedic, while retaining some of the key aspects including the fraught presentation of chivalry and heroism, thereby helping to set the stage for future generations of medievalists.