MALORY, SIR THOMAS (d. 1471), translator and com piler of the famous English classic, the Morte d'Arthur. Previous to the publication of Professor Kittredge's monograph, Who was Sir Thomas Malory? the identity of this writer remained an unsolved problem. Of direct evidence we have very little; in the concluding passage of the book the author asks the prayers of the reader for "Syr Thomas Maleore knyght," and states that the book was ended "the ix. yere of the reygne of Kyng Edward the fourth." Caxton, who printed Morte d'Arthur after Malory's death, in his preface (1485) says that he printed the book "after a copye unto me delivered whyche copye Syr Thomas Malorye dyd take oute of certeyn bookes of frensshe and reduced it in to Englysshe." Kittredge identifies Caxton's Malory with Sir Thomas Malory, knight, of Ne'-abold Revell (or Fenny Newbold), M.P. for War wickshire in 1445. He had served in France, in the retinue of the earl of Warwick. He is almost certainly the "Thomas Malorie, miles," who, on account of his part in the Wars of the Roses was excluded with several others from the operation of a pardon issued by Edward IV. When Sir Thomas Malory's widow died in 1479 she was in possession of his hereditary estates in Northamp tonshire and Warwick, so that it seems clear that Sir Thomas must have conveyed them to her in his probably for fear of confiscation.
not yet know whether Malory himself was responsible for this selection, or whether he found it ready to hand in a ms., the "Frensshe Booke" to which he often refers. Mediaeval copyists, at the instance of their patrons, did make compilations from the various romances within their reach, such as e.g., the enormous codex 112 (fonds Franc.) of the Bibliotheque Nationale, which includes large sections of the Tristan, the Lancelot, and the Merlin Suite. Taking into consideration alike what Malory retains and what he omits, it seems most probable that he was in posses sion, not of complete copies of the romances, but of one or more volumes of compilations from these sources.
The Morte d'Arthur represents the Arthurian cycle in the period of its decadence; nor does Malory in any way endeavour to over come the difficulties caused by the juxtaposition of a number of independent (and often contradictory) versions ; but the diversity of sources is harmonized and wrought into a whole by the great charm of Malory's style; simple, direct, idiomatic, yet musical and dignified, it has lent to the relations between Lancelot and Guenevere a character of truth and vitality lacking in his prede cessors. Malory took the Arthurian story in its worst and weakest form, and he imparted to it a moral force and elevation which the cycle, even in its earlier and finer stage, had, save in the unique case of Von Eschenbach's Parzival, never possessed. Morte d'Arthur was the first English prose epic, and formed one of the chief foundations of English prose.