Morgan Le Fay: Who was she? A paper written to enlight the woman ...

Morgan Le Fay: Who was she?
A paper written to enlight the woman, the sorceress, the healer and the magician
by Johanne Marie Aagaard Laache
Most people have probably heard of King Arthur. Some of them may also be familiar with Morgan
Le Fay 1 , his half-sister 2 , who has a reputation as an evil witch, who again and again battled Arthur,
hated Queen Guinevere, and killed many of Arthur's companions. In the twentieth century, women
stood up for Morgan, and claimed her as a medieval feminist (Bradley, 1987). Was that the right
thing to do? Was she, after all, a witch, or was she an archaic feminist? What was true about her,
and what kind of observations and opinions are subjective and emotionally charged? If we are to tell
the story of Morgan Le Fay we have to potter it together. So many legends, so many fairytales and
myths, and all of them claim to be the one and only truth. Most of the latter tales focusing on King
Arthur, talk of Morgan as an evil woman who tried to kill her husband and brother, but then most of
the tales concentrating on Morgan Le Fay portray her as an original woman with an unfortunate
destiny.
If I am even beginning to try to untie the knot that is the Arthurian Legends concerning his sister,
Arthur himself must first be presented. King Arthur was first properly introduced by Geoffrey of
Monmouth 3 . There are many contradictory suggestions on when he lived, but we can guess that he
lived in the late sixth century AD, and in the beginning of the seventh, that is after the Romans left
Britain and before the Anglo-Saxon invasion. He is said to have been a noble king, loved by his
people, a Christian man whom drew the Saxons away from the British coast, and the son of Uther
Pendragon and Igraine. If that is so, Morgaine and Arthur are half-siblings. Arthur was married to
Guinevere, and he was betrayed and killed by Mordred, who he was a close relative to.
His relationship to his sister is described many places, and also his companions and his royal courts
1 Morgan «Le Fay» is the name most commonly used when referring to her, so that is the
name I will be using in this paper. She has had other names, like Modron, Morrigu, Morgue and
Morgne. The name «Le Fay» is an ancient word for a fairy.
2 This is not clear. Most sources, such as The Encyclopedia Mythica and Geoffrey (ibid.)
makes him the son of Morgause, Arthurs half-sister, and Arthur himself. The family relations in the
Arthurian Legends vary from book to book, from version to version. The earliest literature claimed
that Arthur and Morgaine were not siblings at all, that point of view had been developed later. I will
however, in this paper, assume that they were siblings in some way.
3 Geoffrey of Monmouth was a writer who created the first framework for the Arthurian
legends. His three main works, Prophetiae Merlini (1135), Historia Regum Britanniae (1138) and
Vita Merlini (1150) all speak of King Arthur in some way. His work is fictional, and is said to be
based upon even more ancient texts, but exactly what texts it was, is uncertain.

elations to her. For example, in Lawhead (1996), Myrddin or Merlin, Arthurs good friend and
consultant, says this about her:
It is this that is her downfall. O Great Light! This is her infirmity. The Queen of the Air and
the Darkness can never grant herself fear, she cannot admit it's existence, not even to herself.
She must always display herself as if she has the powers she is really lacking. She seems to
be capable of doing all that is really impossible for her. (p. 99)
In the very same book it is spoken of a Holy Grail, the same Grail that Josef of Arimathea
supposedly brought to Britannia, that is supposed to be a great weapon to defeat this evil woman,
Morgan Le Fay. I will return to the subject of Morgan Le Fay and her faith and religion later in this
paper.
What did Arthur himself think of her? In Malory (1994), Arthur speaks to her husband King Uriens
about her, after she has sent his son and her lover Accolon to fight Arthur:
Then was the king [Arthur] wonderly wroth, more than he was to-forehand, and said unto
King Uriens, My sister, your wife, is always about to betray me, and well I wot either ye, or
my nephew, your son, is of counsel with her to have me destroyed; but as for you, said the
king to King Uriens, I deem not greatly that ye be of her counsel, for Accolon confessed to
me by his own mouth, that she [Morgan] would have destroyed you as well as me(...)
(ch. 16, p. 126).
As this is a told as a saga, there is not much feeling in it, and it is all said in a very matter-of-fact-
way. But in the same fashion as other tales, it is clear that she had done something to harm him. Her
betrayals against him are obviously as many and as various as the literature mentioning it.
What was her purposes? Did she at all have any, was she determined? Did she succeed? It varies,
because the purposes of Morgan changes with everyone who writes about her. To Geoffrey (ibid.),
she was one of nine sisters, the leader of them, furthermore she was a shapeshifter and a healer. She
did not have any blood relations to Arthur, and equally, she didn't try to harm him in any way. In
Chrétien de Troyes' Erec and Enide 4 , she was primarily a healer and Arthur's sister, however, in this
book she is not an important character.
A hundred years later, in the early 13 th century, she changes into some kind of seductress in The
4 De Troyes was also a medieval poet who wrote Erec and Enide in 1140. You will find the
sources I have used to understand his works in the Webgraphy.

Vulgate Cycle 5 , who is bitter towards Queen Guinevere and tries to reveal the Queen's sexual
relationship with the knight Lancelot. She tries to split up Arthur and Guinevere and seduce
Lancelot, but it does not succeed. Can one person have so many personalities?
In a children's book by Crossley-Holland (1998), it says:
The good Morgan ruled the island west of England known as Avalon. She was the first in a
sisterhood consisting of nine healers, and when Arthur got badly wounded, she took him to
Avalon and promised to cure him. (...) This good Morgan had magic powers: she could fly,
she could change shape, and she was also a gifted poet and musician. (...)The evil Morgan
was a fascinating, but dangerous witch, and a enemy of Camelot 6 . She fell in love with
Merlin, and learned to practice magic. She was jealous of Arthur, so she stole his scabbard,
and after the King killed one of her many lovers, she tried to murder him (p. 78).
Is is that simple, or is it just an attempt at making a logical explanation to her schizophrenia? That
the good Morgan Le Fay is the one mentioned in the works of Geoffrey (ibid.), the work of Chrétien
(ibid.) and the one the 60's feminists loved and cherished as a symbol of women, and the bad
Morgan is the one who tries to kill Arthur, steal his sword, his scabbard and his best friend?
However, it is an important point that it is said that she learned to practice magic, and that she was a
healer. It is safe to say that she had healing powers, as all of the sources can agree on that point. She
was not a Christian, at least not in the way that the Christian priests were. Not very long before
Arthur is said to have lived, the Romans left Britain after they had interfered for many centuries.
What they left was a country that was about to be christianized. They had left enough believing men
and women behind to finish their task. Morgan Le Fay was said to be a witch by many. Is this
because she was not Christian?
A brief account: Morgan was, or was not the half-sister of Arthur. In the very first Arthurian legend,
she was merely a healer, a woman with special powers, and she had many qualities we humans do
not have. Was she some kind of a supernatural creature, a fairy, as the name Le Fay suggests? The
understanding of Morgan Le Fay has changed during the centuries from a magician or simply a
5 The Vulgate Cycle is a collection of texts which we can presume originally sprung out
from one text. Several authors, amongst them Cisternian Monks, wrote additions, comments and so
on. It is no longer possible to see what was the original piece and what has been added by many
others later, and one cannot even say who the authors were.
6 Camelot: the capital of King Arthur's kingdom; according to the legend, truth and
goodness and beauty reigned there. (http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/)

wise woman, to a destructive nihilist 7 who wished nothing but the worst for everyone. Later,
feminists found out that she was a great symbol of success and liberty without a man, and as a
woman with stronger will that many of the men she knew, related to, loved and fought. In Bradley
(1987), Morgan says:
In my time I have been called many things: sister, lover, priestess, wise-woman, queen.
Now in truth I have come to be a wise-woman, and a time may come when these things may
need to be known. But I sober truth, I think it is the Christians who will tell the last tale. For
ever the world of Fairy drifts further from the world in which the Christ holds sway. I have
no quarrel with the Christ, only with his priest, who call the Great Goddess a demon and
deny that she ever held power in this world. At best, they say that her power was of Satan.
Or else they clothed her in blue robe of the Lady of Nazareth – who indeed had power in her
way, too – and say that she was ever virgin. But what can a virgin know of the sorrows and
travail of mankind? (p. 5).
Her belief in something beyond Christ, or something that was not Christ, and her supernatural
abilities is somewhat confirmed by Mallory (ibid.) (not a quotation from the original manuscript):
Morgan Le Fay never did get married, but sent to a school in a convent, where she became a
great and skilful master of magic.
In later medieval literature, monks make her evil, and turn her actions into bad, blasfemic plots. She
is said to have betrayed Arthur in many different ways, but in the end, when Arthur is deadly
wounded, she takes him to Avalon, where he stays, and no one knows whether he lived or died
there. About this, Geoffrey of Monmouth writes in his book History of the Kings of Britain:
And even the renowned king Arthur himself was mortally wounded; and being carried
thence to the isle of Avallon to be cured of his wounds, he gave up the crown of Britain to
his kinsman Constantine, the son of Cador, duke of Cornwall.
Can this be said to be Morgan Le Fay? Or is the best explanation simply that Morgan Le Fay was
both the Good and the Bad, and that no line of demarcation can be drawn? Different stories,
interpretations and comprehensions throughout the years have created different pictures and
dissimilar empathies. If one will only read the story through the eyes of the champion of the cause
of equal rights for men and women, Marion Zimmer Bradley, we will see the men as barbarians
who did nothing but raping women, eating and drinking when not fighting and killing. But if we
7 Nihilist: a belief that all political and religious organizations are bad, or a system of thought
which says that there are no principles or beliefs which have any meaning or can be true.
(http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=53723&dict=CALD)

will only read stories such as Arthur by Lawhead (ibid.), the women will play no roles at all, and
the only woman standing out will be Morgan Le Fay, with a wicked tongue and a habit of
conspiring against the king. To say what that is the truth is not simple, and the fact that the sources
are fiction, fantasy and fairy-tales does not make it easier.
To interpret someone, a mythical person, is subjective. Our understanding of history is not alike. We
see the same events with different eyes, ideas and expectations. Most of all, what we want to see is
what we see. When we see the ancient history, we see what we are told to see. There are no proofs
of any kind that Morgan Le Fay existed, and we even doubt the life of King Arthur. To figure out
her relations to King Arthur, the Knights of the Round Table, Queen Guinevere, Sir Mordred and
the priests that condemned her later, is not an easy task. The name King Arthur may tell you
something that it does not tell me, and the name Morgan Le Fay, Morgaine, Morrighan, Morgian or
Morgen may give me certain thoughts and associations that are invisible to you. To the Cistercian
monks, Morgan was perhaps a sorceress. Her actions were to them the proofs that her intentions
were evil. She is not like Arthur, as there is a broad consensus about him being one of the kings that
changed Britain and was worthy of the title King, in all its meaning. It is rather on the contrary;
there is no agreement on her character.
So, who was she? The legend Morgan was probably not a humble and obedient woman such as
most women were in the Medieval period. The legend, Morgan, was an atheist, and if we put all the
little pieces together, a picture can be formed. It may not be correct nor righteous, or just to her
actual person. What her affairs with the Kings royal court actually were, can only be guessed.
The names one has given her throughout the centuries have been many, but they have all in all
meant the same, although some expressions have been clearly negative: a woman who can follow
her own will, is able to heal, and has the power to carry out something similar to magic 8 . Is this
what we really should see her as? Not a libertine 9 , but a radical, a person who forms her own
opinion and belief, especially about religion or politics, rather than just accepting what is officially
or commonly believed and taught.
If this is most just to her character, to what we have put together with the help of countless sources
that is analyzing books, webpages (more or less opinionated and/or unbiased), already formed
opinions, sci-fi books and fantasy literature, then that is what I will se her as. Morgan Le Fay is, and
will probably always be some kind of a mystery. She certainly has confused the minds of many, and
8 Magic: a special and exciting quality that makes something seem different from ordinary
things. (http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=48042&dict=CALD)
9 Libertine: a person, usually a man, who lives immorally, having sexual relationships with
many people. (http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=45839&dict=CALD)

let us rest by claiming her, for now, as what we can see her as, without holding the opinion narrow
and forever unalterable. A freethinker, a healer and an insurgent, although maybe unintentional.
Bibliography
Bradley, M. Z., (1987), The Mists of Avalon, New York: Ballantine Books.
Crossley-Holland, K., (1998) The King Who Was and Will Be: The World of King Arthur and His
Knights, London: Orion Publishing Group. (p. 78)
Lang, A., (2002), King Arthur: Tales from the Round Table, Mineola, New York: Dover
Publications Inc..
Lawhead, S., (1996), The Pendragon Cycle: Arthur, Glasgow, Scotland: HarperCollins Publishers.
Malory, sir T., (1994), Le Morte d'Arthur, New York: Random House Inc..
Webgraphy
Britannia Staff Article, Morgan Le Fay, Britannia.com, LLC (2001). [on-line]
http://www.britannia.com/history/biographies/morgan.html, 14. Mar. 2009.
Clegg, D., Mordred, Bastard Son, Jan. 1, 2006. [on-line]
http://www.douglasclegg.com/mordred.html, 14. Mar. 2009.
Dawn, A., 08. Aug. 2009, Lady Gryphon's Mythical Realm: Morgan Le Fay, based on Ancient
Myth. [on-line]
http://www.mythicalrealm.com/legends/morgan_le_fay.html, 13. Mar. 2009.
DDT Media Productions, Ltd., King Arthur: A Man for the Ages, DW and DDTMedia Productions,
Ltd. (2000). [on-line]
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/4186/Arthur/htmlpages/kingarthurpeople.html, 13. Mar.
2009.

Holloway, P., Caerleon Net: Geoffrey of Monmouth, Historia Regum Brittaniae. [on-line]
http://www.caerleon.net/history/geoffrey/, 20. Mar. 2009.
Kelly, E. S., 05. Mar. 2009, Your Inner Goddess: Morgan Le Fay. [on-line]
http://www.yourinnergoddess.net/Morrigan-Morgaine-Morgan-Le-Fay.html, 14. Mar. 2009.
Lang, A., 24. Mar. 2009, Tales of The Round Table: How Morgan Le Fay Tried To Kill King Arthur.
[on-line]
http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/trt/trt09.htm, 20. Mar. 2009.
Lupack, A. & Lupack, B.T., 06. Feb. 2009, The Camelot Project at the University of Rochester:
King Arthur & The Knights of The Round Table: Other Characters in Arthurian Legends. [on-line]
http://www.kingarthursknights.com/others/morganlefay.asp, 20. Mar. 2009.
Lupack, A. & Lupack, B.T., 06. Feb. 2009, The Camelot Project at the University of Rochester:
Morgan Le Fay. [on-line]
http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/morgmenu.htm, 13. Mar. 2009.
Rise, B. E., 20. Jun. 2000, Encyclopedia Mythica: Geoffrey of Monmouth. [on-line]
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/g/geoffrey_of_monmouth.html, 09. Apr. 2009.
Rise, B. E., 01. Aug. 2001, Encyclopedia Mythica: Merlin. [on-line]
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/m/merlin.html, 13. Mar. 2009.
Rise, B. E., 25. Nov. 2003, Encyclopedia Mythica: Morgan Le Fay. [on-line]
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/m/morgan_le_fay.html, 13. Mar. 2009.
Stagliano, L., Arthurian Legends: Queen Morgan Le Fay, a Student Assignment. [on-line]
http://csis.pace.edu/grendel/projs993a/arthurian/morgan2.htm, 20. Mar. 2009.
Taylor, P., Morgan Le Fay in Arthurian Legends, Patrick Taylor (2004-2007). [on-line]
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Taylor, P., Le Morte d'Arthur, Patrick Taylor (2004-2007). [on-line]
http://www.arthurian-legend.com/le-mort-darthur.php, 13. Mar. 2009.

Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia, 21. Mar. 2009, Morgan Le Fay. [on-line]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morgan_le_Fay, 13. Mar. 2009.
Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia, 11. Mar. 2009, Morrígan. [on-line]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%B3rr%C3%ADgan, 15. Mar. 2009.
Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia, 11. Oct. 2008, Wikiquote: Geoffrey of Monmouth. [on-line]
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Geoffrey_of_Monmouth, 14. Mar. 2009.
Annotated Bibliography
Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
Wikipedia is a free, web-based, multilingual encyclopedia that everyone can access, and that can be edited and written
by whomever wishes to do so. It is written in collaboration among volunteers around the world, and there are
administrators who edit, censor, delete and report articles every day. Articles, or parts of it, that are improper or
incorrect are removed or marked as «in need of tidying-up». Wikipedia has, however, no quality assurance, and there is
always information and articles that haven't been edited. Eg. In October last year, a Wikipedia-article about cellular
respiration said that it was unwise to keep plants in one's bedroom, as they during the nighttime transform oxygen into
carbon dioxide. The articles vary a lot in quality and reliability, but the source can be used if it is used critically and
with care.
Kelly, E. S., (14 March 2009), Your Inner Goddess: Morgan Le Fay,
http://www.yourinnergoddess.net/Morrigan-Morgaine-Morgan-Le-Fay.html
The website is created by a private person, Erynn Shea Kelly, and it is created to put out and show us the ancient, or
more modern, goddesses from mythology, legends, myths and fairytales, as well as to honour women and the female
spirit in general. This makes the website quite a bit subjective, and even though it portays itself as serious and well-
informed, in addition to being familiar with all of these ancient sources, it is not hard to see that some information is
facts, and others are just nonsense. It is a source that one must be critical towards, as it shows only a mere piece of the
woman Morgan Le Fay.
Clegg, D., (05. Mar. 2009), Mordred, Bastard Son, http://www.douglasclegg.com/mordred.html
Clegg's book is a book about Mordred, the man who betrayed King Arthur, wounded him deadly, and got killed himself,
according to many legends. Douglas Clegg has written a book based upon the rumour that tells us that Morgan Le Fay
and King Arthur were, incidentally, the parents of Mordred. Clegg writes at http://www.douglasclegg.com/:
To not take an accepted tale at face value, but to explore the complexity of a fascinating individual's life -- and
to dispel the myths created by only one version of the tale of his existence?

Appendix
The sources that I can find mentioning King Arthur, The Knights of The Round Table, Merlin,
Morgan Le Fay, etc. are not reliable sources, as in sources that have a basis in scientific studies.
They are also often contradictory, that is, they claim to tell the truth, and when someone writes the
excact opposite, who to believe? Geoffrey of Monmouth was a pseudohistorian and in the same way
that Nostradamus was a fortune teller, Geoffrey of Monmouth has written the story as he sees it.
Still, many other books (upon the subject) rest on Geoffrey of Monmouth's works, and therefore
they will all be included as sources here, though, not scholarly. Even the most extreme opinions
have to be comprised, as they are also opinions and views.