Q 01/05

At the truce before Arthur's last battle in Le Morte d'Arthur, what bites a knight and makes him draw his sword?

A) A hound

B) A hornet

C) A rat

D) An adder

Answer · why

D) An adder

An adder slides out of a heath bush and stings his foot, and both armies take the flash of his blade for treachery. Each side had orders to attack if ...

Q 02/05

Sir Thomas Malory apparently finished Le Morte d'Arthur around 1470 while living where, by his own closing words?

A) In a monastery

B) In prison

C) At a royal court

D) On a pilgrimage

Answer · why

B) In prison

In prison is the usual reading: he calls himself a knight prisoner and ends the book asking readers to pray for his deliverance. The leading candidate...

Q 03/05

In Le Morte d'Arthur, the sword in the stone and anvil appears one Christmas in a churchyard in which city?

A) London

B) Canterbury

C) Chester

D) Carlisle

Answer · why

A) London

London is where the lords gather to pray for a king, and Malory admits he cannot say whether the church was St Paul's. Arthur draws the sword on New Y...

Q 04/05

From whom does Arthur receive his second, more famous sword in Malory, after rowing out to an arm in the water?

A) The Fisher King

B) The Archbishop of Canterbury

C) The Lady of the Lake

D) The Red Knight

Answer · why

C) The Lady of the Lake

The Lady of the Lake lets him take it in return for a gift to be named later. When she comes to court to claim it, her price is a knight's head, and s...

Q 05/05

Which king fathers Arthur in Le Morte d'Arthur after Merlin gives him the likeness of the Duke of Cornwall?

A) Uther Pendragon

B) Lot of Orkney

C) Uriens of Gore

D) Hoel of Brittany

Answer · why

A) Uther Pendragon

Uther Pendragon had promised the child to Merlin as the fee for the trick, so the baby is carried away to be fostered. Igraine's real husband had died...