Sir Palamedes

Palamides is a knight of the Round Table whose story brings together the fellowship’s ideals of combat and service with its eventual division. He first appears in these episodes as an opponent in the field; later, when Sir Launcelot and King Arthur become enemies, he chooses Launcelot’s side, argues that restraint will not keep Launcelot safe, and is rewarded with a duchy after the war. His changing role makes loyalty visible not as a fixed allegiance to a court, but as a choice made under pressure.

Combat and the Round Table

Palamides meets Launcelot in a tournament, where both knights are remounted after earlier falls. Launcelot then knocks Palamides down, adding him to the many knights he defeats in the mêlée. The encounter establishes Palamides as a participant in the same martial world as the most celebrated knights, and as one of the Round Table men caught up in the tournament’s shifting contests rather than a distant observer of them.

When Arthur later rides into the field with nine knights to challenge Launcelot and Sir Lavaine, Gareth disguises his identity with a borrowed green shield and joins Launcelot out of gratitude for having been made a knight. Gareth proposes that he meet Palamides while Launcelot faces Sir Gawaine and Lavaine faces Arthur. Gareth strikes Palamides down with his horse, and the encounter helps turn the confrontation into a broader clash between Arthur’s party and Launcelot’s supporters. Palamides is thus placed on the opposing side of a disguised former ally of Launcelot, in a contest where personal ties and factional alignments overlap.

Choosing Launcelot’s Side

The split becomes explicit when Launcelot seeks to learn which knights will stand with him and which against him. Sir Bors gathers a company that includes Palamides and his brother, Sir Safere. Together with other knights, they assemble as Launcelot’s supporters; further knights from Northgalis and Cornwall join them, in part for the sake of Sir Lamorak and Sir Tristram. Palamides’s presence among the gathered company marks his choice as part of an organized allegiance, not a solitary intervention.

Launcelot explains to his followers that he had remained well disposed toward Arthur and Queen Guenever, and that he believes treachery had been prepared around the queen’s summons. As the war continues, Launcelot holds back from attacking Arthur’s party. Palamides answers that sparing them will win no gratitude and that, if they gain an advantage, Launcelot will be killed. His counsel presents the immediate stakes plainly: mercy or hesitation cannot by itself restore loyalty once the conflict has become a battle for survival.

Launcelot accepts the truth of this warning and fights harder, particularly after Bors is badly wounded. Yet the violence does not become an uncomplicated triumph. By evening, Launcelot checks his knights out of pity and allows Arthur’s party to withdraw; both sides bury their dead and tend their wounded. Palamides’s advice helps Launcelot meet the danger, while the pause in fighting preserves a distinction between defending the faction and seeking indiscriminate destruction.

Service, Reward, and Political Order

After the conflict, a hundred knights leave with Launcelot, pledging not to abandon him in prosperity or adversity. He sails with them to Benwick and establishes his authority across his lands. Rather than merely keeping his followers close as a military company, Launcelot distributes offices and territories among them, turning their wartime loyalty into a new political order.

Palamides receives the duchy of Provence. The grant places him among Launcelot’s senior companions and gives concrete form to the allegiance he had shown in battle. His arc in these episodes therefore runs from contest within the Round Table’s shared martial culture to service in a divided fellowship, and finally to advancement within Launcelot’s realm. The reward acknowledges his support, but it also underscores how far the former fellowship has shifted: a knight once fighting fellow Round Table members now holds authority within a separate power structure.