Peredur’s Tournament for the Empress of Cristinobyl turns an extravagant gathering into a test of valor, courtesy, and remembered obligation. Peredur arrives as a spectator, drawn first to a maiden in a satin garment; only after the miller’s sharp challenge does he enter the contests. His victories bring material reward to the household that sheltered him, while his later acceptance of the Empress’s three successive challenges fulfills a pledge tied to his earlier encounter with the Addanc. The episode ends not with a departure or a brief triumph, but with fourteen years of the Empress’s hospitality.

The Gathering and Its Stakes

Peredur rides into a broad valley crossed by a river and marked by tents of many colors. He is struck by the number of water-mills and windmills as well as by the scale of the encampment. A tall, auburn-haired man dressed as a workman identifies himself as chief miller of the mills and welcomes Peredur to his pleasant house. The miller’s home gives the knight a place to stay amid a gathering whose size has required an unusual practical response: the mills were built because food could not otherwise be brought in for the thousands assembled.

The gathering is for the Empress of Cristinobyl the Great. The miller explains that she will accept no one except the most valiant man, and that wealth is no qualification. The tournament is therefore both a public contest and a means of determining who may win her favor. Its scale makes the standard seem daunting: the crowd is counted in thousands, while the mills stand as visible evidence of the provisions needed to sustain it.

Peredur asks the miller for a loan so that he can buy meat and liquor for himself and the household, promising to repay him before he leaves. The miller lends the money, though his wife is angry when Peredur borrows again after the first day. Their strained hospitality forms a small but consequential counterpoint to the grand contest: Peredur is living on credit while surrounded by a spectacle of plenty, and the miller’s household must wait to see whether his promise will be kept.

From Spectator to Competitor

On the first day, Peredur equips himself and his horse, but does not enter the tournament. In another tent, he sees a beautiful maiden leaning from a window, dressed in satin, and becomes deeply attached to her. He remains fixed on her from morning through the afternoon until the tournament ends. He returns to the miller’s house, removes his armor, and borrows more money. The next day he repeats the same pattern: he goes out prepared, watches the maiden instead of competing, and returns to borrow again.

On the third day, the miller strikes him between the neck and shoulder with the edge of an axe and gives him a blunt choice: turn his head away or go to the tournament. Peredur smiles at him and enters the contest. The change is immediate. He overthrows every man who meets him that day and continues until all have been defeated. Those he vanquishes are sent to the Empress’s prison; their horses and arms go to the miller’s wife as payment for the household’s loans. Thus the victories answer two claims at once: they establish Peredur’s prowess before the Empress and settle his debt to the people who have lodged and fed him.

The Empress sends for the victorious Knight of the Mill. Peredur refuses the first and second messages. On the third attempt, she sends a hundred knights to bring him against his will; Peredur fights them, has them bound, and throws them into the mill-dyke. The Empress then consults a wise man of her counsel. Rather than sending another force, he approaches Peredur and asks him to visit for the sake of the lady he loves. Peredur goes with the wise man and the miller, sits in the tent’s outer chamber, and receives the Empress beside him. Their conversation is slight, and he soon takes his leave. The first summons has brought him to her tent, but not yet into a sustained exchange.

The Goblets and the Pledge

The next day Peredur visits the Empress again. In the tent, where the chambers are equally decorated and the company does not know where he will choose to sit, he takes a seat beside her and speaks courteously. Three men then enter in succession, each bearing wine and making the same demand: the vessel is to be given only to someone willing to fight for it. The first brings a goblet; the second presents a goblet fashioned from a wild beast’s claw; the third carries a bowl. Each time the Empress looks to Peredur, he asks her to give the vessel to him, drinks the wine, and passes it to the miller’s wife.

These repeated challenges bring the miller’s household back into the center of the scene. The wife who resented Peredur’s borrowing now receives the vessels he claims, while his earlier victories have already repaid her with the horses and arms of defeated competitors. The episode links public prowess to concrete obligations: what Peredur wins does not remain solely a mark of his personal standing but becomes recompense for the hospitality extended to him.

That night Peredur returns to his lodging. The following day he arms himself and rides to the meadow, where he slays the three men who brought the wine. He then returns to the tent. The Empress reminds him of the faith he pledged when she gave him the stone and he killed the Addanc. Peredur acknowledges that he remembers. The tournament’s confrontations therefore reach beyond the immediate contest: the Empress’s earlier gift and Peredur’s promise give his actions a history, and his answer confirms that he recognizes the obligation.

The Long Stay

After Peredur remembers his pledge, the Empress entertains him for fourteen years. The account gives no further detail about those years, and it does not describe the tournament as ending in a marriage. Its stated outcome is the length of the Empress’s hospitality. That duration gives the episode a larger scope than the sequence of contests might suggest: the arrival, loans, victories, wine challenges, and remembered promise lead into a prolonged stay rather than a quick reward or immediate return.

The tournament’s movement is built from contrasts. Peredur begins by watching while others compete, then acts decisively when pressed to choose. He first avoids the Empress’s summons, yet later sits beside her and responds to the challenges made in her presence. His debts to the miller’s household are repaid through the spoils of victory, while his obligation to the Empress is recalled through the stone and his pledge. By the end, competitive success has become both service to those who aided him and a bond that keeps him at the Empress’s court for many years.