The story narrates the star-crossed love of King Perión of Gaula and Elisena of England, resulting in the secret birth of Amadís.

[2] Abandoned at birth on a raft in England, the child is raised by the knight Gandales in Scotland and investigates his origins through fantastic adventures.

Knighted by his father King Perión, Amadís overcomes the challenges of the enchanted Ínsola Firme (a sort of peninsula), including passing through the Arch of Faithful Lovers.

The knight changes his name to Beltenebros and indulges in a long period of madness on the isolated Peña Pobre (Poor Peak or Mountain).

that in the "original" Amadís, Esplandián eventually kills his father for this offense against his mother's honor; however, Montalvo amends this defect and resolves their conflict peaceably.

His most famous adventure during this time of exile is the battle with the giant Endriago, a monster born of incest who exhales a poisonous gas and whose body is covered in scales.

[dubious – discuss] Unlike most literary heroes of his time (French and German, for example), Amadís is a handsome man who would cry if refused by his lady, but is invincible in battle and usually emerges drenched in his own and his opponents' blood.

[citation needed] Called also Amadís sin tiempo (Amadis without Time) by his mother (in allusion to the fact that being conceived outside marriage she would have to abandon him and he would probably die), he is the most representative Iberian hero of chivalric romance.

François de la Noue, one of the Huguenot captains of the 16th century, affirmed that reading the romances of Amadis had caused a "spirit of vertigo"[3] even in his more rationally-minded generation.

The language is characterized by a certain "Latinizing" influence in its syntax, especially the tendency to place the verb at the end of the sentence; as well as other such details, such as the use of the present participle, which bring Amadís into line with the allegorical style of the 15th century.

The pristine style of Amadís can be perceived in the few original famous pages analyzed by Antonio Rodríguez Moñino: It is lively and straight to the facts of war and love, with brief dialogs, all quite elegant and amusing.

Amadís of Gaula is frequently referenced in the humorous classic Don Quixote, written by Miguel de Cervantes in the early 17th century.

Bernal Díaz del Castillo mentioned the wonders of Amadís when he marveled at his first sight of Tenochtitlan (modern Mexico City)[4] – and such place names as California come directly from the work.

The English literary historian Helen Moore in her 2020 book Amadis in English: A Study in the Reading of Romance suggested the book has been popular over the centuries because: it is essentially ... a good story: plenty of plot, numerous characters through whom readers can experiment … with what I call imaginative "transforms of the self," and highly-elaborated familial, erotic and political relationships.

[citation needed] Amadis of Gaul's popularity was such that in the decades following its publication, dozens of sequels of sometimes minor quality were published in Spanish, Italian, and German, together with a number of other imitative works.