Knight of the Swan
The Chevalier au Cigne, also known as Helias, figures as the son of Orient of L'Islefort (or Illefort) and his wife Beatrix in perhaps the most familiar version, which is the one adopted for the late fourteenth century Middle English Cheuelere Assigne.
[1] The hero's mother's name may vary from Elioxe (probably a mere echo of Helias) to Beatrix depending on the text, and in a Spanish version, she is called Isomberte.
At a later time, the German poet Wolfram von Eschenbach incorporated the swan knight Loherangrin into his Matter of Britain epic Parzival (first quarter of the 13th century).
[2] Another example of the motif is Brangemuer, the knight who lay dead in a boat tugged by a swan, and whose adventure was taken up by Gawain's brother Guerrehet (Gareth or Gaheris) in the first Continuation to Chrétien de Troyes' Perceval.
[7][8][9] Geoffrey M. Myers defended that the "swan-children" tale (a narrative of probable Lotharingian origin) is an independent story due to the existence of variants collected from folk tradition,[10] which folklorist Joseph Jacobs considered to be a "well-known Continental folk-tale" (in regards to The Seven Swans (or Ravens)).
[15] In the same vein, professor Anne E. Duggan remarked that the narrative seems to be a "hybrid story" that "fused" the theme of the Calumniated Wife, the Knight of the Swan, and the "Germanic fairy tale" about swan-children.
[16] Dutch folklorist Jurjen van der Kooi was of the same opinion that Johannes "combined" three tales: type ATU 451, the story of the Swan Knight and the marriage between man and a "waterwoman" (which he calls "Melusine motif").
[19] The story is as follows:[18][20] A nameless young lord becomes lost in the hunt for a white stag and wanders into an enchanted forest where he encounters a mysterious woman (clearly a swan maiden or fairy) in the act of bathing, while clutching a gold necklace.
The young lord brings her to his castle, and the maiden (just as she has foretold) gives birth to a septuplet, six boys and a girl, with golden chains about their necks.
The young lord is told by his wicked mother that his bride gave birth to a litter of pups, and he punishes her by burying her up to the neck for seven years.
The swan-boys land in the young lord's pond, and their sister, who can still transform back and forth into human shape by the magic of her chain, goes to the castle to obtain bread to her brothers.
In the early 13th century, the German poet Wolfram von Eschenbach adapted the Swan Knight motif for his epic Parzival.
The poet changed the title character's name slightly and added various new elements to the story, tying the Grail and Swan Knight themes into the history of the Holy Roman Empire.
In 1848, Richard Wagner adapted the tale into his popular opera Lohengrin, probably the work through which the Swan Knight story is best known today.
[30] Hungarian ethnographer Gaál Károly [hu] and Austrian Slavicist Gerhard Neweklowsky [de] collected a Croatian language tale in Stinatz from informant Anna Sifkovits with the title Labudova dlvuojka (German: Die Schwanenfrau, English: "The Swan Maiden").
Some time later, their grandmother discovers the children are still alive and orders her servant to steal their golden chains, to trap them in swan form forever.
