King Mark

King of Cornwall and husband of Isolde the Fair. Mark was the son of Felix, and the brother of Blancheflor (Blanchefleur; Elyabel in the Prose Tristan, while Malory called her Elizabeth). In the Prose Tristan, Mark had a brother and three other sisters.

His sister fell in love with Rivalen, lord of Armenye, in Brittany. Blancheflor was pregnant when she left Cornwall with her husband, when Morgan, the duke of Brittany, attacked Rivalen's land. Rivalen was killed in battle. When she gave birth to a son, she named him Tristan. Blancheflor died from a broken heart.

When Tristan arrived in Mark's court when he was fifteen years-old, Mark could not recognise him as his sister's son, nor did he know of Tristan's true identity. Mark was so impressed by Tristan's skills in hunting that the hero unknowingly served as Mark's chief huntsman.

It was only when Tristan's foster-father, Roald de Foytenant, found the youth in Cornwall, that the hero's true identity was revealed: that Tristan was Mark's sister's son. Roald proved the identity by showing Mark his sister's ring. Mark welcomed Tristan warmly. Mark made his nephew a knight and soon became his trusted advisor.

The jealousy of his barons over Tristan caused them to plot to remove Tristan's influence over Mark. They wanted their king to find a wife and produce an heir, to get rid of Tristan. Mark sent Tristan to woo the daughter of king of Ireland, named Isolde, known for her great beauty.

Tristan won Isolde for his uncle by killing a dragon. However, by misadventure, Tristan and Isolde unwittingly drank a love potion that Isolde's mother had prepared for King Mark and her daughter. Tristan and Isolde fell in love with one another so strongly that this would have tragic consequences and hardship.

Mark married Isolde, but she had already lost her virginity to Tristan. To hide this, they tricked Mark into sleeping with Isolde's faithful handmaiden, Brangwain. Brangwain helped the two young lovers in many trysts.

The Cornish noblemen were still determined to rid of Tristan, and realised that Isolde was committing adultery with the hero. They informed the unbelieving king. They tried several times to prove Tristan and Isolde were committing adultery and treason, by trying to trap the pairs.

However, Tristan, Isolde and Brangwain managed to avoid their traps with cunning and ingenuity.

Depending on the authors, they sometimes depicted Mark as weak and a coward, sometimes as cruel and barbaric. Mark was prepared to torture or put to death his wife. Later versions like the Prose Tristan and Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur, said that Mark murdered his nephew, cowardly and cold-bloodedly, by stabbing him in the back.

Though his nephew and wife had betrayed him by committing adultery and deliberately lying to their king, the authors and audience were always more sympathetic with the young lovers than with the king.