Mark of Cornwall (Latin: Marcus, Cornish: Margh, Welsh: March or Marchell, Breton: Marc'h) was a sixth-century King of Cornwall, possibly identical with King Conomor. As Mark or Marc (Marc'h), he is best known for his appearance in Arthurian legend as the uncle of Tristan and the husband of Iseult. His young wife engages with Tristan in a secret liaison, giving Mark the epithet "Cuckold King".
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King Mark
In Old Welsh records, Mark is recorded as "March son of Meirchion" of Kernow (Cornwall). He is associated with governing portions of Gwynedd and Glamorgan in Wales. The distance of these areas from modern day Cornwall may indicate that Mark was in fact a ruler of the eponymous Cornovii. Mark has been identified with Conomor, a king of Domnonea and Kernev (Domnonée and Cornouaille) in Armorica.
In his Life of St. Pol de Leon, Wrmonoc of Landévennec refers to a "King Marc whose other name is Quonomorus". Also rendered as Cunomorus, the name means "Hound-of-the-sea".
An inscription on a sixth-century gravestone near the Cornish town of Fowey memorializes (in Latin) a "Drustanus son of Cunomorus", and it has been thought that this is the "Tristan son of Mark (alias 'Quonomorus')" of legend. The present location of the stone is at grid reference SX112521, but it was originally at Castle Dore. It has a mid-6th-century, two-line inscription which has been interpreted as DRVSTANVS HIC IACIT CVNOWORI FILIVS ("Drustan lies here, of Cunomorus the son"). A now-missing third line was described by the 16th-century antiquarian John Leland as CVM DOMINA OUSILLA ("with the lady Ousilla"). Ousilla is a Latinisation of the Cornish female name Eselt. The stone led to Mark's association with Castle Dore.
Legend
A fragmentary poem that speaks of Drystan and March in the Black Book of Carmarthen may be the only Welsh Tristan written material that predates the works of French poetry. March as the uncle of Drustan and the husband of Essylt is also mentioned in the Welsh Triad 71, "Three Lovers of the Island of Britain".
In most versions of the legend of Tristan and Iseult, King Mark of Cornwall is Tristan's uncle. His sister is Tristan's mother, Blancheflor (also known as Elizabeth or Isabelle). In some later versions he is related to Tristan's father, Meliadus. Peter Bartrum noted "In the older versions of the Tristan legend Mark was a sympathetic character and behaved honourably in spite of much frustration."
King Mark sends Tristan as his proxy to bring his young bride, Princess Iseult (or Isolde), from Ireland. She and Tristan fall in love and, with the help of a magic potion, engage in one of the stormiest love affairs in medieval literature. Mark suspects the affair. In a major tradition, his suspicions are eventually confirmed; Mark sends for Tristan to be hanged, and banishes Iseult to a leper colony. Tristan escapes the hanging, and rescues Iseult from her confinement. Mark later discovers this, and eventually forgives them; Iseult returns to Mark, and Tristan leaves the country. In another version, on the other hand, Tristan and Iseult are never in grave danger; the narrator declares that he and God are on their side. The story is cyclical, with Mark repeatedly suspecting Tristan and Iseult of adultery and then believing that they are innocent. Marie de France's Breton lai Chevrefoil begins with an explanation of Mark's fury at the affair of Tristan and Isoude, which leads Mark to banish Tristan from Cornwall.
In the Prose Tristan, Mark and his character deteriorates from a sympathetic cuckold to a villain; he rapes his niece and murders her when she produces his son, Meraugis. Mark also murders his brother, Prince Boudwin, and later kills Boudwin's vengeful teenage son, Alexander (Alis[u]ander) the Orphan. In earlier variants of the story, Tristan dies in Brittany far from Mark; in the Prose Tristan, however, Tristan is mortally wounded by Mark while he plays the harp under a tree for Iseult. This version of Mark was popular in other medieval works, including the Romance of Palamedes and Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur. In these texts, Mark (son of the late King Felix in the Italian variant, La Tavola Ritonda) usually rules Cornwall from Tintagel Castle and often figures as an enemy of Arthur's jester knight, Dinadan. In the Post-Vulgate Cycle, Mark even destroys Camelot after the death of Arthur, allying himself with the pagan Saxons and killing the Archbishop of Logres.
Horse ears
Mark has become associated with a Celtic variant of the story of Midas and his donkey ears from Greek mythology, due to a pun on marc (a Celtic word for "horse"). The story occurs in Tristan by the 12th-century French poet Béroul, where a dwarf reveals that "Mark has horse's ears" to a hawthorn tree in the presence of three lords.
According to a Breton tale published in 1794, Mark was initially the king of Cornouaille, France, and was seated at Ploumarch (Portzmarch). The king kills every barber who knows the secret about his ears except one, who tells the secret to the sand (or wind). Reeds grow from that spot, which are harvested to make reeds for the oboe (or, simply, pipes). When the instruments are played, the music seems to say that the king has horse's ears. John Rhys recorded a Welsh tale similar to the simpler Breton version.
An embellished version, collected by Yann ar Floc'h in 1905, blends the legend of Ys with the premise that Mark was condemned by Gradlon's daughter Ahès (or Dahut). Mark tried to hunt her when she assumed the guise of a doe, and had his ears exchanged for those of his prized horse Morvarc'h.
Modern culture
King Mark has a gruesome role in Alfred, Lord Tennyson's poetry cycle Idylls of the King. While Arthur and many of his knights are taking on the court of the Red Knight, Lancelot is called upon to judge the Tournament of the Dead Innocence. The tournament quickly becomes a mockery, full of insults and broken rules. Tristram (Tristan) is the winner of the tournament, winning all the rubies from the necklace. He then breaks with tradition in presenting them to a woman, saying: "This day my Queen of Beauty is not here." This enrages the crowd, and many say that "All courtesy is dead," and "The glory of our Round Table is no more." Tristram, who in this version marries Isolt of the White Hands, carries his winnings to Mark's wife Queen Isolt (who is upset that Tristram married another woman). They mock each other briefly before Tristram puts the necklace around Isolt's neck and leans down to kiss her. Mark appears as his lips touch her, killing Tristram with a sword.
Mark (the German "Marke") is a character in Wagner's 1859 opera, Tristan und Isolde, where the role was first sung by the bass Ludwig Zottmayr.
Ernest Rhys' poem "The Lay of King Mark" in Lays of the Round Table and Other Lyric Romances (1905).
In the 1954 film The Black Knight, he is depicted by Patrick Troughton as a pagan trying to overthrow Christianity and King Arthur.
C. S. Lewis and Owen Barfield role-played as solicitors of King Mark (represented by Barfield) and Tristan (Tristram, defended by Lewis as the law firm 'Blaise & Merlin') in a series of letters discussing the theories about Malory's life that were published in 1967 as Mark vs. Tristram.
In the 1970s TV show Arthur of the Britons, Mark was played by Brian Blessed.
In 1981 film Lovespell, King Mark was played by Richard Burton in the main role.
Mark (called "Marc'h of Kernow") is a character in Diana L. Paxson's 1988 novel The White Raven presenting the story from the point of view of Iseult's cousin, Branwen.