Medieval King Quotes & Sayings

Christianity had not started off as the ideology of an empire. Virtually nothing is known about its supposed founder, Jesus of Nazareth. There is not even any definite proof he was a historical rather than a mythical figure. Certainly the proof is not to be found in the Christian New Testament. It claims his birth was in Bethlehem in the Roman province of Judaea, where his family had gone for a census during the time of Augustus. But there was no census at the time stated and Judaea was not a Roman province at the time. When a census was held in AD 7 it did not require anyone to leave their place of residence. Similarly, the New Testament locates Jesus's birth as in the time of King Herod, who died in 4 BC. Roman and Greek writers of the time make no mention of Jesus and a supposed reference by the Jewish-Roman writer Josephus is almost certainly a result of the imagination of medieval monks.100 — Chris Harman

He was a strong and noble lord with piercing eyes of grey.
He sat upon his noble throne shining like the dawn.
His sword flashed like the brightest star.
He led our people well.
Yet here and now he lays in blood pierced with arrows.
He was the friend of many knights.
He loved the warrior games.
His heart was won by a lady fair for marriage they did wait.
A kindly prince, his duty carried him to another's bed.
And on her death true love returned, finally they wed.
He felt the grief of children lost to murder and to pain.
I was the youngest of his blood.
I'll never be the same.
Here lays my father and my lord.
I know not what to say.
Except my father and my lord was slain here on this day.
Here lays my father and my lord.
I know not what to say.
Except my father and my lord was slain here on this day ... . — Laurel A. Rockefeller

Ruling is hard. This was maybe my answer to Tolkien, whom, as much as I admire him, I do quibble with. Lord of the Rings had a very medieval philosophy: that if the king was a good man, the land would prosper. We look at real history and it's not that simple ... Real-life kings had real-life problems to deal with ... My people who are trying to rule don't have an easy time of it. Just having good intentions doesn't make you a wise king. — George R R Martin

At least I'm the one leaving. It's so much easier to leave than to be left. — Stefan Emunds

Since Dreygon likes to run this place like a medieval king, I would suggest a duel with pistols at dawn. But after the way you handled that gun yesterday, I wouldn't have a chance."
"I guess not."
"How are you with swords?" Jericho said.
I laughed. "Not sure. But for that girl, I think I'd fight with flaming chainsaws if that's what it took. — Tess Oliver

...early medieval Ireland sounds like a somewhat crazed Wisconsin, in which every dairy farm is an armed camp at perpetual war with its neighbors, and every farmer claims he is a king. — David Willis McCullough

Thus Arthur achieved the adventure of the sword that day and entered into his birthright of royalty. Wherefore, may God grant His Grace unto you all that ye too may likewise succeed in your undertakings. For any man may be a king in that life in which he is placed if so he may draw forth the sword of success from out of the iron of circumstance. Wherefore when your time of assay cometh, I do hope it may be with you as it was with Arthur that day, and that ye too may achieve success with entire satisfaction unto yourself and to your great glory and perfect happiness. — Howard Pyle

Faintly he smiled, but his voice was hard. "Lass, you do not want what I have." As if to prove it, he overturned his hand and dragged a calloused thumb roughly across her bottom lip.

All the breath came out of her in a hot rush. "Oh."
~From THE KING'S OUTLAW, part of the Captured by a Celtic Warrior anthology — Kris Kennedy

Hey dawg, wassup? he said, in the strange way that white talent agents from Los Angeles do in an attempt to sound like young black men from underprivileged backgrounds. A linguistic fashion as peculiar as the lisp that everybody in medieval Spain had to adopt after the king developed a speech impediment. — Craig Ferguson

I read and I read; and I was like a medieval king, I had fallen in love with the picture long before I saw the reality. — John Fowles

Honor is a balancing act and only the heart can strike that balance. — Stefan Emunds

It is dangerous to become attached to a du Lac. He will break your heart, and you will not recover. — Mary Anne Yarde

To the medieval mind a liberty was a right to the enjoyment of a specific property It was a freedom to do something with one's own without interference by the king or any other man. — Arthur Bryant

They have a lot of trouble with pronunciation, because they can't move their jaw muscles, because of malnutrition caused by wisely refusing to eat English food, much of which was designed and manufactured in medieval times during the reign of King Walter the Mildly Disturbed. — Dave Barry

You end up with this succession of periods when everything was marvellous - from King Arthur to the medieval times, Ivanhoe, chivalry, Henry VIII, Merry England, the Blitz — Ian Hislop

Contemporary fantasists all bow politely to Lord Tennyson and Papa Tolkien, then step around them to go back to the original texts for inspiration
and there are a lot of those texts. We have King Arthur and his gang in English; we've got Siegfried and Brunhild in German; Charlemagne and Roland in French; El Cid in Spanish; Sigurd the Volsung in Icelandic; and assorted 'myghtiest Knights on lyfe' in a half-dozen other cultures. Without shame, we pillage medieval romance for all we're worth. — David Eddings

How gorgeous this chess set is.' Each piece was a delicate marble fantasy of medieval warfare. The paint had long ago worn off, except for faint touches of red, in the fury of the king's eyes, on the queen's lower lip, in the bishop's robe. — Eloisa James

The world is an ambitious business. It continuously expands and evolves. But people are lazy and God is far too lovely to do something about it. — Stefan Emunds

Hence King's Messengers and all that. In medieval days you gave a fellow a signet ring as a sort of open sesame. 'The King's Ring! Pass, my lord!' And usually it was the other fellow who had stolen it. I always wonder why some bright lad never hit on the expedient of copying the ring - making a dozen or so, and selling them at a hundred ducats apiece. They seem to have had no initiative in the Middle Ages. — Agatha Christie

Tis so much to be a king, that he only is so by being so. — Michel De Montaigne

The world eclipses and it's just her and him. No it's just her eyes and his soul. Her eyes expose and violate him, she turns him inside out. Then, her eyes drop him like a boring toy. — Stefan Emunds

Now, the good of business is put above anything else, as corporations have become the new ruling body. Most decisions seem to be made like ones of a medieval king: whatever makes profit while ignoring and repressing the truth about whatever suffering it may cause (like pop music, for that matter). — Julian Casablancas

Waiting for one's execution is worse than dying. To seek my beheading is glory. Who went to his execution willingly? Jesus did. Jesus even dragged his cross half way to Golgotha. I think he would have nailed himself to the cross if he had to. — Stefan Emunds

Chronicling the mid-1970s up session with Gerald Ford's clumsiness, the author quotes a medieval maxim that the king has two bodies. The head of state has a physical body like everyone else, but he also represents the body politic, either reflecting its majesty or its weakness. — Rick Perlstein

Wake up! You're a sacred soul and glory is yours for the taking. — Stefan Emunds