"I pledge my service and my loyalty, body and soul, to my Lord. When the clarion call is sounded, I will ride out and fight in the name of liege and Lady. Whilst I draw breath, the lands bequeathed unto me will remain untainted by evil. Honour is All! Chivalry is All! This I swear on my blood and my breath."
- —The Knight's Vow.[3a]
Knights of the Realm are Bretonnian nobles who have proven their skill and valour in combat, having battled the kingdom's foes as young Knights Errant. They make up the bulk of the nobility of Bretonnia and command great respect, both for their station and for the deeds they have performed to reach it. Upon their investiture, Knights of the Realm are given the responsibility of administering a domain – generally a few acres of land, a village and a castle from which they have absolute rule.[1]
Those under a knight's rule are bound to his service, to work his land and pay their taxes, and in exchange the knight provides his subjects with protection. Within the hierarchy of Bretonnia's feudal system, the Knights of the Realm are bound by fealty to Lords of higher status and prestige, scaling all the way up to the Royarch himself.[1]
Role
"Heavily armoured, gilded, decked out in layers of steel that an Empire warhorse would have struggled to carry, let alone charge with. Formidable. Not for nothing did men across the Old World fear the onslaught of the knights of Bretonnia."
- —Reiksmarshal Kurt Helborg, on the superiority of Bretonnia's knights.[4]
A Knight of the Realm is truly the epitome of what it means to be a knight, fighting with a level of skill and full-blooded commitment that even the elite Reiksguard of the Empire cannot match. For countless generations these warriors have lived off the fat of the land, eating the best meat, drinking the best wine and taking the fairest maidens with whom to have children. This, together with constant training and practice at arms, has set them apart from ordinary Men. Bretonnian knights are physically bigger, fitter, and more robust, standing head and shoulders above the kingdom's peasantry. They are a magnificent sight: battle-tempered warriors clad in baroque suits of heavy armour, overlaid with rich liveries emblazoned with Heraldic devices. Mounted atop the finest Warhorses in the mortal world, the Knights of Bretonnia are formidable, plate-armoured giants, leaving lesser warriors to scurry around them like rats at the foot of old monuments.[2][4]
A Knight of the Realm is duty-bound to defend his people and his estate until his death. Trained in the art of war, a single knight is expected to fight off minor threats to his domain - bandits and lone monsters - without the assistance of others. Should the situation become too desperate, a Knight of the Realm is allowed to marshal the peasants of the village into battle, or to shelter them within the confines of his castle until help arrives from a neighbouring domain.[2a]
A noble who manages to hold his domain for many years may end up with a retinue of Knights Errant, which may include his own adult sons. Since the time of Gilles le Breton, it has become common practice for a Knight of the Realm to relinquish his castle and domain to his son when he has accomplished his errand of knighthood. The senior Knight then sets out on a grail quest and becomes a Questing Knight. If there are several sons, the eldest and first to accomplish his errand of knighthood inherits the domain. The other sons, upon accomplishing their own errands, may be given a portion of the domain if it is large enough. This will usually be a tract of wild land on the margins of the primary domain, perhaps still waiting to be cleared of enemies and settled.[2a] Sometimes the errand of knighthood for the son of a Knight of the Realm might the act of conquering this land and holding it long enough to build a castle and settle down with peasants. In this way, new domains are constantly being carved out of the wilderness, keeping the Orcs and other enemies under pressure. If there are no suitable lands to be assigned, it is customary for the younger sons to relinquish their claims to a castle and either join the retinue of a Duke or the King, or set out upon a grail quest immediately.
When new lands are conquered it is often better to carve out new portions of the domain for new Knights of the Realm who have completed their knightly errand, rather than enlarge an existing domain; it is difficult to defend a domain when it becomes too big to properly manage. The simple fact is that a domain is most easily defended by a single Knight if he can see all of it from the highest tower of his castle and can ride all around its boundary in a single day.[2a] It is also good if the castle of his neighbouring Lord can be seen from the tower of the Knight's own castle, so that the Knight may signal for reinforcements and give out warnings of a possible invasion force.
Warfare
"He caught sight of one of the Bretonnian knights, already in the distance and riding hard back to his lines. The warrior’s armour glinted warmly in the last of the sun, as if lined with silver. His charger, its caparison still vivid despite the splatters of grime, powered up the slope with a ponderous, weighty grace. Before quitting the field, the knight brandished his sword with a final flourish – a gesture of arrogance, of self-assurance, of superiority. Magnificent, thought Bachmeier..."
- —A Captain of the Empire witnesses a Knight of Bretonnia.[4]
A Knight of the Realm must obey and embody the standards of chivalry above all. Amongst the most important of the chivalric virtues is to respond to the call to war. When called to war by his Lord, each Knight of the Realm is required by fealty to answer that call and join him on his campaign. Each Knight of the Realm is also required to maintain his own company of soldiers (such as Men-at-Arms) to either fight on his behalf or to defend his domain while on campaign.
When a Knight of the Realm leaves for a campaign, he brings with him as many Men-at-Arms companies as he possibly can in order to bolster the ranks of his Lord's army. The Knight himself will fight alongside other knights, not as a rite of passage as he did when a Knight Errant, but as a noble duty required by his position. For a Knight, there is no greater shame than to fail in these responsibilities and thus betray the chivalric code he is bound to uphold. If he does so, he may be stripped of all titles and rights, and be banished from the realm until he can prove himself worthy once more.[1a]
When on the battlefield, a Knight of the Realm forms up around others of similar status. These squadrons are the bulk of Bretonnian cavalry within most campaign armies. Though their Errand quest is complete, a Knight of the Realm is still all-too-eager to show his mettle in battle, and would gladly face the toughest enemy opponent to do so. As the staunch backbone of the Bretonnian knightly forces, they are skilled and deadly in combat, with stout lances setting their enemies to flight with a single, determined charge.[1a]
Female Knights
Women in Bretonnia are considered second class citizens. All male nobles are expected to become knights, and the overwhelming majority do so. Female nobles are not allowed to become knights and are expected to maintain their households for their husbands, and to serve as a fine ornament to his household.[3]
Most Bretonnian women live with these societal constraints, and a significant number even believe that they are right. Some, however, decide they want to fight or own a shop. In order to do this, they must disguise themselves as men. No one knows how many disguised women there are in Bretonnia at any one time, but solely among the nobility, a knight is found on "his" death in battle to be a woman at least once per year.[3]
However, during the reign of King Louen Orc-Slayer in the 23rd century IC, some female nobles were allowed to become fully-fledged knights and did not need to disguise themselves as men.[5][6]
Notable Knights of the Realm
- Huebald d'Gisoreux - One of the very few peasants to ever become a knight.
- Leonhard d'Quenelles - Led the charge that defeated a Chaos army assaulting his homeland.
- Bertrand le Grande - Leader of the Knights of the Realm who assisted in the destruction of the Black Grail Knights.
- Robinet Morhier - A Bretonnian knight who fought during the End Times.
- Gascard d’Alembençon - A knight who served as Herald to his brother, the enigmatic Grail Knight, Viscount d'Alembençon.
Notable Regiments
- Knights of the Lionhearted - A fearsome squadron of Lyonessan knights, who are one of the few Regiments of Renown in Bretonnia.
- Crusaders of Bretonnia - A vast group of Bretonnian knights who fought during the End Times.
Miniatures
Sources
- 1: Warhammer Armies: Bretonnia (6th Edition)
- 1a: pg. 49
- 2: Warhammer Armies: Bretonnia (5th Edition)
- 2a: pp. 38-39
- 3: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition: Knights of the Grail (RPG)
- 4: Kurt Helborg: Duty and Honour (Short Story) by Chris Wraight
- 5: Warhammer Official Twitter Account — No horse? No problem! Meet the new Bretonnian Knights of the Realm on Foot and Warhammer Community - Warhammer Day Preview: The Kingdom of Bretonnia Revealed
- 6: Warhammer Community - Lords of the Lance Is the First New Novel for the World of Legend