Exhibition / Room 3 The damsel in distress and the witch-hunt

The damsel in distress and the witch-hunt

The courtly figure of the damsel in distress should be put into perspective. In Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1974), Lancelot receives this obscure message: "My father wants to marry me against my will" and he rushes to rescue the fair damsel who turns out to be Prince Herbert! In First Knight (1995), Lancelot saves Guinevere but she can handle a weapon; she is in control of her destiny.

The witch-hunt is frequently portrayed in medievalist films. In The Name of the Rose (1986), the burning at the stake reflects a deliberately dark image of the Middle Ages. Breaking away from Umberto Eco's novel, Jean-Jacques Annaud invents the burning at the stake scene at the foot of the abbey. The 'witch', freed by her peers who revolted against the inquisitor, nevertheless emerges from the ordeal unscathed. Cinema has engraved the image of the witch in the medieval imagination, yet this is an anachronism since the golden age of the Inquisition is the 17^th century!