2013: XV
Articoli

Lancillotto sciamano e il nome iniziatico

Parole chiave

  • shamanism,
  • Lancelot,
  • name and initiation,

Abstract

My essay focuses on the main features of shamanism that allow us to consider Lancelot a shaman himself and, upon being named a shaman, the pas- sage from his ordinary to his extraordinary life. This passage of a shaman’s path to initiation is characterized by periods of time when the neophyte cut off his or her biological and social identity to obtain a new existence. Lancelot faces a series of initiation tests before losing his social identity altogether with the death of his horse, in fact being called li chevaliers. This knight without name is given his own name by his spiritual guide, the Queen Guinevere, and the hierogamic union of the two celebrates the conclusion of the initiation path of Lancelot, the Saver of the Queen.