The Merchant's Story 'The Knight And His Young Wife'

The Knight and his Young Wife The merchant’s tale is about a Knight that has just turned sixty and for some unknown reason has finally decided to get married. He then began to search for the perfect, young, beautiful wife. One day, January gathered all of his friends and told them about his intentions to marry, because he was growing ill and getting older. He explained to them that he wanted a wife no older than twenty. The men then gave him all different advice about his decision. The greatest of the arguments was between Placebo and Justinus. Placebo was for marrying a young woman and told him to do what he wanted, while Justinus was against January marrying a young woman. Justinus’ argument was that a young wife was likely to make a fool …show more content…
This upset January and Damian, but they kept in touch through letters and secret signs. May then one day made Damian a key to January’s garden. On June eighth, January decided to go to the garden with May. He woke May up softly and May took him to the garden and unlocked the garden. Damian was already in the garden like May had told him to be. She told him to climb a tree, and then told her husband that she wanted to eat a pear from the tree. January then helped May up into the tree and after she was in the tree with Damian she began to have sex with him. January’s eyesight was then restored and he saw his wife and Damian and started screaming, asking what she was doing. May then came up with a very believable excuse, saying that she was told that she could struggle with a man in a tree to restore January’s eyesight. January doesn’t believe her and says that instead she was having sex with a man in a tree. May then argues that his eyesight still isn’t completely restored and that he is seeing things. May is excited and rejoices that January has gotten his eyesight back. After this they kiss and January leads May back to his house. (The Canterbury Tales The Merchant’s Tale Summary and