From Chivalry to Trickery: Social Hierarchies and Satire in Chaucer’s The Knight’s Tale and The Miller’s Tale

Abstract

Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales presents a rich tapestry of medieval society through its diverse array of narratives. This paper examines The Knight’s Tale and The Miller’s Tale, two markedly different stories that reflect contrasting perspectives on class, power, and human folly. The Knight’s Tale upholds the ideals of chivalry, courtly love, and divine fate, portraying nobility through a lens of honor and duty. In contrast, The Miller’s Tale, a bawdy fabliau, subverts these ideals through satire, irreverence, and social inversion. By juxtaposing these two tales, Chaucer offers a critique of both aristocratic and common life, revealing the fluid nature of social hierarchies and the enduring power of wit over status. This study explores how Chaucer employs genre, language, and character dynamics to highlight tensions between social expectation and personal ambition, ultimately demonstrating his nuanced engagement with medieval social structures.