關於愛，我是個小學生。

Tristan and Iseult is a romance story, retold in numerous sources with as many variations since the 12th century. The story is a tragedy about the adulterous love between the Cornish knight Tristan and the Irish princess Iseult. The narrative predates and most likely influenced the Arthurian romance of Lancelot and Guinevere, and has had a substantial impact on Western art and literature. While the details of the story differ from one author to another, the overall plot structure remains much the same.

The story and character of Tristan vary from author to author; even the spelling of his name varies a great deal, although "Tristan" is the most popular spelling. Nevertheless, there are two main traditions of the Tristan legend. The early tradition comprised the French romances of Thomas of Britain and Béroul, two poets from the second half of the 12th century. Later traditions come from the vast Prose Tristan (c. 1240), which was markedly different from the earlier tales written by Thomas and Béroul.

After defeating the Irish knight Morholt, Tristan travels to Ireland to bring back the fair Iseult for his uncle, King Mark of Cornwall, to marry. Along the way, they ingest a love potion which causes the pair to fall madly in love. In the courtly version, the potion's effects last a lifetime, but, in the common versions, the potion's effects wane after three years. In some versions, they ingest the potion accidentally; in others, the potion's maker instructs Iseult to share it with Mark, but she deliberately gives it to Tristan instead. Although Iseult marries Mark, she and Tristan are forced by the potion to seek one another, as lovers. While the typical noble Arthurian character would be shamed by such an act, the love potion that controls them frees Tristan and Iseult from responsibility. The king's advisors repeatedly endeavour to have the pair tried for adultery, but the couple continually use trickery to preserve their façade of innocence. In Béroul's version, the love potion eventually wears off, and the two lovers are free to make their own choice as to whether to cease their adulterous relationship or to continue.

As with the Arthur-Lancelot-Guinevere love triangle in the medieval courtly love motif, Tristan, King Mark, and Iseult of Ireland all love each other. Tristan honours and respects King Mark as his mentor and adopted father; Iseult is grateful that Mark is kind to her; and Mark loves Tristan as his son and Iseult as a wife. But every night, each has horrible dreams about the future. Tristan's uncle eventually learns of the affair and seeks to entrap his nephew and his bride. Also present is the endangerment of a fragile kingdom, the cessation of war between Ireland and Cornwall (Dumnonia). Mark acquires what seems proof of their guilt and resolves to punish them: Tristan by hanging and Iseult by burning at the stake, later lodging her in a leper colony. Tristan escapes on his way to the gallows. He makes a miraculous leap from a chapel and rescues Iseult. The lovers escape into the forest of Morrois and take shelter there until discovered by Mark. They make peace with Mark after Tristan's agreement to return Iseult of Ireland to Mark and leave the country. Tristan then travels to Brittany, where he marries (for her name and her beauty) Iseult of the White Hands, daughter of Hoel of Brittany and sister of Kahedin.

Association with King Arthur and demise
The earliest surviving versions already incorporate references to King Arthur and his court. The connection between Tristan and Iseult and the Arthurian legend was expanded over time, and sometime shortly after the completion of the Vulgate Cycle (the Lancelot-Grail) in the first quarter of the 13th century, two authors created the Prose Tristan, which fully establishes Tristan as a Knight of the Round Table who even participates in the Quest for the Holy Grail. The Prose Tristan became the common medieval tale of Tristan and Iseult that would provide the background for Thomas Malory, the English author who wrote Le Morte d'Arthur over two centuries later.

In French sources, such as those picked over in the English translation by Hilaire Belloc in 1903, it is stated that a thick bramble briar grows out of Tristan's grave, growing so much that it forms a bower and roots itself into Iseult's grave. It goes on that King Mark tries to have the branches cut three separate times, and each time the branches grow back and intertwine. This behaviour of briars would have been very familiar to medieval people who worked on the land. Later tellings sweeten this aspect of the story, by having Tristan's grave grow a briar, but Iseult's grave grow a rose tree, which then intertwine with each other. Further variants refine this aspect even more, with the two plants being said to have been hazel and honeysuckle.

Post-death
A few later stories even record that the lovers had a number of children. In some stories they produced a son and a daughter they named after themselves; these children survived their parents and had adventures of their own. In the French romance Ysaie le Triste (Ysaie the Sad), the eponymous hero is the son of Tristan and Iseult; he becomes involved with the fairy king Oberon and marries a girl named Martha, who bears him a son named Mark. Spanish Tristan el Joven also dealt with Tristan's son, here named Tristan of Leonis.

~ wiki

眾多相關故事畫作中，個人最愛的版本是 leighton, 1902。Edmund Blair Leighton，1852年9月21日~1922年9月1日，英國維多利亞時代著名畫家，尤其擅長英國攝政時期和中世紀畫作。雷頓1852年出生在英國倫敦。父親查爾斯·布萊爾·雷頓是一名藝術家。在University College School完成學業後進入皇家藝術研究院學習，1885年和Katherine Nash結婚並有一兒一女。在1878年到1920年連續在皇家藝術研究院舉辦畫展。他的畫作大多數被私人收藏家訂購買走，在市面上難尋芳蹤。他同時也是一位古老時代樂器、藝術品、家具的收藏家。與當時的皇家藝術研究院院長弗雷德里克·雷頓私交甚密，但他本人並非皇家藝術研究院院士。