knight errant
noun

- a medieval knight who travelled about performing brave deeds and helping people in trouble.

- a knight who travelled around looking for adventure.

- a travelling knight seeking adventures in which to display skill, courage and generosity.

- a wandering medieval knight seeking adventures, particularly opportunities to correct wrongs or prove his ability.

- a knight of medieval romance who wanders in search of adventures through which he can demonstrate chivalry.

Cambridge Dictionary, Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, Collins English Dictionary, American Heritage Dictionary
 
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PHRASE ORIGIN

“Knight errant” entered Middle English around the fourteenth century, following the Anglo-French pattern of chevalier errant.

Here, errant means “travelling” or “wandering”. It comes through Old French errer, from a Latin family associated with journeys and going from place to place.

A second Old French verb, also written errer, meant “to stray or make a mistake”. The two histories became entangled. That is why modern errant can describe both a wandering knight and an incorrectly fired golf ball.

The word order is French: the adjective follows the noun. The same pattern survives in heir apparent, court martial and attorney general. It also explains the plural: knights errant.
 
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THE RESTLESS HERO

Every culture seems to invent the same restless hero. He arrives from nowhere, puts something right, refuses the reward and disappears again.

Medieval Europe had the knight errant. Japan had the rōnin, a samurai without a master. Today we have Jack Reacher, Lee Child’s homeless ex-soldier, wandering from town to town and helping strangers.

Why is he so attractive? A hero with a house, a job and a mortgage cannot suddenly devote himself to somebody else’s problem. He has appointments. The wanderer has nowhere else to and because he expects no reward, his motives appear pure.

We long for a single honest person who will act when courts, companies and governments seem slow or powerless. The knight errant promises justice without paperwork.

Helga & Paul Smith
 
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SYNONYMS

adventurer, cavalier, champion, chevalier, crusader, do-gooder, free lance, gallant, hero, idealist, knight adventurer, KNIGHT ERRANT, paladin, protector, questing knight, quixote, rescuer, righter of wrongs, romantic hero, roving knight, wanderer, wandering knight, white knight

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SMUGGLE OWAD into a conversation today, say something like:

“There’s something so universally appealing about the KNIGHT ERRANT that he appears in the mythology of many different cultures.”

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