Morgause

Morgause (/ˈmɔːrɡoʊz, -ɡɑːz/ MOR-gohz, -⁠gahz) is a popular name of a legendary queen and member of King Arthur's family in the Matter of Britain literature, where she is always a queen and usually Arthur's sibling. However, her name varies between texts and traditions, including Anna, Gwyar, or simply as the Queen of Orkney, as does the issue of her children, other than commonly Gawain. In most cases, she is the wife or widow of Lot, ruling over a northern realm such as Orkney, Lothian, Scotland, or Norway. She often has sisters, notably Morgan, with whom she is being sometimes conflated into a single character by modern authors.

In medieval chronicles and Arthurian romances based on or inspired by Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae, as well as in the Welsh tradition, she is typically depicted as the daughter of Igraine, either the daughter or step-daughter of Uther Pendragon, and the full sister or half-sister of Arthur. Occasionally, she may be Uther's sister and Arthur's aunt. Her other children often, but not always, include Mordred.

In a later tradition, originally popularised by French prose cycles, Mordred is the offspring of Arthur's own accidental incest with his estranged half-sister, whom Thomas Malory's seminal Le Morte d'Arthur calls Morgause, queen of Orkney. There, her biological father is Gorlois, her full sisters are Morgan and Elaine, her other lover is Lamorak, and her sons include Agravain, Gareth, and Gaheris, the last of whom murders her.