what do you know about resurrections in the arthurian legend and necromancy in the middle ages?
For a tradition firmly placed within the Christian worldview, resurrections in Arthuriana are surprisingly more likely to occur than not. I recount Peredur, Book of Gareth, Perilous Cemetary, one of the Perceval Continuations and maybe Marvels of Rigomer and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight where these events occur. In the case of some of them, like Lynette's knight for instance, it's ambiguous whether the slain individual is really brought back or is some kind of golem(?).
On the topic of Necromancy, it should be made aware that Necromancy in the Medieval sense is not like the Modern fantasy idea of animating and commanding the undead, but more along the lines of summoning and commanding spirits - demons in particular - for supernatural aid. The idea of necromancy being about reanimating the dead came about as a permutation of the original Greek conception of Necromancy as the Art of summoning the spirits of the deceased to gain information, but of course, it's not really bringing them back to (un)life or even giving them physical bodies.
Most of the time however, (Medieval) Necromancy is about summoning demons to do your bidding, malefic or otherwise, which is why, strangely enough, the Christian clergy has a rather peculiar relationship with necromancy - which was considered distinct from witchcraft - which is why it isn't improbable when Morgan le Fay learns the art in a nunnery. See Richard Kieckhefer's "Clerical Necromantic Underground" for more info.
The acts of resurrection, as seen in the enumerated Arthurian works above, could be thought of instead as nothing more than a hyper-magnified variant of Healing magic - the utilization of herbal balms and ointments to restore even a dismembered knight back to full health, as nutty as that may seem.















