One may wonder how chivalry developed from a knight's code into what it is today. That transition is made easily when one looks at one of the more important parts of chivalry, courtly love. Courtly love usually took place between knights and noble married women. The reason for this is that "Women in the Middle Ages were usually treated as property. While medieval country marriages were often the result of love, marriage among the noble class was more a business transaction than the culmination of ardent feelings " (Medieval Romance). In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Gawain faces a bit of courtly love himself. During his journey to find the Green Chapel, Gawain comes upon a great castle. .

             The lord and his wife invite Gawain to spend the holidays with them. The lord informs Gawain that he can guide Gawain to the Green Chapel, which is apparently not too far away. The lord then proposes that he and Gawain play a game. The lord will go out hunting, and when he gets back he and Gawain will exchange whatever they have gotten that day. The next morning while the lord is out hunting, Gawain is woken by the lady of the castle. They engage in a conversation, and before the lady leaves, she says that if Gawain was really as great of a knight as he says he is, he would not let her leave without first kissing her. Gawain kisses the lady, and when the lord returns and presents Gawain with the deer he has killed, Gawain kisses the lord. The game continues on for the next two days. Gawain continues to get kisses from the lady, so he returns them to the lord like the game says to do. On the last day of the game the lady offers Gawain a green girdle which she says will make whoever wears it invincible. .

             Gawain takes the girdle to protect him from his meeting with the Green Knight because he knows that he is going to die. When the lord of the castle comes home, Gawain does not exchange the girdle, therefore breaking the rules of the game.