Definition of "knight-errant" []

• A knight, often portrayed in medieval romances, who wanders in search of adventures to prove his chivalry. (noun)
• One given to adventurous or quixotic conduct. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "English authors, too, have turned this subgenre to inspired use: Kate Atkinson's reluctant series-hero Jackson Brodie, encountered this year not only in "Started Early, Took My Dog" but also in three PBS-aired TV dramas, puts a beleaguered modern knight-errant in the context of a Whitbread-winning writer's brilliant contemporary novel."
• ""With his powerful sense of justice, dogged determination and the physical and mental skills to overcome what to most would be overwhelming odds, Jack Reacher makes an irresistible modern knight-errant.""
• "Displayed the will of a lion, yet conveyed a vulnerability generating unfamiliar knight-errant tendencies in him."