List of major characters
* Acrasia, Seductress of knights. Similar characters in other epics: Circe (Homer's Odyssey), Alcina (Ariosto), Armida (Tasso). Also the fairy woman from Keats' poem 'La Belle Dame sans Merci'.
* Alma, Her name means "soul." She is the head of the House of Temperance.
* Amoret, She represents the virtue of married love.
* Archimago, An evil sorcerer who is sent to stop the knights in the service of the Faerie Queene. He is symbolically the nemesis of England.
* Artegal (or Arthegall), a knight who is the personification and champion of Justice.
* Arthur. This is the same Arthur of the Round Table, but he plays a different role here. He is madly in love with the Faerie Queene. Prince Arthur is the Knight of Magnificence, the perfection of all virtues.
* Ate, a fiend from Hell disguised as a beautiful maiden, Ate opposes Book IV's virtue of friendship through spreading discord. Ate and Duessa have fooled the false knights Blandamour and Paridell into taking them as lovers.
* Belphoebe, The beautiful sister of Amoret who spends her time in the woods hunting and avoiding the numerous amorous men who chase her.
* Braggadocchio, a comic knight with no sense of honour. He steals Guyon's horse. He is not evil, just a dishonourable braggart.
* Britomart, a female knight, the personification and champion of Chastity. She is young and beautiful, and falls in love with Artegal upon first seeing his face in her father's magic mirror.
* Busirane, the evil sorcerer who captures Amoret on her wedding night.
* Calepine, a knight who acts as Calidore's surrogate throughout much of Book VI.
* Calidore, the Knight of Courtesy, hero of Book Six. He is on a quest from the Fairy Queen to slay the Blatant Beast.
* Cambell, one of the Knights of Friendship, hero of Book Four. Brother of Canacee and friend of Triamond.
* Cambina, daughter of Agape and sister to Priamond, Diamond, and Triamond. Cambina is depicted holding a caduceus and a cup of nepenthe, signifying her role as a figure of concord.
* Canacee, Cambell's sister, whose magic ring renders the wearer invulnerable.
* Colin Clout, is a shepherd, noted for his songs and bagpipe playing, that briefly appears in Book VI, being the same Colin Clout from Spenser's pastoral poetry. Colin Clout may also be said to be Spenser himself.
* Cymochles, a knight in Book II who is defined by indecisiveness and fluctuations of the will. He and his fiery brother Pyrochles represent emotional maladies that threaten temperance.
* Duessa, a lady who personfies Falsehood in Book One, known to Redcrosse as "Fidessa". As the opposite of Una, she represents the "false" religion of the Roman Catholic Church. She is also initially an assistant, or at least a servant, to Archimago.
* Florimell, a lady in love with the knight Marinell, who initially rejects her.
* Glauce, an elderly woman who serves as Britomart's squire.
* Gloriana, the "Faerie Queene" herself.
* Guyon, the Knight of Temperance, the hero of Book Two. He is the leader of the Knights of Maidenhead and carries the image of Gloriana on his shield. According to the Golden Legend, St. George's name shares etymology with Guyon, which specificially means "the holy wrestler."
* Malbecco, protective husband of the lascivious Hellenore. When she is seduced by Paridell, he metamorphoses into a hideous creature, representing jealousy itself.
* Malecasta, a decadent, jaded sophisticate who invites the weary knights to dinner. She studies Britomart at the feast, and tries to seduce her, unaware Britomart is a lady until Malecasta feels the sting of Britomart's magic sword.
* Marinell, "the knight of the sea"; son of a water nymph
* Merlin, who is much the same as in Arthurian legend.
* Paridell, a false knight and a seducer of women. His name derives from that of the Trojan prince Paris. In Book Three, he runs off with Malbecco's wife, Hellenore.
* Orgoglio Appears as a horrible beast and attacks the main character. He represents the sin of Pride — The word "Orgoglio" actually means pride in Italian — and allegorically Orgoglio represents the Redcross Knight's own failure to overcome the Pride of the Flesh. This explains the highly phallic nature of the beast, whom one critic has called an "ambulatory erection," or walking penis. He has a sinful relationship with the character Duessa, sometimes referred to as "The Whore of Babylon."
* Pastorella, a woman raised by shepherds but revealed in the last Canto of Book 6 to be actually the daughter of Sir Bellamoure and Lady Claribell.
* Pyrochles, a hot-tempered knight in Book Two, he and his impressionable brother Cymochles serve as examples of two emotional maladies that threaten temperance.
* The Redcrosse Knight, hero of Book One. Introduced in the first canto of the poem, he bears the emblem of Saint George, patron saint of England;
* Sansfoy, Sansjoy and Sansloy (names from the old French meaning "Faithless", "Joyless" and "Lawless"), three saracen knights who fight Redcrosse in Book One.
* Satyrane , a wild half-satyr man raised in the wild and the epitome of natural human potential.
* Scudamour, the lover of Amoret. His name means "shield of love". This character is actually based upon a real person, Sir James Scudamore, a jousting champion and courtier to Queen Elizabeth I.
* Talus, an "iron man" who helps Arthegall dispense justice in Book Five.
* Timias, Prince Arthur's squire and lover of Belphoebe.
* Triamond, one of the Knights of Friendship, a hero of Book Four.
* Trompart, Braggadocchio's cunning squire. His name derives from the French tromper, "to deceive".
* Una, the personification of the "True Church". Una is also representative of Truth.
SPENSER: THE FEARIE QUEENE: BOOK I
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