Ironside (Sir), called "The Red Knight of the Red Lands."  Sir Gareth, after fighting with him from dawn to dewy eve, subdued him.  Tennyson calls him Death, and says that Gareth won the victory with a single stroke.  Sir Ironside was the knight who kept the lady Liones (called by Tennyson "Lyonors") captive in Castle Perilous.—Sir T. Malory, History of Prince Arthur, i. 134-137 (1470).
    Tennyson seems very greatly to have misconceived the exquisite allegory of Gareth and Linet. (The Reader's Handbook of Famous Names in Fiction, Brewer, v.1, 1899)

    Though the gentle associations of trees and flowers seem to have been but little in favour among our fierce ancestors, yet there is another class of names derived from metals, which, as more in accordance with the character of their ideas, hold a larger place in their nomenclature.  Among these iron, as the symbol of hardness and strength, was naturally the most common, and probably the most ancient.  There are three forms, 1st, the Gothic eisarn, Old High German isarn, Anglo-Saxon isern.  This is the original form from which are derived respectively the later forms isan and iren in Old High German and Anglo-Saxon.  The first in some names might also be the adjective, Old High German isern, Mod. Germn. eisern, ferreus.  So in the Chron. of Limburck there is a Heinrich der Isern, Henry the Iron. 

SIMPLE FORMS.

    Old Germn Isinus, 8th cent. Isarn, 10th cent., Isarna, one of the Anses in Jornandes.  English Ison, Izon, Iron, Isern.  Mod. Germ. Eisen.  French Eysen.

COMPOUNDS.

    (Bert, bright)  Old German Isanbert, Isambert, 8th cent.  Mod. German Isanbart—French Izambert.  (Burg, protection)  Old German Isanburg, Irinbric, 8th cent.—English Ironbridge—Mod. Germ. Isenberg.  (Hard)  Old German Isanhard, Isnard, 8th cent.—English Isnard—Mod. German Eisenhardt—French Isnard.  (Man)  Old Germ. Isanman, 9th cent.—English Ironman.  (Wald, power)  Old German Isinolt, 9th cent.—French Esnault.  (Ulf, wolf)  French Esnouf. 

SURNAME.

    Ironside was the surname both of our own Edmund and also of Bjorn, king of Sweden.  Ironside is a present English name.

    Then there is another form is, which if we take it to be, on the principle which I have assumed throughout this work, the older form of isarn and ison, must represent the Sansc. ayas, Gothic aiz, which at first probably meant copper, but on the discovery of iron was transferred to that metal.  But in a few names, as Isborn, p. 326, is, glacies, may probably intermix. (The Teutonic Name-System &c., Ferguson, 1864)