King Arthur 2 Essay, Research Paper
Tales Of King Arthur
Since the romanticizing of the Arthurian legends by Geoffery of
Monmouth, the historian, during the twelfth century, the legendary ‘king
of England’ has been the source of inspiration for kings, poets, artists
and dreamers alike. The most famous work is probably Sir Thomas Malory’s
Le Morte d’Arthur, completed around 1470, and published in many abridged
and complete versions. Malory’s work contains in one the legend that had
been continually added to over the years by many different writers who
introduced such elements as Sir Galahad, and the ill-fated love affair
between Lancelot and Guinevere. Geoffery of Monmouth had been the first
to put the legends surrounding Arthur into literary form in his History
of the Kings of Britain. He described Arthur’s genealogy as the son of
Uther Pendragon and Igerna, or Igraine, wife of the Duke of Cornwall,
and brought in Merlin the magician, who disguised Arthur as the Duke in
order to romance Igerna at Tintagel Castle while the real Duke was away.
Geoffery also introduced Arthur’s famed court (placed at
Caerleon-on-Usk) and his final battle and defeat at the hands of Modred,
his treacherous nephew.
Artos Of The Celts
It is almost certain that Arthur did exist, although it is unlikely he
was a king. He is more likely to have been a warrior and Celtic cavalry
leader. The Saxon invaders, who were unmounted, would have been at a
considerable disadvantage against the speed with which the Celtic
company were able to move around the country, which would make possible
the dozen victories up and down the country that have been attributed to
the shadowy figure of Arthur. Around the fifth century, a resistance
movement against Britain’s invaders, including Saxons and Angles from
the continent, Picts from the North, and Irish from the West, was being
led which maintained a British hold on the South and West. Around this
time, a man named Artos was beginning to be written of as a powerful
soldier who united the leaders of the small British kingdoms against the
invading armies. It seems likely that he was a noble Celt. The first
mention of his victory in battle was written down around 600 AD, in a
set of church annals called the Annales Cambriae. He must have been a
glimmer of hope to the Britons, and it is not surprising that he might
have been thought of as a king.
Guinevere And The Court At Camelot
In the earliest tales of Arthur, there is no mention of his queen,
Guinevere; she was introduced by later writers, possibly to illustrate
how the dream world of Camelot fell from grace. When Guinevere first
appears in early Welsh stories, she is the daughter of a giant, but
later she becomes the daughter of King Leodegrance of the West Country.
In her original Welsh form of Gwenhwyfar, she was an folk figure before
being connected to Arthur, and may originally have been a lesser
goddess.
Geoffery located Camelot at the very real Roman town of Caerleon in
South Wales; Malory placed it at Winchester, which was the headquarters
of the kings of Wessex and remained a royal seat after the Norman
invasion. Other stories place it near Arthur’s supposed birthplace at
Tintagel. Cadbury Castle in Somerset has been named as another possible
location of Camelot, which has been revealed during excavations to have
been occupied during the time of Arthur and to have been the
headquarters of a leader, if not a king. The real Arthur may have been
buried at Glastonbury Abbey, which lays around twelve miles north-west
of the castle. It is said to have been a secret burial, so the news of
his death would not raise Saxon morale; the mystery may have given rise
to the rumors that he still lived on. In 1190, the monks of Glastonbury
Abbey reported that they had dug up a coffin made from a hollow log, and
a lead cross inscribed with the name of Arthur, or Artos. Within were a
man’s bones, and a woman’s skeleton and mass of yellow hair found in the
same grave were said to belong to his queen, Guinevere.
The Knights Of The Round Table
The legend says that King Arthur chose the round table to ensure that no
one knight would have obvious authority over another. An earlier
addition to the story adds that the original table was part of
Guinevere’s dowry when she was married to Arthur. The Great Hall at
Winchester castle actually contains a round table, this one constructed
around the fourteenth century, and thought to have been built for
Arthurian tournaments held by King Edward III. The first mention of the
Round Table in literature are found in the writings of the poet Robert
Wace in 1155, but he refers to it as famous, and it seems to assume that
the readers would already know of that part of the story. So the actual
years in which the Round Table was introduced are unsure.
Arthur created the Order of the Round Table; an order of knights whose
vows were to live nobly and fight valiantly. King Edward III was so
inspired by the tales that he founded the Order of the Garter from a
wish to revive the loyalty, bravery and comradeship of the Round Table.
The tales of Arthur’s individual knights were added somewhat later that
the element of the Round Table itself. His most famous and loyal knight,
Lancelot, who would eventually betray him by the conducting of an
illicit affair with Guinevere, is not mentioned in any part of the
Celtic material. He is first found as the central hero in the French
Vulgate Cycle, written between 1215 and 1230. Sir Thomas Malory went to
the last three parts of this to find the material for his own work;
Lancelot which follows the knight’s lone adventures, the Queste del
Saint Graal, and the Mort Artu from which he took the romance of
Lancelot and Guinevere and how it brought the downfall of Arthur and
Camelot.
Tristram also enters Malory’s saga from much the same source, another
French collection of tales again from around 1230, called the Prose
Tristan. From here also comes the romance of Lancelot and Elaine of
Corbin, daughter of King Pelles, which resulted in the birth of the
perfect knight, Galahad. It was Galahad who was to succeed in what his
father had failed in persuing, the mystical Holy Grail. Malory draws
again from the French work for the other Elaine, Elaine le Blank, the
maid of Astolat, who died for love of Lancelot after finding he was
willing to be no more than her friend. Tennyson made her sad tale one of
his Arthurian poems, and his other work, The Lady Of Shallot, is also
based upon Elaine, who requested that after her death, her family place
her body in a barge and float it down the river, with a letter in her
hand to tell Lancelot and the royal court of the reason for her death.
The Faerie Queene
Morgan le Fay may be the figure present in the Arthurian saga with the
oldest history. The earliest form of her name is found as the Morrigan,
an Irish goddess of war appearing to heroes on the battlefields. As
Morgan, she is a goddess of healing in the early literature, who rules
over the magical island of Avalon, which seems then to be an afterworld
and place of rebirth. Geoffery of Monmouth made her an enchantress, one
of the ladies who took Arthur away to be healed after his final battle
at Camlan. Malory made her Arthur’s half-sister, one of the three
daughters of Igerna by her first husband the Duke of Cornwall, and the
mother of Modred, Arthur’s son, fathered in an incestuous affair. From
almost her first entrance, she is a dark figure bent on the ruin of
Arthur. Strangely, her last appearance is one of the three queens who,
with Nimue, the Lady of the Lake, Arthur’s good fairy, bears him away to
Avalon.
Out Of Life And Into Legend
The mysterious Isle of Avalon emerged as a legend of it’s own in early
Celtic writings. It was again Geoffery of Monmouth who first drew it’s
name into prominence again by merging it into the Arthurian story. The
most popular location of Avalon has been at Glastonbury in Somerset;
years previously, the hills in the center there were made an island by
the sea flow of the sea into the flat land, and the marshes still exist.
The flooding was later brought under control, and by the time of the
late fourteenth century poem, Le Morte Arthur, Avalon was referred to as
a vale.
According to the legend, Arthur’s nephew or son, Modred, used the
exposed affair of Lancelot and Guinevere to begin civil war, and Arthur
himself was seriously wounded at the battle of Camlan. He was carried
away to Avalon to have his wounds tended. Here can be seen the strongest
remaining influence of the other, older story that became confused with
the legend of Arthur; that of a Celtic god who was said to lay sleeping
in a cave on a remote Western Island. This god had once ruled over a
peaceful and happy kingdom, but had been overthrown. One day he would
rise again and return to rule. There are stories of this ilk that
explicitly name Arthur, such as the Wizard of Alderley edge, in which
Merlin the magician guards Arthur and his knights, who lay sleeping in a
cavern there until England once again needs them. Malory writes that
after Arthur sailed for Avalon, he died, and was buried in some other
place – but that over his grave is written the words, Here lays Arthur:
the once and future king.
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