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One True King of England Removes Sword from Stone
- Thread starter Z-Beat
- Start date
I visited Arthur's supposed grave in Glastonbury recently. What a crock of shit that is. They do tell you that the body that was supposedly found there was gigantic before it mysteriously disappeared in the reformation. They don't tell you that the Abbey was absolutely skint at the time of the 'finding', had already tried to claim the bodies of several other noted figures including Saint Patrick in the years previous with limited success and that the supposed confirmation of the discovery by the King had more to do putting down rebellious mystic Arthur cults than it did with the truth of the matter.
I do like to believe he was real though.
I do like to believe he was real though.
Sounds complicated, let's just let them fight and the one who kills the others becomes king.
Then what's this supposed to mean?
Explain that, smartypants.
I always thought Excalibur came from the Lady of the Lake.
Fuck me it has me in tears every time 😂 "Help, help, I'm being repressed!"
It's actually called The Whole Book of King Arthur and His Noble Knights of the Round Table, but the publisher changed it after Malory died.
It's definitely in English. But there is a very strong tradition of Breton/French Arthurian myths also. At one point the stories were more closely associated with France than Britain (not that they were set in France or that Arthur was French*, just that that's where they were being written).
*the concept of 'French' is anachronistic in the period that Arthur is supposed to have lived in. He did have strong Breton connections but that's no surprise given that Romano-British and the Bretons were the same people.
*the concept of 'French' is anachronistic in the period that Arthur is supposed to have lived in. He did have strong Breton connections but that's no surprise given that Romano-British and the Bretons were the same people.
Artorius is believed be some to have something to do with Arthur but he lived 300 years before Arthur, which means that all the things that Arthur is supposed to have done (become king, fought off the saxons etc etc) could not possibly have happened to Artorius in the 2nd Century, during the imperial period. If Arthur is Atorius then Arthur, as we know him, does not exist.
A more likely candidate is Ambrosius, a Romano-British warlord who seems to have some of the same narrative beats as Arthur (lived in Britanny for a time, fought and defeated saxons).
I prefer to believe those that speculate that Arthur came shortly after Ambrosius and did fight the famous battle of Mons Badonicus (possibly located to a hill near Bath, not far from where I live) where the Saxons were driven off before dying in a battle with a would-be usurper (Mordred in the stories). This basically rests on the idea that even in the dark ages Nennius couldn't have completely invented a famous King out of nowhere without people noticing. Arthur is missing from the Anglo-Saxon chronicles, which goes against him clearly but an explanation could be that he was a pagan and the Christian chroniclers preferred not to glorify him.
There's enough there to believe if you want to.
I haven't seen VS but it's got Arthur and Ragnar Lothbrook in it? Might have to watch it
I mean I think the most likely scenario is that current arthurian lore rose as an amalgamation of several distinct historical figures whose stories kind of got blended and mixed with fantasy over time
That is certainly true. Clearly much of the fantastical events attributed to his life-story are obviously not real and I have no doubt that his legend picked up elements from Celtic, Etruscan and Saxon stories and people. But Nennius tells of a great war lord who fought 12 battles, mostly against the saxons, and who drove the Saxons from the land (temporarily as it turned out). That's not Artorius and it's not quite Ambrosius either. It's not anyone we know of. If that man existed then that's Arthur, though he may have gone by another name.
Completely off-topic but this guy's channel is a delight. I haven't checked back in with him in a while but I've seen a lot of his earlier videos. His video about square vs. round concrete stakes is great lol.
But can he do this?
I did like how much of my knowledge of Arthur mythos comes from reading Fate/Stay Night and Nasu's other works lol.