British Literature - Week 4 - Arthurian Literature

Whew! We made it through Beowulf! Now let's tackle Arthurian literature.

What comes to mind when you think of Arthurian literature? Probably King Arthur, Lancelot, and Queen Guinevere are first on the list, possibly followed by Camelot, the knights of the Round Table, the Holy Grail, Merlin and Morgan le Fey, and maybe Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. In our British Literature class we spent a few weeks on Arthurian literature, mainly because there is so much there, and it's a great way to learn about the time period, and how stories and myths evolve.

Arthurian literature is unique, I believe, because it has spanned so many centuries, and the "original story," if there is one, has been embellished, changed, added on to, or morphed so many times that what is "true" or "original" doesn't even seem to matter anymore. During the 6th - 12th century C.E. (same as A.D. but it stands for Common Era) originality was not of primary importance in writing. A writer, or a bard, or a poet, would take a story and re-create it for the current setting and culture. Not only did the story surrounding King Arthur go through many, many iterations, the story did not stay confined to England and the English language. Writers from the 6th century to the present time have continued the legend of King Arthur in English, Latin, Welsh, French, Anglo-Saxon, and Anglo-Norman.

To keep track of the sources, time periods, and languages covering the myth surrounding King Arthur, I created a board. The first mention of "King Arthur" occurs in 540 C.E., and uses King Arthur as a point of reference - in  "Y Gododdin," Aneirin describes the king as "...glutting black ravens on the wall of the first,though he was not Arthur."  Hmmm. The next reference, written in Welsh by monks trying to figure out the dates of Easter, entitled "The Easter Annals," Arthur is mentioned by name: "The year 490: the battle of Badon in which Arthur bore the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ on his shoulders for three days and nights and Britons were the victors." Ah, so King Arthur did exist; he led his men in battle; he led his men to victory."

A few centuries later, Nennius, writing "Historia Brittonum" in Latin, describes Arthur as a solder, but not a king: "Arthur fought against the Saxons with the Kings of the Britons, but he was commander in the battles."
Not until 1136 when Geoffrey of Monmouth writes his "History of the Kings of Britain" do we see the stories we associate with King Arthur today: Merlin's magic, King Arthur's conquest of the Roman Emperor, Arthur's mortal wound and transplant to Avalon. Centuries later, in about 1400 C.E., Sir Thomas Mallory wrote Morte Darthur, the death of King Arthur, and penned the famous lines

Hic iacet Arthurus, rex quondam, rexque futurus. 

"Here lies Arthur, king once, king to be."

He was right - King Arthur lives on!  More next week...