The Real King Arthur

The mystical tale of King Arthur is one of the great themes of

British literature. But is there any truth behind the myth and
why has it become so influential throughout the centuries?
The King Arthur that we know today is a collection of different
legends, written by different authors, at different times. They
are all united by the common theme that King Arthur was a
fifth century British general who fought against Anglo-Saxon
tribes and ensured that Britain remained a paradise of the
West. The first mention of King Arthur is in the History of the
Britons, penned in 830, and attributed to an author called
Nennius. He writes:
Then in those days Arthur fought against them with the kings
of the Britons, but he was commander in those battles.
A more elaborate tale of King Arthur came about in the 11th
century, when Geoffrey of Monmouth published his book The

History of the Kings of Britain. Arthurs entire life is outlined for

the first time in this work, right from his birth at Tintagel, to his
death, and the legendary figures of Guinevere and Merlin are
introduced. This book had a tremendous impact at the time. To
this day, approximately 200 manuscripts remain in existence.
Then, with the marriage of Henry II of England to Eleanor of
Aquitaine, the stories of Arthur began to bloom in the courts of
France and the legend took on romantic and spiritual tones. It
was within this context that the mysterious Holy Grail first
appears in the work of French court writer Chretien de Troyes.
In his poem,Perceval, or the Story of the Grail (1181-90), it
says:
A girl came in, fair and comely and beautifully adorned, and
between her hands she held a grail. And when she carried the
grail in, the hall was suffused by a light so brilliant that the
candles lost their brightness as do the moon or the stars when
the sun rises.
The tales of King Arthur became so embedded in the minds of
the British people that by the time Henry VIII came to the
throne in 1509, he commissioned the Winchester Round Table
of Edward III to be repainted, with himself depicted at the top
as a latter-day Arthur, a Christian emperor and head of the
British Empire.
Another example of Arthurs influence came in 1834 when the
Houses of Parliament were rebuilt after a disastrous fire.
Arthurian themes from Thomas Malorys book the Death of
Arthur (1486) were selected for the decoration of the queens
robing room in the House of Lords.
Today the myth has lost none of its appeal and is still the
subject of many books and films. However, despite the
entrenchment of Arthur within Celtic folklore, evidence of his

actual existence is slim. In the histories of the time, there is no

mention of an Arthur. The one contemporary source, The Ruin
and Conquest of Britain, written by the British monk and
historian Gildas, gives somebody elses name altogether as the
leader of the Britons. Nor does Arthur appear in any of the
Kings list at the time. But Gildas does mention an unnamed
leader and King of the Britons could this be Arthur?
The consensus amongst most historians is that Arthur probably
did exist, either as an individual or a composite of several
individuals. Since many of the Dark Age heroes were real men
upon whom mythical talent and position were often thrust by
storytellers, there is a strong possibility that Arthur was a Dark
Age warrior of the Celts from which the rest of the mythological
superstructure was formed.
Why, in light of no concrete evidence, has Arthur featured so
heavily in British mythology? One explanation offered is that
the figure of Arthur has come to represent British history in its
entirety, the stories acting as a way of explaining how Britain
has come to be, especially in reference to the relationship
between the Saxons and the Celts. Certainly, the story has
proven particularly popular during times of social unrest due to
its unfaltering moral stability. If the past hundreds of years are
anything to go by, the story of King Arthur shows no signs of
loosing any of its magnetism.