The Pendragon's Hall

The Pendragon is tired of political in-fighting and has found himself turning lately to more ancient historical pursuits. That I will return to politics eventually is inevitable but history has been consuming as much of my time lately that is not taken up with work and preparing for the new baby. One of the most interesting things I've been pondering lately is the historical identity of the original Pendragon: King Arthur. There has been much discussion of this over the years: historians have reached conclusions ranging from calling the Pendragon a complete fabrication to saying he was a Roman leader of slavic mercenaries in Britain. Others have even suggested that he was a chieftain in Brittany, along the coast of France, where Celtic peoples also settled. That he is a complete fabrication seems highly unlikely since human beings are not really that creative and there are few, if any, legends that are truly made up from scratch. In his seminal work The Discovery of King Arthur historian Geoffrey Ashe suggests a better way to approach the question. Instead of asking if King Arthur was real or merely a fiction, historians should ask what king in British history best fits as a model for the Arthurian legend and should simply assume there was some sort of basis. This Pendragon agrees. The records we have are spotty and don't contain as many names and dates as we would like, but phrasing the question this way helps us stop arguing about the validity of the sources and show us what they actually say. Ashe points out that the basic Arthurian legend, going back before the sword in the stone and the Lancelot-Guinevere affair, is that Arthur became king following a usurper called Vortigern, that he led the Britons in a series of battles against the Saxons, that he won peace for his country for some time and actually solidified it by going to conquer Gaul. While in Gaul, Arthur was betrayed by his deputy king and returned to Britain to fight a losing battle. Wounded, perhaps mortally, Arthur went away to an island called Avalon and has not been seen since except for some vague reference to a future return. This much is what we know from Geoffrey of Monmouth and other early histories. But other historians mention Arthur as well so it seems unlikely that Geoffrey just made him up. In the late 400s, moreover, we do have a Briton resurgence that stemmed the tide of incoming Saxons so it is likely Arthur flourished in the latter half of the 5th century. Historical records also tell of a "high king" called Vortigern who invited the Saxons into Britain to protect his shaky claim to the throne in the early part of the 5th century; Vortigern died in the early 450s according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. So Arthur must have come sometime after him. Ashe suggests he was Vortigern's immediate successor as the legendary figures of Aurelius and Uther, Arthur's uncle and father, do not appear in any other historical records, and seem to have been fictional. Searching Geoffrey and other early British historians we find that Arthur is supposed to have gone to Gaul in the time when the western Roman Empire was on its last legs--somewhere between 455 and 476. Geoffrey also gave us the name of the eastern Roman Emperor during Arthur's fighting in Gaul--it was Leo. There were only two Leos in the 5th century who reigned in the East and the second of the two did not last long enough to merit mentioning. Leo I was emperor from 457-474, so Arthur's campaign in Gaul must have occurred during those years. Geoffrey also speaks of a Pope called Sulpicius. No such Pope ever lived, but a Pope called Simplicius did, and the garbling is easy enough to understand: this would overlap Leo's reign during the years 468-474. The final name we have is that the western Roman Emperor was a man named Lucius. The last of the western Roman emperors was a man named Lucerius in early records or Glycerius originally. He overlapped Simplicius and Leo in the years 469-470. Thus, Arthur must have been in Gaul during those years. Who was king of the Britons at that time? He is known on the Continent as Riothamus, and he took an army of Britons to Gaul during that time to fight the Saxons alongside the Romans. While he was there, a deputy king sold him out to the Saxons and Riothamus was (mortally?) wounded in a crushing defeat and was retreating towards an island off the French coast, known as Avalon, when he disappeared from history. He may have left instructions for the Britons in Gaul to keep fighting and he would return to lead them. At any rate, Arthur's "death" is only hinted at in early British legend, and the promise of return did not come in until after the Norman invasion when probably the French side of Arthur's story was meshed with the early British one. Furthermore, Riothamus is a corruption of the British term "rigotamus" which meant "most kingly" or, possibly, "High King." In Celtic times, the eldest son did not necessarily follow a father in kingship--at any rate, Riothamus was not the son of the last known king Vortigern--so it seems a tad too convenient that the High King's name meant "High King." It seems likely that this was a title. And so what was the King's name? According to early historians, it was Artorius, or Arthur.

It's fascinating to me. This is mostly conjecture but it seems quite as likely as anything else. People are generally too quick to dismiss any form of legend as pure fiction, yet most of it has quite real roots in true history. And Arthur is not the only one--but more on this another day.