The Mammoth Book of King Arthur

by Mike Ashley

Is there a case for looking further? Looking back to our pedigrees, we see that the only other contemporary Artúir was Artúir ap Pedr, who lived perhaps a little too early for this event. Like a Kintyre Arthur, this Artúir was also descended from Irish settlers, but by now over eight generations, so may well have been regarded as a Briton by the Irish.

  In consulting this Arthur’s pedigree in The Expulsion of the Déisi, we find that his father’s name is given as Retheoir, which may mean “lance-man” or “lance wielder.” This form of name may also equate with Bicor, which means “good throw” or “lucky throw”. Thus the apparent patronymic Bicor may simply have been a nickname for Arthur, who after his success in killing Mongan became known as “Arthur of the lucky shot”.

  We can, perhaps, play this game a little further. At the same time that Artúir ruled Dyfed, his neighbour in Ceredigion was Arthfoddw ap Boddw, whose name may also incorporate a nickname, “Arth the lucky.” Could “Arth the lucky” and “Arthur the lucky shot” be the same person?

  We do not know enough about either Artúir of Dyfed or Arthfoddw ap Boddw to know why either might be fighting against Mongan in Ireland, or why they should be linked with Kintyre. The coasts of both territories were subject to attacks by Irish raiders and this may have been a retaliation, but it seems unlikely. I strongly suspect that Artúir ap Bicor is a red herring, though a useful one, because it does show that the name Artúir was perhaps becoming more prevalent by the seventh century.

  We have now explored the vast majority of the Welsh Arthurian tradition. There are further minor references in other poems, but they tell us no more about an historical Arthur.

  What is most obvious about the Welsh tales is that they provide none of that background supplied by Nennius, and later by Geoffrey. The Welsh stories tell us nothing of the background of Vortigern and Ambrosius, and nothing significant about Arthur’s campaign against the Saxons. If anything, Arthur’s battles seem to be against other British or Welsh warbands. Badon is mentioned in The Dream of Rhonabwy, but not in the Triads, although Camlann does feature.

  Furthermore, most of the dates relating to the Welsh Arthur are in the mid to late sixth century, and only a few, such as Geraint’s, relate to the time of Badon.

  Almost all of the references to Arthur in the Welsh tales relate to either Arthur of Dyfed or Arthur of Gwent, with perhaps a hint of Arthur of the Pennines. Only the elegies of Llongborth and Catraeth possibly contain a distant memory of the hero of Badon. The triads add little of merit, but we may again get a hint of Arthur’s courts and of his battle tactics.

  Despite the wealth of material, Arthur of Badon still eludes us. But now we turn to the man who will reveal all: Geoffrey of Monmouth.

  9

  THE CREATION OF ARTHUR – GEOFFREY’S VERSION

  1. Geoffrey of Monmouth

  Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Historia Regum Britanniae (History of the Kings of Britain), completed around 1138 (thus more than six centuries after Arthur’s time), was the work that really created the legend, taking a character known from folk tales and turning him into Britain’s greatest hero. Even now, almost nine centuries after Geoffrey’s work took the Norman world by storm, questions are still asked about its authenticity. Virtually every scholar treats Geoffrey’s story as a fabrication, but it is peppered with enough tantalising facts to lure the reader into believing the rest. Over three hundred years have passed since Nennius compiled his Historia Brittonum, and in that time Britain had changed radically. The Saxon conquerors had themselves been conquered by the Normans seventy years earlier in 1066, many becoming serfs within the growing Norman empire. The Welsh remained independent, but although not conquered by the Normans were regarded as a vassal state. The Welsh nevertheless retained a fierce national pride, particularly strong under Gruffydd ap Cynan, king of Gwynedd, the most powerful ruler in Wales. Despite being held prisoner by the Normans at Chester for over ten years, Gruffydd continued to fight, although he was soundly defeated by forces under William II in 1098, and again by Henry I in 1114. For the rest of his life, which was long, Gruffydd ap Cynan strove to establish a national Welsh identity and heritage, becoming a patron of music and the arts, and bringing order to the bardic tradition. Gruffydd had a passion for bardic stories, and there is no doubt that during these years, especially the 1120s, his court was a cauldron for the formation of the Arthurian legend.

  We know little about Geoffrey’s early years. He calls himself Galfridus Monumotensis, or “of Monmouth”, which probably means he was born there. Monmouth over the centuries has been claimed by both Wales and England. It was in the old kingdom of Gwent, or more accurately Ergyng, which places Geoffrey’s childhood in the area where we know from Nennius that both Vortigern and Ambrosius, and therefore possibly Arthur, lived. Geoffrey doubtless grew up with the legends as part of his childhood, and apparently sometimes called himself Arthur, which may also have been his father’s name. It is probable that his parents, or at least one of them, came from Brittany and that Geoffrey may have lived there for some years. We do not know when he was born, but it was probably in the 1080s, and he and his family may have returned to England from Brittany during the reign of Henry I, who became king in 1100.

  We first learn of Geoffrey as a teacher and secular canon at St. George’s College, Oxford, in 1129. The university did not yet exist, but Oxford was already becoming established as a seat of learning. Geoffrey was by then of sufficient status to be a witness to a charter, so he may have been there for most of the 1120s. He remained in Oxford until 1151 when he became bishop-elect of St. Asaph’s in North Wales. He was ordained at Westminster Abbey in February 1152, but probably never visited St Asaph’s due to the renewed conflict between the English and Welsh under Owain Gwynedd. Owain had taken advantage of an England weakened by civil war during the reign of Stephen to establish himself as the most powerful ruler in Wales. This conflict makes it clear that Geoffrey must have been regarded as a Breton rather than Welsh by his Norman peers, who would never have put a Welshman in charge of a bishopric. Nevertheless, Geoffrey’s loyalties must have been divided, and this has to be borne in mind when studying his Historia.

  Geoffrey probably worked for much of the 1120s and into the 1130s on the Historia, almost a fifth of which concentrates on the life and glory of King Arthur. He published separately, in 1134 or thereabouts, the Prophetiae Merlini (The Prophecies of Merlin), later incorporated into the Historia, and the Vita Merlini (Life of Merlin) in about 1150 (see Chapter 15).

  It seems strange that a book that glorifies a hero of the British – the descendants of whom were now the Welsh – should prove so popular with the Normans. Geoffrey’s work could be seen as a rallying cry to the Welsh to show that they had once had a hero capable of defeating the enemy. What they did once they could do again. The need to write his Historia could have been spurred by Gruffydd ap Cynan’s desire to develop the bardic tales. Yet the book also had a strong message for the Normans, now settled in England for nearly a century. The Norman kings were still dukes of Normandy and, in a strange parallel with Arthur, William the Conqueror had been the duke (dux) who had become a king. More significantly, Britain had been treated as a rich but rather backward country by the French, who had a powerful heroic history in their own tales of Charlemagne, founder of the French Empire. In giving Britain Arthur, Geoffrey created a national hero who could rank alongside Charlemagne, and in whom the Normans, as conquerors of Britain, could take equal pride. Geoffrey’s book was, therefore, as much propaganda as it was history, and it is as propaganda that it must be read. Equally, while teasing the facts out of the fancy is not easy, we should not dismiss it entirely as fiction. There is a confused but genuine history hidden amidst the myth.

  Geoffrey’s problem lay in organising that myth into a sequential history. In effect, what he did was to take all the facts and, like pieces of a jigsaw, tried to force them together into a story. Whilst forming a continuous narrative, the historical thread became jumbled, and the events or p
ersons contemporary with Arthur are cast back in time and disconnected from him.

  But where did Geoffrey get this information? So far, we have trawled through the surviving texts and none of them provides the degree of detail that Geoffrey does, particularly about Arthur. In both Nennius and the Welsh Annals, the Arthurian elements seem to be tucked in as extras, and not part of the natural flow. This is one reason why Geoffrey, even during his lifetime, has been accused of inventing most of his history. William of Newburgh, a far more fastidious historian than Geoffrey, who was writing his own history of Britain in the 1190s, accused Geoffrey with typical Yorkshire bluntness of having made it all up, “either from an inordinate love of lying or for the sake of pleasing the British.”

  There is a wonderful fourteenth century document called the Polychronicon, by Ranulf Higden, which says:

  Many men wonder about this Arthur, whom Geoffrey extols so much singly, how the things that are said of him could be true, for, as Geoffrey repeats, he conquered thirty realms. If he subdued the king of France to him, and did slay Lucius the Procurator of Rome, Italy, then it is astonishing that the chronicles of Rome, of France, and of the Saxons should not have spoken of so noble a prince in their stories, which mentioned little things about men of low degree. Geoffrey says that Arthur overcame Frollo, King of France, but there is no record of such a name among men of France. Also, he says that Arthur slew Lucius Hiberius, Procurator of the city of Rome in the time of Leo the Emperor, yet according to all the stories of the Romans Lucius did not govern in that time – nor was Arthur born, nor did he live then, but in the time of Justinian, who was the fifth emperor after Leo. Geoffrey says that he has marvelled that Gildas and Bede make no mention of Arthur in their writings; however, I suppose it is rather to be marvelled that Geoffrey praises him so much, whom old authors, true and famous writers of stories, leave untouched.

  Did Geoffrey make it all up?

  2. Geoffrey’s ancient book

  It is evident from the start that Geoffrey drew upon the works of Nennius and Gildas and upon other, more traditional, sources. In his lengthy dedication to Robert, Earl of Gloucester, the illegitimate son of Henry I and a supporter of Matilda during the civil war, Geoffrey states, with regard to his research:

  At a time when I was giving a good deal of attention to such matters, Walter, Archdeacon of Oxford, a man skilled in the art of public speaking and well-informed about the history of foreign countries, presented me with a certain very ancient book written in the British language. This book, attractively composed to form a consecutive and orderly narrative, set out all the deeds of these men, from Brutus, the first King of the Britons, down to Cadwallader, the son of Cadwallo. At Walter’s request I have taken the trouble to translate the book into Latin, although, indeed, I have been content with my own expressions and my own homely style and I have gathered no gaudy flowers of speech in other men’s gardens.

  In other words, Geoffrey freely adapted this book into his own style. But what book was it? He doesn’t name it, and evidently William of Newburgh did not know of it. Some have conjectured that it was Geoffrey’s own invention, presenting the story as if derived from some long-lost factual source. However, he states that the book was given to him by Walter, Archdeacon of Oxford, and Walter, who died in 1151, was still alive at the time the Historia was issued. If there was no such book, then Walter was in on the hoax, and we are once again dangerously close to the territory of conspiracy.

  Some have suggested that Geoffrey’s book was the Ystoria Britanica (see Chapter 6), which introduced the character of Arthur/Riothamus. Whilst Geoffrey may well have consulted it, it is unlikely to have been his “very ancient book”, as it was written in Latin and there was no need to translate it. Others claim that Geoffrey drew upon the Brut y Brenhined (Chronicle of Kings), though all known versions of this appear to be translations of Geoffrey’s own Historia into Welsh. In some cases the translators added their own details to the text, thus providing variants, but there is no evidence that the Brut y Brenhined existed before Geoffrey’s Historia.

  Another suggestion is the ancient text known as the Brut Tysilio (Chronicles of Tysilio). There has been much dispute as to when these chronicles were first written. Tysilio was a sixth-century prince of Powys, son of Brochwel of the Tusks and great-grandson of Cadell. Legend has it that Tysilio yearned for the religious life, eventually fleeing to Brittany where he established a monastery. It is possible that this story represents two different Tysilios. In any case, neither Tysilio lived into the reign of Cadwaladr whose exploits conclude the Brut Tysilio, causing some to conjecture that the chronicle was continued by others. The copy in Jesus College, Oxford, is from the early 1500s, and thus post-dates Geoffrey’s work. Intriguingly, copies of the Brut – including the one at Jesus – have a colophon which says:

  I, Walter, archdeacon of Oxford, translated this book from the Welsh into Latin and, in my old age, have again translated it from the Latin into Welsh.

  One might puzzle as to why Walter should do that. Perhaps he had lost the original Welsh edition; and it is possible too that the Latin version from which he translated the book back into Welsh may not have been his own, but that undertaken by Geoffrey. If this is the case, it means – unfortunately – that the Tysilio translated back into Welsh would be derived from Geoffrey’s work rather than from the original, which has us chasing our own tails!

  There are many differences between the Brut Tysilio and Geoffrey’s Historia, sufficient to suggest that they may both be translations of the same earlier text, but that the Tysilio is more faithful to the original. The noted archaeologist Flinders Petrie satisfied himself that the Tysilio was authentic and not a revision or contraction of Geoffrey’s Historia. He argued that on a few occasions Geoffrey confirms that he is adding items, but that those elements are missing from Tysilio, whereas one would expect some reference to them if it were a direct translation. Others have noted that the versions of names used in the Tysilio show a closer relationship to the Celtic original, whereas some of those in the Historia could easily be scribal errors. An example appears in book iii.17, where Geoffrey refers to “Archgallo, the brother of Gorbonianus.” In Tysilio this name appears as “Arthal”. Archgallo is not a Latinisation of Arthal, but a misreading of the script, in which the t would have appeared as a Celtic , and easily misread for the letter c. Such an error is unlikely to arise in reverse.

  Until an earlier version of Tysilio is discovered we will not know. Certainly the surviving text is sufficiently close to Geoffrey’s, including many of his errors, asides and comments, that it would seem to be a direct translation, augmented and corrected in the light of their own knowledge and beliefs by later scribes.

  My own belief is that Geoffrey did have an ancient text to work from, but that this was a miscellany rather like Nennius’s, a hotchpotch of dates and legends and anecdotes which he endeavoured to rework into a single narrative. Clearly Geoffrey had no idea who Arthur was or when his period in history fell, but that did not stop him creating both an exciting story and a wonderful piece of propaganda.

  3. Geoffrey’s Vortigern and Ambrosius

  Geoffrey tells the story of Britain separating from the Roman Empire and being attacked by Picts and Saxons, in much the same way as Gildas and Nennius do. After the abortive appeal to Agicus (Aëtius), Guthelinus (Vitalinus), Archbishop of London, turns to Aldroenus (Aldwr in British), ruler of Armorica/Brittany, and offers him the kingdom of Britain. Aldroenus admits that, although he once would have been interested, the present state of Britain offers no allure. However, Aldroenus suggests that his brother Constantine should return to Britain with two thousand soldiers on the understanding that if he frees Britain of its enemies, then he should inherit the crown.

  Constantine is duly made king, marries a noblewoman whom Guthelinus himself had raised, and has three sons. The oldest, Constans, is promised to the church, and Aurelius Ambrosius and Uther are handed to Guthelinus to raise. Ten years pass, presumab
ly in peace, until Constantine is killed by a Pict. A dispute arises over who should inherit the crown because Constans is now a monk and the other two are still children “in their cradles” (vi.7). Vortigern, whom Geoffrey calls “leader of the Gewissei,” now appears on the scene (vi.6). He tells Constans that he will help him become king, crowns him, and becomes his advisor. With Constans a puppet ruler, Vortigern plots to become king himself. Other contenders for the throne – the “older leaders of the kingdom”, as Geoffrey calls them – were all dead, and Constans was Vortigern’s only hurdle.

  Vortigern assumes control of the treasury and places his own men in the major towns, telling them that there is fear of further attack from the Danes and Saxons. He also convinces Constans that he needs a bodyguard of select Pict soldiers. Vortigern, knowing that the Picts are untrustworthy, pays them handsomely, and then states that he plans to leave Britain. The Picts don’t want him to go, and to keep him they murder Constans, presenting his head to Vortigern. Vortigern feigns anguish and has the Picts executed. Amidst suspicion that he planned it all, Vortigern crowns himself king.

  Let’s pause there a moment and consider how all this fits together. We should have one firm starting point, the letter to Aëtius, which we have dated to between 446 and 452, probably 451. Then follows Constantine’s victory over the Picts, his coronation, marriage and raising children. Geoffrey says that ten years pass, but Constans is clearly older than ten, and old enough to be a monk. If Constans is about eighteen when Vortigern insinuates his way into the royal household and brings him (briefly) to the throne, that moves us on to 469. Ambrosius is still a baby, yet the chronology derived from Gildas and Nennius has him in the prime of manhood by now. Clearly Geoffrey is in error.

  In all likelihood, Geoffrey confused Guthelinus’s letter to Aëtius with the original plea to the Romans in 410, when Honorius abandoned Britain to its fate. Eighteen years added to 410 is 428, quite close to Nennius’s date of 425 for Vortigern’s rise to power. This is more satisfactory, because it allows Guthelinus, who is regarded as Vortigern’s father (according to Nennius’s genealogy), to be archbishop during these years and dead by 428.