Notes on a New Arthurian Story

So I'm thinking about trying to create a new Arthurian story, and while trying to decide how to start it off a few interesting things came to mind that are helping me shape the context of the story.

1. Arthur's name, and the names of some of his knights, are puzzles that nobody can solve to everybody's satisfaction, since they seem to have qualities of Latin and Gaelic names. Also, a number of his knights have Gaelic names.


2. The accounts of Arthur all agree on two important things. He was a mighty warrior and both he and his men were known for their ability to fight on horseback.


3. Most accounts of Arthur place in him a period of great unrest and bloodshed in Britain.


4. The earliest accounts of Arthur are all from Welsh sources. The Historica Brittonum and the Annales Cambriae both Welsh histories compiled by Welsh monks and scribes and nearly all of the early legends that mention Arthur are Welsh in origin, most prominantly the the tale of Culhwch and Olwen, and the Welsh Triad.

Combine these suggestive facts together and they point to one particular period of time and to a particular type of Arthur; a Celt raised by Romans who stayed behind with his sword brothers and tried to served protect Briton against the raiders after the Roman Legions left.

During the Roman occupation of Britain the primary inhabitants of the land were Celts from various tribes who later became the Welsh and Irish. It was common practice for Romans to take the sons of prominent members of various kingdoms or tribes and raise them as romans. This served the practical purpose of holding the natives in check, providing soldiers to help garrison the Roman forts, and eventually to spread Roman customs and beliefs among the Celts when the young men were finally released from Roman "hospitality". Such mingling would create names that would be difficult to attribute to either side, since especially toward the end of Roman occupation in Brition, the Celts would have influenced the Romans almost as much as the Romans had influenced them.

If a young Celt was brought up into the Roman occupying army, it is very likly that he would be attached to the cavalry auxilia. They were not meant to do the heavy fighting that legionares were, being used primarily for scouting and tipping the tide a pivital points in the battle. Even so, wearing roman armor and weilding roman weapons, the auxilia would be far ahead of any weaponry deployed by the occupied Celts and later, the invading barbarians from Northern Europe. On horseback, armored and armed with Roman steel against lightly armed raiders with iron weapons, a relativly small mounted company backed by a larger, if poorer armed, local force could dominate a battlefield.

If Arthur were a hero who had defended early Britain against Saxon invaders, we would expect to find numerous mentions of him in Welsh and Irish stories, legends, and chronicles, which is exactly what we find.

On a more personal note: as much as the film King Arthur tried to be true to the scant historical evidence that we have (they even included the battle of Badon Hill), they messed up on at least three basic counts. First, ancient peoples did not use modern cuss words with anything approaching the regularity that Arthur's knights did throughout the film. Second, longbows and crossbows were far, far in the future when Rome fell. Third, and most importantly, Lancelot has nothing to do with Arthur, having been added in by a Frenchman named Chretien, who has singlehandedly done more damage to the Arthurian story than any other single man in history.