matter of Britain

 

the mass of legend, popular in medieval lore, concerning King Arthur of Britain and his knights.

Medieval Sources

The battle of Mt. Badon—in which, according to the Annales Cambriae (c.1150), Arthur carried the Cross of Jesus on his shoulders—but not Arthur's name, is mentioned (c.540) by Gildas. The earliest apparent mention of Arthur in any known literature is a brief reference to a mighty warrior in the Welsh poem Gododdin (c.600). Arthur next appears in Nennius (c.800) as a Celtic warrior who fought (c.600) 12 victorious battles against the Saxon invaders.

These and several subsequent references indicate that his legend had already developed into a considerable literature before Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote his Historia (c.1135), in which he elaborated on the feats of King Arthur whom he represented as the conqueror of Western Europe. After Geoffrey's Historia came Wace's Roman de Brut (c.1155), which infused the legend with the spirit of chivalric romance. The Brut (c.1200) of Layamon, modeled on Wace's work, gives one of the best pictures of Arthur as a national hero.

Chrétien de Troyes, a 12th-century French poet, wrote five romances dealing with the knights of Arthur's court. His Perceval contains the earliest extant literary version of the quest of the Holy Grail (see Grail, Holy). Two medieval German poets important in the development of Arthurian legend are Wolfram von Eschenbach and Gottfried von Strassburg. The latter's Tristan was the first great literary treatment of the Tristram and Isolde story.

After 1225 no significant medieval Arthurian literature was produced on the Continent. In England, however, the legend continued to flourish. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (c.1370), one of the best Middle English romances, embodies the ideal of chivalric knighthood. The last important medieval work dealing with the Arthurian legend is the Morte d'Arthur of Sir Thomas Malory, whose tales have become the source for most subsequent Arthurian material. Many writers have used Arthurian themes since Malory, notably Tennyson in his Idylls of the King. Swinburne, William Morris, and Edwin Arlington Robinson also wrote poetic works based on the legend. T. H. White's trilogy The Once and Future King (1958) is a charming and decidedly 20th-century retelling of the Arthurian story.

The Link to Celtic Mythology

Formerly, it was thought that the Arthurian legend was the work of several inventive poets and romancers of the Middle Ages. The generally accepted theory now is that Arthurian legend developed out of stories of Celtic mythology. The most archaic form in which these occur in British sources is the Welsh Mabinogion, but much of Irish mythology is palpably identical with Arthurian romance.

It is probable that traditional Irish hero stories fused in Britain with those of the Welsh, the Cornish, and the Celts of North Britain. The resultant legend with its hero, Arthur, was transmitted to their Breton cousins on the Continent probably by the year 1000. The Bretons, famous as wandering minstrels, followed Norman armies over Western Europe and used the legend's stories for their repertory. By 1100, therefore, Arthurian stories were well known even in Italy.

The Story

Although there are innumerable variations of the Arthurian legend, the basic story has remained the same. Arthur was the illegitimate son of Uther Pendragon, king of Britain, and Igraine, the wife of Gorlois of Cornwall. After the death of Uther, Arthur, who had been reared in secrecy, won acknowledgment as king of Britain by successfully withdrawing a sword from a stone. Merlin, the court magician, then revealed the new king's parentage. Arthur, reigning in his court at Camelot, proved to be a noble king and a mighty warrior. He was the possessor of the miraculous sword Excalibur, given to him by the mysterious Lady of the Lake.

Of Arthur's several enemies, the most treacherous were his sister Morgan le Fay and his nephew Mordred. Morgan le Fay was usually represented as an evil sorceress, scheming to win Arthur's throne for herself and her lover. Mordred (or Modred) was variously Arthur's nephew or his son by his sister Morgawse. He seized Arthur's throne during the king's absence. Later he was slain in battle by Arthur, but not before he had fatally wounded the king. Arthur was borne away to the isle of Avalon, where it was expected that he would be healed of his wounds and that he would someday return to his people.

Two of the most invincible knights in Arthur's realm were Sir Tristram and Sir Launcelot of the Lake. Both of them, however, were involved in illicit and tragic love unions—Tristram with Isolde, the queen of Tristram's uncle, King Mark; Launcelot with Guinevere, the queen of his sovereign, King Arthur. Other knights of importance include the naive Sir Pelleas, who fell helplessly in love with the heartless Ettarre (or Ettard) and Sir Gawain, Arthur's nephew, who appeared variously as the ideal of knightly courtesy and as the bitter enemy of Launcelot.

Also significant are Sir Balin and Sir Balan, two devoted brothers who unwittingly slew one another; Sir Galahad, Launcelot's son, who was the hero of the quest for the Holy Grail; Sir Kay, Arthur's villainous foster brother; Sir Percivale (or Parsifal); Sir Gareth; Sir Geraint; Sir Bedivere; and other knights of the Round Table. To modern readers, Arthurian legend has become the mirror of the ideal of medieval knighthood and chivalry.

Bibliography

See studies by R. H. Fletcher (2d ed. 1966), R. L. Loomis (1949; 1956; 1927, repr. 1969; 1963, repr. 1970), L. Alcock (1972), J. Morris (1973), and R. W. Barber (1973); J. L. Weston, tr., Arthurian Romances Unrepresented in Malory's Morte d'Arthur (8 vol., 1907; repr. 1971); N. J. Lacy et al., ed., The Arthurian Encyclopedia (1987).

History of Literature
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Ancient Celtic religion

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British mythology

Welsh mythology Breton mythology Mabinogion · Taliesin Cad Goddeu Trioedd Ynys Prydein Matter of Britain · King Arthur

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Irish mythology Scottish mythology Hebridean mythology Tuatha Dé Danann Mythological Cycle Ulster Cycle Fenian Cycle Immrama · Echtrae

See also

Celts · Gaul Galatia · Celtiberians Early history of Ireland Prehistoric Scotland Prehistoric Wales Index of related articles

The Matter of Britain or the Arthurian legend is a name given collectively to the legends that concern the Celtic and legendary history of the British Isles, especially those focused on King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table. The 12th century French poet Jean Bodel created the name in the following lines of his epic Chanson de Saisnes:

Ne sont que iii matières à nul homme atandant,

De France et de Bretaigne, et de Rome la grant.

(translation: "There are but 3 literary cycles that no man should be without: the matter of France, of Britain, and of great Rome". Jean Bodel, Chanson de Saisnes)

The name distinguishes and relates the Matter of Britain from the mythological themes taken from classical antiquity, the "matter of Rome", and the tales of the paladins of Charlemagne and their wars with the Moors and Saracens, which constituted the "matter of France". While Arthur is the chief subject of the Matter of Britain, other lesser-known legendary history of the British Isles, including the stories of Brutus of Britain, Old King Cole, King Lear, and Gogmagog, is also included in the subjects covered by the Matter of Britain: see King of the Britons.

Themes and subjects

Legendary history of Britain

It could be said that the legendary history of Britain was created in part to form a body of patriotic myth for the island. Several agendas thus can be seen in this body of literature.

The Historia Britonum, the earliest known source of the story of Brutus of Britain, may have been devised to create a distinguished genealogy for a number of Welsh princes in the 9th century. Traditionally attributed to Nennius, its actual compiler is unknown; it exists in several recensions. This tale went on to achieve greater currency because its inventor linked Brutus to the diaspora of heroes that followed the Trojan War, and thus provided raw material which later mythographers such as Geoffrey of Monmouth, Michael Drayton, and John Milton could draw upon, linking the settlement of the British Isles to the heroic age of Greek literature, for their several and diverse literary purposes. As such, this material could be used for patriotic mythmaking just as Virgil linked the mythical founding of Rome to the Trojan War in The Æneid. Geoffrey of Monmouth also introduced the fanciful claim that the Trinovantes, reported by Tacitus as dwelling in the area of London, had a name he interpreted as Troi-novant, "New Troy".

More speculative claims link Celtic mythology with several of the rulers and incidents compiled by Geoffrey of Monmouth in his Historia Regum Britanniæ. It has been suggested, for instance, that Leir of Britain, who later became Shakespeare's King Lear, was originally the Irish sea-god Lir. Various Celtic deities have been identified with characters from Arthurian literature as well: Morgan le Fay was often thought to have originally been the Irish goddess Mórrígan. Many of these identifications come from the speculative comparative religion of the late 19th century, and have been questioned in more recent years.

William Shakespeare seems to have been deeply interested in the legendary history of Britain, and to have been familiar with some of its more obscure byways. Shakespeare's plays contain several tales relating to these legendary kings, such as King Lear and Cymbeline. It has been suggested that Shakespeare's Welsh schoolmaster Thomas Jenkins introduced him to this material, and perhaps directed him to read Geoffrey of Monmouth. These tales also figure in Raphael Holinshed's The Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, which also appears in Shakespeare's sources for Macbeth. A Welsh schoolmaster appears as the character Sir Hugh Evans in The Merry Wives of Windsor.

Other early authors also drew from the early Arthurian and pseudo-historical sources of the Matter of Britain. The Scots, for instance, formulated a mythical history in the Picts and the Dál Riata royal lines. While they do eventually become factual lines, unlike those of Geoffrey, their origins are vague and often incorporate both aspects of mythical British history and mythical Irish history. The story of Gabhran especially incorporates elements of both those histories.

The Arthurian cycle

The Arthurian literary cycle is the best known part of the Matter of Britain. It has succeeded largely because it tells two interlocking stories that many later authors have been intrigued by. One concerns Camelot, usually envisioned as a doomed utopia of chivalric virtue, undone by the fatal flaws of Arthur and Sir Lancelot. The other concerns the quests of the various knights to achieve the Holy Grail; some succeed (Galahad, Percival), and others fail (Lancelot).

The medieval tale of Arthur and his knights is full of Christian themes; those themes involve the destruction of human plans for virtue by the moral failures of their characters, and the quest for an important Christian relic. Finally, the relationships between the characters invited treatment in the tradition of courtly love, such as Lancelot and Guinevere, or Tristan and Iseult. In more recent years, the trend has been to attempt to link the tales of King Arthur and his knights with Celtic mythology, usually in highly romanticized, early twentieth century reconstructed versions.

Additionally, it is possible to read the Arthurian literature in general, and that concerned with the Grail tradition in particular, as an allegory of human development and spiritual growth (a theme explored by Joseph Campbell amongst others).

Characters and subjects

Legendary kings and founders

• Brutus of Britain
• Corineus
• Old King Cole
• Cymbeline
• Leir of Britain (Shakespeare's King Lear)
• Cassibelanus
• Caradocus
• Aurelius Ambrosius
• Uther Pendragon
• Cadwallader

Arthur and his entourage

• King Arthur
• the Round Table
• Guinevere, wife of Arthur
• Excalibur, Arthur's magic sword
• Uther Pendragon, father of Arthur
• Camelot, Arthur's capital
• Mordred, Arthur's heir and enemy
• Avalon, Arthur's resting place

Knights of the Round Table

• Lancelot
• Galehault
• Galahad
• Tristan
• Gawain
• Percival
• Bors
• Geraint
• Gareth
• Kay
• Lamorak
• Gaheris
• Bedivere
• Agravaine
• Sagramore
• Calogrenant
• Ywain
• Erec

Other important figures

• Merlin
• Morgan le Fay
• Sir Ector
• The Lady of the Lake

Noteworthy authors

Medieval

• Béroul
• Chrétien de Troyes
• Geoffrey Chaucer
• Geoffrey of Monmouth
• Hartmann von Aue
• Layamon
• Thomas Malory
• Marie de France
• Nennius
• Robert de Boron
• Taliesin
• Thomas of England
• Wace
• Wolfram von Eschenbach

Modern

• René Barjavel
• Marion Zimmer Bradley
• Gillian Bradshaw
• Bernard Cornwell
• Michael Drayton
• Hal Foster
• Parke Godwin
• Raphael Holinshed
• David Jones
• Debra A. Kemp
• Stephen Lawhead
• Rosalind Miles
• William Shakespeare
• Edmund Spenser
• John Steinbeck
• Mary Stewart
• Alfred, Lord Tennyson
• Mark Twain
• Charles White
• T. A. Barron
• T. H. White
• Jack Whyte
• Charles Williams
• Elizabeth Wein

Anonymous

• The Lancelot-Grail Cycle
• The Mabinogion
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
• The Post-Vulgate Cycle
• The Prose Tristan

See also

• Mystery
• Holy Grail
• The Mists of Avalon
• Corineus
• Glastonbury
• Mons Badonicus
• Breton romance
• Chivalry
• The Faerie Queene
• Knights of the Round Table
• List of Arthurian characters
• Sites and places associated with Arthurian legend
• Historical basis for King Arthur
• English historians in the Middle Ages
• Monty Python and the Holy Grail

References

• Derek Pearsall, Arthurian Romance: a short introduction, Blackwell, Oxford, 2005
• D. H. Green, The Beginnings of Medieval Romance: Fact and fiction, 1150-1220, CUP Cambridge 2005
• Carol Dover (ed), A Companion to the Lancelot-Grail Cycle, Boydell & Brewer, 2005

External links

• Historia Britonum (Latin) at The Latin Library
• Historia Britonum (English)
• Brut by Layamon (Middle English)
• The Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland by Raphael Holinshed (partial)
• The History of Britain by John Milton
• The Camelot Project contains a large selection of Arthurian etexts from the sixth to the early twentieth century
• Timeless Myths - Arthurian Legends

Matter of Britain
Key People	King Arthur · Sir Ector · Guinevere · Lady of the Lake · Merlin · Mordred · Morgan le Fay · Morgause · Uther Pendragon
Knights of the Round Table	Agravaine · Bedivere · Bors · Calogrenant · Gaheris · Galahad · Gareth · Gawain · Geraint · Kay · Lamorak · Lancelot · Palamedes · Percival · Sagramore · Tristan
Objects	Excalibur · Holy Grail  · Round Table
Places	Avalon · Camelot · Corbenic
In Media	Books · Films

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