This original and compelling study argues against the traditional identification of Arthur as a king in Celtic Britain. Instead, Graham Anderson explores the evidence for two much older figures, known to classical writers as kings of Arcadia and Lydia, over a millenium before. He shows how these kings can be clearly connected with traditional Arthurian characters and adventure, including an ancient Gawain, a Lady of Shallott, and a predecessor of Excalibur, and shows that the Arthurian universe found in Welsh tales and French romances is already anticipated in these earliest of Arthurian materials.
The Grail legends have been appropriated by novelists as diverse as Umberto Eco and Dan Brown yet very few have read for themselves the original stories from which they came. All the mystery and drama of the Arthurian world are embodied in the extraordinary tales of Perceval, Gawain, Lancelot and Galahad in pursuit of the Holy Grail. The original romances, full of bewildering contradictions and composed by a number of different writers, dazzle with the sheer wealth of their conflicting imagination.
Merlin and the Grail: Joseph of Arimathea, Merlin, Perceval: The Trilogy of Arthurian Prose Romances attributed to Robert de BoronIt is hard to overstate the importance of this trilogy of prose romances in the development of the legend of the Holy Grail and in the evolution of Arthurian literature as a whole.
The Arthurian legend has inspired European writers and artists for almost fifteen hundred years. From shadowy beginnings in early medieval chronicles and poems, it has developed through medieval romance to modern films and TV series. What can account for the evergreen popularity of the ‘Once and Future King’? There is no simple answer, but the Companion outlines the evolution of the legend from the earliest documentary sources to Spamalot and analyses how some of the major motifs of the legend have been passed down in both medieval and modern texts.
King Arthur's story encapsulates the medieval romance and the tragedy of the Dark Ages. Yet legends shroud his life, and to this day scholars cannot agree on his dates, his location or even whether he really existed.
