Speaker 1: M Hey everybody, this is Chuck. Welcome to Saturday Celex.
Speaker 1: I hope you had your pop tarts and your breakfast
Speaker 1: cereal and you watched your your morning cartoons. Because now
Speaker 1: it's time to learn a little something. I'm gonna pick
Speaker 1: was There a Real King Arthur? From January fourteen, two
Speaker 1: thousand and fourteen, as my select pick this week. You know,
Speaker 1: I love my history podcasts and all the episodes we
Speaker 1: do about history, and one of my favorite things is
Speaker 1: is to take a look at, uh, these these figures
Speaker 1: from literature and and lore and think, wow, were they
Speaker 1: real people? Is there a basis in reality? In fact?
Speaker 1: And that's what we did with King Arthur? So, uh,
Speaker 1: I hope you dig it. I certainly did, and here
Speaker 1: we go. Was there a Real King Arthur? Welcome to
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey,
Speaker 1: you welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's
Speaker 1: Charles w Chuck Bryant, Jerry Waved, everybody quiet. Jack. That's
Speaker 1: stuff you should know. Yeah, that's us. That is us
Speaker 1: still legend. You know, it was impossible for me to
Speaker 1: research this without only thinking of two things. Two movies.
Speaker 1: Clive Owe, Nope, Uh, I didn't see that one. It
Speaker 1: was it was good? Was that the one called King Arthur? Okay,
Speaker 1: it was a good I thought, So I'll check it
Speaker 1: out because I dig this character. And I've seen a
Speaker 1: lot of the movies that that tackle Camelot. But Excalibur
Speaker 1: and uh Monty Python and The Holy Grail. Of course,
Speaker 1: I I surely I've seen ex Caliber because I had
Speaker 1: showed time when I was a kid. It was a
Speaker 1: big hot movie when you were twelve in the early eighties. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And then of course the Holy Crail. I mean, how
Speaker 1: do you not see that? It's the Holy Grail of comedies.
Speaker 1: Some say, yeah, I can see that. You should check
Speaker 1: out the Cowler. It actually holds up pretty well, does it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And it's um Has is somewhat notable for having a
Speaker 1: couple of early appearances by actors that went on to
Speaker 1: be uh much bigger movies like that. Yeah. Gabriel byrne
Speaker 1: is in it and just barely and um Liam Neeson
Speaker 1: and I think both of them it was there first
Speaker 1: roles and they're like hardly in the movie. Who was
Speaker 1: who played King Arthur? Um? Was it anybody like I've
Speaker 1: heard of? Or they had to have been big at
Speaker 1: the time, right, Who was it Richard Burton? You know
Speaker 1: when I was uh like thirteen, I saw Richard Harris
Speaker 1: do Camelot the Fox Seater in Atlanta. So is that, like,
Speaker 1: is that based on the Arthurian legend? What the musical Camelot? Yeah? Sure, okay,
Speaker 1: but I mean you know it's a musical. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: it's from the sixties, so you can never tell like
Speaker 1: it had just been named Camelot. That's what I was asking.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, No, it's about the Arthurian legend.
Speaker 1: But out of all of them, I would say, hands down,
Speaker 1: Monty Python and the Holy Grail is the best of
Speaker 1: the Arthurian Legend movie adaptations. Yeah. I haven't seen it
Speaker 1: in years, but it's like one of those that I
Speaker 1: saw so many times I can still quote most of it,
Speaker 1: you know. I mean it has it all. It has
Speaker 1: the killer rabbits, the killer bunnies. Yeah, it has the
Speaker 1: coconut carrying swallows. It has the nice you say knee,
Speaker 1: It has the Black Knight who merely has a flesh wound. Yeah,
Speaker 1: has everything, has singing dancing yeah, um, I mean the
Speaker 1: great Graham Chapman as uh Arthur. Yeah, and um, bring
Speaker 1: out your Dead. Yeah. So many things that are in
Speaker 1: the lexicon from that. Yeah. Uh. Nigel Terry played Arthur
Speaker 1: in the Excalibur movie. I don't I don't know who
Speaker 1: he is. Probably recognize him. Helen Mirren was morgana though,
Speaker 1: oh wow? Um, but yeah, small roles. Oh. Patrick Stewart
Speaker 1: was the other guy, got you he played? Was he bald?
Speaker 1: Has he always like? He always been bald? One of those?
Speaker 1: I'm sure he had hair at some point. Oh, I'll
Speaker 1: bet he looked weird with hair. I can't imagine him
Speaker 1: with hair. What if he was born with like a
Speaker 1: full head of hair and that was it. He started
Speaker 1: losing it after that, right for two days and then
Speaker 1: it all came out all right. So anyway started to
Speaker 1: disrupt this early on. But those two movies, I just
Speaker 1: every time I saw it with a pen dragon. This
Speaker 1: is a cool name, that's a great name. I couldn't
Speaker 1: help but just kind of say those lines in my head.
Speaker 1: So I mean, you you make a good or you
Speaker 1: raise a good point. Um, there's so many Arthur movies
Speaker 1: out there, Arthur books. Sword in the Stone was pretty
Speaker 1: good too. Um that everybody has a kind of a
Speaker 1: basic idea of um. The King Arthur legend, the Arthurian
Speaker 1: myth or romance it's sometimes called to but UM. What
Speaker 1: I think probably a lot of people don't know is
Speaker 1: that it is a syncretized meaning. The Catholics got their
Speaker 1: myths on it and through a bunch of Christianity on
Speaker 1: top of something that was already extant, and in this
Speaker 1: case Um what was excellent was a group of myths
Speaker 1: that arose from the Celts, the Celtic people, which is
Speaker 1: pretty substantial that we have this because the Celts never
Speaker 1: wrote anything down, mainly on account of the fact that
Speaker 1: they didn't have a written language. Their tradition was entirely oral,
Speaker 1: which is why we have very little of an understanding
Speaker 1: of the Celts. Most of our understanding of the Celts
Speaker 1: comes from outside observers like Pliny the Elder. Thank God
Speaker 1: for Pliny, or else we might not even know the
Speaker 1: Celts ever existed. Um, but the Arthurian legend is very
Speaker 1: clearly based on Celtic mythology. But even more enticing to
Speaker 1: me is the idea that it's possibly, or it's possible
Speaker 1: that that um Celtic legend, that Celtic mythology is rooted
Speaker 1: somewhat in fact, Like Arthur may have been a real person.
Speaker 1: That's sort of the Agel question. Yeah, but I mean
Speaker 1: I find that in astoundingly fascinating. Like there's places that
Speaker 1: are part of the Arthurian legend that do exist in
Speaker 1: real life. But whether or not they actually were a
Speaker 1: part of Arthur's life, if there was a real Arthur.
Speaker 1: I mean, each spot um generates awesome debate, you know.
Speaker 1: So for the anthropologist, the history major in me, I
Speaker 1: just I'm fascinated by the whole thing. Agreed, sir. So
Speaker 1: let's go over the basic legend of of Arthur. Uh
Speaker 1: killer king, legendary hero saved Britain when Britain needed saving, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because the Roman Empire had crumbled, um, and the Saxons
Speaker 1: were all over Britain, the Germanic tribes. Yeah, and he
Speaker 1: defeated them and brought great peace to the land and
Speaker 1: built a castle called it Camelot, gathered up nights together
Speaker 1: around around a round table which we'll get into, and
Speaker 1: to help bring peace to to the land. And and
Speaker 1: he did, and he did so very successfully. In in fact,
Speaker 1: in two thousand two, the BBC voted King Arthur as
Speaker 1: number fifty one and the poll of one greatest Britons,
Speaker 1: even though he might not even be a real dude,
Speaker 1: And the Britons are smart folks and they still voted
Speaker 1: him that they're pretty sharp. Yeah. So, um, those are
Speaker 1: the broad strokes. But depending on which version you're reading,
Speaker 1: it's going to be different. Did he pull a sword
Speaker 1: from a stone? Was it Excalibur? Did he get it
Speaker 1: from the lady in the water? Was his undoing, uh,
Speaker 1: Mordred or was it Guinevere and Lancelot? Yeah, it depends
Speaker 1: on which version you're reading. And we'll go over those versions, right,
Speaker 1: and we can you can kind of trace these back
Speaker 1: to you know, you can see layer after layer being added.
Speaker 1: So when you look at the Arthurian legend as we
Speaker 1: understand it now, you can kind of peel back layer
Speaker 1: by layer and get to the original stuff, um, which
Speaker 1: is pretty old. Indeed, like they think that, Um, we
Speaker 1: we'll get to that. Let's let's talk about the Arthur's story. Um,
Speaker 1: so you've got Arthur. He comes along at a time
Speaker 1: when Britain is in its greatest need. There were some
Speaker 1: great kings, possibly relatives of Arthur, like Uther Pendragon, his
Speaker 1: father supposedly would have been one of the rulers. Right,
Speaker 1: what you're smiling because you like that name. All I
Speaker 1: can think of is I am off a son of Pendragon. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you just say that anytime you want, man um so.
Speaker 1: But he arrives at a time when Britain is being
Speaker 1: overrun by the Saxons. It's being um ruled by the Saxon's.
Speaker 1: Like there's no British king on the throne. And there's
Speaker 1: a legend that comes up that there is a sword
Speaker 1: in a stone and only the rightful king, meaning only
Speaker 1: the line of Luther pen Dragon. I'm not gonna say again. Uh,
Speaker 1: We'll be able to remove the sword from the stone,
Speaker 1: and when that person comes, he will be dubbed the
Speaker 1: King of Kings and will restore um the the rightful
Speaker 1: um lineage to the British throne. Yeah and uh. In
Speaker 1: some stories, like I said, a young man, a young
Speaker 1: Arthur pulls the sword stored it's a sword from the
Speaker 1: Swan and uh, and other legends it does come from
Speaker 1: the lady in the lake. He rides out on a
Speaker 1: barge and the hand stretches up with the sword in it.
Speaker 1: All you sees the arm coming from the water, and
Speaker 1: he gets the sword that a way well, and and
Speaker 1: then I think a third a third way. He pulls
Speaker 1: the sword from the stone, proclaiming himself Arthur. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: everyone goes no, one's like he's the dude, right, Like
Speaker 1: we got one of our own back in power now.
Speaker 1: And then that sword breaks and that's when he gets
Speaker 1: ex caliber from the Lady of the Lake. It's right,
Speaker 1: the most powerful magic sword and all the land. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's a it's what you call a bitch and swords
Speaker 1: his pitch and sword Merlin and some stories comes around, uh,
Speaker 1: right about this time, and he appears on Arthur's a teen.
Speaker 1: Generally um associated with the Lady of the Lake. There
Speaker 1: and Avalon, they're both from the same neck of the woods.
Speaker 1: Avalon is a magical mystery place even outside of the
Speaker 1: Arthurian legend. As far as the Celts go, it was
Speaker 1: a it means apple land, yeah, um, and I guess
Speaker 1: apples were super magical to the Celts. But the Avalon
Speaker 1: itself is um almost in otherworldly afterlife. The kind of area,
Speaker 1: even though it's a physical place you can go to
Speaker 1: in Britain, still interesting. Uh. It's interesting that the apple
Speaker 1: is always been a uh strange fruit. Yeah, like I
Speaker 1: know it was probably wasn't an apple and eating but
Speaker 1: it's all in. I wonder Southern Baptists called it an apple? Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I wonder when what it was originally in like
Speaker 1: air Maic and when it was converted to apple. Where's
Speaker 1: the apple indigenous? I don't know or the or the
Speaker 1: apple and the what was the children's was it not
Speaker 1: snow white? Was snow white? Yeah? Yeah? With the poison apple?
Speaker 1: Poison apple again. I saw a video today that we've
Speaker 1: been eating apples wrong? Did you know that? I've seen that.
Speaker 1: I can't bring myself to eat an apple like that.
Speaker 1: There's a there's a middle spindle, a k A. The
Speaker 1: core that is not to be consumed. That it's not true.
Speaker 1: I won't do it. It's just too weird. But you
Speaker 1: can eat the core. There is no core. There is
Speaker 1: a core. I make it. Every I create the core,
Speaker 1: every I I show it. Just like a sculptor reveals
Speaker 1: the sculpture within a slab of stone, so too, do
Speaker 1: I reveal the core in an apple. Let me ask
Speaker 1: you this. If you cut the apple up into the
Speaker 1: eight pieces and get the seeds out you can just
Speaker 1: eat that's the whole apple. You have to shave off
Speaker 1: like inner part the core. For those of you don't know,
Speaker 1: there's a video of a dude eating an apple from
Speaker 1: the bottom end forward and he just eats the whole
Speaker 1: thing because he's a psychopath. Um. Okay, sorry to get
Speaker 1: sidetracked by the history of the apple. Well, no, I
Speaker 1: think you do raise a really really interesting point, Chuck.
Speaker 1: I wonder you know when the apple started getting a
Speaker 1: bad rep, when the apple stood in for other fruit. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think that's an excellent thing to look up. Okay,
Speaker 1: so let me know what you find. Alright. So Arthur,
Speaker 1: like I said, he builds Camelot, that's his castle once
Speaker 1: he restores peace. Yeah. Well, no, no, no, I think
Speaker 1: that was he went out and got all the nights
Speaker 1: to help him restore peace. Okay, So he built Camelot
Speaker 1: and into patient of restoring exactly and recruited nights. Uh
Speaker 1: for the round table. And we might as well go
Speaker 1: ahead and leak that the round table was supposedly round
Speaker 1: because we're all equals and there's no head of a
Speaker 1: round table. Makes sense, yeah, um, And it was either
Speaker 1: fashioned by Merlin yeah, or it was a gift from Guenevere,
Speaker 1: who we haven't gotten to yet, A wedding present from
Speaker 1: Guenevere's father, even though he got it from Arthur's father,
Speaker 1: Luther pen Dragon. Yeah, and her father was King Leo
Speaker 1: de Grants who I think that was. Patrick Stewart, got
Speaker 1: you an excalibur. Um. So the nights go out, they
Speaker 1: defeat all the outsiders there, peace reigns, and that it's
Speaker 1: why Camelot to this day has the connotation of and
Speaker 1: especially with the Kennedys, like this, you know, peaceful, idyllic situation. Right,
Speaker 1: that's Camelot. Although it was a place, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying, it sort of represents more than a place, right,
Speaker 1: represents the piece that he brought with these knights. Um.
Speaker 1: Then he meets Gwenevere, falls in love with this little hottie,
Speaker 1: and then depending on what story you read, there might
Speaker 1: have been an affair with Lancelot or Mordred, who was
Speaker 1: either his nephew or depending on what you read, or
Speaker 1: his son, uh, which technically he could be both because
Speaker 1: supposedly he had Mordred with his half sister. Morgan. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that makes sense, who is translated into Morgan le Fay
Speaker 1: who's like this kind of enchanting temptress, evil woman um
Speaker 1: who helps Mordred Um try to take over Camelot tries
Speaker 1: to take over the throne, and Arthur says, nay to you,
Speaker 1: we will do battle at a place called Camlan, That's right,
Speaker 1: and then dies. That's where Mordred is killed and Arthur
Speaker 1: is um wounded, and depending on the version of the story,
Speaker 1: Arthur's either mortally wounded or just kind of wounded, but
Speaker 1: either way, he gives his his sword ex Caliber to
Speaker 1: Bedevere and says, you need to return this to the
Speaker 1: lady in the lake. After kind of waffling because Bedevere
Speaker 1: is like, I could use ex Caliber. Uh, he finally
Speaker 1: gives he throws ex Caliber to the lake and this
Speaker 1: arm comes up and goes ching and like catches it
Speaker 1: and then goes back down and he's like, there was
Speaker 1: a lady of the lake. Yeah, that's the ex Caliber
Speaker 1: movie version. They followed that version, because I remember distinctly
Speaker 1: him chunking the sword out there in the arm coming up.
Speaker 1: That's cool. I think I have some vague mental memory
Speaker 1: of that as well. Um. And then Arthur's taken to
Speaker 1: Avalon to either die and be buried, which is um
Speaker 1: or he recuperates and hangs out there to come back
Speaker 1: to reign over Britain and it's next time of greatest need,
Speaker 1: which is why Arthur is frequently referred to. And there
Speaker 1: was a book titled the Once and Future King because
Speaker 1: he will return again when Britain needs him, which makes
Speaker 1: him like kind of the British superman. Yeah, before we
Speaker 1: go any further, my friend, I think it's a good
Speaker 1: time for a message break. Hey, now we're back. So
Speaker 1: that's the Uh, that's the basic legend. I mean, like
Speaker 1: we just basically condensed thousands of pages of different books
Speaker 1: and thousands, well not thousands, but hundreds of years of
Speaker 1: um folklore into a few minutes. But you get the
Speaker 1: gist of it. Sure you know the story. And if this,
Speaker 1: if this ignited your fancy and you're like, I want
Speaker 1: to know more, man, you've got a you could dedicate
Speaker 1: the rest of your life to researching and reading Arthurian
Speaker 1: legend because there's tons of it and and it's all
Speaker 1: like we said, um, it's a literary tradition, but it's
Speaker 1: rooted in an oral tradition among the Celts, the pagan
Speaker 1: Celts um but this literary tradition itself is really really
Speaker 1: old that they they first mention of Arthur is um
Speaker 1: from I think the fifth century, right, the fifth century
Speaker 1: Welsh poem, six sixth century Welsh poem. When you're off
Speaker 1: hundred years back then, um, especially with a man who
Speaker 1: may or may not have existed, but Arthur pops up
Speaker 1: in one line in this Welsh poem called the Gododin
Speaker 1: god Odin good Odin. Yeah, it's a great word, and
Speaker 1: this poem eulogizes the Welsh warriors, maybe Britain's oldest poem. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because the Celts would have started to have become Christianized
Speaker 1: around this time, hence things would have started to have
Speaker 1: been written down, so this poem would have popped up
Speaker 1: really right around that cusp between the end of purely
Speaker 1: Celtic take culture. Because the British Isles were the last
Speaker 1: stronghold of the Celts, which swept all the way to Asia,
Speaker 1: like they covered Europe, parts of North Africa. The Celts
Speaker 1: were everywhere, but um, it was the um the British
Speaker 1: Isles that were the last holdouts until about like the fifth, six,
Speaker 1: seven eighth centuries UM, when they became Christianized. Alright, so
Speaker 1: they're Christianized at this point. Yeah. By the time this
Speaker 1: poem came out, the very fact that there's a written poem,
Speaker 1: it shows you that the me their way in this
Speaker 1: area and the Celts are off just telling stories, looking
Speaker 1: their wounds and telling stories, still not writing stuff down
Speaker 1: there like you have you are you familiar with Missileton? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Do you know about knocking on wood? Look at you
Speaker 1: utilizing all your information? Uh so. Uh. Some other references
Speaker 1: in literature, um, the Historia Brittonum History of Britain eight
Speaker 1: hundred and the Analysis Cambria the Animals of Whales a
Speaker 1: few hundred years after that. They were they were basically
Speaker 1: history books, the main history books of Brittain and Wales
Speaker 1: and um. But they themselves were just compilations of of
Speaker 1: other books and can't be like factually verified. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: nevertheless they were used and Arthur was mentioned in both.
Speaker 1: Um the Arthur we know and love today. Uh. You
Speaker 1: can trace back to Jeffrey of Monmouth. He was a
Speaker 1: priest who wrote Historia Regum britagn The History of British
Speaker 1: Kings and the eleven hundreds. But he based his stuff
Speaker 1: on the history of Britton. Um, but it just became
Speaker 1: really popular, right, So like he kind of based it
Speaker 1: on the other thing. Well, I mean most some people
Speaker 1: even say you plagiarized, but it became so popular. He
Speaker 1: was kind of golden, right, and I think great. I
Speaker 1: think also he Um, I mean most histories are based
Speaker 1: on previous histories. Um, so that's that in and of itself,
Speaker 1: isn't a add thing. But yeah, I don't know what
Speaker 1: this article is implying that like he was that he
Speaker 1: stole work or he fabricated it. Well, he was accused
Speaker 1: of fabricating some of it, so so well either way.
Speaker 1: He gave the world the Arthurian legend. That's right, Like
Speaker 1: Arthur existed before this, like as we've seen. But he
Speaker 1: was the one that said, like, there's a great story here,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna bulk this up. Yeah, And so he
Speaker 1: started naming places, he started contemporizing things, like he took
Speaker 1: um this legend and put it into a context that
Speaker 1: the people who lived in his time would understand and
Speaker 1: be fascinated by. Yeah, and he introduced Christianity for the
Speaker 1: first time to the story. Um, the French got ahold
Speaker 1: of it, and then they're all about a good romance novel.
Speaker 1: So they sort of introduced the love elements or not introduced,
Speaker 1: but UH emphasize the love elements a little bit more. Yeah.
Speaker 1: About fifty years after Geoffrey of Monmouth UM made his
Speaker 1: history um Chrestian Detroit UH came up with some stories
Speaker 1: that added that romantic part and a lot like the
Speaker 1: I think the Grail stuff too. Oh yeah, yeah, he
Speaker 1: was the one who who came up with the romance
Speaker 1: between Lancelot and Grenevere and the Grail of search for
Speaker 1: the Grail, which wasn't a part of the story up
Speaker 1: until the twelfth century, and most of the stuff had
Speaker 1: been like history books and poems UM starting with the
Speaker 1: Vulgate cycle or pros lancelot as when you started getting
Speaker 1: these great prose stories and Christianity is woven in even more.
Speaker 1: And this is between twelve ten and twelve thirty, right,
Speaker 1: just to give you an idea of where we are.
Speaker 1: And they don't know if these stories were like maybe
Speaker 1: part of a popular literary trend at the time where
Speaker 1: a bunch of people writing them like chivalry was a
Speaker 1: big thing to write about, or if it was one
Speaker 1: author writing a series of stuff and they were not
Speaker 1: they're not attributed to any single author, but they're they're
Speaker 1: collected to get there was a body of work, the
Speaker 1: Vulgate cycle. Yeah, and those ones focus a little more
Speaker 1: on like Lancelot in the Chivalrous Nights and all that
Speaker 1: we have in the Grail to Um. Yeah with Galahad, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they said that, Um, Joseph of Arimathea, who was in
Speaker 1: the Bible, he was the one who gave Jesus his
Speaker 1: tomb after Jesus was crucified and brought back. And uh
Speaker 1: he said no, well he didn't say that, but they
Speaker 1: they said Joseph Mathea brought the Grail to Britain. Um.
Speaker 1: But then Galahad, Sir Lancelot's illegitimate son, was said in
Speaker 1: the Vulgate cycle that he discovered the Grail because he
Speaker 1: was pure, of course, yes, until he went to the
Speaker 1: castle Anthrax. Remember that scene and the pure and chased
Speaker 1: goes to the castle and there's all the ladies that
Speaker 1: are like tempting him that it's uh, Michael Palin is
Speaker 1: just like wide eyed man. Uh. And then the big
Speaker 1: one um that most of our modern stories are based
Speaker 1: on is Thomas Mallory's Le Morte Darthur The Death of Arthur,
Speaker 1: And I read this in college. Oh yeah, and it
Speaker 1: was tough. It was sort of like a bit of
Speaker 1: a modernized Middle English. Yeah, it wasn't quite Chaucer, wasn't
Speaker 1: that tough, Um. But it was still a tough read.
Speaker 1: And I remember thinking at the time, can I just
Speaker 1: watch Excalibur? And it turns out it could, because that
Speaker 1: was that movie was specifically based on the Death of Arthur. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so as you're you're kind of seeing like each UM,
Speaker 1: each new century, each new um, authors adding their own
Speaker 1: thing to it. Yeah, he didn't actually write it. I
Speaker 1: should say that he compiled the stories together. Okay, surely
Speaker 1: he cleaned them up and well, yeah, but he didn't
Speaker 1: he didn't create a new work, because he's known as
Speaker 1: it's known as a compilation. Well, he did add some
Speaker 1: new stories about some other nights, Sir Gareth and Sir Tris.
Speaker 1: Then UM and he he he also kind of took
Speaker 1: the um the focus off of the Celtic pagan mythology
Speaker 1: and really focused it onto the Christian mythology. UM and
Speaker 1: and at this point, the idea that this whole thing
Speaker 1: is based on Celtic ideals and and myths is lost
Speaker 1: largely to history. I mean, at the very least, it
Speaker 1: doesn't become nearly as a parent. Um. Was he the
Speaker 1: one that added the Lady in the Lake though? Oh no,
Speaker 1: that was the Vulgate cycle, um, which is supposing to
Speaker 1: me because I would think that would be ancient Celtic mythology.
Speaker 1: But that wasn't added until the thirteenth century. Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: The Lady in the Lake and the idea of Mordred
Speaker 1: as Arthur's son by his sister. You think those two
Speaker 1: would be real old No, no, no, it was a
Speaker 1: part of the preoccupation of the weirdos in the thirteenth century. Well,
Speaker 1: I think Mallory did add the after Guinevere and Lancelot
Speaker 1: are busted, they go their separate ways to become a
Speaker 1: nun and a monk, yeah, respectively. Right. Um. So after
Speaker 1: Mallory you have Alfred Lord Tennyson, um, who wrote the
Speaker 1: Idols of the King. Yeah, that creepy looking dude and
Speaker 1: uh great poet. Oh yeah, but scary looking and I
Speaker 1: love his name too, yeah. Um. And then T. H.
Speaker 1: White wrote the Ones in Future King and that was
Speaker 1: the basis of the Sword in the Stone. Yeah, little
Speaker 1: Disney Action. That was a good movie if I remember correctly,
Speaker 1: And Merlin was kind of like a cookie. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was weird right in that story. Yeah, And in
Speaker 1: the Sword and the Stone. I don't remember that one
Speaker 1: that much. Was it was that the animated huh Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: where he's like a young king Arthur pulls the sword
Speaker 1: from the stone. And I didn't see that. I must
Speaker 1: have seen it, but I was all about the Jungle Book.
Speaker 1: This is what came out about the same time. I know,
Speaker 1: but I was exact animators and everything. Yeah, you're like,
Speaker 1: I can't pay attention to this alright, to lend my
Speaker 1: fascination to all right, so we we should talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about the real um ties to real history
Speaker 1: and whether these people were real or these places are real.
Speaker 1: So let's get to that after this message break. Okay, buddy,
Speaker 1: So what's the deal? Was there a Camelot? Was there
Speaker 1: an Arthur? Were these nights real? Dudes? Um? Probably? Alright?
Speaker 1: So send it so well, So take Marlin for example, Okay,
Speaker 1: he seems probably the least likely to have existed because
Speaker 1: he is a magician, sorcerer, a magical wizard. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: a wizard that's that's a great word. Actually, is he
Speaker 1: a wizard or is he just a magician? So well,
Speaker 1: I mean, come on, the two are fairly interchangeable. You
Speaker 1: just wait, my friend, there will be some larger emailing.
Speaker 1: It is not nearly the same series. Let me explain
Speaker 1: to you the difference between a cleric and the major
Speaker 1: um so uh. He was apparently based on one or
Speaker 1: two people that really did exist, and both of them
Speaker 1: were holy men. They would have been druids, at least
Speaker 1: one of them would have been druids. Um he was.
Speaker 1: One was named Merdin wilt and another one was named
Speaker 1: Emirus Ldig. That's a tough one, w L E d
Speaker 1: I G. There's two vowels and both of those names combined, right,
Speaker 1: you know, it's just yeah, it's almost like Russian. It's
Speaker 1: tough to read. Um. And both of them lived in
Speaker 1: the late sixth century, and one was the first one, Merdin.
Speaker 1: He was this wild man who went into war and
Speaker 1: saw too much and like went cray easy and fled
Speaker 1: into the jungle. I've seen too much. Yeah, apparently suffered
Speaker 1: from some some sort of PTSD and went and fled
Speaker 1: into the jungle. While not the jungle because this is
Speaker 1: British Isles, but the woods will call them uh and
Speaker 1: lived as a wild man for many years um, and
Speaker 1: he was apparently a famous local like magic wild man.
Speaker 1: The other one, Emriss, was like a full on, straight
Speaker 1: up druid. He was like a prophet and advisor and
Speaker 1: he definitely lived. So they think that possibly um, one
Speaker 1: of them was Merlin or uh folklore combined the two
Speaker 1: together and made him Merlin. I think that's what most
Speaker 1: of the stuff is. Yeah, possibly based on real people.
Speaker 1: A dash of this and a dash of that, mix
Speaker 1: it up and you come up with a literary figure.
Speaker 1: That's just my take. Camelot Supposedly, if you read the
Speaker 1: Historia Regum Britannia UM, he wrote that it was Cornwall
Speaker 1: at Tintingel Castle, and they've actually found a stone there
Speaker 1: in the eighties nineteen eighties that an inscription that said
Speaker 1: a descendant of Arthur, father of a descendant of cole
Speaker 1: Um in Monmouth. Actually the writer of that history book
Speaker 1: UH names King cole As in Mary Old Soul. Was
Speaker 1: he that same King cole Um as one of Arthur's ancestors.
Speaker 1: But there's a little bit of a rub because that
Speaker 1: castle was built in the early eleven hundreds, so many
Speaker 1: hundreds of years later after Arthur was supposedly living. Right,
Speaker 1: and the author of this article accuses uh Geoffrey of
Speaker 1: basically using Tinto Jail Castle as a way to please
Speaker 1: his patron who had a cousin that lived there at
Speaker 1: the time. Um. But the some archaeological excavations have found
Speaker 1: that this tinted jail area was settled from at least
Speaker 1: three D and was definitely in full swing, was a
Speaker 1: trading post basically and a fortified castle around the time
Speaker 1: when Arthur would have been conceived. So it actually is
Speaker 1: archeologically possible that this was a place where he was born,
Speaker 1: at the very least, if there was a real Arthur
Speaker 1: and he was born in the time frame that we're
Speaker 1: talking about, Tinnanjiel Castle was settled and in full operation
Speaker 1: in that area. Really, yeah, so it wasn't built hundreds
Speaker 1: of years later there. The castle as it stands now
Speaker 1: was settlement, was settlement upon settlement, And as they've excavated
Speaker 1: down where they found that at that time, Yes, there's
Speaker 1: plenty of so that stone could in fact be real. Wow,
Speaker 1: all right, busted? Uh. Thomas Mallory said Camelot was Winchester Castle. Uh,
Speaker 1: And for many hundreds of years there was a wooden
Speaker 1: round table that hung on the wall with all the
Speaker 1: little names of the knights of the round table there. Um.
Speaker 1: But Winchester Castle was built in the eleventh century, and
Speaker 1: they carbon dated the table tot and said it was
Speaker 1: probably painted during the fift hundreds under King Henry the
Speaker 1: eight because everyone was way into chivalry in medieval history
Speaker 1: at that point. Are you're gonna bust that one? That one, No,
Speaker 1: that one makes sense, but that is busted. Unbust. I
Speaker 1: mean they the Cadbury Castle, the fort that's in Somerset's
Speaker 1: mentioned in here too, that one. If anything was Camelot,
Speaker 1: it would have been that place. Yeah, but it wouldn't
Speaker 1: have been Arthur's. It would have been a one of
Speaker 1: the rulers that basically handed over Britain to the Saxons,
Speaker 1: that Arthur had to come in and whose mess he
Speaker 1: had to unmake. Um. It would have been that rulers.
Speaker 1: And there's a sixteen ft thick um fort fortress made
Speaker 1: of timber and stone um that is apparently unique to
Speaker 1: this castle. That's from the fifth century um that was
Speaker 1: written about from that time frame from that period of time,
Speaker 1: was supposedly built around that period of time. So you
Speaker 1: have um documentary evidence in the literature, and then you
Speaker 1: also have the actual physical evidence of this castle that's
Speaker 1: built in the way that's just unique to it. Um
Speaker 1: that supposedly belonged to this guy that Arthur may or
Speaker 1: may not have come in and taken over if he
Speaker 1: if he were ruling in this area at the time,
Speaker 1: that would have been the castle that he would have
Speaker 1: taken over because there was heavily fortified and it was
Speaker 1: just like a prime castle in the area that he
Speaker 1: would have been in. UM. So if there was a
Speaker 1: camelot a castle that he ruled from, that probably would
Speaker 1: have been it. All right. So you're going, Josh Boates
Speaker 1: for Cadbury Castle in Somerset. Yes, okay, um avalon is
Speaker 1: supposedly Glastonbury where they have the music festival. Now, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I think they have a big music festival there. My
Speaker 1: TV tells me, um, and uh, here's the deal there.
Speaker 1: That was the Glastonbury Tour, which is a sort of
Speaker 1: it I guess for England. For that area is a mountain.
Speaker 1: It's like a hill. It's a little hill like the
Speaker 1: Englishman who went up the hill and came down a mountain.
Speaker 1: Um the Glastonbury Tour was had the ruins of St Michael's,
Speaker 1: which was an abbey built in the twelfth century which
Speaker 1: replaced an earlier abbey that was burned down. And while
Speaker 1: they were building the newer abbey, these monks said, you
Speaker 1: know what, we found graves containing bones. Look at the
Speaker 1: bones man and a woman and this is King Arthur
Speaker 1: because there's a cross there and it's subscribed in Latin
Speaker 1: and it says it's King Arthur and Guinevere. So there's
Speaker 1: your proof. Even though the cross doesn't exist anymore, the
Speaker 1: bones don't exist anymore. They did read the inscription that
Speaker 1: was supposedly copied verbatim from the monks, and they said
Speaker 1: some smart dudes said, no, that's twelveth century Latin, my friend,
Speaker 1: not sixth century Latin. Silly people, So I guess there's
Speaker 1: a difference than they knew. So that was quashed. Are
Speaker 1: you about to deebust that deep busting that sweet So
Speaker 1: Glastonbury Tour, This conical hill um used to be an island,
Speaker 1: and at the top of it is Glastonbury Abbey, which
Speaker 1: was built in the twelfth century, but was built on
Speaker 1: the ruins of an early one, so that thing actually
Speaker 1: did happen, It did burn down. Apparently in the nineteen
Speaker 1: eighties they excavated and found a pair of sixth century graves,
Speaker 1: stone line graves. The bones are gone, there's no markers
Speaker 1: or anything like that, but they would have been the
Speaker 1: kind of graves and they were dated to Arthur's era. Furthermore, yes, furthermore,
Speaker 1: the there was evidence that these graves were disturbed in
Speaker 1: the thirteenth century, in the twelve hundreds or is it
Speaker 1: the twelfth century, sorry that they were disturbed in the
Speaker 1: twelfth century. So there's evidence that these graves are from
Speaker 1: the sixth century and that these twelfth century monks did
Speaker 1: find them and open them up. So whether or not
Speaker 1: they were Arthur and Gwenevere, or if this cross ever
Speaker 1: existed and what it said is still remains to be proven.
Speaker 1: But I mean, it's very possible that these monks were
Speaker 1: just trying to drum up patronage to rebuild their abbey,
Speaker 1: so like, hey, we found Arthur, so they may have
Speaker 1: forged the cross, but it's still entirely possible that that
Speaker 1: was Arthur and Guenevere. Just because they beefed up the
Speaker 1: story with the story of a cross doesn't mean it
Speaker 1: wasn't truly their final resting place. Yeah, at the very least,
Speaker 1: they were a pair of sixth century graves there with bones.
Speaker 1: No bones. Oh well, where the bones go? I don't
Speaker 1: know if they moved him in the twelfth century or
Speaker 1: if they just dissolved. We were talking a while. Yeah, alright,
Speaker 1: so is that your vote? Yeah? All right? Or uh
Speaker 1: the Glastonbury tour all right? Which I want to go to?
Speaker 1: This all this makes me want to go to the
Speaker 1: English country so and just like find all this stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's pretty neat. Yeah. I like old things, and it's
Speaker 1: hard to get anything super old in this country, you know. Yeah, hundreds.
Speaker 1: Maybe if you go down to St. Augustine. Let's go
Speaker 1: to Roma, let's see some old stuff to have. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I have to eat. It is neat. It's kind of
Speaker 1: neat to stand there in the Colosseum and think, holy cow, Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is the oldest thing I've ever seen. That was
Speaker 1: the one that got me and Yumi was the Colosseum. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean were everywhere else We're like, yeah, this is
Speaker 1: pretty cool for something about the Colosseum. It was that
Speaker 1: was that was yeah, I was. I was pretty blown
Speaker 1: away to Yeah. And boy the people man good looking.
Speaker 1: The Romans they just all over Italy. The dudes, the chicks,
Speaker 1: they were all like models. Yeah, very stylish, very stylish.
Speaker 1: And cats everywhere where there. Yeah, street cats in Rome,
Speaker 1: they're known for it. I don't remember seeing too many kids.
Speaker 1: Oh you saw some cats. Oh don't they live in
Speaker 1: like all of the ruins and everything. Um, they're they're everywhere. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I like the Trevy Fountain there. That was something else
Speaker 1: that one kind of took my breath away. We should
Speaker 1: start a travel show. I think we just did. Uh
Speaker 1: And finally, um, maybe some of these nights were real dudes.
Speaker 1: Sir bedevere Um he was one of the earliest knights
Speaker 1: to appear in the Arthurian legends and one of his
Speaker 1: right hand dudes Um. He has appeared in other writings,
Speaker 1: historical writings that have nothing to do with the Artherian
Speaker 1: legend exactly, and he was known as uh bed were
Speaker 1: Bedroo Dant member of the Royal House of Findhu, which
Speaker 1: rose to power in Wales in the sixth century, and
Speaker 1: then Sir Kay was also possibly a real dude. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Both of them appear in a Welsh collection of warrior
Speaker 1: poems called the Mabinogion Mabinah John take your pick. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not Welsh, You're not Welsh, so either one we
Speaker 1: get craped for not pronouncing things right. But this this
Speaker 1: stuff is tough. Oh yeah, I mean you've got like
Speaker 1: thirteen letters in one vowel. It's like, what do you
Speaker 1: do with that? You know? And I mean I'm looking
Speaker 1: at the alphabet that I recognize. My brain just won't
Speaker 1: put it together. Uh huh agreed, and finally Arthur himself, Um,
Speaker 1: my vote is on a compilation of real people. Like
Speaker 1: I said earlier, Some folks say he might have been
Speaker 1: a Roman leader named Lucius Artorius Castus, or maybe a
Speaker 1: Roman name Aurelius Ambrosius. See I saw that Aurelius Ambrotius
Speaker 1: was His uncle was Luther Pendragon's brother, and Uther and
Speaker 1: Aurelius had to seize power to start to restore um
Speaker 1: their lineage, and Arthur followed after that. Okay, see, well,
Speaker 1: I guess it depends on who you're reading, you know. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Some folks say he was a British historian named Allen
Speaker 1: wins Wilson says he was a Welsh king uh arthwist
Speaker 1: in the seventh century. I think everyone wants to claim
Speaker 1: a piece of it. I think that's what's going on here,
Speaker 1: you know. I think there's a no he was this
Speaker 1: Welsh king, or no he was this Roman king, when
Speaker 1: I think he might have been all of them. Well,
Speaker 1: the idea that he was sent by the pope to
Speaker 1: basically restore order or take the British Isles back from
Speaker 1: the Saxons, definitely, um is like credence. By the idea
Speaker 1: that he kind of comes out of nowhere and like
Speaker 1: pulls the sword from the stone is like I'm arrived,
Speaker 1: I'm the king of kings now um. So the idea
Speaker 1: that he came from somewhere else is I mean that
Speaker 1: that would suggest that he could have possibly been some
Speaker 1: Roman commander. And there were Roman commanders who did come
Speaker 1: to Britain and fight the sex and successfully was one
Speaker 1: name Arthur. Yeah, one was named notorious. Well there you
Speaker 1: have it. Uh And then some people say that Arthur
Speaker 1: wasn't a name but a title art and which in
Speaker 1: Latin means bear. And if that's the case, it could
Speaker 1: just be like you know, could be anybody, could be
Speaker 1: short for Arthur, could be bear. So why does the
Speaker 1: story persist? Because it's got romance, it's got chivalry, it's
Speaker 1: got all the classic elements of drama, uh in literature
Speaker 1: and fiction. So there you have it, and plus Monty
Speaker 1: Python's take on it doesn't hurt in perpetuating everything? What
Speaker 1: kind of a man can summon fire without flint or
Speaker 1: tinder man? You know that movie Inside now Atten. I
Speaker 1: watched it a lot at one point in my life.
Speaker 1: I think that's my favorite part of the movie. The
Speaker 1: um none shall pass when they have to pass the
Speaker 1: the guy that spits tells them about the rabbit. I
Speaker 1: remember the nun shall I don't remember the spinning. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when he when he when he's talking, he's got a
Speaker 1: lisp and he's he's spitting all over everybody. You got
Speaker 1: anything else? I got nothing else? All right? If you
Speaker 1: want to learn more about King Arthur, you can type
Speaker 1: in king Arthur in the search bar. We also recommend
Speaker 1: you go just look up stuff about King Arthur. There's
Speaker 1: plenty of stuff out there. It's fascinating. Um you let's see,
Speaker 1: I said search bar, right, you did, sir? Okay, well,
Speaker 1: then that means it's time for listening now. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: call this tribute to my father for Megan, Josh, Chuck,
Speaker 1: and Jerry wanted to write to tell you thank you
Speaker 1: mentally for the show. My dad, Howard passed away nearly
Speaker 1: a year ago, and while I don't think he listened
Speaker 1: before he passed, I think he would have really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1: He was a tinkerer and loved learning new things. In fact,
Speaker 1: when I was younger and visited him during the summers,
Speaker 1: i'd be alone most days at his apartment while he worked,
Speaker 1: and he would encourage me to search random things on
Speaker 1: the Internet and read about them to learn something new.
Speaker 1: He would even leave me lists like the planet Jupiter,
Speaker 1: the state of Wyoming, or the year eight. I thought
Speaker 1: at the time it was pretty silly and only did
Speaker 1: it a few times, But now, as an adult, I've
Speaker 1: since found your podcast a few months ago, and I
Speaker 1: find it really fascinating and it reminds me of my
Speaker 1: dad and has been really helpful to me when I
Speaker 1: get down about him being gone. Makes me happy to
Speaker 1: know that he would probably think it's awesome that I
Speaker 1: spend my days learning about things now, so Megan from Plano, Texas,
Speaker 1: thank you for that, and uh, in memory of your father, Howard.
Speaker 1: I think he would like the show too. That's pretty cool.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry he's not around to hear it. No, but
Speaker 1: I mean we're carrying on his legacy exactly. Nice. So
Speaker 1: I guess we need to do a show on the
Speaker 1: year or the state of Wyoming. Um, never not Wyoming. Uh.
Speaker 1: If you thanks a lot for that, Megan, that was
Speaker 1: nice of you to share that. Um. If you want
Speaker 1: to get in touch with me and Chuck to tell
Speaker 1: us anything you like, you can tweet to us at
Speaker 1: s y SK podcast you can do and us on
Speaker 1: Facebook dot com, slash Stuff you Should Know. You can
Speaker 1: send us an email to Stuff Podcast at Discovery dot com,
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