http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-north-west-wales-38330272
Sigh,
when will people get tired of coming up with these things.....
I thought it was near Arbela?
(wanders off singing "We dine well here in GauGamelot, We eat ham and jam and camel a lot...")
Hebden Bridge has a lot in common with places like Tintagel and Glastonbury. Strange inhabitants, craft shops, superfoods. Coincidence? I think not.
Quote from: Erpingham on December 19, 2016, 02:52:46 PM
Hebden Bridge has a lot in common with places like Tintagel and Glastonbury. Strange inhabitants, craft shops, superfoods. Coincidence? I think not.
;D
stands to reason dunnit
but 'they' don't want you to know about it
because
Duncan
Maybe you are on to something. Alexander and Gordion Knot - maybe it was Excaliber (would certainly fit with the legends). Knights heading off to the mysterious East searching for the Holy Grail. Eumenes as Merlin...
Time to redo the Sub-Roman list?
Regards
Tim
there are a lot of people hawking their own version of what may or may not have happened between 200AD and 700AD (this is to allow for all the Arthurs ::) ) .
Good luck to them
They're wrong as Arthur was my great (to the power 50) grandfather and lived just down the road from me and we kept the sword (its up in my attic)
:P
Ah but was he Cornish Roman, Welsh Roman, V(an)illa Roman or some Frankish Jonny-come-lately 3rd/4th Century raider mercenary who became Comes Britanniarum or comes littoris Saxonici per Britanniam
Oh and I forgot 'hetairoi' as Knights of the Round Table...
Quote"In Roman times, Slack was home to a fort called Camulodunum, which means "the fort of the god Camul".
Over the years, well-recognised linguistic processes would have reduced Camulodunum to Camelot."
Not sure if anyone noticed, but there is another place called Camulodunum and it just happens to be the traditional capital of Roman Britain ...
Quote from: Tim on December 19, 2016, 07:46:01 PM
Duncan
Maybe you are on to something. Alexander and Gordion Knot - maybe it was Excaliber (would certainly fit with the legends). Knights heading off to the mysterious East searching for the Holy Grail. Eumenes as Merlin...
Or the seer Aristander ...
We just used to call him 'Duck'
on a semi serious note, having spent a few aimless hours looking at various word/name/place connections with a possible Arthur or a possible Camlan or a possible Camelot etc etc ad infinitum, ad nauseum......its a fool's errand. With a jaundiced eye you can make a lot of things 'fit' with a certain interpretation (depending on your own personal interpretation mind you)
Quote from: Holly on December 19, 2016, 07:57:08 PM
They're wrong as Arthur was my great (to the power 50) grandfather and lived just down the road from me and we kept the sword (its up in my attic)
Ah, Anthony Burgess'
Any Old Iron? The old iron in that, IIRC, was the Sword of Mars carried by Attila, subsequently passed on to Arthur, and then indeed handed down through a Welsh family...
Quote from: Holly on December 19, 2016, 08:57:52 PM
on a semi serious note, having spent a few aimless hours looking at various word/name/place connections with a possible Arthur or a possible Camlan or a possible Camelot etc etc ad infinitum, ad nauseum......its a fool's errand.
The interesting thing about Camulodunum (the one in Essex) is that one does not really need to look - it is there, and everything just falls into place: administrative capital, equine resources, proximity of Chelmsford at the point where the Chelmer ceases to be navigable as a natural rendezvous point for a usurper and his continental Saxon allies. Deducing Camelot and Camlann from the names is hardly even necessary - that is really just icing on the cake.
One of the lessons of historical research is
never trust just names - and never trust anyone whose research hangs on names only, or for that matter just on interpretations or definitions of words. Look for context, events, actions - and then, if the names also work out (they usually do), that is a bonus.
The problem with Camoludunum as a literal Camelot is that Camelot enters the written record in the 12th Century. The name Camoludunum hadn't been used for Colchester for centuries by then, so is unlikely to be familiar to a French romance writer as a real place. He may have read the name of the capital of Britannia in Latin literature and decided that it was suitable as Arthur's capital but it is unlikely he was referring to a known location.
Quote from: Erpingham on December 20, 2016, 11:37:55 AM
The problem with Camoludunum as a literal Camelot is that Camelot enters the written record in the 12th Century. The name Camoludunum hadn't been used for Colchester for centuries by then, so is unlikely to be familiar to a French romance writer as a real place. He may have read the name of the capital of Britannia in Latin literature and decided that it was suitable as Arthur's capital but it is unlikely he was referring to a known location.
I am quite sure he was
not referring it to a known location: he would have picked up 'Camelot' from a trail of Gaelic and Grail literature, and would have failed to make any down-to-earth connection with Colchester itself. Had he actually worked out where it was, we would not currently be paying any attention to Welsh and Cornish locations with questionable place-names. ;)
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on December 20, 2016, 12:00:14 PM
Quote from: Erpingham on December 20, 2016, 11:37:55 AM
The problem with Camoludunum as a literal Camelot is that Camelot enters the written record in the 12th Century. The name Camoludunum hadn't been used for Colchester for centuries by then, so is unlikely to be familiar to a French romance writer as a real place. He may have read the name of the capital of Britannia in Latin literature and decided that it was suitable as Arthur's capital but it is unlikely he was referring to a known location.
I am quite sure he was not referring it to a known location: he would have picked up 'Camelot' from a trail of Gaelic and Grail literature...
Hang on - if "Camelot enters the written record in the 12th Century" (as "Camaalot" in Chrétien de Troyes) then
what "trail of Gaelic and Grail literature" is there for him to get the name from?
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on December 20, 2016, 12:00:14 PM
I am quite sure he was not referring it to a known location: he would have picked up 'Camelot' from a trail of Gaelic and Grail literature, and would have failed to make any down-to-earth connection with Colchester itself. Had he actually worked out where it was, we would not currently be paying any attention to Welsh and Cornish locations with questionable place-names. ;)
There is no Gaelic literature on Arthur/Camelot. Zero. Nada. Zip.
As to the other Arthurian sources, I suggest reading Guy Halsall's
Worlds of Arthur.
Cheers
Mick
read that Mick...not bad
of course with things like this we are assuming there IS a Camelot.....
Quote from: Mick Hession on December 20, 2016, 04:13:03 PM
There is no Gaelic literature on Arthur/Camelot. Zero. Nada. Zip.
Umm .. yes, sorry. For 'Gaelic literature' please read 'Celtic tradition', written or otherwise.
Quote from: Holly on December 20, 2016, 07:03:03 PM
of course with things like this we are assuming there IS a Camelot.....
Or was ...
It looks (at least to me) as if 'Sub-Roman Britain' saw a local leader who became a national leader, who went down to posterity by the name of Arthur, and as knowledge of his actual deeds faded but the general impression of his prowess remained he became the subject of an increasing number of perhaps increasingly imaginative bardic tales as the Anglo-Saxons conquered more and more of England. Tracking back from such substance as was captured by Geoffrey of Monmouth etc. - and we are talking about a net with a fairly wide mesh and an unknown number of holes - it is possible to locate his 'Camelot' geographically by tracing Arthur's final campaign. (It is also possible to use the same method to get an idea of where Mons Badonicus really was, but that is another story - funnily enough, the name works there, too.)
Arthur's final campaign points towards Chelmsford as the site of the final battle ('Camlann') and hence to Colchester as the capital. Colchester's features I have already touched upon.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on December 20, 2016, 08:00:12 PM
Quote from: Mick Hession on December 20, 2016, 04:13:03 PM
There is no Gaelic literature on Arthur/Camelot. Zero. Nada. Zip.
Umm .. yes, sorry. For 'Gaelic literature' please read 'Celtic tradition', written or otherwise.
Quote from: Holly on December 20, 2016, 07:03:03 PM
of course with things like this we are assuming there IS a Camelot.....
Or was ...
It looks (at least to me) as if 'Sub-Roman Britain' saw a local leader who became a national leader, who went down to posterity by the name of Arthur, and as knowledge of his actual deeds faded but the general impression of his prowess remained he became the subject of an increasing number of perhaps increasingly imaginative bardic tales as the Anglo-Saxons conquered more and more of England. Tracking back from such substance as was captured by Geoffrey of Monmouth etc. - and we are talking about a net with a fairly wide mesh and an unknown number of holes - it is possible to locate his 'Camelot' geographically by tracing Arthur's final campaign. (It is also possible to use the same method to get an idea of where Mons Badonicus really was, but that is another story - funnily enough, the name works there, too.)
Arthur's final campaign points towards Chelmsford as the site of the final battle ('Camlann') and hence to Colchester as the capital. Colchester's features I have already touched upon.
blimey...been wasting my time all these years Patrick with Arthuriana lol
Do you know how many Camlan(n)s there are Britain? ;D
I think that the search for Camelot is like the search for the perfect set of wargaming rules. An exercise in futility, driven by hope and doomed to disappointment. Yet, we search onward.
Quote from: Chuck the Grey on December 21, 2016, 03:07:23 AM
I think that the search for Camelot is like the search for the perfect set of wargaming rules. An exercise in futility, driven by hope and doomed to disappointment. Yet, we search onward.
I am inclined to agree Chuck.
I have been reduced to the holistic approach no matter how enticing individual bits of info appear, for example......
where I live there is a town called Bassaleg which is the crossing point of the rather bendy river Ebbw (nearby town Glynebwy or Ebbw Vale) on the route of the Roman road from Caerleon and has a couple of hill forts one of which is called Graig y Saeson and a Maes Arthur nearby. Within a stones throw is an old ferry crossing from a Roman signal station across to another Roman road junction that leads to Bath
I have just mentioned about half a dozen of the supposed Arthurian battle sites within a few miles of each other. Means nothing although very interesting!
Might I suggest that there are three stories here:
Firstly there is the story of the Anglo Saxon and Irish invasion and conquest of Britain...well large areas of it. In that story there is a period where the Britons fight successfully, pin the invaders back and create a pause of half a century. There is then an advance by the Saxons which changes the balance of power in their favour to the extent that they will eventually take England.
Secondly there is a legend of Arthur and/or a British leader of the time who fights battles that are probably associated with the successful period for the British.
Thirdly there is a whole structure of legend and romance that uses Arthur as a base, but draws on classical history, Sarmatian legend, Celtic bardic poetry etc and has very tenuous links with actual history.
One huge problem with the Arthur myth is that the story only really gets some substance some 300 years after his floruit. Arthur believers, and especially those in rather lightweight TV programmes, have a distinct tendency to join the mediaeval romance to the ninth century story, as though Nennius was writing as an almost contemporary source, to the proposed battle sites. So Arthur gains a degree of support, as though Nennius was describing current events.
The map of Britain in Arthurian times is uncertain, particularly in Mercia. Archaeology is gradually filling the gaps, but we don't really know what areas had already gone , which would be a considerable help as it is lijely that Arthurian battles , if they occurred, were on frontiers, or borders. So, if one believed in Arthur and tied his actions to the pushback of the Britons (which has the advantage of tying his fame to an heroic and winning period for them) we should expect to find actions against the kniwn Anglo Saxon core sites and their invasion routes that are aimed at the British states. That is to say we should see some strategic sense in the battles. We should also expect strategic sense to correlate with Arthur's base of operations and with his final battle against British 'rebels'. Of course, if Arthur was just a local hero somewhere who got grafted on to the story of the fightback then that would not help us.
Plumping for Arthur being a leader of the British Reconquista would cause us to doubt Colchester and Chelmsford as sites as they are so far forward, being right on the East coast. More likely that he is based in the area of the Severn , say Viroconium or further up in Chester. A site in the SW such as Cadbury or on the Borders would be rather peripheral to where the action of a fight back would have been.
nice summary Roy, thanks :)
my own particular take is that there are 2 definitive phases with a later sub phase tag on
- mid 5th Century with Ambrosius Aurelianus performing the first round of battles....very possibly as a Dux/warleader.
- early to mid 6th Century with a proper Brythonic warband leader in the role of guerilla fighter trying to stem the tide of advance from now established multi-generation English/mixed race settlements (with reinforcements from the continent)
- a sub phase in the 7th Century where we have a possible 'Arthur' (ap Meurig) operating in the contested border lands of South and Mid Wales
The later legends probably (for me) scoop up the main 2 and possibly the third phases and role them into one person. If you read the sources there are a lot of muddled histories in them and so there is no reason to not think that this happens with the Arthur story and character
Dave, I agree there is a substantial chance of stories getting 'rolled up' as you say because its in the nature of bardic transmission that the bard takes a story line from one tale and adds it it in to a new composition. I doubt audiences in the early middle ages worried too much about plagiarism and copyright. There is, for example a story in the life of Robert Guiscard in which someone allegedly dies and the body is taken into a town for burial, he is not dead and under the 'corpse' is a pile of swords. They oass the walls, the cadaver jumps ip , the swords are handed out, the gate seized. I am pretty sure tge story is also told of Harold Hardrada, by Snorre. These are crafty, fierce warriors and perhaps the one necessity of the story is that it fits what they would have done. If Arthur is a great war leader then appending the battles of others to his list is likely no great problem, esoecially centuries after the event.
R
absolutely Roy.
I have invested a lot of time into Arthuriana and come up with smoke and mirrors with regards to a definitive history. Like I said, I look to the holistic appraisal of the facts (few as there are) and am content to 'allow' some allegorical and/or story telling 'info' to colour the fringes of the basic core. To do otherwise is to become Merlin (if he exists) and go mad :)
PS the heap of corpses story (Im not dead!) is also attributed to Harold in one version
Assuming we had a British leader who not only halted the tide of Saxon conquest in the 5th-6th century AD (once the cities' final appeal to Rome had gone unanswered) but managed to roll it back and make himself master of the island before it all ended in tears and civil war with his would-be successor, Colchester would be the ideal capital for him
once he became established, no matter where he may have started from (which may have been the Welsh border, York, the West Country or anywhere).
QuoteThe map of Britain in Arthurian times is uncertain, particularly in Mercia. Archaeology is gradually filling the gaps, but we don't really know what areas had already gone , which would be a considerable help as it is likely that Arthurian battles , if they occurred, were on frontiers, or borders.
Not necessarily: they could just as well have occurred within heartlands. While it is in theory desirable to meet the foe at the border to preserve one's lands from devastation, a major incursion, particularly by sea, might not allow one to concentrate in time or place and hence one would fight where one happened to have an advantageous position. Still, I think Roy's approach is generally along the right track: look for actions to correlate rather than just relying on names.
QuoteDo you know how many Camlan(n)s there are Britain? ;D
More than enough to amuse generations of would-be amateur philologists. However there is only one at a point where a major river has a ford on the route from London and the south-east to the then-capital and at that point ceases to be navigable. Chelmsford is the ideal place for Mordred to rendezvous with his Saxon allies to block Arthur's army returning from the continent and moving on Colchester. It fits like a glove once the elements are identified, without any forcing.
Has anyone had any success finding Mons Badonicus? (Hints: 1) it is
Badonicus not
Badonus; 2) Arthur was campaigning in Scotland at the time.)
On the general subject of legends, they do tend to be based on truth even if the base has been stretched. Opening the pages of the Greek Alexander Romance, for example we find that Alexander and Porus engaged in battle for a fortnight without either gaining an advantage. With our trusty copy of Arrian to hand, we can tell that someone has over-egged the pudding until it hatched and went 'cuckoo'. However it does rest on a basis of truth: the
pre-battle manoeuvrings that resulted in Alexander successfully crossing the river
did go on for the better part of a fortnight. The trick is to develop a feel about what to look for.
Medieval Romance authors took stories and embroidered them. If we look at some of the stories around Charlemagne's knights, we can see a similar process to that of Arthur. The major advantage we have with Charlemagne is we know he was real and we can see where the echos of reality occur. To suggest we know where Arthur was campaigning at a particular time (e.g. in Scotland) when we don't know whether he existed and, if he did, when is a little futile.
assuming there was a battle of Camlann Patrick ;)
Its first mentioned in the Annals Cambriae some 5 centuries after the events so may or may not be a real battle and it may or may not be the real name if it was :)
No smoke without fire as they say but its a bit flimsy
Maybe no smoke without mirrors, Dave.
If the putative Arthur did drive the Saxons back he did not extirpate them from their bases. It looks a though the victory was not in any way complete. Some of their settlement areas such as Dorchester are well to the West. That makes Colchester rather out on a limb. Viroconium, on the other hand has the advantage that there is large scale new building there at the appropriate time and it is strategically sensible because Wales protects it to the rear and it is sufficiently far away inland to be safe from Irish sea raids.
As to Badon, I would vote for Baydon in Wiltshire. It commands two Roman roads and the Ridgeway and is on the same expansion route that is resumed when the Saxons push on to Dyrrham later and cut Devon off from Wales.
Roy
my own 2 penneth worth is that we can sometime forget the spatial relationship of groupings to one another. There was no linear combat zone in my opinion. Foederati were placed in pockets all around the isles (the old Roman provinces that is) including Irish as well as Saxon/Angles/Germanics. Well certainly for the early (1st) phase of fighting. Also goes partway to explaining why sometimes we appear to have 'celtic' sounding leaders in charge of 'saxon' groupings/warbands
OK, a major weakness of Colchester as a seat for Arthur is the very poor archaelogy of the place in the late fift and early sixth century. Viroconium, however has large scale upmarket building.
Roy
Quote from: aligern on December 21, 2016, 04:02:51 PM
As to Badon, I would vote for Baydon in Wiltshire. It commands two Roman roads and the Ridgeway and is on the same expansion route that is resumed when the Saxons push on to Dyrrham later and cut Devon off from Wales.
But it is not Mons
Badonus but Mons
Badonicus.
Further hint: Mons Graupius. No, that was not the location of the battle, but consider how Latin authors flagged that particular battle as a mountain in the Grampians without finessing any closer than that. Any area in Scotland spring to mind?
Quote from: Erpingham on December 21, 2016, 11:23:56 AM
The major advantage we have with Charlemagne is we know he was real and we can see where the echos of reality occur. To suggest we know where Arthur was campaigning at a particular time (e.g. in Scotland) when we don't know whether he existed and, if he did, when is a little futile.
Not at all: Geoffrey of Monmouth has a temporal and geographical sequence for Arthur's campaign. If we pretend it never happened, fine, end of story, no point reading the books or discussing the subject. If on the other hand we are interested to find out where our putative Arthur would have fought such a battle at such a time, we follow Geoffrey's campaign account. It contains one massive anomaly: part-way through the campaign in Scotland Arthur breaks off and dashes for the West Country to fight at 'Mons Badonicus'. Then, that battle over, he resumes exactly where he left off in Scotland.
My thinking: assume this odd geographical leap is a bardic error because someone insists on having Mons Badonicus (and various opther Arthuriana) in the West Country. Ditto when the Camlann campaign swerves from an advance from Kent to London to north of the Thames to another sudden leap down to Cornwall. Assume instead the campaign continued in the same theatre and what do we get? We get Camelot/Camulodunum/Colchester and Camlann/Chelmsford in the relationship we would expect, the latter just happening to be an ideal rendezvous for Mordred and his Saxons as well as an excellent blocking position to cover Colchester.
Getting back to Mons Badonicus, campaign continuity leads us to look in Scotland, a little north of centre. And there is one region of Scotland whose name just leaps out at us. Granted it was first recorded in the 13th century AD, but it did not spring into being at that time.
Quote from: aligern on December 21, 2016, 07:50:21 PM
OK, a major weakness of Colchester as a seat for Arthur is the very poor archaelogy of the place in the late fift and early sixth century. Viroconium, however has large scale upmarket building.
From the Camulos (http://www.camulos.com/history/history.htm) site:
"This was the age of Arthur, King of the Britons, hero of folklore, whose stronghold was CAMELOT, a variation on CAMULODUNUM. The COLONIA built by the Romans was a natural safe base, with its impressive defensive wall, 6 metres high with ditches to increase their effectiveness. Arthur's base would have been the temple and its perimeter walls, later to be enhanced by the Normans."
From the Time Travel Britain (http://www.timetravel-britain.com/articles/stones/wroxeter.shtml) site:
"At this point, the fortunes of Viroconium changed again. The basilica and bath house had been used as a grain store, but in the early 5th Century the basilica was tidied up, and a substantial new hall together with a number of barns and other buildings constructed within the old Roman city. It is not known who instigated this work, nor why, but given the time period and the close proximity of the site to Wales, it has been suggested -- with some supporting evidence -- that this site might have formed King Arthur's main base during his campaigns."
Inference: as Arthur is recorded as governing much of the country, he probably had several 'bases' of which Viroconium/Uricon/Wroxeter was one, but only the one capital - Camulodunum.
Camelot as an entity is first mentioned by Chretien de Troyes not Gildas, not Nennius (or the posse of monks) not Bede etc. There is no factual basis for there being a 'Camelot'
Again looking at it holistically I prefer to review potential bases for any war leader who held sway over large tracts of territory. For reasons mentioned, hanging onto specific words or place names can drive you down the rabbits hole :)
Quote from: Holly on December 22, 2016, 06:49:16 AM
Camelot as an entity is first mentioned by Chretien de Troyes not Gildas, not Nennius (or the posse of monks) not Bede etc. There is no factual basis for there being a 'Camelot'
And when first mentioned, by Chrétien, "Camaalot" is
not Arthur's capital - his main court is at Caerleon. The importance of Camelot is later embroidery by Geoffrey.
Quote
Getting back to Mons Badonicus, campaign continuity leads us to look in Scotland, a little north of centre. And there is one region of Scotland whose name just leaps out at us.
Why so coy? Usual suspects for a Scottish Badon appear to be Badandun Hill in Angus or Bowden Hill near Linlithgow. But I'm guessing Badenoch as in Badenoch and Strathspey? The capital of which is Kingussie - which is clearly Scottish for 'our King', i.e. Arthur. QED!
Even the name Arthur is a compass for distraction.
Still I rather think we have many discussion point in this thread for exploration :)
QuoteNot at all: Geoffrey of Monmouth has a temporal and geographical sequence for Arthur's campaign.
I assume you believe that Geoffrey's "old book" was a work contemporary with Gildas or Bede, which gave these campaign details which Geoffrey then reset for a modern audience? Rather than trying to put the scraps of information he had collected into a form that would do due honour to a legendary hero?
While happy to accept there was a historical prototype for Arthur, who became a legendary hero to later British peoples, I think back projecting "facts" held in medieval stories about him is historically dubious.
Likewise, while I appreciate Roy and Dave descriptions of possible contexts in which Arthur could have operated, we can't make certain claims about "Arthur was based here" about anywhere. We can't be sure that the real Arthur belonged to a political entity that covered the whole of historic Britannia - in fact as Britannia was split even in Roman times, it seems more plausible he belonged to a smaller political entity somewhere within the old Britannia, or even beyond in Strathclyde or the Scottish lowlands.
Quote from: Erpingham on December 22, 2016, 10:19:58 AM
QuoteNot at all: Geoffrey of Monmouth has a temporal and geographical sequence for Arthur's campaign.
I assume you believe that Geoffrey's "old book" was a work contemporary with Gildas or Bede, which gave these campaign details which Geoffrey then reset for a modern audience? Rather than trying to put the scraps of information he had collected into a form that would do due honour to a legendary hero?
While happy to accept there was a historical prototype for Arthur, who became a legendary hero to later British peoples, I think back projecting "facts" held in medieval stories about him is historically dubious.
Likewise, while I appreciate Roy and Dave descriptions of possible contexts in which Arthur could have operated, we can't make certain claims about "Arthur was based here" about anywhere. We can't be sure that the real Arthur belonged to a political entity that covered the whole of historic Britannia - in fact as Britannia was split even in Roman times, it seems more plausible he belonged to a smaller political entity somewhere within the old Britannia, or even beyond in Strathclyde or the Scottish lowlands.
assuming there was an Arthur.
Still most likely is that there were several people at several different points in several locations that all got swept up into a single entity whose title/name may have been Arthur
:)
enfuriating isnt it? ;D
From Patrick:
'Inference: as Arthur is recorded as governing much of the country, he probably had several 'bases' of which..... '
But is there a record of Arthur governing much of the country? One interpretation of his legend is that he is not the ruler of any state, but a war leader who perhaps deploys the forces of several British states and thus has the numbers to defeat the Saxons. Such an Arthur might have a base, but no capital and given the civitas nature of the British at the time it is quite possible that only a leader who was not a prince of one state could overcome their jealousies and create an unified force. It is rather like Vortigern who had a position above state leadership, as well as leading a particular entity.
The weakness of the case for Camulodunum is that there is not much archaeology of the period there. That a place has walls and a ruined temple is not enough if it is not occupied or if the archaeology of the period is Saxon.
The most suppirtable 'fact' about Arthur is that a victory penned the Saxons back for 50 years. That is extremely unlijely to be in modern Scotland, because the effects would be local only. The most likely site of a Badonicus victory is the line of advance that the Saxons took up when the 50 year hiatus was over and that favours a Baydon site . There the Saxons would have been attempting to folliw the path they later followed to Dyrrham and it would have been a good line for those of Sussex, Kent and Anglia to coalesce on as they advanced. Take the hillfort and the Severn valley is open to you. Stop the Saxons there and they fall vack disunited.
Roy
Quote from: RichT on December 22, 2016, 09:14:32 AM
Quote
Getting back to Mons Badonicus, campaign continuity leads us to look in Scotland, a little north of centre. And there is one region of Scotland whose name just leaps out at us.
Why so coy? Usual suspects for a Scottish Badon appear to be Badandun Hill in Angus or Bowden Hill near Linlithgow. But I'm guessing Badenoch as in Badenoch and Strathspey?
Precisely, and well spotted. It is in the right place for Geoffrey of Monmouth's interrupted campaign, and Badonicus and Badenoch are so phonetically similar (cf. Graupius and Grampian) that 'Mons Badonicus' fits with almost suspicious ease.
Quote from: Holly on December 22, 2016, 06:49:16 AM
Again looking at it holistically I prefer to review potential bases for any war leader who held sway over large tracts of territory. For reasons mentioned, hanging onto specific words or place names can drive you down the rabbits hole :)
Or, as we call it nowadays, archaeology ... ;)
Tangentially, and along these lines, I am surprised that so much stock is placed on 'there was no Camelot until it turns up in Geoffrey of Monmouth'.
Quote from: Erpingham on December 22, 2016, 10:19:58 AM
I assume you believe that Geoffrey's "old book" was a work contemporary with Gildas or Bede, which gave these campaign details which Geoffrey then reset for a modern audience? Rather than trying to put the scraps of information he had collected into a form that would do due honour to a legendary hero?
I believe nothing, but note that the details Geoffrey gives do seem to hang together in a recognisable and sensible pattern except where he suddenly shifts the action in a campaign from its existing location to somewhere in the West Country. This I see as Geoffrey's own editing in order to coincide with what
he believed about matters Arthurian. Whatever 'old book' he had seems to have been much more informative than the localised bardic tales floating around at eisteddfods and the like, and it is a pity he did not simply reproduce it.
Quote
While happy to accept there was a historical prototype for Arthur, who became a legendary hero to later British peoples, I think back projecting "facts" held in medieval stories about him is historically dubious.
It may well be, but if the material is cogent I am happy to go with it as far as it will go.
Quote
Likewise, while I appreciate Roy and Dave descriptions of possible contexts in which Arthur could have operated, we can't make certain claims about "Arthur was based here" about anywhere. We can't be sure that the real Arthur belonged to a political entity that covered the whole of historic Britannia - in fact as Britannia was split even in Roman times, it seems more plausible he belonged to a smaller political entity somewhere within the old Britannia, or even beyond in Strathclyde or the Scottish lowlands.
The division under the Romans into
Britannia Prima,
Britannia Secunda,
Flavia Caesariensis and
Maxima Caesariensis occurred during the time of Diocletian, hence being (in Romano-British terms) a fairly late development, and was quite probably the first thing to be adjusted when Britain began creating its own emperors c.AD 408; we do know that while the other three provinces were each overseen by a
praeses, from late in the 4th century AD the governor of
Maxima Caesariensis was of consular rank, so a clear superiority of precedence had been established there and would logically be claimed by subsequent rulers of domestic origin.
Quote from: Holly on December 22, 2016, 10:32:47 AM
Still most likely is that there were several people at several different points in several locations that all got swept up into a single entity whose title/name may have been Arthur
There is doubtless an element of addition and recombination, just as the Greeks did with the deeds of Heracles. But this emphatically does not mean there was never an original Heracles. Or Arthur. Outside Marvel Comics and the like I have yet to see a hero invented by committee. ;)
Quote from: aligern on December 22, 2016, 11:57:17 AM
But is there a record of Arthur governing much of the country?
That depends upon whom you read.
Quote
The most supportable 'fact' about Arthur is that a victory penned the Saxons back for 50 years.
Only one? Arthur's career was a whole succession of victories, of which Mons Badonicus was perhaps the most famous and most consequential on account of bringing down so many different foes in a single action. Let us not lose sight of the fact that in Geoffrey's account of the campaign Arthur was
on the offensive, probing deep into Scotland, and then engaged and defeated a mixed bag of opponents including a significant Saxon army.
One victory (or, from the Saxon point of view, serious defeat) on its own would be unlikely to suspend Saxon progress for 50 years. A succession of defeats which cowed a generation would have that effect.
Quote(cf. Graupius and Grampian)
Doesn't Grampian come from Mons Graupius, rather than the other way round? So wikipedia believes anyway :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grampian_Mountains
QuoteThe division under the Romans into Britannia Prima, Britannia Secunda, Flavia Caesariensis and Maxima Caesariensis occurred during the time of Diocletian, hence being (in Romano-British terms) a fairly late development, and was quite probably the first thing to be adjusted when Britain began creating its own emperors c.AD 408; we do know that while the other three provinces were each overseen by a praeses, from late in the 4th century AD the governor of Maxima Caesariensis was of consular rank, so a clear superiority of precedence had been established there and would logically be claimed by subsequent rulers of domestic origin.
I'm not fully sure I follow. Are you saying that one of the impacts of the breakdown of an external imperium was to lead to a re-unification of Britannia and this continued until the period of Arthur (and beyond, as he was successful)? And when is your Arthur active? This seems to imply a 5th century Arthur. Not implausible but would like to be clear.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on December 22, 2016, 12:32:48 PM
Only one? Arthur's career was a whole succession of victories, of which Mons Badonicus was perhaps the most famous and most consequential on account of bringing down so many different foes in a single action.
the problem is that (assuming the victories existed) we don't know who some of them were against.
There's also the problem with 'saxons' in that we may be talking about forces of warriors who 'self identified' as Saxon, especially as the first Foederate could have been settled a 150 years before that battle.
Fascinating period 8)
Indeed. It's generally accepted that the Grampians are named after Tacitus' Graupius, not the other way round, so phonetic similarity (barring the typo) is not surprising.
If Badenoch is derived from the Scottish Gaelic Bàideanach meaning drowned land (as Wikipedia says) then it's not that phoentically similar to Latin Badonicus anyway ('by-ten-ach' I think, though I may be wildly wrong - plus there was apparently a separate Badenoch Gaelic dialect).
Or there are the theories of various online Arthur, er, historians, such as that "'Badon' here actually derives from the Welsh (i.e. British) word baedd, meaning a 'boar'" (Simon Stirling, The King Arthur Conspiracy - there's a title that ticks several of the right boxes).
In short, I don't think this sort of phonetic bingo has much value.
Quote from: Jim Webster on December 22, 2016, 01:35:33 PM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on December 22, 2016, 12:32:48 PM
Only one? Arthur's career was a whole succession of victories, of which Mons Badonicus was perhaps the most famous and most consequential on account of bringing down so many different foes in a single action.
the problem is that (assuming the victories existed) we don't know who some of them were against.
There's also the problem with 'saxons' in that we may be talking about forces of warriors who 'self identified' as Saxon, especially as the first Foederate could have been settled a 150 years before that battle.
Fascinating period 8)
spot on
Quote from: RichT on December 22, 2016, 01:46:36 PM
Indeed. It's generally accepted that the Grampians are named after Tacitus' Graupius, not the other way round, so phonetic similarity (barring the typo) is not surprising.
If Badenoch is derived from the Scottish Gaelic Bàideanach meaning drowned land (as Wikipedia says) then it's not that phoentically similar to Latin Badonicus anyway ('by-ten-ach' I think, though I may be wildly wrong - plus there was apparently a separate Badenoch Gaelic dialect).
Or there are the theories of various online Arthur, er, historians, such as that "'Badon' here actually derives from the Welsh (i.e. British) word baedd, meaning a 'boar'" (Simon Stirling, The King Arthur Conspiracy - there's a title that ticks several of the right boxes).
In short, I don't think this sort of phonetic bingo has much value.
agreed and a very good point Rich.
as to your point about Badon, if we use the Baedd root word, it opens up a whole load of possibilities and an obvious connection to the Mabinogion stories and specifically the Twrch Trwyth
Another phonetic goody bag is if we look at Camlann (if we assume it was a real battle). Everyone plumps for Cam meaning crooked but not many go for the mispelled Cam as in the Cam in Annales Cambriae. This is a latinisation/corruption of Cymru/Cymbrogi/Kymri etc etc which could thus translate as enclosure or church of the 'Welsh' (assuming the Cambriae get shortened to Cam of course :) )
Another one is that Camlann is a shortened version of Cae(r) mawr llan or large fortified (enclosed) field by/of the church
There is even a suggestion that Camlann and Camelot are actually one and the same (pronounce the l singularly in Camlann to see what i mean)
layer upon layer 8)
Quote from: Erpingham on December 22, 2016, 01:02:55 PM
Quote(cf. Graupius and Grampian)
Doesn't Grampian come from Mons Graupius, rather than the other way round?
Doubtless so. It is the relationship that is intriguing, especially in view of Richard's point about the origin of 'Badenoch'. I would assume a similar process at work there, although I think Richard has matters the wrong way round: the later Scots pronunciation would vary from the original rather than the original copying the later Scots pronunciation. It is still close enough to be noticeable.
Quote from: Erpingham on December 22, 2016, 01:13:29 PM
I'm not fully sure I follow. Are you saying that one of the impacts of the breakdown of an external imperium was to lead to a re-unification of Britannia and this continued until the period of Arthur (and beyond, as he was successful)? And when is your Arthur active? This seems to imply a 5th century Arthur. Not implausible but would like to be clear.
It does look that way, and not just in my little grey cells. ;) We see Britain turning out its own emperors from AD 406, and it is never reconquered by the declining Western Empire. The (British) emperor Constantine III - who seems to be the pattern for Arthur's supposed continental ventures, perhaps part of the accumulation of legend process Dave was referring to - then drains the remaining Roman regulars out of Britannia in AD 410 in order to seize the parts of Gaul the barbarians have not reached, so that when he dies he leaves both a tradition of home-grown united
imperium and a land deficient in troops. We rather lose sight of Britannia thereafter until Ambrosius Aurelianus appears through a glass darkly in what appears to be the 5th century AD. Then there are discontinuous flashes of Uther Pendragon and Arthur himself, but we would seem to be justified in drawing the conclusion that Britannia was habitually subject to one-man rule (as opposed to consisting of four shared provinces) during the 5th and 6th centuries AD - at least for those parts not being trampled by Saxon invaders. The traditional tribal kings would of course retain or regain their traditional tribal status, but we seem to have continuity for a sort of overall Roman (or sub-Roman) military command.
Quote from: Jim Webster on December 22, 2016, 01:35:33 PM
the problem is that (assuming the victories existed) we don't know who some of them were against.
There's also the problem with 'saxons' in that we may be talking about forces of warriors who 'self identified' as Saxon, especially as the first Foederate could have been settled a 150 years before that battle.
We could indeed, although if they were in Arthur's way and fought against him, I suppose it does not particularly matter whether they were intruding Saxons or just 'Sax-conscious' fifth-generation settlers. Assuming the victories existed, Arthur won just the same.
ok this will bake your noodle
what if the 4 provinces of 4th/5th C Britain go their separate ways as the 5th Century progresses and we have competing warlords surfacing based upon the old province 'headquarters' or capitals. They use existing troops stationed in the provinces (whats left) and possibly supplement with warbands from the continent. Occasionally one leader.Dux/'King' is overlord to the others by treaty/warfare such as is suggested in the warlord Vortigern in the 5th Century. If we accept this then it starts to make more sense with regards to how/where battles occur and why we might have Brythonic sounding leaders leading 'Saxon' armies. For example Ceredig that most famous 'Saxon' coud actually be Caradog (and there is one handily floating around at the time of Cerdig's supposed floruit)
Of course, around here Camelot refers to a location for parking one's traditional means of transport.... ;D
boom tish....you're there all week.... ;)
I thought it was the campaign of Riothamus that was the inspiration for the continental adventures of Arthur? That and recent research that indicates Riothamus may have been borne mortally wounded to the what was the Isle of Avallon in Burgandy?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riothamus
it is a tempting proposition especially if we look closely at the timing and thus the potential command 'structures' of Roman Britain at the time. Could Riothamus be a Dux or Comes Britannianum? Very possibly given the solidity of the Apollinaris letter (but assuming the inference of the contents) and the near contemporary Jordanes work
Is he 'Arthur' though?
possibly one of the pieces of jigsaw that make up the legend of several people (IMHO) attributed to the Arthur figurehead
An old friend, sadly now no longer with us, knew a local historian in Kent very well and that historian was convinced the Battle of Badon was actually in the Dover area. Hengist and Horsa have a connection to Kent as we know and one of those brothers was long rumoured to be buried in a long boat burial at Capel-le-Ferne nr Folkestone. The historian had a theory that perhaps the old Roman fort on top of the hill where Dover Castle now stands could well have been the site of the original Camelot.
Quote from: Holly on December 22, 2016, 09:06:13 PM
what if the 4 provinces of 4th/5th C Britain go their separate ways as the 5th Century progresses and we have competing warlords surfacing based upon the old province 'headquarters' or capitals. They use existing troops stationed in the provinces (whats left) and possibly supplement with warbands from the continent. Occasionally one leader.Dux/'King' is overlord to the others by treaty/warfare such as is suggested in the warlord Vortigern in the 5th Century. If we accept this then it starts to make more sense with regards to how/where battles occur and why we might have Brythonic sounding leaders leading 'Saxon' armies. For example Ceredig that most famous 'Saxon' coud actually be Caradog (and there is one handily floating around at the time of Cerdig's supposed floruit)
This sounds feasible; a mix of traditional Celtic disunity with an overlay or afterglow of unified Roman authority recast as a form of High Kingship.
Quote from: valentinianvictor on December 23, 2016, 11:12:59 AM
I thought it was the campaign of Riothamus that was the inspiration for the continental adventures of Arthur?
Riothamus seems to have come from Brittany as opposed to Britain; there is of course nothing to prevent a Breton bard adding his deeds to a developing Arthurian legend.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on December 23, 2016, 01:40:40 PM
Quote from: Holly on December 22, 2016, 09:06:13 PM
what if the 4 provinces of 4th/5th C Britain go their separate ways as the 5th Century progresses and we have competing warlords surfacing based upon the old province 'headquarters' or capitals. They use existing troops stationed in the provinces (whats left) and possibly supplement with warbands from the continent. Occasionally one leader.Dux/'King' is overlord to the others by treaty/warfare such as is suggested in the warlord Vortigern in the 5th Century. If we accept this then it starts to make more sense with regards to how/where battles occur and why we might have Brythonic sounding leaders leading 'Saxon' armies. For example Ceredig that most famous 'Saxon' coud actually be Caradog (and there is one handily floating around at the time of Cerdig's supposed floruit)
This sounds feasible; a mix of traditional Celtic disunity with an overlay or afterglow of unified Roman authority recast as a form of High Kingship.
Quote from: valentinianvictor on December 23, 2016, 11:12:59 AM
I thought it was the campaign of Riothamus that was the inspiration for the continental adventures of Arthur?
Riothamus seems to have come from Brittany as opposed to Britain; there is of course nothing to prevent a Breton bard adding his deeds to a developing Arthurian legend.
Brittany and Briton itself could have been considered almost one and the same at that time period as Brittany was so-named after the Britons settled there. It's tempting to link Riothamus with his army of 12,000 to the death of Arthur.
As I understood it the provincial ortanisation of Roman Britain had no life beyond the imperial organisation. Governance defaulted down to the civitates, which had been based on the original tribal territories. The provinces had no forces and no piwer base, tax collection, in so far as it continued stopped at the civitats level , so they could afford to suppirt some troops, the local aristocrats who sat in the civitas and Saxon or Irish federates, who could be paid and given land. Above the civitates there existed originally an overall leadership, Vortigern, who may well have been chosen by the civitates, perhaps as a war leader, but his power was consesual and he led only one successor state.
I have my doubts to what extent the civitates states actually represented a resurgence of tribalism as opposed to them just being based upon tribal teritories. Tge Roman Empire relied upon taxes to pay the army which then spent my st of the money locally on consumables. Once the imperial power went tax collection on a kevel above the civitas would cease and army units would disband because they were not local units and were probably above the level of force the locality near them could support. Hence the fleet would disappear, the garrison on the wall would disband, the Saxon shore organisation would cease, unless lije Pevensey, the fortification suited the local civitas to support.
Post Roman organisation in Gaul and Spain followed this pattern. When imperial control was lost the next level of organisation that functioned was the civitas, a city with a dependent, once tribal, territory, was the default. Even though the lost provinces were large and still rich they had no higher organisation that could stand up to even 5000 barbarian warriors.... local govt. alone was not enough.
I agree with Mick (Hession) on this. If you've read and digested Guy Halsall's "Worlds of Arthur", there's nothing much worth saying beyond it on any potential "historical" Arthur. And as Dave (Hollin) noted, you can waste huge amounts of time and effort finding that out for yourself the hard way.
If you feel inclined though, I'd certainly recommend a decent trawl through some of the medieval sources of legend, as they have their own charms and points of interest, so long as you're happy to go down a more fantasy gaming kind of avenue if you want to convert those ideas to the tabletop. Judging by many of the comments here, that does indeed seem a popular option for Arthur, if probably one to be cloaked in a hint of respectability as "speculative history" instead!
And if you want to avoid some of the donkey-work in such conversions, I'd recommend a look at the "King Arthur Pendragon" role-playing game (my personal preference has long been for the 4th edition, when it was still a Chaosium product, but given that was published in 1993, I rather doubt you'll still find copies easily; it always seemed to provide a better-rounded game, with a lot more for your cash, than any of its predecessors or the more recent versions, to me). It is though very much a fantasy game at its heart.
While just to add a little more oyster-grit, the first episode of the recent BBC TV archaeology series "Digging for Britain" (still available via the i-Player currently), featured a dig at Tintagel in which one of the archaeologists even referred to Geoffrey of Monmouth as if his remarks about the place after all had some relevance to the supposed major settlement they'd found there...
Just to second Alistair's recommendation of the King Arthur Pendragon rpg.
We played the classic campaign, from the days of Uther through to Camlann. It took our characters four generations and us as players two years.
Since then we have always regarded Tristan as an all round decent bloke, the Orkney clan were good to work with, Mordred was OK but badly advised, and Morganna a perfect lady and I wouldn't have a word said against her, especially if she might come to hear of it.
But frankly Guinevere was a right pain, and as for Lancelot he never does anything, winning glory off stage and never about when there's wars to be fought. One of our survivors ended up killing him in a duel because he just irritated us so much.
(When you've lived the story for as long as we did, somehow Lancelot seems like a late addition just added to appeal to a French audience. ::) )
Along the lines of Alastair's note, I do quite like reading the more 'legendary' accounts and if you really want an interesting immersion story then look up the Mabinogion. It does have some very interesting stories that do appear to have some historical threads running through them....if you look with a careful eye
Quote from: valentinianvictor on December 23, 2016, 01:45:53 PM
Brittany and Briton itself could have been considered almost one and the same at that time period as Brittany was so-named after the Britons settled there. It's tempting to link Riothamus with his army of 12,000 to the death of Arthur.
Apart from it taking place in the wrong context and the wrong country. :)
Quote from: aligern on December 23, 2016, 06:10:16 PM
As I understood it the provincial organisation of Roman Britain had no life beyond the imperial organisation. Governance defaulted down to the civitates, which had been based on the original tribal territories.
The provinces do seem to be a red herring or otherwise in the nature of fish beyond their use-by date.
Quote
Above the civitates there existed originally an overall leadership, Vortigern, who may well have been chosen by the civitates, perhaps as a war leader, but his power was consensual and he led only one successor state.
There would still have been the title of Dux Britanniorum floating around for anyone who had a sufficiently effective army and could use it.
Quote
I have my doubts to what extent the civitates states actually represented a resurgence of tribalism as opposed to them just being based upon tribal territories. The Roman Empire relied upon taxes to pay the army which then spent my st of the money locally on consumables. Once the imperial power went tax collection on a level above the civitas would cease and army units would disband because they were not local units and were probably above the level of force the locality near them could support.
The tribal kingships and traditions seem to have run in parallel with the Roman administration, so yes, rather than a 'resurgence' of tribalism I think it would be more a matter of the local kings carrying on with their tribal hat rather than the imperial administrative hat. Cities of course had their own curiae still in charge from the days when their taxes went to the Emperor rather than being locally recycled.
Quote
Post Roman organisation in Gaul and Spain followed this pattern. When imperial control was lost the next level of organisation that functioned was the civitas, a city with a dependent, once tribal, territory, was the default. Even though the lost provinces were large and still rich they had no higher organisation that could stand up to even 5000 barbarian warriors.... local govt. alone was not enough.
Well observed. It took someone who could unite the tribes and cities (easier if they were one and the same) to create and sustain the kind of army needed to reverse the trend of invaders helping themselves.
Quote from: Sharur on December 23, 2016, 07:58:43 PM
I'd recommend a look at the "King Arthur Pendragon" role-playing game (my personal preference has long been for the 4th edition, when it was still a Chaosium product, but given that was published in 1993, I rather doubt you'll still find copies easily; it always seemed to provide a better-rounded game, with a lot more for your cash, than any of its predecessors or the more recent versions, to me). It is though very much a fantasy game at its heart.
Given Greg Stafford (the designer)'s birthplace, definitely a case of a Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's court. ;D
One of the charms of the game is the way it begins in the Dark Ages and every decade or so shifts its armour and weapon styles a century or two along the Middle Ages, so that one can begin the 'Boy King' campaign c.AD 495 with cast-off Roman armour and by AD 540 everyone who is anyone is jousting in Gothic plate. The problem it has as an RPG is that there is almost no scope for character improvement. The character generation and combat systems could however with minimal effort be adapted to Homeric warfare ('Men of Bronze') and WW1 aerial combat ('Knights of the Air), for those interested in so doing: both are 'live fast, die young' environments to which the game system seems suited.
Very sadly to me the Arthur stories Geoffrey's and De Troyes seem to have more in common with Livy and Juvenal than with history. They look back to a supposed golden age and compare it unfavourably with contemporary behaviour and events. De Troyes especially seems to use the cover of writing about another country (England) that most of his educated audience would be familiar with, to criticise behaviour that was common by contracsting it with a noble past (and to reflect on the rpg tint here, the Chivalry & Sorcery game was set in that period because of how turbulant the times were in France and England). The story has a lot in of themes that must have seemed common to someone living through the 12th century in France. Being openly critical might have been fatal, so writing about the times while pretending it is about past events is a much safer option.
In think the stories tell us far more about how people in the Frankish influenced world saw themselves than it does about England in the Post Roman period.
Tim, seriously, if you havent already done so, read the Mabinogion
Holly
I have a copy sitting on that pile of things I ought to read rather than I want to read but I will get to it one day, I am sure.
Regards
Tim
Its a bit like reading the Silmarillion, tough in places but light bulb moments all over the place when you have things click in your head. Of course alot of it is pure story telling (at its best) but be warned there are potential historical nuggets in there and countless rabbit holes
enjoy :)
have started Jim Storr's 'King Arthur's Wars' and so far is much in line with my way of thinking. He starts off with looking at the whole amount of information around for the period and then 'cross examines' some of the long held beliefs about the period and persons involved. The chapters I am getting into now is where he looks at the topography and geography of the dark age landscape and tries to use the ground view to assess certain aspects of the period (most notably, and obviously, the battle side of things)
Good hunting, and may your quest be more successful than King Pellinore's. ;)
its a bit rambling in places but does make certain sense (so far) although still has an (unconscious) local slant on his thinking even though he admonishes others for doing so!
Halsall's book was fascinating and thought provoking, but his theory falls down badly when it comes to Gildas (contemporary source) explicitly referencing a war between Saxons and Britons in which the Britons were pressed hard but eventually victorious. And then the Britons gradually subsiding into decay from this high watermark. To get round this Halsall comes up with all sorts of tortuous, tenuous and convoluted explanations, of exactly the sort he criticises amongst historians that do believe in Arthur.
For me "Arthur's" story comes through pretty clearly from the sources we have: Civil authority collapsed, incoming invaders took bloody advantage for a while, "Arthur" scored a few unlikely victories over the invaders (perhaps as a guerrilla leader to start with) and the prestige thereby gained enabled him to dominate the Island's politics for a while on some sort of semi-formal basis (Dux Bellorum). He would not have completely expelled the incomers but subdued them, in the style of Alfred and the Danes. Then, the temporary coalition he had managed to hold together for the duration of the crisis slowly collapsed once the crisis had passed. The Britons started fighting with each other (probably making dirty deals with the Saxons as necessary) and in the process "Arthur" was defeated/assassinated/exiled (to Avalon?)
I am guessing he was probably quite a calculating and ruthless individual (like Octavian or Henry VII) rather than the noble paragon of legend.
Totally agree with Patrick on the identity of Camelot. So obvious I'm always puzzled at how so much time and energy is spent discussing alternatives! Never thought to conflate Camlann with it too, though, although I suppose that would make sense in the context of the "strife" of Camlann (was he killed in an urban riot like Tiberius Gracchus or Pyrrhus?)
assuming there was an Arthur ;)
interesting book by Jim Storre proposes that the british and germanics fought a series of battles and campaigns around many linear boundaries and dykes with the odd ford thrown in for good measure.
I do personally believe that some theories can be too one dimensional or seen through modern eyes. I think the period 5th-7th C is extremely chaotic on so many levels - boundaries, groupings, alliances, migrations, political/socio economics etc etc
Quote from: eques on January 05, 2017, 01:18:18 PM
Totally agree with Patrick on the identity of Camelot. So obvious I'm always puzzled at how so much time and energy is spent discussing alternatives! Never thought to conflate Camlann with it too, though, although I suppose that would make sense in the context of the "strife" of Camlann (was he killed in an urban riot like Tiberius Gracchus or Pyrrhus?)
I see Camlann as being Chelmsford, the point at which the river Chelmer ceases to be navigable and thus a natural rendezvous point for a British usurper of the Mordred persuasion and his unscrupulous Saxon allies arriving by ship from Europe. It also covers the route from Londinium to Camulodunum, so is a useful blocking position to stop the rightful king marching on the capital - and hence a logical site for a battle.
Quote from: Holly on January 05, 2017, 08:03:39 PM
assuming there was an Arthur ;)
If there was not, someone had a lot of fun dreaming him up and selling the idea to future generations. ;)
indeed Patrick.
assuming there was a Mordred and a Camlann too :)
Quote from: Holly on January 05, 2017, 09:46:19 PM
indeed Patrick.
assuming there was a Mordred and a Camlann too :)
If I'm right the only mention we have of Mordred is the one line which says something like "Battle of Camlann, Arthur and Mordred Killed."
No hint that they were on opposite sides
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 05, 2017, 10:02:34 PM
Quote from: Holly on January 05, 2017, 09:46:19 PM
indeed Patrick.
assuming there was a Mordred and a Camlann too :)
If I'm right the only mention we have of Mordred is the one line which says something like "Battle of Camlann, Arthur and Mordred Killed."
No hint that they were on opposite sides
Gueith Camlann in qua Arthur et Medraut corruerunt.
"The strife of Camlann, in which Arthur and Medraut fell."
Medraut/Mordred apparently derives from the latin
moderatus and may be a by-name, so perhaps we don't have his actual name at all.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 05, 2017, 10:32:03 PM
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 05, 2017, 10:02:34 PM
Quote from: Holly on January 05, 2017, 09:46:19 PM
indeed Patrick.
assuming there was a Mordred and a Camlann too :)
If I'm right the only mention we have of Mordred is the one line which says something like "Battle of Camlann, Arthur and Mordred Killed."
No hint that they were on opposite sides
Gueith Camlann in qua Arthur et Medraut corruerunt.
"The strife of Camlann, in which Arthur and Medraut fell."
Medraut/Mordred apparently derives from the latin moderatus and may be a by-name, so perhaps we don't have his actual name at all.
also source is Annales Cambriae written form approx 400 years after the events so not exactly contemporary
interestingly a similar distance that separates Plutarch, Quintus Curtius Rufus, and Arrian from Alexander.
Of course we postulate lost sources available to them but lost to us
indeed Jim. I am reluctant to put too much (emphatic) faith in writings that have been copied and recopied over centuries by people unknown to us in a time of uncertainty and not only hundreds of years from the events but also a millennia from our own time
Holistic approaches for me I'm afraid. Start from the bottom up and avoid deductive 'leaps'
Occam's razor :)
Given the nature of the record (a short, pretty uninformative annal entry) and the fact that it includes Welsh words, the possibility it comes from an earlier Welsh-language annal is pretty good. Doesn't mean its accurate of course.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 06, 2017, 10:44:01 AM
Given the nature of the record (a short, pretty uninformative annal entry) and the fact that it includes Welsh words, the possibility it comes from an earlier Welsh-language annal is pretty good. Doesn't mean its accurate of course.
Or that it is necessarily total imagination. Essentially it is there, and we can grow it until it touches other mentions or trim it to stubble as we think best. :)
Quote from: Erpingham on January 05, 2017, 10:32:03 PM
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 05, 2017, 10:02:34 PM
If I'm right the only mention we have of Mordred is the one line which says something like "Battle of Camlann, Arthur and Mordred Killed."
No hint that they were on opposite sides
Gueith Camlann in qua Arthur et Medraut corruerunt.
"The strife of Camlann, in which Arthur and Medraut fell."
I suspect the fact that both are mentioned and nobody else is
ipso facto puts them on opposite sides; it depends upon period convention: did chroniclers customarily mention the leader of each army or only those on one side? Even the Egyptians, who customarily denied opponents a mention by name, made reference to an opponent's existence (usually as 'the vile fallen one of [insert territory]").
If Medraut derives from Moderatus, such nomenclature at least suggests a Romanised continuity in leadership since Aurelius Ambrosius, which would at least drop several aspiring Welsh
pennaths and associated legends out of the Arthurian window. Such linguistically-based defenestration may not of itself be conclusive, but it may be usefully indicative.
I think it nonsense that Arthur would have had a centre of power in Essex. The most sensible interpretation is that the Badon battle occurs far to the West, the Britons being under severe threat from combined Saxon force. The Saxons besiege a key linking hillfort , Baydon being a good possibility because of its control of routes, the Britons relieve the hill fort and destroy the combined Saxon army.
The Saxon firce has to be bigger than that of one statelet because the battle changes the strategic galance to the point where they are quiet for 50 years...sorry, but some little local victory will not do.
The Britons had suppisedly been driven back before 'Baydon'. If one imagines Arthur winning a series of victories beforehand that pen the Saxons back, then it is likely that they are restricted to the periphery and that any actions would be local, against Kent , Sussex, Anglia, Essex, not a combined force and a big victory against one little kingdom would not pin back the others. To be combined and to be putting out a force whose defeat would end aggression for a generation or more, the Saxons have to be further West.
When the advance renews it is to the West , taking in a drive on Hampshire and culminating in a devisive battle at Dyrrham in 577. It is logical to assume that the strategic drivers are the same.
The big threat before 'Baydon' is Aelle in Sussex, after the battle Sussex is a backwater. After a the battle many Saxons withdraw and settle in Gaul, likely in Normandy. That does not argue for action in Essex , but down the Roman road from the Severn via Baydon to Sussex and Kent.
That some 700 years later a novelist decides to give Arthur a 'capital' based on one of the chief towns of a much earlier Roman Britain is no argument at all for earlier events, only for how mediaeval authors trawled the past to find suitable names and locations for romances...a bit of period flavour..no more!
Roy
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 06, 2017, 11:48:31 AM
Quote from: Erpingham on January 06, 2017, 10:44:01 AM
Given the nature of the record (a short, pretty uninformative annal entry) and the fact that it includes Welsh words, the possibility it comes from an earlier Welsh-language annal is pretty good. Doesn't mean its accurate of course.
Or that it is necessarily total imagination. Essentially it is there, and we can grow it until it touches other mentions or trim it to stubble as we think best. :)
Quote from: Erpingham on January 05, 2017, 10:32:03 PM
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 05, 2017, 10:02:34 PM
If I'm right the only mention we have of Mordred is the one line which says something like "Battle of Camlann, Arthur and Mordred Killed."
No hint that they were on opposite sides
Gueith Camlann in qua Arthur et Medraut corruerunt.
"The strife of Camlann, in which Arthur and Medraut fell."
I suspect the fact that both are mentioned and nobody else is ipso facto puts them on opposite sides; it depends upon period convention: did chroniclers customarily mention the leader of each army or only those on one side? Even the Egyptians, who customarily denied opponents a mention by name, made reference to an opponent's existence (usually as 'the vile fallen one of [insert territory]").
If Medraut derives from Moderatus, such nomenclature at least suggests a Romanised continuity in leadership since Aurelius Ambrosius, which would at least drop several aspiring Welsh pennaths and associated legends out of the Arthurian window. Such linguistically-based defenestration may not of itself be conclusive, but it may be usefully indicative.
I think contemporary convention is that if the names are mentioned using "with" it means together and if names are mentioned using "and" it means against
I think this is one where there is no good reason to doubt the basic tradition that they were on opposite sides (if only because there is no counter tradition of them being on the same side). Unfortunately, it doesn't tell us much more. We can disregard the various parentage traditions, as they are late and contradictory. But Medraut could be a rebel, a rival, a warlord, a ruler etc., etc.
Incidentally, be interested in Patrick's view on the date, as it doesn't seem to fit with his 5th century Arthur.
dates are a minefield as all we really have to go on is written 'evidence' and as anyone who has tried to calibrate the various texts and decipher these into years or even decades hits plenty of obstacles. Some of the dates are so wildly at odds with each other that in fact they could with a squinty eye support the 2 - Arthurs argument. ie one in the 5th and one in the 6th. I am not sold on 'Arthur' per se but 2 main leaders in the 5th and 6th has a lot going for it
Presumably you are going to fit Vortigern et fils and Ambrosius Aurelianus into the sequence too?
It will get quite crowded.
Roy
Given what we know of Arthur, assuming he existed, he could be a contemporary of these better recorded figures. He could even be one of them, under a different name. Because of the "Arthur" industry, we tend to think of a great political leader, maybe with a Roman title. Yet maybe he was a more junior figure originally, the commander of someone's comitatus or teulu perhaps, with a reputation as a battle winner. But you pay your money and you take your choice - the decisive evidence eludes us.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 06, 2017, 12:38:22 PM
I think this is one where there is no good reason to doubt the basic tradition that they were on opposite sides (if only because there is no counter tradition of them being on the same side). Unfortunately, it doesn't tell us much more. We can disregard the various parentage traditions, as they are late and contradictory. But Medraut could be a rebel, a rival, a warlord, a ruler etc., etc.
Or Arthur's horse ? ;)
We almost have to 'ignore' what written stuff there is for the period or use it as supporting evidence and not primary evidence for what we think happened. Archaeology/topography is the main tool to use supplemented with philology, as mentioned written sources (vague and infrequent that they are), and bookended with firm dated/attested events
Whats left is theory and postulation based upon a fractured jigsaw with some of the pieces missing
I still maintain that Occam's razor still applies here no matter how romantic the notions we hold dear on this subject
Quote from: Erpingham on January 06, 2017, 12:38:22 PM
Incidentally, be interested in Patrick's view on the date, as it doesn't seem to fit with his 5th century Arthur.
Not sure yours truly necessarily had a 5th century Arthur, and I have been concentrating on the geography rather than the history. The latter is a somewhat more involved topic. :)
Quote from: aligern on January 06, 2017, 12:00:43 PM
I think it nonsense that Arthur would have had a centre of power in Essex.
Not necessarily nonsense: one's centre of power need not coincide with one's focus of campaigning unless both were exceedingly small - or rather incorrigibly local.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 06, 2017, 10:13:11 PM
Not sure yours truly necessarily had a 5th century Arthur, and I have been concentrating on the geography rather than the history. The latter is a somewhat more involved topic. :)
I apologise - I had read an earlier post as implying Arthur came in the period after the British appeal to Rome as meaning soon after as opposed to many years after.
However, speculating around geography based on place names recorded much later is risky. Why do we not focus on the Welsh tradition that Arthur's court was at Celliwig in Cornwall, for example. Or the tradition recorded by Gerald of Wales and Geoffrey of Monmouth that his capital was Caerleon? Yes, we can decide he had lots of bases all over Britain but to so do presumes a level of coherence of Britain in the post-Roman period. Does this fit our other sources and the archaeology?
Quote from: Erpingham on January 07, 2017, 09:59:13 AM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 06, 2017, 10:13:11 PM
Not sure yours truly necessarily had a 5th century Arthur, and I have been concentrating on the geography rather than the history. The latter is a somewhat more involved topic. :)
I apologise - I had read an earlier post as implying Arthur came in the period after the British appeal to Rome as meaning soon after as opposed to many years after.
However, speculating around geography based on place names recorded much later is risky. Why do we not focus on the Welsh tradition that Arthur's court was at Celliwig in Cornwall, for example. Or the tradition recorded by Gerald of Wales and Geoffrey of Monmouth that his capital was Caerleon? Yes, we can decide he had lots of bases all over Britain but to so do presumes a level of coherence of Britain in the post-Roman period. Does this fit our other sources and the archaeology?
This is the nub of one of the main problems with 'research' and the rabbit hole to which I have fallen in many a time in the past :) eg Celliwig or Gelliwig or Celliwic or Gelliwic etc etc can mean any number of places in Britain and not necessarily where the traditional spots lie. Assuming we take the placename to denote a grove of some description that could be anywhere and if it is in an area where transmogrification of the placename has occurred though Anglicization we are groping ever more in the dark.... as an aside there are plenty of placenames of this ilk in the area I live (along with similar ones for Kernew etc) but doesnt necessarily mean I accept them as 'the one' truth :)
Quote from: Erpingham on January 07, 2017, 09:59:13 AM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 06, 2017, 10:13:11 PM
Not sure yours truly necessarily had a 5th century Arthur, and I have been concentrating on the geography rather than the history. The latter is a somewhat more involved topic. :)
I apologise - I had read an earlier post as implying Arthur came in the period after the British appeal to Rome as meaning soon after as opposed to many years after.
No need for an apology - on rereading, it did look as if that is what I was implying. Out of interest, the Wikipedia article on Mons Badonicus (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Badon) has attempted to close in on a date for Arthur, and bringing together all the source information and archaeology it can muster, puts the battle in a bracket c.AD 491-500, so this would give us an Arthur on the cusp of the 5th and 6th centuries AD, backed by the apparent accord of a fair portion of our scanty source material.
Regarding Welsh place-names, my caveat would be that these are probably at one remove (at least) from the originals and perhaps bardically transmogrified over a century or two since the event. In short, and for once agreeing with Dave ;), I would avoid them. Names derived from Latin originals may be much more helpful.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 07, 2017, 01:04:34 PM
Regarding Welsh place-names, my caveat would be that these are probably at one remove (at least) from the originals and perhaps bardically transmogrified over a century or two since the event. In short, and for once agreeing with Dave ;), I would avoid them. Names derived from Latin originals may be much more helpful.
Personally, I'd treat all the medieval ones as unreliable. Assuming greater authenticity for French sources because their authors have produced made up names that sound a bit like Latin towns from centuries earlier seems a bit risky to me.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 07, 2017, 01:04:34 PM
In short, and for once agreeing with Dave ;), I would avoid them.
;D
Quote from: Erpingham on January 07, 2017, 01:26:04 PM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 07, 2017, 01:04:34 PM
Regarding Welsh place-names, my caveat would be that these are probably at one remove (at least) from the originals and perhaps bardically transmogrified over a century or two since the event. In short, and for once agreeing with Dave ;), I would avoid them. Names derived from Latin originals may be much more helpful.
Personally, I'd treat all the medieval ones as unreliable. Assuming greater authenticity for French sources because their authors have produced made up names that sound a bit like Latin towns from centuries earlier seems a bit risky to me.
me too Anthony. Just too many variables that could have influenced them.
as per Patrick's point, we have some references in Latin (some of which are reasonably contemporary) which possibly lie 'closest' to an original version (possibly mind). The Welsh or Brythonic forms are probably slightly more removed and may indeed take reference from the Latin ones (though not necessarily all). The medieval ones (later Latin/French etc) especially those written from outside of Britain are almost certainly just too far removed and muddied to give us a reliable set of names/places etc
Going back to the point of Badon (PS great shout by Duncan on using Baydon btw as a possible site for the battle - its gaining popularity through where it sits - Wiltshire & Thames basin with close proximity to Roman roads and dark age earthworks etc), I am in the camp of late 5th C for this. It would tie in with what Gildas reports and also would tie in with alot (but there are anomalies) of the burial patterns and placename work that has gone on recently ie mid 5th crisis leading to a generation or 2 of warfare culminating in Badon at the end of the 5th. A generation or 2 of relative peace and then warfare and expansion of English controlled areas in the mid 6th onwards
Quote from: Holly on January 07, 2017, 01:48:13 PM
as per Patrick's point, we have some references in Latin (some of which are reasonably contemporary) which possibly lie 'closest' to an original version (possibly mind). The Welsh or Brythonic forms are probably slightly more removed and may indeed take reference from the Latin ones (though not necessarily all). The medieval ones (later Latin/French etc) especially those written from outside of Britain are almost certainly just too far removed and muddied to give us a reliable set of names/places etc
This at least gives us an aiming-point for Occam's Razor. If we look for Latin or Latin-ish names prior to mediaeval interpolations we cannot be going too far wrong, subject of course to the reliability and completeness of our period sources. Cutting off from consideration off anything later or linguistically non-Latinish except as a possible indicator of something to check for in period sources would certainly simplify our task.
Quote
Going back to the point of Badon (PS great shout by Duncan on using Baydon btw as a possible site for the battle - its gaining popularity through where it sits - Wiltshire & Thames basin with close proximity to Roman roads and dark age earthworks etc),
But with a couple of minor drawbacks: despite plenty of hills, there is the noticeable lack of a nearby and convenient
Mons and it has a name which is first mentioned in AD 1196 (and not, for example, in AD 1086, in the Domesday Book), which seems a bit late for Bede, Nennius
et. al.Quote
I am in the camp of late 5th C for this. It would tie in with what Gildas reports and also would tie in with a lot (but there are anomalies) of the burial patterns and placename work that has gone on recently ie mid 5th crisis leading to a generation or 2 of warfare culminating in Badon at the end of the 5th. A generation or 2 of relative peace and then warfare and expansion of English controlled areas in the mid 6th onwards
This looks to me like a convincing outline.
Thought I was a he first one to mention Baydon? in Wilts. Its the vanity of small differences:-))
Of course it would s just one of the candidates writers have put forward.
Roy
I would like to be able to get a plot of sight lines from the Baydon hillfort.....is this sort of thing available on the web?
Having visited it a few times , it does command the roads that the Saxons of Essex and Middlesex and Kent and Sussex would likely have used to assemble before marching together on Cirencester, Bath and Gloucester. This is projected on the basis that the Severn valley is the heartland of those we might call Romano-Britons, the Ambrosius/ Arthur faction, based on the above towns and on Viroconium. This area was not the only one held by the Britons, but it is probably the largest and most productive of the islands of territory that are no longer penetrated. For Baydon to have strategic impirtance it must be protecting something and that would not be the area of the fort itself. Baydon is meaningful if it can communicate with the towns that lie further up the road in order to summon an army that can rescue it and defeat an invasion.
Roy
I'm not sure that the non appearance of Baydon in the Domesday book is much of a problem to a potential identification. However, a bigger problem is the lack of suitable archaeology in the fort, Liddington camp. near Liddington is another and rather more formidable fort, Barbury casle, which would also fit the bill. Significantly the British are defeated bear there at Beranbrygg in, I think, 556. which would fit very well into a chronology with a fifty year pause in attacks. which then restart in the mid fifth century.
Baydon Might be a British name , or a Saxon one. I think the easy certainly bties of pkace name studies , ham, ing and ton etc. have long since gone. It is possible to have Swindon as like London or as Sweyn's dun.
Roy
QuoteIf we look for Latin or Latin-ish names prior to mediaeval interpolations we cannot be going too far wrong, subject of course to the reliability and completeness of our period sources. Cutting off from consideration off anything later or linguistically non-Latinish except as a possible indicator of something to check for in period sources would certainly simplify our task.
Well, at least that drops us having to consider Geoffrey of Monmouth or Chretien of Troyes. No more Camelot :)
Quote from: aligern on January 07, 2017, 08:21:59 PM
Thought I was a he first one to mention Baydon? in Wilts. Its the vanity of small differences:-))
Well you were the first to mention it to me, 15 years ago IIRC.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 07, 2017, 08:05:08 PM
Quote from: Holly on January 07, 2017, 01:48:13 PM
as per Patrick's point, we have some references in Latin (some of which are reasonably contemporary) which possibly lie 'closest' to an original version (possibly mind). The Welsh or Brythonic forms are probably slightly more removed and may indeed take reference from the Latin ones (though not necessarily all). The medieval ones (later Latin/French etc) especially those written from outside of Britain are almost certainly just too far removed and muddied to give us a reliable set of names/places etc
This at least gives us an aiming-point for Occam's Razor. If we look for Latin or Latin-ish names prior to mediaeval interpolations we cannot be going too far wrong, subject of course to the reliability and completeness of our period sources. Cutting off from consideration off anything later or linguistically non-Latinish except as a possible indicator of something to check for in period sources would certainly simplify our task.
Quote
Going back to the point of Badon (PS great shout by Duncan on using Baydon btw as a possible site for the battle - its gaining popularity through where it sits - Wiltshire & Thames basin with close proximity to Roman roads and dark age earthworks etc),
But with a couple of minor drawbacks: despite plenty of hills, there is the noticeable lack of a nearby and convenient Mons and it has a name which is first mentioned in AD 1196 (and not, for example, in AD 1086, in the Domesday Book), which seems a bit late for Bede, Nennius et. al.
Quote
I am in the camp of late 5th C for this. It would tie in with what Gildas reports and also would tie in with a lot (but there are anomalies) of the burial patterns and placename work that has gone on recently ie mid 5th crisis leading to a generation or 2 of warfare culminating in Badon at the end of the 5th. A generation or 2 of relative peace and then warfare and expansion of English controlled areas in the mid 6th onwards
This looks to me like a convincing outline.
If we want to start with a relatively simple observation of the written sources by using contemporary or near contemporary Latin ones it does indeed allow a certain amount of 'clearing the decks' and to focus on less avenues of enquiry. However, even then we do have to factor in the author(s); their whereabouts, their political/social persuasion, 'eyewitness' or not, contemporary with the events or not and their reasons for penning what they did and the almost certain aspect of having to separate wheat from chaff. Plus then we still have to factor in copyist errors etc. Thats not to say we cant have a decent stab at it but just highlighting some of the pitfalls of using written sources (from that period in time)
re Baydon...its obviously another rabbit hole and although we cannot pour over maps forever in the vain hope of picking 'the one' by approaching the challenge with a holistic view we can perhaps use mapping along with the other evidence. eg if we propose that Badon was late 5th and we analyse patterns of burials/inhabitation and we look at roman roads plus hills/hillforts/topography and then we apply any written detail then we can make a reasonable suggestion.
Quote from: aligern on January 07, 2017, 08:21:59 PM
Thought I was a he first one to mention Baydon? in Wilts. Its the vanity of small differences:-))
Of course it would s just one of the candidates writers have put forward.
Roy
I would like to be able to get a plot of sight lines from the Baydon hillfort.....is this sort of thing available on the web?
Having visited it a few times , it does command the roads that the Saxons of Essex and Middlesex and Kent and Sussex would likely have used to assemble before marching together on Cirencester, Bath and Gloucester. This is projected on the basis that the Severn valley is the heartland of those we might call Romano-Britons, the Ambrosius/ Arthur faction, based on the above towns and on Viroconium. This area was not the only one held by the Britons, but it is probably the largest and most productive of the islands of territory that are no longer penetrated. For Baydon to have strategic impirtance it must be protecting something and that would not be the area of the fort itself. Baydon is meaningful if it can communicate with the towns that lie further up the road in order to summon an army that can rescue it and defeat an invasion.
Roy
apologies Roy, the good shout on Baydon is yours then :)
re the sightlines, not sure but fieldwalking and eyeballing the ground does help. The fact that Ermine Street is there is a big plus
Quotere Baydon...its obviously another rabbit hole and although we cannot pour over maps forever in the vain hope of picking 'the one' by approaching the challenge with a holistic view we can perhaps use mapping along with the other evidence. eg if we propose that Badon was late 5th and we analyse patterns of burials/inhabitation and we look at roman roads plus hills/hillforts/topography and then we apply any written detail then we can make a reasonable suggestion.
It would be useful if Baydon had evidence of refortification in the appropriate period. Any work been done on that that we know of?
I still suspect, alas, that all we can do using dave's methodology is identify the more plausible candidates or areas to search. After that, we can generate a rough political/military framework of what late 5th century/early 6th century Britain and attempt to fit our preferred Arthur model into it.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 07, 2017, 09:53:57 PM
Well, at least that drops us having to consider Geoffrey of Monmouth or Chretien of Troyes. No more Camelot :)
Geoffrey's source, however, should be considered, as some useful information appears to shine through Geoffrey's enthusiastic but possibly muddled account.
In particular, we can also look at Geoffrey of Monmouth's Arthurian campaigns, because these provide enough features to create a 'track' and give us a 'plot' for various sites. Arthur is 'invested with the royal insignia' in IX.1. In IX.2-3 he marches on York and besieges a Saxon leader named Colgrim there, learns of the arrival (by sea) of a fresh Saxon force, is reinforced by 15,000 troops from Brittany and inflicts a severe defeat on the Saxons near 'Caerludoit', which leads the latter to take refuge in 'Caledon Wood'. The latter distinctly suggests Caledonia as the venue, so we are in Bonnie Scotland, and specifically the central part. The Saxons who came form Germany yield up their plunder and promise to leave for home and send tribute in future.
As IX.3 moves to IX.4, the freed Saxons repent of the bargain they made and Geoffrey has them change course in mid-voyage (across the North Sea) and put in to, of all places, Totnes (not the obvious destination for a fleet off the eastern coast of England). This puts them conveniently near Bath for the Battle of
Mons Badonicus in which Arthur, Excalibur and Ron inflict a smashing defeat on the Saxons, whereupon in IX.5-6 Arthur takes up campaigning in Albany (Scotland), freeing Alclud (Strathclyde) and moving on to Moray in the north, where he besieges 'Picts and Scots' at Loch Lomond. While he has the latter by the Trossachs, an Irish army under 'Gilmaurius' arrives by sea and is duly trounced by Arthur (and presumably Excalibur and Ron). Arthur then takes the surrender of the 'Scots and Picts', mops up in Scotland and returns to York for Christmas.
We can readily spot the anomaly: the entire campaign, bar the intermission supposedly around Bath, takes place in Scotland. Arthur's track goes York-'Caerludoit'-Caledon Wood-
Mons Badonicus-Alclud-Moray-Loch Lomond. Apart from a single backtrack to relieve Alclud (Strathclyde), the campaign has a natural progression
if Mons Badonicus is actually in Scotland. Superimposing this on a map of Scotland gives us the interesting feature that the mountainous area of
Badenoch is very close to Moray and Loch Lomond. That kind of coincidence deserves a second look.
Geoffrey has Cador,
Dux of Cornwall, conduct his post-
Mons Badonicus pursuit across the length and breadth of England, ending up at Thanet. The Saxons he hunts (after cutting off their retreat by seizing their boats) are described as fleeing to 'secret hiding-places in the woods', 'mountains' and 'caves in the hills', which are partly but not wholly consistent with the topography of southern England whereas they accord perfectly with that of Scotland.
This approach may give us a further line of enquiry when attempting to pin down Arthurian geography. Camelot, for example, can be retrieved from the bards like a badly-gnawed bone and seen to be Camulodunum by a similar examination of Arthur's last campaign (which Geoffrey also arbitrarily diverts to the West Country, but there are sufficient traces in his account to reconstruct its true course).
remember that there is Arthur's seat outside Edinburgh
but there's a nice list of places with Arthurian connections here. It is probably not definitive, there are doubtless more
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locations_associated_with_Arthurian_legend
Well, I think we should be clear about what is in and out of scope. A couple of posts ago we were up for excluding all but "period" sources - which I presuming are those pre 10th century, as everyone seems to accept Nennius. Geoffrey of Monmouth is 12th century and therefore logically out. If we start saying that Geoffrey of Monmouth had real traditional Welsh sources, then why do we exclude other parts of Welsh tradition, like the Red Book of Hergest or the Triads? Geoffrey is no less strewn with fantastical elements.
It is possible that there are multiple Arthurs in the mix, not necessarily contemporary with one another. A Northern Arthur from the British kingdoms in what is now Southern Scotland and Northern England. A Western Arthur who hails from Cornwall, has bases in Cornwall and South Wales and fights his battles in what is now South West England. Geoffrey has mixed these, so he has Arthur back and forth. None of this is new really. Short of writing another "the real Arthur revealed" alternative history, we are very short of reality to pin this to. Roy and Dave i think have the better approach. Construct plausible military/political/social contexts and place a great hero leader in one of them. A hero so renowned other men may have been named for him and their deeds later confused with his.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 08, 2017, 10:26:27 AM
Quotere Baydon...its obviously another rabbit hole and although we cannot pour over maps forever in the vain hope of picking 'the one' by approaching the challenge with a holistic view we can perhaps use mapping along with the other evidence. eg if we propose that Badon was late 5th and we analyse patterns of burials/inhabitation and we look at roman roads plus hills/hillforts/topography and then we apply any written detail then we can make a reasonable suggestion.
It would be useful if Baydon had evidence of refortification in the appropriate period. Any work been done on that that we know of?
I still suspect, alas, that all we can do using dave's methodology is identify the more plausible candidates or areas to search. After that, we can generate a rough political/military framework of what late 5th century/early 6th century Britain and attempt to fit our preferred Arthur model into it.
Not sure re the first point Anthony, I might try and do some (ahem) digging to see whats been done in the area recently-ish
re the second point....yes. Work from the bottom up. Start with what we know is concrete...try a postulation. Add succeeding layers of less concrete stuff/more suppositional reasoning and see if the theory still holds water. This will still generate a myriad of ideas and theories but it grounds you in what you know.
Thats one of the reasons why I ascribe to the '2 arthurs/leaders' theory and the '2-time' framework of SR/AS warfare. Its also relatively easy to see how a rolled up singular leader might then subsequently be attributed to part or all of the battles/areas etc that may be linked with 2 time frames.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 08, 2017, 12:44:00 PM
Quote from: Erpingham on January 07, 2017, 09:53:57 PM
Well, at least that drops us having to consider Geoffrey of Monmouth or Chretien of Troyes. No more Camelot :)
inflicts a severe defeat on the Saxons near 'Caerludoit', which leads the latter to take refuge in 'Caledon Wood'. The latter distinctly suggests Caledonia as the venue, so we are in Bonnie Scotland, and specifically the central part.
Everybody follows the same rabbit hole for this one. Its not as clear cut as everyone imagines (possibly). I am for a moment pausing on one aspect of place name chasing which I gave up some time ago as a singular means of pinpointing a battlesite although can support a holistically reasoned choice using multi supporting evidence. :)
Cat Coit Caledon/Celidon
Cat = normally 'battle'
Coit = normally 'wood'
so no gremlins there potentially
Caledon/Celidon......could be related to Caledonia ie very Northern Britain
but if we dissect the name into potential components (assuming it doesnt relate to Caledonia) we could end up with:
Cal(d) a prefix for cold from old English or Cal a prefix for hot from Latin!
i/e = y in Brythonic = the/of the
don = hill or valley or even fort
so we could have cold fort, cold valley, cold hill (or hot!). Interestingly we have many Caldecotts/Caldicots/Caldecots and are normally associated with Roman roads and possibly refer to Roman shelters/way stations (one interpretation) so the root word isnt terribly far away (if we are playing the game :) )
admitedly its a mish mash of different root words but the (Historia Brittonum) reference is from the 9th century and plenty of time for this to happen (as has happened elsewhere!)
another possibility is
Cil rather than Cel/Cal
In this instance the cil is a 'corner' or refuge so becomes possibly
valley/hill/fort refuge/retreat
taking it even further (I did say this was a rabbit hole on what appears to be the simplest of the battles - if we accept them at face value mind!)
if we take Cil and then actually use don to refer to the old Welsh/Brithonic goddess (and consort of Bile and incidently also in Irish Dana) we could end up with
refuge or shelter of (the Goddess) Don which with a squinty eye you could rearrange to say the (fortified) shelter of (the goddess) Don which could be construed as Doncaster (Don Caestra)
layer upon layer :)
I think Holly's last post shows one problem with trying to use place names as a guide to the period. Frankly they're that flexible, offer so many options, that you might be better off just working backwards from Geoffrey of Monmouth
I hate to say it, because I'd love to see a decent history of 'Arthur' and 'sub-Roman Britain' but frankly the currently accepted method of writing this history seems to follow the following process.
1) Decide on what the history of the period is.
2) Write it, using as sources everything that supports you, up to and including 17th and 18th century antiquarians.
3) Reinterpret as many sources as possible to they support you.
4)Trash those that don't.
:-[
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 08, 2017, 03:31:36 PM
I think Holly's last post shows one problem with trying to use place names as a guide to the period. Frankly they're that flexible, offer so many options, that you might be better off just working backwards from Geoffrey of Monmouth
I hate to say it, because I'd love to see a decent history of 'Arthur' and 'sub-Roman Britain' but frankly the currently accepted method of writing this history seems to follow the following process.
1) Decide on what the history of the period is.
2) Write it, using as sources everything that supports you, up to and including 17th and 18th century antiquarians.
3) Reinterpret as many sources as possible to they support you.
4)Trash those that don't.
:-[
not far off Jim :)
like I said the best way way is ground up......ie what can we reasonably prove happened from available evidence and then interpret from there and add in other more conjectural stuff
it does tend to hamstring the 'Ive found a place name but not done much background work' peeps but that's not to say they arent right (well obviously not ALL of them ;) ) its just the methodology is a bit wonky
years ago I was as guilty of this as the next man. My 'ooh ooh' Arthurian placename moment came after pouring over maps and found that Bassaleg (just up the road from Caerleon and next to a crossing point of a tributary river) had a Maes Arthur and A Graig y Saeson next to it. It
could be the Battle of (the river) Bassas as mentioned in Nennius but doesnt necessarily fit together with a coherent story based upon known and reliable facts. Interestingly (giving the rabbit hole a good prodding for one moment) Bassaleg is possibly a derivative of Basilica (and either Alectus or legionnis suffixing onto it). If the battle of Bassas river is real and that the placename given to it is reasonably accurate it could mean battle of the river by the dirty great (Roman) church or meeting place!
Quote from: Erpingham on January 08, 2017, 01:07:46 PM
Well, I think we should be clear about what is in and out of scope. A couple of posts ago we were up for excluding all but "period" sources - which I presuming are those pre 10th century, as everyone seems to accept Nennius. Geoffrey of Monmouth is 12th century and therefore logically out. If we start saying that Geoffrey of Monmouth had real traditional Welsh sources, then why do we exclude other parts of Welsh tradition, like the Red Book of Hergest or the Triads? Geoffrey is no less strewn with fantastical elements.
I am quite happy to forget his Welsh 'sources', but his campaign narratives seem to follow solid geography and to be based on something more contemporary to actual events. These are what interest me, and I consider them 'period sources' because that is where they seem to originate before passing through Geoffrey's hot little hands. Remember that much of his material does not originate with him: he is just the means of its preservation (and in some cases distortion).
Quote
It is possible that there are multiple Arthurs in the mix, not necessarily contemporary with one another. A Northern Arthur from the British kingdoms in what is now Southern Scotland and Northern England. A Western Arthur who hails from Cornwall, has bases in Cornwall and South Wales and fights his battles in what is now South West England. Geoffrey has mixed these, so he has Arthur back and forth.
I do not think so: if that were the case, sooner or later his multiple Arthurs would be turning up in two and threes to the same event, perhaps even to fight each other. ;) Rather, Geoffrey seems to be following Jim's model, deciding what his history is and adapting his sources to suit. I think we can disentangle one or two of the adaptations, however.
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 08, 2017, 03:31:36 PM
I think Holly's last post shows one problem with trying to use place names as a guide to the period. Frankly they're that flexible, offer so many options, that you might be better off just working backwards from Geoffrey of Monmouth
Agreed: forget trying to etymologise place names in isolation. Do so only if they crop up as part of a coherent campaign in a source narrative, because then we have an independent geographical reason for zeroing in on them and if there is a match then it is actually supportive of something potentially useful rather than just another hole in the warren.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 08, 2017, 09:46:56 PM
Agreed: forget trying to etymologise place names in isolation. Do so only if they crop up as part of a coherent campaign in a source narrative, because then we have an independent geographical reason for zeroing in on them and if there is a match then it is actually supportive of something potentially useful rather than just another hole in the warren.
correct....the deepest rabbit hole of all Patrick. Interestingly its why there is so much time and effort trying to place Badon. Its a battle (the only one mentioned specifically by name) spoken about by Gildas so is roughly contemporary (ie known by people in his lifetime even if he wasnt around himself at the time). If we can pinpoint that one we have a loose narrative and timeframe to wrap around it and thus with archaeological evidence could start to piece a few things together. It's a calibration point in an otherwise flexible data line
QuoteI do not think so: if that were the case, sooner or later his multiple Arthurs would be turning up in two and threes to the same event, perhaps even to fight each other. ;)
Not sure I follow the reasoning here. You're actual problem is one Arthur is everywhere, either because one of the prototypes was or to give a bit of class to a battle in which didn't have a bankable star. A knock on effect is all battles involving him must fit in a period of maybe 50 years, when in reality they could cover hundreds. Now, I don't think I would take this argument fully to its conclusions (otherwise I'd be writing yet another "the real Arthur" book) but it is something to recall, especially when dealing with Geoffrey of Monmouth, who reshapes a ragbag of old stories into a pseudo-historical narrative.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 09, 2017, 08:54:14 AM
QuoteI do not think so: if that were the case, sooner or later his multiple Arthurs would be turning up in two and threes to the same event, perhaps even to fight each other. ;)
Not sure I follow the reasoning here. You're actual problem is one Arthur is everywhere, either because one of the prototypes was or to give a bit of class to a battle in which didn't have a bankable star. A knock on effect is all battles involving him must fit in a period of maybe 50 years, when in reality they could cover hundreds. Now, I don't think I would take this argument fully to its conclusions (otherwise I'd be writing yet another "the real Arthur" book) but it is something to recall, especially when dealing with Geoffrey of Monmouth, who reshapes a ragbag of old stories into a pseudo-historical narrative.
Good point.
When evaluating one, 2 or 3 Arthur type leaders and also looking at the potential geographical battle sites (rabbit holes aside for one moment), we must remember that it is entirely possible that the timespan is, as you say, much longer than soem would credit or at least think through. If for instance we say that a singular Arthur type person fought 12 battles in one year and there were all over the British Isles then its difficult to rationalise. However, some people have taken this to an extreme and used it to 'reject' hypotheses about potential battlesites - battle 2 cant be here and battle 3 here etc etc because he wouldnt have time to blah blah...etc
If we look at it in terms of generations of warfare - even accepting one Arthur type person over his floruit of say 20 years that is more than enough to fight 12 battles all over Britain (if that is indeed the case). Add on top of that the potential for multi-Arthur type leaders and we suddenly are looking at potentially 50 + years (or indeed several centuries possibly).
We have to look at the evidence with a holistic view but also through the eye of a person from that time period and be prepared to think on a wider horizon of events. It
may bring you back to a hypothesis of a single chap with only a few years of campaigning but we need to assess the bigger picture before zeroing in to (try to) achieve granularity
Quote from: Holly on January 09, 2017, 10:09:33 AM
We have to look at the evidence with a holistic view but also through the eye of a person from that time period and be prepared to think on a wider horizon of events. It may bring you back to a hypothesis of a single chap with only a few years of campaigning but we need to assess the bigger picture before zeroing in to (try to) achieve granularity
Assuming 'granularity' means focus, yes, by all means.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 09, 2017, 08:54:14 AM
QuoteI do not think so: if that were the case, sooner or later his multiple Arthurs would be turning up in two and threes to the same event, perhaps even to fight each other. ;)
Not sure I follow the reasoning here. You're actual problem is one Arthur is everywhere, either because one of the prototypes was or to give a bit of class to a battle in which didn't have a bankable star.
I think we need to separate assumed fact from assumed fiction here. If we had the one-true-Arthur who became the prototype for a host of imitations, then there was still only the one-true-Arthur. If there were a number of chaps named Arthur around at the same time, some or all of them would have met ("I'm Arthur." "No, I'm Arthur." etc. like the scene from Spartacus, perhaps with: "You show me your Excalibur and I'll show you mine."). If there was a sequence of Arthurs, one would expect an occasional hint about some not being in the same class as their namesake.
I also think we need to avoid assuming that every fresh generation of Celtic legend is a new or different Arthur rather than another reworking of the original. Arthur seems to have been a sort of talisman to later Celtic minds, but in making him relevant to an audience of the day, the bards seem to have played fast and loose with geography even more than history. The result is numerous false echoes on the radar screen because of this 'backscatter'.
As Dave points out, Arthur's list of battles is not unreasonable for one man: they did vary in size and scope, and the Mons Badonicus campaign (York to Loch Lomond) disposes of three in a single year, which leaves nine for the rest of his reign. Geoffrey's diversion to the West Country, which does stretch marching capability and credulity, would, as I have mentioned, appear to be unfounded.
We seem to be in general agreement that Geoffrey of Monmouth is perhaps not the best judge of history. My interest lies in his sources, especially those used for 'Arthur's' campaigns. Dave's emphasis on archaeology is very useful - essential really - for mapping out a context of the historical ebb and flow of Saxon influence and incursions and hence putting approximate borders on our Arthur's
floruit period and perhaps geography.
In all of this, we should be aware that 'Arthur' might not have been known as 'Arthur' to contemporaries, at least not officially. The name would of course have to have become affixed or associated in some way during his lifetime. The Latin 'Artorius' apparently means 'ploughman', so I suspect a cognomen hinting either at humble origins or at the restoration of tillage to the land. The Celtic 'Artos' indicates one as strong as a bear, and would suggest a man formidable in war and battle, but may equally be a cognomen rather than the actual name of the individual.
For comparison, 'Uther' means 'terrible' in Celtic. This I feel has to be a cognomen (or an indication of very cruel parents ...). It looks as if following Ambrosius Aurelianus the overall ruler of the day went down through history known only by his cognomen, which may be why we find no mention of their names in Nennius, Bede or Gildas.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 09, 2017, 12:05:38 PM
, which may be why we find no mention of their names in Nennius, Bede or Gildas.
Also, as has been said by many, Gildas was writing a tract, not a school textbook, and would have assumed that his readers were familiar with recent history. In the same way as if I was to say on a forum somewhere "Soviet prestige declined after the Cuban missile crisis" I probably wouldn't bother to add "under the leadership of Kruschev"
Quote from: Erpingham on January 07, 2017, 09:59:13 AM
[Narrative of Arthur controlling wide-flung territories]
Does this fit our other sources and the archaeology?
Well it certainly fits "Arthur fought against them, with all the Kings of the Britons, though he himself was Dux Bellorum". Gildas also speaks as if of a fairly unified British culture and institutions.
If we see Arthur as someone defending the dregs of the Roman order against barbarians then he would obviously have seen the unified Roman province as a model.
That said, in my view Arthur probably wasn't in practice the ruler of a unitary state, more like an extremely powerful magnate who controlled a lot of territory across the Island, and wielded a lot of informal influence by virtue of his ability to beat the Saxons. We might look for parallels in the Angevins, who held a lot of piecemeal territories all over Europe, the Anglo Saxon "Bretwaldaship" or the modern day Americans with their unofficial influence and scattered army bases.
Quote from: eques on January 09, 2017, 01:00:25 PM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 09, 2017, 12:05:38 PM
, which may be why we find no mention of their names in Nennius, Bede or Gildas.
Also, as has been said by many, Gildas was writing a tract, not history, and would have assumed that his readers were familiar with recent history. In the same way as if I was to say "Soviet prestige declined after the Cuban missile crisis" I probably wouldn't bother to add "under the leadership of Kruschev"
true although he does go to great lengths to denigrate others in his diatribe of contemporary leaders so why not specifically mention the commander(s) for the generation warfare previously (or perhaps he does). It could be that the leader of Badon (and the other battles he mentions in generality) is several different people or that he does not know and is sermonising generally. Another possibility is that he has taken the history of the recent (ie 44 years ago) and jumbled it up with the history of 100+ years ago. After all he states that the Antonine Wall and Hadrians Wall were built 150-200 years before his time and not the 400ish years they actually were. Its possibly a bit unrealistic to think this however. OR, maybe, he actually mentions Ambrosius Aurelianus in one passage as taking up arms against the Saxons and then in the next passage just goes on to mention the two and fro of the warfare. By inference, the leader of Badon
could be AA
I think he would have named names where he felt it added to his point, but would not necessarily feel the need to rigourously document everyone.
And yes he is frustratingly ambiguous as to Ambrosius' involvment in Badon.
If I remember correctly there are some phrases in Gildas that can be taken (with a bit of creative interpreting) as references to an Arthur "spawn of the bear" or something along those lines.
Quote from: eques on January 09, 2017, 02:00:15 PM
I think he would have named names where he felt it added to his point, but would not necessarily feel the need to rigourously document everyone.
And yes he is frustratingly ambiguous as to Ambrosius' involvment in Badon.
If I remember correctly there are some phrases in Gildas that can be taken (with a bit of creative interpreting) as references to an Arthur "spawn of the bear" or something along those lines.
Gildas has a rant at 2 kings that could be referenced to a potential Arthur. First there is Cuneglasse (Cuneglas):
"And thou too, Cuneglasse, why art thou fallen into the filth of thy former naughtiness, yea,
since the very first spring of thy tender youth, thou bear, thou rider and ruler of many, and guider of the
chariot which is the receptacle of the bear, thou contemner of God, and vilifier of his order, thou tawny
butcher, as in the Latin tongue thy name signifies."
the other is Maglocune (Maelgwyn):
"And likewise, O thou dragon of the island, who hast deprived many tyrants, as well of their
kingdoms as of their lives,.......Maglocune........Why dost thou show
thyself unto the King of kings (who hath made thee as well in kingdom as in stature of body higher
than almost all the other chiefs of Britain)...... Didst not thou, in the
very beginning of thy youth, terribly oppress with sword, spear, and fire, the king thine uncle, together
with his courageous bands of soldiers"
I think from the point of view of being Arthur, both Cuneglas and Maelgwyn are based too far to the west
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 09, 2017, 05:42:44 PM
I think from the point of view of being Arthur, both Cuneglas and Maelgwyn are based too far to the west
all depends on which Arthur we are talking about - 1,2 or 3
when Gildas is writing, its around 540AD - ish so potentially too late for either of the 2 kings to be a Badon personality since Gildas infers its 44 years since that event. From a timing perspective, therefore, they are too late for an Arthur 1 (450AD ish - Adventus Saxunum) or Arthur 2 (500AD ish - Badon) but could be a candidate for Arthur 3 (Gildas's ruin). Gildas annoyingly doesnt mention some of the British leaders from further afield (eg Elmet) which could mean any number of things - they werent important enough, they werent 'naughty' enough (to get a mention) or they had 'switched sides' and were allied with the Saxons (not as far fetched as you may think). He does seem to infer that Maelgwyn is an overlord of some description and so he may be a King in North Wales but also control further afield via Sub-Reguli
My suspicion is that in what we now think of as England, the 'military' was probably pretty 'Germanic' whatever language they spoke. After all there'd been Foederate in place for over a century, and regular units would have a fair Germanic influence.
As the formal forces broke down you would probably see them replaced by local leaders with a comitas recruited from good fighters, some of whom might have even lived locally before they joined
I'm not convinced that by 500 that there would be too much difference in fighting style between the infantry on both sides.
The Britons probably had more horsemen who were confident enough to fight mounted
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 09, 2017, 09:12:58 PM
My suspicion is that in what we now think of as England, the 'military' was probably pretty 'Germanic' whatever language they spoke. After all there'd been Foederate in place for over a century, and regular units would have a fair Germanic influence.
As the formal forces broke down you would probably see them replaced by local leaders with a comitas recruited from good fighters, some of whom might have even lived locally before they joined
I'm not convinced that by 500 that there would be too much difference in fighting style between the infantry on both sides.
The Britons probably had more horsemen who were confident enough to fight mounted
good shout on the 1st element Jim and I think a pretty good summary for what we might expect. Fighting styles is more difficult to ascertain but if we accept that both sides might be employing degenerate Later Roman type combat then again probably not far from the truth. Cavalry is a really difficult one to estimate, how much and till when for the Sub Romans/early Welsh?
Quote from: Holly on January 09, 2017, 10:42:07 PM
Cavalry is a really difficult one to estimate, how much and till when for the Sub Romans/early Welsh?
And how much more, and more important, would they be if the traditional cavalry area around Camulodunum was available to our 'Arthur'?
By the way, in Latin the name 'Uther', if understood as 'uter' (there is no 'uth-' in Latin, unless pronounced by a Celt) means 'bag' or, perhaps indicatively, 'wineskin'.
Quote from: Holly on January 09, 2017, 03:54:33 PM
Gildas has a rant at 2 kings that could be referenced to a potential Arthur.
Promising ...
Unless, given his reference to
obsessionis badonici montis (the siege of Mons Badonicus) as something clearly in the past and contemporary with his own birth, he is writing after the demise of Arthur*, as seems likely from his diatribes against various 'kings' who appear to be local rulers whereas if writing under Arthur* we might expect him to be fulminating against (or grudgingly praising) the one man leading or governing the whole country.
*
This would presumably be Dave's 'Arthur 2'.Quote from: Holly on January 09, 2017, 08:56:15 PM
when Gildas is writing, its around 540AD - ish so potentially too late for either of the 2 kings to be a Badon personality since Gildas infers its 44 years since that event.
The 44 years is actually between the first Saxon landing under Gurthrigern (Vortigern) and
Mons Badonicus.
"... until the year of
obsessionis badonici montis, when took place also the last almost, though not the least
slaughter of our cruel foes, which was (as I am sure) forty-four years and one month after the landing
of the Saxons, and also the time of my own nativity." -
De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae 26
Gildas' own age at the time of writing is unclear, but his general tone suggests the cantankerousness of old age rather than the idealism of youth. This would put him at least one, and perhaps two, generations after 'Arthur' had gone to his final resting-place.
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 09, 2017, 05:42:44 PM
I think from the point of view of being Arthur, both Cuneglas and Maelgwyn are based too far to the west
An article by Ken Dark (https://www.reading.ac.uk/web/files/GCMS/RMS-2000-04_K._Dark,_A_Famous_Arthur_in_the_Sixth_Century.pdf) points out that all the known 6th-7th century Arthurs have Irish connections, and raises the possibility (no more than that) that the proto-Arthur for whom they are all named may perhaps have been Irish. So perhaps Cuneglas and Maelgwyn aren't "too far west" at all :)
QuoteAnd how much more, and more important, would they be if the traditional cavalry area around Camulodunum was available to our 'Arthur'?
Incidentally, other than later tradition, is there anything that particularly associates Arthur with cavalry? Happy to accept that a leader at this time had a cavalry-based household, but I think we should be careful not to incorporate too much later tradition to this (e.g. the appearance of Arthur's "knights" as cataphracts) or to over-emphasise Arthur's cavalry as extraordinary.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 10, 2017, 10:03:43 AM
QuoteAnd how much more, and more important, would they be if the traditional cavalry area around Camulodunum was available to our 'Arthur'?
Incidentally, other than later tradition, is there anything that particularly associates Arthur with cavalry? Happy to accept that a leader at this time had a cavalry-based household, but I think we should be careful not to incorporate too much later tradition to this (e.g. the appearance of Arthur's "knights" as cataphracts) or to over-emphasise Arthur's cavalry as extraordinary.
I think people get far too hung up on trying to come up with an historical root for the Knights of the legends. Quite clearly in the Middle Ages the Knight was the social and military Rolls Royce of warriors so of course medieval romanticists would make Arthur's immediate circle into Knights (the Arthur of Medieval legends has all the other high medieval accoutrements too - Court, Queen, Castles, hunting, monks, minstrels and so on)
That said, the historical "Arthur" and his immediate retinue probably were mounted, if only to get around the battlefield more quickly. He also undoubtedly had a close knit band of trusted associates, as most leaders do. They may even have sometimes sat around a table!
All the talk of cataphracts, though, is trying to be a bit too literal IMO.
Its an open question about the nature of warfare in the 'Arthurian' period. The Cattraeth poem looks like convincing evidence that the Britons fought mounted, or at least had a class of aristocrats who had a mounted comitatus. The evidence of the Aberlemno stone, if it describes Nechtansmere and the description of the Northumbrian Angles as sending out a mounted expedition looks to be evidence for Pictish and Northumbrian cavalry. The Repton stone shows a mounted warrior. Most of that is rather later evidence. Some years ago , Peter Bone, I think, put a ring case that damage to grave found spears and skeletons showed that the early A/S were fencing with spears, that they had rather smaller diameter shields than was thought and that there was a loose and open style of warfare, that perhaps closed up when the Vikings arrived.
Its plausible that the Britons had forces that comprised landlords with their buccelarii, hired Irish and Germanic foederati and low quality British infantry who garrisoned towns or hillforts. Add to this a few herdsmen with slings and javelins and you have an acceptable wargames army.........and that is, of course the elephant in the room of much research.
Roy
All in all, it looks as if we are happy with the basic concept of cavalry being a significant part of our Arthur's army. Assuming he still utilised elements of Roman tradition, his mounted troops would presumably have been comitatenses, based around his capital, while his infantry would have been a mixed bag predominantly of limitanei and their improvised successors, the good infantry having previously emigrated to the continent under Maximus Magnus, Constantius III, etc. If so, then the 15,000 troops from Brittany who join him in Geoffrey's account of the York-Mons Badonicus-Loch Lomond campaign might have made up a deficiency in good infantry and even acted as the arm of decision in hilly/mountainous country.
The arrival of this particular reinforcement seems to tell us two things about Arthur: he was a capable general, who saw what was needed to make his army fully effective in non-open terrain and he was of a stature and diplomatic ability that allowed him to make an alliance with the ruler(s) of Brittany and obtain a useful force therefrom. If he truly planned this acquisition of force and the extent of the campaign that followed, i.e. taking it all the way to a decisive defeat of the enemy in a single season (if a fairly long one), my respect for him as a general goes up a couple of notches. It may be noteworthy that the Bretons joined him following the capture of York, when the fighting shifted from relatively open country to fairly close country much of the way. This would suggest he timed their arrival for when he foresaw he would be needing them, and not a moment earlier. Interesting, as it suggests that in open country his cavalry plus assumed grab-bag infantry were capable of meeting and beating the Saxons and that in closed country this did not hold true against Scots or Saxons.
I think he would have had some cavalry at his disposal as per most armies in our period, and that these were likely to be the ones wealthy enough to afford a horse.
My impression of the "siege" of Badon is that it started off as a fairly minor, localised affair with one of the sides trapped on a mountain by the other. This gradually escalated until it had sucked in pretty much all the soldiers on both sides throughout the region/province. At this point "Arthur" pulled off some sort of spectacular coup (Nennius' charge that slew 960 men perhaps). The resultant destruction of the flower of Saxon youth is what led to Gildas' 30 year hiatus, and what made the victory so famous.
Getting even further into the realms of historical fiction, I would guess that it was the Britons trapped on the hill, being the survivors of some sort of surprise Saxon offensive in the style of Guthrum's winter attack on Wessex 300 years later. Again, the reversal of fortune represented by the British victory would add to its fame.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 10, 2017, 12:31:08 PM
All in all, it looks as if we are happy with the basic concept of cavalry being a significant part of our Arthur's army. Assuming he still utilised elements of Roman tradition, his mounted troops would presumably have been comitatenses, based around his capital, while his infantry would have been a mixed bag predominantly of limitanei and their improvised successors, the good infantry having previously emigrated to the continent under Maximus Magnus, Constantius III, etc. If so, then the 15,000 troops from Brittany who join him in Geoffrey's account of the York-Mons Badonicus-Loch Lomond campaign might have made up a deficiency in good infantry and even acted as the arm of decision in hilly/mountainous country.
Cavalry were probably militarily significant, if only because the elite who could afford armour, swords and time for hanging out with other elites could afford horses too. The QRF of any polity at this time probably consisted of mounted warriors, backed up with various militias and federates when their was more time to prepare. However, I'm not sure anything as organised as
comitanses were available to any side at the end of the 5th century. Other than back-projecting Geoffrey of Monmouth, is there any evidence for this?
Having rejected GoM as a reliable source for the details of 5th century warfare, I am unlikely to think of the recruiting of huge armies in Brittany and marching them to Scotland as anything other than fantasy. The idea of an army of 15,000 in this period seems extreme, having the logistical capability to support those troops on campaign needing serious suspension of disbelief. Let alone having a fleet able to lift 15,000 troops from the continent and deposit them "somewhere in Britannia". This would be a stretch in Geoffrey's own time (and for much of the Middle Ages).
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 10, 2017, 09:03:32 AM
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 09, 2017, 05:42:44 PM
I think from the point of view of being Arthur, both Cuneglas and Maelgwyn are based too far to the west
An article by Ken Dark (https://www.reading.ac.uk/web/files/GCMS/RMS-2000-04_K._Dark,_A_Famous_Arthur_in_the_Sixth_Century.pdf) points out that all the known 6th-7th century Arthurs have Irish connections, and raises the possibility (no more than that) that the proto-Arthur for whom they are all named may perhaps have been Irish. So perhaps Cuneglas and Maelgwyn aren't "too far west" at all :)
indeed! interestingly Vorteporious/Vortipor/Vortigern in in Old Welsh money is also potentially Guortepir map Aircol (Aircol being a derivation from the latin name Agricola). In Irish pedigrees this translates to Gartbuir mac Alchoil
Gartbuir looks squintingly like Arthur (h and b a penstroke away)
"guider of the
chariot which is the receptacle of the bear"
Could imply some sort of past association with Arthur rather than that Cuneglass is Arthur himself. Could even be a mafia-style insult "You started off as Arthur's chauffeur!"
This would fit the timeline of Gildas writing in the generation after Badon.
Quote from: eques on January 10, 2017, 03:48:48 PM
"guider of the chariot which is the receptacle of the bear"
Could imply some sort of past association with Arthur rather than that Cuneglass is Arthur himself. Could even be a mafia-style insult "You started off as Arthur's chauffeur!"
"You hijacked the chariot containing Arthur's ashes on its way back to Macedonia and hauled them off to your own satrapy!"
No, hang on, wrong semi-legendary general...
Quote from: aligern on January 10, 2017, 10:51:54 AM
Its an open question about the nature of warfare in the 'Arthurian' period. The Cattraeth poem looks like convincing evidence that the Britons fought mounted, or at least had a class of aristocrats who had a mounted comitatus. The evidence of the Aberlemno stone, if it describes Nechtansmere and the description of the Northumbrian Angles as sending out a mounted expedition looks to be evidence for Pictish and Northumbrian cavalry. The Repton stone shows a mounted warrior. Most of that is rather later evidence. Some years ago , Peter Bone, I think, put a ring case that damage to grave found spears and skeletons showed that the early A/S were fencing with spears, that they had rather smaller diameter shields than was thought and that there was a loose and open style of warfare, that perhaps closed up when the Vikings arrived.
Its plausible that the Britons had forces that comprised landlords with their buccelarii, hired Irish and Germanic foederati and low quality British infantry who garrisoned towns or hillforts. Add to this a few herdsmen with slings and javelins and you have an acceptable wargames army.........and that is, of course the elephant in the room of much research.
Roy
I agree Roy, what scant evidence we have does tend to show
some form of cavalry for the period(s) in question - how many and of what quality is another matter. Household troops based upon later Roman practices could be cavalry although numbers might be small. Having said that, small quantities of cavalry could make all the difference in battles where we could see only a few hundred per army.
re the wargames army you propose...seems perfectly reasonable to me!
Quote from: Erpingham on January 10, 2017, 01:30:40 PM
Cavalry were probably militarily significant, if only because the elite who could afford armour, swords and time for hanging out with other elites could afford horses too. The QRF of any polity at this time probably consisted of mounted warriors, backed up with various militias and federates when their was more time to prepare. However, I'm not sure anything as organised as comitanses were available to any side at the end of the 5th century. Other than back-projecting Geoffrey of Monmouth, is there any evidence for this?
The concept would certainly have lingered and presumably also the Roman nomenclature, whether or not the organisation did. Hence, if reorganisation took place under a leader who knew his business and made things work, it would be a concept on which to base such activity.
QuoteI am unlikely to think of the recruiting of huge armies in Brittany and marching them to Scotland as anything other than fantasy. The idea of an army of 15,000 in this period seems extreme, having the logistical capability to support those troops on campaign needing serious suspension of disbelief. Let alone having a fleet able to lift 15,000 troops from the continent and deposit them "somewhere in Britannia".
Geoffrey (or his source) may or may not be right about the size, though I fail to see a shipping problem in this era, which in the afterglow of the Roman Empire still boasted a considerable amount of trade and hence requisitionable vessels to get them across the Channel. In a completely separate incident 'Riothamus' is said to have marched across the length, or at least breadth, of Gaul with a 12,000-strong army, so 15,000 does not seem to be an unreasonable total for the flower of Breton manpower.
The supply question is perhaps more pertinent, but our 'Arthur' would seem to be a good enough organiser in most things, so doubtless would have provided for this. We do note that his allies were not brought into play at the start of the campaign, but were introduced later, so some attention seems to have been paid to minimising the burden.
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 10, 2017, 03:52:57 PM
"You hijacked the chariot containing Arthur's ashes ...
Definitely not cricket. ;)
We are back to an old chestnut here, the survival of units and 'concepts' of the Roman army.
Troops have to have a suppirt system that feeds, equips and recruits them. The example that we have of the garrison of Patavis in the Life of St Severinus is that , once the money stopped coming the unit dispersed. Its possible that a commander would marry into the local landowning class and then be able to support a bodyguard, but this is most likely about 20 men as that would be an effective 'gang' for forcing peasants to pay up in kind
Limitanei might be a different matter if they had land rights that were dependent upon military service. However, they are likely to go native. If they belonged to a tribe...and were federates they would be much more likely to survive as an operating units t because they would have their own social structure and acknowledged leadership and succession plan. A more regular unit would not have that sort of social glue. Limitanei in Gaul answered Aetius call to resist Attila , so we can imagine that, like the Franks soldiers supporting themselves on state granted lands would keep up the habit of mustering in irder to retain the land rights. I would question, though, whether many are going to hang around in a fort on the wall when there is no imperial government. At least in Gaul in 450 you could assume that the Empire might push North again. In Britain imperial power will have seemed very remote indeed and there is a big difference between Hadrian's Wall and the Rhine limes, in that the Wall is in a poor area for agriculture with a much less hospitable climate. Only a money economy is going to keep troops there and because the Roman higher administration collapsed there was most likely no 'state' to run a cash economy.
agreed, there is a hand in hand reduction of available 'fighting' manpower from the mid 5th onwards due to a collapse of the monetary economy in Britain (although I believe there is anecdotal evidence that suggests some cash was transferred over to Britain beyond 410AD). A fracturing of the command and administrative system would also see a reduction in fighting manpower of regular units.
I am really not sure that talk of 15000 fighting troops is supportable in Britain in mid 5th C onwards is realistic therefore
Absolutely bang on Dave, People all too easily forget that 'Arthurian' Britain is very much about localism. Had the Britons managed to keep up their level of geographic organisation such as the Roman province, or nearly so, theywould have been nigh on unbeatable. However the fabric is rent and only small entities survive. Sometimes these statelets arevonly the size of counties. As I have reconstructed before, if the country is capable of supporting 10,000 armoured cavalry, then, when split into 40 entities each fields on average 250 men. That sort of fits with the number that rode to Cattraeth, to get to 300 ( which may be a magic number) and even then aid was sought from other petty states. Some knigdoms were bigger, but some such as Elmet were tiny. It is significant that none of the British kings is able to agglommerate territory in the way that Northumbria or Wessex, or eventually Mercia does. One presumes that is because no mechanism of Roman rule survives and that means no army, for with an army that still functioned a warlord could have declared himself emperor and coerced the civitates and tribal kings into line and built a larger force. Becaue the money economy has collapsed all troops had to have a relationship with the land and be directly fed and supported by it. That suited say a federate group thst wanted land to farm in return for service or the henchmen of a large lNdowner, but means very small units and I suppose that if the main task is holding a couple of walled towns, or keeping bandits away from villas then small units is all you need.
Roy
One thing that is distinctly notable is a drop in agricultural yields with the fall of the Empire. When we start getting some indicator of yields from Church and Carolingian accounts, we see vast areas, even of France, where land previously considered good struggled to return much more than 1.5 kilos harvested for each kilo of grain sown.
The land could no longer support the people it once did, and with the lack of iron implements the sheer number of workers needed meant that large estates barely fed themselves.
Quote from: aligern on January 11, 2017, 11:41:30 AM
Absolutely bang on Dave, People all too easily forget that 'Arthurian' Britain is very much about localism. Had the Britons managed to keep up their level of geographic organisation such as the Roman province, or nearly so, theywould have been nigh on unbeatable. However the fabric is rent and only small entities survive. Sometimes these statelets arevonly the size of counties. As I have reconstructed before, if the country is capable of supporting 10,000 armoured cavalry, then, when split into 40 entities each fields on average 250 men. That sort of fits with the number that rode to Cattraeth, to get to 300 ( which may be a magic number) and even then aid was sought from other petty states. Some knigdoms were bigger, but some such as Elmet were tiny. It is significant that none of the British kings is able to agglommerate territory in the way that Northumbria or Wessex, or eventually Mercia does. One presumes that is because no mechanism of Roman rule survives and that means no army, for with an army that still functioned a warlord could have declared himself emperor and coerced the civitates and tribal kings into line and built a larger force. Becaue the money economy has collapsed all troops had to have a relationship with the land and be directly fed and supported by it. That suited say a federate group thst wanted land to farm in return for service or the henchmen of a large lNdowner, but means very small units and I suppose that if the main task is holding a couple of walled towns, or keeping bandits away from villas then small units is all you need.
Roy
Well, the various political units could have federated at times in response to crises and invaders (in the same way the Ancient Greeks sometimes did). There would have been a shared language and culture. There may have been a sense that such a culture was under threat from invaders. There would have been supranational religious societies and suchlike. They may have seem the incomers as a threat to their shared religion.
For me it is easy to envisage an Arthur figure rising to prominence as the most talented/vigorous General/Mercenary/Troubleshooter on behalf of the various shifting federations and alliances coming together against the Saxons. He may have been called in by the various political units individually if they thought that they were under threat (all this of course reflected in "....With all the Kings of the Britons, though he himself was Dux Bellorum"). Perhaps he then overreached himself and tried to Lord it over the Britons. Either way such Alliances would have been unstable, temporary and difficult to manage which explains why the subduing of the Saxons was only a historical blip.
As to manpower, again perhaps his talent was to recruit, organise and inspire men from across the Island and weld them together. Maybe "all the Kings of the Britons" brought their own troops and then "Arthur" co-ordinated them all in the style of the Duke of Marlborough. The troops would not necessarily need payment if they were defending their land or culture, or inspired by a charismatic leader. Even without levies you would still have the personal retinues of all the Magnates.
It is interesting to speculate on the Arthurian context but it is one where our perception of how Britain was organised colours our image of Arthur. Patrick's Arthur is commander of a sub-Roman state covering most (if not more) of the footprint of the 4th century Roman provinces, with all the structures and resources to campaign with large well-organised armies and large merchant fleets on tap. Harry and Roy (and doubtless others) see Arthur as part of a fragmented political landscape, where a few hundred cavalry are a significant force and bringing together anything sizeable is a major work of temporary alliance building. Arthur thus is a powerful warlord who can weld these alliance forces together, rather than an imperial governor. I'd align myself broadly with the latter camp - I've already suggested that the original Arthur could have been a very charismatic and successful comitatus leader of perhaps one or more of the characters we know names of.
Can we know for sure? No. Does the evidence point in a direction? I would suggest fragmentation, population decline, drop in agricultural production, economic downturn do tend towards the fragmented/decayed model, even if the actual details are hazy.
We have to imagine a very complex process of collapse/partial recovery and collapse again of Roman and Sub Roman Britain. If we imagine that as central authority receeds, there is a potential realignment of local rulers based on the civitas (a parallel of the Greek city states but possibly without the city!) which has been mentioned previously (Roy/Duncan). Its possible that we could have larger administrative areas based on the late Roman dioceses but as time marches on these will be under enormous pressure to fragment due to lack of a fully functioning monetary system and then we are potentially back to civitas structures again.
As Roy and Jim point out, yields for farming are attested to drop (although interestingly Gildas refers to a boon of foodstuffs etc around his time) and with no money and only small areas to potentially defend (against each other in reality most of the time), large scale armies are not required or indeed able to be supported. There is always the militia avenue but again referring to Gildas, there is the implied statement that Romano-british didnt defend themselves initially, ie they relied on external (or internal) mercenaries in effect. Whether these are limitani gone native or foederati/laeti or a mix of both is up for discussion. Local magnates will then hire or inspire loyal followers for personal retinues. It should be remembered that in the late 7th Century Ine of Wessex said that an army was 36 men or more!
Also we shouldnt think of monoglot groupings of people during the time period post the cessation of direct Rome Imperial control - there is the distinct possibility that different areas of Britain spoke different languages or were at least bi or polylingual. The further north or west you went, the less Romanised people became and the more likely to be moderatley pagan as well as preferring to NOT speak in Latin. On top of that you will have the usual leading citizens/town dwellers 'versus' the Pagensis or country-dwellers. On top of that (again) you will have pre-existing communities of 1/2/3/4 etc generation foederati/laeti/limitani who origins, culture and language would have added localised flavours to the landscape.
Therefore we cannot say that its (Sub) Romans vs Saxons as a linear statement as there are just too many layers of differences based upon geographical and cultural/racial lines. We shouldnt, for example, be surprised that we find apparently Sub Roman (Brythonic) sounding kings leading 'Saxon' warriors or kingdoms! With time, of course, as physical boundaries are pushed back and language and cultural identities become more uniform (especially towards the end of the 6th C), then it starts to become more of a 'us versus them' scenario.
Agree with Harry. There is a tendency to assume that one local leader's retinue (call it what you will) is all that will ever be fielded at one time, and one locality is all that will ever contribute to a campaign's supply. Once one gets a real leader who reunifies a realm, resources can be (and usually are) accumulated and focussed to produce much larger armies and supply systems, with everyone contributing a share.
In practically any society, free men are (or were) liable for military service. It came with the status: you can fight for your land and freedom (such as it is) or you can become someone else's victim or slave, your choice. In fact your leader usually made the choice for you, but it meant that under threat of invasion manpower was rarely a problem. Holding together sufficient trained manpower was, unless you build in a standing army or a warrior class. The latter is precisely what our sources think Brittany possessed at this period, courtesy of Conan Meriadoc and followers, so a substantial force from that quarter is not unreasonable.
Quote from: Holly on January 11, 2017, 11:12:42 AM
I am really not sure that talk of 15000 fighting troops is supportable in Britain in mid 5th C onwards is realistic therefore
Misses the point, Dave: these are actually 'borrowed' from
Brittany, and supported in Britain for
one campaign. During much of this campaign they would have been in a position to live off enemy territory. During the rest of the campaign, even the grudging yields of post-pagan Britain could sustain them for a month or two. They could then go home to a surplus accumulated while their mouths had been busy in this sceptred isle.
I have not found any clear mention of the size of Arthur's army in our sources (maybe have not looked closely enough) but Geoffrey's source (in IX.1) has him send Cador with 600 cavalry and 3,000 infantry to defeat defeat 6,000 Saxons under Badulf. Cador executed an ambush which more or less neutralised this force (equivalent to, say, 200 ships at 30 men per ship). The Saxons are then reinforced by the arrival of another 600 ships under Cheldric. Arthur feels unable to confront this force (presumably 18,000 men plus Badulf's survivors), withdraws and appeals to Hoel of Brittany for troops. Hoel gathers and sends 15,000 'armed warriors' to Southampton 'at the next fair wind'. Arthur now feels he can engage, does so and inflicts a smashing defeat and 6,000 losses on the enemy. Then follows the pursuit to 'Caledon Wood', the Saxon pseudo-surrender and the denouement at
Mons Badonicus.
Were we reading such an account in Ammianus, we would have no particular reason to question the numbers involved. The numbers given, and the actions noted for the participants in the face of existing enemy numbers, seem entirely logical. Arthur feels able to cope with 6,000 Saxons but not with 18000(+). He obtains 15,000 extra good-ish troops and now feels able and willing to engage the 18,000(+). He does so and defeats them.
We can thus postulate a minimum OB for Arthur of the 3,000 infantry and 600 cavalry sent with Cador to execute the ambush; it is likely that Arthur had more, but not so many more that he felt he could deal with 18-22,000 opponents. The addition of 15,000 good(ish) troops swings the balance the other way, presumably giving him at least numerical parity with his foes. One can thus surmise that his original army would have been in the region of 6-7,000 strong, perhaps more if the majority were low fighting value peasant draftees for the campaign.
We should perhaps remember that the Dark Ages were only just being invented and the feudal system had yet to be invented, so the only pattern for doing things was the Roman way. This itself depended upon
imperium and
auctoritas, which depended upon legitimacy or perceived legitimacy. With nobody wielding
imperium,
auctoritas functions only at the local level, as Roy, Dave and Jim candidly describe. Once you have someone with
imperium (Ambrosius, Uther, Arthur), then
auctoritas starts to function at the national level and larger forces and supply systems become possible, although as one can estimate from the above Brittany was probably still well ahead of Britain in that respect as of Gildas' birthdate. That may well have changed later, as 'Arthur' consolidated his control. Later generations seem to have viewed his reign as having bucked the otherwise prevailing trend towards scarcity amid regionalised degeneration.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 11, 2017, 01:57:43 PM
Agree with Harry. There is a tendency to assume that one local leader's retinue (call it what you will) is all that will ever be fielded at one time, and one locality is all that will ever contribute to a campaign's supply. Once one gets a real leader who reunifies a realm, resources can be (and usually are) accumulated and focussed to produce much larger armies and supply systems, with everyone contributing a share.
Indeed.
We need to remember we are probably talking about an exceptional figure here, one of the Great Commanders, not some fur-clad journeyman.
Quote from: eques on January 11, 2017, 04:47:22 PM
We need to remember we are probably talking about an exceptional figure here, one of the Great Commanders, not some fur-clad journeyman.
We are looking at a hero hailed as a national saviour. Not necessarily the same thing as "one of the Great Commanders" and unlikely to have been remembered and recorded in the same way.
If indeed he existed or indeed existed as several people all rolled into one glorious leader...
it does make a difference to the numbers and theatre of operations proposed. Early 5th, its still possible for armies to number in the thousands, mid to late 5th it becomes increasingly less so.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 11, 2017, 05:05:53 PM
We are looking at a hero hailed as a national saviour. Not necessarily the same thing as "one of the Great Commanders" and unlikely to have been remembered and recorded in the same way.
Point taken, Anthony, and I hope in return Harry's point about the gentleman in question being a national figure rather than some purely local entity is similarly accepted. :) He does conduct negotiations at what appears to be a national level in his appeal to Hoel for Breton troops.
Quote from: Holly on January 11, 2017, 10:43:08 PM
If indeed he existed or indeed existed as several people all rolled into one glorious leader...
He had to exist in order to start a legend of a glorious leader in the first place. Later generations may have attempted to hang their representatives on his coat-tails but this does not stop him from having existed and winning historically-attested battles to begin with.
I would be happier with scenarios that have a post Roman organisation by province or diocese if;
a) there was any indication of this happening elsewhere. In Gaul or Spain it appears that when Roman imperial authority was removed organisation defaulted to civitas ( city and surrounding territory ) level.
b) The Roman administration at the diocese or province level had any substance. There appear to have been very few civil servants and tax collection was the responsibility of the civitas or large landowners. Hence there was no systemic strength behind organisations above the civitas. Governors were appointed from the centre, there was no method or tradition for appointing them locally. No doubt civitates saw local interest as paramount and the removal of oppressive taxes as a blessing.
The other organisations that held things together were the army and the church. The army had commands and garrisons. It may be that most of the command structure departed with the legions. Even if it did not just go the army problem is that it has garrisons that are now settlers on the borders and federate allies, also settled beyond the borders and some internally. The organisation has list its field forces and most likely the ability to control them. When we had this same debate about northern Gaul I think it might have been Rodger who pointed out that Syagrius most likely controlled as far as his horsemen could ride in a day or two. Syagrius lijely started with an army and authority over federates and laeti...in Britain the army was withdrawn.
The church , in Gaul, provided leadership by city and had a wider organisation, though not one that could command military forces of more than one statelet to act together. Within one city the bishop had moral authority and some patronage and had the advantage that the nobility monopolised bishoprics so a bishop coupkd count on the support of the local wealthy.
Rome's weakness was that it had generally taken over areas organised by tribe or city and it moved to create a city within the tribal area so that the tribal territory could be taxed to support the army and its nobility 'civilised'. Wider organisations had not existed and no wider loyalties were created.bYou were a citizen of Rome and of your city, nothing in between had any active meaning. When the centre collapsed, localism ruled.
Patrick's construction based upon mediaeval romantic novels is fine fantasy and a campaign could be based upon it, as long as no one thinks that fleets of 200 ships or armies of 15000 men were really involved in Britain in the fifth century or later.
As an in eresting check, the sources of the time and the traditions surviving in the much later A/S chronicle have three ships arriving in Kent and the Solent, just as the Goddodin has 300 horsemen, as someone said 36 men is an army. Of course that does not mean that most armies were 36 men, it is a way of creating a limit for a potential crime....raise 36 men or more without royal assent and you can be accused of rebellion. That likely has a relationship to how many men an A/S king kept around him to defeat any coup.
Roy
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 11, 2017, 10:50:34 PM
Point taken, Anthony, and I hope in return Harry's point about the gentleman in question being a national figure rather than some purely local entity is similarly accepted. :) He does conduct negotiations at what appears to be a national level in his appeal to Hoel for Breton troops.
Only if you believe later sources, which you know I have difficulty with :)
Quote
Quote from: Holly on January 11, 2017, 10:43:08 PM
If indeed he existed or indeed existed as several people all rolled into one glorious leader...
He had to exist in order to start a legend of a glorious leader in the first place. Later generations may have attempted to hang their representatives on his coat-tails but this does not stop him from having existed and winning historically-attested battles to begin with.
I tend to agree that there was an original Arthur, around whom legends grew. However, I'm not convinced we can pinpoint him in the evidence. Where is he hiding in Gildas' narrative, for example? How many of Nennius' Arthurian battles featured the original Arthur? What part did he play in the Battle of Mons Badonicus, for example? I tend to think of him as the key commander there because of later tradition but Gildas doesn't mention him.
Quote from: aligern on January 12, 2017, 08:44:48 AM
I would be happier with scenarios that have a post Roman organisation by province or diocese if;
a) there was any indication of this happening elsewhere. In Gaul or Spain it appears that when Roman imperial authority was removed organisation defaulted to civitas ( city and surrounding territory ) level.
b) The Roman administration at the diocese or province level had any substance. There appear to have been very few civil servants and tax collection was the responsibility of the civitas or large landowners. Hence there was no systemic strength behind organisations above the civitas. Governors were appointed from the centre, there was no method or tradition for appointing them locally. No doubt civitates saw local interest as paramount and the removal of oppressive taxes as a blessing.
The other organisations that held things together were the army and the church. The army had commands and garrisons. It may be that most of the command structure departed with the legions. Even if it did not just go the army problem is that it has garrisons that are now settlers on the borders and federate allies, also settled beyond the borders and some internally. The organisation has list its field forces and most likely the ability to control them. When we had this same debate about northern Gaul I think it might have been Rodger who pointed out that Syagrius most likely controlled as far as his horsemen could ride in a day or two. Syagrius lijely started with an army and authority over federates and laeti...in Britain the army was withdrawn.
The church , in Gaul, provided leadership by city and had a wider organisation, though not one that could command military forces of more than one statelet to act together. Within one city the bishop had moral authority and some patronage and had the advantage that the nobility monopolised bishoprics so a bishop coupkd count on the support of the local wealthy.
Rome's weakness was that it had generally taken over areas organised by tribe or city and it moved to create a city within the tribal area so that the tribal territory could be taxed to support the army and its nobility 'civilised'. Wider organisations had not existed and no wider loyalties were created.bYou were a citizen of Rome and of your city, nothing in between had any active meaning. When the centre collapsed, localism ruled.
Patrick's construction based upon mediaeval romantic novels is fine fantasy and a campaign could be based upon it, as long as no one thinks that fleets of 200 ships or armies of 15000 men were really involved in Britain in the fifth century or later.
As an in eresting check, the sources of the time and the traditions surviving in the much later A/S chronicle have three ships arriving in Kent and the Solent, just as the Goddodin has 300 horsemen, as someone said 36 men is an army. Of course that does not mean that most armies were 36 men, it is a way of creating a limit for a potential crime....raise 36 men or more without royal assent and you can be accused of rebellion. That likely has a relationship to how many men an A/S king kept around him to defeat any coup.
Roy
very logical Roy and a sequence and rationale I can follow. We can borrow learnings and patterns from other post Roman regions but as you say compare like with like and highlight where there may be difficulties or differences that means we cant just blindly adopt the 'default position'
Quote from: Erpingham on January 12, 2017, 09:06:54 AM
I tend to agree that there was an original Arthur, around whom legends grew. However, I'm not convinced we can pinpoint him in the evidence. Where is he hiding in Gildas' narrative, for example? How many of Nennius' Arthurian battles featured the original Arthur? What part did he play in the Battle of Mons Badonicus, for example? I tend to think of him as the key commander there because of later tradition but Gildas doesn't mention him.
That is problematic but....
Gildas was writing a generation after Badon, roughly equivalent to the distance of a modern writer from Thatcher and Reagan.
A modern writer ranting about the state of modern politics on an internet forum who mentioned the Falklands war in passing would not necessarily attach Thatcher's name to it.
"Britain hasn't won a military conflict since 1982...." for example.
He would be more likely to mention the names of the contemporary politicians he was complaining about.
Alternatively, he may not have liked Arthur (in some early legends, Arthur has a problematic relationship with the church)
Alternatively, Arthur may be Aurelius Ambrosianus.
The mention of Badon in both Gildas and Nennius is striking, as is Nennius' use of a quite specific, non-Royal and Romanesque description of Arthur's constitutional position. If Nennius was just spinning yarns he would surely have described Arthur as a mighty King or Emperor or some such.
Between Gildas and Nennius in time we have the poem describing a certain warrior as fearsome in battle "though he was no Arthur", which fits quite well with Nennius' "Arthur killed 960 men all by himself....and in all his battles he was victorious"
Then there is the prevalence of the Arthur name amongst petty rulers in the Century after his alleged existence.
I don't disagree with nearly all of that but, you have to admit, it doesn't answer the questions, because they are probably unanswerable. Its back to grounding the debate in what we know and what is surmise, then us making our judgements.
On Nennius' list, at risk of being caught out because its a while since I last read it, it is a list of battles attributed to Arthur. By this stage, there has been plenty of time for Arthur's fame to grow and his real accomplishments to be embellished. So it cements Arthur's hero status but it is risky to try to create campaigns or a military career from it.
On the "Romanesque" title, I'm guess this is Dux Bellorum? It's main argument as a Roman title seems to be the word dux, with the actual title "Dux Bellorum" not being recorded elsewhere in the Roman military hierarchy. So whether its a formal rank, an honorary title or just a form of words which appealed to Nennius is perhaps more speculation than some writers admit.
Absolutely we will most likely never know until time travel is invented, but that is how I interpret it.
I was referring to Dux Bellorum but also to the description around it and the fact that it would be an odd detail for yarn spinners to make up. Why bother to point out that he was not a King but worked with a number of different Kings to fight the Saxons? Why bother to give him a title which was not a common one for the time? Of if they were going to make that up they would go into more elaborate detail on it, not just state it as bald fact and then move on.
For reference the exact lines are:
"Now Arthur fought against them in those days, with all the Kings of the Britons, though he himself was Dux Bellorum"
Quote from: aligern on January 12, 2017, 08:44:48 AM
I would be happier with scenarios that have a post Roman organisation by province or diocese if;
a) there was any indication of this happening elsewhere. In Gaul or Spain it appears that when Roman imperial authority was removed organisation defaulted to civitas ( city and surrounding territory ) level.
But what about when it was restored? This is the situation with our 'Arthur': he has reunited the
civitates and hence seeing the administration and organisation as peaking out at
civitas level is no longer relevant.
Quote
b) The Roman administration at the diocese or province level had any substance. There appear to have been very few civil servants and tax collection was the responsibility of the civitas or large landowners. Hence there was no systemic strength behind organisations above the civitas. Governors were appointed from the centre, there was no method or tradition for appointing them locally. No doubt civitates saw local interest as paramount and the removal of oppressive taxes as a blessing.
And their reimposition under renewed authority as decidedly a mixed blessing, but preferable to the penalty for non-payment.
Quote
The other organisations that held things together were the army and the church.
I have my doubts about the church. ;)
Quote
The army had commands and garrisons. It may be that most of the command structure departed with the legions. Even if it did not just go the army problem is that it has garrisons that are now settlers on the borders and federate allies, also settled beyond the borders and some internally. The organisation has lost its field forces and most likely the ability to control them. When we had this same debate about northern Gaul I think it might have been Rodger who pointed out that Syagrius most likely controlled as far as his horsemen could ride in a day or two. Syagrius likely started with an army and authority over federates and laeti...in Britain the army was withdrawn.
But following the failed appeal to Aegidius it looks as if someone in Britain started building a new one.
Quote
Rome's weakness was that it had generally taken over areas organised by tribe or city and it moved to create a city within the tribal area so that the tribal territory could be taxed to support the army and its nobility 'civilised'. Wider organisations had not existed and no wider loyalties were created. You were a citizen of Rome and of your city, nothing in between had any active meaning. When the centre collapsed, localism ruled.
But a charismatic national who could get the locals to pull together, as in Armorica, could create such a wider loyalty - and be remembered for it by future generations.
Quote
Patrick's construction based upon mediaeval romantic novels is fine fantasy and a campaign could be based upon it, as long as no one thinks that fleets of 200 ships or armies of 15000 men were really involved in Britain in the fifth century or later.
As an in eresting check, the sources of the time and the traditions surviving in the much later A/S chronicle have three ships arriving in Kent and the Solent, just as the Goddodin has 300 horsemen, as someone said 36 men is an army. Of course that does not mean that most armies were 36 men, it is a way of creating a limit for a potential crime....raise 36 men or more without royal assent and you can be accused of rebellion. That likely has a relationship to how many men an A/S king kept around him to defeat any coup.
This is not, however, a sensible way of assessing how many Saxons constituted a fleet. Saxon raiders had earlier necessitated the establishment of the Channel Fleet and the Count of the Saxon Shore, i.e. they were larger than local forces and organisation could cope with. Aegidius had to deal with a force of several thousand Saxons in Gaul. Why should nearer and more convenient England attract less?
What, pray, is the real objection to having 18,000 Saxons and 15,000 Bretons landing in Britain c.AD 490?
Quote from: eques on January 12, 2017, 12:35:19 PM
I was referring to Dux Bellorum but also to the description around it and the fact that it would be an odd detail for yarn spinners to make up.
I've not making myself clear. Nennius has not made anything up, in my opinion. He has reported what his sources (histories, annals, poems, triads ... whatever) say about about Arthur. He was Dux Bellorum (assuming the capitals are in the original). Does that just indicate he was the leader of the combined armies on that occasion? Or he was generally the overall war leader for whatever federation of
civitates there was? Was this something that poets christened him after his great victory at Badon? Or is it a relic or attempt to recreate a former rank in the Roman Imperial hierarchy? Opinions on this may depend on where on the spectrum of Arthur belief you stand.
Only , Patrick, that there is no evidence for such large armies being involved in Britain.
You refer to the Saxon shore organisation of the Roman fleet. It is a distributed force, with about ten bases. The Romans are not expecting major fleet actions. What they face is small penetrations by groups that land and raid and later, when the Roman system has broken down , land and settle. The Anglo Saxon invasions are insidious because they do not involve large forces , they do not penetrate at one point and set off on a march of conquest, they infiltrate. We have, also to imagine the same situation in the West with the Irish. The Saxons very likely had information on geography and where the best land was from those who had been settled as foederati as protectors of the British cities. Significantly these settlements are well inland, for example Dorchester on Thames as well as on the coast. If we take the A/S Chronicle as at least strongly indicative of the nature of warfare at the time the story is one of small fights, The Saxons take Pevensey, the Northumbrian Angles fortify themselves at Bamburgh. The Jutes land and take the isle of Wight and really go no further. Some Saxons land in the Solent,nthey push North and fight battles, but effectively conquer only two counties. The Early Saxon kingdoms include Kent...one county, Essex, one county, Middlesex, maybe two counties, Norfolk and Suffolk , one county each. These are not large armies. The Britons were organised by civitas in the lowlands, by tribal kingdom in the West and North. None of these entities are large, a county or two at most and have forces in proportion.
As to Arthur reimposing a Roman dicesan or provincial organisation, our best example is Vortigern and then the Saxon concept of a Bretwalda which I believe to be based upon his position. That was to be the acknowledged leader of the whole island. However, this is a role based upon precedence, there is no formal administration, no tax powers, though you might get tribute. Yes such a leader might claim to represent Rome, but we must remember that he did not! Ambrosius or Arthur would face the problem that he was not legitimately appointed by the emperor, nor been declared and accepted as emperor by the army (which was how it was done) because there was no army. Arthur, or AA, could have received contingents from towns and princes, but after the campaign they would have gone home, very likely because the money economy had collapsed and coin would have enabled a leader to run a centralised force dependent upon him, not some town council...but this was not the case in Britain.
In Gaul there are larger amies. The barbarian foederati are settled in tribal groups that take up rich provinces, they arrive en masse, ( The Visigoths, the Burgundians) they take over Roman organisation and occupy the cities. The Civitates work for the barbarians in Gaul, they can tax in cash and kind, there is an accepted system of them getting a share of the land. None of this is true inbBritain. The civitates ate smaller and weaker, they are abandoned when the Saxons take over. Estates might have been occupied, but there is little evidence of the Saxons melding with the locals. There was no mechanism to support large armies, even where Bede saw a tribal commonality of origin of Angle or Saxon we get five kingdoms of Angles and four of Saxons.
Roy
Quote from: Erpingham on January 12, 2017, 03:34:13 PM
Quote from: eques on January 12, 2017, 12:35:19 PM
I was referring to Dux Bellorum but also to the description around it and the fact that it would be an odd detail for yarn spinners to make up.
I've not making myself clear. Nennius has not made anything up, in my opinion. He has reported what his sources (histories, annals, poems, triads ... whatever) say about about Arthur.
That' why I was careful to say yarn spinners, not Nennius ;). The point I was trying to make was that the level of detail and subtlety around Nennius' description of Arthur's job title lends Nennius' account a ring of authenticity, whoever he got it from. Otherwise he would have just described Arthur as a "mighty King/Dread Lord" or whatever. Originally it was with a view to answering your question about what links Arthur to Badon.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 12, 2017, 03:34:13 PM
He was Dux Bellorum (assuming the capitals are in the original). Does that just indicate he was the leader of the combined armies on that occasion? Or he was generally the overall war leader for whatever federation of civitates there was? Was this something that poets christened him after his great victory at Badon? Or is it a relic or attempt to recreate a former rank in the Roman Imperial hierarchy? Opinions on this may depend on where on the spectrum of Arthur belief you stand.
Well we will never know but for me it implies he was a sort of troubleshooter - someone who could beat Saxons and therefore found himself frequently being asked for help by the Kings of the Britons. There are plenty of examples from history of a talented General being put in charge of a turbulent coalition of temporary allies. I would guess there were various shifting incarnations of this coalition throughout his career.
we really really have to be careful with the use of the name Arthur. Reading around the subject and taking into account missing mentions of him (or them...ie Arthurs!) eg by Gildas strongly leads me to the proposal that Arthur was a cognomen originally. The parallel example of this is Julius Caesar. Caesar was a cognomen within the Julii family and was used (eventually) to denote being (Roman) Emperor. So in this case, Arthur could be a cognomen for, lets say, 'Arthur no.1' (ground zero) whatever his real name is. If he was spectacular in battle then the use of that cognomen could be attached to other leaders or outstanding commanders eventually turning into a name that people generally wanted to use to hopefully instil greatness on their progeny.
Others have done (much) work on this angle and come up with a variety of suggestions with alot settling for some variation around 'bear' - Arth being Welsh for bear and interestingly ur could be a shortened version of ursus (Latin for bear). Very conjectural and anothe rrabbit hole. But, following it for a moment it would help out with our conundrum of why Arthur is mentioned by some authors and not by others and why he crops up an awful lot with a whole heap of battles placed at his feet which might be difficult to fit into 'generation'
Just something to bear (sorry) in mind
Quote from: aligern on January 12, 2017, 04:11:08 PM
Only , Patrick, that there is no evidence for such large armies being involved in Britain.
Except the evidence of our sources ...
Quote
As to Arthur reimposing a Roman dicesan or provincial organisation, our best example is Vortigern and then the Saxon concept of a Bretwalda which I believe to be based upon his position. That was to be the acknowledged leader of the whole island. However, this is a role based upon precedence, there is no formal administration, no tax powers, though you might get tribute.
You can also decree mass mobilisation. This would be, after all, the quintessential function of a war chief. I think also we should be careful about equating Vortigern's dubious primacy with Arthur's apparently clear supremacy: the one was inviting Saxons in to maintain a shaky position while the other was mobilising his countrymen to clear them out.
Quote
Yes such a leader might claim to represent Rome, but we must remember that he did not! Ambrosius or Arthur would face the problem that he was not legitimately appointed by the emperor, nor been declared and accepted as emperor by the army (which was how it was done) because there was no army.
Unless someone had begun rebuilding one. In any event, a man on the spot with troops has more real authority than a shadow appointed by some remote figure in Constantinople. Aegidius and Syagrius built themselves a state in northern Gaul on the basis of Aetius' arrangements; I see no reason why 'Arthur' could not have done the same with the legacy of Ambrosius and Uther.
Quote
Arthur, or AA, could have received contingents from towns and princes, but after the campaign they would have gone home, very likely because the money economy had collapsed and coin would have enabled a leader to run a centralised force dependent upon him, not some town council...but this was not the case in Britain.
There is the open question of whether the money economy had in fact collapsed: the continuing existence of the civitas suggests that some form of currency other than barter was still in use. Also, the
auctoritas for raising troops would lie with a war leader; the towns' role would be to work out how they can manage their contribution.
Quote
In Gaul there are larger amies. The barbarian foederati are settled in tribal groups that take up rich provinces, they arrive en masse, (The Visigoths, the Burgundians) they take over Roman organisation and occupy the cities. The Civitates work for the barbarians in Gaul, they can tax in cash and kind, there is an accepted system of them getting a share of the land. None of this is true in Britain. The civitates are smaller and weaker, they are abandoned when the Saxons take over.
But until the Saxons take over they are free to work for themselves - or their national war-leader. Let us not overlook this point. ;)
Quote from: Holly on January 12, 2017, 07:10:20 PM
Reading around the subject and taking into account missing mentions of him (or them...ie Arthurs!) eg by Gildas strongly leads me to the proposal that Arthur was a cognomen originally.
Agree entirely.
Quote
So in this case, Arthur could be a cognomen for, lets say, 'Arthur no.1' (ground zero) whatever his real name is. If he was spectacular in battle then the use of that cognomen could be attached to other leaders or outstanding commanders eventually turning into a name that people generally wanted to use to hopefully instil greatness on their progeny.
King John's nephew Arthur was one of these. However for some reason he never became attached to the Arthur legend ... the fact that none of the rulers Gildas mentions carries the 'Arthur' cognomen (aside from Cuneglass' bear chariot hints) but have different cognomens of their own suggests it was not a very well established tradition. By contrast, every Roman emperor or would-be emperor was a Caesar (or an Augustus or a Sebastos or an Autokrator, depending upon when and where he was crowned). So while I like the theory I feel disinclined to adopt it.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 12, 2017, 08:49:58 PM
Quote from: aligern on January 12, 2017, 04:11:08 PM
Only , Patrick, that there is no evidence for such large armies being involved in Britain.
Except the evidence of our sources ...
Or "later works of historical fiction", as we call them.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 12, 2017, 08:49:58 PM
Quote
So in this case, Arthur could be a cognomen for, lets say, 'Arthur no.1' (ground zero) whatever his real name is. If he was spectacular in battle then the use of that cognomen could be attached to other leaders or outstanding commanders eventually turning into a name that people generally wanted to use to hopefully instil greatness on their progeny.
King John's nephew Arthur was one of these. However for some reason he never became attached to the Arthur legend ... the fact that none of the rulers Gildas mentions carries the 'Arthur' cognomen (aside from Cuneglass' bear chariot hints) but have different cognomens of their own suggests it was not a very well established tradition. By contrast, every Roman emperor or would-be emperor was a Caesar (or an Augustus or a Sebastos or an Autokrator, depending upon when and where he was crowned). So while I like the theory I feel disinclined to adopt it.
its not perfect I agree although I still think there is much mileage in it. The Cuneglas passage in Gildas reads:
ut quid in nequitiae tuae uolueris uetusta faece et tu ab adolescentiae annis,
urse, multorum sessor aurigaque currus receptaculi
ursi
I would be inclined to see King John's nephew Arthur as someone named after a figure from popular literature. Born in 1187, he is post the first wave of popular Arthurian fiction, which painted Arthur as a chivalric paragon which any high born young aristocrat might emulate.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 13, 2017, 09:56:31 AM
I would be inclined to see King John's nephew Arthur as someone named after a figure from popular literature.
Or popular tradition, given the literacy rate of the period. Either way, I believe your point is that 'Arthur' had by then already been romanticised and 'young Arthur' was named after the ideal rather than the original.
Dave essentially has a slightly different process occurring significantly earlier, perhaps within reminiscing distance of Arthur's own lifetime. He also has Arthur as a Caesarish-connotation cognomen rather than a personal name
per se. This has the implication that anyone claiming the name would need some sort of force to back it up.
Either way, it points to an original 'Arthur' who made enough of an impression to spawn this tradition. I think where I differ from Dave is that I do not see the deeds of later Arthur-cognomened individuals necessarily being added to the achievements of the original, although where bards are concerned no such bet is entirely safe.
My own campaign analysis, such as it is, depends upon the internal consistency and military logic of Geoffrey's source rather than the who's who of post-Roman Britain. The stumbling-block for some is the belief that everything collapsed down to collections of rustic ruffians once Roman administration evaporated, which on the whole seems to be true, but does not consider the rather different situation that would have existed when someone rebuilt some form of overall rule.
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 12, 2017, 09:47:50 PM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 12, 2017, 08:49:58 PM
Quote from: aligern on January 12, 2017, 04:11:08 PM
Only , Patrick, that there is no evidence for such large armies being involved in Britain.
Except the evidence of our sources ...
Or "later works of historical fiction", as we call them.
Except where they cite earlier sources, e.g. 'The Frensshe Booke'.
QuoteMy own campaign analysis, such as it is, depends upon the internal consistency and military logic of Geoffrey's source rather than the who's who of post-Roman Britain.
Geoffrey's source is a stumbling block. He is unclear what this source is other than it is an old book in the British language. It is difficult therefore to speak of its "internal consistency and military logic". Some certainly doubt it's existence (a bit unfair on Geoffrey perhaps) but it could be legendary material, it might be short annal entries like the well known Camlann one, we don't know. So, we know Geoffrey assembled some sources, some of which we can identify. Many suspect he assembled these to create a narrative, rather than simply translating a pre-existing narrative. In which case, any "internal consistency and military logic" would be down to Geoffrey's skills as a narrator.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 13, 2017, 12:21:14 PM
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 12, 2017, 09:47:50 PM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 12, 2017, 08:49:58 PM
Quote from: aligern on January 12, 2017, 04:11:08 PM
Only , Patrick, that there is no evidence for such large armies being involved in Britain.
Except the evidence of our sources ...
Or "later works of historical fiction", as we call them.
Except where they cite earlier sources, e.g. 'The Frensshe Booke'.
Especially then:
QuoteBy now, critics of Malory know that the statement "the Frensshe book maketh mencyon," is deeply suspicious; indeed, it has become something of a cliché to note that when Malory says "the French book sayeth," often the French book "sayeth" no such thing. But Malory's attempts at misdirection are particularly important in a reading of the Morte Darthur because they emphasize those cruces when the author felt most compelled to alter his source material, and was most concerned about what those changes meant.
- http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2120&context=oa_dissertations
QuoteAlthough Malory cites his "Frensshe book" as the source for what he tells us about the final destination of Lancelot's knights, these details do not appear in his French sources or in any of the English ones either, and he is here trying, as he often does, to conceal his addition of information not in his sources ...
- here (https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=5zE3pcl1tjwC&pg=PA223&lpg=PA223&dq=%22the+frensshe+book%22&source=bl&ots=J3HLCpwJEE&sig=6TWLfw2ZR0R0_F-vpEU3CCcWZWI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwik0cSEnb_RAhUJNhoKHXbADYAQ6AEIITAB#v=onepage&q=%22the%20frensshe%20book%22&f=false)
dipping into Gildas again reminds me of how frustrating he can be. He gives us tantalising info mixed up with a few anachronistic red herrings, some very clear detail and then silence on other stuff (oh that and warbling on about morals etc). Sometime I wonder with Gildas if we get almost as much information about things that he doesnt mention as much as with things he does. As per earlier, he doesnt mention 'Arthur' but does mention Ambrosius in the past and 5 kings in the present. When we refer to 'Arthur' is it because there is the possibility of it being a cognomen that Gildas is silent? Having said that, his five Kings from the present all have potential cognomens in that they can be potentially 'broken down' into component elements.
I am not saying that 'Arthur' (1,2 or 3) is there in the people he does mention but we could reasonably infer that there is at least a possibility. If 'Arthur' existed before Gildas's time (and we have to at least acknowledge there is a possibility that the 'real' Arthur is someone who comes along after Gildas but gets all the good bits attached by the time he is mentioned centuries later) wouldnt it be reasonable to assume he would mention him by name (real or cognomen)? After all he is happy to mention good guys (Ambrosius) and equally bad guys (5 kings, Maximus etc). Or look at it the other way, why wouldnt he mention 'Arthur' somewhere either to illustrate his godliness and virtues or to denigrate him as a heathen or lacking in morals?
Interesting point Holly
So it's possible in Gildas's day that Arthur was just a workaday general, nothing special, kept his nose clean and won the occasional battle but wasn't morally good enough to be a good king or bad enough to be a bad king
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 13, 2017, 02:59:40 PM
So it's possible in Gildas's day that Arthur was just a workaday general, nothing special, kept his nose clean and won the occasional battle but wasn't morally good enough to be a good king or bad enough to be a bad king
The logical arguments, if we assume Arthur was around :
1. He was a relatively minor character in Gildas' eyes, neither good enough or bad enough to warrant a mention
2. He was one of the mentioned people under a different name
3. Gildas didn't mention Arthur, despite him being a major figure, because they didn't get on
Of these, there is a tradition of no.3 (something about Gildas' brother) but I would suggest 1 or 2 are more likely. If 3, why didn't Gildas paint Arthur as the lowest of the low? He wasn't shy of preaching to the powerful.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 13, 2017, 03:12:05 PM
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 13, 2017, 02:59:40 PM
So it's possible in Gildas's day that Arthur was just a workaday general, nothing special, kept his nose clean and won the occasional battle but wasn't morally good enough to be a good king or bad enough to be a bad king
The logical arguments, if we assume Arthur was around :
1. He was a relatively minor character in Gildas' eyes, neither good enough or bad enough to warrant a mention
2. He was one of the mentioned people under a different name
3. Gildas didn't mention Arthur, despite him being a major figure, because they didn't get on
Of these, there is a tradition of no.3 (something about Gildas' brother) but I would suggest 1 or 2 are more likely. If 3, why didn't Gildas paint Arthur as the lowest of the low? He wasn't shy of preaching to the powerful.
absolutely...!
if its 1. then that tends (not absolutely but a good way towards) to support the amalgamation theory of 'Arthur' being a composite of different figures who all fought different battles/campaigns in different generations
if it 2. we have narrowed the field down somewhat! It also doesnt exclude the possibility of further amalgamation of others/others battles mind
if its 3. then I suggest he is going against the (his) grain by not painting him is a really bad light. It doesnt fit his 'MO' to coin a phrase and although I would never reject something utterly without compelling evidence I would take Occams razor on this one and say its unlikely
of course there is a 4th variable ie the true first Arthur comes after Gildas. However, this does seem unlikely as after Gildas (ie late 6th C onwards) there are not very many 'stunning' British victories that could give someone a hero status. That doesnt stop it occuring and of course there is always the chance that if there was an Arthur after Gildas, he could have been 'English' ;) Very unlikely but it there it is......(another elephant in the room)
Huh?
Thought I'd already answered this.
Twice!
Again, Gildas was writing a political tract, not a school textbook. Therefore, he wouldn't feel the need to mention information he knew his readers would be familiar with. He would mention the more contemporary leaders on whom he had decided to concentrate his ire because he had to in order to complain about them.
The reference to Badon was only a passing one. If I made a passing reference to the Battle of Waterloo in the course of making an argument about something else I wouldn't feel the need to add "which was won by the Duke of Wellington"
Add to this the possibility that Gildas disapproved of Arthur and did not want to ascribe to him an achievement, or that Arthur was Ambrosius, and it is entirely feasible that he would not mention him.
I am not saying this is definitely the case, but it's a completely feasible possibility.
Quote from: eques on January 13, 2017, 04:50:37 PM
Huh?
Thought I'd already answered this.
Twice!
Well, you obviously answered it to your satisfaction, which is good. Unfortunately, others are still making their minds up. Please humour us :)
Quote from: Erpingham on January 13, 2017, 05:02:49 PM
Quote from: eques on January 13, 2017, 04:50:37 PM
Huh?
Thought I'd already answered this.
Twice!
Well, you obviously answered it to your satisfaction, which is good. Unfortunately, others are still making their minds up. Please humour us :)
That's fine, but it was asked as if it was a new question, and without referring back to my previous answers! Even saying "good points" to someone else, about points I had previously made! >:(
Anyway, by way of example here is a thread from this forum about the Battle of Bannockburn which does not mention Robert the Bruce, (though it does mention Arthur funnily enough!)
http://soa.org.uk/sm/index.php?topic=2454.0
If, in 1500 years' time, a printed version of that thread is all the information anyone has about the Battle of Bannockburn, imagine how confusing and bewildering they would find it.
sorry Harry,
its my age! ;)
Quote from: Duncan Head on January 13, 2017, 01:45:01 PM
Especially then:
QuoteBy now, critics of Malory know that the statement "the Frensshe book maketh mencyon," is deeply suspicious; indeed, it has become something of a cliché to note that when Malory says "the French book sayeth," often the French book "sayeth" no such thing. But Malory's attempts at misdirection are particularly important in a reading of the Morte Darthur because they emphasize those cruces when the author felt most compelled to alter his source material, and was most concerned about what those changes meant.
QuoteAlthough Malory cites his "Frensshe book" as the source for what he tells us about the final destination of Lancelot's knights, these details do not appear in his French sources or in any of the English ones either, and he is here trying, as he often does, to conceal his addition of information not in his sources ...
Or rather, that there existed an additional book of which they have no knowledge, which would more easily explain why Malory introduces discordant material at certain junctures.
Quote from: eques on January 13, 2017, 04:50:37 PM
Again, Gildas was writing a political tract, not a school textbook. Therefore, he wouldn't feel the need to mention information he knew his readers would be familiar with. He would mention the more contemporary leaders on whom he had decided to concentrate his ire because he had to in order to complain about them.
And had he not been so keen to jam-pack his diatribe with quotations from scripture, he might have remembered to leave space to mention who was behind the upturn in British fortunes. But then again, Harry's next point gives us a clue why he might not have done.
Quote
Add to this the possibility that Gildas disapproved of Arthur and did not want to ascribe to him an achievement, or that Arthur was Ambrosius, and it is entirely feasible that he would not mention him.
Gildas seems to disapprove of everyone who is not a monk, Hebrew priest or prophet, New Testament apostle or Gildas, so to him 'Arthur' may just be another fundamentally sinful king who, perhaps being dead at the time of writing, would be omitted because he cannot be castigated in person.
When we look at our sources, we need to take account of their world view and perspective. I think Harry is on the right track here.
definitely need to take into account Gildas (and others) world view and perspective Patrick. We can at times inadvertently view these things for a 21st C perspective.
re omitting Arthur from castigation because he is dead didnt stop him doing it to Magnus Maximus. This then leads us to a possibility that he is a minor king/leader and too far removed from Gildas timeframe. This then creates a problem that this possible 'Arthur' isnt the all conquering hero the later writings make him out to be. After all if he won all those battles and stopped the Saxons/Picts/Scots/other internal enemies in their tracks his fame surely should demand a response from Gildas?
If we are to try and assign a reasonable portion of the 'Arthur' fame to an individual then I agree it is most likely Ambrosius. I am not saying it is mind, I am just following the flow of reasoning and how Gildas has reported other individuals
Quote from: Holly on January 14, 2017, 08:45:37 AM
re omitting Arthur from castigation because he is dead didnt stop him doing it to Magnus Maximus.
Good point.
Quote
This then leads us to a possibility that he is a minor king/leader and too far removed from Gildas timeframe. This then creates a problem that this possible 'Arthur' isnt the all conquering hero the later writings make him out to be. After all if he won all those battles and stopped the Saxons/Picts/Scots/other internal enemies in their tracks his fame surely should demand a response from Gildas?
In Gildas' preface, he writes:
"... for it is my present purpose to relate the deeds of an indolent and slothful race, rather than the exploits of those who have been valiant in the field"
This, to me, looks like the true explanation.
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 14, 2017, 11:12:10 AM
In Gildas' preface, he writes:
"... for it is my present purpose to relate the deeds of an indolent and slothful race, rather than the exploits of those who have been valiant in the field"
This, to me, looks like the true explanation.
Fair point. Combining with Harry's comment about it being too obvious who won the battle, we should expect our proto-Arthur to be a well-known fighter/military leader, rather than one of the generally immoral political figures he likes to lay into. The later reputation as dux bellorum would fit with this.
As to "Arthur by other names" I am a little surprised no-one has brought up the Geoffrey Ashe theory that equated him to Riothamus. I'm particularly surprised that Patrick has not hit on this, as it involves yet another large Breton army and a name co-incidence, as Avallon features in the tale.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 14, 2017, 11:51:42 AM
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 14, 2017, 11:12:10 AM
In Gildas' preface, he writes:
"... for it is my present purpose to relate the deeds of an indolent and slothful race, rather than the exploits of those who have been valiant in the field"
This, to me, looks like the true explanation.
Fair point. Combining with Harry's comment about it being too obvious who won the battle, we should expect our proto-Arthur to be a well-known fighter/military leader, rather than one of the generally immoral political figures he likes to lay into. The later reputation as dux bellorum would fit with this.
As to "Arthur by other names" I am a little surprised no-one has brought up the Geoffrey Ashe theory that equated him to Riothamus. I'm particularly surprised that Patrick has not hit on this, as it involves yet another large Breton army and a name co-incidence, as Avallon features in the tale.
Patrick's point is indeed a fair point to discuss and your interpretation Anthony is also fair in terms of a war leader rather than a king.
Re Riothamus, we have to be careful that we are now attaching elements of much later traditions/tales to that possibilty eg Aval(l)on is first mentioned by Geoffrey of Monmouth
Quote from: Holly on January 14, 2017, 12:06:04 PM
Re Riothamus, we have to be careful that we are now attaching elements of much later traditions/tales to that possibilty eg Aval(l)on is first mentioned by Geoffrey of Monmouth
Yes, forgive the tweak to Patrick's tail :) The Riothamus suggestion was, however, a genuine proposal from Ashe and perhaps should be considered if we are looking for people who might be Arthur under another name. I am, I must confess, a bit sceptical of the alternative name approach, though.
:) tweaks and add ons are part and parcel of Arthuriana Anthony
Quote from: Holly on January 14, 2017, 08:45:37 AM
re omitting Arthur from castigation because he is dead didnt stop him doing it to Magnus Maximus. This then leads us to a possibility that he is a minor king/leader and too far removed from Gildas timeframe. This then creates a problem that this possible 'Arthur' isnt the all conquering hero the later writings make him out to be. After all if he won all those battles and stopped the Saxons/Picts/Scots/other internal enemies in their tracks his fame surely should demand a response from Gildas?
This is certainly problematic.
However, to refine the argument further, Gildas' mention of names would be haphazard rather than structured. He might well mention names if they fitted into the sentence, or to his argument, or just if he randomly felt like mentioning them, but he would not feel obliged to mention them all. He was not writing a work of reference or thinking of the peace of mind of future historians.
He was writing a tract and therefore while names would obviously intrude into that, he was not writing with the intention of providing a work of reference for us.
I was not saying he consciously thought "Arthur's dead so I won't mention him", just that he would be less likely to automatically do so while writing about contemporary politics.
Also, as he seems to generally be pleased about the subduing of the Saxons, he may have thought that then launching into his usual rant against the person responsibe for that would confuse things, or just detract from the flow of his argument.
There are a lot of left wing people today who don't like Churchill but who do like to celebrate the defeat of Nazism...such people tend not to mention the 2 together.
I am not saying this definitely explains the lack of mentions for Arthur (which is a bit odd) but it is AN explanation and quite a satisfying one.
PS wasn't aware of Gildas saying that about the valiant deeds in the prologue, but it definitely strengthens this argument. It could even be read as "If you're expecting another soppy paean to Arthur bloody Pendragon you can look elsewhere!"
What is known about Riothamus is delineated in the relevant Wikipedia article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riothamus). Sidonius' letter and Jordanes' reference (the relevant passages are quoted in full, in Latin and English) do give the impression (to me at least) that Riothamus was a Breton king or war leader, not a Briton.
The article does suggest that Riothamus may have become confused with Arthur and hence provided the basis of the legend of Arthur campaigning on the continent against the Roman Empire. I think they have the right idea but the wrong person: the continental campaigns of 'Arthur' look to me more like a mixture of those of Constantine I and III. Not sure that Riothamus actually fits into the Arthur cycle anywhere, least of all as a historical prototype or the man himself, not least because far from fighting against the Empire he was marching to its assistance (or at least that of the Western Emperor of the day). He is also a generation too early for the Mons Badonicus timeframe suggested in the Wikipedia article on that particular topic. (The Annales Cambriae actually put Mons Badonicus in AD 516.)
I think Geoffrey Ashe was taking an over-blurred view of the available evidence, along the following lines: Arthur must have been someone mentioned around the latter half of the 5th century AD; this is someone mentioned around the latter half of the 5th century AD, so maybe this is Arthur. To him, as I see it, the overriding question was not whether he had the right Arthur but whether Arthur actually existed, and in this respect Riothamus was a potential godsend: a historical entity from almost the same culture present at almost the right time and almost doing some of the right things. ;)
Sadly, there are too many wrong things for Riothamus to be Arthur. I think we need to look within Britain itself, in the generation before Gildas.
Nennius is a little more useful: in chapter 56 he writes:
"At that time, the Saxons grew strong by virtue of their large number and increased in power in Britain. Hengist having died, however, his son Octha crossed from the northern part of Britain to the kingdom of Kent and from him are descended the kings of Kent. Then Arthur along with the kings of Britain fought against them in those days, but Arthur himself was the military commander ["dux bellorum"]."
Arthur is here mentioned by name and status made a contemporary of Octha. Octha (Octa) is dated to AD c.500-543. Perhaps revealingly, in chapter 38 of Nennius' Historia Brittonum, Octa and his brother Ebusa raid Scotland and carve out a dominion there. This may be the 'northern part of Britain' from which Octa came on the death of Hengist.
"Octa and Ebusa arrived with forty ships. In these they sailed round the country of the Picts, laid waste the Orkneys, and took possession of many regions, even to the Pictish confines."
This provides an interesting reason why Arthur's York campaign extended into a campaign through central Scotland: the Saxons controlled land there. It also provides a reason for the Saxons to send a significant fleet to Scotland during the campaign: to hold their dominions, which may have been extensive.
This brings us no nearer finding a named and identifiable Arthur, but it is interesting how the temporal and geographical pieces are falling into place.
I can see why Riothamus is an interesting figure in the search for 'Arthur'. Some of the details of what is attached to this person seems to fit although for me more the latter 'Arthur' of medieval fame.
What I am interested to find out more about is why the migration of Britons to Brittany kicked off to begin with and ultimately how many and when was the apogee. I mean we can blithely state that Britons migrated to Brittany to escape Picts/Scots/Saxons etc but is the only or main reason or indeed was it something else? I think this will help with determining some of the conditions in Britain at the time of our enquiries. Also ascertaining how many may also help to explain some of the potential 'emptying' of the landscape theories and colonisation by the English
I am a great believer that the migration was organised by the Christian priests. The Saxons were aggressive and persecuting pagans and priests had a very good reason to encourage their flocks to flee. A good example is Silchester where archaeologists puzzled as to why a walled town was abandoned, without signs of it being taken. Priests have anther advantage in leading a migration in that they have the contacts in Gaul to arrange reception of the refugees.
Roy
thanks Roy, it would be interesting to find out (not likely I know!) what the main areas for emigration where. I mean was is mainly lowland Britain or a mix of all areas? If I look at your suggestion I would hazard to postulate that lowland Britain was more 'Roman' and more 'Christianised' and so presumably would feel the brunt more and also see more benefit to moving to Brittany...?
Breton migration, and Breton/Britain links, are big topics. On where people came from, we might actually be able to get some clues from archaeology if we had cemeteries of the right period, from isotope studies. Never seen any reference to that though.
Geographically, the naming of parts of Brittany after Devon and Cornwall should hint where the maintained links were, but obviously, migrants could have left from those areas having fled from elsewhere.
Language is another element. The settlers presumably came from British rather than Latin-speaking areas, to impose British as the native tongue. That would then involve us with a question of what language different parts of Britain spoke, though. Also the interesting question of how the Breton language became dominant. It does suggest the British were in a culturally influential position rather than desperate boat-people.
excellent point Anthony thanks.
The geographic element is interesting and I share your reasoning re the SW hints and also we shouldnt rule out Northern Britain (or anywhere else for that matter! :) ) although admittedly it would be difficult for emigres from that area to traverse all the way to Brittany in 'one journey' (I am thinking Damnonia here in addition to the normal Dumnonia).
The language element is really interesting. It could suggest the majority of emigres coming from less Romanised areas of Britain who firmly spoke Brythonic first and Latin (if at all?) second. It could also suggest that the area had a very long standing (trade/tribal/heritage etc) realtionship with say the SW and Brythonic was already in use as a part of a multilingual society there (happy to be shot down for this suggestion not having one much research on Brittany per se!). If we dont accept the pre existing use of Brythonic in Brittany prior to large scale migrations (do we have evidence for numbers potentially?) then it tends to suggest enough people coming over to establish that language in an otherwise presumably Latin orientated situation (or is it more complicated than that).
Another element is religion, could it be not just the Pagan vs Christian question but potentially the form of element that is the driver? (eg Pelagianism vs Orthodoxy?). I have read that Pelagius has been placed in Brittany as an alternative to Britain as his birth place by some. Could this mean that Pelagianism was potentially strong in Brittany and thus many emigres from Britain made the move to escape religious persecution by other Christians?
The religious aspect is interesting because we know lots of early Breton saints were considered to have come from Britain as missionaries. Linking back to the position of the emigres and language, we might speculate that Christian immigants might be better able to connect into sub-Roman structures and hence be influential than a largely pagan native population.
I am happy to see a potential model based on either Pelagians escaping to Brittany or Roman Catholics escaping there (delete according to taste and reasoned arguments). One interesting thing is that (assuming its actual), if Germanus of Auxerre arrive in Britain early 5th C and hung around preaching about the wickedness of Pelagianism, could this have been an impetus for the those adherents to start migrations to Brittany? As we see, if we could fix a date for the beginning of migrations (or at least mass migrations) it could fit in with this hypothesis.
There are a number of aspects highlighted by period (or possibly period) sources.
1) Brittany was the repository for the fighting men of Britannia who followed Maximus Magnus to the continent. When he met his Waterloo (or Aquileia) Conan Meriadoc (who inadvertently subsequently gave both his names to heroic fantasy) settled the warriors in Brittany, perhaps as a way of avoiding Theodosius' 'object lesson' to Maximus' supporters, Brittany or at least key parts of it being quite defensible. This gave Brittany the basis of a good, effective army which could not or would not be stripped out by later desperate Roman magistri militum, and hence made it a natural refuge for people from Britannia (not least because the men in charge shared the same culture and spoke the same languages).
2) Theodosius brought Christian, or at least Athanasian, intolerance to new depths, and things were apparently no better under his successors. Dave's observation about the religious element looks valid; anyone leaving Britannia in a hurry for religious-based reasons of self-preservation would find in Brittany a natural stopping-point, perhaps the safest one around, and quite probably the most tolerant. ("Mithras? Yes, we do Mithras: even got the chalice." "Pelagius? Decent enough chap; not sure why all the fuss about him." etc.)
3) Britannia was increasingly subject to barbarian incursions, and Roy's point about likely organised departures (e.g. Silchester) would suggest a significant movement of Britannian population into Brittany as barbarian raids and seizure of territory intensified.
We may thus have a continuing flow of emigrants for a number of reasons from the late 4th century AD to the 6th, peaking on various occasions. I would suggest that survivors from Saxon-struck regions or those about to be would form the bulk of the flow, but that is just my guess.
Quote from: Holly on January 15, 2017, 11:17:41 AM
I am happy to see a potential model based on either Pelagians escaping to Brittany or Roman Catholics escaping there (delete according to taste and reasoned arguments). One interesting thing is that (assuming its actual), if Germanus of Auxerre arrive in Britain early 5th C and hung around preaching about the wickedness of Pelagianism, could this have been an impetus for the those adherents to start migrations to Brittany? As we see, if we could fix a date for the beginning of migrations (or at least mass migrations) it could fit in with this hypothesis.
I'm not sure that Pelagians is an issue. http://eprints.gla.ac.uk/3310/1/Gilmarcus.pdf is worth a look, but I'd suggest that there wasn't really two competing factions at the ground level.
It's worth reading for the comment;-
"It is no accident that Pelagius was a lawyer with no responsibility for anyone else apart from a handful of upper-class ascetics in their villas, to whom he offered guidance, while Augustine was the bishop of a north African town full of off-duty sailors, dodgy shop-keepers, married couples who were not immune to the attractions of other people's husbands and wives, people who were less than generous in their almsgiving, and folk still shamefully attracted by the exotic revelries celebrated at New Year – people he compassionately described as often 'weeping and groaning' while they sin"
Maybe the religion thing was an issue or maybe it wasnt, its just one of those timing coincidences with the Pelagian heresy raging within Britain and other parts of the empire around the early to mid 5th C. I do maintain that we shouldnt discount it though and Patrick's amusing aside did make me chuckle (for the right reasons and with a little nod towards Monty Python et al :) )
re the settling of Armorica with troops from Maximus's Britain contingents its a definite possible beginning of the reason for the focus point for any disaffected Britons looking to escape Britain for whatever reason
The Pelagian heresy never seems to get up the head of steam necessary to rage :-[ I suspect a vast majority of Christians, whether they were under the nominal control of a Pelagian bishop or not, couldn't tell the difference. Compared with the Donatists in North Africa (who knew how a heresy should rage) it was a civilised dispute in the members bar of a rather exclusive club :o
fair point although it was felt necessary to send Germanus to sort it out....although he did it, (allegedly) without having to burn anyone!
Quote from: Holly on January 15, 2017, 07:17:27 PM
fair point although it was felt necessary to send Germanus to sort it out....although he did it, (allegedly) without having to burn anyone!
The fact that it could be decided by a debate has always struck me as interesting. If true it's a first amongst church heresies 8) Actually I've read several writers who reckon that Pelagian thinking has remained within the British in some way through to the present day.
But the presence of Germanus in 429 seems to indicate that it was an ordered society and the "Alleluia Victory was against the Picts and scots and fought in Mold in northern Wales!
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 15, 2017, 10:18:39 PM
Quote from: Holly on January 15, 2017, 07:17:27 PM
fair point although it was felt necessary to send Germanus to sort it out....although he did it, (allegedly) without having to burn anyone!
The fact that it could be decided by a debate has always struck me as interesting. If true it's a first amongst church heresies 8) Actually I've read several writers who reckon that Pelagian thinking has remained within the British in some way through to the present day.
But the presence of Germanus in 429 seems to indicate that it was an ordered society and the "Alleluia Victory was against the Picts and scots and fought in Mold in northern Wales!
A breed apart eh?
And yes, the Germanus episode seems to indicate there is stabilty some 20 years after the rescript of Honorius (although some writers dont ascribe to that particular assumption re the rescript!). Interestingly it seems to suggest that the southern part of Britain appears not to be under much threat insofar as Germanus felt it necessary to lead what troops there were personally due to a lack of experience? (feel free to amend!). Perhaps at this time the North was militarised (as normal) and the South was not even though we have to acknowledge that at least Western Britain was under threat
Yes the situation is entirely different from that envisaged with Germanic peoples rampaging across Britain to be stopped by Arthur or whoever.
So the generation after 'Rome Left' managed pretty well and seems to have kept the lights on well enough
That does appear to be the case although, whether we believe it fully or not, the inference is that once a serious threat came to Southern/Western Britain it was unable to cope such that it relied upon a travelling clergyman to whip the local militia into shape. In fact does that lead us to propose that only militia type troops are around at this point? At least in Southern/Western areas?
Guardian readers (always ahead of the rest) will know that King Arthur is alive and well living on a council estate in Farnborough (where his grandchildren went to school with my kids 20 years). That is when he's not carrying out his druidical duties at Stonehenge. I wouldn't be surprised if the new road tunnel doesn't open up the cavern where the rest of the Knights of the Round Table lie sleeping.
Quote from: Holly on January 16, 2017, 09:30:40 AM
That does appear to be the case although, whether we believe it fully or not, the inference is that once a serious threat came to Southern/Western Britain it was unable to cope such that it relied upon a travelling clergyman to whip the local militia into shape. In fact does that lead us to propose that only militia type troops are around at this point? At least in Southern/Western areas?
given he'd been a Dux in Auxerre before entering the church he might have had considerable experience, perhaps more than was available to the forces in the SE if the country had been peaceful.
Also it may be that Wales had been largely stripped of military forces (isn't there hints of this from the forts and the Notitia?) and therefore there was a somewhat ad hoc force put together to deal with a threat?
The force might actually have been Welsh from the local communities
The travelling clergyman was evidently a martial or at least belligerent bishop (we see the same thing in mediaeval England on occasion, not always with a fortunate outcome - cf Archbishop Melton at Myton in AD 1319). What this episode does tell us is that despite the withdrawal of active troops in AD 410 there was still a credible military organisation in place as of AD 428 - the withdrawal of the legions had not left the province entirely defenceless.
What was lacking was leadership: with the death of Constantine III in AD 411) there was literally nobody left in overall charge of Britannia. If there was some form of deputy as of AD 411 he was presumably dead or otherwise gone by AD 428, but the local forces were still there: the impression one gets is that when Germanus came, he saw himself placed at the head of forces which sprang up at his coming, and he conquered.
It suggests that anyone with Dux Bellorum status could do the same. Naturally it would take a highly competent Dux to do it well, and over a sustained period.
Quote from: Bohemond on January 16, 2017, 10:21:14 AM
I wouldn't be surprised if the new road tunnel doesn't open up the cavern where the rest of the Knights of the Round Table lie sleeping.
Historians ought to be there when that happens. ;)
Quotethe local forces were still there: the impression one gets is that when Germanus came, he saw himself placed at the head of forces which sprang up at his coming, and he conquered.
Quotethe inference is that once a serious threat came to Southern/Western Britain it was unable to cope such that it relied upon a travelling clergyman to whip the local militia into shape. In fact does that lead us to propose that only militia type troops are around at this point? At least in Southern/Western areas?
Isn't it fascinating how we can make opposite interpretations from the same event? A leaderless regular army or a demilitarised society relying on militia. And this from a relatively well recorded event. Sums up the problems of interpreting the period, I think.
Moving on though, the Germanus event does suggest a period of organised civic life in the lowland zone. Archaeologically, we have possible federate or federate descended communities around, yet clearly not yet as leaders. The symbolic/actual arrival of Hengest and Horsa (more by-names) in the late 440s was seen by those who came after as a watershed. So, do we go back to the old model and say there is a functioning society, struggling but making its way, for a generation after 410, in which existing Germanic communities are integrated, followed by later waves of incomers with a more radical agenda?
Anthony, I see no reason to not assume a functioning society. To a certain extent we might see Bishops replacing civitas leaders in some areas, this seems to have happened in Gaul where some cities chose their bishop to 'rule', often because he was a competent person of the right social class
Jim
Quote from: Erpingham on January 16, 2017, 01:31:16 PM
Quotethe local forces were still there: the impression one gets is that when Germanus came, he saw himself placed at the head of forces which sprang up at his coming, and he conquered.
Quotethe inference is that once a serious threat came to Southern/Western Britain it was unable to cope such that it relied upon a travelling clergyman to whip the local militia into shape. In fact does that lead us to propose that only militia type troops are around at this point? At least in Southern/Western areas?
Isn't it fascinating how we can make opposite interpretations from the same event? A leaderless regular army or a demilitarised society relying on militia. And this from a relatively well recorded event. Sums up the problems of interpreting the period, I think.
Moving on though, the Germanus event does suggest a period of organised civic life in the lowland zone. Archaeologically, we have possible federate or federate descended communities around, yet clearly not yet as leaders. The symbolic/actual arrival of Hengest and Horsa (more by-names) in the late 440s was seen by those who came after as a watershed. So, do we go back to the old model and say there is a functioning society, struggling but making its way, for a generation after 410, in which existing Germanic communities are integrated, followed by later waves of incomers with a more radical agenda?
in answer to the first point....yes! :) I am still leaning more to the militia type or localised/hereditary units BUT can see the opposite point of view as well (in point of fact not so opposite more 2 faces of the same coin?)
re the second point of organised life in the lowland zone, this is where it gets really
interesting . Could we infer that some form of functioning civitas and partly Sub Roman life existed with villa based grandees and a few important leaders calling the shots, liaising with the (faithful) foederati communities (possibly several generations in from being 'inserted' during imperial years) and hoping that the troubles of the North dont come southwards? Highland areas would potentially revert to more tribal arrangements and less 'Roman-like'/civitas organised communities more quickly and potentially also retain a higher degree of martial readiness? Could we go further and thus propose either a collapse or partial collapse of the North and Western 'frontiers' led to a lowland response of looking to bolster local forces which could have led to a requirement for further foederati hence the Adventus Saxonum?
The talk of bears and chariots from Gildas 32 naturally calls to mind the seven brighter stars of the north-circumpolar constellation the Great Bear, Ursa Major, long known in many places as a wagon or chariot, including Britain, where it also had an association with Arthur. For instance, Canto I.XVII of Walter Scott's lengthy poem Lay of the Last Minstrel from 1805 opens with:
"Arthur's slow wain his course doth roll,
In utter darkness, round the pole;
The Northern Bear lowers black and grim:"
(Cited from the 1889 edition, based on Scott's text and notes going back to 1813, available in various formats, including downloadable PDF, here (https://archive.org/details/layoflastminstre00scotuoft).)
It's unclear how long before Scott's time this may have been current, though his familiar use of it would suggest it as commonly understood by the mid to late 18th century at least.
There's then an intriguing triplet of Arthurian constellations cited as from Welsh folklore in and before 1909 via Marie Trevelyan's Folk-Lore and Folk-Stories of Wales. From p. 35:
...the Lyre is Arthur's Harp; the Great Bear is Arthur's Ploughtail; Orion is Arthur's Yard...
(Scanned version available online via this webpage (https://archive.org/details/afl2317.0001.001.umich.edu), also again including a free PDF download option.)
The provenance and longevity of such names is uncertain from this source too, but it's interesting that the long-standing British perception of a plough in these same seven stars is an unusual choice, not found elsewhere. Possibly it may be linked to the Welsh aradr, plough, which would naturally need a driver or ploughman, aradrwr or arddwr...
:D
As a simple farm boy the Plough constellation looks a damned sight more like a plough than a bear :-)
(https://pgapworld.wikispaces.com/file/view/Ploughmen_Fac_simile_of_a_Miniature_in_a_very_ancient_Anglo_Saxon_Manuscript_published_by_Shaw_with_legend_God_Spede_ye_Plough_and_send_us_Korne_enow.png/43190151/570x338/Ploughmen_Fac_simile_of_a_Miniature_in_a_very_ancient_Anglo_Saxon_Manuscript_published_by_Shaw_with_legend_God_Spede_ye_Plough_and_send_us_Korne_enow.png)
Provided of course its got a mouldboard and isn't just an ard, which means it's probably later than Arthur, perhaps several hundred years later.
Lord alone knows what the significance of this is :-[
So what are the 'militia' style forces that are available to a 5th century Roman province.
We know that landlords held large estates and could provide a group of likely mounted men. These would ge small in number. They are for collecting taxes and coercing coloni. We should see them as not cavalry n a large unit scale, but one could assemble quite a few if the overall leader had the authority. I would inagine small groups such as the followers of Ecdicius in Gaul. In Spain in the 6th century the Ostrogoth Theudis arried a wealthy Spanish heiress and could provude 2000 men from his hokding which were lijely very large.
Towns would likely have a watch who guarded the gates, arrested wrongdoers, manned walls. Towns in Spain appear to have been well capable of defending thenselves against barbarians, but not of power projection . Walls were maintained by groups within the town taking responsibility for repairing them and presumably manning them (Caesarius of Arles) and Procopius has the Jews of Naples nanning a section so particular groups might have a specified duty. However, such troops would not ge. very useful in the field, like the units raised in Spain by the cousins of Honorius, who failed to hold the mountain passes against the Vandals. Maybe such a levy would be best advised to hide in a valley and shout to scare the enemy.
That there were settlements of Germanic laeti in Britain starting in the 4th century seems certain. They apoear to be quite small and are not locared on the border so maybe they held fords or towns, or the Saxon shore forts such as Pevensey. . Lastly there are the British federates, tribes such as the Votadini, or the Welsh of North and West Wales.vThese were likely the largest military forces and were more apt that the town or estate troops. At Dereham in 577 the Saxons defeated the forces of the British 'kings' of Bath Cirencester and Gloucester, which implies that these chaps had forces, perhaps augmented by Irish federates. Its a very messy picture, no doubt an army could ge assembled but any sizeable force would be an alliance . Fortunately for the British their Saxon opponents were also fragmented and their alliances would suffer the same centripetal tendencies.
We should remember that the Britons are the only post Roman entity to hold back their barbarian attackers for any sgnificant period.
Roy
Certainly we see figures from Egypt and some estates seem to have reasonable large numbers of men, often with soldiers leading and training them. (Soldiers taking unofficial leave of absence to do this seem to have been something of a problem)
Given that in Egypt there were raiders in the desert, bandits and similar based in the Delta and other areas, you could see how these forces could get a fair bit of practice.
There were also small 'police posts' with armed guards to provide a refuge for travellers and signaling to pass on the word of raids.
Even in the earlier Imperial period there were quite large numbers of these men. I've seen articles discussing them in Asia Minor as well as Egypt. Then you get the situation with the Moors in North Africa where you have 'Roman officials' who are also tribal leaders and can raise considerable numbers of men outside the conventional military structures.
I seem to remember Marcus Aurelius drafting units of these men straight into the army to make up losses
Quote from: Sharur on January 16, 2017, 04:29:13 PM
The talk of bears and chariots from Gildas 32 naturally calls to mind the seven brighter stars of the north-circumpolar constellation the Great Bear, Ursa Major, long known in many places as a wagon or chariot, including Britain, where it also had an association with Arthur ...
The provenance and longevity of such names is uncertain from this source too, but it's interesting that the long-standing British perception of a plough in these same seven stars is an unusual choice, not found elsewhere. Possibly it may be linked to the Welsh aradr, plough, which would naturally need a driver or ploughman, aradrwr or arddwr...
I was going to air the astrological aspect but Alastair has done it much better.
Guess what
artorius means in Latin.
Ploughman. :)
Quote from: aligern on January 16, 2017, 05:03:06 PM
We should remember that the Britons are the only post Roman entity to hold back their barbarian attackers for any significant period.
Roy
Indeed we should Roy and a very salient point. There are many factors coming into play but the process of resistance by the Sub Roman British is one of 'never say die' and may underpin the very essence of what it is to be 'British' (and yes I know how ironic this is as the majority of these isles are or consider themselves 'English'). Also the fact that this resistance was so tenacious and took so long would possibly aid the very process of generating the 'Arthur myth'. I am not saying Arthur didnt exist just saying the legends that surround him, layer upon layer, generation upon generation could have reinforced and reinvented time and time again because of this resistance by the British people.
There is an extensive collection of possible derivations of Arthur in the eponymous wikipedia page
ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur
Note that one possible route is again astrological relating to the same constellation but rather more ursine in derivation.
Quote from: Erpingham on January 16, 2017, 08:58:31 PM
There is an extensive collection of possible derivations of Arthur in the eponymous wikipedia page
ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur
Note that one possible route is again astrological relating to the same constellation but rather more ursine in derivation.
Other lesser explored avenues include Vortipor(ius) known in Irish annals are Gartbuir. The b could be a mispelt h for instance. Maybe too late for our tastes but could be interesting for the fact he could be of recent Irish decent and thus not really 'British' (remember Nennius' passage Then in those days Arthur fought against them with the kings of the Britons, but he was commander [dux bellorum] in those battles)
Another Garth, this time in Welsh means cliff or enclosure and a soft mutation allows it to become Arth (for example Penarth which is thought to be Pen y Garth).
Technically the constellation bits are more folkloric than astrological (as not being linked with the zodiac), and nor are they (like almost all of this topic...) in any way new; a colleague first showed me a just-published short article on them more than twenty years ago now, and it's not the earliest 8)
Quote from: Jim Webster on January 16, 2017, 04:53:15 PM
As a simple farm boy the Plough constellation looks a damned sight more like a plough than a bear :-)
Quite right, Jim! And it's even moving in the right direction, unlike the views of the wagon that have the team as the three stars
following the box of the car. ;D
But you'll notice I avoided mentioning some of the things "plough", "ploughing" can also be interpreted as meaning, and which if you dig far enough, you'll discover the fans of Arthuriana definitely haven't ;)
Plough/ploughing is certainly interesting...for instance Eochu/Eochaid Airem from Irish legend is said to have been High King of Ireland at the time of Julius Caesar. Airem is said to mean ploughman and there are many similarities between this chap and the Arthur of Welsh folklore. In the tale of Culhwch and Olwen, Arthur and his men had to plough the land for the giant Yspaddaden. Also as an aside when talking about Garth previously (as in Gart(h)buir) it can also be linked to Gard......which can be used to denote a stronghold such as Lancelots' Joyous Gard in Malory
Even more interesting (though going a bit off track deep into Arthur mythology now....or is it? ;) ) is that Culhwch is the son of Celyddon
What was that you were saying earlier about rabbit holes, Holly?
Quote from: Erpingham on January 17, 2017, 09:25:24 AM
What was that you were saying earlier about rabbit holes, Holly?
;D
There are lots of them and they run deep!
On the subject of Britannia's resistance to the invader, Gildas has a few interesting observations, if delivered in overlong sentences.
"The Romans, therefore, left the country, giving notice that they could no longer be harassed by such laborious expeditions, nor suffer the Roman standards, with so large and brave an army, to be worn out by sea and land by fighting against these unwarlike, plundering vagabonds; but that the islanders, inuring themselves to warlike weapons, and bravely fighting, should valiantly protect their country, their property, wives and children, and, what is dearer than these, their liberty and lives; that they should not suffer their hands to be tied behind their backs by a nation which, unless they were enervated by idleness and sloth, was not more powerful than themselves, but that they should arm those hands with buckler, sword, and spear, ready for the field of battle; and, because they thought this also of advantage to the people they were about to leave, they, with the help of the miserable natives, built a wall different from the former, by public and private contributions, and of the same structure as walls generally, extending in a straight line from sea to sea, between some cities, which, from fear of their enemies, had there by chance been built.
In short, the Empire - or what was left of it - overturns a basic precept of Imperial rule and urges the populace to arm for their own defence.
They then give energetic counsel to the timorous native, and leave them patterns by which to manufacture arms. Moreover, on the south coast where their vessels lay, as there was some apprehension lest the barbarians might land, they erected towers at stated intervals, commanding a prospect of the sea; and then left the island never to return."
This suggests the above counsel was further supported by a 'military mission' to arm and perhaps organise the Britons for their own defence. The timing would be about right (post-Constantine III and pre-'Agitius' (Aetius or Aegidius)) for Germanus to take command of these ready-made forces and provide leadership to field them effectively.
which could indicate raw/untested/militia type troops raised in response to external threats (in addition to laeti/foederati)
Quote from: Holly on January 17, 2017, 07:16:31 AM
Plough/ploughing is certainly interesting...for instance Eochu/Eochaid Airem from Irish legend is said to have been High King of Ireland at the time of Julius Caesar.
The personal name Eochaid comes from the Old Irish word for Horse (equivalent to Equus) and appearances of the name in later legend are often as avatars of the horse-god. The name was particularly associated with the ruling dynasty of the Ulaid in north-eastern Ulster while Ptolemy's map has the Epidii (a P-Celtic form of Eochaid) on the opposite, British, side of the North channel.
Cheers
Mick
Quote from: Mick Hession on January 17, 2017, 10:13:23 AM
Quote from: Holly on January 17, 2017, 07:16:31 AM
Plough/ploughing is certainly interesting...for instance Eochu/Eochaid Airem from Irish legend is said to have been High King of Ireland at the time of Julius Caesar.
The personal name Eochaid comes from the Old Irish word for Horse (equivalent to Equus) and appearances of the name in later legend are often as avatars of the horse-god. The name was particularly associated with the ruling dynasty of the Ulaid in north-eastern Ulster while Ptolemy's map has the Epidii (a P-Celtic form of Eochaid) on the opposite, British, side of the North channel.
Cheers
Mick
thanks Mick, this element being right up your alley so to speak! Even more interesting then....horse ploughman!
Quote from: Holly on January 17, 2017, 10:09:19 AM
which could indicate raw/untested/militia type troops raised in response to external threats (in addition to laeti/foederati)
Gildas seems rather confused as to when exactly things occured (his comments on what must be Hadrians Wall and other late Roman fortifications, including the Saxon Shore) but his general message is clear. This would certainly point to a fundamentally militia approach but it would be surprising if there weren't other forces available, as Roy has said, supported by the big landowners for defence of their interests. Also, that there were military communities of "barbarians" in service by land-grant or some other mechanism seems to follow from the archaeology.
As to untried, it would be very surprising if they weren't dealing with low level raiding and brigandage. Dealing with more organised military threats or working together in defence of something bigger than their town or villa, perhaps not. Presumably, this is where Germanus comes in.
The way I see it there would have been available to the Britons:
- Personal retinues of powerful men.
City Militias (which may have doubled as Fire Service/Police)
Volunteer Militias/Military Societies etc.
Levies drawn from the Land, probably on some sort of proto-feudal basis, or client/patron relationships (we have a precedent in young Pompeius Magnus raising legions from his family estates), or may have been something similar to the Fyrd.
(Possibly) Saxon, Irish and Pictish mercenaries and allies.
In my theory, major Saxon incursions would have provided a strong incentive for all these elements to come together, and to come together from multiple regions, probably assisted in this by the organising ability/charisma of "Arthur"
Quote from: Erpingham on January 17, 2017, 12:04:12 PM
Quote from: Holly on January 17, 2017, 10:09:19 AM
which could indicate raw/untested/militia type troops raised in response to external threats (in addition to laeti/foederati)
Gildas seems rather confused as to when exactly things occured (his comments on what must be Hadrians Wall and other late Roman fortifications, including the Saxon Shore) but his general message is clear. This would certainly point to a fundamentally militia approach but it would be surprising if there weren't other forces available, as Roy has said, supported by the big landowners for defence of their interests. Also, that there were military communities of "barbarians" in service by land-grant or some other mechanism seems to follow from the archaeology.
As to untried, it would be very surprising if they weren't dealing with low level raiding and brigandage. Dealing with more organised military threats or working together in defence of something bigger than their town or villa, perhaps not. Presumably, this is where Germanus comes in.
absolutely, dealing with brigandage and low level raiding would be the order of the day for most militia types. Presumably (big presumption) is that this was the de facto state of lowland Britain on the whole with the suggestion of repeated incursions in the North and West and so hence the multiple mentions of Scots and Irish.
Interestingly, one interpretation of the Welsh Poem 'Marwnad Cunedda' has infighting between two brythonic groups - the Coelings (from Hen Coel fame) and Cunedda/Bryneich around Hadrians Wall in the very late 4th or early 5th. the poem mentions payment for troops in kind with no mention of precious metals/coins etc and Cunedda himself is referred to as guletic/gwledig (lord/leader/land holder) as opposed to teryn (king)
Quote from: Patrick Waterson on January 17, 2017, 09:47:33 AM
On the subject of Britannia's resistance to the invader, Gildas has a few interesting observations, if delivered in overlong sentences.
"The Romans, therefore, left the country, giving notice that they could no longer be harassed by such laborious expeditions, nor suffer the Roman standards, with so large and brave an army, to be worn out by sea and land by fighting against these unwarlike, plundering vagabonds; but that the islanders, inuring themselves to warlike weapons, and bravely fighting, should valiantly protect their country, their property, wives and children, and, what is dearer than these, their liberty and lives; that they should not suffer their hands to be tied behind their backs by a nation which, unless they were enervated by idleness and sloth, was not more powerful than themselves, but that they should arm those hands with buckler, sword, and spear, ready for the field of battle; and, because they thought this also of advantage to the people they were about to leave, they, with the help of the miserable natives, built a wall different from the former, by public and private contributions, and of the same structure as walls generally, extending in a straight line from sea to sea, between some cities, which, from fear of their enemies, had there by chance been built.
In short, the Empire - or what was left of it - overturns a basic precept of Imperial rule and urges the populace to arm for their own defence.
De redditu iure armorum: Valentinian III issued a law of that name in 440 and Majorian the same in 458, restoring the right to bear arms (in Italy at least) - so it was within the spirit of the times.
I am tempted to do an article on this thread....and possibly a mini campaign game too?
Don't let anyone stop you, Dave. :)
Quote from: Holly on January 24, 2017, 07:33:23 PM
I am tempted to do an article on this thread....and possibly a mini campaign game too?
What would be Patrick's victory conditions?
Boring the opposition to death.
good question Duncan. I am happy for people to suggest things (inc Patrick ;-) )
For me, I would go for a Civitas or proto kingdom trying to get pre eminence over all others by say 600AD ish (any of them with victory points awarded for territory held etc)...this means that we are not necessarily looking at linear 'nationalities' as such and the timeframe is important in this context therefore
I have to ask, Dave, why there was not an attempt of one kingdom to dominate and incorporate the others. In Gaul, Spain, Africa and Italy, eventually there is a resolution down to one dominant barbarian tribal kingdom. That may say something about the numbers and initial lack of a cohesive culture of the invaders. As I subscribe to the 'three ship' theory, i.e. that there are small German forces, either arriving scattered or here already as small federate contingents, that militates against an overmighty invader with an army of say 10'000, just taking over and being able to overawe any opposition. From the British side we might ask the question of why they did not start out at least with a unified organisation. The appeals to Honorius, Aetius are by the civitates, there is no governor, not even a governor of one of the four dioceses mentioned. Interestingly there is no leadership at that level on the continent. Once the army is gone the Roman organisation appears to be down to individual cities. I think this has severe implications for any scenario based game because the essential reality of the post imperial provinces and dioceses is that they do not exist. In the minds of the Late Romans you can aim for the purple and thus the legitimate command of all trrops in a province, or you can run a town. When the organisation is reduced to the level of town, or tribal warrior king of what had been a civitas, then there appears no concept of anything bigger except maybe to incirporate a neaby petty kingdom. I know this is a point I have made before, but any game has to deal with the realities of the mental concepts of people at the time to be a good simulation.
There appears to be a Bretwalda like concept amongst tge Britons, which may have Roman echoes, but it appears to be tribute and acknowledgement of superiority based. Hence I suggest that the game is about political and military manoeuvering to gain the 'Dragon if the Island' position and that other states are not conquered, rather they are overawed, maybe militarily and forced to turn up with their comitatus to fight alongside levies and foederati from wherever the battle is, but that the tribal kings and leaders of civitates are always difficult to coerce and to hold together as an army and always plotting to undercut and perhaps get the position for themselves, though historically it looks more likely that the alternative is simply to be independent of central authority rather than to replace it.
Roy
It depends upon the main focus of the campaign, whether this is to kick the invaders out of Britannia and/or subdue them so they are good servants rather than bad masters, or to become primus inter pares as far as the surviving British kingdoms are concerned, stopping the Saxons being a side-issue.
As far as I can see, the first condition was the priority under Ambrosius/Uther/Arthur, and the second afterwards.
Hence, up to and including the Arthur period, the idea could be for the Britons to gain prestige (victory points) by defeating Saxons. Rather than just counting at the end of the game, prestige can be used to create alliances: if two (or more) powers of differing prestige ally against a Saxon foe, they average out their prestige ratings (these become the new victory point totals). Hence it pays to ally with a more prestigious friendly power, but the top-rated powers will be reluctant to ally with just anyone, as doing so can drop their totals.
Victory points gained by the alliance are shared equally, except that the power which entered the alliance with the highest prestige score is considered to lead ('Pendragon!') and gains a bonus equivalent to an additional share of victory points. Hence, say five kings get together and thrash a Saxon army, gaining 200 victory points: each king gets 40 VP but the Pendragon gets another 40, total 80. There is of course a catch: defeat loses victory points, and the Pendragon loses an extra share (which means he will probably not be Pendragon next time round).
At some point players can agree to invoke a change the victory conditions so that victory over Saxons no longer generates VP, but victory over Britons does. This (the Mort D'Arthur) will significantly change the play of the game, as the Britons henceforth cease to be friendly rivals and instead become cats in a sack. Invoking Mort D'Arthur would perhaps require a Pendragon to have held a clear victory point superiority for a few turns, to the point where it would be obvious that if things continued no other player could hope to win. The Saxons can also be expected to spread with fewer problems, perhaps enhanced by a general Saxon revolt on the turn the Mort D'Arthur is invoked.
That would be my suggested concept. It obviously needs work, and I think Dave's idea of points for territory etc. should apply throughout, and timeframe will matter, but the general approach should keep a campaign alive.
It might be worth reviewing our evidence for a "Bretwalda" figure. As I have understood it, it mainly boils down to names. Vortigern has a name that could be high king, Uther is called Pendragon which means head dragon, which could be a heroic reference to leadership, Arthur is Dux Bellorum, which again could be a role or a title implying wider hegemony. But these always smack of back projection after the event. Vortigern could just be a name, Uther could be a leader of warriors and Arthur could just have been senior comitatus leader in a campaign.
Arthur is also "ameraudur" in the Elegy of Geraint, and possibly other Welsh sources. But I don't think anyone else is, which argues against it being an institution.
One of the best evidences for such a position is that , once they have the piwer, the Saxons start squabbling over who has the position. It looks as though it is a big moment when it becomes a title that is held by the invader, as though it was something they took from the Britons. As I have tried to explain before peopke actually in oeriod have limited concepts of what can be....hence Roman provincial kings are not firthcoming. Its about what is in their heads. A more recent exampke is in the ECW when the Earl of Manchester says 'What matter it if we beat the king 50 times, he shall still be king'. He clearly had no concept that they could create a republic or a different constitution and that is very much how peopke, even powerful and well educated ones who have read Greek and Latin texts, think. So I suggest that the Saxons see Bretwaldaship as being the thing to aim for, as the prize, because it was what the Britons had as the greatest pisition on the island. Significantly the Saxons seem to have worked by overawing rather than just crushing and incorpirating the other German kingdoms, so Essex goes on for some while, Kent becomes a sub kingdom of Wessex.
I think, at risk of treading on Mick's turf, the Irish situation in the Middle Ages and 16th century may be similar. Local power relations and titles were the whole scope of leaders ambitions and, instead of seeing the big picture of the foreign threat, they just saw it as a possible ally in their local struggles. High kingship was a theoretical possibility, but it wasn't a sovereign position.
By all means, tread on :)
You make a very interesting point. But the clarity of the foreign threat was probably not that evident at the time. In medieval Ireland the foreignness of the English was tempered within a generation or so by intermarriage, bilingualism and the adoption of certain Irish customs (usually those that favoured the nobility!). At a local level, the neighbouring English baron on one side of your territory was no more exotic than your Irish neighbours on the other side and just as likely to raid your cows one week as to ally with you against someone else the next week. As time went by the distinction between English and Irish became quite fuzzy in many respects and in some cases old identities were discarded and replaced by new ones - thus the Ui Dunlainge became anglicised as FitzDermots and the De Nangulos became O'Costellos, for example. It was only with the "second conquest" by the Tudors that the Irish (and those of the original English that had gone native) came up against something completely alien, but that was a comparatively rapid process - a half-century or thereabouts - so left little time for adaptation to the threat.
Looking at Arthurian Britain, Guy Halsall makes some interesting points about identity that certainly have parallels with the Irish experience, though the traffic is a bit more one-way, with British communities adopting Saxon identities over time.
Cheers
Mick
very interesting thoughts chaps....
I was generally thinking along the same lines in terms of aiming for...lets say.....'Tyrant of the Island' as the winning position in the campaign. Roy makes very good points about the (apparent) localised view of what was achievable by the British and later the Saxons (or Anglo British!). Patrick also makes interesting points about points to be gained in a campaign game :)
I will ponder on this but definitely think there is merit in:
- alliances gaining points for players
- (extra) points for being 'Tyrant of the Island' for a season especially when winning battles
- territory held = points/resources
- use of Roman roads/cities for movement/supply/prestige (which admitedly might drop off to wards the end of the game!)
- spend points to recruit allies/foederati
- in addition chance has to play a part (think plague/bad weather/raiding pirates/loss of allies!/emigration)
- economic output and population
- special leaders and unique leader qualities (eg a fancy sword called Calliburn etc giving combat bonuses)
- obvious combat segments per season whether done by dice/cards or tabletop battles (poss allow for both)
I do have a picture in my mind of Britain split into some petty kingdoms/civitates diagrammatically marked on a map.
What I would ask others is in regards of the timeframe. Originally I had it in my head a period of roughly 410AD (from the alleged rescript incident) to approx 600AD (loss of most lowland Britain by the Brythonic speakers and a sundering of the SW, Wales and the North from each other). However I am persuaded to narrow the point down to a 'generation' or 2 if there was merit and an easy choice eg 480AD to 520AD could encompass most of the action in regards to a potential 'Arthur' and all those battles........?
How about doing an AD 480-520 prototype to sort out basic goals, mechanisms and factions/powers, and using it to fine-tune the basic points systems, goals, play outline, key special rules etc.? If it goes swimmingly, start adding extra details for a grand AD 410-600 version.
makes sense Patrick...the shorter version is focused on assembling alliances and winning battles and prestige for a singular leader. The longer game would look to more long term for building (long lasting) dynastic kingdoms
This all sounds very interesting.
A couple of thoughts come to mind. First, Marwanad Cunedda indicates that the civates were not the only level of political organisation. Cunedda has his own court, he can allocate land and has a warband but no claims of a royal title are made for him. He was expected to fight alongside the men of Bryneich but no one claims he led them. Once killed his court poet is concerned to ensure that the treaty between polities that provided for Cunedda's role is renewed so that the Warband and poet can continue in their present position. Second, the geographical scope of the poem would indicate that present day Cumbria, Durham and Northumberland with perhaps Lothian too, comprised a recognised political area.
Success in game terms might be to be recognised as the Wledig of the whole area.
completely agree.....there is a political 'unity' inferred for the area by treaty (mentioned as you indicate in the poem) but not necessarily one of 'kingdom' status.
back to the 'nature' of our Arthur leader....Wledig (aka Guletic etc) is seen in the mould of a Protector and thus possibly a titular 'leader' but not a king
Yes Arthur seems not to have been a King at all. I'm minded to see Guletic/Wledig as a king who holds the allegiance of other kings. Some quite prominent lads are denied the title so it has some precise meaning.
I think it was Snyder who went into some depth about the title of 'Tyrant' and its meaning in our period. He was minded (from memory) to think of Tyrant as a leader but not necessarily a king in the classic sense.
so potentially we have tyrants (a la Gildas) ruling civitas/areas with an Overlord or Protector who may or may not have been a ruler himself, very much in keeping with a Dux Britanniarum
He did, and also considered the relationship between the words Tyrant and Tigern. Vortipor is titled protector but he comes from an Irish dynasty established it seems by Maxin Wledig so in that case we have a title (and position) accruing to an original king surviving in use by by his successors. Koch makes a similar point about the word Iudex, are these people appointees or governing in their own right as perhaps the magistrates of former colonia?
I wonder about Gildas and his ideas about legitimacy, clearly Roman is good and the Church is even better. The kings are all Celtic ones and they can be good or bad, the foam flecked bards are clearly very bad but they are the custodians and promulgators of native elite culture. The accusations of adultery don't work from the stand point of Celtic law where serial marriage and temporary marriage are all provided for. I'm intrigued by Koch's view of Bangor, where he seems to place Gildas, and Powys as a militant Christian alliance operating along the lines of Iona and Northumbria.
thanks, trying to remember sources on the hoof is difficult for me!
re Gildas.....does anyone wonder why he mentions just 'Highland' area kings for his attacks. Obviously some of the eastern portions of the island are lost to the proto-English by the mid 6th C, but he appears to neglect lowland British (controlled) leaders altogether. Is this to do with a Celtic outlook versus a Sub Roman outlook (again touching upon religion here as discussed earlier in the thread)? Patrick (no the historical one ;-) ), has a go at Coroticus as a 'feral' or apostate British leader in a similar vein to Gildas.....ie both attack the morals of the leaders/tyrants/kings but not their military or leadership prowess
I think it is about religion. Despite its success in replacing paganism Christianity never impacted upon the Celtic legal system beyond slotting the clergy into the old Druid slot in the hierarchy. Irish clerics never stopped complaining about the secular aristocracy to little avail.
If Koch is right about Powys then we have Gildas's ideal kingdom with the Church as a major power acting as gate keeper to the kingship.
Patrick's letter is interesting he clearly sees Coroticus and co as part of the same nation as himself cives of Roman successor states who share a political and cultural identity including Christianity. He is not exceeding his authority because the victims are his flock and the incident took place on his turf. Coroticus has enslaved some of Patrick's converts and has done so with the help of Irish and Pict pagans. Charles-Edwards discusses it at length in an illuminating way. It is striking that Patrick is threatening Coroticus rather than pleading with him - just like Gildas.
Quote from: Anton on January 27, 2017, 02:11:52 PM
Charles-Edwards discusses it at length in an illuminating way. It is striking that Patrick is threatening Coroticus rather than pleading with him - just like Gildas.
which of his books btw so I can have a look? :)
Holly, it is in Charles-Edwards Early Christian Ireland published in 2000.
thought so.....I have a copy
up in the loft somewhere! :(
For those interested, I have been delving into the Cunedda stuff especially the poem attributed to Taliesin and it does throw up some interesting stuff with regards to our thread although potentially 'too early' for an an Arthurian period proper (?). There are quite a few translations knocking about and even Koch has produced several versions. This is probably my favourite though:
Between the brine and the high slope and fresh stream water,
men will cringe before Cunedda, the violent one.
In Caer Weir [?Durham] and Caer Lywelydd [Carlisle],
fighting will shake the Roman towns [civitates].
A tidal inrush of flame, a wave from across the sea;
champion will set upon champion;
moved by the man who gained sway across the habitable surface of the world,
as the sighing of the wind over the ash wood.
The heirs of Kynvarch and those of Coel will hold fast together in alliance.
They will adorn the skillful bards who sing.
It is the death of Cunedda that I mourn and shall mourn.
The thick door, the stout stronghold of refuge,
the fearless one is mourned --
the noble, refined, profound one,
His address to the towns of the Romans [civitates] was harsh and stark,
harder than bone against the foe.
Exalted Cunedda, before going to his earthen resting place,
he maintained his honour a hundred times over.
Before our protector perished,
the men of the land of Byrneich [Bernica] were wont to give battle.
A song of pain was sung for fear and dread of him before a covering of earth became his portion.
A pack like wild dogs ensheathed him.
Cowardice is worse than death. For this bitter death I lament,
for the court and the onslaught of Cunedda.
For [want of] the abundance of the brine, for the salmon of the sea,
for the spoils of the oven, I shall now surely perish.
I shall recite the verse that the bards recite.
As others reckon, I shall reckon
the wonders of the battle lord:
[his] gift of a hundred steeds before Cunedda took his share.
He used to grant me cattle in mid summer.
He used to grant me horses in winter.
He used to grant me bright wine and oil.
He used to grant me a throng of slaves for a household.
He was a mighty attacker in conflict --
the chieftain whose face was that of a lion.
The borderland was always reduced to ashes prior to the everlasting overthrow of Edern's son [Cunedda].
He who was brave, unyielding, fierce, is cut off by the consuming power of death.
He was wont to sustain a resplendent shield [ie protection].
Heroic men were his captains.
Grief wakens me, holds back the wine of the man great in feats --
the sleep of Coel's descendants destroyed.
A possible mention of another semi-legendary King in that last line.
Nice to see that Holly.
I wonder if we read civitates as a political unit rather than (walled) Roman towns what we would be talking of. We have the Carvetii in the west around Carlisle, something around Corbridge according to some and I'd guess something in north Durham possibly centred on Chester le Street/ Durham/Caer Weir or further south at Vinovium/Binchester.
In one of his treatments of Marwanad Cunedda Koch opines the phrase 'profound one' that is to say 'deep one' is a reference of the Cunedda's Dumnonian ancestry. At the moment I cannot recall if Cunedda was a Coeling but, if he was, we might think that Coel was also Dumnonian.
Koch treats Cunedda/the (South = Bryneich) Votadini as distinct from the Coelings (Rheged) and to a degree the Northern Votadini (ie far beyond the wall). The long standing emnity (which bursts forth again in Y Gododdin) is between the descendents of Cunedda and Coel. Marwnad Cunedda is thus an elegy for the fallen Cunedda in fighting against Coel