The Truth Behind the Legends of King Arthur

[@calebburton848]

Excellent description and story behind this obscure character. Best historical evidence I’ve heard for a fact based Arthur!

[@orgolwg]

Nice video Caleb, well explained

[@melissaminshall9360]

Hope you keep digging for more historical data on King Arthur. I appreciate the work you've done so far. Just found your channel and have only the pleasure of watching a few of your videos so far. I believe a lot of the early Briton history is being hidden and obscured to give the impression that Rome was the most civilized and advanced society, but through digging of my own have found otherwise. For instance they lead us to believe that the Romans founded London, but in actuality E.O. Gordon, in Prehistoric London , states that the city of London (Llandin) was founded circa 1100 BC by Brutus of Troy, some three centuries before Rome. Finding the right books is getting harder each year that passes, but I have been able to find more than you would think that would fill in a lot of vacant or obscured years of British history with an abundance of source information. But right now I am going to watch the rest of your videos.

[@alphalunamare]

7:45 The village of 'Coedkernew' is ideally placed for this referecence. There is a road sign on the old A48, I always used to wonder about its connection to Cornwall.

[@calebhowells1116]

Indeed!

[@Penddraig7]

For me Arthrwys as in Arthrwys ap Meurig is just the Welsh equivalent of Arthur which was likely latinised to Artorius and that was anglicised to Arthur. Arthur is said to mean strong bear and Arthrwys is Arth + rhwys, Arth meaning a bear and Rhwys meaning Vigor/Vigorous; wanton/wantonness; luxuriant/luxuriance; lively So they mean the exact same thing at the end of the day, spelling wasn’t the best back then too, it’s well documented that spelling often depending on the scribe and so that accounted for multiple variations of spelling. Also when it comes to Welsh, the alphabet has changed numerous times over the millennia since the introduction of the Romanised alphabet and at the time in question th would have been t, w would have been u and y was either an e or i, both were used, so Arthrwys would have been either Artruis or Artrues, so Arthrwys could easily have become Artorius in Latin. But i agree 100% that the King Arthur of legend is a conflation of two Arthur’s, both of whom would have had some kind of legend status for their individual feats and over time the two stories got jumbled up and combined into one legend and i agree that Arthur II was Arthrwys ap Meurig, it all just fits, obviously the story has been embellished and romanticised by later writers and storytellers and because of the Chinese whispers phenomenon

[@peterjeremymckenzie8444]

Very concise explanation, thanks Caleb. It is interesting to note that Llandaf Cathedral has a stained glass window with Arthur and that in the 19th Century they had similar thoughts on their past history.

[@clio99027]

There is, in certain circles, a belief that Arthur was based on a British warrior named Owain Dant Gwyn or Howell Dant Gwyn who was based at the Roman city of Viraconium Cornovii, modern day Wroxeter just outside of Shrewsbury. Bear in mind that most battles attributed to Arthur were fought in the north of Britain.

[@ncjhood]

Thank you for your video Caleb - very much enjoyed it and found it very informative!

[@calebhowells1116]

I’m glad to hear that you enjoyed it! 😄

[@AutisticEditz13]

I'm still sceptical on this. William O. Pughe in 1803, pulling from an unknown source, says: "His descent is thus: Caradog ab Iestyn ab Gwrgant ab Ithel ab Morgan Vawr ab Arthvael ab Rhys ab Arthvael ab Gweirydd ab Brochwel ab Meirig ab Arthvael ab Rhys ab Eunyad ab Morgan Mwynvawr ab *Andros* ab Meirig ab Tewdrig" Also Athrwys (King of Gwent, son of Tewdrig) is not Athrwys (son of Meurig)

[@pattheplanter]

There is another possible kernel for the growth of the legend, though long before the usual suspects. There was once a British King who presided over a prosperous time, ruling from the city of Camulodunum (the most likely source for Camelot). He regularly defeated his neighbours in battle to spread his rule. His father had already been so powerful that he was called King of the Britons. The young king fought against the armies of an invader across most of southern Britain for eight years before being defeated in a final great battle. He left the scene of the last battle alive and was then betrayed by a Queen who was having an affair with her husband's greatest warrior. The king did not die but went into exile in a far-distant and almost mythical land famous for the size and sweetness of its apples. It was not King Arthur. This king is best known as Caractacus or Caratacus, the version of his name the Romans had used. The original name is thought to have been something like Caratauc or Caratacos. It is derived from a root meaning "beloved" like the modern Welsh cariad. Old Welsh has Caratauc, which became Caradoc. Modern Welsh has Caradog. Old Breton has Caratoc. The surviving Irish form of the name of Caradoc is Carthach or Carthaigh. The modern surnames Carthy and O'Carthy come from the same name. McCarthy derives from "mac Carthaigh" - son of Caratauc. I know historians don't trust Geoffrey of Monmouth but his The History of the Kings of Britain had King Arthur defeating the Romans under the fictional Emperor Lucius Tiberius (or Hiberius) and becoming Emperor himself. Caratauc fought the armies of Claudius. The real Emperor Claudius' first name was Tiberius. I believe Geoffrey had some strange Welsh sources. Caratauc was forgotten until he was resurrected as a hero of the British Empire in the 19th century because of his bravery in fighting a massive Empire, being British and being a noble, well-spoken loser. Even so, he is nowhere near as famous as King Arthur.

[@kevincasey5035]

Can I offer a piece of criticism? I followed you up to about 15 mins but then you started going into genealogies and dates. Perhaps showing possible family trees would have been useful here. While I applaud your research and have no bones with it, you say that somebody visited one "court" and went to another. Did "courts" exists in pre-1066 petty kingdoms? I would have thought it more likely that a petty ruler maybe had a servant or two (paid or otherwise) but no specialized tax gatherer or "captain of the guard" etc. In my own research into the Battle of Hastings I found information had been disregarded to make the official narrative what it is . However, trying to make a narrative that fitted all four early sources ( Carmen, BT, Will of Poitiers and Will of Jumieges) made me pay attention to what was written ( or depicted) very closely and resulted in a narrative that was more nuanced than the original. So, are there things that are in the accounts that you haven't been able to explain away? P.S I've liked and subscribed!

[@K55365]

You can look up the research paper : 'Iranian Roots of the Legends of King Arthur' by K. Arthur

[@stuartdow]

Arcturus

[@danielferguson3784]

It's just as likely that the Arthurian stories survived in areas that remained British, while being lost in the eastern areas as the Anglo-Saxons took over the land. So the legendary stories became attached to places remaining to the 'Welsh', whether or not this was the actual real location of the events in the tales. It is evident that, as with the Boar hunt etc. the events themselves are imaginary also. The name Arthur, or similar, occurs in several parts of Britain, in Royal genealogies, especially in the north & west, but not only in Wales. Any one of these could be based on a 'real' Arthur, & there is little to prefer any one over another. This 'version' would seem to make the legendary 'King Arthur' little more than a minor war leader in a limited area of south-east Wales, & hardly important enough to have engendered all the legends that later surrounded his memory. The Welsh Magnus Maximus stories are pretty much fantasies, based on the simple fact that he was a famous Roman soldier who usurped the Imperial rule, having started in a British command. The legends give him a fictional Welsh birth & heritage, & an association with the Roman fort at Caernarvon, none of which things are recorded in conventional histories. The stories also make him the fount of later Welsh Royal bloodlines, again these are nonsense. The Andregathius connection is a bit of a stretch, & unnecessary, as the 'conquest of Europe/Greece' by leaders from Britain is a repeated story of real conquests by several Emperors who campaigned to gain the Imperial throne, starting in Britain. Among these were not only Constantine 3rd & Maximus, but most famously & successfully Constantine 1st, who also added Christianity to his credit. It was only right that any great leader from Britain, especially with a Christianising mission, should conquer both the western & eastern Empires, even if only in the imagination of later story-tellers. They possibly had the story of 'Riothamus' & other Britons adventures in the future Brittany to follow as a recent (or contemporary) example, along with the Kingdom of Syagrius fighting to retain a Roman state in Gaul. In short there are several possible personages that lie at the core of the Arthurian legends, & your example is only one, & probably not the likeliest.