tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/arthurian-legend-38758/articles
Arthurian legend – The Conversation
2022-09-06T15:04:00Z
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/190021
2022-09-06T15:04:00Z
2022-09-06T15:04:00Z
House of Dragons – an introduction to the stories and British history that inspired the beasts of Westeros
<p>Dragons have inspired awe and wonder since the beginning of human imagination. Most recently, these fire-spitting flying creatures – in modern western culture at least – have come alive in Game of Thrones and its new spin off, House of Dragons.</p>
<p>These winged beasts are particularly important in the new series. Set 200 years before Game of Thrones, the series follows the Targaryen family who rules Westeros with the help of their dragons. </p>
<p>In the medieval west, dragons feature both in literature and in political history and prophecy. They reached their heyday in Arthurian stories, most notably in Merlin’s legendary prophecies of two dragons fighting for the sovereignty of two warring peoples. This story was later used and reused for centuries for political gain by real historical people.</p>
<p>The beasts of Westeros, the fictional land in which these series are set, owe a debt to these tales. So, for those who want to stand out from the crowd in online debates about the new series, here is an introduction to the dragons of Westeros that takes in Arthurian legend, a handful of battles and wars, the Tudors and the story of a contested heir. </p>
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<img alt="Quarter life, a series by The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><strong><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/quarter-life-117947?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">This article is part of Quarter Life</a></strong>, a series about issues affecting those of us in our twenties and thirties. From the challenges of beginning a career and taking care of our mental health, to the excitement of starting a family, adopting a pet or just making friends as an adult. The articles in this series explore the questions and bring answers as we navigate this turbulent period of life.</em></p>
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<h2>Dragons in western literature</h2>
<p>The dragon’s roots in medieval lore go back to their image as menacing animals, such as the dragon at the end of the Germanic story of <a href="https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/beowulf">Beowulf</a>. In this epic poem, Beowulf, a Scandinavian hero defeats Grendel, an outcast creature of gigantic stature in order to defend the Geats. After years of peace, Beowulf dies in combat against a new enemy, a dragon that holds power and a hoard of precious treasures – possibly in an act that symbolises the faults of a bad king in early culture.</p>
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Fathers">Early Christian authors</a> gave dragons human characteristics such as greed and in literature, dragons signalled the sin of avarice – they were creatures to fear and defeat. In later medieval Europe, however, red and white dragons featured in the pre-history of the legendary King Arthur of the Pendragon dynasty. </p>
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<img alt="A medieval painting of people watching two dragons battle." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/482992/original/file-20220906-16-oq0wfa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/482992/original/file-20220906-16-oq0wfa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482992/original/file-20220906-16-oq0wfa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482992/original/file-20220906-16-oq0wfa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482992/original/file-20220906-16-oq0wfa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=630&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482992/original/file-20220906-16-oq0wfa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=630&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/482992/original/file-20220906-16-oq0wfa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=630&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">An illustration of the battle between the red and white dragon from Historia Regum Britanniae. Vortigern is depicted sitting at the edge of a pool watching.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lambeth Palace Library/Wikimedia</span></span>
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<p>According to Geoffrey of Monmouth’s <em><a href="https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/bnf-english-copy-of-geoffrey-of-monmouths-history-of-the-kings-of-britain">Historia Regum Britanniae</a></em> (History of the Kings of Britain), first written in the 12th century, Arthur’s father, Uther Pendragon, gets his surname from witnessing a comet in the sky (the “pen” in his name meaning “head”) that resembles a fire-spitting dragon. </p>
<p>Prior to Uther’s reign, it is Vortigern, a Celtic leader (said to have invited the Saxons into Britain) who finds that his building of a tower at Dynas Emrys in North Wales is prevented by the underground struggle between a white and red dragon. The red dragon symbolises the Welsh and the white the Saxons. This Arthurian prophecy of these battling beasts was used to tell of a time when a leader would come to liberate the Welsh. This prophecy endured for centuries. </p>
<h2>Dragons and prophecy</h2>
<p>By the time Arthur was written into medieval history books, however, his Welsh ancestry had all but been forgotten, and he had been assimilated into English culture. This erasure led generations of English kings to claim descent from Arthur, if tenuously. This was particularly so during the Wars of the Roses (1455-87) when the white rose and red rose, representing the houses of York and Lancaster, clashed in a dynastic war that decimated the aristocracy. When it came to an end, with Henry Tudor bringing together in his descent the two dynasties and the Welsh line, the fighting white and red dragon could be said to have gone to rest.</p>
<p>Shakespeare’s dramatic rendering of the infamous Machiavellian-style politics during the Wars of the Roses in his series of history plays gave Game of Thrones’s creator, George R.R. Martin, a powerful <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/george-r-r-martin-the-rolling-stone-interview-242487/">source of inspiration</a> for his books. Dynastic wars dominate Game of Thrones but the presence of dragons and their political significance comes to the fore in House of Dragons. </p>
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<p>In the second episode of House of Dragons, king Viseryis reveals to his heir, princess Rhaenyra, that the Targaryen dynasty has only really held its position thanks to controlling the power dragons yield. The political power struggle that unravels is reminiscent of the period of English history known as <a href="https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofEngland/King-Stephen-Anarchy/">The Anarchy</a> (c. 1138-53), when the only male heir of King Henry I of England died and Matilda, the king’s daughter, was designated heir – the first female in England.</p>
<p>Stephen of Blois, the king’s nephew, contested Matilda’s claim and bitter struggles ensued. It can easily be seen that a period like this brought much anxiety and concern about the future. At this time, Geoffrey’s works, the <em>Historia</em> and also his Prophecies of Merlin, steeped in Arthurian legend as they were, were used to build hope in prophecy as a tool to read the future of politics while the prospect of peace was nowhere in sight.</p>
<p>The Anarchy in England preceded the Wars of the Roses by almost as many years as the action depicted in House of Dragons precedes the events of Game of Thrones. It is easy to see how these periods and their myths inspired Martin. In both of these historical periods of turmoil, and in Martin’s series of novels, human control over prophecy is as difficult as their control over dragons. </p>
<p>Prophetic texts were used to infuse politics with hope for a charismatic leader and dragons could only enhance the enticing aura of mystery around such a future. It is here that Martin’s use of dragons moves to a more modern taste for fantastical power. </p>
<p>Interestingly, dragons of yore had to be dominated or defeated; their occasional use in heraldry and art was meant to impress and inspire awe. The dragons of Westeros, however, are most powerful when lead, in both TV series, by young female characters who nurture rather than destroy or dominate these creatures. In the prequel, we are just getting a look at this relationship. We should expect a lot more legend and violence, but also more inspiring female-dominated politics and more dragon action.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/190021/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Raluca Radulescu does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Dragons have been used for political manoeuvring throughout the history of Britain.
Raluca Radulescu, Professor of Medieval Literature and English Literature, Bangor University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/143865
2020-08-04T11:42:12Z
2020-08-04T11:42:12Z
Cursed: retelling of Arthurian legend puts women centre stage in an era of female leadership
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351052/original/file-20200804-20-3xp48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=31%2C31%2C3552%2C2116&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Katherine Langford plays Nimue in the latest retelling of the Arthurian legend.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix © 2020</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Netflix’s new series <a href="https://www.radiotimes.com/news/on-demand/2020-07-17/cursed-netflix-review/#:%7E:text=Cursed%20is%20definitely%20a%20bit,Cursed%20is%20worth%20sticking%20with.">Cursed</a>, based on the <a href="http://www.comicon.com/2019/11/15/review-cursed-is-blessed-with-a-strong-dose-of-frank-miller/">illustrated novel by Frank Miller and Tom Wheeler</a>, is a retelling of the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Arthurian-legend">Arthurian legend</a> – but like none you have seen before. The central character is not the young man destined to rule over Camelot and the Knights of the Round Table, the narrative that has come down through the centuries. In this version of the legends, the main character is a <a href="https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/tv/a33336609/who-is-nimue-cursed-netflix-lady-of-the-lake-legend/">woman called Nimue</a>. </p>
<p>In other tellings of the Arthurian legends, <a href="https://time.com/5867159/netflix-cursed-arthurian-legend/">Nimue is usually a mysterious figure</a> about whom little is known. She gives Arthur his sword and sometimes assists him, but she also (in <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Le-Morte-Darthur">Malory’s Le Morte d'Arthur</a>) strips Merlin, Arthur’s adviser, of his powers and traps him under a stone.</p>
<p>In Cursed, we meet Nimue as a young woman who is a member of the “fey” – a pagan magical minority population. Nimue and other members of her tribe are able to pass as human – but other fey tribes have wings, or scales, or even tusks or antlers, making blending in with the human population much more difficult.</p>
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<p>When her village is destroyed by the Red Paladins – inquisitorial figures who seek to cleanse the land of all fey in the name of the Christian god – Nimue begins a journey to return the sword of the first kings to Merlin, her mother’s dying wish. The sword is sought by King Uther and his rivals as a means of proving their right to rule. Along the way, she encounters Arthur, a young mercenary, who will eventually help her in her journey.</p>
<p>Nimue’s role is just one way in which this series upends the traditional cycle of tales. As a retelling of Arthurian legend, Cursed is almost unrecognisable – Nimue, who usually dwells at the fringes of the story (as the mysterious Lady of the Lake, for example) has been brought centre stage. Instead of giving the sword to Arthur, or even bringing it to Merlin as initially instructed, she decides to keep the sword and proclaims herself the Fey Queen.</p>
<p>While viewers of Cursed will encounter many familiar names from Arthurian legend, including Uther Pendragon, Merlin, Morgana, Gawain, and even Lancelot and Perceval, they may be surprised by the depiction of these characters in the series. </p>
<p>Uther is a whiny man-child dominated in the political sphere by Lunete, the queen mother. Merlin, meanwhile, is a jaded alcoholic concealing that he has lost his magical powers. Even Arthur, although good-hearted, is a liar and a thief who initially steals the sword for himself. He proves himself by recognising Nimue’s authority and serving her cause (rather than the other way around).</p>
<h2>Changing narrative</h2>
<p>Yet the story of Arthur has always been open to adaptation. Malory’s Le Morte d'Arthur – although recognised as the source of most modern Arthurian retellings – was itself an adaptation of <a href="https://www.ancient.eu/article/1069/the-literary-development-of-the-arthurian-legend/">earlier Arthurian narratives</a>. Writing during the Wars of the Roses, Malory, a prisoner of war, used the story of King Arthur not only to look back at a lost golden age, but also to reflect values and ideals he wanted to celebrate in his own time. </p>
<p>Each retelling of the story reflects the time in which it is being told as well as its aspirations. For example, the BBC’s series Merlin, which ran from 2008 until 2012, also took an untraditional approach by portraying both Arthur and Merlin as young men. Merlin, far from being a source of wisdom, is still learning how to use his powers and frequently makes mistakes. Prince Arthur is brave, but also arrogant – and, in order to prove himself worthy of kingship, must come to understand that nobility of character is not limited to those of noble birth. </p>
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<img alt="Devon Terrell plays Arthur in the Netflix series Cursed." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351056/original/file-20200804-925-c213c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351056/original/file-20200804-925-c213c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351056/original/file-20200804-925-c213c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351056/original/file-20200804-925-c213c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351056/original/file-20200804-925-c213c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351056/original/file-20200804-925-c213c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351056/original/file-20200804-925-c213c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Destined to rule: Arthur must prove himself worthy of kingship.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Netflix @2020</span></span>
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<p>King Uther, Arthur’s father, although a strong king, represents everything Arthur must learn to reject. He is intolerant of those who are not like himself (especially magic users) and determined to maintain the social hierarchy at all costs. It is Arthur and his young friends who must make Camelot great. Thus, the series promotes tolerance and acceptance and the importance of valuing others based on their merits rather than the circumstances of their birth.</p>
<h2>Female leadership</h2>
<p>In Cursed the emphasis also falls on the younger characters. They are the ones with the power to change the world and save it from the excesses of an older generation characterised by its intolerance. In the persecution of the endangered fey minority by the Paladins, we can see the dangers of religious fanaticism. But this discrimination is not limited to the Paladins, their actions are tolerated and sometimes even condoned by the wider human population, who regard the fey with fear and suspicion. As in our time, racism is not limited to a few extremists.</p>
<p>But what is perhaps most compelling about Cursed is its emphasis on female power and agency. The series is dominated by its female characters – not just Nimue, but also Morgana, Lunete, Lenore and Red Spear (who is revealed in the novel as none other than Guinevere, a leader of a band of Vikings who assist Arthur and Nimue), who all exhibit different forms of leadership. </p>
<p>This female agency seems particularly relevant at a time when leaders such as Angela Merkle, Jacinda Ardern, Mette Frederiksen, Silveria Jacobs and Tsai Ing-wen are all praised for their handling of the coronavirus pandemic in Germany, New Zealand, Denmark, Sint Maarten and Taiwan respectively. Likewise, there is much speculation about who Joe Biden will choose as a female running mate in the 2020 US presidential election. In such times, the story of a woman rising to power to save her people is more relevant than ever.</p>
<p>Arthur may live on in legend as the “<a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/5/18/15649214/once-and-future-king-th-white-king-arthur">Once and Future King</a>”, but his story must also remain relevant for the present. Perhaps, now, more than ever, we need versions of our legends that make us see these old stories in new ways.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/143865/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marta Cobb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The new adaptation of the ancient Arthurian legend is unlike anything you have seen before.
Marta Cobb, Teaching Fellow in Medieval Studies, University of Leeds
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/110244
2019-02-11T06:03:09Z
2019-02-11T06:03:09Z
The Kid Who Would Be King: why King Arthur films are the perfect antidote to epic Brexit posturing
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/257974/original/file-20190208-174880-1stig7u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">20th Century Fox</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>King Arthur <a href="https://theconversation.com/here-are-the-five-ancient-britons-who-make-up-the-myth-of-king-arthur-86874">probably never existed</a>, but from a cinematic point of view, he may as well have done. Few figures, mythical or historical, have reappeared as frequently on the big screen. This winter, less than two years after Guy Ritchie’s 2017 King Arthur: The Legend of the Sword, comes a new take on the tales: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWwVD1xdAX4">The Kid Who Would Be King</a>. But what is the appeal of this particular tale? And above all, why now?</p>
<p>The Kid Who Would Be King, like Ritchie’s film, is another take on a familiar trope. Like any legend, the Arthur myth is a cinematic template on which storytellers can impose their own ideas – and these variations can tell us a lot about the times and places that produced them. Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), for instance, with its medieval plagues and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2c-X8HiBng">Marxist peasants</a>, reflects parodically on the construction of national mythologies. Notably, this was at a time when Britain’s imperial and economic influence had dwindled.</p>
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<p>The contexts of Brexit, inevitably, provide a backdrop to the more recent films. The Legend of the Sword is a popular retelling in every sense. Ritchie transposes his familiar London “low-life” milieu to the world of the Round Table, with his <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHD9P2Is0cc">muscular Arthur</a> a brothel-raised orphan, backed up by a multicultural array of petty thieves and streetfighters. The war here, with his usurping uncle, Vortigern, is more a people’s rebellion. Yet the film still ends with the newly crowned king demanding fealty from the Vikings, while rejecting their demands for British slaves.</p>
<p>Ritchie’s film was greeted in some quarters as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/lostinshowbiz/2017/mar/30/brexit-britain-needs-a-new-national-syory-step-forward-guy-ritchie">a film about Brexit</a>, but it could just as easily be an allegory about the Corbynite “revolution”, if you wanted it to. Yet it does draw on some of the Arthurian fables’ more nationalistic elements. The more dewy aspects of the legends – the Sword and the Stone, the Lady of the lake, Avalon – were recounted by Thomas Malory in 1485 and form the basis of all the most popular Arthurian retellings. Yet these largely obscure the King’s earlier, more militaristic depictions. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/feb/19/death-king-arthur-simon-armitage-review">circa 1400 anonymous poem Morte Arthure</a>, for instance, focuses on Arthur’s resistance to paying Roman taxes and his campaign to reassert British dominion in Europe. The poem commemorates national Empire-building, as much as it mocks and scorns “continental” manners and morality. Transposed to our populist era of “hard men” politicians, Ritchie’s brawny Arthur comes with interesting connotations, inadvertently or otherwise.</p>
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<h2>A very British epic</h2>
<p>More to the point, Arthurian films tell us about the <em>cinematic</em> contexts that produced them. Monty Python’s muddy take on the story may take its cues from realist European films such as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdTmk9_mAHc">1973’s Lancelot du lac</a> – but its <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQCArh_R9dY">cut-price epic style</a> is born of the group having no money to spend: a common issue with British films of the impoverished 1970s. The Holy Grail’s contrast to Hollywood’s widescreen spectacles, such as Knights of the Round Table (1953) or <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzaeisqxtvQ">Camelot (1967)</a>, is part of its comic point.</p>
<p>Similarly, The Legend of the Sword’s debt is less to contemporary politics and more to the recent traditions of epic film. The film inherits much of its style and narrative tropes from Ridley’s Scott’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do9zep1n8cU">Gladiator</a> (2000), the epic that revived the genre, and demonstrated the international appeal of ancient stories. </p>
<p>Made at huge expense by Warner Bros at its Leavesden studios – and with the creative input of Harry Potter producer Lionel Wigram – Ritchie’s movie was itself seen as another global franchise in the making – <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2017/may/16/epic-fail-why-has-king-arthur-flopped-so-badly">until it flopped</a> at the box-office. Ironically, then, this fiercely British film is “British” only in a limited sense. Like the Harry Potter films, it exemplifies the globalised nature of cinema: a “local” story financed by multinational capital, shot in a Hollywood-owned British studio and made for worldwide distribution.</p>
<h2>Rejuvenating Arthur</h2>
<p>By contrast, The Kid Who Would Be King offers a twist to this model. Here, the global genre of the epic is localised and brought down to earth – in this case, by transferring the legend to a modern secondary school, with a cast barely into their teens.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/n__1Y-N5tQk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Other recent films have trodden the same ground. Edgar Wright’s 2013 The World’s End (another Working Title production) was a <a href="http://collider.com/the-worlds-end-featurette-cornetto-trilogy/">jokey modern take on Arthurian myth</a>, its 12-pint pub crawl – led by fallen leader Gary King – its own legendary Grail quest. It’s also familiar territory for Kid Who Would Be King director Joe Cornish, whose 2011 debut, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cD0gm7dHKKc">Attack the Block</a>, banded inner-city youths against an alien invasion, as well as the Metropolitan Police.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/here-are-the-five-ancient-britons-who-make-up-the-myth-of-king-arthur-86874">Here are the five ancient Britons who make up the myth of King Arthur</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>This focus on the young in The Kid Who Would Be King is both cinematically welcome and topical in light of the generational schisms and social divisions highlighted and brought about by Brexit – <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/joe-cornish-kid-who-would-be-king-rejecting-major-franchises-1178767">a point highlighted by Cornish himself</a>. By putting Excalibur in the hands of a gawky schoolkid, Cornish’s film offers a lighter-hearted alternative both to epic cinematic follies and delusions of national grandeur. </p>
<p>Joking it may partly be, yet with its allegiances to Britain’s future generation, the film becomes another politically charged return to this most potent national myth.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/110244/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Neil Archer receives funding from the British Academy. </span></em></p>
The various readings of this national myth can tell us a lot about our cultural and political time and place.
Neil Archer, Lecturer in Film Studies, Keele University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/109928
2019-01-31T12:05:48Z
2019-01-31T12:05:48Z
Morgan le Fay: how Arthurian legend turned a powerful woman from healer to villain
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256601/original/file-20190131-108351-107dh4f.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Rebecca Ferguson as Morgana in The Kid Who Would Be King.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">20th Century Fox</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the new movie <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/movies/movie-reviews/the-kid-who-would-be-king-movie-review-782191/">The Kid Who Would Be King</a>, the protagonist Alex thinks he’s just an ordinary schoolboy until he stumbles upon Excalibur, the legendary sword of King Arthur, in a building site. Having drawn the sword, he must unite his fellow students to form a new band of knights and, with the help of the wizard Merlin, defeat the evil enchantress Morgana.</p>
<p>Morgana, also called Morgaine or Morgan, is a <a href="https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/78528134.pdf">staple figure of the Arthurian legend</a>. Her relationship to Arthur varies but usually she is introduced as Arthur’s half-sister, the daughter of his mother Igraine and her first husband Gorlois, the Duke of Cornwall. In English depictions of the 14th and 15th centuries – such as Thomas Malory’s <a href="http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/onlineex/englit/malory/">Le Morte D'Arthur</a> or <a href="https://www.bl.uk/works/sir-gawain-and-the-green-knight">Sir Gawain and the Green Knight</a> – she often lurks at the fringes of the Arthurian court, plotting its downfall. </p>
<p>In Le Morte d'Arthur, she steals Excalibur and gives it to her lover, Accolon, intending that they overthrow King Arthur and rule in his place. Thwarting the scheme, Arthur recovers the sword, but she steals its magical scabbard, which has healing properties, indirectly contributing to Arthur’s fatal wounding in his final battle. </p>
<p>Morgan also conspires against Arthur’s queen, Guinevere, sometimes because they are rivals for the love of Arthur’s most important knight, Sir Lancelot. In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight she sends the Green Knight into Arthur’s court in the hopes that Queen Guinevere will be frightened to death.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256574/original/file-20190131-75085-1aritk.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256574/original/file-20190131-75085-1aritk.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=772&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256574/original/file-20190131-75085-1aritk.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=772&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256574/original/file-20190131-75085-1aritk.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=772&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256574/original/file-20190131-75085-1aritk.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=970&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256574/original/file-20190131-75085-1aritk.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=970&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256574/original/file-20190131-75085-1aritk.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=970&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Illustration from Le Morte d'Arthur.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Aubrey Beardsley</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But in earlier tellings of the Arthurian story, Morgan can be a far more benevolent figure. In <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2853704">Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Vita Merlini</a>, composed in the 12th century, Morgan is described as the most beautiful of nine sisters who rules Avalon, the Fortunate Isle. She also has healing powers and can shape-shift and fly. After Arthur is wounded in the Battle of Camlan, he is brought to her for healing. Far from plotting his downfall, she promises that she can heal him. </p>
<p>Often linked to various supernatural female characters of Celtic mythology, Morgan is also called Morgan “le Fay” (the fairy), hinting at otherworldly origins for her character. Yet in late medieval depictions, she is more associated with evil ambition and sexual immorality.</p>
<h2>Woman and witchcraft</h2>
<p>Why is there a shift in the portrayal of Morgan le Fey? In the late medieval period, magic increasingly became associated with witchcraft and the devil. But Merlin tends to be treated kindly – even though he is sometimes described as the son of a demon – because he is generally seen as Arthur’s protector and is someone who uses his magical powers in aid of Camelot. He is, of course, also a man. Meanwhile Morgan is condemned for being a woman who seeks magical and political power for herself. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256575/original/file-20190131-108338-1wbc4pe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256575/original/file-20190131-108338-1wbc4pe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1393&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256575/original/file-20190131-108338-1wbc4pe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1393&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256575/original/file-20190131-108338-1wbc4pe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1393&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256575/original/file-20190131-108338-1wbc4pe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1751&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256575/original/file-20190131-108338-1wbc4pe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1751&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256575/original/file-20190131-108338-1wbc4pe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1751&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Morgan le Fay depicted as witch and temptress.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Spencer Stanhope (1880)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Yet even in Malory some traces of her former, more benevolent character remain. After Arthur is fatally wounded fighting his illegitimate son Mordred, she is one of the mysterious women who take him to Avalon for healing. Thus the character of Morgan is revealed to be far more complex than she initially appears.</p>
<p>More recent depictions of Morgan, especially in literature, have attempted to convey some of this complexity. In her book, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1983/01/30/books/arthur-s-sister-s-story.html">Mists of Avalon</a>, Marion Zimmer Bradley portrays Morgaine as a defender of the old pagan religion of Britain against the encroachment of Christianity. Although she attempts to overthrow Arthur, it is primarily to protect this way of life. </p>
<p>In the majority of portrayals in film and television, however, Morgan continues to be a villain. In the BBC’s Merlin, Morgana begins as a friend to Arthur, Gwen, and Merlin, but, in the end, she betrays them. Morgana is given plausible reasons for her change of heart: not only does she have magical powers in a Camelot ruled over by Uther – a king who condemns magical practitioners – but she also discovers that she is his illegitimate daughter and that he has no intention of acknowledging her. </p>
<p>But as the series draws to a close a once complex character seems to be motivated solely by hatred and greed – and she becomes a pantomime villain dressed in black. Her awakening magical powers and her desire to rule over Camelot lead to her moral decline.</p>
<h2>Arthur was no saint either</h2>
<p>In spite of Arthur’s reputation as being a noble warrior and a just king, his legend is riddled with moral ambiguity from the moment of his conception. Arthur’s father Uther Pendragon desires Igraine – the unavailable wife of the Duke of Cornwall – so Merlin arranges for him to visit her in secret, magically disguised as her husband. This act of deception and betrayal results in Arthur’s birth. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Cg-h8TwQCgs?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Arthur, who is no saint himself, has a child out of wedlock – the product of an incestuous union with his half-sister Morgause (in some versions of the legend it is Morgan, but the two have often been conflated, especially in more modern retellings). Learning of the child Mordred’s birth (and that the child is fated to be his downfall), he tries to destroy his son by ordering the death of all babies born on that day. Arthur’s best knight Lancelot has an adulterous affair with Arthur’s wife Guinevere. Yet among this catalogue of venality and treachery, it is Morgan who is usually branded the villain.</p>
<p>The story of King Arthur has been told many times, and there is no reason to think that these stories will ever lose their hold over the popular imagination. Every telling of the story differs, but, throughout most of the story’s history, Morgan le Fay has been one of its most powerful female characters. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-king-arthur-became-one-of-the-most-pervasive-legends-of-all-time-71126">How King Arthur became one of the most pervasive legends of all time</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Yet increasingly she is seen not only as abusing what power she has, but also as being hungry for more power – making her one of the story’s greatest villains because she does not support Arthur and his Camelot. But why should we assume that Arthur’s Camelot deserves her support? In the 21st century, should a woman be considered evil because she desires power for herself?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/109928/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marta Cobb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Yet again sexism rears its ugly head in this portrayal, from Arthurian legend, of a much maligned woman.
Marta Cobb, Teaching Fellow in Medieval Studies, University of Leeds
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/87558
2017-11-22T10:27:35Z
2017-11-22T10:27:35Z
What exactly is the Holy Grail – and why has its meaning eluded us for centuries?
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195659/original/file-20171121-6013-1dbqu5j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=962%2C2%2C977%2C666&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Galahad_grail.jpg">The Achievement of the Grail / Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Type “Holy Grail” into Google and … well, you probably don’t need me to finish that sentence. The sheer multiplicity of what any search engine throws up demonstrates that there is no clear consensus as to what the Grail is or was. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of people out there claiming to know its history, true meaning and even where to find it. </p>
<p>Modern authors, perhaps most (in)famously <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/jul/26/featuresreviews.guardianreview17">Dan Brown</a>, offer new interpretations and, even when these are clearly and explicitly rooted in little more than imaginative fiction, they get picked up and bandied about as if a new scientific and irrefutable truth has been discovered. The Grail, though, will perhaps always eschew definition. But why?</p>
<p>The first known mention of a Grail (“un graal”) is made in a narrative spun by a 12th century writer of French romance, Chrétien de Troyes, who might reasonably be referred to as the Dan Brown of his day – though some scholars would argue that the quality of Chrétien’s writing far exceeds anything Brown has so far produced. </p>
<p>Chrétien’s Grail is mystical indeed – it is a dish, big and wide enough to take a salmon, that seems capable to delivering food and sustenance. To obtain the Grail requires asking a particular question at the Grail Castle. Unfortunately, the exact question (“Whom does the Grail serve?”) is only revealed after the Grail quester, the hapless Perceval, has missed the opportunity to ask it. It seems he is not quite ready, not quite mature enough, for the Grail.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195663/original/file-20171121-6020-1m4wegd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195663/original/file-20171121-6020-1m4wegd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195663/original/file-20171121-6020-1m4wegd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195663/original/file-20171121-6020-1m4wegd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195663/original/file-20171121-6020-1m4wegd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195663/original/file-20171121-6020-1m4wegd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=567&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195663/original/file-20171121-6020-1m4wegd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=567&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195663/original/file-20171121-6020-1m4wegd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=567&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Holy Grail depicted as a dish in which Christ’s blood is collected.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/ILLUMIN.ASP?Size=mid&IllID=43455">British Library</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But if this dish is the “first” Grail, then why do we now have so many possible Grails? Indeed, it is, at turns, depicted as the <a href="https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/597634/Holy-Grail-Real-Location-Hunt-Crusade-King-Arthur-Templars-LoveAntiques-1-million-Worth">chalice of the Last Supper</a> or of <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/11225538/The-Holy-Grail-the-conspiracy-theories.html">the Crucifixion</a> or <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3140518/Have-POLICE-Holy-Grail-Wooden-relic-thought-Christ-s-chalice-recovered-year-stolen-burglars.html">both</a>, or as a stone containing the <a href="http://newagejournal.com/tag/serpent-grail">elixir of life</a>, or even as the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/22/books/the-last-word-the-da-vinci-con.html">bloodline of Christ</a>. And this list is hardly exhaustive. The reason most likely has to do with the fact that Chrétien appears to have died before completing his story, leaving the crucial questions as to what the Grail is and means tantalisingly unanswered. And it did not take long for others to try to answer them for him.</p>
<p>Robert de Boron, a poet writing within 20 or so years of Chrétien (circa 1190-1200), seems to have been the first to have associated the Grail with the cup of the Last Supper. In Robert’s prehistory of the object, Joseph of Arimathea took the Grail to the Crucifixion and used it to catch Christ’s blood. In the years that followed (1200-1230), anonymous writers of prose romances fixated upon the Last Supper’s Holy Chalice and made the Grail the subject of a quest by various knights of King Arthur’s court. In Germany, by contrast, the knight and poet Wolfram von Eschenbach reimagined the Grail as “Lapsit exillis” – an item more commonly referred to these days as the “Philosopher’s Stone”. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195664/original/file-20171121-6027-jfauhj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195664/original/file-20171121-6027-jfauhj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195664/original/file-20171121-6027-jfauhj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195664/original/file-20171121-6027-jfauhj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195664/original/file-20171121-6027-jfauhj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195664/original/file-20171121-6027-jfauhj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195664/original/file-20171121-6027-jfauhj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195664/original/file-20171121-6027-jfauhj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Holy Grail depicted as a ciborium.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">British Library</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>None of these is anything like Chrétien’s Grail, of course, so we can fairly ask: did medieval audiences have any more of a clue about the nature of the Holy Grail than we do today?</p>
<h2>Publishing the Grail</h2>
<p>My <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/publishing-the-grail-in-medieval-and-renaissance-france-hb.html">recent book</a> delves into the medieval publishing history of the French romances that contain references to the Grail legend, asking questions about the narratives’ compilation into manuscript books. Sometimes, a given text will be bound alongside other types of texts, some of which seemingly have nothing to do with the Grail whatsoever. So, what sorts of texts do we find accompanying Grail narratives in medieval books? Can this tell us anything about what medieval audiences knew or understood of the Grail? </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195661/original/file-20171121-6013-laulka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/195661/original/file-20171121-6013-laulka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=867&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195661/original/file-20171121-6013-laulka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=867&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195661/original/file-20171121-6013-laulka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=867&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195661/original/file-20171121-6013-laulka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195661/original/file-20171121-6013-laulka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/195661/original/file-20171121-6013-laulka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Sangreal.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sangreal.jpg">Arthur Rackham</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The picture is varied, but a broad chronological trend is possible to spot. Some of the few earliest manuscript books we still have see Grail narratives compiled alone, but a pattern quickly appears for including them into collected volumes. In these cases, Grail narratives can be found alongside historical, religious or other narrative (or fictional) texts. A picture emerges, therefore, of a Grail just as lacking in clear definition as that of today. </p>
<p>Perhaps the Grail served as a useful tool that could be deployed in all manner of contexts to help communicate the required message, whatever that message may have been. We still see this today, of course, such as when we use the phrase “The Holy Grail of…” to describe the practically unobtainable, but highly desirable prize in just about any area you can think of. There is even a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJDEcLTyYdU">guitar effect-pedal</a> named “holy grail”.</p>
<p>Once the prose romances of the 13th century started to appear, though, the Grail took on a proper life of its own. Like a modern soap opera, these romances comprised vast reams of narrative threads, riddled with independent episodes and inconsistencies. They occupied entire books, often enormous and lavishly illustrated, and today these offer evidence that literature about the Grail evaded straightforward understanding and needed to be set apart – physically and figuratively. In other words, Grail literature had a distinctive quality – it was, as we might call it today, a genre in its own right.</p>
<figure>
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<p>In the absence of clear definition, it is human nature to impose meaning. This is what happens with the Grail today and, according to the evidence of medieval book compilation, it is almost certainly what happened in the Middle Ages, too. Just as modern guitarists use their “holy grail” to experiment with all kinds of sounds, so medieval writers and publishers of romance used the Grail as an adaptable and creative instrument for conveying a particular message to their audience, the nature of which could be very different from one book to the next. </p>
<p>Whether the audience always understood that message, of course, is another matter entirely.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87558/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Leah Tether works at the University of Bristol. She received funding for this research from Anglia Ruskin University, Ghent University, Somerville College, Oxford and the Stationers' Foundation.</span></em></p>
Is the Grail the chalice from the Last Supper – or the Crucifixion? Does it contain the elixir of life? Or is it Mary Magdalene’s womb?
Leah Tether, Reader in Medieval Literature and Digital Cultures, University of Bristol
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/86874
2017-11-10T14:01:03Z
2017-11-10T14:01:03Z
Here are the five ancient Britons who make up the myth of King Arthur
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194157/original/file-20171110-29349-14uw211.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/sacred_destinations/3974921871/in/photolist-74fvMH-6SqPyq-e7k6pV-8pkrqM-fAuYSH-6RSXQj-XWQ4eQ-aat7Xy-6SqPbq-ah3jmN-6SqPh3-6g2X21-8yFHiK-8suvjc-7fcwux-Lm3bp-62S3Sb-Y1hMH6-7gxnqQ-6SAKjy-5DaBKT-nJ5gs-nQkaKV-C2g6X-nJ52w-o3MHdC-4gwUfb-bwLJgy-8CkDaA-nEwxdB-4b5te1-2dRuqc-4jyiXJ-6SAQsJ-nJ6QX-8Chwkz-mxX2a-6SwNX4-3aR53F-7X4gUw-byuSUJ-WJTW-nJ2oH-nJ5xS-8CkCEU-nJ6fm-8ChrmP-8CkJCW-cQLr3-8ChxLV">Holly Hayes/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>King Arthur is probably the best known of all British mythological figures. He is a character from deep time celebrated across the world in literature, art and film as a doomed hero, energetically fighting the forces of evil. Most historians believe that the prototype for Arthur was a warlord living in the ruins of post-Roman Britain, but few can today agree on precisely who that was.</p>
<p>Over the centuries, the legend of King Arthur has been endlessly rewritten and reshaped. New layers have been added to the tale. The story repeated in modern times includes courtly love, chivalry and religion – and characters such as Lancelot and Guinevere, whose relationship was famously immortalised in Thomas Malory’s 1485 book Le Morte D'Arthur. The 2017 cinematic outing, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, is only the most recent reimagining. </p>
<p>But before the addition of the Holy Grail, Camelot and the Round Table, the first full account of Arthur the man appeared in the Historia Regum Brianniae (<a href="http://www.yorku.ca/inpar/geoffrey_thompson.pdf">the History of the Kings of Britain</a>) a book written by <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/history/sites/themes/society/arthur_geoffrey_of_monmouth.shtml">Geoffrey of Monmouth</a> in around 1136.</p>
<p>We know next to nothing about Geoffrey, but he claimed to have begun writing the Historia at the request of Walter, archdeacon of Oxford, who persuaded him to translate an ancient book “written in the British tongue”. Many have concluded, as Geoffrey failed to name his primary source and it has never been firmly identified, that he simply made it all up in a fit of patriotism.</p>
<p>Whatever the origin of the Historia, however, it was a roaring success, providing the British with an heroic mythology – a national epic to rival anything written by the English or Normans.</p>
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<h2>Story teller</h2>
<p>As a piece of literature, Geoffrey’s book is arguably the most important work in the European tradition. It lays the ground for not just for the whole Arthurian Cycle, but also for the tales surrounding legendary sites such as Stonehenge and Tintagel and characters such as the various kings: Cole, Lear and Cymbeline (the latter two immortalised by Shakespeare). </p>
<p>As a piece of history, however, it is universally derided, containing much that is clearly fictitious, such as wizards, magic and dragons.</p>
<p>If we want to gain a better understanding of who King Arthur was, however, we cannot afford to be so picky. It is Geoffrey of Monmouth who first supplies the life-story of the great king, from conception to mortal wounding on the battlefield, so we cannot dismiss him entirely out of hand. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.amberley-books.com/arthur-and-the-kings-of-britain.html">full and forensic examination</a> of the Historia Regum Britanniae, has demonstrated that Geoffrey’s account was no simple work of make-believe. On the contrary, sufficient evidence now exists to suggest that his text was, in fact, compiled from a variety of early British sources, including oral folklore, king-lists, dynastic tables and bardic praise poems, some of which date back to the first century BC. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194165/original/file-20171110-29389-1atx5ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194165/original/file-20171110-29389-1atx5ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194165/original/file-20171110-29389-1atx5ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194165/original/file-20171110-29389-1atx5ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194165/original/file-20171110-29389-1atx5ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194165/original/file-20171110-29389-1atx5ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194165/original/file-20171110-29389-1atx5ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194165/original/file-20171110-29389-1atx5ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Here be dragons?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/geo462rge/3403778548/in/photolist-6bMfM3-86LVrm-KxE1d-RXVvBa-8MyYS6-qUzvmS-TWzwYh-U3mx1y-b3Ws44-qZ4pkg-Y6MaLj-oRUEyG-r8jfyt-nUHzFp-cbFkns-VnmrNf-5zD9QS-yGZyH-4frXq-nzTJLB-pMkBE-9XCZ1t-s7uuuG-ULedZA-73SHe3-J5pSNv-7uRiwK-Y4iE6T-cMFqry-7Rbbyr-eyh9J-nK4BhW-5gZtqi-phc9SF-ezPqCZ-9cCRgH-p5QYFo-r74axH-YSH6LK-4jf2Ay-onpdbY-6Ur41S-8z1gdH-rg7mx2-6kv9GW-8z1vvT-WCJDBX-dAWcLB-cbLJim-nbY4P6">George Reyes/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In creating a single, unified account, Geoffrey exercised a significant degree of editorial control over this material, massaging data and smoothing out chronological inconsistencies. </p>
<p>Once you accept that Geoffrey’s book is not a single narrative, but a mass of unrelated stories threaded together, individual elements can successfully be identified and reinstated to their correct time and place. This has significant repercussions for Arthur. In this revised context, it is clear that he simply cannot have existed. </p>
<p>Arthur, in the Historia, is the ultimate composite figure. There is nothing in his story that is truly original. In fact, there are five discrete characters discernible within the great Arthurian mix. Once you detach their stories from the narrative, there is simply nothing left for Arthur. </p>
<h2>Cast of characters</h2>
<p>The chronological hook, upon which Geoffrey hung 16% of his story of Arthur, <a href="http://www.historyfiles.co.uk/FeaturesBritain/BritishAmbrosiusAurelianus01.htm">belongs to Ambrosius Aurelianus</a>, a late 5th-century warlord from whom the youthful coronation, the capture of York (from the Saxons) and the battle of Badon Hill is taken wholesale. </p>
<p>Next comes Arvirargus, who represents 24% of Arthur’s plagiarised life, a British king from the early 1st century AD. In the Historia, Arthur’s subjugation of the Orkneys, his return home and marriage to Ganhumara (Queen Guinevere in later adaptions) parallels that of the earlier king, who married Genvissa on his return south. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194170/original/file-20171110-29358-ru3wft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194170/original/file-20171110-29358-ru3wft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194170/original/file-20171110-29358-ru3wft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194170/original/file-20171110-29358-ru3wft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194170/original/file-20171110-29358-ru3wft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194170/original/file-20171110-29358-ru3wft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194170/original/file-20171110-29358-ru3wft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194170/original/file-20171110-29358-ru3wft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Constantine’s statue in York.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/statue-roman-emperor-constantine-great-located-682642528?src=p9SNymr8tkYmCjnGbuGxow-1-5">chrisdorney/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p><a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/romans/romespivotalemperors_gallery_06.shtml">Constantine the Great</a>, who in AD 306 was proclaimed Roman emperor in York, forms 8% of Arthur’s story, <a href="https://www.ancient.eu/Magnus_Maximus/">whilst Magnus Maximus</a>, a usurper from AD 383, completes a further 39%. Both men took troops from Britain to fight against the armies of Rome, Constantine defeating the emperor Maxentius; Maximus killing the emperor Gratian, before advancing to Italy. Both sequences are later duplicated in Arthur’s story. </p>
<p>The final 12% of King Arthur’s life, as recounted by Geoffrey, repeat <a href="http://www.englishmonarchs.co.uk/celts_25.html">those of Cassivellaunus</a>, a monarch from the 1st century BC, who, in Geoffrey’s version of events, was betrayed by his treacherous nephew Mandubracius, the prototype for Modred.</p>
<p>All this leaves just 1% of Geoffrey’s story of Arthur unaccounted for: the invasion of Iceland and Norway. This may, in fact, be no more than simple wish-fulfilment, the ancient Britons being accorded the full and total subjugation of what was later to become the homeland of the Vikings. </p>
<p>Arthur, as he first appears, in the book that launched his international career, is no more than an amalgam. He is a Celtic superhero created from the deeds of others. His literary and artistic success ultimately lies in the way that various generations have reshaped the basic story to suit themselves – making Arthur a hero to rich and poor, elite and revolutionary alike. As an individual, it is now clear that he never existed, but it is unlikely that his popularity will ever diminish.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86874/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Miles Russell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
A forensic dig into early British history means we can finally understand the heroes and stories that created a composite king.
Miles Russell, Senior Lecturer in Archaeology, Bournemouth University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/75346
2017-05-24T09:09:14Z
2017-05-24T09:09:14Z
Each era gets the King Arthur it deserves – and we got Guy Ritchie’s
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170296/original/file-20170522-25076-1ys6pn2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Courtesy of Warner Bros.</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>With a certain comforting certainty, a new version of the Arthurian legend seems to hit cinemas about once a decade: think of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2009/oct/01/camelot-reel-history">Camelot (1967)</a>, <a href="http://www.denofgeek.com/us/movies/excalibur/254302/john-boormans-excalibur-isnt-just-another-king-arthur-movie">Excalibur (1981)</a>, <a href="https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/first_knight/">First Knight (1995)</a> and <a href="http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/king-arthur-2004">King Arthur (2004)</a>. This is not to mention the numerous television versions that have appeared in between. Now we have director Guy Ritchie’s take on the subject, with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2017/may/21/king-arthur-legend-sword-review-guy-ritchie">King Arthur: Legend of the Sword</a>.</p>
<p>Each of the previous iterations had a very different focus – and like all good (vaguely) historical fiction, tell us more about the present than the past. This is particularly true for myths because they always have a “built-in ambiguity that makes them applicable to a variety of times and places”, as the US theologian S. Brent notes. </p>
<p>For example, while Excalibur was emphasising the magical elements of the myth with the wizard Merlin at its centre, both First Knight and King Arthur tried hard to “historicise” the legendary king. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170300/original/file-20170522-25076-c6xjns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170300/original/file-20170522-25076-c6xjns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170300/original/file-20170522-25076-c6xjns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=884&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170300/original/file-20170522-25076-c6xjns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=884&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170300/original/file-20170522-25076-c6xjns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=884&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170300/original/file-20170522-25076-c6xjns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1110&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170300/original/file-20170522-25076-c6xjns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1110&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170300/original/file-20170522-25076-c6xjns.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1110&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Sean Connery as Arthur and Richard Gere as love rival Lancelot in First Knight (1995).</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>First Knight presents a traditional Arthur as a benign and ageing king (played by Sean Connery) ruling over Camelot as the most advanced and bustling metropolis of its time. In his old age, he marries the much younger Guinevere (Julia Ormond), who will ultimately betray him with the much younger Lancelot (played by Richard Gere at the height of his career). </p>
<p>It is a tale of a great nation being brought down by individual failure. Religion also plays an important role in the film as it is faith rather than magic from which Arthur draws strength, for example when he publicly prays: “May God grant us the wisdom to discover right, the will to choose it, and the strength to make it endure.”</p>
<p>The 2004 version directed by Antoine Fuqua provides a stark contrast to this theme. Not only does it set the story about 1,000 years before the more common medieval period, it also boldly claims that the myth was “based on a real hero, who lived 1,600 years ago”. It promises its audience the “truth behind the myth” – by creating an entirely new version of it. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170302/original/file-20170522-25082-kt79xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170302/original/file-20170522-25082-kt79xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170302/original/file-20170522-25082-kt79xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=888&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170302/original/file-20170522-25082-kt79xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=888&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170302/original/file-20170522-25082-kt79xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=888&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170302/original/file-20170522-25082-kt79xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1116&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170302/original/file-20170522-25082-kt79xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1116&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170302/original/file-20170522-25082-kt79xe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1116&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">King Arthur (2004) attempted to ‘historicise’ the Arthur legend.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Sitting neatly alongside other sword-and-sandal blockbusters of the same year, such as Troy and Alexander, King Arthur moves its subject to late Roman Britain. It presents Arthur (Clive Owen) as a Roman soldier, who is on a last mission to free the Pope’s godson from the savage tribes north of Hadrian’s Wall. </p>
<p>What he discovers, however, is the savagery of the Christian church, ultimately siding with the pagan tribes to free Britannia from Saxon invaders as well as from Roman deprivation. Magic is almost completely absent. Instead, it is Arthur’s skill as a seasoned soldier and clever strategist, rather than a magical sword, which makes him successful. </p>
<h2>Man, magic (and David Beckham)</h2>
<p>What then, can we learn from the most recent instalment of the myth, claimed to be the first in a series of six? First of all, Guy Ritchie’s version sets the story in a fantasy time that is somewhat hard to pin down. While the chainmail armour and lady’s dresses are loosely medieval, the settings of the Royal palace are hard to define, and the CGI skyline of Londinium (which features more prominently than Camelot) is scattered with Roman ruins, including an enormous Colosseum. </p>
<p>It also returns to a focus on the more magical elements of the story, stating in its opening line that “for centuries, man and magic lived in peace…” The first few minutes of the film establish its apparent attempt at offering a new Lord of the Rings, including giant elephants battling a hilltop city. We even get a close-up shot of a fiery magic eye that is reminiscent of Peter Jackson’s visual rendering of Sauron in Lord of the Rings. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170304/original/file-20170522-25068-vusdxd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170304/original/file-20170522-25068-vusdxd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170304/original/file-20170522-25068-vusdxd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170304/original/file-20170522-25068-vusdxd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170304/original/file-20170522-25068-vusdxd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170304/original/file-20170522-25068-vusdxd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170304/original/file-20170522-25068-vusdxd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=452&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">It wouldn’t be a Guy Ritchie movie without a bit of knuckle.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Courtesy of Warner Bros.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What then about the myth? In this film, Arthur is a streetwise boy rather than a royal knight or an experienced soldier, a rags-to-riches story fit for a time in which class hierarchies are continuously challenged. He is a thief, driven more by personal revenge than the higher motive of freeing his nation. </p>
<p>Moreover, the film revives and expands the magical and fantastic elements of Excalibur to align itself much more closely with epics such as the already mentioned <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9781444320589.ch11/summary">Lord of the Rings (2001-3)</a>, <a href="http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/The_Hobbit_(film_series)">The Hobbit (2012-14)</a> and the enormously popular television saga <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2011/apr/18/game-of-thrones-dont-believe-the-gripes">Game of Thrones</a>, rather than its immediate cinematic predecessors. This in itself is not a problem. </p>
<p>The problem is that Ritchie seems to misunderstand what makes those works successful as myths. Ritchie’s iconoclastic style may have worked well in small crime comedies such as <a href="https://reelrundown.com/movies/Snatch-2000-Movie-Review">Snatch (2000)</a> and maybe to some extent even in his take on <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2011/dec/19/forensic-guy-ritchie-sherlock-holmes">Sherlock Holmes</a> (although I’m sceptical, but that’s another story). Here, it simply undermines the epic grandeur suggested by the visuals. </p>
<p>For example, as Robbie Collin <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/0/king-arthur-legend-sword-review-guy-ritchies-combat-heavy-camelot/">notes in the Telegraph</a>: “The sword-pulling scene … is sabotaged from within by a David Beckham cameo that goes on for line after forehead-slapping line, and saps the moment of its mythic excitement.” Whereas you could argue that myths have always been somewhat of a mash-up of various cultural influences, Ritchie’s film is so eclectic that it fails to develop any coherent mythical realm in which the audience can immerse itself. </p>
<p>Apart from the already mentioned cinematic elements, the film also features magical Egyptian pyramids, a powerful sea monster hiding in a cave reminiscent of <a href="https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2008/03/beow-m01.html">Beowulf (2008)</a> and a Kung Fu school – to name but a few. All this makes for an entertaining and visually stunning cinematic spectacle, but it fails to provide what myths can do best – namely offer a coherent and inspiring worldview and ethos. Sadly, it may be exactly this lack of this inspiring vision that makes this film so contemporary.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/75346/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sylvie Magerstaedt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Guy Ritchie’s blokey remake of the Arthur legend fails to establish any kind of coherent narrative.
Sylvie Magerstaedt, Principal Lecturer in Media Cultures, University of Hertfordshire
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/77834
2017-05-22T10:20:14Z
2017-05-22T10:20:14Z
Arthur: Legend of the Sword – a film obsessed with effect rather than substance
<p>Cinematic adaptations of the King Arthur story have frequently assigned a central place to the love triangle between Arthur, Guinevere and Lancelot – most famously in the saccharine Hollywood remake, <a href="http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/first-knight-1995">First Knight (1995)</a>. Not so in Guy Ritchie’s latest remake, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword. The film lacks any romantic component and instead foregrounds questions of sovereignty, legitimacy, and authority, by focusing the narrative on Arthur’s ability to wield the magic sword Excalibur. </p>
<p>In doing so, Ritchie follows in the footsteps of a long-standing, distinctively British Arthurian tradition, where the interest focuses on military, strategic and political issues. The most influential medieval versions of the legend invariably concentrate on the problem of sovereignty and the establishment of “British” identity in a divided country threatened by foreign invasion. </p>
<p>Often such adaptations also functioned as commentaries on contemporary concerns. Geoffrey of Monmouth’s hugely influential 12th-century account of King Arthur’s rise and fall in the <em><a href="http://d.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/text/geoffrey-of-monmouth-arthurian-passages-from-the-history-of-the-kings-of-britain">Historia Regum Britanniae</a></em> (c. 1136), for instance, was written against the background of the recent Norman invasion and settlement in Britain. It also channelled a number of Welsh oral traditions concerning the prophesied “return” of King Arthur, a native British King destined to expel the invaders. </p>
<p>Thomas Malory’s <em><a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1251/1251-h/1251-h.htm">Morte D'Arthur</a></em> (c. 1469) similarly gives us a King Arthur at pains to establish his sovereignty in a kingdom torn apart by rival factions, in ways that are clearly reminiscent of the contemporary civil unrest bred by the Wars of the Roses.</p>
<h2>Arthur’s motley crew</h2>
<p>Regardless of its debatable artistic merits, Ritchie’s adaptation also gives us an unmistakeably contemporary Arthur: unrefined, cunning, opportunistic, and verbally aggressive. He is neither eloquent or charismatic – and his laddish banter seems eminently inappropriate for the legitimate heir to the royal crown. But he somehow commands the respect and admiration — if not quite the affection — of his band of brothers, who display none of the aristocratic sophistication or courtly trappings we usually associate with the Knights of the Round Table. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170284/original/file-20170522-25076-1eyr0em.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/170284/original/file-20170522-25076-1eyr0em.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=256&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170284/original/file-20170522-25076-1eyr0em.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=256&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170284/original/file-20170522-25076-1eyr0em.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=256&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170284/original/file-20170522-25076-1eyr0em.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=322&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170284/original/file-20170522-25076-1eyr0em.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=322&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/170284/original/file-20170522-25076-1eyr0em.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=322&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Band of brothers: Arthur and his crew.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Courtesy of Warner Bros</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A populist Arthur, then, channelling civil discontent, who eventually and unwillingly becomes the leader of a revolt against the usurping Vortigern. Vortigern’s forces embody the ruthless, machine-like efficiency of a dehumanised, oppressive establishment, upheld by an army of faceless and heavily armoured knights who are part imperial Stormtroopers, part SS officers, rallying under the banner of an ominous imperial eagle and ruling from an impregnable fortress dominated by a stone tower. </p>
<p>Arthur’s band by contrast is a motley crew of disaffected characters, gathering in a London brothel and united by little more than a steady flow of banter in a mixture of mockney and regional accents. We have a Black <a href="http://www.kingarthursknights.com/knights/bedivere.asp">Bedivere</a>, the Asian <a href="http://www.villagevoice.com/2017/05/09/how-can-a-king-arthur-story-with-a-character-named-kung-fu-george-be-this-generic/">Kung Fu George</a> — who “don’t speak English good” but is an OK sort of a geezer – and <a href="http://www.kingarthursknights.com/knights/percivale.asp">Perceval</a> as a dopey lad with a knitted tea cosy on his head. London too seems strikingly multicultural. Part Bangkok mean streets, part Varanasi on the banks of the Ganges, part crumbling Rome – complete with ruins of an improbable Coliseum – the whole held together by a vaguely Celtic soundtrack rich in bagpipes.</p>
<h2>Sword and sandals</h2>
<p>Beneath this rough-and-tumble portrait of a streetwise Arthur lies a much deeper unease about the difficulty of constructing and negotiating something like a British identity and addressing questions of political sovereignty and legitimacy in the contemporary context. </p>
<p>With generally awkward dialogue and little in the way of plot, character development, or proper content, it is the film’s eclectic style that takes centre stage. Legend of the Sword is a film obsessed with effect rather than substance and Arthur is less concerned to further a particular cause than to look good and sound good in the eyes and ears of his mates.</p>
<p>Arthur’s crew accordingly punch their way through this movie without any discernible plan or ideological affiliation – and seem content with delivering short, snappy but vacuous replies to any taunts or threats as they arise, shrugging off any opposition or disbelief. Thankfully, little is needed in the way of structured thought and speech, as one of his opponents conveniently reminds him: “If you’re lost for words, the sword will speak for you.”</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"863170694061936640"}"></div></p>
<p>Appropriately, then, the sword itself becomes the central signifier in this film, rendering the development of anything like character, plot, or a structured ideology unnecessary or impossible. All that is required is for Arthur to overcome his hesitation: “You are resisting the sword,” he is told by Merlin’s envoy, the female mage. Arthur must take the power into his hand by letting go of his rational side and thus the movie effectively becomes a weird, warped narrative about the renunciation of individual will. </p>
<p>As soon as Arthur grasps the sword – unmistakably modelled on Tolkien’s ring – the world around him is transformed in a vision. It is finally the sword itself that supplies the much-needed “vision” that eludes all human characters. In this sense Ritchie’s film is symptomatic of a much broader modern unease concerning traditional political structures and discourses and specifically the loss of confidence in the possibility of articulating something like a consistent, viable political vision through human language. Rather than being ideologically motivated, Arthur’s rebellion is brought about by a set of coincidences and contingencies. </p>
<p>The sword becomes a magical surrogate for the lack of a genuine social or political ideal, an almost spiritual object able to cut through the Gordian knot of doubts and difficulties – and through the painful need for negotiating competing claims and contradictions in an uncertain and unstable world. In such a world, personal and political responsibility are conveniently dissolved and the victorious Arthur finally merges with the land itself. </p>
<p>As he turns to an embassy of very hipstery Vikings in the closing scene, Arthur reminds them that they are now “addressing England” – and they promptly fall to their knees. Arthur, for his part, bears no grudges, seems overjoyed at his own improbable triumph and welcomes the coolest Vikings since the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/leningradcowboys/">Leningrad Cowboys</a> into the fold of the Round Table, declaring: “Why have enemies when you can have friends?” No matter how desperate it may sound, we all need more <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-danish-concept-of-hygge-and-why-its-their-latest-successful-export-67268">hygge</a> in such troubled times.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/77834/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marco Nievergelt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Somehow the sword Excalibur becomes the central character in this laddish remake of the Arthurian legend.
Marco Nievergelt, Senior Teaching Fellow, Medieval and Early Modern English and European Literature, University of Warwick
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/77712
2017-05-17T01:31:40Z
2017-05-17T01:31:40Z
Guy Ritchie’s King Arthur – a triumph of modern spectacle
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169631/original/file-20170516-24333-1taaat5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Vortigern (Jude Law) addresses the crowd in King Arthur: Legend of the Sword.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Safehouse Pictures, Village Roadshow Pictures, Warner Bros.</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>There have been several film versions of the King Arthur myth, each reflecting something about the socio-political context in which it was produced. Richard Thorpe’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0045966/">Knights of the Round Table</a> (1953), for example, reflects the perception of the need for stable, considered government in the wake of WWII and the onset of the Cold War. </p>
<p>John Boorman’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082348/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Excalibur</a> – still the best of the Arthur films – offers a version of the myth combining the austere (1980s Thatcher) and the hallucinogenic (the recently passed 1970s).</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/eC_TFoGhqUU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Guy Ritchie’s most recent version, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1972591/?ref_=nv_sr_1">King Arthur: Legend of the Sword</a>, is one of the better ones, even if its approach leads to a rather uneven film. Ritchie has built a career around infusing old genres and cultural myths with fresh energy through hyper-kinetic style – with more or less success – and King Arthur is no different. </p>
<p>Like many of Ritchie’s films, King Arthur is acutely self-conscious vis-à-vis its own processes of narrative construction. There are, for example, several scenes in which Arthur (Charlie Hunnam) recounts to other characters recently occurred events in the world of the film, which we see enacted and re-enacted on screen through tongue in cheek flashbacks. </p>
<p>The whole thing is, indeed, hyper-aware of its own mythology – and the key part the Arthur myth plays in the formation of English nationalism. </p>
<p>This awareness of cultural myth – and Ritchie’s attempt to energise it – is evident in the aesthetics of the film. It sutures together sequences evoking the earnestness of Game of Thrones-style fantasy (which can appear ludicrous if played to the hilt – dragons, really, how seriously can we take them?) with those defined by Ritchie’s trademark larrikinism and gallows humour. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/x6KihePgZFo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>This odd aesthetic combination is probably the most compelling thing about the film, epitomised in the opening 20 or so minutes of it.</p>
<p>This extended pre-title sequence takes place in Camelot, following the backstory of Arthur’s part in the legend, including his father Uther Pendragon (Eric Bana)’s victory against the evil Mordred, Uther’s slaying by his brother Vortigern (Jude Law), and Arthur’s escape from Vortigern.</p>
<p>It is filmed in a deliberately serious fashion, with slow motion images of battle accompanied by sombre, medieval music, the whole thing enshrouded in ash and fog. It has an intensity – and interiority – wholly unusual in Ritchie’s oeuvre. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169633/original/file-20170516-24313-19qokng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169633/original/file-20170516-24313-19qokng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169633/original/file-20170516-24313-19qokng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169633/original/file-20170516-24313-19qokng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169633/original/file-20170516-24313-19qokng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169633/original/file-20170516-24313-19qokng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169633/original/file-20170516-24313-19qokng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169633/original/file-20170516-24313-19qokng.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Astrid Bergès-Frisbey as The Mage.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Safehouse Pictures, Villages Roadshow Pictures, Warner Bros.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The film then crosses, after the credits, to the town of Londinium, where we witness the growth of Arthur from toddler into fighting man, shown in an accelerated montage accompanied by pounding dance music. The film, having gestured towards its project and dynamic to come – the infusion of one of England’s most serious national myths with a hooligan irreverence – now settles into playing this out to its logical conclusion. </p>
<p>Arthur, when we meet him as an adult, is basically one of Ritchie’s lowbrow gangsters placed in fantasy England – he is a lovable geezer who runs a brothel and a gang of hoods. He refers to his followers as “lads” and there is an extended sequence in which they plan an assassination of the King that plays out like a heist sequence from <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0208092/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Snatch</a>. </p>
<p>When the film intermittently cuts back to Camelot from Londinium, it adopts the more sombre approach of the opening; when it cuts back to Arthur and Londonium, it becomes Ritchie’s (equally mythical) good-guy, gangster’s paradise. </p>
<p>The film thus develops the story of Arthur’s finding of Excalibur, his revelation as saviour of England (and its commoners), his defeat of tyrant Vortigern, and his construction of the Round Table, making for an at times thrilling, at times bizarre, and generally wildly uneven viewing experience. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169634/original/file-20170516-24333-p90gu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169634/original/file-20170516-24333-p90gu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169634/original/file-20170516-24333-p90gu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169634/original/file-20170516-24333-p90gu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169634/original/file-20170516-24333-p90gu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169634/original/file-20170516-24333-p90gu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169634/original/file-20170516-24333-p90gu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169634/original/file-20170516-24333-p90gu2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Bedivere (Djimon Hounsou) does his serious, wise man thing alongside Arthur (Charlie Hunnam).</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Village Roadshow</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Like most Hollywood films, Arthur’s quest for justice – his activation as leader of the population against its rulers – is couched primarily in individualistic terms.</p>
<p>Arthur is at pains to point out, several times, that for him the revolution is not a quest for any kind of greater justice, but (Batman-style) merely about revenge for the murder of his parents. This revenge mission itself is kinetically filmed and violent – but not too violent, for if it were it would lose its PG-13 rating and a chunk of box office revenue – replete with Ritchie’s usual self-deprecating (some might say affectedly so) touches. </p>
<p>Even the fashion style of hero and villain are telling. King Arthur would almost be worth watching for the comic value of the costumes alone. Hunnam, as Arthur, frequently appears in a sheepskin-lined leather coat, looking like he’s just walked offstage at an Oasis concert, and Law appears, at times, in an open shirt and jacket that makes him look like an effete and sleazy London nightclub owner. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169632/original/file-20170516-24350-1tu0gp1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169632/original/file-20170516-24350-1tu0gp1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169632/original/file-20170516-24350-1tu0gp1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169632/original/file-20170516-24350-1tu0gp1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169632/original/file-20170516-24350-1tu0gp1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169632/original/file-20170516-24350-1tu0gp1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169632/original/file-20170516-24350-1tu0gp1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169632/original/file-20170516-24350-1tu0gp1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Arthur (Charlie Hunnam) in that leather coat.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Safehouse Pictures, Village Roadshow Pictures, Warner Bros.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>King Arthur is pretty good, and Ritchie is to be commended for his (perhaps) uncynical attempt to blend classic English myth with the contemporary gangster myth he’s been so instrumental in recreating for the 21st century.</p>
<p>Hunnam is enjoyable to watch, even if Law seems asleep at times, and the suporting actors are good, including Djimon Hounsou doing the serious wise man thing, and Neil Maskell – one of the unsung stars of contemporary British cinema – excellent as the most geezerish of geezers, Arthur’s suggestively named gang member Back Lack. </p>
<p>There are, however, two points of criticism – one major, one less so.</p>
<p>The film ends with a saccharine promotion of British liberal-nationalism. Arthur assumes the person of England and “all of her subjects,” and a brigade of Vikings kneel down before her/him. It is a little on the nose, especially for anyone with even a rudimentary understanding of the relationship between British liberalism and colonialism, and the many atrocities enacted on behalf of Mother England throughout the latter period. </p>
<p>It can be difficult, too, for the modern viewer to sustain her or his interest in this kind of prophetic narrative. We are so used to narratives of individual choice and deliberate action occurring in universes governed by chance that this mythical narrative is always in danger of become uninvolving. If the whole thing is preordained – the film is, after all, called King Arthur – then why would we be interested in following Arthur’s journey? </p>
<p>Still, Ritchie navigates this bind well, knowing that it’s the presentation of the journey – and our involvement in and judgement of the spectacle – that is of paramount importance, rather than narrative development or denouement. </p>
<p>And this is why Ritchie himself is one of the kings of modern spectacle. </p>
<p><em>King Arthur, Legend of the Sword opens May 18.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/77712/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ari Mattes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword is an at times thrilling, at times bizarre, viewing experience that blends classic English myth with a gangster aesthetic.
Ari Mattes, Lecturer in Media Studies, University of Notre Dame Australia
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.