The New Arthur
From the bastion of his power, the king of England gazes west, towards a land where his rule does not yet reach. A fierce realm that many English kings before him, including his grandfather, have failed to pacify. Now, four years after ascending his throne, the time has come for king Edward I to take to the sword. But whereas his predecessors merely mobilized armies, Edward will bring something more to bear upon the Welsh. He flies the banners of a legend. Not just any legend, but that of the very people he intends to subdue.
Most of you will be familiar with the legendary king Arthur as a pious, Christian ruler of Britain whose reign was characterized by knightly chivalry and virtue. This is the image that persists from the 12th century author Geoffry of Monmouth. Geoffry, however, did not invent the legend of Arthur. In fact, it appears in literary lore from the ninth century; accounts of a native British king who fought against Roman occupiers and Saxon invaders alike. Interestingly, this king was not originally considered English (for no such nationality existed at the time), but Welsh. Even as an English identity developed in its own right, the Welsh continued to dream of the day a new Arthur would rise from their midst to defeat their eastern neighbors.
Although the mythical king Arthur was originally a Welshman, by the thirteenth century his legend was told and revered throughout Europe, and England was of course no exception. There was even an attempt by king Henry II to recast Arthur as an Englishman, by “discovering” what was supposedly king Arthur and queen Guinevere’s tomb in an English Abbey. His grandson, Edward I, would go even further in his efforts to appropriate the legend of Arthur. Throughout king Edward’s reign, Arthur was a model for kingship he aspired to imitate. Besides admiring king Arthur as a personal source of inspiration, Edward used the legend of Arthur to legitimize his reign and build a myth around it.
This is most apparent in the English king’s use of Arthur to justify his invasion and subsequent rule of Wales. Perhaps this was the logical conclusion of the drive to anglicize king Arthur, the use of the legend as a propaganda tool against the very people who he in fact originally represented. By casting himself in the image of the legendary king, destined to rule all of Britain, Edward I could create a supportive narrative around his conquests. One could say that his version of the legend was in fact vindicated, as he would be the first English king to successfully consolidate royal power in Wales. Perhaps even more so, in that the anglicized version of king Arthur, displayed in many renditions of the stage-play Camelot, is typically the one remembered by posterity. The Welsh origins of the myth, however, have been largely forgotten.
Destiny fulfilled. The new Arthur looks upon the castle being built in front of him at Caernarvon. It is but one of many that are being raised across Wales, a land that resisted English overlordship for many generations. Each of these constructions is a tool of royal power, and a monument to it. But Arthur was a king of Britain, and Edward is but a ruler of England and Wales. From the bastion of his power, the king gazes north.