King Arthur's Britain: The Truth Unearthed

[Captain Blood]

Theories are tailored by evidence. Not the evidence tailored to fit a theory.

I’m afraid the latter is standard practice for too many archaeologists, and especially TV archaeologists. They confidently spout authoritative explanations of what something was, or what was happening, or what it means, based on a few flimsy fragments of next to nothing - and a huge mountain of supposition... 

The language point is interesting. The Normans had an extremely profound impact on the English language. There are basically two words for almost everything you can think of in the English language - the formal, long winded, Latin-French word, and the informal, shorter Germanic root word. One the language of the conquerors and overlords, which even 1000 years later still rules the roost in the upper echelons of British society - in law, academia, government, commerce, officialdom, etc. The other, the language of the ordinary people which we use in natural conversation with each other every day. This dichotomy strongly supports the view of a thin veneer of a French speaking ruling class holding sway over a largely unchanged Anglo-Saxon general population...

[Arlequín]

I don't normally get tired of watching Alice Roberts, but after an excellent C4 programme on Roman Chester a few days ago, I watched this one too. I can't help feeling that there was a committee responsible for what was included, it was a right mess. Geoffrey of Monmouth for example, was as close to the Age of Arthur as I am to the start of the Hundred Years War.

The line shown that bissected 'Angland' from the 'Britons' is also pretty much the line that separated 'civilian' aka 'wealthy and materialist' Roman Britain from the military 'highland' districts. Besides being roughly the route of the Foss Way, it also marks a border between coin finds Post-383 AD, which are almost entirely unknown West of the line, other than those few outposts on the N Welsh Coast that could be supplied by sea.

Barring the settlements along the 'Via Deva' (A5/A41 from High Cross to Chester) and the hinterlands of Chester and Wroxeter, there is little 'Roman' apart from the area around the Severn Estuary (Caerleon, Gloucester, Bath, Cirencester et al), West of the line.

I'm supportive of the 'less warfare' and 'smaller battles' lobby, but 2% is still 70,000 out of a population of c.3.5 million. In comparison Britain had 7% of its population under arms in 1945. Britain's Great War casualties were under 2% and look at the impact of that on our society, we are still affected by it in popular memory today.

No mention of the Irish and Scots, who were the main threat in the West and certainly the only one for the Cornish for quite some time after.

In any case Arthur came from Shropshire and lived at Wroxeter, where he built the wooden palace we call 'Camelot'. 

[Cubs]

In any case Arthur came from Shropshire and lived at Wroxeter, where he built the wooden palace we call 'Camelot'. 

Au contraire, I've spent many a summer in Tintagel, Cornwall, and the amount of gift shops selling Arthurian artefacts alone should be proof enough that he was born there. Plus there's a rock with 'Artor' or something scratched into it nearby. Only Dark Age Britons knew how to scratch rock like that.

[tin shed gamer]

Isn't there a polygamist wanabe cult leader down that way who claims to be Arthur. Or was that more South Wales?

[Cubs]

Isn't there a polygamist wanabe cult leader down that way who claims to be Arthur. Or was that more South Wales?

Probably both. I'm Arthur and so's my wife.

[Randell]

I haven't watched it, do they discuss all the defensive dykes/reinforced across the south and east in this period?

[tin shed gamer]

Nope totally avoids the issue of defensive fortifications. If I remember rightly it simply inferred that Rome left and every body abandoned forts and towns never actually says were they went.
Totally ignoring that a British version of Roman culture florished long after the empire. Or that high Latin poetry was been written hundreds years after the collapse of the western empire. Expamles exist written by noble women not just monk's.
No it inferred a dystopian power vacuum and economic collapse that magically has not been preasure kegged by the gentle intergration of an influx of people with a different culture and language driven by the desire for new land.

 it' was okay because the unicorns set out some ground rules before they left.

[Arlequín]

There's good evidence for the decline and partial abandonment of towns well before the Romans left, or more properly, before the administrators and supporters of Constantine III were kicked out. Once everybody became a Roman Citizen in 288, the wealthy by and large, stopped funding public works and ploughed their money into their villas.

Economic collapse happened when the Rhine Frontier was breached, as Britain was the bread basket for the army there. It has also been suggested that almost everything West of the Foss Way was turned over to local leaders after Theodosius's reconquista, or Magnus Maximus's bid for the Purple. Certainly Welsh tradition has it so.

The dykes were just there to mark borders symbolically... I mean some guys just put a stone there, but harnessing the labour of thousands says far more than yer white picket fence. Totally not needed to keep enemies out, no sir, that's some crazy talk.

The present-day King Arthur is a Yorkshire man living in Salisbury, he's had quite an interesting life; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Uther_Pendragon

[twrchtrwyth]

Nobody's mentioned the most annoying thing yet. She called his spear 'Ron'. 

[Arlequín]

Blame Geoffrey of Monmouth, he shortened it from Dadooronron, or whatever it was in the Annals, to give it more pep. Be thankful he didn't call the shield Hermione, or change Arthur to Harry.

 

[Patrice]

Blame Geoffrey of Monmouth

At least he was bright enough to realize that books called "The Prophecies of Merdin" or the "Life of Merdin" would not be very attractive for the Norman-French elite, and that Merlin would be more commercial if the name Myrddin had to be adapted.

[tin shed gamer]

Not the Arthur I was thinking of.
The in Salisbury is a new age equivalent of the Monster raving loony party.
It's one just one of those weird ways my life bounces along but I actually do European tradition martial arts on a Monday night which are run by a druid. He's alway popping off on some retreat or other.He often comes back with vegetable
Last week Tony and I left training with a marrow in hand and bearded long axe in the other.( i wish you could have seen the look on the faces of the Hobby bobbies as we walked around the corner )
The dykes were most definitely boundaries but I suspect the had an economic dimension to.
It requires a serious logistical capacity to under take the construction of one.Which requires an infrastructure. The inference was that wasn't a functional infastructure to organise against any influx so it must have been a passive intergration because no one could get their tish together to say "Oi jog on."

I don't buy inner city decline as evidence of a lack of a cohesive infrastructure.If that were true .We'd be mad maxing it right now.
The need to eat and be able to live .Is more likey a driving force to move you to a new area to be self sufficient .

Dykes are a psychological statement of defensive intent .Over here is our not yours and it will stay ours.
You don't expend such efforts if your all just one big happy family in  commune Britannia.

[Vanth]

I am always lightly amused by titles like "King Arthur's Britain: The Truth Unearthed"...

[Arlequín]

... Merlin would be more commercial if the name Myrddin had to be adapted.

Well as 'dd' is a 'th'  sound it's very close to 'the Prophecies of Mervin', so pretty much anything would be better.

 

The elite shifting their focus from urban works to development of large indjvidual estates, does create instant micro kingdoms once central authority is removed. Our urban centres are in decline but we do still have local and central government, a tax system, police and a military. All that went overnight leaving just landowners with their private armies, or tribal groups that had existed outside 'Roman Britain', depending on where you were.

[axabrax]

With all due respect to the science, the notion that genetics can entirely explain a largely cultural phenomenon 1500+ years ago borders on myopia, if not hubris.