Tales of King Arthur and his Round Table have captured the imagination of audiences for centuries. However, much about Arthur is a mystery, such as if he was even a real person or not. He was likely a real person, probably around the 5th or 6th century. The first mention of Arthur appears in Historia Brittonum, written circa 829/830, well before Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote about Arthur in The History of the Kings of Britain, which he completed in 1136. There is no one set story chronicling the life of Arthur and his knights; however, Geoffrey is often credited with creating the basis of what later became the vast tradition it is today. Depending on what you are reading or watching, anything from the characters and their relationships to the setting can be different. To highlight this, I will compare how Arthur and Mordred are portrayed in The History of the Kings of Britain by Geoffrey of Monmouth, BBC’s Merlin and David Lowery’s 2021 film The Green Knight.
The figure of Arthur is a hard one to pin down due to the fluidity in the tales surrounding him. As previously mentioned, he was likely a real person who fought against the Saxons in the 5th or 6th century. This is likely why Arthur is often portrayed as a warrior king. The portrayal of a warrior king is consistent throughout most of the Arthurian tradition, both written and recorded. Arthur is presented this way in both of the written texts above. However, in The Green Knight, Arthur is presented as an old man, unable to fulfil the role of a warrior and, as such, has to leave Gawain to fill in. Arthur is not even a named character in the film, and those unaware of the source material would not realise this is Arthur. In BBC’s Merlin, we are first introduced to Arthur as a prince and watch him become a king over five seasons. While this version of Arthur does fight a lot, I would not call him a warrior King. The fights are mainly against magical creatures or bandits, and rarely does he fight armies.
The topic of birth and parentage is another way my selected texts differ. In The History of the Kings of Britain, Arthur’s father, Uther, wanted to sleep with a married woman called Ygerna. However, she was loyal to her husband. To trick Ygerna, Uther persuaded Merlin to use magic to disguise himself as Ygerna’s husband and then rapes Ygerna resulting in the birth of Arthur. BBC’s Merlin is somewhat similar. However, in this version, Uther and Ygerna (in this version named Ygraine) are married but can’t conceive. Again Uther resorts to the use of magic, and Arthur is born. This series of events sets up the central conflict of the series. Arthur’s parentage is not mentioned in The Green Knight. Mordred’s parentage is another aspect that changes between texts. In some texts, he is the result of an incestuous relationship between Arthur and his sister Morgause or Morgana. In The History of the Kings of Britain, Mordred is Arthur’s nephew. In BBC’s Merlin, Mordred is an orphaned druid with no relations to any of the above characters.
Arthur’s death, or not death, is the most contentious aspect of Arthurian tales, even resulting in physical fights. Geoffrey of Monmouth was the first to introduce the idea that Arthur had not died at Camlann but was taken somewhere to heal from his wounds. However, the earliest reference to the death of Arthur is in the Annales Cambriae, which was possibly compiled around the 10th century, which states he fell at Camlann in 537. Geoffrey was also the first person to name Avalon, where Arthur went to recover. In Geoffrey’s version, Merlin predicts Arthur’s reign and death but “his departure [would] be doubtful”. While in BBC’s Merlin, there is a prophecy about Arthur’s reign and death, it is not Merlin that delivers it. As far as I am aware, one thing that stays consistent through any retelling of the tale is that Mordred is the one that kills Arthur, although his reasoning may differ.
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