First Post-The Biggest Step is the First Step Out the Door

Okay, well, here's the first post of what will hopefully be many in regards to Badon Hill and the historic king Arthur. Like Nennius before me, I've heaped together everything I could find over the past several years, along with some more recent things as they present themselves, and now I mean to put it all into cohesive thoguhts and organized structure here on this blog. I know many people will be disappointed that this does not concern the Romances, but it will touch on much of the original Brythonic (i.e. Welsh) legends concerning Arthur, as well as discovering the origins of certain romantic elements, and how Arthur was taken from Britain to the rest of the world (for example, why are some of the earliest depictions of Arthur found not in Britain or France, but in Italy??)

So, to start off, certain undeniable principles need to be established. For one, Arthur was never king of England. Even if Arthur was really a king (which is highly debatable), he would be a leader of the Britons, the native ancestors of the Welsh, rather than the Proto-English Aengles and Saxons (the ancestors of the English people). So when Graham Chapman said that he was "Arthur, king of the Britons", those are the Britons he was talking about.
Next, Arthur did not come from an idealized late medieval period full of magic, giant castles, courtly love, or knights in shining armour. The Britain that the Arthur figure hails from had been abandoned by the Romans nearly a century before (AD 407), and had been told to look to its own defenses. While woad covered Picts from the north, Irish raiders from the west, and germanic pirates and settlers from the mainland threatened the Britons, the local warlords and officials set themselves up as kings and fought with each other as well as with the outsiders for dominance. Coins were no longer printed, most of the writing stopped, and many of the Roman towns began to crumble,  or were abandoned altogether. As the Aengles and Saxons began to encroach further and further into Briton territory, their advance was suddenly stopped after a battle, referred to by the contemporary monk Gildas as "the siege of Mount Badon"(De Excidio Britannae), halted their settlement of the island for nearly half a century. Although the official leader of the battle was not named, later sources attributed it to a war leader and hero called Arthur.
Finally, and I have to make this clear, there is currently NO DEFINITIVE EVIDENCE that a historical person named Arthur existed at this time. That's not to say that there wasn't, but no hard evidence shows that one did. Because of this everything that I or anyone else discussing the matter puts forward is CONJECTURAL until some sort of solid proof arises. That includes the crackpots, the rational hopefuls (like yours truly) and the disillusioned who are fixed on the idea that Arthur never existed. That's why I'm focusing on Badon. It happenned, that is a fact, and it is historically established that the Britons were the victors. If we can discover when, where and how the battle was fought, then more light will be shed on its victorious commander, and we will be one step closer to discovering the truth behind the Arthur Figure.

So there you have it. The search for the Historical King Arthur in a nutshell. The clock's approaching an unholy hour, so I'll leave you here, go say my prayers, and call it a night. I'll be back tomorrow, hopefully with my first scribbles and notes translated into something everyone can understand. The Lord's peace be with you.

-RRH