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00:00Every year, in a field in Cornwall, they gather to commemorate the last battle of the greatest of all British heroes.
00:19The tales of Arthur have got it all. Love and courage, betrayal and the ultimate spiritual quest.
00:40This is a search for the legend of King Arthur, a journey through Celtic Britain, France and Ireland.
00:49It's a story of ancient alchemy and medieval mysticism.
00:55The tale of a lost golden age, which one day will return.
01:01But to the oldest inhabitants of Britain, the Celts, it's the story of the death and rebirth of their nation.
01:19The
01:24The End
01:54The End of King Arthur has been told by poets and filmmakers for a thousand years
01:58how the pure knighthood was destroyed in the end by adulterous love
02:03and the horror of civil war.
02:08Merlin! Where are you?
02:11It has immortal characters and imperishable symbols.
02:15The Holy Grail, the Round Table and the magic sword, Excalibur.
02:24Behold, the Sword of Power, Excalibur.
02:36The End of King Arthur
02:42The legend of Arthur was born in the Dark Ages,
02:59out of the battles between the Celtic peoples of Britain and the English newcomers.
03:03But our search for the legend begins here among the canal barges
03:09in an industrial suburb of Oxford.
03:14It was here in the 12th century that a Celtic scholar
03:18wrote a manifesto against the hated English, the occupiers of Britain.
03:22It's rare that you can pinpoint the exact time and place
03:30in which a myth gets created or reshaped by a great storyteller.
03:34But in this case, we can.
03:37This, believe it or not, is the most important place
03:40in the creation of the myths of King Arthur.
03:43Just come and have a look at this.
03:44This is all that's left of the 12th century abbey on Osney Island outside Oxford.
03:55It was here in 1129 that a young Welsh cleric
04:02became the most influential, the most brilliant
04:08and the most imaginative creator of the Arthur myth.
04:12His name, Geoffrey of Monmouth.
04:14It was right on this spot that Geoffrey created
04:26an imaginary history of the Celts
04:28as the Celts might have dreamed their history could be.
04:32Here, for the first time, a Merlin and Guinevere
04:36and the wicked Mordred, the betrayer of Arthur.
04:39Here's the prototypes of Excalibur and Camelot
04:43and Avalon, and at the centre of it, Arthur himself,
04:48the once and future king.
04:51But when you think of Geoffrey's author,
04:55don't think history, think storytelling.
04:58This is a kind of dazzling medieval infotainment
05:01in comparison with which mere historical fact is simply boring.
05:13Now, Uther Pendragon was Lord of Britain.
05:19He held a great feast,
05:20and among those present was Gorlois, Duke of Cornwall,
05:23with his wife, Igerna,
05:25the greatest beauty in all Britain.
05:28When the king cast his eyes on her,
05:30he fell madly in love.
05:32Her husband, discovering this, retired angrily from the court.
05:35He put his wife into the castle of Tintagel by the seashore,
05:40a place of the greatest safety.
05:42Then King Uther said to the wizard Merlin,
05:45My passion for Igerna is such,
05:48that if I do not possess her,
05:49I will go mad with desire.
05:52And Merlin said,
05:53I have a magic potion
05:55that will make you appear the exact likeness of her husband,
05:58and you can go to her.
05:59The king drank the potion,
06:02and he went to Tintagel,
06:04and he was let in.
06:06And the king stayed all night in Igerna's arms,
06:09and he made passionate love to her,
06:11for she was deceived by Merlin's magic.
06:14And that was the night Arthur was conceived.
06:18Geoffrey was writing at a time
06:40when the Celtic Britons were in revolt
06:42against the kings of England.
06:44They needed a hero.
06:45And here at the fortress of Tintagel in Cornwall,
06:51Geoffrey heard folk tales
06:52about a Celtic warrior called Arthur,
06:55who would one day return
06:56and defeat the English oppressors.
07:07We know that Geoffrey was writing the 1130s,
07:11picking up various stories around the country,
07:13and that he was somehow induced to visit Tintagel.
07:18And his description,
07:19when we get on to the question of Arthur's conception by trickery,
07:23makes it perfectly clear that he was here.
07:25All we're told is Arthur's conceived here.
07:34The assumption is he's born here.
07:36After that, one has to say,
07:38in the history of the kings of Britain,
07:39Arthur doesn't have anything more to do with Tintagel.
07:41But that was sufficient to spark it off.
07:44Somehow, a whole series of beliefs is brought together
07:47by this genius, this romancer,
07:50this Geoffrey Archer of our period.
07:54It's a wonderful book, the historian.
07:56And it's brought here.
07:58But Geoffrey's Arthur wasn't just a good story.
08:11It was a political weapon.
08:13His prophecy that Britain would rise again
08:15could be used against the English by all the Celts,
08:18the Welsh, and the Cornish in Cornwall in south-western England.
08:24King Arthur represents the Celtic spirit
08:26for bards and people of Cornwall.
08:31And therefore, when we all cry,
08:32Ninzu maro, mixte, and Arthur,
08:34essentially it's expressing the fact
08:37that the Celtic spirit is not dead in this country.
08:43Every year, the Celtic bards meet here in Bodmin,
08:46speaking the ancient British language of Cornwall.
08:50Otoma, clether, is in lay callous book.
08:54Clether, mixte, and Arthur.
08:58Swearing on Arthur's Excalibur,
09:01their independence from the English.
09:06Ninju maro, mixte, and Arthur.
09:08King Arthur's not dead, at least not in spirit anyway.
09:11And the sword represents the spirit of Arthur
09:13who defended Britain as we diminished westward
09:17in the onslaught of the Anglo-Saxons
09:19many thousand years ago.
09:34But the idea of Arthur as a resistance hero
09:38against the English was far older than Geoffrey.
09:43In the Roman Empire, Britain was the jewel in the crown.
09:47When the Romans left, it was coveted by the barbarians,
09:50especially the Saxons,
09:52ancestors of today's English,
09:55who sailed across the sea from Germany.
09:57According to later legend,
10:07the Saxons were first welcomed
10:09by the British warlord, Vortigern,
10:11who used them as mercenaries
10:13to defend Britain.
10:14The Anglo-Saxon tradition
10:23was that the first landing of the Anglo-Saxons
10:26was at a place called Ipwinusfleot,
10:29which most people say is Ebsfleet.
10:31Where's Ebsfleet?
10:32Well, Ebsfleet is just behind the power station
10:35to our starboard side of the mountain.
10:37LAUGHTER
10:37It all looks like some nondescript backwater
10:47of 21st century Britain, doesn't it?
10:50But this is the scene
10:52of perhaps the most momentous events
10:54that ever took place
10:55in the history of the British Isles.
10:59We're in one of the marshy channels
11:01between the Isle of Thanet
11:02and the mainland of Kent.
11:04And according to legend,
11:05it was here in the year 449 AD
11:10that three ships came sailing up
11:13under the command of two pagan Saxon chieftains.
11:18Their names were Hengist and Horsa,
11:22a stallion and a horse.
11:24Hengist and Horsa, so the legend goes,
11:36were hired as mercenaries by Lord Vortigern
11:39to fight for him.
11:42Hengist and Horsa, so the legend goes,
11:44were hired as mercenaries by Lord Vortigern
11:46to fight for him.
11:46Unwisely, perhaps, Vortigern gave them land as a reward,
11:50but the Saxons soon turned against him
11:52and took more for themselves.
11:56A foothold in Britain
11:58that would become England.
12:00In the heart of rural Kent,
12:25this re-enactment group
12:26are recreating their ancient English past.
12:29They're building a Saxon long hall.
12:36For Kim Sidorn, it really is a dream come true.
12:41Isn't that amazing?
12:44So it's like the great medieval barns, in a way.
12:47It is, very much so.
12:48Same idea, I suppose, is it?
12:49Yeah, and the woodwork is very similar.
12:52The hall will be accurate in every historical detail,
12:56but it will also embody an English myth.
12:59Where's the fire?
13:00You're standing in it, basically.
13:01There will be a long fire running up the centre of the building,
13:05perhaps 12 feet long or so.
13:06And for many English people,
13:12that myth arouses emotions
13:14as strong as those felt by the Celtic bards in Cornwall.
13:18But then the English were the winners.
13:25This poem was written over 1,000 years ago in Old English.
13:46It boasts of the coming of the Saxons
13:54and their conquest of the Britons.
13:56You can almost hear it in modern English, can't you?
14:02Since the Angles and Saxons came over across the broad waves,
14:07Ofer brad brimu,
14:09sought out Britain,
14:11Britain a sought,
14:12and took the earth,
14:14Erdbegetten.
14:15Amazing, amazing, isn't it?
14:19England.
14:20England is an idea that has lit the world for 1,000 years.
14:25The land holds the bones of those who died for it.
14:28England is still an idea and an ideal
14:34and is held high in the hearts of many of us.
14:40And I speak for ordinary people
14:41as well as nuts like us
14:43that seek to recreate this period.
14:50And it was in response to such tales of Saxon victories
14:54that the Celts created their own hero.
14:58Arthur, the Lord of Battles,
15:04fought for the kings of Britons
15:05against the Saxon invaders.
15:07He fought 12 battles
15:09and he carried the image of the Virgin Mary
15:11on his shoulders
15:12and our Lord Jesus Christ in his heart.
15:15In his 12th battle on Mount Baden,
15:18960 Saxons fell in one day from one charge
15:22and no one struck them down but Arthur alone.
15:25By the time that tale was written in the 9th century,
15:39the Celts, or the Welsh as the English call them,
15:41had been pushed to the corners of the island,
15:44still railing against the man who had betrayed Britain.
15:47Vortigan, having fled from the Saxons
15:54that he'd invited into the country
15:56to help him with his battles,
15:57was advised to build a castle
15:59in one of the strongest places
16:01in the island of Britain.
16:03And he came here.
16:04But unfortunately,
16:05every time his workmen returned to their labours,
16:08they found that the stones were scattered
16:10all over the place
16:11and they weren't able to build the castle.
16:13His advisers, his counsellors,
16:15told him that there was a curse
16:17that made it impossible to build anything.
16:21And the only way that you could break that curse
16:23was to find a golden-haired boy
16:25whose mother could confirm
16:27that there never was any father
16:29and to kill the boy
16:31and sprinkle his blood around the summit of the hill.
16:33The boy led Vortigan to the top of the hill
16:43here at Dinas Emrys.
16:48Under a stone pavement,
16:50he revealed a great jar.
16:52Inside were two dragons,
16:54one white and one red.
16:57The dragons fought each other
16:58until the red one triumphed
17:00and the white one fled.
17:03It was a prophecy, the boy said.
17:06One day the Celts would overthrow the Saxons,
17:09a hero would appear,
17:10and Britain would rise again.
17:14And this is supposedly
17:15the exact spot where it happened.
17:18When the archaeologist
17:20that was working here in the 1950s dug,
17:22indeed he did find a pavement
17:25exactly where you'd expect to find it.
17:28I don't suppose it's possible
17:31this really was the fortress of Vortigan, is it?
17:34Well, that's another suggestion.
17:36Maybe, maybe there was a fortress here.
17:39Maybe there are dragons still here.
17:46Spared from death,
17:47it was the blonde boy
17:48who prophesied the return of Arthur.
17:51And the boy's name?
17:52And the boy's name?
17:54Merthyn,
17:55or as we know him,
17:57Merlin.
18:00But to the Welsh,
18:02Merthyn is also one of their first bards,
18:04and today's Welsh poets
18:06still claim his inspiration.
18:08The image of Merlin we have today
18:12is a bit like kind of Gandalf
18:15in Lord of the Rings, isn't it?
18:16But who is the first Merlin?
18:18He was a court poet
18:20in the north of England
18:21when the whole of Britain
18:22was British-Welsh.
18:24He becomes a kind of a seer,
18:26but not a wizard.
18:28He doesn't go to change people
18:29to the Bronx and stuff.
18:30But he does have this power
18:32to see things that other people can't.
18:33Yeah, he's more of a prophet
18:36than somebody who pulls rabbits
18:37out of a hat.
18:38Yeah, yeah, that's right.
18:40And the oldest poetry that's survived
18:43talks about him in the wood
18:44with his piglet.
18:45He speaks to his piglet
18:47like a familiar, in a way.
18:49And there are long pieces of verse,
18:53half of which are factual and historic,
18:57and half of which are just ranting
18:58about different things.
19:00What does that mean?
19:23It means I know how high a star is,
19:27and I know how wide heaven is,
19:29and I know why minds are troubled.
19:37So it was through poetry and prophecy
19:40that Arthur first came into being.
19:42But it was Merlin's magic
19:44that made him not just a warrior,
19:46but a king.
19:47On Christmas Eve,
19:52when the nobles of England
19:53came out of church,
19:54they saw a great stone
19:56with an iron anvil
19:57into which a sword was fixed.
19:59And on the sword blade,
20:00inlaid in gilt,
20:01it said,
20:02Whoever takes this sword
20:04out of the stone
20:05shall be king.
20:07And all the worthiest lords tried,
20:09and no one could move it.
20:11Then young Arthur
20:12happened to ride up on his horse,
20:14and he saw the stone.
20:15And he leaned over in his saddle,
20:17took the sword by the hilt,
20:18and drew it out.
20:20And the archbishop said,
20:22Here is the man
20:23that God has chosen,
20:25as you have all seen.
20:27And that was the way
20:28Arthur became king.
20:30And that story shows
20:39how Arthur begins
20:40to attract other tales,
20:42like a magnet.
20:44Hi, Neil.
20:45Hello, Michael.
20:45Hi.
20:46So this is it.
20:48This is a simple charcoal furnace
20:50for you using today.
20:51Take a seat.
20:53That's it.
20:53You just go left and right.
20:55That's great.
20:56The sword in the stone
20:57is one of the most famous
20:58of the tales of Arthur.
21:00You can go a little bit slower.
21:02But this part of the legend
21:03may come from
21:04much more ancient times.
21:10Back in the Bronze Age,
21:12this was an absolutely magical thing,
21:15as well as a dramatic
21:18technological innovation.
21:20The smith is somebody
21:21who transforms base metals
21:25into something beautiful
21:27and extraordinary.
21:28Neil Burrage is a bronze caster
21:34and he's worked out
21:35the ancient technique
21:36of casting bronze swords
21:38in a stone mould.
21:39of the stone mould.
21:40Can we get rid of some of this charcoal
21:54on the tile?
21:56Can you see?
21:57Yeah, yeah, yeah.
21:57Oh, wow.
21:58Look at it inside.
22:01We go this way.
22:02OK.
22:03And we pour?
22:04And we pour.
22:10There we go.
22:13Right, you can talk.
22:14Yeah, is that it?
22:15That's it.
22:16We can tell it's set now.
22:24Because it's not moving.
22:26So, if you use this,
22:28push the middle,
22:29we can tell it's set.
22:31Right.
22:31So now we're going to lay it down.
22:33Yeah.
22:33And then try to encase the mould apart.
22:45Wow.
22:47So we've got a nice casting.
22:53God, look at that.
22:54That's absolutely amazing, isn't it?
22:57Yeah.
22:57It is magic.
22:58So there's the sword in the stone.
23:18That's a technique from the Middle Bronze Age,
23:20about 1,000 B.C.,
23:21but you can see how a process like that
23:24was the kind of thing that could be remembered
23:26by the bards and the poets and handed down.
23:30Maybe the story of the sword in the stone
23:33is a hangover of that ancient past.
23:44By the late 12th century,
23:46Arthur had become a rallying cry for Welsh revolt,
23:49and the English began to see him as a threat.
23:51I thought we could start off that they, um,
23:53well, let's call it the old...
23:54According to Geoffrey of Monmouth,
23:56Arthur's last resting place
23:58was the Isle of Avalon, Glastonbury.
24:01The Lady Chapel starts at that arch there, does it?
24:03Is that right?
24:04And here, the English king, Henry II,
24:07decided to prove that Arthur was dead
24:09and could never come back.
24:12And how many places?
24:13Um, about 14, 15 places.
24:1514 or 15 places.
24:1614 or 15 places.
24:1614 or 15 places.
24:1714 or 15 places.
24:17Clues in medieval chronicles allow us to piece together
24:21what really happened on Britain's first archaeological dig.
24:247, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 12.
24:2915.
24:30Round about here is the tomb.
24:33Yeah.
24:34When they started digging,
24:36they put up a pavilion around the spot
24:38so that people couldn't see what they were doing.
24:40They screened it off like I had a police investigation in there.
24:43They screened it off.
24:44They did.
24:44It looked just like a police investigation.
24:46Fantastic.
24:46And Gerald of Wales said that they went down 16 feet.
24:50And what did Gerald say they found at the bottom of the hole, then?
24:53Um, a large, hollowed oak coffin with two skeletons,
24:58one of Arthur, one of Guinevere.
25:01This is the page from Camden's Britannia.
25:04And this is his drawing of the cross.
25:11Hickliacet in Cletus Rex Arturius in Insula Avalonia.
25:20Is that suspicious?
25:21I think it's very suspicious.
25:22I think it's a suspicious part
25:25because you're talking about the famous King Arthur.
25:27King Arthur doesn't become famous until long after his death.
25:30And the lettering's wrong as well.
25:31The lettering's 12th century.
25:33Oh, is it?
25:33Yes.
25:35Oh, too much.
25:35So they've given themselves away.
25:45Given a fine new tomb in Glastonbury,
25:48Arthur became a huge tourist draw.
25:50Meanwhile, his legend went international.
25:55Henry II's French wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine,
25:58hired French poets to write new Arthur myths.
26:03There, Arthur was a courtly hero of the age of chivalry.
26:07The former Welsh guerrilla was now head of the most glamorous court in Europe.
26:22And what better place to imagine it?
26:25Towering ramparts, fairy-tale turrets, monks and nuns, knightly halls.
26:30This is how the medieval romances picture the world of King Arthur.
26:39The Bretons are also Celts, cousins of the Cornish and the Welsh.
26:44Bertrand Vintan does tours of the Breton Arthurian sites.
26:48We're heading to a little island over there, Tomilin.
26:54It's about a...
26:55How far is it?
26:56About a kilometre?
26:57No, it's about three kilometres from here.
26:59Like, it's...
27:00Right.
27:00It's really tricky.
27:01You think it's so near, it's kind of a distance.
27:04Here in France, Arthur became a kind of medieval superman
27:08who slew monsters, rescued maidens and fought giants.
27:13So, the stories of Arthur, Arthur and Merlin, Merlin,
27:18they are well known here in France and Brittany.
27:20You know, wow, amazing.
27:21Now, there is a British legend that is about Tomilin.
27:26Arthur came here and killed the giant.
27:29Is this story also here?
27:31Yes, that was an ogre who came from, like, Spain, this one.
27:34An ogre who came from Spain?
27:36Yeah.
27:36He was huge and he used to live in this island of the Mont Saint-Michel.
27:41Yeah.
27:42Arthur was on his way to Rome.
27:44He heard that he was a princess who was, like, in trouble with that ogre.
27:50So, he decided to come to the rescue.
27:53Arthur killed the ogre, but he was too late.
27:56Princess Helene was already dead.
27:59Breton legend says he buried her here on the island.
28:03Here we are.
28:04We're going to the top.
28:04And so, Brittany became another Arthur country.
28:13And what a human thing it is in places of such breathtaking beauty
28:18to create wonderful stories and tie them to real landscapes.
28:23That's how myths grow, crystallizing our dreams.
28:37And it was here in France that medieval dreamers now made the tale of Arthur and his knights
28:44a focus for the spiritual values, a focus for the spiritual values of the age.
28:48But of all the writers who reinvented, reimagined Arthur in the 12th century,
29:01the greatest was Chrétien de Troyes.
29:04Chrétien took the legend onto a whole new level of romance and chivalry and spiritual quest.
29:12And in his last work, he added an amazing twist, a wonderful theme which has captivated the world ever since.
29:19A young knight, Sir Percival, arrives tired and hungry at a magical castle.
29:31From here to Beirut, says Chrétien, a more beautiful castle could never be seen.
29:37But a dark threat of war and suffering hangs over the land.
29:46Percival is led into the hall and there is seated as if for a feast.
29:54And he watches in silence as a vision unfolds.
29:59A boy came in, holding a white lance, and he passed in front of the fire.
30:21Everyone in the hall saw a drop of blood issue from the tip of the lance,
30:25and the red drop ran right down to the boy's hand.
30:29Now a girl came in, fair and comely, and between her hands she held a grail.
30:36And when she carried the grail in, the hall was filled with a light so brilliant
30:41that the candles lost their brightness, as do the moon or stars when the sun rises.
30:50And Percival went to sleep, longing to know the meaning of this vision,
30:54and who is to be served from the grail.
30:59When Percival woke, the castle was empty and the grail was gone.
31:14And a quest began that has fascinated writers and filmmakers ever since.
31:18A grail is a serving dish, but it soon became the grail,
31:24the cup used by Christ at the Last Supper.
31:27The tale invented by Chrétien came back to England and soon spread to the Welsh borders.
31:43And here they say if you want to find the Holy Grail, the key, or rather the keys, are kept in the Hodnut Village shop.
31:54Hi Janice, this is Michael.
31:55Hi Janice, nice to meet you.
31:57Hello.
31:57Sorry to disturb you.
31:59Can we borrow the key for the church?
32:01Yes, you certainly can.
32:02I'll go here.
32:03Now, it's a bit complicated.
32:05That's the outer door.
32:06You go into the little door in the corner.
32:08So that's the outer door, upper lock.
32:10Okay.
32:11That's the inner door, upper lock.
32:14And the inner door, bottom lock.
32:16Thanks very much.
32:17The grail story appears in a 13th century Shropshire legend,
32:24and it resurfaces with a Victorian antiquarian, Thomas Wright.
32:28What he did was he left a series of clues within the poetry, which finally brought you to this church.
32:33Graham Phillips has spent years trying to untangle the riddle.
32:37He thinks that Wright left clues to the whereabouts of the Holy Grail in the west window of the village church.
32:47Well, there it is.
32:52You can see that the four figures represented are supposed to be Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
33:00Although John, quite clearly, is a woman in this representation.
33:05Perhaps Mary Magdalene.
33:07And obviously, with the cup being called the Marian chalice,
33:09the chalice that was supposed to have been used by Mary Magdalene to collect Christ.
33:13At the crucifixion, she holds the cup up to collect the blood of Christ.
33:18Yeah.
33:18So what led you to this?
33:20A family called the Fitzwarine family possessed a cup which they claim was the Holy Grail.
33:26Their descendants were called the Vernons,
33:29and their descendant was Thomas Wright, the man who had this same-class window put in.
33:34So, the plot thickens here.
33:36He claims to have the very same cup, but he's got no son to hand it on to.
33:41No story has generated so many conspiracy theories.
33:46But that's a testimony to the seductive power of the myth and its symbols.
33:52And if one of those statues has to be the one that's important,
33:55it must be the one that's above St John's head, the eagle statue.
33:59The Shropshire Grail mystery leads to Hawkeston Park.
34:10It's an 18th century fantasy garden, which has now become another Arthur country.
34:18Only this one was made to order.
34:20In this man-made grotto, the mischievous Victorian Thomas Wright left a final clue.
34:42Right.
34:43So, these are the two statues.
34:48This one here, lion statue.
34:51And the other one over here is the actual eagle statue.
34:56Bring it on.
34:57Move it.
35:00You can see its feet here.
35:03This is its breast, and its head would have been here.
35:06But it was in the base of this, when it was being moved down the cliff there,
35:11and it fell to the bottom, that from the base of it,
35:14there was a little hollow, and that's where the cup was found.
35:18The cup that was found in the statue,
35:23it's quite small.
35:27In fact, when you see it...
35:29Wow.
35:29Can we bring it into the light?
35:30Yeah.
35:33When you actually see it, it doesn't look much different to an ink cup.
35:38But...
35:39God, how interesting.
35:40It was taken to the British Museum, where they identified it,
35:43and this is interesting, as a first-century Roman scent jar.
35:48No.
35:48And it can't be proved that that's exactly what it was,
35:51but that's certainly the style of it.
35:58How like medieval people we still are.
36:01The power of the tale is so great that we will it to be true.
36:06But despite all the seekers, from the medievals to the da Vinci code,
36:16the grail is pure myth.
36:18A symbol created by Chrétien and the poets who came after him,
36:25of something that can never be possessed,
36:28but for which we must still strive.
36:33A symbol, perhaps, of the human quest itself.
36:36And the holy grail is not the only symbol of Arthur, which was created to meet our needs.
36:44In medieval England, they thought Arthur's Camelot was Winchester, and here they have Arthur's Round Table.
37:00It's the ultimate symbol of equality among men of power, copied in parliaments around the world,
37:12in the United Nations itself.
37:16It was made for Edward I in 1290,
37:20after he'd read buried Arthur's bones in a marble tomb in Glastonbury.
37:24Well, this is the best way to view it.
37:27I haven't been so near it for years.
37:29So it's a fake.
37:30Yeah.
37:30But of course, it's also real.
37:32Wow.
37:33Now we're up here, you can start to make out the names of the heroes, can't you?
37:37Galahad.
37:39Lancelot.
37:39Lancelot de Lac.
37:41Gawain.
37:41Oh, that's Gawain.
37:42That's Gawain.
37:43And then Percivale.
37:44And this is Tristram.
37:45Tristram de Liennes.
37:47Gareth.
37:48Bedivere.
37:49And all the odd ones.
37:50200 years later, the table was repainted by another would-be Arthur, Henry VIII.
37:56This was painted when, Martin?
37:57It was painted sometime just after August 1516.
38:01Yeah.
38:01Henry had come here, first visited as king,
38:04saw it was in bad condition,
38:06and immediately issued a writ from Southampton to repair the hall and paint the table.
38:10This is one of the world's greatest symbols, after all.
38:13But it's changed its symbolic meaning through the centuries.
38:15So what was Henry's interest in the Arthur story?
38:18Henry wanted to be elected Holy Roman Emperor.
38:23So he has it, King Arthur, painted with his own face,
38:27so that this is clearly a descendant of Arthur,
38:30who rules the round table in this night.
38:33Arthur reborn.
38:34Arthur reborn.
38:35Yeah.
38:35Redivibus.
38:36And so, Geoffrey of Monmouth's prophecy had come true.
38:48Henry VIII was a Tudor.
38:50The Tudors were Welsh.
38:52The old monarchy of Britain had been restored.
38:55And the myth of Arthur had become a parable of Britain itself,
39:02a dream of what Britain had been and could be once more,
39:07a paradise land whose golden age might still come again.
39:11But only a few years later,
39:24it was Henry himself who smashed that old world forever.
39:31When Henry fell out with the Pope and made England Protestant,
39:34he ordered the demolition of England's old medieval Catholic culture.
39:38And here in Glastonbury, Arthur's Isle of Avalon,
39:45they felt the full fury of the Reformation.
39:50It was like the Taliban in Afghanistan
39:53or the Cultural Revolution in China.
39:55And among the casualties,
39:58the bones that lay in the black marble tomb
40:01in the middle of the nave,
40:03Arthur and Guinevere, whoever they really belonged to,
40:07gone forever.
40:07And with that,
40:20you might have thought
40:21the myth of Arthur had run its course.
40:24The Tudor Revolution
40:25would lead us into the modern world.
40:28The Age of Angels and Grails
40:30gone forever.
40:31But like every nation,
40:36the British still needed their myths.
40:38Myths of identity,
40:40myths of state.
40:41Visitors come and think this is medieval,
40:47but actually it's...
40:48Well, they come and they know that it represents British history.
40:55In the 19th century,
40:57the Houses of Parliament were rebuilt
40:58and decorated with the tales of Arthur and his knights.
41:02This is our legend and myth which Victorians thought was most appropriate.
41:12Here in her robing room,
41:17when Queen Victoria dressed for great affairs of state,
41:20she did so under the gaze of her mythic predecessor.
41:23What they wanted in this room
41:28was some kind of aesthetic
41:30which represented the merits and the virtues of kingship of monarchy.
41:40And through Arthur,
41:42England would engage again with her lost past.
41:46So you see this great mass of legends and stories about King Arthur
42:06grew and was added to over hundreds of years,
42:11responding to the times,
42:13to needs that were political and cultural,
42:16and even emotional, psychological.
42:18And you can see too that most of them
42:20have no origin in real historical events.
42:24They're the product of wonderful imagination of the storytellers.
42:32But is that all there is to it?
42:35Where did the first Arthur storytellers get their tales?
42:40How far back do they really go?
42:46Well, to find out in the islands of Britain today,
42:51there's only one place you can go.
42:54To Ireland.
42:55I went down into County Cork with Professor Dahio Hogan
43:07to find one of only two storytellers still alive
43:10who can recite the Gaelic hero tales of ancient Ireland.
43:15And the tale-teller himself, Sean, has sprightly 18.
43:19But he did a lot of work.
43:20So he's a little bit more difficult to do than the story.
43:23There is no wonder.
43:24Do you want to go at the end of the country?
43:25Hello?
43:25Good morning.
43:26Hello,特isch.
43:27I'm Michael.
43:28Yes, very nice to meet you.
43:29Hello, welcome to the country.
43:30I'm Michael, you're welcome to the country.
43:31Michael.
43:31Michael, you're welcome.
43:32Michael.
43:33Michael, you're welcome.
43:34Michael.
43:34Michael, you're welcome to the country.
43:35Michael, we're welcome to the country.
43:36Padraig, the piddle player, is 90 years old and the tale-teller himself, Sean, a sprightly 80.
44:06This story tells of Finn McCool and the young warriors, the Fjana, a tale with uncanny echoes of Arthur, the magic sword, the cup that brings eternal life.
44:36How did you first hear these stories? What captured your imagination?
44:40I learned from the old people. From the old people?
44:43From the old people. The mind is the important thing. The only thing we have in this world is our way of thinking. There is nothing stronger than our way of thinking.
44:53When that particular story is written in about the 16th century, the writer was using older motifs and older Fjana materials.
45:00When you're listening to Sean, you're listening to a voice that goes back for centuries and centuries and centuries and even for millennia.
45:08When you listen to Sean telling the Fjana story, you get something of the impression of what it was like in this period in Wales from the 9th to the 11th century when the Arthurian tradition was oral before it became part of the great literature of Europe.
45:22When I'm telling that story, those stories, I'm living them.
45:30So through Sean, we can trace elements of the tale back 1,500 years or more.
45:37But are they just fantasy?
45:43Could there even have been a real Arthur, as the Welsh believe?
45:48It's only a short hop of about 15 miles at its shortest between County Antrim in Ireland and the islands of Scotland.
45:56This stretch of water has been a passageway for migrants and seamen and saints, along with stories and legends for thousands of years.
46:12This is the Isle of Ionia.
46:13It's the Burial Place of the Kings of the Scots, Gaelic speakers who came here from Ireland in the Dark Ages.
46:34It was here that an Irish saint, Columba, came in the 6th century and converted the Scots to Christianity.
46:43Oh, this is a 19th century edition, is it?
46:47Yeah.
46:48He came from what we would now call Northern Ireland, and this area of Scotland was already colonised by his people.
46:57And they were having a hard time because the king of the Picts on the rest of Scotland was giving them a hard time.
47:03And they maybe sent for Columba as an important person from their own tribe to come and help them to counter this pressure from the Pictish king.
47:12Columba's was a brutal age of battles between Scots, Picts and Saxons, but his life was written down in one of Britain's earliest biographies.
47:21And this is the crucial bit here.
47:24This is the bit that I'm looking for.
47:26It's about the sons of King Aidan, who's really the first of the king of the Scots, who emerges from the shadows as a real person.
47:36And it's about a prophecy that Saint Columba makes.
47:40King Aidan's troops win the battle, but it's an unhappy victory.
47:54Three hundred and three heroic warriors die in the battle.
47:59But even more important, in the same battle,
48:02Neartorum Superius Memorato Imbello, Trucidati Sund, were killed the two sons of Aidan.
48:12Ecodius and the eldest son, Artorius.
48:19Arthur.
48:20Arthur.
48:20Arthur.
48:24Just like the Holy Grail, we search for Arthur, willing him to be real.
48:32But there is a real Arthur who died in a sixth century battle, somewhere north of Hadrian's Wall, once the northern frontier of the Roman Empire.
48:44Was it his name that was handed down by the bards to all those later storytellers?
48:50And never was there seen a more doleful battle in any Christian land.
49:04And they fought all day long and never stinted till all the noble knights were laid to rest in the cold earth.
49:12And they fought till it was near night.
49:14And then King Arthur spied the traitor, Sir Mordred.
49:19And he ran towards him crying,
49:21Traitor, now is your death day come.
49:24And King Arthur smote Sir Mordred under the shield with a thrust of his spear right through his body.
49:30And when Sir Mordred felt he had his death wound,
49:33He pushed himself with his last strength up to the burr of King Arthur's spear.
49:40And he smote his father, Arthur, with his sword over the side of his head.
49:46And then Sir Mordred fell stark dead to the earth.
49:49And the noble Arthur fell in a swoon.
49:54Ah, he said,
49:57Now I have my death.
49:58There's one last clue in our search.
50:17The Welsh chronicles say that Arthur's last battle was at a place called Camlan,
50:26a Roman fort on Hadrian's wall called Camboglana.
50:30That's so beautiful.
50:31Lovely.
50:31Well, now we're climbing the wall, you see.
50:33Oh, yes.
50:35So we're now inside the...
50:36You'll now be inside the fort.
50:38The fort, yeah, yeah.
50:39In Major Johnson's potting shed were relics from the end of the Roman world.
50:47This is amazing, absolutely amazing.
50:54The fort was occupied by a team of Tungrians, a balanced fort.
51:00The fort has never been excavated,
51:03but we know it was still occupied by a Celtic warlord in the 6th century,
51:07just the time when the legend of Arthur began,
51:10in the very area where the first Welsh bards like Myrthyn
51:15sang their songs of a lost Celtic world and its heroes.
51:21I don't know whether you know this story,
51:23but in the Annals of Wales,
51:25which are in a 10th century manuscript in the British library,
51:29has a note speaking of a battle at a place called Camlan,
51:32which, if it is a Roman place name at all, must be Camoglana,
51:37in which Arthur and Medroth died.
51:41That was very interesting, yes.
51:43Well, yes, I remember that from, you know,
51:46what one knows of Arthur,
51:48but I'd never sort of connected that it might be how.
51:51Could it be here?
51:51So here at last, perhaps,
51:58is a tangible link with an Arthur of history.
52:10There doesn't have to be a historical prototype,
52:13but if there was, maybe this is the connection.
52:21As he lay dying, Arthur said to Sir Bedivere,
52:35Here, take Excalibur.
52:38Go with it to the lake
52:39and throw my sword in the water.
52:43But Sir Bedivere couldn't bring himself
52:45to throw such a wonderful thing away,
52:47and twice he hid Excalibur
52:49and came back to the king
52:50and said he had thrown it in the water.
52:53What did you see? said Arthur.
52:56I saw nothing but the ripple of the waves,
52:59said Bedivere.
53:00Ah, traitor untrue, said King Arthur.
53:04Now you have twice betrayed me.
53:09The third time,
53:11Bedivere threw the sword into the lake
53:13and an arm appeared,
53:15grasped the sword
53:16and took it back into the water,
53:18safe for the day
53:20the king will return.
53:29And so, over the centuries,
53:32King Arthur became
53:33a symbol of their histories
53:35for the peoples of the islands of Britain.
53:38And in that sense,
53:40as with all great myths and legends,
53:42he's still alive today.
53:44As Sir Thomas Mallory said
53:48more than 500 years ago,
53:50some men say that King Arthur is not dead,
53:53but had by the will of our Lord Jesus Christ
53:55into another place.
53:57And men say he will come again
53:59and win the Holy Cross.
54:01I will not say that this shall be so,
54:06but on his tomb is written this verse.
54:10Here lies Arthur,
54:12once and future king.
54:14Next time on In Search of Myths and Heroes,
54:24a journey through the secret Himalayas
54:28in search of Shangri-La,
54:30a place of peace in a world of war.
54:34For a thousand years,
54:35travelers to Tibet have told tales
54:37of a hidden land where time stood still.
54:40Now, find out the truth behind the legend.
54:42For more about ancient myths
54:55and their modern meaning,
54:56continue the journey at pbs.org.
55:01In Search of Myths and Heroes
55:03is available on videocassette and DVD.
55:06The companion book to the program
55:08is also available.
55:09To order, call PBS Home Video
55:11at 1-800-PLAY-PBS.
55:15.