Calling all Arthurian Scholars:

[Sand Snake No. 9]

There have been lots of very good threads lately about the myths, legends and sagas that may have provided GRRM with some inspiration for plotlines in ASOIAF. [see Apple Martini's thread on Jon and Resurrection Myths). Thanks to insomnia and a late-night showing of Excalibur , the 1981 film directed by John Boorman, on Encore, I've thought of another one – the stories of Arthur and Camelot.

For example, Cersei and Jaime are doing a two-person enactment of the romantic dramas in the legends. They are Guinevere and Lancelot, the queen and the kingdom's finest knight who cuckold the King. They are also Arthur and Morgause, the brother and sister whose incestuous son, Mordred, causes the fall of Camelot.

As well as borrowing from legends, GRRM also gives shout-outs to modern writers and films in ASOIAF, and I think he's tipped his hat to Excalibur in his description of the wormy-lipped Joffrey, which could be a description of Boorman's Mordred, right down to the gold armor.

There's also another element in Excalibur that might have influenced GRRM. In the movie, the wizard Merlin uses a "spell of making" in which he invokes "the dragon," or the earth, and the result of the invocation is a white mist that he calls "the breath of the dragon." If there is, as some posters speculate, an ice dragon, could the killing mist that accompanies the white walkers be its breath?

Jon could also be seen as an Arthur figure. He is, perhaps, the product of rape, like Arthur, and like Arthur he was carried off shortly after his birth to be fostered in complete ignorance of his birthright. Poor Jon, however, wasn't given an easy task like pulling a sword from a stone to prove he's the rightful King of Westeros.

But before I forget, Arthur's father was named Uther Pendragon. So Arthur and Jon are both dragons . . .

Anyway, while I've read a lot of modern Arthurian stories like The Mists of Avalon and The Once and Future King, I've never clenched my teeth and plowed my way through Le Morte d'Arthur . But I bet that more than one of you smart folks have, and you can pick out more parallels between the stories of Arthur and ASOIAF. Please, share with us?

[Sand Snake No. 9]

I found something in another thread:

Where was that? Was it early on? I don’t remember it.

The interesting thing about the greenseers on the weirwood thrones beneath Bloodraven’s hollow hill is that they were even less um perky than Bloodraven himself. I think they have been there a very, very, very long time. And I suspect that the immortality of the weirwoods, which live forever if not cut down, is pumped into the greenseers so long as they stay connected to them. When the Andals cut down the weirwoods in the south, this quite literally killed any greenseers plugged into them down below in their roots.

I keep thinking of Nimuë trapping Merlin in an enchantment within a tree beneath a hollow hill, to sleep that way forever.

Bloodraven, the former sorcerer, is trapped within a tree's roots beneath a hollow hill. He's described as "dreaming" on his weirwood throne. Hmmmn . . .

[lilenadheas]

UGH! Why couldn't you have watched it a couple of months from now?? I'm due to start my Arthurian Legends module in college. The thread we could have made.... damn it.

BTW, props on reading Morte D'Arthur, it is a pain to get through.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

I think you covered most of them.

Another that I'd add is the parallel in the titles, "Once and Future King" and the "Prince That was Promised." More interesting because the Once and Future King never actually comes — might the PtwP prophecy go similarly unmet?

[BondJamesBond]

King Robert as Uther and Edrick Storm as Arthur? A huge Baratheon comeback in the works?

[Pod The Impaler]

There have been lots of very good threads lately about the myths, legends and sagas that may have provided GRRM with some inspiration for plotlines in ASOIAF. [see Apple Martini's thread on Jon and Resurrection Myths). Thanks to insomnia and a late-night showing of Excalibur , the 1981 film directed by John Boorman, on Encore, I've thought of another one – the stories of Arthur and Camelot.

For example, Cersei and Jaime are doing a two-person enactment of the romantic dramas in the legends. They are Guinevere and Lancelot, the queen and the kingdom's finest knight who cuckold the King. They are also Arthur and Morgause, the brother and sister whose incestuous son, Mordred, causes the fall of Camelot.

As well as borrowing from legends, GRRM also gives shout-outs to modern writers and films in ASOIAF, and I think he's tipped his hat to Excalibur in his description of the wormy-lipped Joffrey, which could be a description of Boorman's Mordred, right down to the gold armor.

There's also another element in Excalibur that might have influenced GRRM. In the movie, the wizard Merlin uses a "spell of making" in which he invokes "the dragon," or the earth, and the result of the invocation is a white mist that he calls "the breath of the dragon." If there is, as some posters speculate, an ice dragon, could the killing mist that accompanies the white walkers be its breath?

Jon could also be seen as an Arthur figure. He is, perhaps, the product of rape, like Arthur, and like Arthur he was carried off shortly after his birth to be fostered in complete ignorance of his birthright. Poor Jon, however, wasn't given an easy task like pulling a sword from a stone to prove he's the rightful King of Westeros.

But before I forget, Arthur's father was named Uther Pendragon. So Arthur and Jon are both dragons . . .

Anyway, while I've read a lot of modern Arthurian stories like The Mists of Avalon and The Once and Future King, I've never clenched my teeth and plowed my way through Le Morte d'Arthur . But I bet that more than one of you smart folks have, and you can pick out more parallels between the stories of Arthur and ASOIAF. Please, share with us?

That's a good film, one of the few versions of the Arthur story which I like.

Good call about Joffrey / Mordred.

I see Brienne as a pure knight who is alone on a quest (a typical medieval theme) - she seems part Galahad (and part Joanne of Arc).

Just yesterday I had a thought about Excalibur, while in one of the King Robert threads. The discussion was about how the realm decayed under his rule. Robert cared little for his life and just wanted to get lost in his baser desires; the realm became much the same - dysfunctional, decayed, lost to those who cared little for the greater good and played their game for themselves. From that I recalled the principle expressed in Excalibur: "the King and Land are one". That redicovery of royal principles such as true courage and honour, was the point of the grail quest. Who in ASOIAF, among the contenders for the Iron Throne, can actually embody this ?

A strange thought.

[E-Ro]

King Robert as Uther and Edrick Storm as Arthur? A huge Baratheon comeback in the works?

Yes, stannis.

[Sand Snake No. 9]

UGH! Why couldn't you have watched it a couple of months from now?? I'm due to start my Arthurian Legends module in college. The thread we could have made.... damn it.

BTW, props on reading Morte D'Arthur, it is a pain to get through.

Well bookmark this thread and come back when you know it all! (And by the way, I didn't read Morte D'Arthur. Too intimidating, not to mention too damn long.)

[Sand Snake No. 9]

I think you covered most of them.

Another that I'd add is the parallel in the titles, "Once and Future King" and the "Prince That was Promised." More interesting because the Once and Future King never actually comes — might the PtwP prophecy go similarly unmet?

I thought "Once and Future King" referred to Arthur. He reigned once, then when he was mortally wounded by Mordred he was carried away to the Isle of Avalon to sleep until the realm needs him again. Whence the title "Future King."

This discussion makes me want to read "The Once and Future King" again.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

I thought "Once and Future King" referred to Arthur. He reigned once, then when he was mortally wounded by Mordred he was carried away to the Isle of Avalon to sleep until the realm needs him again. Whence the title "Future King."

This discussion makes me want to read "The Once and Future King" again.

It does. But once he goes to Avalon, he doesn't come back. They're still waiting on him.

Once -> Past Azor Ahai/Last Hero/whoever

Future -> Intended dude who never shows up

[Winter's Knight]

I thought "Once and Future King" referred to Arthur. He reigned once, then when he was mortally wounded by Mordred he was carried away to the Isle of Avalon to sleep until the realm needs him again. Whence the title "Future King."

This discussion makes me want to read "The Once and Future King" again.

I have heard the title phrased slightly differently as well: "The king of the past is the king of the future". On a deeper reading, it doesn't mean that Arthur shall rise again to rule but that every king that has gone before bleeds into the king that is to come. The past seeps into the present, tainting it with it's own sins and triumphs, preventing and perverting coming events.

Either Jaime or Tyrion says something similar I believe, about how they are all dancing on the threads their parents left behind.

[The Roaring Bear]

I always saw some parallels between Jorah Mormonts stint as a slave, getting branded and such with Chretien de troyes story "The Knight of the Cart" Where Lancelot, in order to find and rescue Gueneviere has to ride in the back of a dwarfs cart.

The act of riding in a cart was for criminals, and so LAncelot had to be willing to go through the embarrassment in order to save the Queen. Gwen actually ends up scolding Lancelot because he hesitated for half a second lol... a funny scene. Anyways, as I said, I see Jorah Mormont's enslavement on his way back to Queen Dany as being a reference since he is with Tyrion (a dwarf) and since its embarrassing.

[Black Wolf Smith]

http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/topic/65918-arthurian-legend-and-tptwp/

[Sand Snake No. 9]

It does. But once he goes to Avalon, he doesn't come back. They're still waiting on him.

Once -> Past Azor Ahai/Last Hero/whoever

Future -> Intended dude who never shows up

Gotcha.

I've always thought that Brienne was a stand-in for Joan of Arc, however it makes more sense story-wise to see her as Perceval/Parzival on his long, long quest for the Holy Grail. Parzival is originally raised away from court by a mother who does not want him to become a knight, but then he encounters three knights from King Arthur's court, and he leaves his mother behind to pursue his knightly ideal, and Brienne leaves her home for similar reasons. Parzival is also depicted as innocent and faithful, but rather bumbling, and he makes mistakes that prolong his quest. Very Brienne. Ultimately, however, he succeeds in finding the grail and curing the wounded king, and he becomes the perfect knight. so perhaps there is hope for Brienne?

Anyhoo, the Perceval/Parzival myths go beyond the Arthurian legends and overlap with stories about Gawain and if anyone has any special knowledge of these stories, please chime in! :)

[Alia of the knife]

I noticed the similarities too.

Jon- Arthur

Lyanna- Igraine

Rhaegar- Uther

Bloodraven/Howland Reed- Merlin

Lyanna was betrothed to Robert, and in those days, betrothals were almost informal marriages, so in a sense, Lyanna was the "wife" of another great Lord, and though she didn't love Robert, it remains to be seen if she willingly ran off with Rhaegar.

It's been years since I read "Mists of Avalon," so I will have to dig it out.

I also saw a few similarities in "Pillars of the Earth," and then more into the future, "Dune."

One of my favorite lines in "Dune" is "the Sleeper must Awaken," speaking about the true essence of a person lying dormant until something happens, and they know who and what they are.

I suppose in this case, it's "waking the Dragon," though Viserys effed it up as a true "impact statement."

[secretTysha]

I was fortunate to be able to take an entire semester of Arthurian legends in college. Sadly I was a little jaded about life and love at the time. Not really a good mindset for studying that material.

I've been looking for some reading material to fill the long years between ASOIAF installments. I think I have an answer.

If I am remembering correctly, I believe the parallels are spot on,

We need to find our Gawain and pig faced girl.

[Sand Snake No. 9]

I was fortunate to be able to take an entire semester of Arthurian legends in college. Sadly I was a little jaded about life and love at the time. Not really a good mindset for studying that material.

I've been looking for some reading material to fill the long years between ASOIAF installments. I think I have an answer.

If I am remembering correctly, I believe the parallels are spot on,

We need to find our Gawain and pig faced girl.

Garland Tyrell as the courteous Gawain?

[Slender Aimry Hill]

Well, there is one obvious and unavoidable and wonderful overlap.

Martin was inspired by the Wars of the Roses - Malory actually fought in them.

Forget Arthur for a moment - don't worry, not a very long one - Sir Thomas Malory is among the most Martinian knights on record.

Wiki has this:

The third contender [for the Malory who wrote Morte D'Arthur], is not only most well documented, but most popular as a claimant. This is Sir Thomas Malory of Newbold Revel in Warwickshire. H. Oskar Sommer first put forth this theory in his 1890 edition of Le Morte d'Arthur and Harvard Professor George Lyman Kittredge provided the evidence in 1896. Kittredge showed Malory as a soldier and member of Parliament who fought at Calais with Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick. However, a biography by Edward Hicks in 1928, revealed him as a thief, bandit, kidnapper, and rapist, hardly in keeping with the high chivalric standards in the book.

This Malory was born to Sir John Malory of Winwick and Lady Phillipa Malory, heiress of Newbold. Thomas, their only son, was born between 1393 and 1416. he became a professional soldier and served under the Earl of Warwick, but all dates are vague, and it is unknown how he became distinguished. He acted as an elector in Northamptonshire, but in 1443 was accused, along with an accomplice, Eustace Barnaby, of attacking, kidnapping, and stealing £40 of goods from Thomas Smythe. Nothing became of this charge, and he soon married a woman named Elizabeth Walsh, who would bear him a son, Robert.

The same year, Malory was elected to Parliament, serving at Westminster as knight of the shire for Warwickshire for the rest of 1443, and being appointed to a Royal Commission charged with the distribution of monies to impoverished towns in Warwickshire. Despite the charge against him, he seemed to have remained in good standing amongst his peers. In 1449 he was elected as MP for the Duke of Buckingham's safe seat of Great Bedwyn.

However, this would change rapidly, when, in 1450 he was accused of ambushing the Duke of Buckingham, Humphrey Stafford, along with a gang of 26 other men. The accusation was never proved. In May of that year, he was next accused of extorting 100 shillings from Margaret King and William Hales of Monks Kirby, and, the next August, of committing the same injury against John Mylner, for 20 shillings.

In between, in June 1450, he found the time to break into the house of Hugh Smyth of Monks Kirby, stealing £40 pounds of goods, and raping his wife. Eight weeks later, Malory alone was charged with attacking the same woman, in Coventry. Nine months later, on 15 March 1451, he and 19 others were ordered to be arrested. Nothing came of this and in the following months, the Malory gang racked up crimes consisting of violent robberies, rising past 100. At one point, he was arrested and imprisoned in Maxstoke Castle, but he escaped, swam the moat, and regrouped with his gang at Newbold Revel.

This continued, until the matter finally came to trial on 23 August 1451, in Nuneaton. Those accused included him and several others, with numerous charges. The judgement went against Malory and he was in London's Marshalsea prison by 1452, where he remained for a year. His response was to plead "not guilty," and demand a retrial with a jury of men from his own county. This never took place, but he was released. In March, he was back in Marshalsea, from which he escaped two months after, possibly by bribing the guards and gaolers. After a month, he was back in prison, and was held until the following May, released on a bail of £200, a considerable sum.

Next, when Malory was to answer for his crimes, he could not be found. This was because he was in custody in Colchester, accused of more crimes involving robbery and the stealing of horses. Once again, he escaped, and was at liberty until November, when he was apprehended and returned to Marshalsea, under penalty for escape of £1000.

He seems to have lain low for a few years, being either imprisoned in Newgate Prison or Marshalsea. He obtained bail at least once, but was soon locked up again for failing to pay back loans made to him by various people for his extensive bail payments. All these terms in prison would have given him ample time to write Le Morte d'Arthur.

In and out of prison for years, he was pardoned at the accession of Edward IV to the throne in 1461. After this, little is heard, spare that a grandson, Nicholas, was born to Robert. Robert soon died. Sir Thomas Malory of Newbold Revel died on 14 March 1470, and was buried with adequate splendor in Christ Church Greyfriars, near Newgate Prison. His being interred here suggests that his misdeeds were forgiven and that he possessed some wealth, either the result of his robberies, or some unknown patron, possibly Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, under whom Malory may have spent time as a paid spy.

Rape and pillage indeed - sounds more Amory Lorch than Tom O'Seven, does Malory. And the escape from the moat is pure Martin, or rather, Martin is impure Malory! at your heart out, Theon and Jeyne leaping from the walls of Winterfell...

(It seems only fair at this point to drag in this excellent book by Christina Hardyment, which claims Malory was falsely accused of many of these crimes and effectively stitched up for supporting the Lancastrian kings:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Malory-Life-Times-Arthurs-Chronicler/dp/0007114893/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1343465175&sr=1-3)

Malory is well worth reading (massive understatement) and is actually mostly extremely accessible, by the way (maybe skip the book about Arthur's invasion of Rome which is quite boring. And some people find the Book of Tristram aimless, but, I mean, it's nothing on A Feast for Crows or A Dance with Dragons in that respect...). Obviously TH White is brilliant and a good interpretation but you should really go for the raw stuff too. Its language is not Chaucerian or Gawain-poet level of incomprehensible, just beautiful and cool. What is truly wonderful about it is it's the greatest accidental work of English prose ever. Malory wasn't trying to writ well, he was just messing around with some French romances in his plain soldier's idiom - which ended up winning him immortality. If I had to lose Malory or Shakespeare, I'd be really hard put to say which.

But back to the actual Arthurian content. Probably the most striking result of Martin's enthusiasm for the Wars of the Roses is the 'House' system, arms, words, seats, cadet branches, rivalries, which I would argue is the whole basis for what makes his books particularly compelling. This, too, is very Morte D'Arthur.

Obviously Stark and Lannister resemble York and Lancaster. Malory's references are a bit more veiled and obscure but sometimes they come into brighter light.

The whole story is initiated by the feud between the Pendragons and the Cornwalls, (brilliantly reimagined at the beginning of TH White's second volume), when Uther rapes the Duchess of Cornwall, Igreyne. (Effectively. He resembles her husband by magic, otherwise it wouldn't have been consensual, her husband is being killed by Uther's troops at that precise moment, and after the victory she is carried off and promptly married).

Obviously this brings to mind Martin's 'original sin', Rhaegar and Lyanna (where the rape is similarly ambiguous and becomes more so), though it also reminds us of Aerys's conduct with practically any woman he's mentioned alongside. What is very Wars of the Roses and also Martinian is that this rape is not atoned for or forgotten. Its consequences rumble on.

From the Cornwalls, via a daughter's marriage, descend by far the most interesting and antiheroic family in Malory, the Orkneys. Historically they have a tang of the Beauforts, legitimised bastard kin to the Lancaster kings (obviously Martin's Beauforts are Blackfyres though), and the Nevilles (the family of Warwick 'the Kingmaker'). But in Martin's rendering they surely bring the Greyjoys to mind, at least to mine. If the Orkmonts were top fish in the Iron Isles that would be even better, though...

Gawaine is the eldest Orkney son. In English and Scottish versions of the legend he is Arthur's unofficial heir, the supremely courteous knight, a bit free with the ladies maybe but essentially superb. The French sources with whom Malory is tinkering, though, vilified him to build up their spangly hero Lancelot. Malory sticks to that line but his English memory keeps mucking things up, and the result - again I think mostly by accident/fate - is the Morte D'Arthur's most psychologically complex character. I would consider drawing a parallel with Theon, except that Gawaine is one of the most terrifying fighters about. Theon's great, but I have to admit he isn't that.

The Orkneys add to their existing feud against the Pendragons (which sort of has to lie low now they find themselves quasi-heirs to the Pendragon throne) one against the House of Pellinore, whose patriarch killed theirs, Lot. Suffice to say that the Orkney vengeance is bloody and swift and more than outdoes Martin...

Another 'House' in Malory is formed by Lancelot's kin, a bunch of smug, shinily armoured, silkily chivalrous Frenchmen. I would definitely opine that this lot emit a 'Lannister' vibe. And I agree with earlier suggestions that Cersei and Jaime are pretty much Guinevere and Lancelot with added incest. Jaime's character as he begins to reject Cersei is even, on many occasions, similar to Lancelot's internal tortures as he attempts to renounce Guinevere while questing for the Grail, or when she's banished him yet again for literally no reason. Lancelot and Guinevere have a more convincing relationship than Jaime and Cersei (or pretty much anyone else in literature), but their one-liners aren't always quite so good.

The bit of Malory that follows the Grail Quest is the best, the most Malorian and the most Martinian, and you can really sense the bloody wounds left in Malory's mind and conscience by the Wars of the Roses. There is intrigue, regret, nostalgia, inevitability, tragedy, crazed berserker rages, everything. I would even perhaps have considered suggesting skipping the former bits and starting there, but actually don't do that, anymore than it's right to skip late Martin! The journey makes the destination all the better. It must be admitted, though, that unlike Martin, Malory gets, fairly consistently, better and better as he goes on.

[Khal Porno]

Ha, Excalibur is a piece of shit, but quite entertaining.

[Fire Eater]

Could the Isle of Faces be a kind of Avalon?

Avalon is an island associated with mystical practices and people, and ruled by an order of enchantresses. The Isle of Faces is associated with the mystical CotF and Green Men, and run by the Order of the Green Men who possess magical abilities.