Korean Job Discussion Forums

[seonsengnimble]

I submit to you the idea that Arthurian legend was in fact anti-English Norman/French propaganda.

Here are my reasons.

1. The Normans were French descendants of Galls.
2. Galls ruled Britain before the Romans and later the Anglo-Saxons.
3. The Normans were a mix of Galls, Romans and later Vikings.
4. King Alfred, an Anglo-Saxon who fought off the Vikings and was revered as one of the greatest kings of England.
5. Arthurian Legend takes place before the appearance of the Anglo-Saxons
6. Arthurian Legend sprang up during the Norman rule of England.

This seems like a legend which favors the ancestors of the French conquerors of England rather than a legend which favors the English.

Please discuss...

[donducky]

You've got a PhD thesis right there! No joke!

It's long been my view that England has been under foreign occupation since 1066, and has somehow never yet managed to free itself. Hand on heart, that's not a joke. How does a single woman, of largely non-English parentage, married to a prince of Greece, get to be "sovereign" over what were once, a thousand years ago, a sovereign people?

The Scots may soon help settle this by voting for independence. Just the kind of constitutional crisis Britain has been needing for about . . . ah . . . the past thousand years now.

Yes, I'm a Yank!

[morrisonhotel]

[morrisonhotel]

[JMO]

[young_clinton]

[Moldy Rutabaga]

There is a large missing spot in English literature between Old English and Middle English, and not much well-known was written in that time period. The Anglo-Saxons were interested in Germanic legends and stories and not in Arthurian tales. The Middle English writers of about 1200-1500, including Chaucer, inherited that tradition but weren't terribly interested in the Anglo-Saxon stories. They were much more appreciative of continental stories of France, Italy, and Greece/Rome.

There was a late medieval belief that the ancient Britons were the refugees from the fall of Troy, and the culture of the day was fascinated with Arthurian stories and connections to Gallic and Celtic culture, just as we now have our themes of cowboys and robots and such.

It would be interesting to argue that Arthurian legend was based on anti-English sentiments, but in all the reading I've done in the period the English-German connection isn't really on the radar at all. I would say more that the medieval English simply really liked the romance and mystery of the Arthurian stories and that their French connection helped bolster the Norman aristocracy that ruled the island.

England is developing more of a national consciousness of English-ness by the time of Chaucer, and accordingly Chaucer is less interested in Arthurian legend, except where he's making fun of it for its contrived cliches, such as in Sir Thopas.