Letter 4

Lisa

Lisa Comento wrote:

Hello, my name is Lisa and I'm a college student. I was reading up on the King Arthur piece you have here - and I do hope you are the one who wrote it. The legend of King Arthur has always facinated. Lately over the past year I have read up on his story.

Looking for the facts I have read that his father's name was "Uther" though in another research piece I read that his father's name may have been "Aidan." Is Uther consisdered part of a writers imagination? Which is right?

Also in late August of this year I herad something on the news about how a secret chamber was found that had inscriptions on it. They dated the inscriptions back to the 5th century - I was wondering if you have the facts on that story. It somehow proved Arthur's existence.

The website is great and very informational. I hope you can answer my questions! Thank you for your time.

-Lisa Comento

Dear Lisa,

Thank you for your comments on my Battle of Hastings 1066 web site.

I am not sure if you are interested more in the legend or the fact. If we discuss the legend first. I always thought that Uther Pendragon was the accepted father of Arthur and Igraine the mother. You must appreciate that there are as many theories as there are solutions. All must be taken with a pinch of salt. What you read about this man today has very little bearing in truth. It is the imagination of many writers over a many hundreds of years and has been glossed up to the point where even the legend becomes absurd. This is epitomized by the many Hollywood productions about Arthur which are many peoples only understanding of this man. I have gone into some detail about the possibility of who Arthur might have been in my web site.

What you say about the discovery of a chamber this year is not totally correct. Some stones were found with Celtic inscriptions that date back to the approximate time that Arthur was supposed to have existed. You can probably understand that putting two and two together and coming up with five was achieved quite easily in this case. As far as I could calculate, there was nothing on these inscriptions that could tie them down to the existence of Arthur. The only similarity was the location. It would not be unusual to find such things in the west of England because the Celts were pushed that way during the early Saxon Invasions.

I may give the impression that this man never existed. That is the last thing I would want to say. It is just that he was not the man many people think or wish him to be.