arthurian - Where did King Arthur get his sword, Excalibur?

There are two different stories of how King Arthur received his sword, Excalibur. The first is that he pulled it out of an anvil or stone slab (and by doing so confirmed that he was the rightful king of the land). The second is that he received it from the Lady of the Lake (and that he had to return it to her before he died).

Which one of these stories is correct? Or did King Arthur have two different swords that he got different ways?

Answer

The Excalibur problem is that, over time, people have combined two different Arthurian swords into a single blade. This is a serious pet-peeve of mine.

Sword # 1: "Clarent", the sword in the stone. It was used in Ceremonies (e.g. the dubbing of knights). This sword designates Arthur as being rightful heir of Uthur.

Sword # 2: "Excalibur/Caliburn", given to Arthur by the Lady of the Lake, and Arthur's sword for battle. This sword grants the divine right to rule England.

Most popular depictions (especially in recent years) tend just to use one sword or the other and call it Excalibur. However, some find a way of placing the sword in the position of both: e.g. the Lady of the Lake puts it into the stone, or something to that effect.

Older texts, however, do make the distinction clear even if it's a "blink and you miss it" moment. For example, a sentence saying that the sword in the stone was fragile, and couldn't be used for combat, so Arthur went to the Lady of the Lake for a new one.

In the medieval "Alliterative Morte d'Arthur" the roles of Arthur having the two swords is actually really important: Part of Mordred's coup involves stealing Clarent (establishing that he has the mortal right to rule by laws of men) in addition to kidnapping/"marrying" the queen. The final battle involves Arthur, wielding Excalibur (divine right to rule), versus Mordred, wielding Clarent. The two then destroy each other.

I really hope this helped clear things up for you. I'd recommend starting with Geoffrey of Monmouth and working your way through medieval texts to see the evolution of the depiction of Arthur's swords.

Comments

languages - Do we ever see written English in the Star Wars films?

In Empire Strikes Back , we see a transcription of what R2's beeps and bloops mean, but it's not English (sorry for the low quality, it's from the 2004 DVDs): I'd assume it's what Basic looks like when written, but is there some point in the the Star Wars films we see written English instead? (This sort of spun off from a discussion in How do people understand astromech droids? .) Answer At one point there was English but it has been phased out in subsequent versions of the films. Chris Gould at DVD Active did a comparison of all versions of each of the Star Wars films, and in his comparison of Episode 4 , there are a couple of screenshots showing how the power gauge for the Death Star tractor beam was changed. I imagine there are probably more to be found in his other comparisons but I haven't got around to reading those yet.

Was the "pure soul" of Harry's what had really hurt Voldemort?

In the Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort possesses Harry, and it hurts. Greatly. I think that Dumbledore explained that it was because Voldemort's rotten soul was incapable of assimilating Harry's pure soul, that Voldemort didn't understand the love and friendship etc that Harry has in his heart. But, I think it was a lie. Remember that in Deathly Hallows, while looking for information regarding Horcruxes, it is discovered that it is in fact possible to merge a soul fragment back, but that the process was extremely painful. Now then, if Voldemort tried to possess Harry, and Harry had a fragment of Voldemort's soul, I think that it could have been the true cause of Voldemort's pain: the fact of having his soul so close of another fragment. I think that Dumbledore knew that fact, but had to lie to Harry because it was inappropriate to let him know that he had one of Voldemort's soul fragments at the moment. Is that right? Or was it truly the pure soul of Harry's...

star wars - What "exactly" happens when someone turns to the Dark Side?

When I saw the original Star Wars saga as a kid, the concept of the Dark Side imprinted in me was quite simple. You did a bad thing, so you're a bad person so you go to the Dark Side and keep doing bad things. Now, obviously this doesn't hold true in reality. In my mind it is perfectly reasonable for Luke to kill the Emperor and Vader and then just flee the Death Star and rejoin the Alliance. After all they are at war, those are enemy officers that have captured him and are taunting him by threatening with death of all loved ones and the whole operation was intended to kill the Emperor anyway. The same would hold true for Anakin. He could have killed Mace Windu to save the Chancellor and Padme but that doesn't mean he's going to then go mad and kill all Jedis including children. It doesn't add up from a merely psychological point of view. He had a set of objectives and that made him want to keep the Chancellor alive (quite valid by the way, Mace Windu is quite clums...

star trek - Warning regarding forward saucer section in Nemesis?

In Star Trek: Nemesis , just before the Enterprise rams into the Scimitar, Picard sends a text message from his captain's chair arm pad to Troi — who is manning the helm in lieu of the crewman who was just blown out through what was once the view screen — indicating that she should put full impulse on standby. (Literally, if you watch the scene closely, Troi's console prefaces the order with "TXT MSG" !) My question is: Did Picard also somehow warn crew members in the forward saucer section about what was about to happen? The ramming of the Scimitar was a heat of the moment decision. Considering that he also resorted to calling the auto-destruct sequence shortly after (which ended up being offline), he probably was of the mindset that any losses would be acceptable in order to hault Shinzon's march to Earth. Still, I'm curious. Answer The original script indicates that he called for the crew to " brace for impact ". Whether that call (or the comma...

Blog

Search This Blog