Irish Influence on Medieval Welsh Literature

A new book by Patrick Sims-Williams

Patrick Sims-Williams has recently completed a new book, published by Oxford University Press, March 2011, on Irish influence on medieval Welsh literature which will be of interest not only to medievalists but to all those concerned with the problem of how to recognize and evaluate literary influence.

Professor Sims-Williams has authored several books on Celtic and Anglo-Saxon topics, including Ancient Celtic Place-Names in Europe and Asia Minor (Wiley-Blackwell, 2006), Ptolemy: Towards a Linguistic Atlas of the Earliest Celtic Place-names of Europe (CMCS Publications, 2000), The Celtic Inscriptions of Britain: Phonology and Chronology, C.400-1200 (Wiley-Blackwell, 2002), and Religion and Literature in Western England, 600-800 (Cambridge University Press, 2005).

He has also contributed to major works such as 'The Early Welsh Arthurian Poems' (pp.33-72) to The Arthur of the Welsh: Arthurian Legend in Mediaeval Welsh Literature, edited by Rachel Bromwich, AOH Jarman and Brinley Roberts (University of Wales Press, 1991) and 'Gildas and vernacular poetry' (pp. 169-190) in Gildas: New Approaches (1984), edited by Michael Lapidge and David Dumville. He has edited the journal Cambrian Medieval Celtic Studies (CMCS) since 1981.

In this new book, Irish Influence on Medieval Welsh Literature, Patrick Sims-Williams examines the extensive and now famous literature of Ireland's Middle Ages which was unknown outside the Gaelic-speaking world of Ireland, Scotland, and the Isle of Man - with Wales an important exception. With the settlement of Irish emigrants in Wales from the 5th century onwards, Irish scholars worked in Wales in the 9th century, and throughout the Middle Ages there were ecclesiastical, mercantile, and military contacts across the Irish Sea. From this standpoint, it is not surprising that the names of Irish heroes such as Cu Roi, Cu Chulainn, Finn, and Deirdre became known to Welsh poets, and that Irish narratives influenced the authors of the Welsh Mabinogion .

Yet the Welsh and Irish languages were not mutually comprehensible, the degree to which the two countries still shared a common Celtic inheritance is contested, and Latin provided a convenient lingua franca. This work discusses if some of the similarities between the Irish and Welsh literatures could be due to independent influences or even to coincidence? Patrick Sims-Williams provides a new approach to these controversial questions, situating them in the context of the rest of medieval literature and international folklore. The result is the first comprehensive estimation of the extent to which Irish literature influenced medieval Welsh literature.

Analytical Table of Contents
List of maps
Preface

1. Introduction
The introduction discusses estimates of Irish vernacular influence on Welsh literature. Assumptions about ‘Celtic’ literature deriving from Renan and Arnold are considered in the light of ‘Celtoscepticism’. Problems include the divergence of Irish and Welsh, loss of manuscripts, uncertain dating of texts, independent folkloric influence, the widespread ‘Heroic Biography’ and ‘Heroic Age’, and the limitations of the philological Stammbaum model. Cognate names e.g. Finn/Gwynn, Nuadu/Nudd, Suibhne Geilt/Myrddin Wyllt (Merlin) versus borrowed names such as Mannanán/Manawydan are analysed, as is the character Brân. Historical contacts include Hywel ab Owain Gwynedd's and Cadwgan of Whitland's Irish parentage, the use of Welsh at Tracton, Co. Cork, and the alleged influence of Gruffudd ap Cynan on Welsh music and poetry. Latin intermediaries are include the Vita of Maedóc of Ferns. Some Irish material in Welsh reflects observation of reality (e.g. Irish dress) rather than texts.

2. Irish Vernacular Influence on the Earliest Welsh Literature
This chapter contends that solid evidence of Irish influence on Welsh literature starts with the ninth-century ‘brain drain’ of Irish scholars. The discussion covers the Cambridge Juvencus manuscript, Dubthach and Merfyn Frych, the Historia Brittonum, Cormac's Glossary, glosses and marginalia, the Pangur Bán poem, Cædmon's Hymn, the Twrch Trwyth and Ychen Bannog legends, and the May Day poem in the Black Book of Carmarthen and the Elegy on Cú Roí in the Book of Taliesin.

3. Kaer Sidi and other Celtic Otherworld Terms
In chapter three the author argues that modern terms the Otherworld and l'Autre Monde are problematic and that there was no common Celtic term. Locations overseas and in tumuli are discussed. Terms discussed include síd, Annwfn, Andoounnabo, gorsedd, forad, Ynys Wair, Kaer Sidi, Caer Siddi, tíre béo and terra viventium. Reference is made to Preiddeu Annwn, Historia Brittonum, De Abbatibus, Elis Gruffudd, Hanes Taliesin, and William Owen-Pughe.

4. Narrative Techniques in Irish and Welsh, I: The 'Slavic Antithesis'
Looks at narrative technique, the so-called Slavic Antithesis', found in Irish and Welsh, but also elsewhere which casts doubt on there being a connection between the Celtic examples. Illustrations are given not only from Togail Bruidne Da Derga, Mesca Ulad, Táin Bó Cúailnge, the Cynddylan englynion, and Taliesin, but also the Finnsburg fragment and Eiríksmál, ballads from Russia, Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece, Finland, Ossetia, and even from Superman.

5. Narrative Techniques in Irish and Welsh, II: The Riddling 'Watchman Device'
With particular reference to Togail Bruidne Da Derga and Branwen this chapter discusses the narrative technique called the ‘Watchman Device’. It is illustrated from Homer, Statius, Valerius Flaccus, the Shahnama, the Mahabharata, Laxdœla saga, Thithreks saga, the Bórama, Táin Bó Cúailnge, Serbian and Scottish Gaelic ballads, and even Kenneth Grahame. The Irish and Welsh examples have undergone the influence, perhaps independently, of the ‘Slavic Antithesis’ of Chapter 4 and of international landscape riddles. Riddles from around the world are compared and the relationship beween riddle, metaphor, kenning, and myth is discussed.

6. The Irish Elements in Culhwch and Olwen
Chapter six examines the Irish personal names and place-names in Culhwch and Olwen and what they meant to the author in terms of Irish literature, e.g. Esgair Oerfel, Seisgeann Uairbheóil, the ‘five fifths of Ireland’, Diwrnach, Cai, Llenlleawg, Caledfwlch, Conchobar mac Nesa, Cú Roí mac Dáiri, Fergus mac Róich, Lóegaire Búadach, Conall Cernach, Maelwys mab Baedan, Scilti scawntroet, Gilla goeshydd, Garselit gwyddel, Brys fab bryssethach. Use of Annals, floating lists, and sheer invention is suggested. Some comparison is made with narrative themes in the areithiau, Cathcharpat Serda, Fled Bricrend, Widsith, Cath Maige Tuired and Rigomer.

7. The Irish Geography of Branwen
Allusions to Irish geography in the Second Branch of the Mabinogi, Branwen; the former rivers between Britain and Ireland called Lli and the Archan and the submerged kingdoms; the river Liffey and Dublin; and the origin story of the ‘five fifths of Ireland’ are discussed in the seventh chapter. The last is compared with Lebor Gabála Érenn and Giraldus Cambrensis, with the Lot story in Genesis 19, with the stories of Cairbre Cattchenn and Túathal Techtmar, and with the ‘Treachery at Scone’.

8. The Submission of Irish Kings in Fact and Fiction
This chapter looks at possible allusions in the Second Branch of the Mabinogi, Branwen, to Irish customs relating to hospitality and submission to an overlord, with particular reference to Brian Bórama, Athelstan, Henry II, ‘Easter houses’, and the use of halls and tents. Texts discussed include Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, Annals of Inisfallen, Annals of Ulster, Annals of Tigernach, Mac Carthaigh's Book, Expugnatio Hibernica, Thady Dowling, Vita Sanctae Monennae, Chaucer's House of Fame, Tromdám Guaire, Scéla Cano meic Gartnáin, Scéla Mucce Meic Dathó, Fled Bricrenn, Orgain Denna Ríg, and Vitae of St Gwynllyw and St Gwenfrewy.

9. Llasar and the Lake of the Cauldron
Here the author offers an explanation of the story in Branwen about the giant Llasar bringing the cauldron of rebirth from a lake. Comparison is made with the folklore of Llyn Cwm-llwch and Llyn y Fan Fach, and in particular with that of Devenish on Lough Erne, as in Tochmarc Emire, Tochmarc Ferbae and Cóir Anmann. Llasar's story is compared with stereotyped hostile migration-legends, e.g. the Flemish in Pembrokeshire or Ingimund near Chester. Llasar's name derived from llasar ‘azure’ but got equated with Irish lasair ‘flame’ and Latin Lazarus, giving rise to the story that he was shunned, was burned in the Iron House and survived with the cauldron of resurrection. Welsh knowledge of the Lives Irish saints called Lasair, Mo Laise, or similar is likely; connections between Wales and the cult of St Maedóc at Ferns, Co. Wexford, and Drumlane, Co. Cavan provide a link.

10. The Iron House, the Men in Bags, and the Severed Head
Continuing from Chapter 9, this chapter begins with the Iron House story in Branwen. Arson in medieval life and literature is discussed, with special reference to Norse material and the Irish sagas Orgain Denna Ríg and Mesca Ulad, but also the Grimms' ‘Six Go Through the World’ and Vercelli Homily IX. It is argued that the Bórama, first attested in the Book of Leinster, is the best Irish parallel to Branwen and that a version of it, probably from St Maedóc's monastery at Ferns, Co. Wexford, influenced the Welsh author here and in his ‘Men in the Bags’ episode. A Leinster sequel, The Battle of Allen, may have influenced his story of Brân's severed head. The Welsh king Brân and Irish king Brandub seem to have been equated.

11. Cu Chulainn in Late Medieval Wales
This chapter discusses a legendary Irish musical council at Glendalough and then a reference to Cú Chulainn in a sixteenth-century Welsh tune-name. Allusions to this hero by the poets Lewys Glyn Cothi and Gwilym ab Ieuan Hen may refer to this tune or to the Elegy on Cú Roí mac Dáiri in the Book of Taliesin, available in Radnorshire. The name Cú Chulainn also seems to have been used as a nickname for Irish immigrants at Ystumgwern in the Extent of Merioneth of 1420 and in Llyn in a subsidy roll for 1292–3, The status of other Irish immigrants such as the Twrllachied of Anglesey and Osbwrn Wyddel of Llanaber are discussed. In Appendix I it is argued that Cuhelyn is an unrelated name and that allusions to ‘Cuhelyn's shield’ are more likely to refer to the Welsh Cuhelyn Fardd than to the Irish story about the shield of Cú Chulainn. In Appendix II it is argued that allusions to ‘nyf’ by Casnodyn, Dafydd ap Gwilym, Gruffudd ap Maredudd and other Welsh poets are not to an Irish heroine Niamh, but to the Welsh word nyf meaning ‘snow’.

12. Fionn, Deirdre, and Lebarcham in Late Medieval Wales
Chapter 12 considers allusions to Fionn, Deirdre, and Lebarcham by late medieval Welsh poets, in particular Gruffudd ap Maredudd, Dafydd y Coed, Dafydd ap Gwilym, Casnodyn, Trahaearn, Lewys Glyn Cothi, Ieuan Du'r Bilwg, Dafydd Nanmor and Wiliam Llyn. A reference to ‘Ffin vab Koel’ in the satire Araith Iolo Goch is also discussed. The Deirdre allusions are to the late medieval Oided mac nUisnig (or Oidheadh Chloinne hUisneach) rather than the Old Irish Longes mac nUislenn. The descriptions of Lebarcham recall Talland Étair and Tochmarc Luaine ocus Aided Athairne.

13. Irish Influence on Medieval Welsh Literary Criticism?
Discusses a possible instance of medieval Irish literary criticism influencing Welsh literacy criticism, in connection with comments on shifts between second and third person address in panegyric. Reference is made to the Irish Grammatical Tracts and Bardic Syntactical Tracts, the Trefhocul tract, Preface to Amra Coluim Cille, Taliesin, the Gogynfeirdd, the Cywyddwyr, Einion Offeiriad and the Welsh Bardic Grammar. Comparison is made with Priscian and Petrus Hispanus, and evocatio in Latin rhetoric. A possible Latin formula praesens et absens is hypothesized.

14. Conclusion
In summary, the final chapter discusses the book's findings and the changing views on Irish influence of scholars such as John Rhys, Kuno Meyer, Ludwig Stern, John Morris-Jones, T. Gwynn Jones, J. Lloyd-Jones, Ifor Williams, Saunders Lewis, C. H. Slover, Cecile O'Rahilly, and Proinsias Mac Cana.

Abbreviations and References
Index

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Cambrian Medieval Celtic Studies
Patrick Sims-Williams has been Professor of Celtic Studies at Aberystwyth University since 1994 and was previously Reader in Celtic and Anglo-Saxon an the University of Cambridge. Currently President of the International Congress of Celtic Studies, he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 1996 and directs the Academy’s research project on the Development of the Welsh Language (Datblygiad yr Iaith Gymraeg).

In 1981 he founded the academic journal Cambrian Medieval Celtic Studies (formerly Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies to 1992) and has remained the journal's editor to this day. CMCS is a bi-annual journal of Celtic studies, appearing in summer and winter, covering Medieval Celtic language, literature, history, and archaeology of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and Brittany from A.D. 400 to 1500.

More recently, CMCS Publications has widened its publishing output to monographs, such as Helen McKee's The Cambridge Juvencus manuscript glossed in Latin, Old Welsh, and Old Irish: Text and Commentary (2000) and Marged Haycock's Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin (2007).

Patrick Sims-Williams is a regular contributor with articles such as:
Gildas and the Anglo-Saxons - CMCS 6 (1983), pp. 1-30.
The submission of Irish kings in fact and fiction: Henry II Bendigeidfran, and dating of The Four Branches of the Mabinogi - CMCS 22 (1991), pp. 31-61
The provenance of the Llywarch Hen poems: a case for Llan-gors, Brycheiniog - CMCS 26 (1993), pp. 27-63
The death of Urien - CMCS 32 (1996) , pp. 25-56
Celtomania and Celtoscepticism - CMCS 36 (1998), pp. 1-36

CMCS is available from the Department of Welsh, Old College, King Street, Aberystwyth. SY23 2AX. Wales. Annual subscription (since 2002) is £22 to institutions; £10 to individuals for 2 numbers, inclusive of packing and postage.

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Early Welsh Saga Poetry

“I carry a head in the grasp of my hand
of a generous lord – he used to lead a country.
The chief support of Britain has been carried off

I carry a head which cared for me.
I know it is not for my good.
Alas, my hand, it performed harshly.

I carry a head from the side of the hill
and on his lips is a fine foam
of blood. Woe to Rheged because of this day.

It has wrenched my arm, it has crushed my ribs,
it has broken my heart
I carry a head which cared for me.”

Welsh saga poetry is said to have its roots in Dark Age Northern Britain, 400 – 700 AD. The 9th century Historia Brittonum (History of the Britons) records the bards of the time Taliesin and Aneirin amongst others who's work has not survived:

“Then Dutgirn at that time fought bravely against the nation of the Angles. At that time, Talhaiarn Cataguen was famed for poetry, and Neirin, and Taliesin and Bluchbard, and Cian, who is called Guenith Guaut, were all famous at the same time in British poetry.”

This era is known as the period of Y Cynfeirdd (literally "The earliest poets"), their poetry celebrating their patrons and praising their valiant efforts in battle. We know of Taliesin's works from the 6th century praise poems to Urien of Rheged and Aneirin's Y Gododdin, the moving poem recounting the disastrous British attack on Catraeth, the most archaic version of the poem John Koch has dated to the 6th century.

This style, personified by Aneirin and Taliesin, was continued by a number of anonymous poets all writing in the same tradition; from the 9th century we find the saga poetry of Llywarch Hen which laments those who have fought and fallen in battle. 'Llywarch Hen' (Llywarch the Old) was a 6th century prince, and cousin to Urien, from the ruling family in the 'Hen Ogledd' (Old North) of the northern British kingdom of Rheged, comprising of territory from parts of modern southern Scotland. In his later years Llywarch, now an old man, has also been transferred from his northern British background to Wales in the context of the incessant border skirmishes with the English. The early Welsh poems attributed to Llywarch Hen have come to be known as saga englynion.

Welsh Saga Poetry
Early Welsh saga "Englynion", are lyric poems long presumed to be the poetic remains of lost stories, told in a mixture of prose and verse.

Englynion (singular: englyn) are the oldest recorded Welsh metrical form, short form poems that consist of three or four lines stanzas, dating from as early as the 9th century. Each englyn has a complex structure, for example involving rhymes or half rhymes, and a certain number of syllables per line and other variants.

The englyn is the only early stanzaic metre in Welsh. The origins of the metre have defied attempts to be traced but is thought to have been in existence since at least the 8th century. The main period of floruit for the three-line types is the 9th and 10th centuries; by the 11th century the higher classes of poets, the bards, had adopted four-line variants of the earlier types, and the three-line types were used only by the lesser, more popular poets. The englyn is used for a wide range of subjects in the early period: religious verse, gnomic poetry, prophecy and antiquarian works. The main bardic genre, praise poetry, is not attested for the early period.

But by far the most extensive and important body of englynion poetry are the lyric poems in character termed “englynion chedlonol” or “saga englynion”.

Saga poems are long narratives, recalling an heroic adventure or events, typically battles in early Welsh poetry, often featuring generations of the same family. The term is said to originate from Old Norse or Icelandic prose tales depicting Norwegian and Icelandic history, battles and legends.

The Songs of Llywarch the Old
The collective early Welsh saga englynion known as Canu Llywarch Hen, Canu Heledd and Canu Urien are considered to be part of a cycle concerning the figures whose stories they tell. Their subject is mainly the characters and events of the 6th and 7th centuries, during the long years of warfare with the Anglo-Saxon invaders. These three main cycles, or groups of poems, refer to material concerning Llywarch Hen, Heledd and those dealing with the death of Urien Rheged.

In the poems concerning Llywarch Hen, (Canu Llywarch Hen) his life was the subject of a presumed lost saga of which only a series of englynion, survives. Llywarch flees to Powys, his new homeland often associated with Llanfor, near Llyn Tegid in Gwynedd. Canu Llywarch Hen recalls the loss of all twenty-four sons of Llywarch Hen, in battle against the English.

The Canu Heledd recalls the fall of the kings of the Pengwern region (modern Shrewsbury, Shropshire) and the elegy Geraint son of Erbin, concerning the Battle of Llongborth, are also associated indirectly with Llywarch. The "Heledd Cycle" laments the death of Cynddylan, prince of Powys in the 7th century, his lands devastated by the English of Mercia. Scholars argue that the 9th century poems do not deal with historical events, indeed there is no account of Cynddylan outside of Welsh poetry, but reflect the background of the border conflict. Heledd, sister of Cynddylan, is the lone survivor in this cycle, in which she laments the loss of Cynddylan's great hall, formerly filled with life, but now ruined and empty.

Included here is the "The Death-song of Cynddylan" (Marwnad Cynddylan), which is thought to be older than the 10th century Canu Heledd, likely composed in East Powys not long after Cynddylan's death in 655 AD.

“The Death of Urien”, the third in the cycle, is the most obscure of the three, composed sometime after the assassination of the 6th century British leader of Rheged. Llywarch, here in his native north Britain, appears as the narrator, where in one poem he returns to Rheged with the British leader's severed head; whether Llywarch murdered Urien himself or retrieved his head to prevent the enemy obtaining it as a trophy has been the subject of considerable debate. The Historia Brittonum recalls how Urien was killed by one of his own people:

“Hussa reigned seven years. Against him fought four kings, Urien, and Ryderthen, and Guallauc, and Morcant. Theodoric fought bravely, together with his sons, against that Urien. But at that time sometimes the enemy and sometimes our countrymen were defeated, and he shut them up three days and three nights in the island of Metcaut; and whilst he was on an expedition he was murdered, at the instance of Morcant, out of envy, because he possessed so much superiority over all the kings in military science.”

Welsh Scholarship
Most of the saga englynion were first published in 1792 by William Owen. At the time Llywarch was considered to be the composer of the englynion, not a character in some of the verse. The early works were considered unsound due to the infancy of Welsh scholarship. The texts from the Red Book of Hergest englynion and Black Book of Carmarthen poems in The Myvyrian Archaeology of Wales (1801-7) were considered little better. Skene's The Four Ancient Books of Wales (1868) were translations commissioned from Welsh clergymen of the time who had no training in the older language and considered unreliable at best. In the 1900's J Gwenogvryn Evans produced diplomatic editions of The Black Book of Carmarthen (1906) and The Poetry in the Book of Hergest (1911) which are invaluable for the modern scholar of Welsh Literature.

Modern Welsh scholarship begins with the works of Sir John Rhys and Sir John Morris-Jones. However, it was their pupil Sir Ifor Williams who produced editions and elucidations of the early poetry of Wales. Williams presented an outline of his theories in his British Academy Lecture of 1932 `The Poems of Llywarch Hen' which demonstrated that this cycle of poems dated from the 9th century based primarily on historical grounds.

Soon after, Williams produced 'Canu Llywarch Hen' (University of Wales Press, 1935), containing poems relating to the figures of Llywarch Hen, Heledd and Urien Rheged, their background being the wars between the Cymry and the English in the 6th and 7th centuries, in Powys and on the Shropshire border; but also including memories of warfare in the `Old North', which covered much of southern Scotland, and northern England. Williams showed that, contrary to earlier assumption, Llywarch Hen is not the name of the anonymous poet who composed these dramatic poems, but rather that of a leading actor in them, an ancient warrior, relocated in Powys, portrayed as a senile figure, goading his sons to go out and fight in defence of their borderland, as he himself is no longer able to do so, then lamenting their loss.

Patrick Ford produced the first work to present an entire cycle to an English audience in 'The Poetry of Llywarch Hen' (1974). Ford's work is not an edition and denies any sort of narrative framework for the poems.

Jenny Rowland produced the first full edition of the saga englynion since Sir Ifor Williams's Canu Llywarch Hen appeared in Welsh. Rowland's work was first submitted as a PhD thesis to the University of Wales in 1982. Rowland's work, based primarily on the Red Book texts, was published by as Early Welsh Saga Poetry: A Study & Edition of the Englynion (D S Brewer, 1990) containing full English translations, narrative and notes making the work accessible to a wider English audience. Long out of print, and virtually impossible to obtain a copy second-hand, Rowland's opus is now available again as a “print-on-demand” service directly from the publisher's website.

Rowland's critical discussion of the saga "englynion" seeks to restore the lost narrative background by careful reading of internal indications and by comparative study. The growth, nature and artistry of each cycle is fully explored, as well as how each relates to the larger corpus. Relevant early Welsh traditions and history are also cited and the broader questions of what was the nature of the original prose setting, the metrical principles and practice, and their relationship to the Old English elegies are also covered.

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Early Welsh Saga Poetry
A Study & Edition of the Englynion
Edited by Jenny Rowland

Published1990, D S Brewer
ISBN: 9780859912754
Hardback, 698 pages

Table of Contents
Part 1: The Llywarch Hen poems; the Urien Rheged poems; Canu Heledd - the historical background - the poems; "Claf Abercuawg" and penitential lyrics; miscellaneous saga poems and the performance of the saga "Englynion"; other genres using the three-line "Englyn" metres; metrics, authorship, language, dating.
Part 2: Edition and translations of the texts: the manuscripts of the saga "Englynion"; editorial note; Canu Llywarch; Canu Urien; Canu Heledd; "Claf Abercuawg" and "Kyntaw Geir"; miscellaneous saga poems. Appendices: Early Welsh genealogical tracts - edition and text of "Marwnad Cynddylan".

This major “print on demand” programme ensures specialist, rare and difficult to find books such as Gildas: New Approaches edited by David Dumville and Michael Lapidge, and Saint Germanus of Auxerre and the End of Roman Britain by E A Thompson, are available once more. Essential reading for students of Medieval Welsh literature and Dark Age Britain.

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The Viking Art of Navigation

The Vikings were renown as seaborne raiders of north west Europe and a dominant force for 300 years between AD 750 and AD 1200. The Vikings were known to have travelled vast distances navigating by the sun using a special sundial or ‘sundisc’. However, how the Vikings navigated in cloudy or foggy situations, when the 'sundisc' was unusable, was not fully understood until recently.

The word 'Viking' is a modern revival, the term is not known from Middle English, but by the 19th century it had come to mean a Scandinavian pirate. The term 'Vikingr' was used only in Denmark and the West Norse area as attested in the Norse prose histories known as the Sagas of the Icelanders and found on several Scandinavian rune stones, usually explained as meaning "one who came from the fjords," from 'vik' meaning "creek, inlet, small bay".

The Modern English term Viking is thought to have derived from Old English 'wicing' and Old Frisian 'wizing' which are almost 300 years older than the Sagas of the Icelanders and thought to derive from 'wic' as in "village, or camp", related to the Latin 'vicus' meaning "village, habitation", referring to their temporary camps, an important feature of the Viking raids which commenced in Britain in 793 AD with the attack on Lindisfarne. The later Norse raiding armies who settled in England were generally referred to as 'Danes'.

In the Sagas the word 'Viking' refers to a seaborne warrior taking part in an oversea expedition, such as their famed longship journeys as far afield as the Russian Volga and across the northern Atlantic to Newfoundland in the New World. According to 'Eirik the Red's Saga' Norsemen first settled Greenland in the 980's AD and started to explore lands westward only a few years after the Greenland settlements were established.

The Sagas tell that Leif Erikson landed on the shores of a beautiful place with references to wild grapes, hardwoods, butternuts, that he named Vinland (Vine land). The length of day recorded in the sagas has led to speculation that Leif’s Vinland was somewhere between New England and Newfoundland.

Tales claiming the Vikings reached the New World 500 years before Columbus did not become widely known until the 19th century, and since then scholars have debated their veracity claiming the content of the sagas cannot be relied upon as primary evidence and arguing that seaborne Norsemen could not have successfully navigated across the Atlantic solely by the sundial or ‘sundisc’ alone which would be ineffective in cloudy weather. The magnetic compass was not then known in Europe and in the short summer nights of northerly latitudes they would also have had limited views of the stars to guide their way across the ocean. It has long been suspected that the Vikings must had some other navigational aid.

In 1960 evidence of Vikings in North America came to light at L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, Canada. Several Norse artifacts and clear Icelandic- style house foundations were uncovered providing proof that Vikings had indeed landed, and briefly settled, in North America before Columbus. More recent archaeological work has revealed over 300 years of intermittent contact between the Greenlandic Norsemen and Native American peoples, primarily with the Inuit people in the Canadian Arctic. While the Norse colony in Greenland lasted for almost 500 years, the continental North American settlements were small and do not appear to have developed into permanent colonies.

How did the Vikings navigate across the northern Atlantic to the New World?

The Sagas tells of a glowing 'sólarsteinn' or ‘sunstone,’ that, when held up to the sky, revealed the position of the Sun even on a cloudy day. References to these mysterious sunstones are found in the Saga known as the Sigurd legend. The story of Sigurd is told in the Völsunga Saga, a late 13th century Icelandic prose rendition of the origin and decline of the Völsung clan, although the origins of the material are thought to be considerably older.

The Saga tells that:
"The weather was very cloudy. It was snowing. Holy Olaf the king sent out somebody to look around, but there was no clear point in the sky. Then he asked Sigurd to tell him where the sun was. After Sigurd complied, he grabbed a sunstone, looked at the sky and saw from where the light came, from which he guessed the position of the invisible sun. It turned out that Sigurd was right."

Past research has shown that some insects, including honeybees, use polarisation for navigation when the sun is obscured by clouds. This led to a hypothesis being developed in the1960's which suggested that under foggy or cloudy conditions, Vikings may have been able to determine the azimuth direction of the Sun with the help of skylight polarisation, as with the insects.

According to this theory, the Vikings could have determined the direction of the skylight polarisation with the help of a birefringent (double-refracting) crystal. Danish archaeologist Thorkild Ramskou suggested in 1967 that the enigmatic sólarsteinn (sunstone) could have been a piece of Icelandic spar, which is calcite in the form of a transparent, polarising crystal, common in Iceland. Other candidates for the sunstone include cordierite or tourmaline, both of which are common in Scandinavia and also function as polarising filters.

Iceland spar calcite crystal

Recently a new study, published in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, March 2011, reported how researchers tested these crystals in the high Arctic, Finland, Hungary and Tunisia when the sun was hidden. Scientists Gábor Horváth from the Eötvös University in Budapest and Susanne Ĺkesson from Lund University, have been investigating Ramskou’s hypothesis which had until now never been tested.

A polarising crystal allows only light polarized in one direction to pass through, and it appears dark or light depending on its orientation to the polarised light. Sunlight becomes polarised through the scattering of air molecules in the atmosphere, with the line of polarisation at a tangent to concentric circles with the sun at their centre. Ramskou postulated that by rotating a polarizing crystal the Vikings could determine the direction of polarisation and therefore the position of the sun when it was hidden by fog or was just beneath the horizon.

In 2005, Horváth and Ĺkesson crossed the Arctic Ocean and measured the polarisation patterns of the sky under a wide range of weather conditions in totally overcast skies. They were surprised to learn that these patterns were very similar on clear and cloudy days and even when the ground was covered over by snow and ice, although the polarisation was weaker in overcast conditions. They concluded that these polarising crystals function in much the same way as the mythical sunstone of the Vikings, suggesting the Norsemen could have used this information to determine the position of the sun even when obscured by cloud or fog and navigate across the northern Atlantic in high Arctic zones.

Viking 'sunstone' more than a myth


Sources:
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 12 March 2011, Vol. 366, No. 1565, pp.772-782:
On the trail of Vikings with polarized skylight: experimental study of the atmospheric optical prerequisites allowing polarimetric navigation by Viking seafarers - Gábor Horváth, András Barta, István Pomozi, Bence Suhai, Ramón Hegedüs, Susanne Åkesson, Benno Meyer-Rochow and Rüdiger Wehner.

Proceedings of the Royal Society A, 8 March 2012, Vol. 468 no. 2139, pp.671-684
A depolarizer as a possible precise sunstone for Viking navigation by polarized skylight - Guy Ropars, Gabriel Gorre, Albert Le Floch, Jay Enoch and Vasudevan Lakshminarayanan.

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UPDATE 2012
Further research in 2011 on a crystal recovered from a 16th century shipwreck indicated that such sunstones could indeed have been used by the Vikings to successfully navigate across the North Atlantic to the New World.

Writing in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society A, a team led by Guy Ropars at the University of Rennes in Brittany, describe tests on a a piece of Icelandic spar found aboard a sunken Elizabethan military ship discovered off Alderney in the Channel Islands in the 1970s. The study team came to the conclusion that using the Icelandic spar as a depolarizer, the Vikings could have performed precise navigation under different conditions.

The study suggests that the sunstone may still have been in use on board ships more than four centuries after the Vikings, proving invaluable in avoiding navigational errors as just one of the cannons aboard the ship would have disturbed a magnetic compass by as much as 90 degrees.

UPDATE 2013
In March 2013 researcher's declared that a crystal found in the wreck of a 16th-century English warship dispatched to France in 1592 by Queen Elizabeth I that foundered off the island of Alderney, in the Channel, is indeed a sunstone, the near-mythical navigational aid said to have been used by Viking mariners.

The theory first aired 45 years ago claimed that a sunstone, a device that fractures the light, could enable seafarers to locate the Sun even when it is behind clouds or has dropped below the horizon. Sunstones, could have helped the great Norse mariners to navigate their way to Iceland and even perhaps as far as North America during the Viking heyday of 900-1200 AD, way before the magnetic compass was introduced in Europe in the 13th century.
Shipwreck find could be Legendary Sunstone

UPDATE 2014
In a paper published in Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical & Engineering Sciences a team of researchers working in Hungary has proposed that a sun compass artifact found in a convent in 1948 might have been used in conjunction with crystals to allow Vikings to guide their boats even at night.

Credit: Soren Thirslund

Since the discovery of the sun compass fragment, researchers have theorized that Viking sailors used them to plot their course, at least when the sun was shining. They didn't have magnetic compasses, however, which suggest they must have had some other means for steering in the evening or the later hours. In this latest effort, the researchers describe a scenario where the Vikings might have used a sunstone to help them use light from the sun below the horizon with a sun compass fragment operating in similar fashion to a sundial.

Researchers suggest Vikings used crystals with sun compass to steer at night
Vikings' sunstones a navigation light


UPDATE 2016
Viking navigators analysed the skylight polarization with sunstones in cloudy/foggy weather. Combining these sunstones with their sun-dial, they could determine the position of the occluded sun, from which the geographical northern direction could be guessed. However, the theory is still unproven, Now Laboratory experiments have studied the accuracy of the first step of this sky-polarimetric Viking navigation.
Royal Society Open Science January 2016

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Shepherd's Monument Shugborough

The Shepherds Monument has been the centre of mystery for two hundred and fifty years. Now an historian claims to have solved the enigmatic inscription.

Enigmatic Inscription Solved?
Carved on the 18th-century Shepherd's Monument in the grounds of Shugborough Hall in Staffordshire, England, the ancestral home of the Earls of Lichfield, is the mysterious sequence of letters - O U O S V A V V, followed on the next line by the letters D and M. The inscription which has so far defied attempts to decipher it, appears below a mirror image of Nicolas Poussin's famous painting, The Shepherds of Arcadia.

Theories abound to the meaning of the enigmatic code which has defied a satisfactory explanation for two hundred and fifty years; attempts have been made since the 19th century, among them the great Victorians Dickens and Darwin. In 2004 a team of former code-breakers from Bletchley Park, Britain's famous main decryption establishment of World War II, failed to make a positive decipherment. The code-breakers revealed that they believe the cipher is a message from the Priory of Sion, which is likely to stand for "Jesus (As Deity) Defy", interpreted as belief that Jesus was an earthly prophet, not a divinity. Another of the Bletchley code-breakers suggested it was simply a love poem; "Optima Uxoris Optima Sororis Viduus Amantissimus Vovit Virtutibus", which translates as "Best wife, Best sister, Widower most loving vows virtuously", a phrase first suggested by archivist Morchard Bishop in letters to Margaret, Countess of Lichfield in the early 1950's. However they admitted that you need more than ten letters to break a code; consequently the inscription retains its secret.

Debate continues as to whether the Priory of Sion was invented as a 20th century hoax or has a genuine provenance in the 11th century as guardians of a secret bloodline of the Merovingian dynasty in France. In the controversial book “The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail” (1982), the authors Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln, perpetuated this theory, claiming that The Knights Templar, an order which captured Jerusalem during the Crusades, was the military branch of the Priory of Sion and they were both fronts of the same organisation.

The Knights Templar, or to give them their full title, The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon, were thought to be guardians of relics recovered from the Holy Land during the early Crusades, including the Holy Grail, the cup used by Jesus at the Last Supper. The secret society of the Priory of Sion succeeded the medieval Knights Templar, and were known as the keepers of the Holy Grail. This was subsequently claimed as fact in the preface of Dan Brown's bestselling novel “The Da Vinci Code” (2003).

The Grail was first introduced to medieval Arthurian romance by Chretien de Troyes in the late 12th century as a "graal" a serving dish or platter. It can be no coincidence that de Troyes composed his tale around the same time as the crusades were taking place and dedicated “ The Story of the Grail, or Perceval” to his patron and crusader, Philip, Count of Flanders. The French Cistercian Abbot Bernard of Clairvaux officiated at the Council of Troyes at which he traced the outlines of the Rule of the Knights Templar, who soon became the ideal of Christian nobility. Originally buried at Clairvaux Abbey, Bernard's remains were later moved to Troyes Cathedral.

Chretien de Troyes would appear to have had access to first hand information from the Crusader Knights and evidently his Arthurian tales contain much pagan material, infused with earlier Celtic themes. It was not until Robert de Boron, wrote his "Joseph d'Arimathie", and continued in the Vulgate's "Estoire del Saint Graal," that Chretien's "graal" was Christianised and transformed into "The Holy Grail" the vessel of the Last Supper.

To others, the concept of the Holy Grail as a bloodline descended from Jesus Christ persisted. In the The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, Baigent, Leigh, and Lincoln, proposed the theory that Christ had staged his crucifixion, married Mary Magdalene and eventually sired the Merovingian dynasty. The book also claimed that Nicolas Poussin was a member of the the Priory of Sion, and suggested that his painting, The Shepherds of Arcadia, contains hidden meanings of great esoteric significance.

Interest in the Shepherd's Monument and its inscription exploded following Dan Brown's 2003 novel The Da Vinci Code, featuring the Priory of Sion at the centre of a conspiracy to cover up the Christ bloodline and loaded with esoteric symbolism. The Da Vinci Code finally led to the tomb of Mary Magdalene, the wife of Jesus, her womb depicted by Brown as the receptacle of the Holy Grail, the Christ bloodline, buried beneath the Rose Line in Paris. Many believe the Shepherd's Monument inscription, if deciphered, would reveal the location of the tomb of Jesus.

Shugborough Inscription Solved?
Recently, the Staffordshire Newsletter carried a small article on the 3rd February 2011, stating that an historian had solved the 250 year old riddle of the O.U.O.S.V.A.V.V. & D.M inscription on the Shepherd's Monument at Shugborough, claiming it has nothing to do with the Holy Grail and is nothing more than 18th century graffiti.

Historian A J Morton claims the letters were probably created in memorial of Viscount Anson and his mother Mary Vernon-Venables. Morton said: "Those seeking Grails and other trinkets are going to be disappointed. More than half the letters (S,V,A,V,V and M) match precisely the initials of Viscount Anson of Shugborough (1767 1818) and those of his mother Mary Venables-Vernon. Mary was the resident of Shugborough in 1773." He added, "It's as simple as that. Family initials on a private memorial."

The story appeared in several press reports, the Telegraph reported that Mr Morton discovered that Anson's wife was the daughter of the 1st Baron Vernon and sister of Edward Vernon-Harcourt, an Archbishop of York. Their son, Thomas Anson, was made Viscount Anson of Shugborough in 1806.

Mr Morton said: "It is very likely that 'M'ary 'V'enables-'V'ernon of 'S'udbury Hall, the Baron 'V'ernon of 'D'erbyshire, the honourable Edward 'V'ernon-Harcourt and the 1st 'V'iscount 'A'nson of 'O'rgreave (a hamlet 'U'nited with 'O'verley) and 'S'hugborough were somehow involved in the creation of the original 'Shugborough Code'. Or are all those Vs just a coincidence?"

Mr Morton said: "I've tried convincing myself that I'm wrong, but I can't see any way out. While I'm pleased to have solved it, I do worry that I've destroyed something magical."

He added: "The Grail has brought the estate some much-needed attention and, I imagine, a certain amount of financial relief. But unless they can provide a more convincing solution, I'm afraid the Grail story may have run out of steam."

However, many do not share Mr Morton's confidence in having claimed to have solved the mystery of the Shepherd's Monument inscription, pointing out that his interpretation is just a jumbled mess of letters pulled from any place having an association with the Anson family and hardly fall into the correct order as the Shugborough monument inscription.

A spokesman for Shugborough said: "We get five or six people a week who believe they have solved the code so we are a bit wary now."

The Inscription
Perhaps the most convincing explanation is often the simplest; the letters O.U.O.S.V.A.V.V. is the Latin translation of Ecclesiastes 12:8, ORATOR UT OMNIA SUNT VANITAS AIT VANITAS VANITATUM, which reads; "Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher, all is vanity" .


This explanation tends to agree with an earlier monument at Hagley Park, Worcestershire,which was inscribed "OMNIA VANITAS" taken from the Vulgate version of the verse which is "Vanitas vanitatum dixit Ecclesiastes omnia vanitas".

A letter dated 23rd December 1743 mentions the inscription at Hagley Park:

"Mr Lyttelton has built a kind of alcove in his park, inscribed "Sedes Contemplationis" near his hermitage. Under the aforesaid inscription is 'OMNIA VANITAS'."

Thomas Anson is known to have visited Hagley Park in the 1750's.

The letters D and M on the line below is considered an abbreviation of the Latin Diis Manibus, “dedicated to the shades” a common inscription on Roman tombstones and monuments where “shades” was typically a term for “spirits of the dead". It is known that there were authentic Roman funerary stones at Shugborough.

Of all the explanations offered for the inscription on the Shepherd's Monument at Shugborough this is the simplest and considered to perfectly reflect the message of Poussin's painting.

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Arthur's Hunting Path

“On winter nights, when the moon is high, wait by the track by Camelot. Though nothing catches your eye except shade and moon shadows, you may hear them ride by: Arthur and his men, hoofbeats clattering, with their horns and their hounds on their way to hunt. At night, I hear you ask? Aye at night, for Arthur is not only the king under the hill, but in this land he leads a different kind of hunt – a wild, wild hunt. He calls to his red-eyed hounds as the moonlight silvers the sky, for tonight, my lads, the hunters ride.” [1]

Legends of Camelot
Perhaps the best known site of the claimants for Arthur's legendary court at Camelot is the ancient hillfort of Cadbury Castle, south of the village of South Cadbury, just off the A303 from Chapel Cross, barely a couple of miles east of Sparkford, Somerset. The word "castle" suggestive of a medieval fortress and battlements of Arthurian romance, but this was never a fortification of stone walls and turrets. The hillfort at South Cadbury, with its massive Iron Age earth bank and defensive ditch system, re-fortified in post-Roman times, was without doubt the base of a powerful Dark Age warlord, a dux bellorum; if Arthur existed in an historical sense then this is, without doubt, the most likely contender for his garrison.

The strong Arthurian associations at Cadbury Castle have caused much consternation amongst scholars who have argued that these links only appeared after John Leland's account in 1542, and of course conveniently present the argument that he probably invented much of the Cadbury folklore:

"Right at the South end of South Cadbury Church stands Camelot. This was once a noted town or castle, set on a real peak of a hill, and with marvellously strong natural defences..... Roman coins of gold, silver and copper have been turned up in large quantities during ploughing there, and also in the fields at the foot of the hill, especially on the East side. Many other antiquities have also been found, including at Camelot, within memory, a silver horseshoe. The only information local people can offer is that they have heard that Arthur frequently came to Camelot." [2]

Of course this a rather circular argument; we can neither prove or dis-prove that Leland made up his story of Cadbury Castle being Camelot. It is certainly possible that the Arthurian association of the site existed in local folklore long before Leland's time. We know from other sites, as attested in Historia Brittonum, that Arthur certainly existed in the landscape before Geoffrey of Monmouth. But we must accept that Leland is the first to record the connection with the South Cadbury hillfort.

Following Leland, the antiquarian and historian William Camden (1551-1623) also called the hillfort 'Camalat' identifying the site with the Camelot of Chretien de Troyes. Camden claimed that locally it was called 'Arthur's Palace':

“....and taketh into him a rill neere which is Camalet, a steepe hill and hard to get up: on the top whereof are to bee seene expresse tokens of a decayed Castle with triple rampires of earth cast up, enclosing within it many acres of ground, and there appeare about the hill five or six ditches, so steepe that a man shall sooner slide downe than goe downe. The Inhabitants name it King Arthurs Palace.....As for Cadburie, a little towne next unto it, we may ghesse verie probably to have been that Cathbregion where King Arthur (as Ninnius writeth) defeated the English-Saxons in a memorable battell. ” [3]

Folk tales from the late 19th century said that the hill was hollow, Arthur and his knights lie sleeping inside waiting for when the country needs their help. A local person saw the gates as a boy, but they cannot be located today. A local poem calls them golden gates claiming that if you look through them on St John's Eve you can see the king in his court. A group of Victorian archaeologists visiting the hillfort were about to commence their dig when they were asked by a local man if they had come ‘to take the king away’.

The hollow hill is reminiscent of fairy lore and inevitably we find a tale of how they carried corn up from the arable side below the camp. When bells were placed in the church they went away and left gold behind. As in much fairy lore, they appear to have left the hill with the coming of iron.

Passing through South Cadbury village you come to the foot of a path leading up the hill a short distance beyond the church. This path climbs gently to a gate in a wall, and then more steeply through woods, until it emerges in the enclosure at the top. Found in the lowest rampart is a well on the left of the path as you go up into the hillfort, this is known as Arthur's Well. Sounds from this Well can be heard at Queen Anne's Wishing Well, another 200 yards further on within the ramparts. During the dark, silent hours on Midsummer or Midwinter's Night, King Arthur and his knights are said to ride throughout this land, and water their thirsty horses either here or at another well by the village church of Sutton Montis. Whether seen or not, their silver-shod hoof beats can always be heard.

Glastonbury Tor from Wearyall Hill

Below the hill there are the slightest traces of an ancient trackway running in the direction of Glastonbury. This track is known as Arthur's Lane, Arthur's Hunting Path or Causeway, said to be a lost bridle path leaving Cadbury by its west gate heading in a north westerly direction toward the Tor at Glastonbury, 11 miles distant. It is thought that this was an ancient neolithic trackway across the Somerset marshes linking Cadbury with Glastonbury.

“......between South Cadbury Castle and Glastonbury Tor to the N.E. lay a bridle path called "Arthur's Lane, which is believed to have originally been founded as a Neolithic causeway into the Glastonbury marshes.” [4]

On winter nights, the spectres of Arthur and his knights can be heard galloping past on their horses with their baying hounds running in their wake. At every full moon Arthur and his men rode round the hill to water their silver-shod horses at a nearby well:

“Folks do say that on the night of the full moon King Arthur and his men ride round the hill, and their horses are shod with silver, and a silver shoe has been found in the track where they do ride, and when they have ridden round the hill, they stop to water their horses at the Wishing Well”. [5]

Inevitably Arthur's troop riding along this lane became associated with the Wild Hunt of north European folklore. The leader of the Wild Hunt could be interchangeable between historical figures but was usually legendary such as Gwynn ap Nudd, Woden or Arthur, adopting the role of psychopomp in gathering the souls of the dead. Gwynn ap Nudd, King of the Welsh Fairy race, the Tylwyth Teg, has strong associations with Glastonbury, indeed his abode is said to be within the Tor itself, and he accompanies Arthur on the Hunt for the supernatural boar, the Twrch Trwyth as recorded in the tale of Culhwch and Olwen. Son of Nudd, the ancient British sea and river deity, known as Nodens, God of healing, who's domain abounds the nearby Severn estuary, as attested by the 4th Century Romano-British temple at Lydney Park, Gloucestershire, England. The Wild Hunt is accompanied by white, red-eared Hellhounds, known in Welsh mythology as the Cwn Annwn, and in Somerset as Gabble or Gabriel Ratchets. [6] If one was unlucky enough to witness the Wild Hunt it was thought to be an omen of ill fortune or even the death of the observer. The Hunt would kidnap any mortals in its path and take them with it to the abode of the dead.

The Starres which Agree with their Reproductions on the Ground [7]
In the 1920's Katherine Maltwood, a scholar of fine art, was commissioned to illustrate the anonymous High History of the Holy Grail, or the Perlesvaus, originally written in Old French, sometime in the early half of the 13th Century, as a continuation of Chretien DeTroyes' unfinished story of the Grail, "Le Conte du Graal, or Perceval". Some of the geographical references in this text correspond so well to the Somerset countryside that certain commentators have argued that Perlesvaus or at least its prototype must have been composed at Glastonbury; indeed a fragment of the Perlesvaus manuscript has been found at Wells Cathedral.

As Maltwood researched her material, she discovered that the adventures of the knights of the Round Table corresponded to place-names in the Vale of Avalon. Using a 1" ordnance survey map and aerial photographs taken from a height of 30,000 feet, she began to trace these on a map and figures began to reveal themselves, delineated by streams, tracks and boundaries, and before long she had discovered the twelve signs of the zodiac in their correct order. On placing a star map over the circle of zodiacal figures on the map Maltwood found the stars and their respective constellations corresponded. She called her discovery the Temple of the Stars.

A thirteenth figure, the great dog of Langport, sitting to the southwest and outside of the main circle of the zodiac, and perhaps the most convincing of all the figures, is seen as guardian to the entrance of Avalon. The nose of this great landscape canine is the mound at Burrowbridge, along the A361 road, known as Burrow Mump, or Alfred's Fort, which has all the appearance of being constructed by the hand of man out of red clay, not found locally, an island amidst the Somerset marshes at Altheney. The mump has all the appearance of being a facsimile of Glastonbury Tor, complete with ruined church to St Michael.

Maltwood wrote up her findings in Glastonbury's Temple Of The Stars and noted the observation that “Alfred's fort at Athelney and Camelot Castle at South Cadbury are both 11 miles from the Isle of Avalon”. [8] The Isle of Avalon is of course Glastonbury Tor, however, after making the observation Maltwood made no more of the connection which laid dormant until the great visionary John Michell rediscovered the St Michael Line in the late 1960's.

Burrow Mump

Michell noted that Burrow Mump was 11 miles from Glastonbury Tor, both orientated at 27 degrees north of east, to the Beltane sunrise on 1st May. Extending this alignment a further 11 miles at the same orientation he came to another St Michael site at Stoke St Michael. Then extending this line in both directions it was found to form an alignment through Avebury circle to St Margaret's on the east coast near Lowestoft and westwards from St Michael's mount and the extreme south-west point of England below Land's End. It marks the longest continuous stretch of land in southern England. The St Michael Line is marked by a host of shrines to St Michael and runs through many prehistoric sites attesting its ancientness. [9]

Michell observed that the distance between Glastonbury Tor and the summit of Cadbury Castle, is 10.909 miles or 4 Geomancer's Miles (GM). At 2.7272 English miles in length, the Geomancer's Mile is a pretty much forgotten measure rarely mentioned these days but Michell states it was once a unit of measure of prehistoric Britain. He adds that “this interval, or its multiples, was placed wherever possible between the sacred centres.” Michell notes that John Neal, a student of ancient metrology, when surveying village churches of the Taunton area, found that of the 300 or so, over 100 are situated at 1 Geomancer's mile distant from at least one other. It is no secret that many older churches were built upon the sites of prehistoric temples; the use of the Geomancer's Mile in a third of the network of Taunton village churches would appear to confirm this.

Michell states that: “Cadbury is, of course, Camelot, the site of King Arthur's Palace, once, according to legend, linked with the Tor by a tree lined causeway. Curiously enough, the distance between Glastonbury Tor and the hill of St Michael's, Burrowbridge also approximates to 4 GM.” [10] Like Maltwood before him, Michell made little more of the reciprocal distance between these ancient sites.

Studying this correlation of ancient sites in Somerset, Glastonbury based Nicholas Mann has determined that the alignment of Arthur's Hunting Path from the summit of Glastonbury Tor to Queen Anne’s Well, Cadbury is orientated toward critical points in the moon's cycle. Excavations by Leslie Alcock between 1966 and 1973 provided evidence that activity at this site started in the Neolithic to who the moon was very important with many of their earliest megalithic sites orientated to phases of the lunar cycle. [11]

Mann sates that the northernmost setting point of the moon, the Northern Major Standstill, and the southernmost rising point of the moon, the Southern Major Standstill, align with this ancient trackway. The Neolithic and the later inhabitants of Cadbury Castle would not have missed so dramatic an event as the moon setting over Glastonbury Tor, occurring only every nineteen years. At the same time, and for several months, from Glastonbury Tor they would have witnessed the moon rising from Cadbury, although the hillfort is below the horizon when viewed from the Isle of Avalon. [12]

Lunar Major Standstill
The term "lunar standstill" was apparently coined by the archaeologist Alexander Thom, in his 1971 book Megalithic Lunar Observatories. A lunar standstill being equivalent to a solar solstice when these two celestial bodies, having reached the end of their respective cyclic journeys, appear to 'standstill'. At a major lunar standstill, which takes place every 18.6 years, the range of the declination [13] of the Moon reaches a maximum. As a result, at northerly latitudes, the Moon appears to move from its highest point in the sky to lowest on the horizon in just two weeks. This time appears to have held special significance for the Neolithic people of Britain and Ireland, indeed the megalithic monument at Callanish on the Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides, Scotland, would appear to have been constructed specifically to witness the extremes of the lunar cycle, where the moon is seen to just skim the top of the tall stones for a few hours either side of midnight. During major lunar standstills at latitudes as far north as Callanish, the moon barely sets, an observation noted in Diodorus' famous text concerning the Temple of Apollo on the Isle of the Hyperborean's:

“They say also that the moon, as viewed from this island appears to be but a little distance from the earth and to have upon it prominences, like those of the earth, which are visible to the eye. The account is also given that the god visits the island every nineteen years, the period in which the return of the stars to the same place in the heavens is accomplished; and for this reason the nineteen-year period is called by the Greeks the 'year of Meton'.” - Diodorus Siculus, Library of History 2. 47. 1 - 6

Hamdon Hillfort

Noticing this lunar alignment from the summit of Cadbury to Glastonbury Tor was 11 miles, Mann found another parallel alignment 11 miles equidistant from the ruined church of St Michael on Burrow Mump to the northern tip of Hamdon Hill's neolithic fort, near Montacute. At Montacute we find another hill with all the appearance of being sculpted by the hand of man, similar to Glastonbury Tor and Burrow Mump, complete with church dedicated to St Michael. And Hamdon Hill to Cadbury Castle, is yet again 11 miles. Coincidence?

Linking Barrow Mump to the Tor, again 11 miles distant, is the St Michael Line, as stated above. Mann found that when joining the sites of Glastonbury Tor, Cadbury Castle, Hamdon Hill and Barrow Mump it formed a parallelogram, or diamond, with equidistant sides of 11 miles each, or as John Michell stated, the ancient unit of measure of 4 Geomancer's Miles each.

The parallel north west – south easterly alignments from the Tor to Cadbury Castle (Arthur's Hunting Path) and Burrow Mump to Hamdon Hill are aligned to the Major Lunar Standstills. Forming the closing sides of the diamond in the Somerset landscape, are the north east – south westerly alignments from the Tor to Burrow Mump and Cadbury Castle to Hamdon Hill are orientated on the Beltane sunrise. Mann notes that only at this latitude will these alignments form a diamond or rhombus. [14]

Mann suggests that a remnant of the Diamond's lore may have passed down in the legends of King Arthur galloping along “Arthur’s Hunting Path” or “Arthur’s Causeway” from Cadbury Castle to Glastonbury on stormy winter nights; survival of ancient moon lore of the Major Lunar Standstills when Arthur was said to ride was probably the moon set at its most northerly point in its 18.61 year cycle. The landscape diamond shows he would have continued on his way across the Bristol Channel and beyond to the Black Mountains in Wales. [15]

Further archaeological excavations by the South Cadbury Environs Project’s (SCEP) during 1992-2007, extending Leslie Alcock’s Cadbury Castle excavations sponsored by the Camelot Research Committee, uncovered some significant finds in our pursuit of Arthur at Milsoms Corner at Cadbury.

Prehistoric Burials found at Cadbury Castle
At the western flank of the hillfort of Cadbury Castle is Milsom’s Corner, a multi-period site on the slope below the south west gate. The main area occupied a slight rise, which over time, effectively became a westerly facing terrace, which has since been heavily damaged by deep ploughing. The land falls away gently to the west and north overlooking the Somerset Levels. Activity on this site commenced in the early Neolithic, attested by a linear arrangement of pits orientated towards the top of the hill. These early- and late-neolithic pits may have possessed ritual significance to Cadbury Hill’s summit, and a row of pits along the spine of the Milsom’s Corner spur has been interpreted as marking a special the way to and from the hill through mostly uncleared woodland. To the west of Cadbury, ditches arced around a small knoll and the base of the Milsom’s Corner spur to form a funnel leading into a narrow corridor for 200m before ascending through the ramparts to the south-west gate.

This was succeeded by an Early Bronze Age human burial, cut through later in the Middle Bronze Age. A cattle jaw bone found in the upper middle fills of the Milsom’s Corner spur enclosure ditch returned a date of 1380-1210 cal BC. Later in the Bronze Age, a bronze shield, already old at the time, appears to have been ceremonially deposited in the corner of the silted settlement enclosure ditch. [16]

A flexed burial in a slatted, 'boat-like' coffin, may have been covered by a barrow on a narrow spur at Milsom’s Corner which formed a natural threshold on the western approach to Cadbury hill. The 'boat-like' coffin was aligned on Glastonbury Tor, 11 miles to the north west, aligned with Arthur's Hunting Path. [17]

Neolithic boat-like coffins aligned on the Tor to ferry the dead across the water to the Isles Of Avalon, sharing the same orientation as an ancient trackway said to be travelled by Arthur at the time of the Major Northern moonset at Glastonbury; this all sounds remarkably familiar.

Is this the origin of the tale of Arthur's journey by death-barge to Avalon following the Strife of Camlann, guided by Barinthus the ferryman who knew the stars, suggestive that the event was a symbolic journey for spirits of the dead from a cemetery at Milsom’s Corner, Cadbury Castle, across the flooded Somerset levels in the direction of the northern moonset to the Otherworldly portal upon the Tor.


Copyright © 2013 Edward Watson
http://clasmerdin.blogspot.co.uk/

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Notes
1. Quoted from D. Stobie, Exploring Arthur's Britain, Collins & Brown, 1999, in Nicholas Mann, The Star Temple of Avalon, The Temple Publications, 2007
2. John Leland, Itineray, 1542.
3. William Camden, Britannia, 1607. [http://www.philological.bham.ac.uk/cambrit/]
4. Helen Hill, The Realms of Arthur, 1970.
5. E K Chanbers, Arthur of Britain, Sidgwick and Jackson, 1927
6. The name Gabble or Gabriel Ratchets, an old word for a type of hound, was first recorded around 1665 and referred to a strange yelping sound heard in the sky at night, supposedly a death omen. Jennifer Westwood, Albion. A Guide to Legendary Britain. Grafton Books, 1985.
7. Dr John Dee, Astrologer to Elizabeth I, 1583. Following the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the Mystic and Alchemist John Dee along with his companion, fellow Alchemist and Psychic Edward Kelly, came to the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey, around the year 1583, to see if anything could be salvaged. An ‘alchemical manuscript’ which Kelly claimed to have discovered somewhere previously in the ‘Vale of Avalon’ near Glastonbury was said to refer to ten specific locations in England where buried treasure was hidden. Dee was more interested in the discovery of ‘Merlin’s Secret’, said to be found in the unusual arrangements of the prehistoric earthworks in Vale of Avalon. Dee mapped out these earthworks and determined they represented the signs of the zodiac and other constellations. In the margin of this map he wrote the quoted words “The Starres which Agree with their Reproductions on the Ground......” However, Dee’s apparent 16th century discovery of the Glastonbury Zodiac lies solely in the story of Dee's biographer Richard Deacon who went to the Warburg Institute where Dee’s papers were stored. On examining them, Deacon claimed to have found this map with Dee’s zodiac quotation in the margin. Deacon copied it down but the next time he went to see these documents, Dee's map of the zodiac could not be found. Yuri Leitch, John Dee and the pre-Maltwood Enigma.
8. Katherine Maltwood, A Guide to Glastonbury's Temple Of The Stars, James Clarke & Co., 1964, first published 1929.
9. John Michell, The View Over Atlantis, Garnstone Press, Revised Edition 1972, p.66.
10. Ibid., p.155
11. Nicholas Mann, Glastonbury Tor, Triskele, 1986.
12. The Metonic Cyle of 18.61 years is a period of 235 lunar months, at the end of which the phases of the moon repeat in exactly the same order and on the same days as the preceding cycle.
13. In astronomy, declination is one of the two coordinates of the equatorial coordinate system, the other being either right ascension or hour angle. Declination in astronomy is comparable to geographic latitude, but projected onto the celestial sphere. Declination is measured in degrees north and south of the celestial equator. Points north of the celestial equator have positive declinations, while those to the south have negative declinations.
14. Nicholas Mann, The Isle of Avalon, Green Magic, 2001, pp. 77-81.
15. Nicholas Mann, Energy Secrets of Glastonbury Tor, Green Magic, 2004, pp. 91-97.
16. South Cadbury Environs Project’s (SCEP) – Appendix 3.
17. Richard Tabor, Cadbury Castle: focusing the landscape.

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Camelot Abandoned

Why was South Cadbury Hillfort deserted

Camelot
The remains of a large ancient hillfort can be found on a steep, isolated hill of limestone and sandstone at South Cadbury, in Somerset. Known as Cadbury Castle, the hillfort is 500 feet above sea-level, the summit providing panoramic views across central Somerset, including the Tor at Glastonbury some 11 miles distant to the North West. The hillfort has a massive four line defence of bank-and-ditch enclosing a defended area of l8 acres, rising to a long, level central plateau. A break in the ditches at the south-west above the village of Sutton Montis indicates the original gateway. This vast Iron Age hillfort was completely refortified in the Arthurian period, c.500 AD, which has led to claims that it is the site of King Arthur's court at Camelot.

Such a prominent site no doubt was the stronghold of a powerful Dark Age warlord but medieval British sources made- no mention of Camelot; writing in the early 12th century Geoffrey of Monmouth placed King Arthur's court at Caerleon in South East Wales and fails to mention Camelot at all. Similarly, the Welsh Triads do not mention Camelot but place Arthur's court at Celliwig, Cornwall. Indeed, Camelot is first mentioned by the French poet Chretien de Troyes in the romance called Lancelot, or the Knight of the Cart, written in the late 12th century.

Camelot appears to have been a product of medieval French Arthurian romance, but the French authors always placed the location of Arthur's court in Britain. In 1469 Sir Thomas Malory completed "Le Morte d'Arthur" while in London's Newgate Prison. Malory's work is the definitive English Arthurian romance and brings together many earlier French and Welsh tradtitions. Malory placed Camelot at Winchester were today the Round Table can be seen hanging in the Grand Hall. Malory's opus was printed by William Caxton in 1485 who named the work after the last book Morte Darthur although Mallory had originally named it "The Whole Book of King Arthur and His Noble Knights of the Round Table". In his preface Caxton placed Arthur's court in Wales, seemingly following Geoffrey of Monmouth and disagreeing with Malory:

“And yet of record remayne in wytnesse of hym in wales in the toune of Camelot the grete stones & meruayllous werkys of yron lyeng vnder the grounde”.

There is some speculation that Camelot was derived from the Romano-British word 'Camelodunum'. However, the name 'Cadbury' is generally considered to be an Anglo-Brythonic hybrid from the Welsh “cad” = battle + English “bury” = fortification, stronghold = 'Battle-Fort'. Others have suggested a derivation from the personal name Cado, a Dumnonian King, recorded as having a stronghold at Din-Draithou (Dunster), in which case Cadbury could simply mean “Cado's fort”.

Arthur features in several 'Saints Lives' in which he is often at odds with the holy men, often depicted as somewhat of a petty tyrant, in a similar vein to the Arthur of the Welsh Triads which seem to be based on a tradition independent of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae. In one such account Cado (Cadwy) features along with Arthur in a well known incident in the Life of Saint Carannog (Vita Carantoci), an early 6th century West Country Abbot, who is credited with founding Llangrannog, Ceredigion, Wales and credited with establishing St Carantoc's Church at Crantock, Cornwall. The Vita, composed in the early 12th century in Cemis, Pembrokeshire, tells how Carannog arrives in Arthur's realm in search of a marvellous altar which he set adrift in order to see where he should go and preach. On arriving at the banks of the River Willett he meets both Cadwy and Arthur. Arthur promises to help the saint if he will render harmless a serpent that is devastating his lands. Carannog succeeds with prayer were Arthur has failed with force. Arthur then presents him with the altar that he had tried to use as a table but everything he put on it was thrown off at once.

In his notes on the county of Somerset in 1542, John Leland, Antiquarian to King Henry VIII, relates a tradition equating Arthur's court at Camelot with the ancient hillfort of Cadbury Castle. The term "Camallate" was used by Leland, thus identifying "South Cadbyri" as Camelot:

"At the very south end of the church of South-Cadbyri standeth Camallate, sometime a famous town or castle. . .The people can tell nothing there but that they have heard Arthur much resorted to Camalat."

Not far away from the Cadbury site are the old villages of Queen Camel and West Camel which some believe influenced Leland when making reference to 'Camallate'. And of course we find the River Camel in Cornwall, where Geoffrey located Camlann.

Camelot - Cadbury
First inhabited in the Early Neolithic before 3000 BC and again in the Late Neolithic around 2000 BC, characteristic finds of flints and pottery but no evidence of any structures from this early period were uncovered. There followed a long period of abandonment with no indications of activity until the 8th or 7th century BC. By the 5th century BC, the community had expanded to to the status of a large village fortified with a rampart and ditch at the head of the steepest slope. By the time of the Roman conquest the defensive earthworks had increased to four massive banks and ditches, the top rampart some thirty feet high, containing a shrine and an armourer's workshop complete with domestic buildings. From the archaeological evidence it seems the ramparts were not stormed by the Romans at the time of the invasion in 43 AD but survived until c.70 AD when the inhabitants were slaughtered and the defences partially dismantled. [1]


Deep plough soil on the fourth rampart has been interpreted as indications of cultivation for the first two centuries of Roman rule. In the late 3rd and early 4th centuries renewed activity was marked by finds of pottery and coins, the latest of which being from the reign of Honorius dated 393 – 402 AD, indicating activity into the early 5th century. Within the rampart enclosure the site of a possible Romano-British temple was identified, prompting speculation that it was a site of pilgrimage. Occupation recommenced in around 470 AD as evidenced by class A, B and D pottery sherds. [2] This pottery was of a type also found at Tintagel, indicating that someone of high status who could import luxury goods had resided there. This led to the formation of the Camelot Research Committee, co-founded by Geoffrey Ashe and C A Ralegh Radford, which carried out large-scale excavations of South Cadbury hillfort in 1966 - 70 under the direction of Leslie Alcock.

In 1967 the excavations soon revealed that the fort had indeed been re-fortified in post-Roman times, the classic Arthurian period. Alcock found evidence for a wall which had been built in the 500's AD and the ramparts were strengthened with large quantities of dressed masonry from derelict Roman buildings and mounted by raised wooden walkways. The remains of a large timber feasting hall, 63 feet by 34, were discovered at the centre of the site, set in a commanding position on the high part of the plateau called 'Arthur's Palace'. It has been dated to the 5th/6th centuries from pottery finds. [3]

The remains of a massive gatehouse dating from the same period was found at the south-west entrance. Trenches through the bank revealed a cross-section with layers one above another showing how the rampart had been rebuilt at various times throughout the centuries. During the Arthurian period it had been substantially rebuilt; at the top of the earthwork was a dry stone wall 16 feet thick. Holes indicated where ancient timber posts had rotted marked where massive posts had upheld a breastwork on the outside, protecting sentries on the wall. Wooden beams had run across this binding the structure together and supporting a platform, and probably wooden watch towers.

A silver Germanic ring was uncovered indicating the defensive earthworks were repaired around 550 AD. The gate was refortified around this time, possibly in response to westward aggression of Wessex who was pushing its borders further into Somerset as part of a general wave of expansionist activity by the English kingdom from the mid sixth century onwards. [4]

The Anglo Saxon Chronicle records English advances in the area:

577. This year Cuthwin and Ceawlin fought with the Britons, and slew three kings, Commail, and Condida, and Farinmail, on the spot that is called Derham, and took from them three cities, Gloucester, Cirencester, and Bath.

The hill fort at South Cadbury was then abandoned and appears to have gone out of use in the early 7th century. Alcock asserts that occupation had come to an end before 600 AD. Why?

The Wasteland
Was the hillfort stormed by advancing Anglo-Saxons? There is no archaeological evidence that shows there was any destruction or an invasion at the site of South Cadbury at the beginning of the 6th century – it simply seems to have gone out of use. This assumption is based on archaeological evidence (or lack of); the absence of the imported class E pottery ware.

We have noted above the presence of class A and B pottery ware. Class A dates to between 400-500 AD and included bowls ‘with a cross or other motif’ whilst class B pottery ware dates to between 500-600 AD and comprised of amphorae which held both oil and wine. Both A and B pottery consists of both native and imported pottery from the eastern Mediterranean.

Class E pottery ware is dated between 600-700 AD and consists of native grass-marked ware and imported grey-ware originating from the Rhineland. Tintagel and Congresbury display the same pottery ware pattern as South Cadbury; absence of Class E. Tintagel has well known Arthurian associations and no doubt trade links with Cadbury. This absence of Class E pottery ware indicates that Tintagel was probably deserted the same time as Cadbury.

The evidence indicates that Tintagel lost its economic supremacy in south-west Britain and consequently disappeared from the archaeological record until the 12th century. This is due in part to changing trade patterns possibly as a result of political changes in the Mediterranean area at the time. Consequently, communities reliant on Tintagel for trade, namely, but not only, Cadbury Castle and Congresbury, effectively vanished at the same time. Imports increased along the south eastern coast, and merchants may have found these areas provided better trade than the western peoples, whose main exchange seems to have shifted to the Bristol region. [5]

A recent article by Sue Carter [6] suggests the reason was famine. Carter states that the Catholic Encyclopaedia records an entry under the information relating to St. John the Almsgiver, 550-616 AD, indicating there was a shortage of wheat in Britain. In addition, Carter cites how “the 5th century was a century of woes – raiding, wars, plagues, peasant revolts”, contributing to a fall in population, especially male. The cessation of imported goods and the result of local crop failure would be disastrous for a population of people with no centralised authority. Carter continues that research into the Somerset Levels area has shown that “a growth of raised deposits ceased after a change in the climate and a reduction in the annual rainfall in about 400AD.”

Carter concludes that “Famine may be plausible and would certainly explain the abandonment of a site, or several, where no military action or raiding is visible in the archaeological record. It certainly would explain why people just moved away from an area and left no trace.”

Climate Change
Michael E Jones pioneered the theory that abrupt climate change played a major role in ending Roman rule in the 5th century, using various evidence, such as pollen records, peat layers and tree rings, to support his idea that Britain’s climate suddenly got cooler and wetter around 450.
Jones proposes that around 400 AD, the weather in Britain became wetter and colder, a deterioration that intensified after 450 AD. He suggests that by the late Roman period, there may have been as much as a 10% increase in rainfall. Together with deforestation and expanded agriculture and grazing, the heavier rains would have caused flooding and aggravated soil erosion, leaching it of its nutrients and fertility. Annual average temperature also dropped during this time, perhaps as much as 2.5 degrees F (1.5° C), which would have lowered the elevation at which grains could grow by 650 feet and shortened the growing season by almost one whole month.

Although the literary evidence is meagre, we do find references in some Dark Age sources such as the Annales Cambriae which record plague at this time probably as a result of the deteriorating conditions:

537 - The battle of Camlann, in which Arthur and Medraut fell: and there was plague in Britain and Ireland.

547 - The great death [plague] in which Maelgwn, king of Gwynedd died. Thus they say 'The long sleep of Maelgwn in the court of Rhos'. Then was the yellow plague.

Certainly, this is the impression conveyed by Gildas, who records an oral tradition of invasion, famine, plague and a break down in society during the mid 5th century. The result was human disaster leaving the Britons vulnerable; "an environmental crisis," Jones adds, "Less grain could be grown. Famine struck, the Romans left and the Saxons invaded." [7]

The Catastrophe that Preceded the Dark Ages
What could have caused such a drastic change in climate? According to Professor Mike Baillie of Queen's University in Belfast, something catastrophic occurred on Earth 1,500 years ago that may have led to the Dark Ages and coincided with the end of the Roman Empire and the death of King Arthur. Baillie suggests it could have been a bombardment of cometary debris or the eruption of a super volcano, but whatever it was, evidence can be found in the chronology of tree rings from around the world. This global environmental event occurred around 540 AD and recorded in the tree ring chronologies which date back thousands of years, and indicate something quite extraordinary occurred around the time of King Arthur's death, the end of the Roman Empire and the beginning of the Dark Ages.

An important part of the Arthurian Mythos is the Grail legend which contains the concept of a wasteland where no crops grow and the land is infertile; something which certainly could be explained by an environmental catastrophe. Significantly, continental Grail romances always set their story in Britain. The cometary impacts or volcanic eruptions filled the atmosphere with dust and debris; a long winter began. Crops failed, and there was famine. The death of Arthur is commonly dated to this time, right in the middle of this environmental catastrophe. [8]

Was this Camelot?
For whatever reason, South Cadbury hillfort was deserted, but it is the Arthurian period occupation of the late 5th century that attracted the most interest at the time of Alcock's excavations and to this day South Cadbury hillfort retains its association with Arthur. Alcock himself was rather suspect of the Arthurian associations of the site and he was accused of encouraging publicity that the site was the military base of an ‘Arthur-like’ Dark Age warlord, a dux bellorum, which the popular press quickly proclaimed as the historical Arthur.

Scholars such as David Dumville must have been pulling their hair out when Alcock's book “Arthur's Britain” was published in 1971 acknowledging that someone must have done the things credited to Arthur at the time of 5th century occupation of South Cadbury hillfort; Alcock therefore considered he was justified in labelling the period ‘Arthurian’. Other historians joined rank with Alcock, such as John Morris who published his reconstructed history of sub-Roman Britain, titled “The Age of Arthur”, in 1973 prompting Dumville's scathing literary outburst demanding Arthur be removed from our history books. [9]

However, although not well received by archaeologists and historians, these books made a large impact on a more popular readership, capturing the public's imagination. Alcock’s excavations had uncovered a new type of late 5th century site; the heavily fortified British hall. It was soon discovered that the fortified Dark Age hall, was not unique to South Cadbury as there were many more similar fortified halls at other Dark Age hillforts in Britain. This is symbolic of the Arthurian period more than anything else; a battle leader co-ordinating British resistance against advancing barbarians. Alcock had confirmed the Arthurian period did actually exist.

Copyright © 2011 Edward Watson

http://clasmerdin.blogspot.co.uk/


See: Arthur's Hunting Path, a Neolithic trackway from Cadbury to Glastonbury Tor.

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Notes:
1. Leslie Alcock, Arthur's Britain, Penguin, 1989, (1st edition 1971).
2. Charles Thomas, Imported Pottery in Dark-Age Western Britain.
Although perhaps a little dated now and written before Alcock's excavations at South Cadbury this classification generally holds good although there have been revisions to the chronology;
Class A comprises table-wares in the late Roman tradition,
Class B, amphorae and lagenae, containers for wine and oil.
Class D, sub-Roman ware. Alcock favoured a Bristol-Channel origin.
Class E, of distinct, late-Roman, appearance, source in north-eastern France, from a common source between the Somme and the Rhine, perhaps just inside the area usually known as the Rhineland.
Classes A and B were of a east Mediterranean type, wheel made wares introduced late within the 5th century, continued in use to 6th century. It is hard to show any clear case of their importation in the 7th century.
Class A,B and D pottery ware came in to Britain through western trade routes, whereas Class E came in from the East, possibly shipped by Frisian merchants.
3. Leslie Alcock, By South Cadbury, is that Camelot? Excavations at Cadbury Castle 1966-70. Thames and Hudson, 1972.
4. Geoffrey Ashe & Leslie Alcock, Cadbury: Is that Camelot? in The Quest for Arthur's Britain ed. Geoffrey Ashe, 1968.
5. Charles Thomas, Op. Cit.
Class A and B was imported directly by sea from the Byzantine world through the Straits of Gibraltar. Alcock has proposed that the Vandal control of the western Mediterranean entrance at the Straits of Gibraltar, in the mid 5th century might be thought to have interrupted, if not disrupted entirely, such a trade. However, as Charles Thomas states, there appears to be no evidence to support this. Thomas adds that the end of the 6th century is indicated by archaeology, which historically, represents the collapse of the Justinian attempt to reconquer the western empire. The merchant ships which had made the long and hazardous voyage with wine and oil from Byzantium to the distant northern islands simply ceased to find it worth-while.
6. Sue Carter, Did Famine Destroy ‘Camelot’? HeritageDaily - Heritage & Archaeology News- 2011.
7. Michael E. Jones, The End of Roman Britain, 1996.
8. Mike Baillie , Exodus to Arthur; Catastrophic Encounters with Comets, Batsford, 2000.
9. D. Dumville, Sub-Roman Britain: History and Legend, History #62, 1977.

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