Arthur, the Once & Future King of Britain, Rules On Screen In These Adaptations

You can barely move in Britain without encountering a site or natural feature connected with Arthur or named after him. Mystical elements, which include the belief that Arthur is sleeping, ready to be woken if Britain is once again in great need, doubtless gave comfort for centuries during times of war and hardship. His story is one that we never tire of, yet we know so little about him and his times. With The Winter King, starring Iain de Caestecker and based on Bernard Cornwell’s Arthurian trilogy, making its debut on MGM+ on August 20, 2023, let's talk about the once and future monarch.

Britain was abandoned by its Roman occupiers in 410 CE, leaving the island open to invaders from modern Germany and Denmark (Saxons and Jutes). Arthur seems to have been a warlord with extraordinary skill in uniting the disparate peoples of what had been Roman Britain, and using what infrastructure remained (forts, roads, cities). The invaders were probably looking for fresh farmland and the raids may have been family affairs with the wives and kids coming along for the pillage. No one wore horned helmets. And no, we don’t call it the Dark Ages, even though there is very little surviving documentation.

Y Goddodin, a Welsh poem honoring the dead of a battle in northern England ca. 600 CE survives as a 13th-century manuscript but the text almost certainly dates from much earlier. It has the first mention of Arthur, to whom one of the fallen warriors is compared: