Taking a new perspective, Andrew Beattie looks at the castles, forts
and abbeys that lay claim to be connected to King Arthur and his
'Camelot'.
The story of King Arthur is one of the best known in English history: he
was the boy who was schooled by Merlin and who claimed his right to lead
the Britons against the Saxons by drawing a sword from a stone; later,
he was the warrior who congregated with his knights around a Round Table
and who was given a magical sword, Excalibur, by the Lady of the Lake.
These stories have been told and re-told hundreds of times - and over
the centuries the actual figure of Arthur has retreated into obscurity,
with many scholars suggesting that he was a mythical figure who never
actually existed. Arthur has been the subject of thousands of books; yet
this one tells his story in a way that is wholly new - through the
places where the events surrounding his life supposedly unfolded.
From Tintagel Castle in Cornwall, Arthur's reputed place of birth, to
Slaughterbridge in the same county, one of the contenders for the
location of his final battle against the Saxons, and from Cadbury Castle
in Somerset, one of the numerous claimants to be the site of Arthur's
fort of Camelot, to Glastonbury, where in 1191 his grave was reputedly
discovered by local monks, the trail through some of England's most
historic places throws a whole new light on this most compelling of
legends.
