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The story of the historical King Arthur began approximately fourteen centuries ago. He is said to have lived 500 A.D., or a little earlier, and is thought to have been a leader of the Britons in their battles against the invading Anglo-Saxons. He was evidently so wise a leader and performed so many deeds of valor that he became a hero to his countrymen for all time. Many wonderful legends have grown up to add to the luster of his memory, and he has been credited with possessing all manner of supernatural powers. A chronicler describes him as "one of Love's lovers," and says that "his famous deeds are right fit to be kept in remembrance."
During the eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth and fourteenth centuries the Arthurian legends attained the height of their popularity. Minstrels and troubadours carried the fame of Arthur over all of Europe, celebrating his glorious deeds in song. Historians told of them in prose and poets in verse, while artists adorned the halls, tapestries and stained glass windows of many castles with scenes depicting the marvelous exploits of King Arthur and his knights. There were many who believed that Arthur had never died but had become a sort of guardian angel for his people, watching over them from his home in the fairy Isle of Avalon, and that in times of acute crisis he would return to lead England to victory.
It was about 1136 that the Arthurian legends began to assume tangible literary form. At this time Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote his History of the Kings of Britain, in which some of Arthur's heroic deeds are described.
In the interim 1175 to 1205, Layamon, a priest of Worcestershire, gave the first presentation in the English language of the Arthurian story. This was written in verse, wherein Arthur says: "I will fare to Avalon, to· the fairest of all maidens, to Argante the Queen, an elf most fair, and she shall make my wounds all sound — make me all whole with healing draughts. And afterwards I will come again to my kingdom and dwell with the Britons with mickle joy."
Perhaps the supreme masterpiece dealing with the legends of Arthur is that which was written by Sir Thomas Malory in his famous Morte d' Arthur. Here we find chivalry and romance portrayed at its highest and best, with background of feudal grandeur.
Malory wrote his great work while he was in prison during the War of the Roses (1455-1486). It achieved an enormous popular ity and revived throughout the English-speaking world a vivid interest in the life of Arthur, his kingly deeds and the deeds of his noble knights.
In the year that Malory's book was published, added interest was imparted to the subject by reason of the announcement of England's new king, Henry VII of the house of Tudor, that he himself had descended from King Arthur, and that in his son, whom he named Arthur, Merlin's prophecy had come true — Arthur had returned.
The Round Table, which at present adorns the wall in Winchester Castle, was decorated as we see it today on the occasion of the birth of Prince Arthur, and in his honor. However, the origins and first usage of the Round Table lie far in the historic past, when "Round Tables" and court circles of thirteen were numerous and represented the established traditions, both religious and civil, of the country before the days of Christianity and before there were any Christian kings.
In the sixteenth century, during the reign of Elizabeth I, Arthurian pageantry was one of the most popular forms of entertainment at Court. Many of the famous writers of the time introduced characters from the Arthurian Fantasies into their works, as, for example, Edmund Spencer in his Faerie Queen. The first Arthurian play in English, Thomas Hughes' Misfortunes of Arthur, was presented before the Queen in 1588.
By this time, however, a heavy pall of materialism was descending upon the world-a materialism that endeavored to substitute "reason and common sense" for the chivalry and romance of King Arthur's Court. These beautiful legends were gradually cast aside by the mass mind. Their supernatural aspects were relegated to the category of "old wives' tales." Only in the minds and hearts of mystic poets and artists they lingered on like some half-forgotten dream.
It was due largely to Lord Tennyson, England's poet laureate under Queen Victoria, that the nineteenth century saw a renaissance of the Arthurian tales. Tennyson was deeply inspired by Malory's Morte d' Arthur, and upon its themes he based his great mystical and philosophical epic, Idylls of the King. This work was published in 1842 and was unprecedentedly popular in all English-speaking countries, as exemplified especially in the United States where by 1890 these poems were taught in all public schools, and where also the aristocratic ruling families of the South actually endeavored to make chivalry a way of life. Sir Walter Scott's novels of medieval chivalry furnished the prose accompaniment to the poetic passion of idealism which swept England and America with Tennyson's poetic epic; while on the continent Richard Wagner brought forth his astonishing and revolutionary music-dramas based on similar medieval themes.
In the twentieth century the Arthurian and Grail poems have again suffered a relapse from popularity, except, as before, among dedicated mystics for whom their charm has been perennial. We have not seen the end of the Holy Grail, nor of its avowed servitors. Although these stories and poems are couched in the words and customs of the West, a whole new audience awaits them in the Orient. Indian scholars and mythographers say that the story of the Last Supper and the search for the Grail has many parallels in Indian legend, most of which arose from historic episodes or from the religious beliefs and rites of the people; but which also include a distinct branch of literature arising from Western sources by way of Christians who fled from persecution in the west and found sanctuary in India. The "Thomas Christians" of the Malabar coast are among these.
Indian scholars point out that the general framework of the Holy Grail legend always postulates the existence of a magic cup or other talisman and a land which is suffering famine and dearth by reason of the sin or weakness of the king, who is in reality the embodiment of a nature god. When the nature god was sick, nature was sick also, the crops suffered, famine struck the land, the people sickened and died. Then a folk hero seeks for the magic talisman to restore the king's health and with it the prosperity of land and people. One usually finds that there is a magic drink of some kind, because water is necessary to restore a parched land, and it is not unusual to find that it is a heroine rather than a hero who is called to the Quest.
The omnipresence of the Grail motif in all civilizations, and as far back as there is any record, attests to its universal significance and promises the world-wide restoration of the Grail Mystery, probably in some not far-distant day.
It is to be understood that in one sense the true Grail is the epic or legend itself and that the magic which it holds is the Esoteric Doctrine of the people to whom the legends are conveyed. That some international poet will one day write a story of the Buddha, showing him as setting out in quest of the Grail and attaining it under the Bodhi-tree, as Galahad finds his Tree of Paradise in Sarras, is, indeed, inevitable. There are seven Schools of the Lesser Mysteries, and each of these Schools must of necessity have its own "Cup" (instruction) which confers the magic powers of Illumination and Initiation. Why recast the Esoteric Doctrine into new forms of poetry? Why is not the ancient prose sufficient, one might ask. It must be realized that the most perfect instruction deserves the most perfect art form that can convey or communi cate it to others; as the perfect jewel deserves the perfect setting which only a master craftsman is able to create.
The Arthurian legend continued that after the grievous wound which Arthur received at the hands of Modred, the evil and traitorous knight, he was taken to an old church wherein hung a broken cross, and that there he died at midnight and was buried in the little churchyard by his few faithful followers. Another legend relates that he was rescued by the Three Beautiful Queens and carried away to the fairy Isle of Avalon, where he still lives and rules, awaiting the time when he can return to serve again upon the earth. The two legends are complementary: the one relates to the body, the other to the soul of the great King.
The ruined church and broken cross symbolize the fact that the Church has discarded and forgotten the high initiatory teachings which formed the cornerstone of Christianity in the first three hundred years after Christ.
After the building in England of Glastonbury Abbey, some of the priests who ministered there declared that it had been their high privilege to receive the disinterred bodies of both King Arthur and his beautiful Queen Guinevere, and that these had been buried under the High Altar in the church. The Queen, however, was not laid at the side of the King as his equal. She had been placed at the feet of the King, for she had wounded him sorely in life.
Tradition preserved the memory of the place of Arthur's interment within the Abbey, as we are told by Giraldus Cambrensis, who was present when the grave was opened by command of Henry II about the year 1150, and saw the bones and sword of the monarch, and a leaden cross set into his tombstone upon which was the inscription in rude Roman letters: "Here lies buried the famous King Arthur, in the island Avalonis."
— Corinne Heline
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