Christopher Hibbert, MC, FRSL, FRGS (5 March 1924 - 21 December 2008) was an English writer, historian and biographer. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and the author of many books, including Disraeli, Edward VII, George IV, The Rise and Fall of the House of Medici, and Cavaliers and Roundheads.
Described by Professor Sir John Plumb as "a writer of the highest ability and in the New Statesman as "a pearl of biographers," he established himself as a leading popular historian/biographer whose works reflected meticulous scholarship.
I have just finished reading ‘Buried’ by Alice Roberts and she says ‘Nearing the end of their dig on Tintagel, the archaeologists found themselves lifting a large slab that had formed a window sill, only to discover that the underside bore inscriptions. Nothing like ‘Arthur was here’, unfortunately (and highly improbably, given it’s likely that King Arthur didn’t exist – sorry!),…’
Arthur didn’t exist? My word. Whatever next? Let’s see what this book has to say about that. He first looks at when Arthur is first mentioned in any texts. Apparently, it was Geoffrey of Monmouth’s book, Historia Regum Britanniae, that created the Arthurian legend even though Arthur is mentioned in some texts before then. The legend of King Arthur did not just stay in Britain. It ‘spread across Europe and into parts of Asia’.
The tales are quite something. Is it fact or Fiction or somewhere in-between? Hibbert relates a lot of history where a real Arthur could well fit in. Being born around 475 from Roman descent (Artorius – his Roman name) he became a leader slaying the Saxons. In later texts he would be referred to as King.
Ultimately, it is an interesting theory. It is up to you whether you believe it is true or not.
Summary: King Arthur and the myth of Camelot have fascinated generations and continues to capture the imagination of Britons as their once and future king. Hibbert's book both narrates the fiction and delineates what may be known of the historical Arthur.
King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, Guinevere, Excalibur, Lancelot and more have captivated the imaginations of generations of readers of Malory's le Morte d'Arthur and T. H. White's Once and Future King. Indeed, many Britons look for the second coming of Arthur when the sceptered isle faces its greatest need.
Christopher Hibbert seeks to untangle the truth from the legends in this short history of Arthur and Arthurian studies. He begins with the various historical accounts of Arthur in chapter 1 and then proceeds to a summary of Malory's narrative of Arthur's life in chapter 2. Chapter 3 touches on the Grail Quest, added by Chrètian de Troyes in the twelfth century. Chapter 4 situates Arthur in the fifth century AD amidst the conflicts between Saxons and Britons. Chapter 5 explores the accounts suggesting that Arthur arose as a military commander leading the Britons against their Saxon enemies. Then chapter 6 focuses on the search for "Camelot" and considers the archaeological evidence found in Glastonbury at South Cadbury Castle.
Chapter 7 sums up what seem to be the "best guesses". Hibbert plainly believes in the real existence of an Arthur, born around 475 AD, who became a military leader under King Ambrosius, uniting surrounding kingdoms under his leadership and winning a decisive victory at Mount Badon, near the Wansdyke, in 516. The victory ushers in a fifty year peace, broken only by civil war between him and his illegitimate son Mordred, leading to his burial in Avalon. Chapters 7 and 8 also explore the various literary treatments of Arthur from Tennyson to T. H. White.
While there are expensive hardbound versions, it appears this is primarily available in electronic format. A feature exploited to a greater degree than most e-books I have read is links to numerous Wikipedia articles throughout the work that provides helpful background on various figures, places, and other subjects.
I have to admit to finding the organization of this book a bit confusing, and in the end, I fail to find myself convinced that Arthur was more than legend, while yet appreciating the power of this legend, with swords in stone, Excalibur claimed from an upraised hand in a lake, the affair of Lancelot and Guinevere, and the tragedy of war between father and son. It seems that there are all the elements of Greek tragedy, of both nobility and hubris, of high aspiration and human fallibility. One understands how the Arthurian legend, as well as a Broadway musical, could captivate the imagination of the "best and the brightest" of the Kennedy administration that fostered its own "Camelot myth." It makes me wonder at times whether there is something deep inside us longing for the reign of "the once and future king."
Not really very good. All the same information is available elsewhere, and has been improved upon since this was initially published. Very much of the "Arthur was a real historical king so let's disregard everything that has been written about him since as unimportant", which doesn't fly with me, obviously.
The first one-third of the book is a simple retelling of the Arthurian legend. I found that helpful not having read the stories in a long time. The remainder of the book attempts to demonstrate why these legends are based on fact. That part of the book I didn’t find very compelling.
Christopher Hibbert was a respectable popular historian but this Book isn’t up to a very good level.
Un buen libro si se quiere iniciar en información básica del Rey Arturo como yo lo estoy haciendo. Mi proyecto es leer y recopilar información y este es un bueno inicio, tanto como se plantea las diferentes versiones que los monjes dejaron redactadas en pergaminos y libros, así como sitios arqueológicos básicos y un poco de la influencia de la leyenda en el arte y la música.
It’s a pleasantly written and interesting account of the story of King Arthur, his knights and their adventures linked with the actual history of Britain in the period from the end of Roman rule to the middle of the next century. He traces how the legend emerged, the adaptations throughout the years and the place of Arthur in the British folk memory. It’s dated but still worth reading.
I liked several chapters in this book—which provided some evidence for the existence of Arthur and gave reasonable biographical information about him. But frankly I was bored by parts of other chapters, which detailed later legendary books about him. Less about the legends and more about the history of the times in which he lived—as well as more on archeological findings—would have improved the book, in my opinion.
So, basically, it seems Arthur lived around Cornwall in the southwest of England in the early 6th century. He was born into a wealthy family and probably had a Roman name, Artorius. He led the Britons against the Angles, Saxons, Jutes, and perhaps the Picts, using cavalry prominently (as did the Romans). He also invoked Catholicism while seizing supplies from monasteries. He was killed later during a civil war, along with a son, Mordred, who contested him for power.
Hibbert also explores the evidence to support the existence of Merlin (probably a combination of Myrddin Wyllt and Ambrosiius Aurelianus), Guinevere (Arthur seemed to have married three different women with that name!), and Lancelot (perhaps inspired by a Celtic legend).
Overall, it was a worthwhile read, but left me wanting more.
This was a short book about King Arthur that I purchased at a used bookshop for a dollar. First published over 50 years ago, it's probably not entirely up-to-date regarding Arthur scholarship, which as a field is admittedly less dynamic that astrophysics or machine learning, but nevertheless must have had its share of discoveries in the intervening decades.
A while back I listened to a course on King Arthur from the Teaching Company, and I thought it was going to be fascinating but it wasn't my thing. I always think I'm going to enjoy the legends of King Arthur simply because I loved The Sword In The Stone as a child. I read Chrétien de Troyes and Steinbeck's translation and they were okay but I don't remember too much. I attempted The Once and Future King but gave up after one interminable chapter after another where the young Arthur transmutes into a fish or a hawk.
The thing that surprised me about the Arthur legends when I began to read them is that there is no canonical version. It's not Star Wars. It's more like the Marvel Universe with continual reboots, different actors, new characters and plotlines and themes added along the way. The earliest Arthur legends made no mention of Merlin, for instance. I find this lack of consistency frustrating. It makes Arthur more like a folk tale than a literary protagonist.
The early Arthur stories were heavy on the gore. European literature was at a primitive stage. Niceties such as character development were still in their infancy, superseded by endless battle scenes. This was the golden age for graphic depictions of spearing and beheadings and enemies cleaved from skull to navel by a broadsword. It's mechanical and repetitive: perfect for an audience of 10th-century warriors or 21st-century eight-year-old boys.
Later Arthur stories focus on chivalry, emphasizing Arthur as a figure of justice and nobility. Also there's a lot of dragon questing and the wooing of pretty ladies, including Arthur's wife Guenevere who gets wooed hard by Lancelot.
This book recounts the evolution of the Arthur legend, retells the highlights such as the sword in the stone and the round table and strange ladies lying in ponds distributing swords, which is admittedly no basis for a system of government.
But most of the book is concerned with the historicity of Arthur. Was he real? If so, who was he?
The author of this book is convinced that Arthur was a real person, born around 475 in the English Christian kingdom of Ambrosius, one of the last outposts of Roman culture as the isle of Britain succumbed to Saxon invasion. Arthur himself may have been the child of Roman nobles. Anyway, the theory goes, Arthur formed an army, (temporarily) defeated the Saxon horde, attained overlordship of other British tribes, and went down in history as a brilliant warrior king.
The only problem with this theory is there is absolutely zero contemporary evidence for it. However, there's very little contemporary evidence for much of anything in this period of British history. With the decline of Roman civilization and Christianity went literacy, and records are sparse for the entire era from 500 AD to 1000. So the fact that the earliest mention of Arthur comes hundreds of years after he supposedly lived doesn't necessarily disprove his existence. The stories that came later were, of course, complete fabrications. Even the dragons, probably.
Overall, short and informative book, but honestly it reads like an extended Wikipedia article. Like, if you were to actually read the Wikipedia entry on King Arthur you will learn everything this book has to tell you in less time.
I got this in a second hand book store - it had been a present for (or from?!) an unnamed Granny for Birthday + Christmas in 2007. However, I hadn't realised it was originally written back in 1969 - a short almost pamphlet of a book at a time when archaeology at Cadbury Hill was fresh and promised new insights into the legend of Arthur.
Hibbert sketches out the origins of the myths in different sources, Gildas, Nennius, the impetus given to the legend by Geoffrey of Monmouth in 1180 or so, the recurrent appearances in the annals of some rather dubious welsh saints with Arthur as the villain to be instructed in Christian virtue and then 300 years later Malory's Morte D'Arthur.
Hibbert weaves a credible narrative of Arthur as pragmatic cavalry commander whose appropriation of church/monastic wealth to fund his campaigns might explain the ambivalence of church records towards him and notably Gildas's failure to name him, while still mentioning his greatest victory at Mount Badon. It is a narrative brought very much to life by Bernard Cornwell in his Winter King, Enemy of God and Excalibur trilogy.
However, with the notion of overwhelming waves of Saxon invasion being challenged by a model of gradual cultural assimilation, there is less necessity for a Dux Ballorum to explain away a 50 year hiatus in Saxon expansion.
Hibbert also explains how captivating the notion of Arthur was to contemporary European culture and how his fame spread through French writers as much as Geoffrey and his "obscure" source document. Perhaps Arthur is just one of the earliest examples of fake news spread through viral repetition in a self-sustaining and self-referencing conspiracy theory. Maybe the Legend of Arthur is as fabricated and as intractable as the myth that vaccines cause autism! But at least Arthur's legend is less harmful than modern misinformation!
You don't get anything more from this than reading a Wikipedia entry on the topic, but at the time of publishing it wasn't so easy to do that, and for my purposes I find it easier to force myself to sit down and read a book than to stare at a computer screen for an hour or two, which is how quick this read is. Hibbert explains the historical background for Arthur's legend, how it becomes famous and who covers it, retells Malory's version of the tale and then deconstructs what elements of it are fabrications or else play on possible real events. Then at the end, there is a description of the possible sites of Camelot and a brief overview of the (at the time) new archaeological discoveries. You would be disappointed if you wanted to come away from this as an expert on the topic; I think I've learnt *more* from fictional Arthurian retellings, in terms of the wider culture, knights, what captured public imagination about the tale, etc. But if you want a quick read on the topic, it does the job - and I think that's all the book intends to be.
This book examines the Arthurian legend, starting with the earliest mentions of the 6th century hero in historical references shrouded in the mists of time, to the present day. Linking folktale, legend, poetry, myth, actual written records, and archaeological discoveries, Hibbert explores the various versions, documenting the evolution of an obscure dark age warlord into a romantic, medieval, chivalrous knight of epic proportion and reknown. The text is hot-linked to reference material for those who like to "read more about it." Thoroughly enjoyed this quick, factual refresher.
A quick and easy read, this work covers the evidence, speculation and literature of King Arthur from the 6th century until The Once and Future King. It is a brief overview and certainly not an in-depth study, and it doesn't touch on any of the literature and works that have followed T.H. White's work. For what it is, it is a solid bit of work.
Interesting, short, read. Author is making a case for the King Arthur legends being based(and embellished) on a real 6th century leader. Meanders a bit and was originally published in the late 60's. I'm curious what new info has come to light in the 50 years since. I'm NOT a nonfiction reader and don't feel my time was wasted.
Fascinating but so much of the lore of a King Arthur is merely folklore and the energetic imaginations of bards and writers over the centuries. There is absolutely nothing to confirm or refute that such a person existed.
The historical research was made understandable and interesting. There was no real conclusion as to whether the romanticized really existed...the one depicted in modern movies. Gods book.
This book of historical research and legend is thought provoking and wistful. While I love the King Arthur stories on their own, proof of Arthur's history is fascinating. Read also about the legend of the Hawthorne tree... Cool stuff!!
I've read a number of books on King Arthur, but still found new things in this book, a very general overview of the historical background of the King Arthur stories. A number of books mention various things found in this book, but Hibbert put some of them into a context that was more clear. If you know anyone who wants to know a little about the history behind King Arthur, and a little bit about why and how the medieval and renaissance versions came about, this is a good starting point.
Who was or who could have been the real King Arthur. Using archaeological discoveries, historical literature and papers, the author researches who the real King Arthur was vs. the myth. A very interesting and well written book that places Arthur in his historical surroundings and timeframe, connecting him to all that was happening in the Britain of his time as well as breaking down some of the romantic myths. A quick and enjoyable read.
This is quite a good little nonfiction synopsis of the Arthur myth and who he may have possibly been in history. I love reading about King Arthur, and it's been a long time since I read any, so I enjoyed this refresher. It includes a breakdown of L'Morte d'Arthur, which is valuable. Enjoyable, though not super in-depth, read.
Shorter than I expected, draws no real conclusions
I'm currently doing research on Arthuriana, so I picked up this book as being possibly helpful. It did give me some information I was missing (about Cadbury), so I'm satisfied. That said, a reader looking for conclusive evidence will be sorely disappointed.
The illustrations tend toward the monotonous (inevitably just a bunch of goofy medieval junk), but the text proves a great and well-tempered read. The second one of these American Heritage books that I've come across, and another clear winner.
This is an excellent job of "the true king Arthur" from archeology, literature, history and mythology, Christopher invites us to know the man beyond the myth.