Showing posts with label Tintagel Castle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tintagel Castle. Show all posts

Friday, 18 June 2021

The Cornish Wedding of King Arthur to Guenever

Restormel Castle, Cornwall

As I was unable to get out and about this week todays post is the the story of King Arthur's marriage to Guenever (sometimes written as Guenevere).

This is a very old version from the early 1800s and is in a poetry format. I have been fascinated by King Arthur since childhood - anyway, here we go ...

King Arthur Marries Guenever

"When Restormel Castle he alights
With worship hood in hand the knights,
Arthur, conduct to castle bower.
On verdant deis sat Guenever:
Like tendrils of vine, her hair
In golden ringlets falls:
The diamond-comb her hand dismissed,
When she sees  mail and nodding crest
Approach the massive walls;
And rose respectful -: coats of dust,
The armour of the chiefs encrust;
The steeds wet, foaming, pranced;
As o'er her cheek, fresh beauties dawn;
Her King to meet, across the lawn;
She in form divine,  advanced.
Great was the contrast :- beat with rains;
And scorched with suns, on bloody plains,
The warrior King, her lily hands,
Pressed his lips - her countenance bland,
Where opening roses, modest, blushed,
With spotless innocence was flushed.
A Christian Priest with beard of snow, 
The first whom Cornwall's converts know,
Whose words still, Druid forms repeal
With purer faith and holier zeal,
unites their hands - admist the nite,
He prays heaven's grace on them alight.
King Arthur and Queen Guenever
To famed Tintagel now repair.
The skies are clothed in livelier blue,
As onward they their course pursue;
More glorious beams the golden day
On Cornwall's royal-ranged array."


Tintagel Castle, Cornwall

Thanks for visiting my blog. I realise this post isn't everyone's cup of tea!

Monday, 25 January 2021

The Stone Inscription, King Arthur and Tintagel Castle


I photographed the above stone / slate quite a few years back. Some say that this has connections with the legendary King Arthur.

In the late 1990s archaeologists discovered pottery from the 5th and 6th centuries on the eastern side of Tintagel Castle, Cornwall. They also found the slate / stone as in the photo above. It was covering a 6th century drain.

On the slate is the rough inscription:

PATERN COLIAVFIT ARTOGNOV

It appears that someone called Artognov wanted people to know that he had made or built something at Tintagel Castle.

Professor Charles Thomas of Exeter University translated the inscription as, "Artognou, father of a descendant of Coll, has had this built"

This got many jumping to conclusions that Artognov was actually King Arthur, who is said, by some, to have been born in Tintagel Castle. See my post A Flavour of Tintagel Castle and the Story of King Arthur.

The date of the slate, 6th Century, ties in with the time King Arthur is said to have been born.

Unfortunately it is now generally accepted that the stone does not have any connection with King Arthur ... but experts aren't always right!

Part of Tintagel Castle

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