TINTAGEL, England, 11 August 2004 — The offer is tempting: Join King Arthur’s Round Table, and far from having to commit to a life of chivalry and battle, a small fee brings not only membership but a special badge and four newsletters a year. Much has changed since the 5th century, it appears.
It has, at least, in the southwest of England, where the heritage of the real King Arthur — if, indeed, such a person ever existed — is a serious tourist money-spinner.
The legend of the ancient English king, guided by the wizard Merlin and his magical sword Excalibur, is familiar worldwide, while his round table of knights at the court of Camelot remains a watchword for valor and wise government.
The story has been committed to film a number of times, most recently in the eponymous Anglo-US production “King Arthur”, released this month.
Most of the tale is modern adornment, much from “Le Morte D’Arthur”, a 15th century epic by Sir Thomas Malory, and a similarly titled 19th-century poem by Lord Alfred Tennyson, both reflecting the romantic preoccupations of their eras.
However many historians, delving into earlier sources, believe there was an important English leader called Arthur around the fifth century, although not necessarily a king.
Despite loud claims from Wales, northern England and Scotland, the strongest historical claim on Arthur’s legend rests in the far southwest of England, and nowhere embraces this more seriously than Tintagel.
The sleepy Cornish coastal town boasts the cliff-top ruins of an ancient castle long claimed as Arthur’s birthplace, boosted by the discovery in 1998 of an ancient stone inscribed with the name “Artognov”. A walk down Tintagel’s main street shows how vital Arthur is to local pride and wallets.
An entire tourist industry has sprung up around the king, leaving a Camelot amusement arcade battling for space with the King Arthur’s Arms pub, featuring on its menu the fabled “Excaliburger”.
Perhaps strangest of all is King Arthur’s Great Halls, a vast stone mock-up of what Camelot might have looked like, built in the 1930s by an Arthur-obsessed custard tycoon and now a tourist draw in its own right.
It is here that the modern would-be knight can, for 20 pounds (30 euros, $37), sign up to a modern incarnation of the round table based on the Arthurian values of fairness and fellowship.
Despite the curiosities, most experts agree that Tintagel has as strong a claim to Arthur as anywhere. “The most we can say about that is that in recent years there’s been a lot of work done on Tintagel, and it was certainly an important place at about the right time,” said Geoffrey Ashe, a historian who has written a series of books about Arthur.
“There’s really nowhere else that could compete as a possible birthplace — but we have to say possible.”
