Oct 11, 2026 · 1 hr 13 min · 18 segments
What is the historical truth behind the tales of King Arthur, Britain’s greatest myth? When did these stories begin, and with whom? And, is Arthur’s apocalyptic last battle based on an English…
Tom HollandHost
Dominic SandbrookHostSo people might have thought that was just a, a sort of random throwaway remark.
Um, and he stages this very trendsetting tournament in Cyprus to mark the knighting of his eldest son.
And so you have these Round Table tournaments where everyone dresses up as Lancelot or Gawain or Arthur or whatever.
So very like the Rest Is History Festival that we stayed at Hampton Court this summer.
I guess you'd say it's the kind of the original pan-European kind of sporting institution, kind of the medieval Champions League.
It's that kind of sense of a, a, a shared sport that people from across Christendom can, can share in.
So very famously in thirteen twelve, there was this French poet called Jacques de Longuyon, and he drew up a list of the nine exemplars of chivalry, and he chose three pagans to illustrate, you know, the nobility of the classical world.
Three Jews, so th-these are biblical heroes, and three Christians, and together these constitute the nine worthies.
As you say, it's a measure not just of his fame, but of his kind of moral stature.
And so I think it's, it's unsurprising that when the first printing press is introduced, um, in England in 1476, so again, again, that's against the backdrop of the Wars of the Roses, the merchant responsible for it very rapidly is looking around for something to publish about King Arthur.
So people might have thought that was just a, a sort of random throwaway remark.
Um, and he stages this very trendsetting tournament in Cyprus to mark the knighting of his eldest son.
And so you have these Round Table tournaments where everyone dresses up as Lancelot or Gawain or Arthur or whatever.
So very like the Rest Is History Festival that we stayed at Hampton Court this summer.
I guess you'd say it's the kind of the original pan-European kind of sporting institution, kind of the medieval Champions League.
It's that kind of sense of a, a, a shared sport that people from across Christendom can, can share in.
So very famously in thirteen twelve, there was this French poet called Jacques de Longuyon, and he drew up a list of the nine exemplars of chivalry, and he chose three pagans to illustrate, you know, the nobility of the classical world.
Three Jews, so th-these are biblical heroes, and three Christians, and together these constitute the nine worthies.
As you say, it's a measure not just of his fame, but of his kind of moral stature.
And so I think it's, it's unsurprising that when the first printing press is introduced, um, in England in 1476, so again, again, that's against the backdrop of the Wars of the Roses, the merchant responsible for it very rapidly is looking around for something to publish about King Arthur.
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