Jessie Laidlay Weston

“ When we add to this the fact that the writers of the 12th century represented the personages and events of the 6th in the garb, and under the conditions, of their own time, we can understand the reason of the manifold difficulties which beset the study of the cycle.
But into the figure of Arthur as we know him, other elements have entered; he is not merely an historic personality, but at the same time a survival of pre-historic myth, a hero of romance, and a fairy king; and all these threads are woven together in one fascinating but bewildering web. ”

“ The idea of a slumbering hero who shall awake at the hour of his country’s greatest need is world-wide, but the most famous instances are Northern, e.g. Olger Danske and Barbarossa, and depend ultimately on an identification with the gods of the Northern Pantheon, notably Thor. W. Larminie cited an instance of a rhyme current in the Orkneys as a charm against nightmare, which confuses Arthur with Siegfried and his winning of the Valkyr. ”

“ Fairy.—We find that at Arthur’s birth (according to Layamon, who here differs from Wace) , three ladies appeared and prophesied his future greatness. This incident is also found in the first continuation to the Perceval, where the prediction is due to a lady met with beside a forest spring, clearly here a water fairy. In the late romance of La Bataille de Loquifer Avalon has become a purely fairy kingdom, where Arthur rules in conjunction with Morgain. ”