From top left to bottom center: Guest Tony Sullivan, Host and Moderator Richard Johnson and Guest Dr. Linda A. Malcor
First, I want to again thank Richard for giving us Arthurians and new place to make our voices heard. And, of course, I wish to congratulate both guests on their performances - and just for having the courage to present their contrasting views in a public forum.
I would like to treat first of the case against Lucius Artorius Castus as put forward by Tony Sullivan.
Tony and I disagree on whether the famous Arthur is a Dark Age war-leader or (mostly) a reflection of the Roman period Castus. There is really no reason to rehash that here, as I discussed the matter at length in my recent talk on O'R GOLWG (https://youtu.be/ICS0cyB8bqg?si=iy1LOWzqO3aBuPAZ).
I think where Tony and I find ourselves at loggerheads is in our different take on the Arthurian battles. He leaves several of the sites either unidentified or in considerable doubt and does not, in the main, base his theory upon those identifications he does make or allow. He does not give much credence to modern toponomastics.
One thing I will never change my mind about: we have only battles in the HB and AC for Arthur. That's it. If we can't show something with those, then we have nothing for Arthur. Period. As Linda (who to this day has ignored my place-name findings and who herself has etymologically or geopolitically impossible identifications for a good portion of the battles), any theory that does not successfully place the sites is presenting an invalid argument. Invalid why? Because it literally lacks a premise.
I've come up with excellent candidates for the battles that make sense across all disciplines. Therefore, I feel I'm uniquely qualified when it comes to presenting a valid theory.
In brief, I become disenchanted when someone tries to tell me who Arthur was and what he was doing if they have no defensible idea of where he was doing it. That's pretty much my position now and I've not yet seen sufficient reason to change it.
But on to Linda...
To be honest, I would not have bothered to write this debate response had she not three times claimed that armatas in my proposed reading ARM(ATAS) GENTES did not mean "armed." That, essentially, I was forcing a meaning on the word that it didn't possess. [In passing, and as I explain in my O'R GOLWG talk, we have examples in Roman historical texts of gentes being used specifically to designate tribes in northern Britain - a meaning for the word she unaccountably refuses to accept.]
I find this claim especially irksome. And not just because it is wrong, but because she was provided with all the dictionary entries, agreement from top Latinists and numerous examples culled from the literature. She has chosen to ignore that entire body of universally known and accepted evidence. Why she has decided to do so I have no clue - unless it's because she can think of no other way to discount the validity of my proposed reading. Certainly, I've many times over (most recently in my current O'R GOLWG talk) dispensed with her specious claim that only her own ARMATOS fits.
[As an aside, she also stated during the debate that as the /M/ of ARM[...]S on the Castus stone showed no signs of a ligatured /E/, the word could not be ARMENIOS. This is patently untrue, something else that has been pointed out to her many times. A standard /N-I/ ligature works just fine, as we can see on the reconstruction of the memorial stone by Christopher Gwinn:
Linda needs to stop making false claims of this kind. Every time she does so she degrades her credibility.]
Here is the relevant listing for armatus in one of the world's most respected Classical Latin dictionaries. For examples of the usage of armatas and scholarly comment on that usage in literature and epigraphy, please consult the relevant chapter in my new book LET NOT ANYONE ESCAPE FROM SHEER DESTRUCTION.
Hence, armātus, a, um, P. a., armed, equipped, fitted with armor (opp. inermis, togatus, q. v.); also subst.: armātus, i, m., an armed man, a solier, = miles.
A. Adj.
1. Lit.: armatos, si Latine loqui volumus, quos appellare vere possumus? opinor eos, qui scutis telisque parati ornatique sunt, Cic. Caecin. 21, 60: cum animatus iero satis armatus sum, Att. ap. Non. p. 233, 18; p. 495, 23: armati pergemus, Vulg. Num. 32, 32; ib. Judith, 9, 6: ab dracontis stirpe armatā exortus, Att. ap. Non. p. 426, 2: armata manus, Lucr. 2, 629; so id. 2, 636; 2, 640; 5, 1297; cf. id. 5, 1292: saepe ipsa plebes armata a patribus secessit, Sall. C. 33, 4: contra injurias armatus ire, id. J. 31, 6: facibus armatus, Liv. 5, 7: armatus falce, Tib. 1, 4, 8: classes armatae, Verg. G. 1, 255: armatus cornu, Plin. 11, 37, 45, § 128.
2. Meton.: armati anni, i. e. years spent in war, Sil. 11, 591.
Trop.: excitati, erecti, armati animis, armed, furnished, etc., Cic. Phil. 7, 9, 26.
In the sup. only twice, and referring to the pos. armatus in connection with it (comp. and adv. never used), Cic. Caecin. 21, 61 (v. the passage in its connection): tam tibi par sum quam multis armatissimis nudi aut leviter armati, Sen. Ben. 5, 4.
B. Subst.: gravidus armatis equus (sc. Trojanus), Enn. ap. Macr. S. 6, 2 (Trag. v. 97 Müll.): armatos educere, id. ap. Non. p. 355, 16: navem triremem armatis ornat, Nep. Dion, 9, 2: decem milia armatorum, id. Milt. 5, 1; so Vulg. Exod. 38, 25: armatis in litora expositis, Liv. 37, 28; 42, 51; 9, 24; Suet. Caes. 30.
To address a few other points of inaccuracy or error raised by Linda during the debate, in no particular order:
1) She continues to maintain that Pendragon refers to the Sarmatian draco, supposedly adopted by the Roman army. Alas, I long ago shared my research with her on the Sarmatian draco - whose very existence, it turns out, cannot be proven (https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2024/02/there-is-absolutely-no-evidence-for.html?m=1). She has never seen fit to comment on that research. Furthermore, she continues to deny that the real meaning of Pendragon, a poetic metaphor, as agreed upon by the Welsh scholars, is "Chief warrior" or "Chief of warriors."
As Tony emphasized, Linda's claim that Castus commanded Sarmatians in Britain in not substantiated by his cursus. A good rule of thumb to adopt that helps prevent undesirable speculation is this: if it isn't on the stone, he didn't do it.
2) She is wrong about pretty much every aspect of the Grail legend. Celtic antecedents are easily demonstrable, and the later Christian overlay can be traced in readily discernible phases. The process of "converting" (pun strictly intended) pagan motifs to Christian legend, as evinced in the Grail story, has its parallel in the Church's embracing of pagan divine personages (like the Irish Brigit) by transforming them into saints. Basically, the Church realized it was often easier to bring deeply entrenched paganism safely into the fold rather than struggle endlessly to extirpate it. I will be talking with Richard in the future about the Arthurian Grail in both its pagan and Christian incarnations. Touched upon during this conversation will be the true identities of Lancelot and Galahad and the Grail kings (all of whom are purely Celtic with a Christian gloss; there is no Alanic influence or elements present in the Grail stories). Linda even defines the gradalis incorrectly (see https://www.medievalists.net/2025/10/holy-grail-medieval-graal/).
I have many articles on the Grail and Grail characters at my blog site, of course. Here is one of the more important recent ones:
And an oldie, but goodie:
3) I will also be demonstrating in a talk with Richard that there is no justification in seeking anything other than known British medieval sources when tracing the origin and evolution of the Sword in the Anvil motif of Arthurian tradition. Ironically, as Linda prepares to come out with a book on this subject (co-authored with John Matthews), I had just completed my own research on the subject:
4) Tony and I have dealt with the dux issue in great detail. No reason to keep beating the proverbial dead horse. The cursus reading (with the possible exception of whatever is chosen for the ARM...S portion) that has been confirmed by all the top epigraphers can be accepted without reservation. The best version and discussion of the Castus inscription can be found in Dr. Roger Tomlin's Britannia Romana: Roman Inscriptions and Roman Britain. Dux in the context of the Castus cursus is a temporary military command of some legionary troops. It is not a designation for a provincial military governor. Britain was always a senatorial province. I had more on this in my first talk with Richard.
The following article is one of the better, more comprehensive articles I've written on the subject of dux in the Castus inscription:
5) Linda (and Tony!) believe Camelot to be mythical. It is not.
The case has often been made that Camelot is a late French form of the Romano-British Camulodunum place-name. However, archaeological evidence from both the fort on Old Lindley Moor near Slack and from the fort on Almondbury five miles from Slack (either of which may have been the ancient Camulodunum) has not revealed Dark Age occupation of these sites. The other primary candidate for Camelot is the Cadbury hill-fort by the Camel villages in Somerset. While this fort does show Dark Age occupation, its location does not match that provided for Camelot in the romances.
The first clue as to the actual whereabouts of Camelot is found in Chretien de Troyes’ Knight of the Cart, which is the earliest romance to mention this site. According to Chretien, Camelot is ‘in the region near Caerleon’ (something Tony remarked upon). For some reason, most authorities have seen fit to ignore this statement, insisting that Camelot was placed near Caerleon simply because of Geoffrey of Monmouth’s glorified description of the latter site as a major Arthurian centre. If we do take
Chretien’s statement seriously, we can for the first time arrive at a satisfactory identification of this most magical of royal cities.
The second clue to the location of Camelot is from the later romance The Quest for the Holy Grail, wherein Arthur escorts the Grail questers from Camelot to a point just shy of Castle Vagan.
A third clue, from the prose Tristan, places Camelot either on or very near the sea. The last clue is from the Morte Artu; in this source, the castle of Camelot is on a river. It goes without saying that we need to look for a CASTLE or, at the very least, the site of an earlier hill-fort of some significance.
Castle Vagan is St. Fagan’s Castle (W. Ffagan) four or five miles west of Cardiff.
According to the HB, Campus Elleti, the ‘Field or Plain of Elleti’, where Vortigern found Ambrosius, was said to be in Glywysing, the later Morgannwg/Glamorgan. Only a dozen miles separate Campus Elleti from Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Caerleon.
In my opinion, Campus Elleti, with Latin Campus rendered as French Champ (the p of which became silent), became Camelot:
Cham(p) ellet(i) > Camelot
To clinch the matter of Camelot's location, I decided to go look at THE BOOK OF LLANDAFF itself, where the name Elleti occurs, given to a marsh (L. palud for palus). The reference is sparse, but not ambiguous: the swamp of Elleti is between the River Thaw and the villa of Gerbert. Gerbert is, of course, Gilbert. This is a reference to the early Norman lord Gerbert/Gilbert de Umfraville of Penmark Castle. The castle is only a couple kilometers east of the River Thaw. See https://books.google.com/books?id=mhnYtVAUhQEC&pg=PA280&lpg=PA280&dq=%22Gilbert%22%2B%22Penmark%22&source=bl&ots=jAPCTYtWvV&sig=ACfU3U3H9jphfO2v8JpTjYL3WTIe6nO5LA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwins6Dl643qAhVDJjQIHQLiDTUQ6AEwAXoECAoQAQ#v=onepage&q=%22Gilbert%22%2B%22Penmark%22&f=false.
In conclusion, I can only echo Tony's often expressed sentiment: attempting to utilize Geoffrey of Monmouth or anything post-Galfridian (hagiography, romances) through a process of extrapolation to prove anything historical about a pre-Galfridian Arthur is a futile quest. And the same goes for drawing on Scythian-derived folklore motifs with that purpose in mind. For this last, see, for example,
