Posts tonen met het label King Arthur. Alle posts tonen
Posts tonen met het label King Arthur. Alle posts tonen

woensdag 18 juni 2014

My idea for a story to get an important English/Norse myth into the TV series Vikings

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emil_Doepler
When I was doing research on Excalibur I found a fantastic Norse myth about Odin and a sword in the heart of a mighty oak.

I started thinking about the series of Vikings who are full of Odin mythology. What if the writers of Vikings the series actually use that myth how would it look like?

Would Athelstan get challenged to get that sword out the heart of the oak? Or should we give Rollo that shot after he invaded France together with Ragnar.

Fact is we know there was a King called Athelstan. Rollo the Walker or Rollo the Viking became the duke of Normandy.

In one of the articles I read note that I am not sure if it is true. That Arthur wasn’t English at all. (1) But used to live in France. So if the series would go that far we could have our own tale of the Excalibur.

We also know that King Athelstan drove the Vikings out of England. He conquered the last Vikings in York. The Vikings settled in Scotland and with the scots they battled with King Athelstan after a while the battle of Hastings was a fact.

Rollo or Athelstan could be living the Arthurian tales.
We could make this legend work in the series. It is not yet told in one of the Vikings episodes.


Sword Excalibur

Arthur Drawing the Sword from the Stone
Walter Crane
Illustration
Today I want to write about a subject that popped up in my head yesterday.
Swords. Viking swords but then I found another interested subject about the swords. Something about Excalibur from King Arthur. 

When I started my research today about the Viking swords and their names I came across Gram it is a mythical story that looks like the Arthurian story. (1.)

http://levigilant.com/Bulfinch_Mythology/bulfinch.englishatheist.org/b/guerber/Chapter26.htm


In short words Odin pushed the sword Gram into the heart of a mighty oak. Who took it out of there would be fated to win battles.

Then I started to research a little bit more and find out that in several mythologies the Arthurian story was used. Both the stone story and the sword in the lake are used in different stories.

You could say that I was overwhelmed by these aspect of the stories seem the same but are slightly different. I didn’t expect to find that many in different mythologies and legends. I liked the idea of writing about it.

If you look at:


It is all about a sword in a stone, oak or a sword that came out of the lake. (2.)

Then I started to think is it possible that this story is from originally Nordic. What If the Vikings had that story before the Arthur legend came out? In my journey to that question I found out something interesting. (3) A battle called Mount Beddon in the year 516 (not sure if it is that year) tells us that this is associated with the Arthur legends. This fight was with Vikings. It is also the kingdom of Umbria. (4)

Conclusion: if Vikings and Arthur lived in the same timespan they have fight each other. But it is not certain if they did.