‘King Arthur’ Profile

July 10, 2004 -- Knights dressed in silver armor, the magic sword Excalibur — these are among the legends surrounding King Arthur. But what if he actually lived in a cold, dark time and fought barbarians dressed as a Roman?

Four hundred years after Jesus Christ, the Roman Empire reached as far west as Britain. It was the very edge of the Christian world. In the north of England, the farthest outpost of their empire, the Romans built the 75-mile-long Hadrian's Wall to keep the barbarians out — until the Roman Empire began to crumble.

If King Arthur actually lived, it was during this chaotic, dangerous time known as the Dark Ages. This presents a far different picture from the familiar Arthurian legends, where the great king reigned at Camelot with his unfaithful Queen Guinevere and Merlin the magician, and Sir Lancelot and the knights of the Round Table searched for the Holy Grail.

Is there any historical truth behind all this? Perhaps.

According to one theory, the real Arthur would have lived in the fifth century, leading a group of warriors against barbarian invaders. That is how the most recent Hollywood movie takes on the story in King Arthur, starring Clive Owen as the titular monarch and Keira Knightley as a sword-swinging Guinevere.

"This is the original King Arthur. This is where all the myths came from," said producer Jerry Bruckheimer. "Ours is the special forces of, I guess, the fifth century."

Literary Records Introduce Arthur

Finding information about the real Arthur is not easy as there is very little data emerging from the Dark Ages.

"The oldest written account of Arthur, in which Arthur's name is mentioned, is just a fragmentary mention of him in a poem, where the author says, ' So and so was a great warrior, but he was no Arthur,'" said John Matthews, a consultant on King Arthur.