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See also:ROUND TABLE, THE , in the Arthurian See also:Romance (q.v.), the table round which, in See also:- ORDER
- ORDER (through Fr. ordre, for earlier ordene, from Lat. ordo, ordinis, rank, service, arrangement; the ultimate source is generally taken to be the root seen in Lat. oriri, rise, arise, begin; cf. " origin ")
- ORDER, HOLY
order to avoid quarrels as to See also:precedence, See also:- KING
- KING (O. Eng. cyning, abbreviated into cyng, cing; cf. O. H. G. chun- kuning, chun- kunig, M.H.G. kiinic, kiinec, kiinc, Mod. Ger. Konig, O. Norse konungr, kongr, Swed. konung, kung)
- KING [OF OCKHAM], PETER KING, 1ST BARON (1669-1734)
- KING, CHARLES WILLIAM (1818-1888)
- KING, CLARENCE (1842–1901)
- KING, EDWARD (1612–1637)
- KING, EDWARD (1829–1910)
- KING, HENRY (1591-1669)
- KING, RUFUS (1755–1827)
- KING, THOMAS (1730–1805)
- KING, WILLIAM (1650-1729)
- KING, WILLIAM (1663–1712)
King See also:Arthur's knights are seated, and so applied collectively to the knights themselves as the See also:title of a mythical order of See also:chivalry. The origin of the Round Table is obscure. See also:Geoffrey of See also:Monmouth makes no mention of it, and the earliest See also:record is that of See also:Wace, much See also:expanded by his translator, See also:Layamon, who gives a picturesque detailed description of the fight for precedence which took See also:place at Arthur's See also:board on a certain Yuletide See also:day, and the slaughter which ensued. For this slaughter Arthur took See also:summary vengeance, slaying all the kinsfolk of the See also:man who started the fight, and cutting off the noses of his See also:women-folk. For the future avoidance of any such scenes a cunning workman of See also:Cornwall offered to make a table which should seat 1600 knights and more, and at which all should be equal. Arthur accepted this offer, and the result was the Round Table, See also:peace and See also:harmony. Wace does not mention the number of knights.
These versions of the pseudo-See also:chronicles .practically ascribe the See also:foundation to Arthur; the romances, however, differ. In these either See also:Merlin made the table for Uther Pendragon,
or it had belonged to I,eodegrance, king of Cornwall and See also:father of See also:Guenevere, and was given to Arthur on his See also:marriage with that princess. When the See also:founding of the Round Table is ascribed to Merlin it is generally in See also:close connexion with the See also:Grail See also:legend, forming the last of a See also:series of three, founded in See also:honour of the Trinity—the first being the table of the Last Supper, the second that of the Grail, established by See also:Joseph of Arimathea. The number of knights whom the table will seat varies; it might seat twelve or fifty or a See also:hundred and fifty; nowhere, See also:save in Layamon, do we find a practically unlimited See also:power of See also:accommodation. It is also to be noted that whereas, in the pseudo-chronicles, it is the See also:common table of Arthur's See also:court, designed in the interests of peace and unity, in the romances it is a sign of superiority, only the best and most valiant knights being adjudged worthy of a seat at the Round Table. In fact, it has become the See also:equivalent of an order of See also:knighthood, the members of which See also:form a brotherhood See also:bound by See also:oath to succour each other at need and to refrain from fighting among themselves. The membership is not restricted to the knights of Arthur's immediate court and See also:household, knights who are, in all essentials outsiders, appearing but as passing guests at Arthur's board, such as, e.g., See also:Perceval and See also:Tristan, may be elected knights of the Round Table. In two romances, the See also:prose Tristan and the Parzival, the place of the Round Table proper is taken, on a See also:journey, by a silken See also:cloth laid on the ground, round which the knights are seated. In the versions more closely connected with the Grail See also:story the name of the chosen See also:knight appears on his seat, and there is one vacant place, the See also:Siege perilous, eventually to be filled by the Grail winger.
It is obvious that the tradition has passed through several stages, and has varied in the See also:process. The See also:original source is not easy to determine. Dr See also:Lewis See also:Mott has pointed' out that " Round Tables " exist in many parts of See also:Great See also:Britain, the name being often associated with circular trenches, or rings of stones, which were demonstrably employed in connexion with the agricultural festivals held at See also:Pentecost, Midsummer and Michaelmas. However this may be, and it seems probable that Dr Mott is right in his See also:identification, the pseudo-chroniclers and romance writers certainly had in their minds a genuine table, although, probably, one of magical properties. Thus Layamon's table can seat an indefinite number, and yet it can be carried by Arthur when he rides abroad. On closely examining Layamon's version it seems probable that he had in his mind not merely a circular, but a turning table; he gives it as ground for the See also:quarrel that all the knights wished to sit within; at the table the Cornish workman will make none shall be See also:left without, but they shall sit " without and within, man against man." It is difficult to explain this phrasing in any other See also:hypothesis than that Layamon pictured to himself Arthur's See also:- HALL
- HALL (generally known as SCHWABISCH-HALL, tc distinguish it from the small town of Hall in Tirol and Bad-Hall, a health resort in Upper Austria)
- HALL (O.E. heall, a common Teutonic word, cf. Ger. Halle)
- HALL, BASIL (1788-1844)
- HALL, CARL CHRISTIAN (1812–1888)
- HALL, CHARLES FRANCIS (1821-1871)
- HALL, CHRISTOPHER NEWMAN (1816—19oz)
- HALL, EDWARD (c. 1498-1547)
- HALL, FITZEDWARD (1825-1901)
- HALL, ISAAC HOLLISTER (1837-1896)
- HALL, JAMES (1793–1868)
- HALL, JAMES (1811–1898)
- HALL, JOSEPH (1574-1656)
- HALL, MARSHALL (1790-1857)
- HALL, ROBERT (1764-1831)
- HALL, SAMUEL CARTER (5800-5889)
- HALL, SIR JAMES (1761-1832)
- HALL, WILLIAM EDWARD (1835-1894)
hall as open on one See also:side, and that, on a great feast-day, owing to the number of guests, the table extended beyond the covering afforded by the roof. As the feast took place " on rnid-See also:winter's day " the annoyance of those who were without would be intelligible. To obviate this the cunning workman devised a circular table, turning on a See also:pivot, with seats affixed, at which the guests sat the one See also:half in turn within, the other without, the hall " man against man." This would make the Round Table analogous to the turning castles which we frequently meet with in romances; and while explaining the peculiarities of Layamon's See also:text, would make it additionally probable that he was dealing with an earlier tradition of folk-See also:lore See also:character, a tradition which was probably also See also:familiar to Wace, whose version, though much more condensed than Layamon's, is yet in substantial harmony with this latter. This, too, is certain; the fight for precedence at Arthur's board may be paralleled by accounts of precisely similar quarrels in See also:early Irish literature, e.g. the famous See also:tale of Fled Bricrend or Bricriu's Feast of the Ultonian See also:cycle.
See also:Recent grail researches have made it most probable that that mysterious See also:talisman was originally the See also:vessel of the See also:ritual feast held in honour of a deity of vegetation, See also:Adonis, oranother; if the Round Table also, as Dr Mott suggests, derives from a similar source, we have a See also:link between these two not-able features of Arthurian tradition, and an additional piece of See also:evidence in support of the view that behind the Arthur of romance there See also:lie not only memories of an historic See also:British chieftain, but distinct traces of a mythological and beneficent See also:hero. Incidentally also it would seem that those versions which connect the table more closely with Arthur are the more correct.
See Wace, Le See also:Roman de See also:Brut, ed. See also:Leroux de Lincy (1836-38), vol. ii. 74-76) ; Layamon, Brut, ed. See also:Madden, vol. ii. p. 532 ; A. C. L. See also:- BROWN
- BROWN, CHARLES BROCKDEN (1771-181o)
- BROWN, FORD MADOX (1821-1893)
- BROWN, FRANCIS (1849- )
- BROWN, GEORGE (1818-188o)
- BROWN, HENRY KIRKE (1814-1886)
- BROWN, JACOB (1775–1828)
- BROWN, JOHN (1715–1766)
- BROWN, JOHN (1722-1787)
- BROWN, JOHN (1735–1788)
- BROWN, JOHN (1784–1858)
- BROWN, JOHN (1800-1859)
- BROWN, JOHN (1810—1882)
- BROWN, JOHN GEORGE (1831— )
- BROWN, ROBERT (1773-1858)
- BROWN, SAMUEL MORISON (1817—1856)
- BROWN, SIR GEORGE (1790-1865)
- BROWN, SIR JOHN (1816-1896)
- BROWN, SIR WILLIAM, BART
- BROWN, THOMAS (1663-1704)
- BROWN, THOMAS (1778-1820)
- BROWN, THOMAS EDWARD (1830-1897)
- BROWN, WILLIAM LAURENCE (1755–1830)
Brown, The Round Table before Wace (See also:Boston, 1900) ; Lewis F. Mott, The Round Table (Boston, 1905). (J. L.
End of Article: ROUND TABLE, THE
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