King Arthur (film) - Historical Notes

Historical Notes

Despite the film's supposedly historically grounded approach, much artistic licence regarding historical figures, peoples, events, religion and weaponry is taken with the plot. As did the earliest versions of the Arthur story, the film places the story of Arthur not in its better-known medieval setting but in the (still plausible) earlier times of antiquity, the early dawn of the Middle Ages. It would appear that the Arthur depicted in the film is based most closely upon Ambrosius Aurelianus, the Romano-Briton who fought against the Saxons in the 5th century, and was probably the leader of the Romano-British at the Battle of Mons Badonicus (Mount Badon). Nevertheless, Arthur's full name in the film is Artorius Castus, referring to Lucius Artorius Castus, a historical Roman active in Britain in the 2nd or 3rd century. It is specified Arthur was given the ancestral name of a legendary leader.

The film is loosely based on the "Sarmatian hypothesis", formulated by C. Scott Littleton and Ann C. Thomas in 1978, which holds that the Arthurian legend has a historical nucleus in the Sarmatian heavy cavalry troops stationed in Britain. In the 2nd century, 5,500 Iazyges were transported there as auxiliaries during the Marcomannic Wars. However the hypothesis is not accepted in the scholarship as it lacks a solid base.