REVISITING MY TWO FAVORITE CANDIDATES FOR CAMLANN

The Welsh tradition, as I've thoroughly demonstrated before in posts and in my book THE BEAR KING, places Arthur's last and fatal battle on the Afon Gamlan in Gwynedd.

However, I have also looked at another, perhaps more exciting potential site: the Uley Bury hillfort in Gloucestershire.

http://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2017/12/uley-bury-and-arthurs-camlan-process-of.html

After extensive searching, I've not found additional suitable places in southern England.

In this blog post, I will try to decide if Uley Bury is the more viable candidate of the two widely separated locations.

To begin, it is fairly obvious that if Arthur fought at Badon, and Badon is (as linguistics demand) Bath in Somerset, then we must invoke a new chronology, one that it very difficult to establish, as it would be based solely on the misordering of the Gewissei genealogy - something evinced in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.  See

http://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-gewissei-and-cuneddas-sons-why-are.html

Furthermore, as Camlann was Arthur's last battle, it plainly followed Badon.  When we look at the taking of Bath in the ASC, an action which Cerdic's/Ceredig's father Ceawlin/Maquicoline/Cunedda supposedly spear-headed, and then place on the map the other battles and sites mentioned in the year 577, as well as battles subsequent to Dyrham in 584 at Fethanleag and in 592 at Adam''s Grave - with Ceawlin dying at an undisclosed location* in 593 - the resulting map is rather telling.  For Uley Bury and the River Cam are right in the middle of the grouping. 

Uley Bury and Anglo-Saxon Chronicle Battles

Does this mean Arthur died at Uley Bury?  Well, we have a choice, as I see it.  Either Ceredig/Cerdig/Arthur went home from his southern battles and died fighting a neighboring dynast in Merionethshire at the Afon Gamlan - something certainly possible, as Ceredigion and Merionethshire bordered upon each other - or Camlann as *Cambolanda, the Crooked Enclosure or Enclosure of the Cam [River], was part of a continuing Gewissei campaign in Gloucestershire. 

My problem with the Afon Gamlan in NW Wales is that it is a rather unremarkable site for a battle.  The Roman road does not even cross it.  On the other hand, there is no denying the impressive nature of the Uley Bury hillfort, and hillforts were targeted by the Gewissei.  Uley Bury is also smack-dab in the middle of the Gewissei military theater. For these reasons alone I would prefer Uley Bury as Arthur's Camlann.

*Crida perishes along with Ceawlin.  If we may allow for this to be a form of Creoda/Creda, Ekwall mentions a 'Creodan hyll' in Wiltshire.  So far as I know, the hill has not been identified.  But it could be that Ceawlin/Cunedda died at this place.