St. Medard
The Cams, Hampshire
West and East Wittering
A bit of a bombshell here, which may or may not be well-received by the Arthurian community.
I now am, for the first time, not only fairly confident that I know who Medraut was, but also where Camlan was located.
How did I come to these realizations?
Well, it was during my comparison of the Annals Cambriae entry for the year 537 with entries in the Irish Annals that I noticed something peculiar. Where the AC has Arthur and Medraut perish in Camlan during a year that saw plague in Britain and Ireland, the corresponding year entry in the Ulster Annals had the death of Comgall son of Domangart, King of Dalriada. Yes, the same Dalriada that later saw an Arthur in its royal family. A later Domangart, billed as this Arthur's brother, dies with him.
That got me sidetracked for awhile. But only the other day I more thoroughly investigated the strange fact that there is no plague mentioned in the Irish Annal for 537. Instead, that source duplicates the death of Comgall son of Domangart in 545, and it is there that we are told about the plague.
T537.2 [538 in Ulster]
Comgall son of Domongort, king of Scotland died in the 35th year of his reign.
U545.1
The first mortality called bléfed, in which Mo-Bí Clárainech died.
U545.2
Death of Comgall son of Domangart, as some say.
I asked myself this question: what if we run with 545 instead of 537 and see what happens?
What happened is something so strange I find it difficult to assign merely to coincidence.
In 545, in Gaul, the famous St. Medard died. Medard was bishop of Noviomagus, modern Noyen. Alarm bells started going off in my head, for I knew there were other places named Noviomagus - and two were in Britain!
And not only were they in Britain, they were in the extreme SE, where fighting was going on (according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle) between the Britons and the Saxons during Arthur's floruit.
The two sites in question are Chichester, which was the capital of the old Regni kingdom in Sussex. The other was Crayford in Kent. Here are their respective listings from Rivet and Smith's The Place-Names of Roman Britain:
Now, after looking at all this, I believe Medraut - from an earlier Medrad - represents St. Medard. -ard to -rad is a simple metathesis, easily performed by a copying scribe. The famous bishop was wrongly transferred through the usual folkloristic processes from the Gallic Noviomagus to a British one.
Which one - Chichester or Crayford?
Definitely the former. I had long ago discussed two important sites near Chichester. The first was the ASC's Cymensora, once a contender for Arthur's Camlan. I later dispensed with this site in favor of The Cams or Cams Shore near Portchester. For more on these two sites, please see the following old blog posts:
Crayford is the scene of a battle in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. It immediately follows the battle of Aylesford, during which Cattigern the son of Vortigern is killed. Cattigern means 'Battle-lord/leader' and has often been compared to Arthur as 'dux erat bellorum'.
455
Her Hengest 7 Horsa fuhton wiþ Wyrtgeorne þam cyninge, in þære stowe þe is gecueden Agęlesþrep, 7 his broþur Horsan man ofslog; 7 æfter þam Hengest feng to rice 7 Æsc his sunu.
457
Her Hengest 7 Æsc fuhton wiþ Brettas in þære stowe þe is gecueden Crecganford (Crayford) 7 þær ofslogon .iiiim. wera, 7 þa Brettas þa forleton Centlond 7 mid micle ege flugon to Lundenbyrg.
As Medard of Noviomagus in Gaul was related to the Noviomagus that was Chichester, we might be tempted to favor Cymenesora, i.e. Wittering, on Selsey Bill, which is very close to the Romano-British city. Whatever the origin of Cymen-, the Welsh may have taken it for their own camen, "crookedness, curvature, turn, bend, loop" (GPC) plus ora, 'shore, bank.'
The mixing in of Medard as Medrad may well have been accidental - indeed, I think it unnecessary to propose intentional creativity in this instance. Once Medard's Noviomagus was wronly associated with Chichester, it would have been an easy matter to combine annal entries. We might imagine original multiple entries for the same year, something like -
Year X Arthur perishes at Camlan. Blessed Medard rests. And there was plague in Britain and Ireland.
A copyist at some point merely assumed Medard died with Arthur at Camlan and shortened the entry.
Or sucessive entries -
Year Xa Arthur perishes at Camlan.
Year Xb Blessed Medard rests.
Year Xc Plague in Britain and Ireland.
Again, combined to read like the AC entry we now possess.
It seems to me this adequately explains the significance of the Camlan entry, and incidentally provides us with the most likely location for Arthur's last battle - at least according to tradition preserved in the AC.
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