King Rion's Underkings

[Jallan]

I was wondering if it is ever mentioned the names of the 11 kings that
Rience flayed their beards from their faces? I cannot seem to find this
information in my Caxton text, or if Arthur ever restored their dignity
after Balin delivered Rience to him.

<< Also there were slain at that battle twelve kings on the side of
King Lot with Nero, and all were buried in the Church of Saint
Stephen's in Camelot, and the remnant of knights and of others were
buried in a great rock. >>
These 12 kings in Malory are King Lot and the eleven kings conquered by
Rion/Rience as is made clearer in the Post-Vulgate Merlin which via the
Huth Merlin manusript is Malory's source here.
The Huth Merlin is a composite romance, beginning with the Vulgate
Merlin text and jumping to the Post-Vulgate Merlin text which explains
some of the contradictions in the this portion of Malory. The Huth
Merlin (followed by Malory) seems to identify the 11 rebel kings of the
Vulgate Merlin with the Kings conquered by Rion which creates problems
as many of these other kings obviously did not die in the battle
between Arthur and Nero, as they are well known from other Arthurian
romances, especially King Urin, King Angusel/Angwisance, and King
Ider/Yder/Idres. In any case, in the Post-Vulgate Merlin it is made
clear that King Lot is an ally of King Rion, not one of the kings
conquered by Rion.

Accounts also differ as to the number of kings conquered by King Ritho
/ Rion / Rys / Rience whose beards he flayed off to make his coat.

The only texts to give names to any of these kings are the Vulgate
Merlin and a purported folktale published by the 19th century antiquary
Iolo Morganwg.

For the Vulgate Merlin account, I here draw mostly from Rupert T.
Pickens' translation in Norris J. Lacy's Lancelot-Grail which is based
on H. Oskar Sommer's edition of the romance. I also provide variant
forms of the names of the kings as given in H. Oskar Sommer's Vulgate
Version of the Arthurian Romances: Index of Names and Places to Volumes
1-VII.

The Vulgate Merlin provides two differing accounts of Rion's subkings.

In section 5:92 it is stated of Rion:

<< He has defeated twenty-five crowned kings, and, out of spite, he had
their beards torn off with their skin and made into a coat which he has
a knight always hold before him every day he holds court, and he says
that he will not stop until he has defeated thirty kings. >>

Section 14 begins telling how Merlin, King Arthur and his allies King
Ban and King Bors with some of their knights came incognito to the aid
of King Leodagan on whom Rion was waging war "with fifteen crowned
kings". Only the four sub-kings who are actively attacking King
Leodagan's city of Carohais are here mentioned by name:

1. King Roolant / Ryolent / Kaolanz / Caelenc / Kaolant / Karolant /
Canlent (he was fourteen feet tall, slain by King Arthur)
2. King Plarion / Placiens / Clarion / Clariel / Phariouns of Ireland
(the biggest man in the army of giants, slain by King Ban)
3. King Sornegrieu / Sornigres / Sornigrex / Sornigriex / Sornegrieus /
Senigran / Sinagreus / Segrain / Senygres / Sonygreux / Segegan /
Sarnagut of the Land of the Irish (who is much wounded and has his hand
cut off by King Ban)
4. King Sapharin / Sorhalt / Safarin / Sofrains / Sofarin / Saphariens
/ Sorhaus / Serans (slain by King Arthur)

After the deaths of the kings Roolant, Plarion, Sapharin and the
maiming (to the death?) of King Sornegrieu, Rion summons further aid
before recommencing the war, at which point he now has twenty armed
kings at his command. (End of section 16.) Though no list is given,
many kings appear in the following battles (Section 29 and following).
Some of these names are obviously corrupt, as sometimes what must be
the same king is referred to by a different name. Identifying such
characters with one another as much as possible, I actually find 24
kings in total:

Group 1: Kings mentioned near the beginning of the account and not
mentioned again later, at least by these names:
1. King Jonap / Minap / Josuap / Minahap (slain by King Ban)
2. King Falsaron / Fausaron
3. King Aroans / Arroars of Betinia / Laufanie
4. King Celinas (King Rion's cousin)
5. King Clariel / Clarel / Clarell / Gloriel (slain by King Arthur)

Group 2: The following three kings are introduced as a group of kings
pursued by king Bors:
6. King Gloriant / Glorians / Glorienx / Gloriel / Clarell / Glorieus
(slain)
7. King Minados / Madolas / Mynados / Mirdonas / Mandones / Mardonas
(slain).
8. King Calufer / Calofeus / Colufer

Group 3: The following six kings are introduced as a group of kings
pursued by Nascian, Adragain, and Hervi of Rivel:
9. King Kahanin / Cahanin / Kahamus / Kahannus / Chahannuns / Kehenius
/ Kahadins (King Arthur cuts off his right hand)
10. King Maltaillies / Maltaillees / Mautailliez (which is French for
"Misshapen", slain by King Bors)
11. King Frenicas / Fernicans / Finnains
12. King Cooars / Zeroarz / Heroars ("Cooars" being French "Coward")
13. King Baufumes / Baitrames / Balfinne, Brauremes (slain)
14. King Minadap / Maidrap / Mendamp / Minadrap / Mahidrap / Mynadap /
Moydas / Mordrup / Menedap (slain)

Group 4: Prose Merlin texts all intorduce four kings pursued by King
Bors, but Sommer's edition lacks two of the names which must be
restored from other mansucripts:
15. King Pinoras (name omitted in Sommer's text)
16. King Sinagreus (name omitted in Sommer's text)
17. King Gaidou / Gardon. (slain by King Bors)
18. King Margot / Margoras / Mengoras / Magoras (slain by King Ban)

Group 5: The following four kings are introduced as a group of kings
pursued by King Leodagan and Cleodalis his seneschal.
19. King Zidras, Zydras, Ydras, Ysdras (slain by King Ban)
20. King Caulus / Callas / Aucalas / Atalas the Almaçor ("l'Almaçor"
[Lauracour / Laumacor / Lamnachour] from an Arabic word for chieftain,
slain by King Arthur)
21.King Collocaulus / Colocaulus / Colocallus / Collocaulus / Caulus
(slain by Nascien)
22 King Dorilas / Dodalus / Dodalis, an emir (slain by King Bors)

Group 6: Kings appearing near the conclusion of the account:
23 King Alipansin / Ali Pantin / Alipantin / Alipantius / Alepanum
24 King Galaad / Galad / Glaalanz / Galescin / Groales / Braolans /
Galagnes of the Land of the Pastures

It is impossible to identify a king appearing in Groups 2 to 5 with any
king in another group within Groups 2 to 5 as the kings in each of
these groups are active in the account simultaneously.

It is possible that the text should read that King Rion had all 25 of
his vassal kings with him, not only 20. It is possible that an original
list of 25 names underlies this account and the author forgot to
restrict himself to 20 names in using that list. It is also possible
that the author was inventing names largely at random and carelessly
overran the proper number of 20 kings. One might also ask whether two
or three of these kings might not be heirs of Roolant, Plarion, and
Sapharin who were slain in the first campaign, and if so, whether being
allowed to ascend to their father's kingdoms required having their
beards flayed off.

At a later point, beginning with section 50, the story turns to King
Rion's direct challenge to King Arthur which leads to the ware in which
Rion dies, this romance following the tradition that Arthur himself
slew Rion, rather than that which first appears to our knowledge in the
romance Le Chevalier à Deus Espées in which the Rion (called Ris in
this romance) is captured by the Knight of the Two Swords and sent as
prisoner to Arthur's court.

This part of the Vulgate Merlin seems based on a different source than
provided the account of Rion earlier in the romance, because here King
Rion claims in a letter to Arthur that he has defeated nine kings and
made a cloak lined with their beards, not 25 kings are previoiusly The
9 kings who are summoned by King Rion are listed as:

1. King Paladem / Paladems / Palerens / Paladeus
2. King Safur / Safurs / Tasurs
3. King Sarmedon
4. King Argant / Argans / Agans
5. King Taurus / Thaurus
6. King Aride / Arade of Galore / Galoire
7. King Solinas
8. King Kahanin
9. King Alipantis of the Pastures

Kahanin is the name of a king in the earlier war against Leodagan where
his hand is cut of by King Arthur and accordingly the two can be
reasonably identified. Sarmedon in the early war is the name of a
standard-bearer, presumably not a king, whose arm was hewed off by King
Bors. King Alipantis might be the same as King Alipansin who appeared
in that same war. The name Solinas appears in Leodagan's war applied to
a nephew of Rion who heads a division. But this Solinas is not called
king, unless he be identical to King Celinas called Rion's cousin. In
medieval French "cousin" was used rather loosely to mean any kinsperson
so the identification is a possible one. The other names are new. And
in the following battle Gawain kills a King Pharoah / Pharaon who does
not appear on either list, but might be a corruption of Paladem, or
vice versa.

A partial harmonization can be forced by taking most of these kings to
be heirs to kings slain in the previous war. However this does not
explain why Rion is now said only to have overcome nine kings and
obtained nine beards.

None of the underkings in any of these lists appear elsewere in extant
Arthur legend, though some of the names (or similar names) appear as
names of other characters. The names Alipansin and Alipantis both seem
derived from Alifatima, the name of the King of Spain in Arthur's Roman
war in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regem Britannicae.. The Vulgate
Merlin also introduces prominently a king named Clarion as King of
Northumberland (Malory's King Clarience of Northumberland) as well as a
hostile Saxon King named Clarion; but both are active after the death
of Rion's Clarion. And there is a warrior named Clarion or Clariel
among Rion's host (distinct from King Plarion / Clarion and distinct
from King Clariel) who is slain by King Bors.

Indexes and dictionaries of Arthurian names tend to confuse such
characters of similar or identical names.

The 18th century scholar Iolo Morganwg presented a purportedly genuine
folk tale about King Rhitta, that is King Rion, telling how King Nyniaw
and Peibiaw foolishly went to war over the grazing of the stars in the
sky, for one claimed the stars as his cattle and the other claimed the
heavens as his pasture. King Rhitta put an end to this foolishness by
conquering both and then went on to conquer other kings to the number
of 28, from all of whom he took beards for his mantle. But Iolo was a
notorious forger of lost tradition and this tale may be another of his
inventions.

See
http://www.red4.co.uk/Folklore/trevelyan/snow2sea/rhittathegiant.htm
for a translation of this story.

This is not the straightforward list of names that was requested, but
it is rare in the inconsistant and contradictory maze of Arthurian
literature that any question can be answered simply and that any
question does not lead to even more questions.

[PAUL GADZIKOWSKI]

Jallan <***@smrtytrek.com> wrote:
: This is not the straightforward list of names that was requested, but
: it is rare in the inconsistant and contradictory maze of Arthurian
: literature that any question can be answered simply and that any
: question does not lead to even more questions.

And I've got one for you, since you seem to have this matter at your
fingertips. Among the alliance of eleven of Lot in Malory is an Idres of
Cornwall, but in all the work the name seems only to appear in the account
of one battle; and after that Mark is ruler of Cornwall. But the name
with/or several variants appears in your list of Rience's sub-kings. In
what other contexts, if any, does this character appear in the pre-Malory
works? Thanks for any response to an idle question.


Paul Gadzikowski, ***@iglou.com since 1995
http://www.arthurkingoftimeandspace.com New cartoons daily.
http://members.iglou.com/scarfman/new.htm Fanfiction stories and cartoons.

"It's me, I said. I'm the one who sang to you."

[Jallan]

Post by PAUL GADZIKOWSKI
And I've got one for you, since you seem to have this matter at your
fingertips. Among the alliance of eleven of Lot in Malory is an Idres of
Cornwall, but in all the work the name seems only to appear in the account
of one battle; and after that Mark is ruler of Cornwall. But the name
with/or several variants appears in your list of Rience's sub-kings. In
what other contexts, if any, does this character appear in the pre-Malory
works? Thanks for any response to an idle question.

Actually, I partly covered this in answer to one of your earlier
questions in
http://groups.google.ca/group/alt.legend.king-arthur/browse_thread/thread/a6875d88de5937ef/89e88c435ee6489b?lnk=st&q=Jallan+Cornwall&rnum=1&hl=en#89e88c435ee6489b

Malory's King Idres is the King Yder of the French romances, mentioned
quite often as a background character and distinguished both from the
more famous Arthurian knight Yder son of Nut (Welsh Edern son of Nudd)
and from Yder of the Dolerous Mountain. (Yder son of Nut appears in
Malory corrupted into Ider / Idrus son of Uwaine.)

But the only verse romance where King Yder's kingdom is named is
Duremart le Gallois where it is Cornwall, though whether this refers to
Cornwall in Britain or Cornouaille in Brittany or both at once is of
course unknowable. (In French both territories are spelled
identically.)

King Yder, no kingdom mentioned, is also very prominent in the early
portions of the Prose Lancelot, especially in the Arthur's war against
Prince Galahot and Arthur's later war against the Saxons. But the name
of his kingdom does not appear.

In the later portions of the Prose Lancelot and in La Mort Artu, a King
Caberentin of Cornwall appears quite prominently and Yder ceases to be
mentioned. But Caberentin is mentioned before Yder ceases to appear and
so we cannot easily harmonize by assuming Caberentin is simply Yder's
heir.

In the Vulgate Merlin King Yder is quite prominent again as one of the
11 rebel kings. And as in Duremart le Gallois, he is called King of
Cornwall. King Caberentin does not appear at all in the Vulgate Merlin.

As to King Mark, the surviving medieval poetic stories of Tristan and
Mark fall into two categories: the so-called folk version in which Mark
is a king of Cornwall contemporary with King Arthur and the so-called
courtly version of Thomas and Gottfried von Stassburg where King Mark
of Cornwall is also King of all England a generation or so after
Arthur's reign. The King of Ireland, the father of Isolde, is in this
tradition (implicitly by Thomas and explicitly by Gottfried) identified
with Gormund King of Ireland who appears as a 6th century king in
Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regem Britanniae and in derivative
works. In this continuity Mark, as a British king, is to be inserted
after Geoffrey's Gormund and the tale tells what Geoffrey does not, how
England became freed from Gormund's lordship when Tristan defeated the
Morholt.

Thomas' courtly version seems to have been written either for Henry II
of England or his queen Eleanor of Acquitaine. The traditions of the
Prose Lancelot also seem connected to the House of Anjou. Most notably,
the Royal Minster where Lancelot's mother founds and where she becomes
a nun is almost certainly intended to be the legendary foundation which
became the Abbey of Fontrevault to which Queen Eleanor retired and
where she was buried, as was her husband King Henry and her son Richard
Coeur de Leon. King Ban's kingdom of Benoic is explicity said to
include the castle if Issoudun and to be on the river Loire bordering
on the kingdom of Berry. It is in short, more-or-less, Anjou and
Tourraine.

Accordingly the authors of the Prose Lancelot, the Quest of the Holy
Grail, and Le Mort Artu, may have preferred the courtly version of the
Tristan story to the folk version. In fact, there is one single mention
of Mark, Tristan, and Isolde in the Vulgate Cycle, in Le Mort Artu,
when Bors refers to Tristan's recent death as an example of the
misfortunes that come from love. Here Mark's kingdom is not mentioned.
Possibly the author of this reference was unaware that he should not be
treating Tristan as a contemporary of Arthur. At any rate, King
Caberentin of Cornwall, not King Mark, appears proimently in Arthur's
final battle with Modret.

The Vulgate Merlin, an expanded version of Robert de Boron's Merlin
which provides an early history of Arthur somewhat congruent with the
Lancelot cycle, also makes no mention of King Mark, and in respect to
Cornwall mentions only King Yder (except in the Roman war section where
Geoffrey's Duke Cador of Cornwall appears, but only as a knight named
Cador of Cornwall with no mention of rank). Since this work delights in
lists of knights and barons culled from earlier romances, omission of
any mention of King Mark would appear to be by decision rather than by
accident. A knight named "Tristan who never laughed" who apears in this
work comes from earlier Arthurian verse romances where is is obviously
not taken to be the same as the more famous Tristan.

I don't believe that King Yder or Idres can be reasonably identified
with any of Rion's subkings in this same work.

Romances written following the Vulgate Cycle do, of course, make much
of Tristan and King Mark as contemporaries of King Arthur. These later
romances, so far as I can recall, make no mention of either King Yder
or King Caberentin (or Cador).

Malory himself, however, at the beginning of his story of Trystram,
mentions that at that time there were two kings in Cornwall, probably
to explain how King Idres and King Mark could both be kings of
Cornwall.

A further note: in the earliest section of the Prose Tristan,
Cornouaille, Mark's kingdom, appears to be identified with Cornouaille
in Brittany rather than with the English Cornwall, as characters
reguarly travel from Cornwall to France overland, but always travel to
Britain by sea. Tristan's own country of Leonois (Malory's Lionesse),
pictured as adjoining Cornwall, is here presumably identified with the
region of Léon which borders on Cornouaille in Brittany. (In the
earlier verse romances, in the folk version, Tristan's kindom is
Loenois, not Leonois, and Loenois is simply the Norman-French name for
Lothian in what is now south-eastern Scotland. Sporadically in
Arthurian romance King Lot of Ocanie is also called King Lot of Loenois
and Orcanie.)

[Jallan]

Post by PAUL GADZIKOWSKI
And I've got one for you, since you seem to have this matter at your
fingertips. Among the alliance of eleven of Lot in Malory is an Idres of
Cornwall, but in all the work the name seems only to appear in the account
of one battle; and after that Mark is ruler of Cornwall. But the name
with/or several variants appears in your list of Rience's sub-kings. In
what other contexts, if any, does this character appear in the pre-Malory
works? Thanks for any response to an idle question.

Actually, I partly covered this in answer to one of your earlier
questions in
http://groups.google.ca/group/alt.legend.king-arthur/browse_thread/thread/a6875d88de5937ef/89e88c435ee6489b?lnk=st&q=Jallan+Cornwall&rnum=1&hl=en#89e88c435ee6489b

Malory's King Idres is the King Yder of the French romances, mentioned
quite often as a background character and distinguished both from the
more famous Arthurian knight Yder son of Nut (Welsh Edern son of Nudd)
and from Yder of the Dolerous Mountain. (Yder son of Nut appears in
Malory corrupted into Ider / Idrus son of Uwaine.)

But the only verse romance where King Yder's kingdom is named is
Duremart le Gallois where it is Cornwall, though whether this refers to
Cornwall in Britain or Cornouaille in Brittany or both at once is of
course unknowable. (In French both territories are spelled
identically.)

King Yder, no kingdom mentioned, is also very prominent in the early
portions of the Prose Lancelot, especially in the Arthur's war against
Prince Galahot and Arthur's later war against the Saxons. But the name
of his kingdom does not appear.

In the later portions of the Prose Lancelot and in La Mort Artu, a King
Caberentin of Cornwall appears quite prominently and Yder ceases to be
mentioned. But Caberentin is mentioned before Yder ceases to appear and
so we cannot easily harmonize by assuming Caberentin is simply Yder's
heir.

In the Vulgate Merlin King Yder is quite prominent again as one of the
11 rebel kings. And as in Duremart le Gallois, he is called King of
Cornwall. King Caberentin does not appear at all in the Vulgate Merlin.

As to King Mark, the surviving medieval poetic stories of Tristan and
Mark fall into two categories: the so-called folk version in which Mark
is a king of Cornwall contemporary with King Arthur and the so-called
courtly version of Thomas and Gottfried von Stassburg where King Mark
of Cornwall is also King of all England a generation or so after
Arthur's reign. The King of Ireland, the father of Isolde, is in this
tradition (implicitly by Thomas and explicitly by Gottfried) identified
with Gormund King of Ireland who appears as a 6th century king in
Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regem Britanniae and in derivative
works. In this continuity Mark, as a British king, is to be inserted
after Geoffrey's Gormund and the tale tells what Geoffrey does not, how
England became freed from Gormund's lordship when Tristan defeated the
Morholt.

Thomas' courtly version seems to have been written either for Henry II
of England or his queen Eleanor of Acquitaine. The traditions of the
Prose Lancelot also seem connected to the House of Anjou. Most notably,
the Royal Minster where Lancelot's mother founds and where she becomes
a nun is almost certainly intended to be the legendary foundation which
became the Abbey of Fontrevault to which Queen Eleanor retired and
where she was buried, as was her husband King Henry and her son Richard
Coeur de Leon. King Ban's kingdom of Benoic is explicity said to
include the castle if Issoudun and to be on the river Loire bordering
on the kingdom of Berry. It is in short, more-or-less, Anjou and
Tourraine.

Accordingly the authors of the Prose Lancelot, the Quest of the Holy
Grail, and Le Mort Artu, may have preferred the courtly version of the
Tristan story to the folk version. In fact, there is one single mention
of Mark, Tristan, and Isolde in the Vulgate Cycle, in Le Mort Artu,
when Bors refers to Tristan's recent death as an example of the
misfortunes that come from love. Here Mark's kingdom is not mentioned.
Possibly the author of this reference was unaware that he should not be
treating Tristan as a contemporary of Arthur. At any rate, King
Caberentin of Cornwall, not King Mark, appears proimently in Arthur's
final battle with Modret.

The Vulgate Merlin, an expanded version of Robert de Boron's Merlin
which provides an early history of Arthur somewhat congruent with the
Lancelot cycle, also makes no mention of King Mark, and in respect to
Cornwall mentions only King Yder (except in the Roman war section where
Geoffrey's Duke Cador of Cornwall appears, but only as a knight named
Cador of Cornwall with no mention of rank). Since this work delights in
lists of knights and barons culled from earlier romances, omission of
any mention of King Mark would appear to be by decision rather than by
accident. A knight named "Tristan who never laughed" who apears in this
work comes from earlier Arthurian verse romances where is is obviously
not taken to be the same as the more famous Tristan.

I don't believe that King Yder or Idres can be reasonably identified
with any of Rion's subkings in this same work.

Romances written following the Vulgate Cycle do, of course, make much
of Tristan and King Mark as contemporaries of King Arthur. These later
romances, so far as I can recall, make no mention of either King Yder
or King Caberentin (or Cador).

Malory himself, however, at the beginning of his story of Trystram,
mentions that at that time there were two kings in Cornwall, probably
to explain how King Idres and King Mark could both be kings of
Cornwall.

A further note: in the earliest section of the Prose Tristan,
Cornouaille, Mark's kingdom, appears to be identified with Cornouaille
in Brittany rather than with the English Cornwall, as characters
reguarly travel from Cornwall to France overland, but always travel to
Britain by sea. Tristan's own country of Leonois (Malory's Lionesse),
pictured as adjoining Cornwall, is here presumably identified with the
region of Léon which borders on Cornouaille in Brittany. (In the
earlier verse romances, in the folk version, Tristan's kindom is
Loenois, not Leonois, and Loenois is simply the Norman-French name for
Lothian in what is now south-eastern Scotland. Sporadically in
Arthurian romance King Lot of Orcanie is also called King Lot of
Loenois and Orcanie.)

[PAUL GADZIKOWSKI]

Jallan <***@smrtytrek.com> wrote:
: PAUL GADZIKOWSKI wrote:
:> And I've got one for you, since you seem to have this matter at your
:> fingertips. Among the alliance of eleven of Lot in Malory is an Idres of
:> Cornwall, but in all the work the name seems only to appear in the account
:> of one battle; and after that Mark is ruler of Cornwall. But the name
:> with/or several variants appears in your list of Rience's sub-kings. In
:> what other contexts, if any, does this character appear in the pre-Malory
:> works? Thanks for any response to an idle question.
:
: Actually, I partly covered this in answer to one of your earlier
: questions in
: http://groups.google.ca/group/alt.legend.king-arthur/browse_thread/thread/a6875d88de5937ef/89e88c435ee6489b?lnk=st&q=Jallan+Cornwall&rnum=1&hl=en#89e88c435ee6489b

That'll be when I asked about all the "of Cornwall" surnames in Arthur's
legends. Thanks for the exhaustive replies.


Paul Gadzikowski, ***@iglou.com since 1995
http://www.arthurkingoftimeandspace.com New cartoons daily.
http://members.iglou.com/scarfman/new.htm Fanfiction stories and cartoons.

"It's me, I said. I'm the one who sang to you."