Okay But What If I Snap And Write A Full-fledged Fic Of Arthur Becoming King In S1 And How It Could Have

boy do i love te

again, ethically sourced from tumblr

Observances

Merlin/Arthur | Mature | No Archive Warnings Apply | Word Count: 373

Historical AU | Festivals | Prophecies | Second Person POV (Merlin)

For the @merlinmicrofic prompts "feast" and "new year."

Will post to Ao3 once it's back up.

Arthur's halls are decorated for the birth of the sun, Saturnalia was a sennight ago, and you saw an ominous sign this morning in the movement of the birds.

small tw: for animal (bird) death

☾ ☾ ☾

Arthur’s hall is decorated with yew branches. Up and down the benches there is elaborate food upon decorated plates of a dull silver that he told you was called pewter. His hounds whine and beg for scraps from the revellers, having grown bored of the swan wing that had been tossed to them. Now it lay on the straw strewn floor, gnarled and upsetting. 

Your eyes are on him, but everyone’s eyes are on him, they always are. Warlord, lord, king. Tonight he wears an abolla that is a red as rich as blood (and you’ve seen plenty of blood, by now). His hair and eyes are pale against the colour but not diminished by them. 

But his eyes are on you. They shouldn't be on you, not as much as they are, they need not ever be on you, but they are. You’re a servant, what’s more you are of the Silures, reviled by his father, yet his eyes have been on you since you were crowned with oak leaves for saving his life.

What a strange mix of observances that he claims as his own. 

On Saturnalia he said that you could do anything, so you sat in his lap and had him feed you figs and almonds with his fingers.

But that was a sennight ago, now above his chair there is a bower of willow and ivy, now he raises his cup and you go to his side to pour him grape wine from across the sea. 

He would put you to death for your aurgury this morning. It was the flight of the hedge sparrows that alerted you just a breath before it happened; a peregrine claimed an ouzel, too slow to retreat to the coppice, right before your eyes. There are signs in everything, you are finding, even the strange prognostications of the Romans. Ouzel cock, black druid, guide to the otherworld. Your people go unmarked in death as they do in life. There are few left, even, to cry your name. Fewer still will survive to see the spring.  

The fire is making you sweat, causing the woad staining your arms to run. 

His cup goes up, the room stills.

“The sun is reborn,” Arthur says. 

hi!! youre one of the few blogs i know of that are familiar with both the bbc show and arthuriana so i was wondering if you could point me towards texts where gawain and merlin have any sort of meaningful interaction? or is prose merlin all there is? i love their dynamic on the show and i know it's probs one of a kind in arthuriana but it would be interesting to compare and contrast :) thanks!

so far i only know of Robert de Boron's Prose Merlin for this. In that text, Merlin had lots of interactions with the teenaged Orkney siblings and especially Gawain, acting as an annoying coach to them (i.e. shapeshifting into different disguises to insult them into getting their asses together, or just messing with these royal teenagers and making them laugh.)

Welsh Myrddin did not have anything to do with Arthur and Gwalchmai in the Mabinogion either. Actually Myrrdin isn't in Mabinogion.

Myrddin and Taliesin were the only ones who had some interaction in The Black Book of Carmarthen.

In Geoffrey of Monmouth, Merlin never met Arthur and his knights. because he left Uther's court permanently after he helped Uther beget Arthur by Ygraine

Medieval French! Merlin (Robert de Boron tradition) usually just takes a backseat and disappears from the narrative once Arthur properly rules the throne after he defeats the rebelling barons.

I haven't gotten far in the Vulgate Cycle myself (it is also based on Robert de Boron's initial work). Maybe there are more there. But I have no idea yet.

In Thomas Malory, Merlin would often only appear to Knights after some tragedy happens to tell them that he knew everything all along.

I don't know much about post-Thomas Malory Arthuriana yet to tell you if there are other adaptations where Merlin is constantly involved in the (mis)adventures of Arthur's Knights either.

.....

Here's the thing we have to remember tho. Legendary Merlin is supposed to be this old wise trickster fart that everyone in King Arthur's court fears and respects (because of his powers and because he has advised and assisted many kings). If he forms some bonds with the knights then it's because he wanna mess with them or he knows something that they don't, or he has some quests for them.

It's what we have to keep in mind when looking at arthurian legends and even classic arthurian tv shows and movies.

BBC Adventures of Merlin is an anomaly because they made their Merlin into one of the youngest, and most inexperienced characters (who doesnt even have a court rank). As a result, he formed some rather interesting dynamics with characters that bore the same name as Arthurian Knights.

...

thanks for trusting me with this question. i hope you find the stories you are looking for.

you are not unloveable you are just sad and a little bit angry. let’s go have some soup

Art by Rolf Mellstrom, 1916

they were 100% joined at the hip post-finale

Late 60s Early 70s medieval revival part 1

the great thing about medieval literature is that it returns us to a time when men were men and women were women, *insert gritty realism gif here*, featuring such important and eternal gendered characteristics such as

(M) Why Would I Learn To Think Critically When I Could Find a Random Damsel In The Woods To Tell Me What To Do

(F) Demands To Be Brought The Heads Of Her Enemies

(M, to F) Be Mean To Me, No, Meaner Than That

(F) Meticulous Maintenance Of Social Connections And Alliances Via Writing Letters

(M) Crying

(M) More Crying

(M) Even More Crying, While Being Held Tenderly By Brother In Arms

(F) Necromancy

(M) Meticulous Maintenance Of Social Connections And Alliances Via Mistaking Friend’s Identity, Attacking Him, Then Kissing And Making Up

(F) Expert Medical Practitioner

(M) Self-Care By Episodes Of Madness In The Woods

(F) Owner Of Haunted Castle