Legends of Arthur: Arthur the King

An idea for a youing Arthur -  scnadanavian influenced.

Not surprisingly, I've been giving a bit of thought to who or rather how my Arthur will be.

I suppose one of the most significant features of Arthur, especially when it comes to combat is his link to his mythical and magical sword, Excalibur.

I want my skirmish wargames in the age of Arthur to be mythical more than fantastic, so a sprinkling of the magical will be required to be sure ... but not too much. So, what about Arthur?

The foremost legendary fighter of the times was supposed to be Lancelot and then a swag of his grail knights or those more broadly of the Round Table. Arthur was a champion in his own (especially in his youth) but it was Excalibur which gave him the legendary edge.

As my knights are essentially rooted in the twelfth century, they will all be using single-handed arming swords, I think my Arthur will have a hand-and-a-half 'great sword'. I'm not sure how this will translate into any particular rule system but I'm thinking greater damage with a tendency for my King to wield it two-handed. Perhaps it will provide a degree of magical protection affording the same save as a shield armed knight.

If my Arthur model is the only one armed as such, that will make him stand out further on my table-top.

How shall he be armoured? Well, I'm sticking with the full maille of the period and fur lined cloak but the real question rests on how his helm is depicted. Actually, I'll go with scale armour if I can - more of this later. Historically, from what I can observe is you want to know how English kings were equipped for battle, you need to look at their Great Seals. On one side sits the king on the throne with orb, scepter and crown as law giver. On the obverse is the king mounted for battle as defender, protector of the realm. It is not until King Henry III in the thirteenth century that we see the first crowned great helms. All previous depictions of English Kings have helms without crowns (including the most famous warrior King of all - Richard the Lion-Heart).

An idea for when Arthur is a young King
with an anotyomic face shield of a wise or older bearded man.

So, it looks like my Arthur will similarly have a helmet uncrowned - maybe, or at least an earlier version will be.

Newell's Arthur

Of all the imagery which exists for the legendary King Arthur, I'm fondest of all of those illustrations by the early twentieth century American, Newell Convers Wyeth which he produced for Sidney Lanier's "The Boy's King Arthur" (1922). He depicted an anachronistic looking King compared to those around him, in a high arching spanghelm with maille aventail and crowned with a golden dragon. So I'm drawing heavily on this and bringing it up to the twelfth century - a little.

It will be a challenge to represent this in 28mm.