540AD revisited.
bump for later read.
The hit song of 540 was "The knights around the table go round and round."
It's hard to talk about King Arthur because it's hard to seperate the legend from the fact. Apparently, there was a King Arthur in real life.
Last I heard, Arthur was fictional. Perhaps he went up to ride the comet's tail.
Now, over that, the close approach of a comet would pretty well explain why the death rate in France was much higher than in Italy, Spain or Brittain.
Blam, is there any actual written record to back up what the tree rings seem to indicate?
We dine well here in Camelot
We eat ham and jam and Spam a lot
We're Knights of the Round Table
Our shows are formidable
But many times we're given rhymes
That are quite unsingable
We're opera-mad in Camelot
We sing from the diaphragm a lo-o-o-o-t
In war we're tough and able
Quite indefatigable
Between our quests, we sequin vests
And impersonate Clark Gable
It's a busy life in Camelot I have to push the pram a lot
"Dr Baillie said that there were several theories as to the explanation. One was that a vast volcano had erupted and pumped huge amounts of dust into the atmosphere. Yet such a volcano "would have been out of all proportion to ones we see in recent times", he said, adding that the geological records bore no trace of it."
The book Krakatoa by Simon Winchestor does suggest that this event was an eruption of the same volcano. I don't remember all the details but he was pretty convincing. I really recommend the book btw.
ping
Is this thread prompted by the comet shards coming by earth in a month or so? Supposedly it will all miss, but some by less. Somebody on the overnight radio said something like three chunks could hit earth, although the rest of the 17 pieces are strung out and would have to miss because of orbital geometry.
bump for later read
I have always placed the death of Arthur closer to 500, myself. Counts what authority you listen to.
Beyond that, this sort of conflates the death of Arthur with Merlin's confrontation with Vortigern near the end of his reign, and also the fall of Uther, and several other tales that involve comets...very common in Celtic mythology. Buy a copy of the Mabinogeon and Monmouth's History of the Kings of Britain and see how many stories use comets as signs.
It's Bush's fault. FEMA was inept and could have avoided the Dark Ages according to Howard Dean.
"THE story of the death of King Arthur and its references to a wasteland may have been inspired by the apocalyptic effects of a giant comet bombarding the Earth in AD540, leading to the Dark Ages, a British scientist said yesterday."
I have to put on my aluminum hat to read and understand this one!!
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Knights who say, "ni" ping.
A "dendrochronology" ping.
(1) all societal events are not caused by environmental change. Greens, get a life and learn even the tiniest bit of history.
(2) Arthur is a legend, not an historical figure. The first tales about him date from around the 8th century, and the full story appears only in the 11th. Many elements are identifiably Norman in the later versions.
(3) The wasteland and rebirth of it stuff is all pagan theology not history. It is tied to tales of great kings because the original function of kings was magical-mystical, not military-political. The specific rites involved have been traced back to first millenia BC central and eastern Europe, and cannot possibly have originated 750 years later on the other side of the continent. For that matter, in their eastern European forms they are probably imports from the near east reflecting much older - thousands of years older - stuff also seen in the high civilizations (Egypt, Babylon, etc).
(4) The dark ages were already well under way long before 540 AD. Adrianople, when the Goths achieved military ascendency over the Roman armies, was in 378 AD. (For that matter, the "Roman" army had been becoming progressively more German in actual composition for nearly 200 years at that point). Alaric's sack of Rome was in 410. Major political events have major historical, civilizational effects, without any sky is falling horsefeathers.
