Talk:Gododdin

King Arthur and the Gododdin
Alistair Moffat makes a good case for King Arthur being from the Gododdin. Specifically, he points out Roxbourgh Castle, near Kelso. In that time it was called "Marchidun." This makes perfect sense as far as placement, the Saxons were less of a problem than the Picts and the southern Britains were not skilled or experienced in warfare compared to the Men of the Old North. It also makes sense as far as "Pen Dragon," because the Sarmatian cavalry was situated in the area. Not to mention the fact that these could easily make up the majority of knights in the stories, and that many of Arthur's ancestors were from this area of Britain. The oldest mention of Arthur is in "Y Gododdin," and many places in north Wales were settled by these people, leading to the connection of Wales with Arthur. There is much more in his book, "Arthur and the Lost Kingdoms." -G.T.N.

There were more kings than these. Leuodenus was "Lot," who later became part of Arthurian legend, and his son was Gwalchmai, later Gawain. See this site. ---G.T.N. (talk) 15:56, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

North-eastern Britain?
I was about to make a change directly, but thought it may be contentious (for some), so am raising the issue here first. Gododdin is described as being in "north-eastern Britain (modern north-east England and south-east Scotland)". The bit in parentheses is uncontroversial, I would think, but from an objective standpoint (whether you take the northern isles to be part of Britain or not), it is a bit of a stretch to describe this as north-eastern Britain. The eastern part is just about acceptable, though I suspect that more of mainland Britain lies strictly to the east of the centre of Gododdin than to its west. Gododdin was at least on the east coast, though. The north part, however, can only have come from an anglo-centric worldview, in my opinion. Given that Newcastle is roughly half-way between the north and south of the British mainland, it seems to me that, at best, Gododdin can be said to have been just north of the middle of Britain. It certainly wasn't in the north east, any more than North Yorkshire, say, is in the south east.

Axnicho (talk) 09:15, 9 May 2009 (UTC)