Children of King Arthur?

Question

At one point in T.H. White's novel "The Once and Future King" it says that Arthur had two illegitimate children. Obviously Mordred is one, who is the other?

I'm specifically looking for who White is alluding too - the only thing I can find in a quick search online mentions a son Lohot by Lisanor (also perhaps known as Borre with mother Lionors). It also mentions a son Gwydre, possibly by Guinevere, which could NOT be the son White is talking about, as he clearly mentions that Guinevere was childless.

Answer 1

sorry, as far as I know you've hit the other two on the head.  Myth and legend is hard to pin down because its always changing.  I've read some legends where it was actually three Guineveres Arthur married over his lifetime.  And the earliest tales have absolutely no mention of Lancelot at all, much less a love triangle.  But as for the children other than Mordred - Lohot and Gwydre are the only two I've ever heard of in legend that wasn't an modern day author's rewrite (Bernard Cornwell mentions Amhar as Loholt's twin for instance and both of them Arthur's b******s).  And since Gwydre was supposed to be the son of Guinevere - that just leaves Lohot.  I'd be curious to see if anyone comes up with anything different.

Answer 2

I believe "Gwydion" may have been a name of a son in some versions of the story?  In Mists of Avalon, though, Gwydion and Mordred were the same person.

Answer 3

T. H. White‘s Arthurian writing is almost entirely based Sir Thomas Malory (and White‘ own imagination) so the other illegitimate son is almost certainly the son of Lisanor whom Malory mentions only twice and once calls Borre and once calls Bohart.

He apparently took the name form a corrupt from in the “Vulgate Merlin'',

Lohot first appears in Chrétien de Troyes’s poem “Erec et Enide” in a list of knights. Chrétien tells us only that Lohot is son of Arthur.

Lohot is mostly famous for dying in contradictory ways.

In Ulrich von Zatzikoven’s “Lanzelet” we are told in Kenneth G. T. Webster’s translation when Queen Ginover has been abducted:

“This youth was perfect in virtues. We have seldom heard in any kind of story that there was ever a knight more courtly—and no wonder: King Arthur was his father and Ginover was his mother. This good hero, was was called Loüt the gracious bewailed his mother’s afflicton.This news was so grievous to him that he wailed aloud in his heartfelt sorrow. This grieved all the knights, for I will truly say to you that never did any young man win more renown than Loüt from the time that he began to bear a sword until he rode away, as the tale tells, with Arthur, his noble father, into a country whence the Britons still expect both of them evermore; for they quarrel about it, asserting that they will come again.''

Lohot appears again in the “Perlesavus” which can be found translated on the web by Sir Sebestian Evans as “The High History of the Holy Grail”. Lohot is first mentioned at the beginning of Branch XII (http://omacl.org/Graal/branch12.html), his beheading by Kay the Seneschal is revealed to Perceal in Branch XV (http://omacl.org/Graal/branch15.html), the news is brought to court in Branch XIX (http://omacl.org/Graal/branch19.html), in Branch XXI we learn that Queen Guenivre has died of sorrow because of Lohot's death (http://omacl.org/Graal/branch21.html) and in Branch XXIV Lancelot comes to the chapel of Avalon, apparently Avalon identified with Glastonbury, where the body of Guenievre and the head of Lohot lie in a tomb (http://omacl.org/Graal/branch24.html).

In the “Prose Lancelot'' as translated by Samuel N. Rosenberg in “Lancelot-Grail”, edited by Norris J. Lacey, Volume II, we find at 27:347, speaking of the Dolorous Tower:

“In that prison were King Yder and Guivret of Lambale and Yvain of Loenel, Cadowain of Carmurain and Kehedin the Small and Kay of Estral, Girflet the son of Doon and Dodinel the Wildman, Duke Taulas and Mador of the Gate, and Loholt the son whom King Arthur had begot with the beautiful damsel Lisanor before marrying the queen, and who became sick to death in that place; and together with them was Gaheris of Carahew; they were all captives together.” Later Lancelot, meets a hermit coming from the Dolorous Tower. He asks what the hermit was doing, and the hermit explains that he went to see two very sick knights, “and he said that they were from the house of King Arthur, one named Galegantin the Welshman, who was suffering because of what had been done to him in prison, and the other named Loholt, the son of King Arthur, who was sick with an illness he had caught there.”' Loholt is never mentioned again in this work, and we are probably intended to believe that the died of his illness in the Dolorous Tower.

From the “Vulgate Merlin'', translated by Rupert T. Pickens, in the “Lancelot-Graal”, Volume 1, The Story of Merlin, 8,124:

“And it happened that King Athur, following Merlin’s advice, became friends with a maiden, the most beautiful ever born. Her name was Lisanor, and she was the daughter of Earl Sevain, and she was born in the castle of Quimper-Corentin.

“This maiden came to swear fealty to King Arthur, and other barons came with her, because they feared that he might take their lands away, so they cam to him of their own free will. And as soon a King Arthur saw the maiden, he liked her very much, and, thanks to Merlin, he could at last talk to her alone, and they lay together all night. There Loholt was conceived: he was later a good kngiht and a companion of the Round Table. When it was mid-Lent, the king took leave of the young lady and got ready to go into the kingdom of Carmelide along with a body of forty knights.” This passage is the origin of Malory’s first mention of Borre/Bohart. The second mention is just in a list of the Knights of the Round Table near the end of his book.

When Arthur returns from Carmelide, Guenevere is his wife, and we hear nothing more of Lisanor. Of Loholt we hear in 39:356 some generally praisworthy words about Sir Kay, after which we are told:

“Nor in his life did he[Kay] ever do but one unlawful thing, that is, against Loholt, King Arthur’s son, whom he killed in the Perilous Forest, and he was accused in court by Perceval the Welshman; who had been told about it by a hermit who saw him [Kay] slay him [Loholt].”

In “Le Livre d’Artus” a variant version of the end of the “Vugate Merlin” which has never been translated into English, Arthur has a dream in which he knights his son Loholt at Loholt’s request. Thereupon Loholt goes into the forest, slays a beast, and falls asleep on the beast’s body. Kay comes by, takes a white bird from Loholt’s breast, and releases it into the air so that it can no longer be seen. Thereupon arises a mist and Arthur no longer sees Loholt’s body. Kay returns to court, but is challenged by another knight (presumably Perceval) for stealing the bird. The other knight wins, and Kay is banished from court by Arthur.

Loholt later appears as a child being brought up in Arthur’s court. We are told nothing here about his mother Lisanor.

A son of Arthur named Llacheu appears in Welsh tradition and it is suspected that he is identical in origin to Lohot.  Indeed a Welsh translation of the “Perlesvaus” translates Lohot as Llacheu. But some scholars deny the identity.

See http://www.celtnet.org.uk/gods_ll/llache... .

Other sons are ascribed to Arhur, Anir/Amhar and Gwydre in Welsh tradition and Ilinot in Wolfram von Eschenbach’s “Parzival” who was brought up by a lady Florie of Kanadic and died in her service. Wolfram often produces strange versions of Arthurian names, so Ilinot could also be Lohot.

The  Ã¢Â€ÂœPost-Vulgate Arthurian Cycle” introduces a son of Arthur begotten by rape around the same time that Galahad is begotten. He is named Arthur the Little and becomes one of the nine knights who sit at the Grail Table at the end of the Grail Quest along with Galahad, Perceval and Bors. After Arthur’s mysterious departure, Arthur the Little is slain in a battle with Bleoberis of Ganis, after which Bleoberis becomes a hermit.

Answer 4

King Arthur is a mythological character, not an actual person.