Caerleon

Caerleon, called Carlion in the narrative, is an Arthurian court city whose identity is complicated by the book’s deliberately unstable geography. The preface identifies it with Caerleon-upon-Usk, yet also observes that the story treats Carlion, Carlisle, Cardoile, and Camelot as places that can blur or substitute for one another. Caerleon therefore matters both as a named setting in Arthur’s story and as a revealing example of how the romance rearranges geography to serve its narrative.

Identity and Place in the Romance

The preface says that after Uther’s death, the Lords and Commons assembled at London’s greatest church and elected Arthur king. In the ensuing wars against Cornwall, Wales, and the North, Arthur made Carlion, Camelot, or both his headquarters. The alternatives are not resolved: the account presents Caerleon as one of the centers of Arthur’s rule while acknowledging that the narrative does not maintain a consistent distinction between it and Camelot.

The Narrative Geography

In the preface’s account of the story’s movements, the action passes from near Tintagil to St. Alban’s and London, then to Carlion. The editor identifies this last place as Caerleon-upon-Usk, but stresses that it seems interchangeable in Malory’s mind with Carlisle or Cardoile. The History of Merlin places Cardoile in Wales, while other romances similarly conflate Wales and Cumberland. Caerleon thus belongs to a map in which names and locations shift rather than forming a stable itinerary.

The contents also place Arthur’s ride to Carlion alongside his dream and his sighting of the Questing Beast. That association gives the city a role in the romance’s sequence of courtly and marvelous episodes, even though the supplied account does not describe the city itself in that episode. Elsewhere the contents refer to Arthur’s hall as the setting for a feast attended by kings, princes, and Round Table knights, followed by the arrival of Roman ambassadors; this passage establishes the royal court’s political function but does not explicitly locate that hall at Caerleon.

Caerleon and Camelot

The preface traces competing identifications of Camelot. Caxton’s preface appears to place Camelot in Wales, probably meaning Caerleon, where the Roman amphitheatre was still called Arthur’s Round Table. Malory, however, seems at one point to connect Camelot with Avelion or Glastonbury, and elsewhere identifies it as Winchester, which also had a Round Table associated with Arthur. These references make Caerleon one of several claimants to Camelot’s narrative identity, not a securely exclusive location.

The preface distinguishes these literary associations from a Somerset place that existed under the name Camelot. It describes the site later known as Cadbury Castle as a substantial town and fortress, with earthworks and walls enclosing a central area of about thirty acres; Roman pavements, urns, coins, and other remains had been found there. Leland called it Camallate or Camalat and described its position on a hill and its natural strength. Maps from 1575 and 1610 called it the Castle of Camellek, and a 1727 edition of Camden reported that local inhabitants called it King Arthur’s Palace. The editor notes that the name was later superseded by Cadbury Castle. This material concerns the competing historical and antiquarian identifications of Camelot; it does not establish that the Somerset site was Caerleon.

Narrative and Historical Significance

The preface warns that, apart from one geographical connection it accepts, the geography of Arthur’s campaigns is fanciful. It describes the narrative as requiring a disregard of time and distance to move successively among places such as Caerleon, Carlisle, Winchester, London, St. Alban’s, and Camelot. Caerleon’s shifting relation to Camelot is part of that larger pattern: the romance draws on recognizable place-names but does not bind them to a consistent historical map.

The city consequently occupies two registers at once. Within the story, Carlion is a possible headquarters and a stop in Arthur’s movement through the realm; in the preface, Caerleon is also an object of geographical correction and comparison, set against the competing traditions surrounding Camelot. The uncertainty is not resolved by the supplied evidence, and that uncertainty is itself central to understanding the place’s role in the book.