As you may know "The Witcher" game is based on Andrzej Sapkowski's work as a novelist. He wrote short stories which were gathered and published in two tomes, and five novels (The Witcher Saga as readers call it) describing Geralt's adventures in time of disdain - war with Nifgaard.
One book amongst his other publishings (short stories, fantasy compendium, Silesian medieval fantasy trilogy), and book I think really is underestimated in Poland, is "Swiat krola Artura" - "King Arthur's World" in English. Sapkowski took a role as a guide to mythic Britannia and presented us archetypes, many versions of king's legend, explained some imprecision in a manner which doesn't let us stop reading. But I don't want to focus on a book but rather on one topic from it - magic sword Excalibur.
So what Mr. Andrzej dug out from his researches about this blade?
In "Mabinogion" - Welsh old story - the sword is named Caledvwlch, which translate to Crushing or Steel Cutting. In Geoffrey from Monmouth version it's a Calibur, later in "Vulgate" renamed to Excalibur explaining that in Hebrew it means Cutting Iron And Steel (similar to Welsh translation). And most important thing which caused me to post this on blog is one of mistaken beliefs that Excalibur was liberated from stone, and is a Latin "ex calce liberare". Wrong. This is not that sword. Excalibur was a gift from Lady of the Lake.
And I may add as a curiosity that Arthur was a proud owner of magic lance Rhongomynyad, Carnwenan short sword and Wynebgwrthucher shield. Even magic cauldrons and invisibility cloak.
So why the conscience word in blog's topic? Well, a few years ago I was on fantasy and sci fi convention and was participating in fantasy trivia. I was asked to name, owners of three magic swords. First Andúril (Aragorn), second Gryswandir (Corwin - Amber prince), and third Excalibur (Lady of the Lake). Wait. What? Not king Arthur? I knew that I will score zero points but I couldn't resist. The answer was right with my conscience.
Comments
The Witcher does sound interesting, shall have to look it up.
I like Arthur too, he is certainly on eof my most favorite historical figures.
I bet the game is great but the performance, poor voice acting and embarrassing dialogues just make me keep this game on the shelf (thankfully I got it free with new LCD)
So anyways, people wanting to experience The Witcher should get the European Version of the game, not just because of the naked ladies, but because the a gem like this should only be appreciated the way it was originally meant to be. Plus you get to see naked ladies. JK
great blog!
Interesting stuff! Never heard of this author before.
You suddenly aroused my curiousity with this post. Had I known someone like you was tracking me sooner, well, it doesn't matter. That's an excellent post, I enjoyed it. So now I've even been educated about Excalibur. That's rad.I'd play the Witcher, but as it stands, my PC can't really handle new games. If there's a 360 port I'll be sure to be all over it.
Sharvie