If we assume that Arthur was a real person (perhaps you can come to your own conclusions whilst navigating this site) then this then raises another question of who this elusive character was. As mentioned in Did he exist, there is little evidence in terms of documented facts of the time due to shifts in power and a lack of records due to plague and war.

Upon investigating it was clear that Arthur is a man of many faces; many identities. In "The Figure of Arthur", Barber debates the identity of Arthur and mentions ideas such as Arthur the ‘Political Hero’ and Arthur ‘The National Messiah’. In another book he describes ‘Arthur the Emperor’.

There is little evidence from the historical texts to give us any indication of who this man Arthur was except that he was a man of great courage and bravery. As Morris (1977) describes:

"He remains a mighty shadow, a figure looming large behind every record of his time, yet never clearly seen.". (Morris 1977:116)

It is clear in Morris’ work that he believes that there was once a real Arthur and that:

"This central feature of the legend, the portrait of the strong just ruler whose good government was overthrown by the jealous ambition of lesser lords, is fully historical." (Morris 1977: 116)

He only really writes one line to back up this claim, however, and this is that he trusts Gildas’ account. This is baffling as Gildas, although he is talking about the time in which Arthur supposedly lived, does not mention Arthur at any time.

There is a mention of the ‘King of the Britons’ in 468AD where it is said that he crossed to Gaul with twelve thousand troops. Some historians believe this ‘king’ to be Arthur although believing the title to be honorary. Some have tried to explain the title away by saying it simply meant he was a ‘Breton’ or a chief of immigrants in Brittany. This idea has been disputed, however, because there is little evidence to suggest that there were many immigrants at the time.

Another name that has been given to this ‘King of Britons’ is Riothamus which means ‘supreme king’ or ‘supremely royal’. This is interesting as Riothamus is a historical character or, in other words, he did actually exist. There have been claims that this Riothamus was actually Arthur and is, perhaps, an idea that was used by Geoffrey of Monmouth.