Coel, King of Rheged, is the original of the Old King Cole of the nursery rhymes. We are told that Hueil, one of the nineteen sons of Caw of Strathclyde, was much disliked by Arthur. Another of the sons, Gildas the monk, seems to have returned this dislike. It is he who, in 540 A.D., wrote The Loss and Conquest of Britain, without once mentioning Arthur by name, though he refers to the Battle of Badon Hill, the last of Arthur's twelve great battles, in which he broke the Saxon power. From the tone of Gildas' book it is to be inferred that, if Arthur was a Christian at all, his Christianity went no further than lip-service. At any rate he was no friend to the monks.
Caliburn is the most pronounceable of the names for Arthur's sword, which was later romanticized as Excalibur. White was Arthur's colour; his white hound, Cabal, has a place in legend. Canrith means “white phantom.”
It will be seen from these necessarily sketchy notes that any given episode of my story may — to quote Geoffrey Ashe again — "be taken as fact or imagination or religious allegory or all three at once." In this, if in nothing else, it is wholly true to its time.
— M.S.
November 1970 — November 1972
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mary Stewart, one of the most popular novelists writing today, was born in Sunderland, County Durham, England. Her father was a clergyman of the Church of England, her mother a descendant of the first New Zealand pioneers.
After boarding-school, she received a B.A. with first class honours in English Language and Literature from Durham University and went on for her M.A. Later she returned to her own University as a Lecturer in English. She married a geologist, F. H. Stewart, who is now Regius Professor of Geology at Edinburgh University and a Fellow of the Royal Society. He is Chairman of the Natural Environment Research Council and a member of the Advisory Board of the Research Councils.
Mrs. Stewart's career as a novelist began in 1954 with the publication of Madam, Will You Talk? Since then she has published thirteen successful novels, including The Crystal Cave and The Hollow Hills, her two magical books about the legendary enchanter Merlin and the young Arthur. Her first book for young readers, The Little Broomstick, was published in 1971 and quickly met with the same success as her other novels. In 1968, she was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. In 1971, the Scottish Chapter of the International PEN Association awarded her the Frederick Niven prize for The Crystal Cave.