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This article argues that medieval retellings ofTheban legends, particularly of the war between Polynices and Eteocles, exercised a profound and sustained influence upon Arthurian tradition. The Theban themes of incest, civil war, and kin-slaying furnished a classical precedent for exploring the darker side-and destruction-of Camelot. (PB & DB)
Because the legend of Thebes enjoyed great popularity in France when many Arthurian texts were being composed, critics have long sought to unearth connections between Camelot1 and Thebes. To date, however, they have turned up only a few isolated parallels.2 In the early twentieth century, scholars investigating the Arthur-Mordred relationship sought after, but failed to find, significant borrowing from the story of Laius and Oedipus;3 subsequent editors and critics have all but dismissed the influence ofTheban legend upon Arthurian tradition.4 The standard source-studies of the relevant Arthurian works, such as the Mort Artu, do not record the influence ofTheban narratives.5 More recently, M. Victoria Guerin has pointed out a number of parallels between the Roman de Thebes and the Vulgate cycle, but even she hesitates to definitively assert a source-influence relationship.6 One reason why scholars have found so few Theban resonances in Arthurian literature is that they have mostly looked for them in the wrong places, concentrating on Oedipus and the Vulgate cycle's Mordred. Yet Oedipus is not the central protagonist of the legend of Thebes in the Middle Ages. Ultimately basing their works on Statius' Thebaid, medieval authors instead focus upon the conflict between Polynices and Eteocles, the incestuously born sons of Oedipus whose struggle to claim the rule ofThebes tears apart the kingdom. Oedipus, whose story figures so prominently in the ancient Greek legend of Thebes, barely features in the Thebaid and its medieval retellings. Once one looks beyond Oedipus to the characters, scenes, and motifs that loom largest in the medieval reworkings ofTheban legend, their extensive influence upon Arthurian texts becomes obvious. As this article will show, Theban narratives constitute one of the most important bodies of literary intertexts for the medieval Arthurian tradition.
Alongside Troy, the city-state of Thebes furnished a famous classical antecedent to which authors and audiences looked to make sense of the history of Arthur's kingdom. However, whereas connections to Troy cast a mantle of fame and legitimacy upon...