O rei Artur e sua apropriação na longa duração, do rei Afonso iii, de Portugal a D. Sebastião, o Desejado

Abstract

From the thirteenth century on circulated in the Iberian Peninsula two accounts on the image of King Arthur which were appropriated for political purposes to strengthen the royal figure. The first was the chilvaric novel The Quest for the Holy Grail, written in French and translated to Portuguese in mid-century by order of the king Afonso III. The other was a chronic Navarre entitled Libro de las Generaciones (1270), which contained the genealogy of the Celtic kings, which highlights Arthur and his most characteristic attributes as warrior-king and a fair-king. In both works the predominance of these elements were inspired by the work Historia Regum Britanniae, wirtten by Geoffrey of Monmouth, in England between 1135 and 1138. The Historia Regum presents Arthur as an expansionist king, killer of two giants and conqueror of thirty kingdoms. These well-defined elements reappear in the narrative that circulated in the Iberian Peninsula. The positive attributes of Arthur were associated with King Alfonso III of Portugal and its chronic as opposed to his brother Sancho II, known as a "weak" king, according to the chronicles. Messianic elements of Arthur were also associated with king John I and also to his military commander Nuno Alvares Pereira. The association between Arthur and an ideal king is also connected with the image of king Sebastian, who died at the Battle of Alcazarquivir (1578). To this day, some poor people in Brazil, as the inhabitants of the Lençois Island in the state of Maranhão, still believe in d. Sebastião’s return to bring an era of prosperity and wealth, myth that is associated with the messianic character of King Arthur.