Merlin - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Merlin is a legendary figure best known as the wizard

Magician (fantasy)

A magician, mage, sorcerer, sorceress, wizard, enchanter, enchantress, thaumaturge or a person known under one of many other possible terms is someone who uses or practices magic that derives from supernatural or occult sources...

featured in the Arthurian legend. The standard depiction of the character first appears in Geoffrey of Monmouth

Geoffrey of Monmouth

Geoffrey of Monmouth was a cleric and one of the major figures in the development of British historiography and the popularity of tales of King Arthur...

's Historia Regum Britanniae

Historia Regum Britanniae

The Historia Regum Britanniae is a pseudohistorical account of British history, written c. 1136 by Geoffrey of Monmouth. It chronicles the lives of the kings of the Britons in a chronological narrative spanning a time of two thousand years, beginning with the Trojans founding the British nation...

, written c. 1136, and is based on an amalgamation of previous historical and legendary figures. Geoffrey combined existing stories of Myrddin Wyllt

Myrddin Wyllt

Myrddin Wyllt , Merlinus Caledonensis or Merlin Sylvestris is a figure in medieval Welsh legend, known as a prophet and a madman...

(Merlinus Caledonensis), a North Brythonic

Hen Ogledd

Yr Hen Ogledd is a Welsh term used by scholars to refer to those parts of what is now northern England and southern Scotland in the years between 500 and the Viking invasions of c. 800, with particular interest in the Brythonic-speaking peoples who lived there.The term is derived from heroic...

prophet

Prophet

In religion, a prophet, from the Greek word προφήτης profitis meaning "foreteller", is an individual who is claimed to have been contacted by the supernatural or the divine, and serves as an intermediary with humanity, delivering this newfound knowledge from the supernatural entity to other people...

and madman with no connection to King Arthur

King Arthur

King Arthur is a legendary British leader of the late 5th and early 6th centuries, who, according to Medieval histories and romances, led the defence of Britain against Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and...

, with tales of the Romano-British

Romano-British

Romano-British culture describes the culture that arose in Britain under the Roman Empire following the Roman conquest of AD 43 and the creation of the province of Britannia. It arose as a fusion of the imported Roman culture with that of the indigenous Britons, a people of Celtic language and...

war leader Ambrosius Aurelianus

Ambrosius Aurelianus

Ambrosius Aurelianus, ; called Aurelius Ambrosius in the Historia Regum Britanniae and elsewhere, was a war leader of the Romano-British who won an important battle against the Anglo-Saxons in the 5th century, according to Gildas...

to form the composite figure he called Merlin Ambrosius .

Geoffrey's rendering of the character was immediately popular, especially in Wales

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

. Later writers expanded the account to produce a fuller image of the wizard. Merlin's traditional biography casts him as a cambion

Cambion

In medieval legend, a cambion is the half-human offspring of the union between a human male and a succubus, or of an incubus and a human female.-Creation:...

: born of a mortal woman, sired by an incubus

Incubus

An incubus is a male demon that has sexual intercourse with sleeping women.Incubus may also refer to:- Film :* Incubus , a film in Esperanto starring William Shatner* Incubus , a horror film starring Tara Reid...

, the non-human wellspring from whom he inherits his supernatural powers and abilities. The name of Merlin's mother is not usually stated, but is given as Adhan in the oldest version of the Prose Brut. Merlin matures to an ascendant sagehood and engineers the birth of Arthur through magic and intrigue. Later authors have Merlin serve as the king's advisor until he is bewitched and imprisoned by the Lady of the Lake

Lady of the Lake

The Lady of the Lake is the name of several related characters who play parts in the Arthurian legend. These characters' roles include giving King Arthur his sword Excalibur, enchanting Merlin, and raising Lancelot after the death of his father...

Name and etymology

The name "Merlin" derives from the Welsh

Welsh language

Welsh is a member of the Brythonic branch of the Celtic languages spoken natively in Wales, by some along the Welsh border in England, and in Y Wladfa...

Myrddin, the name of the bard Myrddin Wyllt

Myrddin Wyllt

Myrddin Wyllt , Merlinus Caledonensis or Merlin Sylvestris is a figure in medieval Welsh legend, known as a prophet and a madman...

, one of the chief sources for the later legendary figure. Geoffrey of Monmouth

Geoffrey of Monmouth

Geoffrey of Monmouth was a cleric and one of the major figures in the development of British historiography and the popularity of tales of King Arthur...

Latinised

Latinisation (literature)

Latinisation is the practice of rendering a non-Latin name in a Latin style. It is commonly met with for historical personal names, with toponyms, or for the standard binomial nomenclature of the life sciences. It goes further than Romanisation, which is the writing of a word in the Latin alphabet...

the name to Merlinus in his works. The medievalist Gaston Paris

Gaston Paris

Bruno Paulin Gaston Paris , known as Gaston Paris, was a French writer and scholar.He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1901, 1902 and 1903.-Biography:Paris was born at Avenay...

suggests that Geoffrey chose the form Merlinus rather than the regular Merdinus to avoid a resemblance to the Anglo-Norman

Anglo-Norman language

Anglo-Norman is the name traditionally given to the kind of Old Norman used in England and to some extent elsewhere in the British Isles during the Anglo-Norman period....

word merde, for faeces

Feces

Feces, faeces, or fæces is a waste product from an animal's digestive tract expelled through the anus or cloaca during defecation.-Etymology:...

.

The Celticist A. O. H. Jarman suggests the Welsh name (ˈmərðɪn) was derived from the toponym Caerfyrddin, the Welsh name for the town known in English as Carmarthen

Carmarthen

Carmarthen is a community in, and the county town of, Carmarthenshire, Wales. It is sited on the River Towy north of its mouth at Carmarthen Bay. In 2001, the population was 14,648....

. This contrasts with the popular but false folk etymology that the town was named for the bard. The name Carmarthen derives from the town's previous Roman name, Moridunum

Moridunum (Carmarthen)

Moridunum was a Roman fort and town in the Roman province of Britannia. Today it is known as Carmarthen, located in the Welsh county of Carmarthenshire .-Fort:...

Geoffrey's sources

Geoffrey's composite Merlin is based primarily on Myrddin Wyllt

Myrddin Wyllt

Myrddin Wyllt , Merlinus Caledonensis or Merlin Sylvestris is a figure in medieval Welsh legend, known as a prophet and a madman...

, also called Merlinus Caledonensis, and Aurelius Ambrosius, a mostly fictionalised version of the historical war leader Ambrosius Aurelianus

Ambrosius Aurelianus

. The former had nothing to do with Arthur and lived long before the Arthurian period. According to lore, he was a bard driven mad after witnessing the horrors of war, who fled civilisation to become a wild man of the wood

Wild man

The wild man is a mythical figure that appears in the artwork and literature of medieval Europe, comparable to the satyr or faun type in classical mythology and to Silvanus, the Roman god of the woodlands.The defining characteristic of the figure is its "wildness"; from the 12th century...

in the 6th century. Geoffrey had this individual in mind when he wrote his earliest surviving work, the Prophetiae Merlini (Prophecies of Merlin

Prophecy of Merlin

Prophecy of Merlin , sometimes called The Prophecy of Ambrosius Merlin concerning the Seven Kings, is a 12th-century poem written in Latin hexameters by John of Cornwall, which he claimed was based or revived from a lost manuscript in the Cornish language. The original manuscript is unique and...

), which he claimed were the actual words of the legendary madman.

Geoffrey's Prophetiae do not reveal much about Merlin's background. When he included the prophet in his next work, Historia Regum Britanniae, he supplemented the characterisation by attributing to him stories about Aurelius Ambrosius, taken from Nennius

Nennius

Nennius was a Welsh monk of the 9th century.He has traditionally been attributed with the authorship of the Historia Brittonum, based on the prologue affixed to that work, This attribution is widely considered a secondary tradition....

' Historia Brittonum. According to Nennius, Ambrosius was discovered when the British king Vortigern

Vortigern

Vortigern , also spelled Vortiger and Vortigen, was a 5th-century warlord in Britain, a leading ruler among the Britons. His existence is considered likely, though information about him is shrouded in legend. He is said to have invited the Saxons to settle in Kent as mercenaries to aid him in...

was trying to erect a tower. The tower always collapsed before completion, and his wise men told him the only solution was to sprinkle the foundation with the blood of a child born without a father. Ambrosius was rumoured to be such a child, but when brought before the king, he revealed the real reason for the tower's collapse: below the foundation was a lake containing two dragon

Dragon

A dragon is a legendary creature, typically with serpentine or reptilian traits, that feature in the myths of many cultures. There are two distinct cultural traditions of dragons: the European dragon, derived from European folk traditions and ultimately related to Greek and Middle Eastern...

s who destroyed the tower by fighting. Geoffrey retells this story in Historia Regum Britanniæ with some embellishments, and gives the fatherless child the name of the prophetic bard, Merlin. He keeps this new figure separate from Aurelius Ambrosius, and to disguise his changing of Nennius, he simply states that Ambrosius was another name for Merlin. He goes on to add new episodes that tie Merlin into the story of King Arthur and his predecessors.

Geoffrey dealt with Merlin again in his third work, Vita Merlini

Vita Merlini

Vita Merlini, or The Life of Merlin, is a work by the Norman-Welsh author Geoffrey of Monmouth, composed in Latin around AD 1150. It retells incidents from the life of the Brythonic seer Merlin, and is based on traditional material about him....

. He based the Vita on stories of the original 6th-century Myrddin. Though set long after his time frame for the life of "Merlin Ambrosius", he tries to assert the characters are the same with references to King Arthur and his death as told in the Historia Regum Britanniae.

Merlin Ambrosius, or Myrddin Emrys

Geoffrey's account of Merlin Ambrosius' early life in the Historia Regum Britanniae is based on the story of Ambrosius in the Historia Brittonum. He adds his own embellishments to the tale, which he sets in Carmarthen

Carmarthen

Carmarthen is a community in, and the county town of, Carmarthenshire, Wales. It is sited on the River Towy north of its mouth at Carmarthen Bay. In 2001, the population was 14,648....

, Wales

Wales

(Welsh: Caerfyrddin). While Nennius' Ambrosius eventually reveals himself to be the son of a Roman

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

consul

Consul

Consul was the highest elected office of the Roman Republic and an appointive office under the Empire. The title was also used in other city states and also revived in modern states, notably in the First French Republic...

, Geoffrey's Merlin is begotten on a king's daughter by an incubus. The story of Vortigern's tower is essentially the same; the underground dragons, one white and one red, represent the Saxons and the British, and their final battle is a portent of things to come.

At this point Geoffrey inserts a long section of Merlin's prophecies, taken from his earlier Prophetiae Merlini. He tells only two further tales of the character. In the first, Merlin creates Stonehenge

Stonehenge

Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument located in the English county of Wiltshire, about west of Amesbury and north of Salisbury. One of the most famous sites in the world, Stonehenge is composed of a circular setting of large standing stones set within earthworks...

as a burial place for Aurelius Ambrosius. In the second, Merlin's magic enables Uther Pendragon

Uther Pendragon

Uther Pendragon is a legendary king of sub-Roman Britain and the father of King Arthur.A few minor references to Uther appear in Old Welsh poems, but his biography was first written down by Geoffrey of Monmouth in his Historia Regum Britanniae , and Geoffrey's account of the character was used in...

to enter into Tintagel

Tintagel

Tintagel is a civil parish and village situated on the Atlantic coast of Cornwall, United Kingdom. The population of the parish is 1,820 people, and the area of the parish is ....

in disguise and father his son Arthur with his enemy's wife, Igraine

Igraine

Igraine , in Arthurian legend, is the mother of King Arthur. She is also known in Latin as Igerna, in Welsh as Eigyr, in French as Igerne, in Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur as Ygrayne— often modernized as Igraine—and in Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival as Arnive...

. These episodes appear in many later adaptations of Geoffrey's account. As Lewis Thorpe

Lewis Thorpe

Lewis Thorpe B.A. L.-ès-L. Ph.D D. de l'U FIAL FRSA FRHistS was a British philologist, translator, and husband of the Italian scholar and lexicographer Barbara Reynolds. He died on 10 October 1977....

notes, Merlin disappears from the narrative after this; he does not tutor and advise Arthur as in later versions.

Later adaptations of the legend

Several decades later, the poet Robert de Boron

Robert de Boron

Robert de Boron was a French poet of the late 12th and early 13th centuries who is most notable as the author of the poems Joseph d'Arimathe and Merlin.-Work:...

retold this material in his poem Merlin. Only a few lines of the poem have survived, but a prose retelling became popular and was later incorporated into two other romances. In Robert's account, as in Geoffrey's Historia, Merlin is begotten by a demon on a virgin as an intended Antichrist

Antichrist

The term or title antichrist, in Christian theology, refers to a leader who fulfills Biblical prophecies concerning an adversary of Christ, while resembling him in a deceptive manner...

. This plot is thwarted when the expectant mother informs her confessor Blaise of her predicament; they immediately baptize the boy at birth, thus freeing him from the power of Satan. The demonic legacy invests Merlin with a preternatural knowledge of the past and present, which is supplemented by God, who gives the boy a prophetic knowledge of the future.

Robert de Boron lays great emphasis on Merlin's power to shapeshift, on his joking personality, and on his connection to the Holy Grail

Holy Grail

The Holy Grail is a sacred object figuring in literature and certain Christian traditions, most often identified with the dish, plate, or cup used by Jesus at the Last Supper and said to possess miraculous powers...

. This text introduces Merlin's master Blaise, who is pictured as writing down Merlin's deeds, explaining how they came to be known and preserved. Robert was inspired by Wace

Wace

Wace was a Norman poet, who was born in Jersey and brought up in mainland Normandy , ending his career as Canon of Bayeux.-Life:...

's Roman de Brut

Roman de Brut

Roman de Brut or Brut is a verse literary history of Britain by the poet Wace. Written in the Norman language, it consists of 14,866 lines....

, an Anglo-Norman

Anglo-Norman language

Anglo-Norman is the name traditionally given to the kind of Old Norman used in England and to some extent elsewhere in the British Isles during the Anglo-Norman period....

adaptation of Geoffrey's Historia. Robert's poem was rewritten in prose in the 12th century as the Estoire de Merlin, also called the Vulgate or Prose Merlin. It was originally attached to a cycle of prose versions of Robert's poems, which tells the story of the Holy Grail

Holy Grail

: brought from the Middle East

Middle East

The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...

to Britain by followers of Joseph of Arimathea

Joseph of Arimathea

Joseph of Arimathea was, according to the Gospels, the man who donated his own prepared tomb for the burial of Jesus after Jesus' Crucifixion. He is mentioned in all four Gospels.-Gospel references:...

, the Grail is eventually recovered by Arthur's knight Percival

Percival

Percival or Perceval is one of King Arthur's legendary Knights of the Round Table. In Welsh literature his story is allotted to the historical Peredur...

.

The Prose Merlin contains many instances of Merlin's shapeshifting. He appears as a woodcutter with an axe about his neck, big shoes, a torn coat, bristly hair, and a large beard. He is later found in the forest of Northumberland by a follower of Uther's disguised as an ugly man and tending a great herd of beasts. He then appears first as a handsome man and then as a beautiful boy. Years later, he approaches Arthur disguised as a peasant wearing leather boots, a wool coat, a hood, and a belt of knotted sheepskin. He is described as tall, black and bristly, and as seeming cruel and fierce. Finally, he appears as an old man with a long beard, short and hunchbacked, in an old torn woolen coat, who carries a club and drives a multitude of beasts before him (Loomis, 1927).

The Prose Merlin later came to serve as a sort of prequel to the vast Lancelot-Grail

Lancelot-Grail

The Lancelot–Grail, also known as the Prose Lancelot, the Vulgate Cycle, or the Pseudo-Map Cycle, is a major source of Arthurian legend written in French. It is a series of five prose volumes that tell the story of the quest for the Holy Grail and the romance of Lancelot and Guinevere...

, also known as the Vulgate Cycle. The authors of that work expanded it with the Vulgate Suite du Merlin (Vulgate Merlin Continuation), which describes King Arthur's early adventures. The Prose Merlin was also used as a prequel to the later Post-Vulgate Cycle

Post-Vulgate Cycle

The Post-Vulgate Cycle is one of the major Old French prose cycles of Arthurian literature. It is essentially a rehandling of the earlier Vulgate Cycle , with much left out and much added, including characters and scenes from the Prose Tristan.The Post-Vulgate, written probably between 1230 and...

, the authors of which added their own continuation, the Huth Merlin or Post-Vulgate Suite du Merlin.

In the Livre d'Artus, Merlin enters Rome in the form of a huge stag with a white fore-foot. He bursts into the presence of Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar

Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....

and tells the emperor that only the wild man of the woods can interpret the dream that has been troubling him. Later, he returns in the form of a black, shaggy man, barefoot, with a torn coat. In another episode, he decides to do something that will be spoken of forever. Going into the forest of Brocéliande

Brocéliande

Brocéliande is the name of a legendary forest that first appears in literature in 1160, in the Roman de Rou, a verse chronicle written by Wace....

, he transforms himself into a herdsman carrying a club and wearing a wolf-skin and leggings. He is large, bent, black, lean, hairy and old, and his ears hang down to his waist. His head is as big as a buffalo's, his hair is down to his waist, he has a hump on his back, his feet and hands are backwards, he's hideous, and is over 18 feet tall. By his arts, he calls a herd of deer to come and graze around him (Loomis, 1927).

These works were adapted and translated into several other languages. The Post-Vulgate Suite was the inspiration for the early parts of Sir Thomas Malory

Thomas Malory

Sir Thomas Malory was an English writer, the author or compiler of Le Morte d'Arthur. The antiquary John Leland as well as John Bale believed him to be Welsh, but most modern scholars, beginning with G. L...

's English language

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

Le Morte d'Arthur

Le Morte d'Arthur is a compilation by Sir Thomas Malory of Romance tales about the legendary King Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot, and the Knights of the Round Table...

. Many later medieval works also deal with the Merlin legend. The Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

The Prophecies of Merlin contains long prophecies of Merlin (mostly concerned with 13th-century Italian politics), some by his ghost after his death. The prophecies are interspersed with episodes relating Merlin's deeds and with various Arthurian adventures in which Merlin does not appear at all. The earliest English verse romance concerning Merlin is Arthour and Merlin, which drew from the chronicles and the French Lancelot-Grail.

As the Arthurian myths were retold and embellished, Merlin's prophetic aspects were sometimes de-emphasised in favour of portraying him as a wizard and elder advisor to Arthur. On the other hand, in the Lancelot-Grail

Lancelot-Grail

it is said that Merlin was never baptized and never did any good in his life, only evil. Medieval Arthurian tales abound in inconsistencies.

A manuscript found in Bath from the 1420s simply records a "Merlyn" as having helped Uther Pendragon

Uther Pendragon

with his "sotelness" or subtleness, presumably but not necessarily magic. His role could be embellished and added to that of Aurelianus Ambrosius, or he could be made into one of old Uther's favourite advisors and naught more.

In the Lancelot-Grail and later accounts, Merlin's eventual downfall came from his lusting after a huntress named Niviane

Lady of the Lake

(or Nymue, Nimue, Niniane, Nyneue, or Viviane in some versions of the legend), who was the daughter of the king of Northumberland. In the Suite du Merlin, for example, Niviane is about to depart from Arthur's court, but, with some encouragement from Merlin, Arthur asks her to stay in his castle with the queen. During her stay, Merlin falls in love with her and desires her. Niviane, frightened that Merlin might take advantage of her with his spells, swears that she will never love him unless he swears to teach her all of his magic. Merlin consents, unaware that throughout the course of her lessons, Niviane will use Merlin's own powers against him, forcing him to do her bidding.

When Niviane finally goes back to her country, Merlin escorts her. However, along the way, Merlin receives a vision that Arthur is in need of assistance against the schemes of Morgan le Fay

Morgan le Fay

Morgan le Fay , alternatively known as Morgane, Morgaine, Morgana and other variants, is a powerful sorceress in the Arthurian legend. Early works featuring Morgan do not elaborate her character beyond her role as a fay or magician...

. Niviane and Merlin rush back to Arthur's castle, but have to stop for the night in a stone chamber, once inhabited by two lovers. Merlin relates that when the lovers died, they were placed in a magic tomb within a room in the chamber. That night, while Merlin is asleep, Niviane, still disgusted with Merlin's desire for her, as well as his demonic heritage, casts a spell over him and places him in the magic tomb so that he can never escape, thus causing his death.

Merlin's death is recounted differently in other versions of the narrative; the enchanted prison is variously described as a cave (in the Lancelot-Grail), a large rock (in Le Morte d'Arthur), an invisible tower, or a tree. In the Prophetiae Merlini, Niviane confines him in the forest of Brocéliande with walls of air, visible as mist to others but as a beautiful tower to him (Loomis, 1927). This is unfortunate for Arthur, who has lost his greatest counselor. Another version has it that Merlin angers Arthur to the point where he beheads, cuts in half, burns, and curses Merlin.

Fiction featuring Merlin

Literature

Many parts of Arthurian fiction include Merlin as a character. Mark Twain

Mark Twain

Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...

made Merlin the villain in his 1889 novel

1889 in literature

The year 1889 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*Theodore Roosevelt publishes the first of four volumes of The Winning of the West, with three more by 1896.-New books:*Gabriele D'Annunzio - Il piacere...

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is an 1889 novel by American humorist and writer Mark Twain. The book was originally titled A Yankee in King Arthur's Court...

. He is presented as a complete charlatan with no real magic power, and the character seems to stand for (and to satirise) superstition. Yet at the very last chapter of the book, Merlin suddenly seems to have a real magic power, and he puts the protagonist into a centuries-long sleep (as Merlin himself was put to sleep in the original Arthurian canon). C. S. Lewis

C. S. Lewis

Clive Staples Lewis , commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was a novelist, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian and Christian apologist from Belfast, Ireland...

used the figure of Merlin Ambrosius in his 1946 novel That Hideous Strength

That Hideous Strength

That Hideous Strength is a 1945 novel by C. S. Lewis, the final book in Lewis's theological science fiction Space Trilogy. The events of this novel follow those of Out of the Silent Planet and Perelandra and once again feature the philologist Elwin Ransom...

, the third book in the Space Trilogy

Space Trilogy

The Space Trilogy, Cosmic Trilogy or Ransom Trilogy is a trilogy of science fiction novels by C. S. Lewis, famous for his later series The Chronicles of Narnia. A philologist named Elwin Ransom is the hero of the first two novels and an important character in the third.The books in the trilogy...

. In it, Merlin has supposedly lain asleep for centuries to be awakened for the battle against the materialistic agents of the devil, able to consort with the angelic powers because he came from a time when sorcery was not yet a corrupt art. Lewis's character of Ransom has apparently inherited the title of Pendragon

Pendragon

Pendragon or Pen Draig, meaning "head dragon" or "chief dragon" , is the name of several traditional Kings of the Britons:...

from the Arthurian tradition. Merlin is also portrayed in the T. A. Barron

T. A. Barron

Thomas Archibald Barron is an American writer of fantasy literature, books for children and young adults, and nature books.-Biography:...

series The Lost Years of Merlin

The Lost Years of Merlin

The Lost Years of Merlin is a work of literature by T.A. Barron, published by Penguin Group USA. It tells the tale of the legendary wizard Merlin's youth. Though the character Merlin is world famous as an ancient wizard, this story of his lost youth is original to the author...

and The Great Tree of Avalon.

Merlin is a major character in T. H. White

T. H. White

Terence Hanbury White was an English author best known for his sequence of Arthurian novels, The Once and Future King, first published together in 1958.-Biography:...

's collection The Once and Future King

The Once and Future King

The Once and Future King is an Arthurian fantasy novel written by T. H. White. It was first published in 1958 and is mostly a composite of earlier works written in a period between 1938 and 1941....

and the related The Book of Merlyn

The Book of Merlyn

The Book of Merlyn is an Arthurian fantasy book written by T. H. White. It is the conclusion of The Once and Future King, but it was published separately and posthumously.-Plot summary:...

. White's Merlin is an old man living time backward, with final goodbyes being first encounters, and first encounters being fond farewells.

Mary Stewart

Mary Stewart

Mary Florence Elinor Stewart is a popular English novelist, best known for her Merlin series, which straddles the boundary between the historical novel and the fantasy genre.-Career:...

produced an influential quintet of Arthurian novels, with Merlin as the protagonist in the first three: The Crystal Cave (1970), The Hollow Hills (1970) and The Last Enchantment (1979).

Merlin plays a modern-day villain in Roger Zelazny

Roger Zelazny

Roger Joseph Zelazny was an American writer of fantasy and science fiction short stories and novels, best known for his The Chronicles of Amber series...

's short story "The Last Defender of Camelot

The Last Defender of Camelot (short story)

"The Last Defender of Camelot" is a fantasy short story by Roger Zelazny. It was first published in the Summer 1979 issue of Asimov's SF Adventure Magazine. It was subsequently published as a chapbook by Underwood/Miller for the May 23, 1980 V-Con 8 where Zelazny was guest of honor...

" (1979), which won the 1980 Balrog Award for short fiction and was adapted into an episode of the television series The Twilight Zone

The Twilight Zone

The Twilight Zone is an American television anthology series created by Rod Serling. Each episode is a mixture of self-contained drama, psychological thriller, fantasy, science fiction, suspense, or horror, often concluding with a macabre or unexpected twist...

in 1986. Additionally, the last five books in Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber star a character named Merlin, with seemingly little to do with Arthurian legend, though other references to the legend seem to hint at a connection.

Merlin also plays a major role in Stephen R. Lawhead

Stephen R. Lawhead

Stephen R. Lawhead, born , is a best-selling American writer known for his works of fantasy, science fiction, and more recently, historical fiction, particularly Celtic historical fiction...

's The Pendragon Cycle. Here Merlin is the child of Taliesin

Taliesin

Taliesin was an early British poet of the post-Roman period whose work has possibly survived in a Middle Welsh manuscript, the Book of Taliesin...

and the Lady Charis (the Lady of the Lake

Lady of the Lake

). He is the last child of the race who sought refuge on the Isle of the Mighty (Britain) when Atlantis

Atlantis

Atlantis is a legendary island first mentioned in Plato's dialogues Timaeus and Critias, written about 360 BC....

fell into the sea, and thus is blessed with long life and power. Merlin becomes a king in his own right; but after losing his beloved in war, he flees to the wilderness. He is later found by his loyal servant and sets on a quest to find the new High King of Britain and bring about Taliesin's vision of the Kingdom of Summer. He eventually finds Arthur and acts as his chief bard and aide. In this series, unlike most, Merlin is a champion of Christianity. Marion Zimmer Bradley

Marion Zimmer Bradley

Marion Eleanor Zimmer Bradley was an American author of fantasy novels such as The Mists of Avalon and the Darkover series. Many critics have noted a feminist perspective in her writing. Her first child, David R...

also connects the stories of Merlin and Taliesin in her novel The Mists of Avalon

The Mists of Avalon

The Mists of Avalon is a 1983 novel by Marion Zimmer Bradley, in which she relates the Arthurian legends from the perspective of the female characters.-Plot introduction:...

. Here, "the Merlin" is a title held by the Chief Druid of Britain, with Taliesin being one of the individuals to hold this role. A second Merlin, the bard Kevin Harper, becomes the Merlin famously seduced by Nimue.

Bernard Cornwell

Bernard Cornwell

Bernard Cornwell OBE is an English author of historical novels. He is best known for his novels about Napoleonic Wars rifleman Richard Sharpe which were adapted into a series of Sharpe television films.-Biography:...

's best selling trilogy "The Warlord Chronicles

The Warlord Chronicles

The Warlord Chronicles is a trilogy of books about Arthurian Britain written by Bernard Cornwell...

" -- (The Winter King (1995), Enemy of God

Enemy of God (novel)

Enemy of God is the second book in The Warlord Chronicles series by Bernard Cornwell. The trilogy tells the legend of Arthur seen through the eyes of his follower Derfel Cadarn.-Plot introduction:...

(1996), Excalibur: A Novel of Arthur (1997)) -- portrays Merlin as an eccentric, charismatic, and arrogant Druid, feared by Britons and Saxons alike, who struggles to restore the pagan ways of the pre-Roman Britain in face of the rapid proliferation of Christianity.

Kristine Jones explores Merlin's childhood in Merlin of Carmarthen. Various legends of the magician's young life are woven together, and Merlin is portrayed as an isolated boy whose life is tragically intercepted by war and an inescapable future.

Bryan Davis

Bryan Davis

Bryan Allan Davis is a former West Indian cricketer who played in four Tests in 1965. He later qualified for Glamorgan playing in the championship winning side in 1969....

's two series Oracles of Fire and Dragons in our Midst both introduce Merlin as a contemporary prophet from the Aurthurian era. Merlin is also the name of the private plane the Bannister family owns and flies.

Merlin is referenced in the Harry Potter

Harry Potter

Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling. The books chronicle the adventures of the adolescent wizard Harry Potter and his best friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...

series as a great sorcerer from the past. Wizards and witches who have achieved great deeds are awarded with the Order of Merlin. His name is used in exclamations, such as "Merlin's beard!". Furthermore, J. K. Rowling

J. K. Rowling

Joanne "Jo" Rowling, OBE , better known as J. K. Rowling, is the British author of the Harry Potter fantasy series...

s new website, Pottermore

Pottermore

Pottermore is a website by J. K. Rowling, developed by TH_NK and sponsored by Sony. The website, according to Rowling, will serve as a permanent online home for the wizarding world of Harry Potter. The site will feature many of J.K...

, reveals that Merlin attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and that he was placed in Slytherin House.

Merlin is also a recurring character in Simon R. Green's Nightside

Nightside (book series)

Nightside is a series of fantasy novels by author Simon R. Green.After Just Another Judgement Day, Green has only three more books planned, which will bring an end to the series.-Setting:...

series, appearing as dead but able to manifest himself through a direct blood descendent, Alex Morrissey, through sheer will.

Merlin's Mirror, by Andre Norton

Andre Norton

Andre Alice Norton, née Alice Mary Norton was an American science fiction and fantasy author under the noms de plume Andre Norton, Andrew North and Allen Weston...

, tells the story of the half-human, half-alien Merlin and his struggle to ensure that Arthur reach the throne of Avalon in spite of the machinations of the villainess Nimue, the Lady of the Lake.

In Robert Holdstock

Robert Holdstock

Robert Paul Holdstock was an English novelist and author best known for his works of Celtic, Nordic, Gothic and Pictish fantasy literature, predominantly in the fantasy subgenre of mythic fiction....

's series "The Merlin Codex", Merlin is portrayed as a mage

Mage

Mage may refer to:*Magi, a tribe from ancient Media of Iran*Mage, Burma*Magician , a practitioner of paranormal magic*Magician , a practitioner of magic as portrayed in works of fiction...

from the beginning of time. He and others were set with the task of walking a circular path around the world and learning all they could. The story is set centuries before Merlin meets Arthur. Also in this telling every time Merlin uses his magic, it ages him.

In Raven c.s. McCracken's novella Merlin's Knot (2011), Merlin has placed all of his knowledge of magic in a secret book, lost to the ages until Alan Clark, a computer programmer and artificial intelligence specialist, cracks the Celtic Knot code to find its final hiding place. However, he hasn't been the only one looking for it - Morgan Le Fey, Merlin's long-time foe, has also been searching for the tome and will stop at nothing to get it.

In Susan Cooper's "The Dark is Rising" sequence, Merlin is portrayed as Merriman Lyon, one of the Old Ones of the light, engaged in a timeless battle with those of the dark. He is capable of moving through time in order to manipulate events to prepare the youngest of the Old Ones for their final battle.

The Dark Tower

The Dark Tower

Dark Tower may refer to:* The Dark Tower , an unfinished novel by C. S. Lewis* Barad-dûr the fortress of Sauron in the fantasy world of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings* The Dark Tower , a 1933 comedy by George S...

series by Stephen King

Stephen King

Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...

mentions Merlin (spelled Maerlyn) as having been part of the ancient court of Arthur Eld

King Arthur

and, furthermore, as being the illegitimate father of series antagonist Randall Flagg

Randall Flagg

Randall Flagg is a fictional character created by Stephen King. Flagg has appeared in seven novels by King, sometimes as the main antagonist and others in a brief cameo. He often appears under different names; most are abbreviated by the initials R.F. There are exceptions to this rule; in The Dark...

Film and television

Merlin is an important figure in films and television programs, where he functions often as a teacher or mentor figure, a role that he shares with other wizard and wizard-like figures in popular texts, such as Gandalf the White. One of the best known of the film Merlins is the Merlin of the 1963 animated Disney film The Sword in the Stone

The Sword in the Stone (film)

The Sword in the Stone is a 1963 American animated fantasy comedy film produced by Walt Disney and originally released to theaters on December 25, 1963...

, based on T. H. White

T. H. White

Terence Hanbury White was an English author best known for his sequence of Arthurian novels, The Once and Future King, first published together in 1958.-Biography:...

's novel of the same name

The Sword in the Stone

The Sword in the Stone is a novel by T. H. White, published in 1939, initially a stand-alone work but now the first part of a tetralogy The Once and Future King. A fantasy of the boyhood of King Arthur, it is a sui generis work which combines elements of legend, history, fantasy and comedy...

. Disney's (and White's) version of the character aids and educates King Arthur

King Arthur

about various things. He was voiced by Karl Swenson

Karl Swenson

Karl Swenson was an American theatre, radio, film, and television actor.-Biography:Born in Brooklyn, New York of Swedish parentage, Swenson made several appearances with Pierre-Luc Michaud on Broadway in the 1930s and 40s, including the title role in Arthur Miller's first production, The Man Who...

and animated by several of Disney's Nine Old Men, including Milt Kahl

Milt Kahl

Milton Erwin Kahl was an animator for the Disney studio, and one of Disney's Nine Old Men....

, Frank Thomas

Frank Thomas (animator)

Franklin M. "Frank" Thomas was an American animator. He was one of Walt Disney's team of animators known as the Nine Old Men....

, Ollie Johnston

Ollie Johnston

Oliver Martin Johnston, Jr. was an American motion picture animator. He was one of Disney's Nine Old Men, and the last surviving at the time of his death. He was recognized by The Walt Disney Company with its Disney Legend Award in 1989...

, and John Lounsbery

John Lounsbery

John Lounsbery was an American animator who worked for The Walt Disney Company. He is best known as one of Disney's Nine Old Men....

. Kahl also designed the character, refining the storyboard

Storyboard

Storyboards are graphic organizers in the form of illustrations or images displayed in sequence for the purpose of pre-visualizing a motion picture, animation, motion graphic or interactive media sequence....

sketches of Bill Peet

Bill Peet

Bill Peet , was an American children's book illustrator and a story writer for Disney Studios...

. Merlin later appeared in a number of Disney productions, where he has been voiced by several different actors. Merlin, played by Nicol Williamson

Nicol Williamson

Nicol Williamson is a Scottish-born English actor who was described by English playwright John Osborne as "the greatest actor since Marlon Brando".-Early life:...

, has a large role in the 1981 film Excalibur

Excalibur (film)

Excalibur is a 1981 dramatic fantasy film directed, produced and co-written by John Boorman that retells the legend of King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table. Adapted from the 15th century Arthurian romance, Le Morte d'Arthur by Thomas Malory, Excalibur features the music of Richard Wagner...

, which is roughly based on Malory's Le Morte D'Arthur. Laurence Naismith

Laurence Naismith

Laurence Naismith was an English actor.Naismith appeared in films such as Carrington VC , Richard III , Sink the Bismarck! , Jason and the Argonauts , and Diamonds Are Forever . He also starred in a children's ghost film The Amazing Mr Blunden...

appears as Merlyn in the film version of the musical play Camelot

Camelot (musical)

Camelot is a musical by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe . It is based on the King Arthur legend as adapted from the T. H. White tetralogy novel The Once and Future King....

, (based on T. H. White's The Once and Future King

The Once and Future King

The Once and Future King is an Arthurian fantasy novel written by T. H. White. It was first published in 1958 and is mostly a composite of earlier works written in a period between 1938 and 1941....

). In the 1998 miniseries Merlin

Merlin (film)

Merlin is a television miniseries which originally aired in 1998 that retells the legend of King Arthur from the perspective of the wizard Merlin...

, the protagonist Merlin (played by actor Sam Neill

Sam Neill

Nigel John Dermot "Sam" Neill, DCNZM, OBE is a New Zealand actor. He is well known for his starring role as paleontologist Dr Alan Grant in Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III....

) battled the pagan goddess Queen Mab

Queen Mab

Queen Mab is a fairy referred to in Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. She also appears in other 17th century literature, and in various guises in later poetry, drama and cinema...

.
In 1981, the television series Mr. Merlin

Mr. Merlin

Mr. Merlin, a Larry Larry Company Production in association with Columbia Pictures Television, was a 1981–82 sitcom starring Barnard Hughes as Merlin the wizard, disguised as Max Merlin, a mechanic in modern-day San Francisco.-Plot:...

featured Merlin living undercover in modern-day San Francisco as a mechanic named "Max Merlin," portrayed by Barnard Hughes

Barnard Hughes

Bernard Aloysius Kiernan “Barnard” Hughes was an American actor of theater and film. Hughes became famous for a variety of roles; his most notable roles came after middle age, and he was often cast as a dithering authority figure or grandfatherly elder.-Personal life:Hughes was born in Bedford...

. In 2006 and 2007, the television series Stargate SG-1

Stargate SG-1

Stargate SG-1 is a Canadian-American adventure and military science fiction television series and part of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Stargate franchise. The show, created by Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner, is based on the 1994 feature film Stargate by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich...

used Merlin and Arthurian legend as major plot points in both Season 9 and 10. Specifically, Merlin is portrayed as an Ancient

Ancient (Stargate)

The Ancients are a humanoid race in the fictional Stargate universe. They are called "Ancients" in the Milky Way, but are also known as Lanteans or Ancestors in the Pegasus galaxy and as the Alterans in their home galaxy, and they sometimes call themselves Anquietas in their language...

whose superior knowledge of the universe is the source of many components of the legends. In 2005, Merlin appeared as leader of the Woads of Britton and father to Guinevere

Guinevere

Guinevere was the legendary queen consort of King Arthur. In tales and folklore, she was said to have had a love affair with Arthur's chief knight Sir Lancelot...

in King Arthur

King Arthur (film)

King Arthur is a 2004 film directed by Antoine Fuqua and written by David Franzoni. It stars Clive Owen as the title character, Ioan Gruffudd as Lancelot, and Keira Knightley as Guinevere....

. Also in 2007, the film The Last Legion

The Last Legion

The Last Legion is a 2007 film directed by Doug Lefler. Produced by Dino De Laurentiis and others, it is based on a 2003 Italian novel of the same name written by Valerio Massimo Manfredi...

portrayed Merlin (initially called Ambrosinus) as a druid and tutor of both the last Roman Emperor

Roman Emperor

The Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman State during the imperial period . The Romans had no single term for the office although at any given time, a given title was associated with the emperor...

Romulus Augustus

Romulus Augustus , was the last Western Roman Emperor, reigning from 31 October 475 until 4 September 476...

Caesar

Caesar (title)

Caesar is a title of imperial character. It derives from the cognomen of Julius Caesar, the Roman dictator...

, as well as of his son Arthur

King Arthur

.

In 2008, the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

created a television series, also called Merlin

Merlin (TV series)

Merlin is a British fantasy-adventure television programme by Julian Jones, Jake Michie, Julian Murphy and Johnny Capps. It began broadcasting on BBC One on 20 September 2008. The show is based on the Arthurian legends of the wizard Merlin and his relationship with Prince Arthur but differs from...

, which deviated significantly from more traditional versions of the myth, portraying Merlin (played by Colin Morgan

Colin Morgan

Colin Morgan is an actor from Armagh, Northern Ireland, best known for playing the title character in the BBC TV series Merlin. Morgan went to Integrated College Dungannon and, during his third year, won the 'Denis Rooney Associates' Cup awarded to the best overall student of that academic year...

) as the same age as Arthur, and swapping the moralities of Morgana and Nimueh so that they are good and evil respectively instead of the other way round (though in later series, Morgana turned to darkness).

Merlin, portrayed by Simon Lloyd Roberts, was the protagonist of the 2008 fantasy film Merlin and the War of the Dragons

Merlin and the War of the Dragons

Merlin and the War of the Dragons is a 2008 fantasy film produced by The Asylum, based loosely on the legends of King Arthur. It was filmed entirely on location in Wales.- Plot :...

, which was based loosely on the legends of King Arthur

King Arthur

. The 2010 Disney Channel original movie Avalon High

Avalon High

Avalon High is a young adult novel by Meg Cabot, published in 2005. It reached number 3 in The New York Times children's best sellers list in January 2006. A manga sequel called Coronation, Volume one: The Merlin's Prophecy has been released....

also featured Merlin, played by Joey Pollari

Joey Pollari

Joey Pollari is an actor best known for his role as Tyler in the Disney XD first original movie, Skyrunners, which premiered on November 27, 2009.-Biography:...

. Merlin was also featured in The Sorcerer's Apprentice

The Sorcerer's Apprentice (2010 film)

The Sorcerer's Apprentice is a 2010 fantasy adventure film produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, directed by Jon Turteltaub, and distributed by Walt Disney Pictures, the team behind the National Treasure franchise...

, having three apprentices.

The Doctor Who

Doctor Who

Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...

episode Battlefield

Battlefield (Doctor Who)

Battlefield is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from September 6 to September 27, 1989. It was the last appearance of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart in Doctor Who....

suggests that Arthurian legend in our world is influenced by actual events in a parallel world, and that the Doctor

Doctor (Doctor Who)

The Doctor is the central character in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who, and has also featured in two cinema feature films, a vast range of spin-off novels, audio dramas and comic strips connected to the series....

is himself Merlin. In keeping with the notion that Merlin might experience events in reverse order, however, the Doctor has no memory of ever having (yet) been Merlin, while Mordred

Mordred

Mordred or Modred is a character in the Arthurian legend, known as a notorious traitor who fought King Arthur at the Battle of Camlann, where he was killed and Arthur fatally wounded. Tradition varies on his relationship to Arthur, but he is best known today as Arthur's illegitimate son by his...

remembers Merlin being "bound in the ice caves for all eternity".

In the 2011 TV series Camelot

Camelot (TV series)

Camelot is a historical-fantasy-drama television series which premiered on April 1, 2011. It was co-produced by the Starz cable network and GK-TV which began production during the summer of 2010...

, Merlin was played by Joseph Fiennes

Joseph Fiennes

Joseph Fiennes is an English film and stage actor. He is perhaps best known for his portrayals of William Shakespeare in Shakespeare in Love, Sir Robert Dudley in Elizabeth, Commisar Danilov in Enemy at the Gates, Martin Luther in Luther, Merlin in Camelot, and his portrayal of Mark Benford in the...

.
Merlin appears at the beginning of the cartoon TV Show, "Justice League" episode #20 "A Knight of Shadows, Part 1". Merlin's voice is portrayed by the actor William Morgan Sheppard. Ashley Cowie, Scottish author, historian, and archaeologist, and his team search the U.K. for treasures said to have been hidden away by Merlin in the 5th episode of season 1's "Legend Quest".
He also has appeared in Batman: The Brave and the Bold

Batman: The Brave and the Bold

Batman: The Brave and the Bold is an American animated television series based in part on the DC Comics series The Brave and the Bold which features two or more super heroes coming together to solve a crime or foil a super villain...

, in the episode "Day of the Dark Knight!",

Other cultural references

A main belt

Asteroid belt

The asteroid belt is the region of the Solar System located roughly between the orbits of the planets Mars and Jupiter. It is occupied by numerous irregularly shaped bodies called asteroids or minor planets...

asteroid

Asteroid

Asteroids are a class of small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun. They have also been called planetoids, especially the larger ones...

is named Merlin

2598 Merlin

2598 Merlin is a small main belt asteroid, which was discovered by Edward L. G. Bowell in 1980. It is named after Merlin, the legendary wizard who helped King Arthur.Merlin is a C-type asteroid, meaning it is dark in color and carbonaceous in composition....

in honour of the legendary wizard. Merlin is a character in the MMO role-playing game

MMORPG

Massively multiplayer online role-playing game is a genre of role-playing video games in which a very large number of players interact with one another within a virtual game world....

s Wizard101

Wizard101

Wizard101 is a 3D massively multiplayer online role-playing game created by KingsIsle Entertainment. Players take on the role of students of Wizardry to save the Spiral , and battle a variety of creatures by casting spells using a turn-based combat system similar to collectible card games...

and RuneScape

RuneScape

RuneScape is a fantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing game released in January 2001 by Andrew and Paul Gower, and developed and published by Jagex Games Studio. It is a graphical browser game implemented on the client-side in Java, and incorporates 3D rendering...

. In the latter, Merlin's Crystal is a quest to free Merlin and become one of the Knights of the Round Table. In the role-playing game Magic and Mayhem

Magic and Mayhem

Magic & Mayhem, also known as Duel: The Mage Wars , The Art of Magic , Mana: Der Weg der schwarzen Macht , Duelo de hechiceros , Art of Magic: La Guerra dei Maghi and Arcanes , is a fantasy/mythology-themed real-time strategy game designed by Julian Gollop and developed by Mythos Games...

, Merlin is the game's final antagonist. He also appears in the action role-playing game Kingdom Hearts

Kingdom Hearts

is an action role-playing game developed and published by Square in 2002 for the PlayStation 2 video game console. The first game in the Kingdom Hearts series, it is the result of a collaboration between Square Enix and The Walt Disney Company. The game combines characters and settings from Disney...

and Kingdom Hearts II

Kingdom Hearts II

is an action role-playing game developed by Square Enix and published by Buena Vista Games and Square Enix in 2005 for the Sony PlayStation 2 video game console...

. Adobe Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop is a graphics editing program developed and published by Adobe Systems Incorporated.Adobe's 2003 "Creative Suite" rebranding led to Adobe Photoshop 8's renaming to Adobe Photoshop CS. Thus, Adobe Photoshop CS5 is the 12th major release of Adobe Photoshop...

has long included an easter egg

Easter egg (media)

Image:Carl Oswald Rostosky - Zwei Kaninchen und ein Igel 1861.jpg|250px|thumb|right|Example of Easter egg hidden within imagerect 467 383 539 434 desc none...

featuring Merlin; in the Paths palette, when holding option/alt and selecting Palette Options from the flyout menu, a miniature dialog appears entitled "Merlin Lives!" with a cartoon depiction of the wizard and a single button, "Begone." On the Harry Potter website "Pottermore

Pottermore

" it is stated that Merlin was a Slytherin. The Penderyn Distillery in Wales produces a cream liqueur called 'Merlyn' named after the wizard.

External links

BBC audio file, Radio 4 In Our Time
In Our Time (BBC Radio 4)
In Our Time is a live BBC radio discussion series exploring the history of ideas, presented by Melvyn Bragg since 15 October 1998.. It is one of BBC radio's most successful discussion programmes, acknowledged to have "transformed the landscape for serious ideas at peak listening time"...

, 45 minutes.
Merlin: or the early History of King Arthur: a prose romance (Early English Text Society
Early English Text Society
The Early English Text Society is an organization to reprint early English texts, especially those only available in manuscript. Most of its volumes are in Middle English and Old English...

[Series]. Original series: 10, 112), edited by Henry Wheatly. (1450s) (The complete prose Middle English translation of the Vulgate Merlin. Chapter I to VI cover Robert de Boron's Merlin.)
Prose Merlin, Introduction and Text (TEAMS Middle English text series) edited by John Conlea, 1998. (1450s) (A selection of many passages of the prose Middle English translation of the Vulgate Merlin with connecting summary. The sections from The Birth of Merlin to Arthur and the Sword in the Stone cover Robert de Boron's Merlin).
Of Arthour and Merlin: Auchinleck Manuscript (National Library of Scotland) (1330s). (A Middle-English verse adaptation of the Vulgate Merlin combined with material closer to Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia. Lines 1-3059 cover approximately Robert de Boron's Merlin).
XIIIth century Merlin manuscript BNF fr. 95 Bibliothèque Nationale de France, selection of illuminated folios, Modern French Translation, Commentaries.
The Beguiling of Merlin. Edward Burne-Jones
Edward Burne-Jones
Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1st Baronet was a British artist and designer closely associated with the later phase of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, who worked closely with William Morris on a wide range of decorative arts as a founding partner in Morris, Marshall, Faulkner, and Company...

, Liverpool Museums
Merlin: Texts, Images, Basic Information, Camelot Project at the University of Rochester. (Numerous further texts and art concerning Merlin.)
Merlin : Opera by Ezequiel Viñao with a Libretto by Caleb Carr, (Words and Music. Excerpts from the opera)

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Name and etymology

Geoffrey's sources

Merlin Ambrosius, or Myrddin Emrys

Later adaptations of the legend

Fiction featuring Merlin

Literature

Film and television

Other cultural references

See also

External links