It’s an interesting fact that most of the characters in Arthuriana wouldn’t have spoken English like we are all lead to believe. The rightful King of England not speaking English? Get out of here!
As it turns out, Arthur’s English would have been almost unintelligible to modern speakers. Old English was guttural, rolling, and sounded something more like Swedish or Danish than the language we have now. The epic Beowulf was written in Old English, so Arthur, Kay, and all the other British knights, would have spoken something that looked more like this pronunciation nightmare:
Hwæt. We Gardena in geardagum,
-Beowulf
þeodcyninga, þrym gefrunon,
hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon.
Guinevere was a Welsh Princess, so she would have been speaking Old (or even archaiac) Welsh. Welsh split off from the other Britannic languages around the 6th century, so Guinevere’s language is a little up for grabs. The great thing is that people in this time-frame were almost polyglots, so she could probably communicate with her husband just fine. Arthur could probably speak Welsh as well since the two languages existed side-by-side (geographically) since forever.
Eiri mynyd guynt am bert
-Eiri Mynyd
Cans creaudur nem am nert
Ai cyscy a una Gurnert
Another language that would have been floating around Camelot was a language called “Norn”. Norn is a dead language that was spoken in Orkney and Shetland until around 1850, and was a sister/daughter language to Old Norse. It was similar in sound (we think) to Faroese, which is spoken almost exclusively in the Faroe Islands. Faroese is a sweet sounding version of the nordic languages and honestly sounds a lot like Icelandic to me. The modern Orkney accent is noted to have a fun lilting quality to it that makes the residents sound like they’re almost (emphasis on the almost) singing when they speak. I assume that this strange lilt comes from the history of Norn, but you’re free to make of that information what you will. What’s important to note, is that all of the knights from Orkney, (Gawain, Agravain, Gaheris, Gareth, and Mordred) would have spoken Norn.
Favor i ir i chimrie, Helleur ir i nam thite,gilla cosdum thite cumma, veya thine mota vara gorto yurn sinna gort i chimrie, ga vus da on da dalight brow voraFirgive vus sinna vora sin vee Firgive sindara mutha vus,lyv vus ye i tumtation, min delivera vus fro olt ilt.
Amen.
-The Lord’s Prayer in Orcadian Norn
Sir Tristan would have spoken something akin to Cornish, a language that died in the 18th century, but revived in the 1900s. Cornish is another flowing language that looks like the love-child between Welsh and Old English. It has a growing number of speakers and can be learned if you are interested.
En dalleth Deu grwes an neue ha an aor.
-Genesis 1:1
Lancelot would have spoken old French or possibly Norman. Old French’s exact pronunciation is up for debate, but from what I’ve learned, it sounds more like Castilian Spanish than what I expected. It looks a lot like the French we have today, partially because it’s a lot younger than most of the other languages in Camelot. Old French was only a few hundred years old by the time Lancelot came about, so the language is significantly more refined and modern sounding than the other languages I’ve talked about.
Je ne sais par où je commence, Tant ai de matière abondance, Pour parler de ma pauvreté.
-Rutebeuf to Saint Louis
In addition to these languages, most of the noble class could also speak Latin and possibly even Greek or Hebrew. It was considered a sign of good breeding to be well-versed in classical languages for centuries after the fall of the Roman empire. It also just made sense to figure out a single language for business and political transactions.
So while Arthur is muttering to Kay in Old English, Guinevere was running the household in Old Wesh and fending off Lancelot’s French poetry. Meanwhile, Tristan is yelling obscenities in Cornish while Agravain responds just as colorfully in Norn. All the while, an army of side-characters are chatting loudly in God knows how many other languages.
Nobody can even hear the sound of Merlin sobbing “You all speak Latin” in the background.
Madness and Arthuriana 