a b c Jameson, Conor (January 2014). "A place for the misfit". British Birds. 107 (1): 2–3. ISSN 0007-0335. Wart and Merlyn return to Ector's castle, and the wizard becomes the boys' tutor. He pays special attention to the Wart. Merlyn turns Wart into a fish, and together they explore the castle's moat. In one of their excursions, the boys and Merlyn encounter Little John, who leads them to Robin Hood (referred to as Robin Wood) and Marian. Their extended stay with Robin culminates in an encounter with a griffin. Kay manages to slay the beast, taking its head as a trophy. During the fray, the griffin breaks the Wart's collar bone. The Sword in the Stone is a 1938 novel by British writer T. H. White. First published by Collins in the United Kingdom as a stand-alone work, it later became 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. Walt Disney Productions adapted the story to an animated film, and the BBC adapted it to radio.

King Arthur appears in myths and legends from the medieval period. He may have been based on a historical figure, a military leader in Roman Britain, who fought against the Saxons in the 5 th and 6 th century and who appears in Welsh stories. In the 9 th century Nennius of Wales wrote a History of the Britons which lists a number of battles which at which Arthur fought and which records his death in 537AD. The Arthur of the legends is mentioned in the Mabinogi, a collection of Welsh stories. In the 12 th The Importance of The Second World War to T. H. White's "Once and Future King" ". Archived from the original on 29 May 2008 . Retrieved 30 April 2008. barbican a defensive tower or similar fortification at a gate or bridge leading into a town or castle.Keenan, Hugh T. “T(erence) H(anbury) White” in British Children's Writers, 1914–1960, ed. Donald R. Hettinga and Gary D. Schmidt, Gale Research, 1996. The huntsman nodded to Robin, who was standing behind, and held the hound's eyes with his own. He said, "Good dog, Beaumont the valiant, sleep now, old friend Beaumont, good old dog." Then Robin's falchion let Beaumont out of this world, to run free with Orion and to roll among the stars. The Wart did not like to watch Master Twyti for a moment or two. The strange, little leathery man stood up without saying anything and whipped the hounds off the corpse of the boar as he was accustomed to do. He put his horn to his lips and blew the four long notes of the mort without a quaver. But he was blowing the notes for something else, and he startled the Wart because he seemed to be crying. Narrator p. 160 a b Ness, Mari (August 6, 2015). "In Need of a Villain: Disney's The Sword in the Stone". Tor.com . Retrieved May 15, 2016.

In the Post-Vulgate version, used in Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur for the second Excalibur, the sword's scabbard is also said to have powers of its own, as any wounds received while wearing it would not bleed at all, thus preventing the wearer from ever bleeding to death in battle. For this reason, Merlin chides Arthur for preferring Excalibur over its sheath, saying that the latter is the greater treasure. The scabbard is, however, soon stolen from Arthur by his half-sister Morgan le Fay in revenge for the death of her beloved Accolon, he having been slain by Arthur with Excalibur in a duel involving a false Excalibur (Morgan also secretly makes at least one duplicate of Excalibur during the time when the sword is entrusted to her by Arthur earlier in the different French, Iberian and English variants of that story). During Morgan's flight from the pursuit by Arthur, the sheath is then thrown by her into a deep lake and lost. This act later enables the death of Arthur, deprived of its magical protection, many years later in his final battle. In Malory's telling, the scabbard is never found again. In the Post-Vulgate, however, it is recovered and claimed by another fay, Marsique, who then briefly gives it to Gawain to help him fight Naborn the Enchanter (a Mabon figure). [32] Seldom Re-Peeted: The Bill Peet Interview". Hogan's Alley (Interview). Interviewed by John Province. May 10, 2012 . Retrieved December 28, 2019. kestrel a small, reddish-gray falcon, noted for its ability to hover in the air with its head to the wind. Television retellings include the traditional The Legend of King Arthur (1979) and the popular 2011 BBC fantasy drama Merlin The name Excalibur ultimately derives from the Welsh Caledfwlch ( Breton Kaledvoulc'h, Middle Cornish Calesvol), which is a compound of caled, ' hard ', and bwlch, ' breach, cleft '. [1] Caledfwlch appears in several early Welsh works, including the prose tale Culhwch and Olwen ( c. 11th–12th century). The name was later used in Welsh adaptations of foreign material such as the Bruts (chronicles), which were based on Geoffrey of Monmouth. It is often considered to be related to the phonetically similar Caladbolg, a sword borne by several figures from Irish mythology, although a borrowing of Caledfwlch from the Irish Caladbolg has been considered unlikely by Rachel Bromwich and D. Simon Evans. They suggest instead that both names "may have similarly arisen at a very early date as generic names for a sword". [1] [2] In the late 15th to early 16th-century Middle Cornish play Beunans Ke, Arthur's sword is called Calesvol, which is etymologically an exact Middle Cornish cognate of the Welsh Caledfwlch. It is unclear if the name was borrowed from the Welsh (if so, it must have been an early loan, for phonological reasons), or represents an early, pan-Brittonic traditional name for Arthur's sword. [3]Merlin appears in the world builder video game Disney Magic Kingdoms as the guide for the player during the game progress, and as the owner of Merlin's Shop, where the players can buy and sell in-game items, as well as other options that Merlin can perform. [47] In a November 2023 update to that game, Merlin became a fully playable character, while Arthur was also added to the game; both were done in celebration of the film's 60th anniversary. [48] Merlin also appears as one of the villagers in Disney Dreamlight Valley, filling a similar role as a guide who teaches the player new mechanics during the early portions of the game.