Guinevere | |
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Matter of Britain character | |
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Guinevere by Henry Justice Ford (c. 1910)
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First appearance | Historia Regum Britanniae |
Created by | Geoffrey of Monmouth |
Information | |
Occupation | Princess, queen |
Family | Leodegrance, Gwenhwyfach |
Spouse(s) | Arthur |
Significant other(s) | Lancelot, Mordred |
Guinevere (/ˈɡwɪnɪvɪər/ ( listen) GWE-ni-veer; Welsh: Gwenhwyfar
pronunciation gwen-WHO-e-var; Breton: Gwenivar), often written as Guenevere or Gwenevere, is, in Arthurian legend, the wife of King Arthur. She first appears as Guanhumara (with many spelling variants in the manuscript tradition) in Geoffrey of Monmouth's pseudo-historical chronicle of British history, the Historia Regum Britanniae, written circa 1136. She is also found in medieval Welsh prose, in the mid-late 12th-century tale Culhwch and Olwen, as Arthur's wife Gwenhwyfar, sometimes spelled Gwenhwyvar.