King Arthur's Burial Cross

The cross existed at one time and may still exist in some dark cellar or dusty attic. If found, it would be the only tangible relic in existence associated with King Arthur and could provide important clues as to whether or not it was his grave that was opened on that day in 1190.

http://www.britannia.com/history/arthur/cross.html
Discovery of the Cross
he medieval historian, Gerald of Wales, tells us that sometime before he died in 1189, Henry II gave a message to the monks of Glastonbury Abbey regarding the location of the grave of King Arthur. He also tells us that Henry had gotten the information from an unnamed Welsh bard.

Gerald's account goes on to say that the Glastonbury monks, presumably acting on this information, had uncovered a hollowed-out log containing two bodies, while digging between two stone pyramids standing together in the abbey cemetary. The log coffin had been buried quite deep, at around 16 feet down. A stone slab cover had been found at the seven foot level, and attached to its underside was an oddly shaped cross with a latin inscription on it, naming the occupants of the coffin as the renowned King Arthur and his queen, Guinevere.

Beside Gerald's report written in "Liber de Principis instructione" c.1193, there were several other versions of the discovery of the grave and cross which appeared in various chronicles over the years. Each account was a bit different from the others and either included or omitted details which the others did not. At least five different versions of the inscription on the cross have been reported, and this inconsistency in the details of the story has led many scholars to think that a great hoax was being perpetrated by the Glastonbury monks for the purpose of generating pilgrim traffic to their abbey. 

Adding to the suspicions aroused by the above inconsistencies, the case for a "monastic hoax" gains more strength when we consider that there were several obvious motives for it: 

the monks' beloved abbey church, the most glorious in all England and possibly in all of Christendom, had been destroyed by fire in 1184, just a few short years before.

the abbey's greatest pilgrim attraction, the "Old Church," England's oldest Christian structure which dated back many hundreds of years, had been burned up with it.

the abbey's chief benefactor, the recently deceased Henry II, was no longer in a position tofinance their efforts to rebuild and the new king, Richard, was more interested in using his money to go "Crusading."

A popular legend, current among the British people, claimed that King Arthur had never actually died and that he would one day return to his people when their need was great. While it is easy for modern people to discount a story like that, the twelfth century was an age of great credulity, and since no one could point to the location of Arthur's actual burial place, the legend couldn't be so easily discounted. Amazingly enough, no one had ever even claimed to know where the grave was, let alone try to identify it. A verse from the Welsh "Stanzas of the Graves" (aka The Graves of the Warriors of Britain), states:

There is a grave for March, a grave for Gwythur,
a grave for Gwgawn Red-sword;
the world's wonder, a grave for Arthur

The historian, William of Malmesbury, confirms that the whereabouts of Arthur's burial place is unknown, and that silly legends have been created as a result:

. . .tomb of Arthur is nowhere beheld, whence the ancient ditties fable that he is yet to come.

Given the immediate need for cash to rebuild their abbey, the death of their chief benefactor and a willingness to engage in questionable practices to serve what they believed was a noble end, it would take no great leap of the imagination to expect that the Glastonbury monks would come up with some other scheme to raise funds. In King Arthur, it would seem that they had a ready-made solution to their problems: a major legendary figure whose grave could attract all the pilgrims that the Old Church did, and, at the same time, enhance the abbey's reputation for sanctity and prestige as the final resting place of saints and kings.

Having said all that, it must be noted that there are a few difficulties with the "monastic hoax" theory. First of all, if we are going to credit the monks with the imagination and effrontery necessary to perpetrate a hoax of this magnitude, then we should also expect them to be able to manage the public relations campaign that would be needed after the "discovery" of Arthur's body.

Instead, we see several different accounts of the exhumation of the grave and, over the years, we get several versions of what was inscribed on the cross. The varied accounts of the inscriptions are as follows:

Ralph of Coggeshall, "Chronicon Anglicanum," c.1225

"Here lies the famous King Arthur, buried in the isle of Avalon"

Margam Abbey (Wales), "Chronicle," some date it early 1190's, others, 14th century

"Here lies the famous King Arthur, buried in the isle of Avalon"

John Leland, 1542

"Here lies the famous King Arthur, buried in the isle of Avalon"

William Camden, "Britannia," 1607

"Here lies the famous King Arthur, buried in the isle of Avalon"

Monks of St. Albans, "Chronica Majora," mid- to late-13th Century

"Here lies the renowned King Arthur, buried in the isle of Avalon"

Adam of Domerham, "Historia de rebus Glastoniensibus," 1291

"Here lies interred in the isle of Avalon, the renowned King Arthur"

Gerald of Wales, "Liber de Principis instructione," c.1193

"Here lies buried the famous King Arthur with Guinevere his second wife in the isle of Avalon"

Gerald of Wales, "Speculum Ecclesiae," c.1216

"Here lies buried the famous King Arthur in the isle of Avalon with his second wife Guinevere"

Shouldn't we expect that if the monks had been willing to risk this deception in the first place, that they would have made sure that everyone was telling the same story? Another troublesome thing is that while the fortuitous timing of the "discovery" of Arthur's grave might seem highly suspicious to us, the monks didn't follow up by doing what we might expect them to have done if they were really trying to pull off a hoax. We would expect them to have launched a major publicity campaign, announcing the discovery to the world. We would expect to find evidence that a major influx of pilgrims had been planned for. We would expect to find documentary and literary evidence that Glastonbury had, in fact, become a more important place of pilgrimage than it had already been.

Surprisingly, we see none of that. Other than a few mentions in monastic chronicles through the years, there is no record of any "advertising blitz." There were no new structures built to enshrine the bodies or to house or otherwise accommodate the pilgrims. And there was nothing written to suggest that the "discovery" at Glastonbury attracted any unusual attention, at all.