... it may sound like that: "oh, I'm a re-enactor, I know everything, why don't they ask me?" Quite the contrary. There's a lot of re-enactors and self-styled historians who have this attitude, and often they don't have either the actual knowledge to back it up... or the simple flair and style one needs when revealing he or she is omniscient. *g*

Actually, I'm a philologist, and I learned something from my studies that I can't repeat often enough: to research something for whatever project, I need

1. Humility, because no matter how hard I work, there's always something that is wrong, and not admitting it means cheating the reader. There can always be a following work that improves this one. That's why so many literary essays are titled "For a study on..."

2. Sources, sources, sources. Did I mention sources? Or the absence of sources, yes. In a matter like Arthur, one has to admit this is the most common situation. See point 1.

3. Credibility. When there are no sources, I must have such a good knowledge of the period, of what surrounds the "hole", to be able to fill it believably. But always admitting it - see points 1 and 2. Like a restoration of a painting: you have to be able to enjoy the full picture, but without being cheated into believing everything is authentic.

What worries me about the "King Arthur" project is that in the movie's press releases there's very little of 1 and 2. Maybe 3 is OK, we'll see in the theatre.

BUT, I don't want to be like sour critics who cut to pieces something with the clear intention of showing off or getting even. It happened to me recently while reading an essay on a favourite historical TV show of mine. The critic was all "I wasn't asked, I could have told them, stupid Hollywood" and so on. This took out a lot of believability and even pleasure from his otherwise correct and interesting points. He, too, should have relied just on sources - "the hat was like this, here is a picture, full stop." He would have looked better, and it's a lesson I'd better learn for myself too, when I go on a rant about things that don't convince me historically! *rollseyes*