Most people know the story of the Sword in the Stone, in which King Arthur pulled a sword from a stone and thus proved his right to rule England. Many also know about the Twelve Knights of his Round Table. It has long been assumed that the story of these companions comes from a similar tale about Charlemagne’s Twelve Companions, in turn inherited from Jesus and his Twelve Disciples. But what if there is a much earlier origin for both the Sword in the Stone and the Twelve Knights, one rooted in astronomy and first emerging in the Cradle of Civilisation?

In The Sword in the Stone, John Matthews and Linda A. Malcor put forward the convincing theory that this story began to form 4,000 years ago in the cultures of Mesopotamia and Babylon, first appearing explicitly in the culture of the Hittites, and then repeated itself down through the centuries across cultures as distant as Japan and North America. The authors here bring all the strands together to explain how we arrived at Arthur.

Reflecting our timeless relationship with the stars, The Sword in the Stone will forever change your perception of that famous tale.