Six Arthurian legends for children, taught the medieval way. Learn illumination, calligraphy, and bookbinding as you create a personal library of magical Arthurian manuscripts!
Even though King Arthur is a familiar name to almost anyone, it’s so easy for young people to encounter these foundational stories obliquely, without substance or relationship. They may know some of the names or some outlines of the story, but it’s probably through things like cartoons or advertisements or other fragments absorbed through entertainment. Even though stories and legends have always been entertaining, that can’t be where their significance ends.
Great stories were never meant to be only passively consumed. Myth provides templates for understanding reality and inspiring action; they may begin in the imagination, but they come alive when they flow out into the work of our hands and the noble choices we make.
At the same time, many children today are starved for opportunities to craft and create things that matter. These are the kinds of projects that require care, discipline, and skill, and that result in something they can hold, keep, and be proud of. When everything is disposable and meaningful creative endeavor is thought to be exclusive realm of some remote elite, it’s no surprise that genuine wonder and youthful enthusiasm seem to be so hard to come by.
Story-telling is a big part of my family culture and home education, and so is craftsmanship and creative endeavor. This Arthuriad program is born out of that desire to integrate “making” alongside “receiving” for my own children, so they can experience the cultural inheritance more personally and relationally. We still have these old tales in our own day because for centuries people told them around fires, wrote them down, copied them, illuminated them, carved them into stone, wove them into tapestries, etc. I want my children to know the stories and to take part in this transmission themselves.
What Is The Arthuriad?
The Arthuriadis a year-long creative immersion into the Arthurian tradition, designed for young people and their families.
Across the year, participants will:
Encounter classic Arthurian stories in rich, myth-faithful form
Learn traditional art forms and skills inspired by medieval manuscript culture
Create their own illuminated pages, calligraphic text, and finished books
Build a lasting relationship with myth through hands-on creation
Each part of the year centers on a core Arthurian theme, drawing story, symbolism, and craft together into something tangible.
The Arthuriad unfolds across six short story books (for this first cycle), each focused on a foundational pillar of the Arthurian world:
1. Young Merlin and the Dragon Tower - Destiny
2. The Sword in the Stone - Kingship and legitimacy
3. The Round Table - Fellowship and honor
4. The Lady of the Lake – Sacred inheritance
5. The Knight of the Cart – Trial and sacrifice
6. The Dolorous Stroke – Consequence and hope
Each book includes:
A mythic narrative rooted in medieval source traditions, but suitable and accessible for children
Calligraphic text for them to practice scripting by tracing
Stylistic illuminations and initials for them to color or paint - books 1 and 2 in the Celtic “Book of Kells” style, books 3 and 4 in the Carolingian Romanesque style, and books 5 and 6 in the High Gothic style.
The program is deliverable in several ways, depending on how far in you want to jump.
You can start small and simple, with just the first one or two stories delivered digitally as print-ready files that you can illuminate, along with a basic demo tutorial for how to assemble your book when you’re done with the illuminating. If you want to learn more about the art styles themselves, you can bundle the first two book files along with the Celtic Art course that gets into how the motifs are constructed and the early Insular calligraphic script is written. One of the text files you will get has the script very faint on the page so you can learn and practice this calligraphic script by tracing as you hand-write the text yourself. If this is you, check out the Squire, Knight Errant, and Knight Banneret tiers.
Text for calligraphy tracing alongside text just for coloring
If you’re really starting from scratch and want everything you need in one easy bundle, you can get the box kit that has all the pages of the first two book already printed, folded, and ready for sewing, as well as paints, calligraphy pens, book boards, cover leather, and everything required to illuminate and make a finished, bound book. When you get the box kit, you’ll also get access to the Celtic Art course and a more in-depth case binding tutorial course walking you step-by-step through the assembly process for your book. If this is you, you’ll want the Grail Knight tier. This is the only physical reward tier, so note that shipping fees will be additional and collected post-campaign in the Pledge Manager. These fees are calculated depending on your mailing address.
If you already know this is the kind of project for you, you can also get the whole year subscription at a discounted one-time price now, rather than the monthly subscription through my website. This will get you all six stories, digitally delivered in sequence every two months over the course of the year, plus all three medieval illumination/calligraphy tutorial courses (Celtic, Carolingian, and Gothic) and a medieval bookbinding tutorial if you want to bind all the stories together in one medieval-style volume. This is the High King tier.
If you love the Arthurian mythos and the medieval art but you’re not quite ready to go all the way into making your own books, you’ll want to check out the Page and Knight of the Round Table tiers. I’m also making a monthly series of illuminated carpet pages and poems for the major characters and relics of the tales. These are available as print-ready coloring pages; you can start with just the King Arthur print and poem as a stand-alone piece, or you can get the whole year subscription at a discounted one-time price now, which will get you a new art piece and poem digitally delivered every month beginning in April. The whole year subscription will include these: Month 1: King Arthur (Celtic style)
Month 2: Merlin (Celtic style)
Month 3: The Sword in the Stone (Celtic style)
Month 4: Guinevere (Celtic style)
Month 5: Sir Kay (Romanesque style)
Month 6: The Round Table (Romanesque style)
Month 7: Sir Gawain (Romanesque style)
Month 8: The Green Knight (Romanesque style)
Month 9: Sir Pellinore (Gothic style)
Month 10: Sir Lancelot (Gothic style)
Month 11: Sir Yvain (Gothic style)
Month 12: The Fisher King (Gothic style)
Celtic style King Arthur coloring page
Starting the collection of 12 illuminations and poems
These stories are derived from the very diverse body of medieval Arthurian texts. They are distilled and simplified for children, but not sanitized of their symbolic depth or comically “Shrekified” to make them relatable to pop-culture sensibilities. My goal is to present them to a young audience with clarity and care while maintainting their mythic significance and dignity.
2. Creation Over Consumption
Participants are going to be immersing into the visual and artistic stream of the Medieval age that carried these tales to us now. Learning these stories in this way, then, is active and participatory, not passive and consumptive. The myths become vehicles for creativity and activity, as they were always meant to be.
3. Skill That Builds Personal Quality
At the heart of the chivalric ethos is the vocation to do difficult, beautiful things. This program is aimed at inviting children into this ethos in real, immediate ways. They won’t be mounting up to joust with villains and monsters yet, but they will be growing confidence, attention to detail, focus, and diligence as they develop and practice these book-art skills. And that’s a fine starting point.
4. Lasting Keepsakes, Tangible Tradition
At the end of the year, participants don’t just have a login or collection of digital content, they have a body of work they made and can keep for life. They will have something immensely valuable for its beauty and handcrafting, and they have a baseline they can return to over the years if they want to develop the skills further or try to surpass their first-attempt quality later on.
What This Backerkit Campaign Is Funding
This campaign exists for:
Funding the prototype box kit sets that will be used in our year-long box subscription program down the road
Adapting and writing the tales, and designing the illustrated materials and iconography
Establishing the visual and narrative foundation of the full year cycle and upcoming mailing subscription programs
Fine-tuning easily accesible tutorial materials for young participants
We’re launching and inviting here, but we’re only just getting started!
March 17 – April 3: Pledge processing and Box Kit packing
April 4-7: Digital mailing for Squire Tier and Book 1 for digital book tiers
April 8-15: Mail out Box Kits
Thereafter the digital mailing for the subscription tiers will go out the first week of the month – every month for the Round Table tier art pages and every other month for the High King books and art courses, concluding in March 2027.
Shipping Fees
Shipping fees are calculated based on your mailing address, and will be added and collected for the Box Kit pledges in the Pledge Manager when you fill out the survey after the campaign. The Box Kits will be approximately 2 lbs. 12 oz. so shipping rate examples will look like: US (West Coast): $19.60 US (Midwest): $13.85 US (East Coast): $12.70 UK: $49.25 Canada: $38.50
