Pelinor - King of the Islands and Knight of the Round Table; first an adversary, and then a loyal ally of King Arthur . Later knightly novels also call him the father of Perceval . Pelinor is one of those characters who initially did not belong to the Arthurian tradition, but were pulled into its orbit in the late stages of folding the epic. However, there is also a hypothesis based on an analysis of the name and characteristics of this character, which connects him with the Celtic pagan tradition.
On the other hand, it is unlikely that Pelinor is a real historical person or that he had a real historical prototype. At the same time, thanks to medieval compilers, Pelinor was so firmly “rooted” in the Arthurian legends that it became almost indistinguishable from other Camelot characters.
Before the appearance of King Arthur Lancelot at the court, he acts as almost the first knight of the kingdom: it is to him that Merlin gives the honorable place to the right of the Death Chair at the Round Table.
In terms of the chronology of the events of the Arthurian epic, the King of the Islands first appears immediately after Arthur sees a dream about the ruin of his kingdom. The young king challenges Pelinor to a duel, but he refuses.
The next clash between Arthur and Pelinor actually ends in a duel, as a result of which Arthur is forced to look for a new sword, and Merlin takes him to the lake, from where the hand holding Excalibur rises.
Merlin, realizing that a more experienced knight nobly spared his pupil when Arthur and Pelinor clash for the third time, casts a sleepy spell on the King of the Islands. In the future, Pelinor will play, though not too noticeable, a very significant role in the fate of Merlin himself. It is Pelinor who brings to Camelot Nimue, the Virgin of the Lake.
The sleepy spell cast upon him by Merlin is perhaps partly parallel to the magical dream into which Merlin Nimue himself plunges.
Pelinor has a number of motives associated with the pagan tradition: his daughter Elaine’s severed head is found at the source, his other daughter is dying, and Pelinor himself is injured in a strange duel near the Giants Round Dance.
When the armies invaded Logriya first, Riens of Wales, and then Lot, Pelinor, speaking on the side of Arthur, shows miracles of courage in the battle of Dimlock and in a duel kills Lot himself. Lot's death at the hands of Pelinor became the reason for the enmity of the sons of the king of Orkney not only to Pelinor himself, but to his entire family.
Avenging the death of his father, Gawain and his brothers ( Gaheris , Agravein and Mordred ) once lie in wait for Pelinor on a deserted road and, having attacked four, they kill him. The eldest son of King Pelinor, Lamorack of Wales, also becomes a victim of this enmity.