''Prince Valiant in the Days of King Arthur'', often simply called ''Prince Valiant'', is an American comic strip created by Hal Foster in 1937. It is an epic adventure that has told a continuous story during its entire history, and the full stretch of that story now totals more than 4600 Sunday strips. The strip appears weekly in more than 300 American newspapers, according to its distributor, King Features Syndicate. As the Duke of Windsor, Edward VIII called ''Prince Valiant'' the "greatest contribution to English literature in the past hundred years".Syracuse University: Hal Foster Papers.
/ref> Generally regarded by comics historians as one of the most impressive visual creations ever syndicated, the strip is noted for its realistically rendered panoramas and the intelligent, sometimes humorous, narrative. The format does not employ word balloons. Instead, the story is narrated in captions positioned at the bottom or sides of panels. Events depicted are taken from various time periods, from the late Roman Empire to the

High Middle Ages The High Middle Ages, or High Medieval Period, was the periodization, period of European history between and ; it was preceded by the Early Middle Ages and followed by the Late Middle Ages, which ended according to historiographical convention ...

, with a few brief scenes from modern times (commenting on the "manuscript").Goldberg, Todd and Carl Horak, edited by Don Markstein and Rick Norwood. ''A Prince Valiant Companion''. Manuscript Press. While drawing the '' Tarzan'' comic strip, Foster wanted to do his own original newspaper feature, and he began work on a strip he called ''Derek, Son of Thane'', later changing the title to ''Prince Arn''. King Features manager Joseph Connolly eventually renamed it ''Prince Valiant''. In 1936, after extensive research, Foster pitched his concept to William Randolph Hearst, who had long wanted to distribute a strip by Foster. Hearst was so impressed that he gave Foster ownership of the strip. ''Prince Valiant'' began in full-color tabloid sections on Saturday February 13, 1937. The first full page was strip #16, which appeared in the Sunday '' New Orleans Times Picayune''. The internal dating changed from Saturday to Sunday with strip #66 (May 15, 1938). The full-page strip continued until 1971, when strip #1788 was not offered in full-page format—it was the last strip Foster drew. The strip continues today by other artists in a half-page format.

Characters and story

The setting is Arthurian. Valiant (Val) is a Nordic prince from Thule, located near present-day Trondheim on the Norwegian coast. Early in the story Valiant arrives at Camelot where he becomes friends with Sir Gawain and Sir Tristram. Earning the respect of King Arthur and Merlin, he becomes a Knight of the Round Table. On a Mediterranean island he meets the love of his life, Aleta, Queen of the Misty Isles, whom he later marries. He fights the Huns with his powerful Singing Sword, which, in a 1939 strip, a witch identifies with the legendary sword Flamberge, a magical blade apparently created by the same enchanter who forged Arthur's Excalibur. Val travels to Africa and America and later helps his father regain his lost throne of Thule, which has been usurped by the tyrant Sligon.Markstein, Don. Toonopedia: ''Prince Valiant''
/ref> When the strip starts in 1937, Val is five years old. The first episodes follow the youth through the wild Fens district of Britain with his father, the deposed King Aguar of Thule. When Val encounters the witch Horrit, she predicts he will have a life of adventure, but he will never be happy or content. Arriving home, Val discovers that his mother has died. Not long after this come encounters with Gawain, with gigantic creatures and with the glory of Camelot. Steve Donoghue comments: Val acquires the Singing Sword in strips from 1938. The original owner of the Singing Sword is Prince Arn of Ord, Valiant's rival for the maid Ilene. The two men put aside their differences when Ilene is kidnapped by Viking raiders on her way to Ord. Arn hands Valiant the charmed sword to help him hold back their pursuers while he himself rides ahead to free Ilene. The pair continue in their efforts to rescue Ilene, eventually discovering that she has been killed in a shipwreck. Arn gives the Singing Sword to Valiant after that adventure and the two part as friends. Later in the series it is mentioned that the Singing Sword is a sister to King Arthur's Excalibur. In the strips from 1939 Val is knighted by King Arthur, and the following year, he helps to restore his father as King of Thule. Moving across Britain, Europe, and the Holy Land, Val fights invading Goths, Huns and Saxons. In 1946, shortly after Val marries Aleta, she is kidnapped by the Viking raider Ulfran. Val's pursuit takes him past the Shetland Islands, the

Faroe Islands The Faroe Islands ( ) (alt. the Faroes) are an archipelago in the North Atlantic Ocean and an autonomous territory of the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark. Located between Iceland, Norway, and the United Kingdom, the islands have a populat ...

Iceland Iceland is a Nordic countries, Nordic island country between the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic and Arctic Oceans, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between North America and Europe. It is culturally and politically linked with Europe and is the regi ...

Greenland Greenland is an autonomous territory in the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark. It is by far the largest geographically of three constituent parts of the kingdom; the other two are metropolitan Denmark and the Faroe Islands. Citizens of Greenlan ...

, Newfoundland and the Saint Lawrence River, arriving at Niagara Falls 1,000 years before Columbus. Defeating Ulfran, Val is reunited with Aleta, and the couple spend that winter with friendly Native Americans.Bayly, Michael. "Valiant Prince Turns Fifty". ''Canberra Times'', April 1987.
/ref> In the strip dated August 31, 1947, Prince Arn, their first son, is born in America, and Val celebrates by getting drunk. The infant Arn is named after Val's old friend, Prince Arn of Ord, who likewise named his own son after Valiant. Val and Aleta's other children are the twins, Karen and Valeta (born 1951), Galan (1962) and Prince Nathan (1979). Agents of the

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

Emperor Justinian abduct Nathan shortly after his birth, and he is eventually rescued by Arn. Earlier, in strips from 1964, Arn leads an expedition to America. In strips from 1987 Val becomes a grandfather when Arn and his wife, Maeve, daughter of the traitorous Mordred, give birth to Ingrid.

History and myth

The historical and mythological elements of ''Prince Valiant'' were initially haphazard, but soon Foster attempted to bring the facts into order. Many elements of the story place it in the fifth century, such as the death of

Attila Attila ( or ; ), frequently called Attila the Hun, was the ruler of the Huns from 434 until his death in early 453. He was also the leader of an empire consisting of Huns, Ostrogoths, Alans, and Gepids, among others, in Central Europe, C ...

the Hun in 453 and

Geiseric Gaiseric ( – 25 January 477), also known as Geiseric or Genseric (; reconstructed Vandalic language, Vandalic: ) was king of the Vandals and Alans from 428 to 477. He ruled over Vandal Kingdom, a kingdom and played a key role in the Fall of th ...

's sacking of

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

in 455, which Prince Valiant and Aleta witness. The murder of Aëtius in 454 differs from the historical version; Valiant and Gawain are blamed for the murder and must flee. Slightly fantastic elements, like "marsh monsters" (a dinosaur-like creature) and witches, were present in the early years but were later downplayed (as was Merlin's and Morgan le Fay's use of magic), so that by 1942, the story became more realistic. The storyline is by no means historically accurate. While obviously meant to take place during the

Later Roman Empire In historiography, the Late or Later Roman Empire, traditionally covering the period from 284 CE to 641 CE, was a time of significant transformation in Roman governance, society, and religion. Diocletian's reforms, including the establishment of t ...

, Foster incorporated anachronistic elements: Viking longships, knights,

Muslim Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...

s, alchemists and technological advances not made before the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

. The fortifications, dresses, armor and armament resemble the

rather than the fifth century.

Other artists

In 1970, after tryout strips by several artists, Foster invited John Cullen Murphy to collaborate on the strip. Here is a list of the transition artists: * #1756 Foster * #1757 Gray Morrow * #1758 Foster * #1759 Foster * #1760 Murphy * #1761 Foster * #1762 Wally Wood * #1763 Foster * #1764 Murphy * #1765 Gray Morrow * #1766 Murphy * #1767 Gray Morrow * #1768 Foster * #1769 Murphy * #1770 Gray Morrow * #1771–1772 Murphy * #1773 Foster * #1774–1775 Murphy * #1776 Foster * #1777 Gray Morrow * #1778–1779 Murphy * #1780 Gray Morrow * #1781–1787 Murphy * #1788 Foster (last) * #1789–3502 Murphy From 1971 on, Murphy drew the strip from Foster scripts and pencil sketches. Foster continued to write the continuity until strip #2241 in 1980. Murphy then drew it solo with scripts by his son Cullen Murphy, an editor of '' The Atlantic''. Stories by Cullen Murphy included many adventures in which Val is opposed by the Emperor Justinian. John Cullen Murphy's daughter, Mairead, did the lettering and coloring. In March 2004, Murphy retired and turned the strip over to his chosen successor, illustrator Gary Gianni. Scripting duties were passed on to Mark Schultz with Scott Roberts providing the coloring. Schultz continued as the writer when Thomas Yeates began as the strip's artist on April 1, 2012.

Awards

Hal Foster was recognized for his work on the strip with the Banshees' Silver Lady award in 1952, followed by the National Cartoonists Society's Reuben Award in 1957, their Story Comic Strip Award in 1964, their Special Features Award in 1966 and 1967, the Gold Key award in 1977, and the Elzie Segar Award in 1978. He was inducted into the Will Eisner Hall of Fame in 1996, and in 2005 he was inducted into the Joe Shuster Canadian Comic Book Creators Hall of Fame for his contributions to comic books. In 2006, Foster was inducted into the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame. At age 73, Foster was elected to membership in Great Britain's Royal Society of Arts, an honor given to very few Americans. Murphy received the National Cartoonists Society Story Comic Strip Award for his work on the strip in 1971, 1974, 1976, 1978, 1984 and 1987. In 1995, the strip was one of 20 included in the Comic Strip Classics series of commemorative postage stamps.

Reprints

* Hastings House produced seven hardback ''Prince Valiant'' books in the 1950s, using the illustrations by Foster but with the text simplified by Max Trell and for the last two books by James Flowers. This series was reprinted in Germany as ''Prinz Eisenherz'' (Prince Ironheart) and continued there for an additional five volumes. * Nostalgia Press published four hardback reprints in conjunction with King Features. Some entire panels were colored solid pink or solid purple. * ''Prince Valiant: An American Epic'', from Manuscript Press, reprinted the first three years in three volumes, in the full original color and full page size. They also published a hardback omnibus of the three years, in a limited edition of 26 copies , and a print of Hal Foster's last Prince Valiant page, so that all Foster pages would be available in full page format. * Fantagraphics published a set of 50 trade paperbacks reprinting all of the strips written by Hal Foster, including those drawn by John Cullen Murphy. * Andrews McMeel published ''Prince Valiant: Far from Camelot'', the only collection of creators Gary Gianni and Mark Schultz's current strips, dating from November 21, 2004, to May 11, 2008. * A French reprinting of all the Foster-drawn strips was published by Editions Zenda in a green cloth, embossed hardcover series with dustjacket. Featuring two years' worth of strips per volume, it was printed from the original color pages with typeset lettering. * ''Prince Valiant'' has often been reprinted in comic books. ''Feature Book'' #26 reprints most of the first year of the strip, and is the only comic book to have an original cover by Hal Foster. Many Foster strips were reprinted in the pages of Ace Comics and King Comics. Not reprints are seven Dell four-color ''Prince Valiant'' comic books (#567, 650, 699, 719, 788, 849, 900) drawn by Bob Fujitani, writer unknown. A 1973 ''Prince Valiant'' comic book reprinted Foster art with a simplified text intended to teach reading to children. * '' Prince Valiant'' by Fantagraphics Books is a hardcover collection of the comic strip in full color, published since 2009. In 2018 they completed their reprint of all the Prince Valiant pages drawn by Hal Foster in eighteen volumes. This excluded his work for page 2000, published on June 8, 1975. By 2023, with a total of twenty-six volumes, they plan to finish reprinting all the pages written and penciled by Foster, drawn by John Cullen Murphy, which began near the beginning of Volume 18. The Dutch edition was published by Silvester Strips in a translation by comic strip artist Mark van Broekhoven.

Film and TV adaptations

* '' Prince Valiant'' is a 1954 American motion picture by

20th Century Fox 20th Century Studios, Inc., formerly 20th Century Fox, is an American film studio, film production and Film distributor, distribution company owned by the Walt Disney Studios (division), Walt Disney Studios, the film studios division of the ...

, filmed in color and Cinemascope. Directed by Henry Hathaway, it starred James Mason, Robert Wagner (in the title role), Janet Leigh and Sterling Hayden. The film was also adapted into a comic book. * Prince Valiant also appeared in the episode "Terror in Time" of '' Defenders of the Earth''. * '' The Legend of Prince Valiant'', a 1991 animated American television series seen on The Family Channel in the US and CBBC in the UK, is available on DVD. * '' Prince Valiant'' is a 1997 UK/Ireland/Germany film starring Stephen Moyer, Katherine Heigl, Thomas Kretschmann, Edward Fox, Joanna Lumley and Ron Perlman. The soundtrack of the

film score A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film. The score comprises a number of orchestral, instrumental, or choral pieces called cues, which are timed to begin and end at specific points during the film in order to ...

by David Bergeaud was released on February 20, 2003 by Perseverance Records.

Other media

* In addition to two ''Prince Valiant'' phonograph records (released in 1947 and 1968) and three coloring books, Treasure Books published a small 1954 children's book with Foster art in color. *

Marvel Comics Marvel Comics is a New York City–based comic book publishing, publisher, a property of the Walt Disney Company since December 31, 2009, and a subsidiary of Disney Publishing Worldwide since March 2023. Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin G ...

published a four-part

miniseries In the United States, a miniseries or mini-series is a television show or series that tells a story in a predetermined, limited number of episodes. Many miniseries can also be referred to, and shown, as a television film. " Limited series" is ...

titled ''Prince Valiant'' in the 1990s. * Bastei in Germany published a six-issue series titled ''Die Legende von Prinz Eisenherz'' in 1994, based on the animated TV series. * Chaosium produced a '' Prince Valiant: The Story-Telling Game''

role-playing game A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, or abbreviated as RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of player character, characters in a fictional Setting (narrative), setting. Players take responsibility for acting out ...

. In 1999, '' Pyramid'' magazine named the ''Prince Valiant Role-playing Game'' as one of "The Millennium's Most Underrated Games". Editor Scott Haring commented that "''Prince Valiant'' was designed as a beginner's introduction to roleplaying... Perhaps the subject matter's perceived lack of 'cool' killed this game, but it deserved better". In 2016, Stewart Wieck used crowdfunding platform Kickstarter to reprint the game.

Cultural references

* The "Prince Valiant" haircut, a variant of the pageboy resembling Val's, was once popular, particularly for children. * Harvey Kurtzman and Wally Wood satirized the strip with ''Prince Violent'' in '' Mad'' #13 (July 1954), which ends in Violent losing his page-boy haircut to "the fair maid Alota" in the best of all causes. * Prince Valiant once used the guise of a demon, and that costume was an inspiration to Jack Kirby for his character Etrigan the Demon.The Demon – Don Markstein's Toonopedia
/ref> The same panel also inspired the Italian creative team EsseGesse on their comic series ''Kinowa''. * Bugs Bunny parodied the strip in '' Prince Violent'' (renamed ''Prince Varmint'' for television release) with Bugs defending a castle against Viking raider Yosemite Sam. * In the Academy Award-winning short '' Knighty Knight Bugs'', King Arthur sends court jester Bugs to recover the Singing Sword from the Black Knight, portrayed by Yosemite Sam in black armor. * Dave Sim did a weekly ''Prince Valiant'' parody, ''Silverspoon'', in '' The Buyer's Guide to Comics Fandom''. The strip employed Foster's illustrations-with-captions format. Sim's comic book series '' Cerebus the Aardvark'' also contained a ''Prince Valiant'' parody with illustrations/captions. * In '' Spaceballs'', actor Jim J. Bullock plays Prince Valium, the consistently sleepy suitor of Princess Vespa ( Daphne Zuniga), whom Vespa leaves at the altar. * "Valiant", the second episode in the first series of the BBC's '' Merlin'', features a knight Valiant played by Will Mellor who dishonourably uses an enchanted shield and dies in a duel with Arthur during the tournament finale. * Richard Marcinko in his autobiographical work '' Rogue Warrior'' notes that one of his men was given the call sign "Prince Valiant", or PV for short, as he had a hairstyle like the comic's protagonist. * Prince Valiant and Flash Gordon appear on the cover of the October 2009 '' Comics Revue'', drawn by Mark Schultz.

Citations

General and cited references

* ''Hal Foster: Prince of Illustrators'' by Brian M. Kane, Vanguard Productions, 2001. IPPY Award-winning biography of Hal Foster. * ''A Prince Valiant Companion'' by Todd Goldberg and Carl Horak, edited by Don Markstein and Rick Norwood, Manuscript Press. * ''The Definitive Prince Valiant Companion'' compiled by Brian M. Kane, Fantagraphics Books, 2009. * ''The Prince Valiant Page'' by Gary Gianni, Flesk Publications, 2008.

External links

''Prince Valiant''
on Comics Kingdom
''A Prince Named Valiant: A celebration of the finest work ever produced in the comic art medium''

King Features: ''Prince Valiant''
*
IMDb: ''Prince Valiant'' (1954)

IMDb: ''The Legend of Prince Valiant'' (1991)

IMDb: ''Prince Valiant'' (1997)
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