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Many Britons fled to escape the invaders. They went westwards, into the hills of what are now Cornwall and Devon, Wales, the Lake District and southwest Scotland. Some even crossed the seas, to Ireland or to Brittany in France. It must have been heart breaking for them to leave their homes and crops, but even this was better than death or slavery.
However in some areas the Britons banded together and fought the invaders. Roughly 50 years after the first English settlements there seems to have been a British recovery. We learn from several sources that in about the year 500 the Britons won a big battle at a place called Mount Badon. They drove out invaders from a large part of England and seem to have stopped their advance for more half a century.
Written records suggest that the Britons had two successful war leaderd at this time. The first, Ambrosius Aurelianus, was descended from a Roman family. After him, so we are told, came Arthur, the inspiration of many legends in later centuries. The earliest known reference to Arthur was made by a Welsh monk called Nennius, whose History of the Britons was probably written in the early ninth century. According to Nennius, Arthur-who was not himself a king-commanded the Britons in twelve major battles, of which only the last is given a name familiar to historians:
It seems likely that Arthur was a real historical figure. But he would not have been much like the character in the famous stories of the Round Table. And his followers would not have been splendid knights like Sir Lancelot and Sir Galahad, althought they may have fought on horseback. They would have been a band of brave Britons, fighting desperately to save their country from invasion.