Saxon Chron. A.D.
485. Flor. Wigorn. [s] Hen. Hunting. lib. 2.]

These Saxons, from the situation of the country in which they settled,
were called the West Saxons, and landed in the year 495, under the
command of Cerdic, and of his son Kenric [t]. The Britons were, by
past experience, so much on their guard, and so well prepared to
receive the enemy, that they gave battle to Cerdic the very day of his
landing; and though vanquished, still defended, for some time, their
liberties against the invaders. None of the other tribes of Saxons
met with such vigorous resistance, or exerted such valour and
perseverance in pushing their conquests. Cerdic was even obliged to
call for the assistance of his countrymen from the kingdoms of Kent
and Sussex, as well as from Germany, and he was thence joined by a
fresh army under the command of Porte, and of his sons Bleda, and
Megla [u]. Strengthened by these succours, he fought in the year 508,
a desperate battle with the Britons, commanded by Nazan-Leod, who was
victorious in the beginning of the action, and routed the wing in
which Cerdic himself commanded; but Kenric, who had prevailed in the
other wing, brought timely assistance to his father, and restored the
battle, which ended in a complete victory gained by the Saxons [w].
Nazan-Leod perished with 5000 of his army; but left the Britons more
weakened than discouraged by his death. The war still continued,
though the success was commonly on the side of the Saxons, whose short
swords, and close manner of fighting, gave them great advantage over
the missile weapons of the Britons. Cerdic was not wanting to his
good fortune; and in order to extend his conquests, he laid siege to
Mount Badon or Banesdowne, near Bath, whither the most obstinate of
the discomfited Britons had retired. The southern Britons, in this
extremity, applied for assistance to Arthur, Prince of the Silures,
whose heroic valour now sustained the declining fate of his country
[x]. This is that Arthur so much celebrated in the songs of
Thaliessin, and the other British bards, and whose military
achievements have been blended with so many fables, as even to give
occasion for entertaining a doubt of his real existence. But poets,
though they disfigure the most certain history by their fictions, and
use strange liberties with truth where they are the sole historians,
as among the Britons, have commonly some foundation for their wildest
exaggerations. Cert