There were places for a large number of knights around this board (the number varying greatly with different writers), and a special place was reserved for the Holy Grail, which, having vanished from Britain because of the sinfulness of the people, the knights still hoped to have restored when they became sufficiently pure.
"This table gan [began] Uther the wight; Ac [but] it to ende had he no might.
For, theygh [though] alle the kinges under our lord Hadde y-sitten [sat] at that bord, Knight by knight, ich you telle, The table might nought fulfille, Till they were born that should do all Fulfill the mervaile of the Greal." ELLIS, _Merlin_.
A great festival was announced for the institution of the Round Table, and all the knights came to Carduel, accompanied by their wives.

Among the latter the fairest was Yguerne, wife of Gorlois, Lord of Tintagel in Cornwall, and with her Uther fell desperately in love.
"This fest was noble ynow, and nobliche y-do [done]; For mony was the faire ledy, that y-come was thereto.
Yguerne, Gorloys wyf, was fairest of echon [each one], That was contasse of Cornewail, for so fair was there non." ROBERT OF GLOUCESTER.
Yguerne had already three or four daughters, famous in the Arthurian legends as mothers of the knights Gawain, Gravain, Ywain, and others.

One of the king's councilors, Ulfin, revealed the king's passion to Yguerne, and she told her husband.

Indignant at the insult offered him, Gorlois promptly left court, locked his wife up in the impregnable fortress of Tintagel, and, gathering together an army, began to fight against Uther Pendragon.
The day before the battle, Merlin changed Uther into the form of Gorlois, and himself and Ulfin into those of the squires of the Duke of Cornwall.
Thus disguised, the three went to Tintagel, where Yguerne threw the gates open at their call and received Uther as her husband, without suspecting the deception practiced upon her.
[Sidenote: Birth of Arthur.] On the morrow the battle took place.

Gorlois was slain.