Why is Ged's usename 'Sparrowhawk'? Because A) he's a wizard and B) a sparrowhawk is a kind of bird of prey - as is a Merlin. —Azvolrien
Continuing on with the "Merlin" example and firmly cementing it in-story, in "The Farthest Shore", Ged meets a young prince, Arren, from the isle of Enlad. At the beginning of the book, the wizards' council speculates that the world is going wrong because the prophesied High King of Earthsea has not come to rule, and while Ged agrees, he refuses to stay on Rome, and leaves to search out the cause of the loss of magic, taking Arren with him. All through the quest, Ged is Arren's teacher and mentor through the world and its people, and at the end, after Ged has sacrificed his power to restore magic, the High King is revealed to be Arren. The in-universe translation of "Arren" is "sword" — as in King Arthur's sword, Excalibur, and "Enlad" is "England" with the g and an n removed, making "The Farthest Shore" a stealth homage to T.H. White's The Once and Future King.
