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GRAIL, THE HOLY

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Originally appearing in Volume V12, Page 322 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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GRAIL, THE See also:HOLY , the famous See also:talisman of Arthurian See also:romance, the See also:object of quest on the See also:part of the knights of the See also:Round Table. It is mainly, if not wholly, known to See also:English readers through the See also:medium of See also:Malory's See also:translation of the See also:French Quite du See also:Saint Graal, where it is the See also:cup or See also:chalice of the Last Supper, in which the See also:blood which flowed from the wounds of the crucified Saviour has been miraculously preserved. Students of the See also:original romances are aware that there is in these texts an extraordinary diversity of statement as to the nature and origin of the Grail, and that it is extremely difficult to determine the precise value of these differing versions.l Broadly speaking the Grail romances have been divided into two See also:main classes: (1) those dealing with the See also:search for the Grail, the Quest, and (2) those See also:relating to its See also:early See also:history. These latter appear to be dependent on the former, for whereas we may have a Quest romance without any insistence on the previous history of the Grail, that history is never found without some allusion to the See also:hero who is destined to bring the quest to its successful termination. The Quest versions again fall into three distinct classes, differentiated by the See also:personality of the hero who is respectively See also:Gawain, See also:Perceval or Galahad. The most important and interesting See also:group is that connected with Perceval, and he was regarded as the original Grail hero, Gawain being, as it were, his understudy. See also:Recent discoveries, however, point to a different conclusion, and indicate that the Gawain stories represent an early tradition, and that we must seek in them rather than in the Perceval versions for indications as to the ultimate origin of the Grail. The See also:character of this talisman or relic varies greatly, as will be seen from•the following See also:summary. I. GAWAIN, included in the continuation to Chretien's Percevai by Wauchier de See also:Denain, and attributed to Bleheris the Welshman, who is probably identical with the Bledhericus of Giraldus Cambrensis, and considerably earlier than Chretien de See also:Troyes. Here the Grail is a See also:food-providing, self-acting talisman, the precise nature of which is not specified; it is designated as the " See also:rich " Grail, and serves the See also:king and his See also:court sans serjani et sans See also:seneschal, the butlers providing the guests with See also:wine. In another version, given at an earlier point of the same continuation, but apparently deriving from a later source, the Grail is See also:borne in procession by a weeping See also:maiden, and is called the " holy " Grail, but no details as to its history or character are given.

In a third version, that of See also:

Diu Crone, a See also:long and See also:con-fused romance, the origin of which has not been determined, the Grail appears as a reliquary, in which the See also:Host is presented to the king, who once a See also:year partakes alike of it and of the blood which flows from the See also:lance. Another See also:account is given in the See also:prose See also:Lancelot, but here Gawain has been deposed from his See also:post as first hero of the court, and, as is to be expected from the, treatment meted out to him in this romance, the visit ends in his See also:complete discomfiture. The Grail is here surrounded with the See also:atmosphere of See also:awe and reverence See also:familiar to us through the ' The See also:etymology of the O. Fr. graal or greal, of which "See also:rail" is an See also:adaptation, has been much discussed. The See also:Low See also:Lat. original, gradate or grasale, a See also:flat dish or platter, has generally been taken to represent a diminutive cratella of See also:crater, bowl, or a lost cratale, formed from the same word (see W. W. See also:Skeat, See also:Preface to See also:Joseph of Arimathie, Early Eng. See also:Text See also:Soc.).—ED. Quite, and is regarded as the chalice of the Last Supper. These are the Gawain versions. 2. PERCEVAL.—The most important Perceval text is the See also:Conte del Grael, or Perceval le See also:Galois of Chretien de Troyes.

Here the Grail is wrought of See also:

gold richly set with See also:precious stones; it is carried in See also:solemn procession, and the See also:light issuing from it extinguishes that of the candles. What it is is not explained, but inasmuch as it is the vehicle in which is conveyed the Host on which the See also:father of the See also:Fisher king depends for nutriment, it seems not improbable that here, as in Diu Crone, it is to be understood as a reliquary. In the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach, the ultimate source of which is identical with that of Chretien, on the contrary, the Grail is represented as a precious See also:stone, brought to See also:earth by angels, and committed to the See also:guardian-See also:ship of the Grail king and his descendants. It is guarded by a See also:body of chosen knights, or See also:templars, and acts alike as a See also:life and youth preserving talisman-no See also:man may See also:die within eight days of beholding it, and the maiden who bears it retains perennial youth—and an See also:oracle choosing its own servants, and indicating whom the Grail king shall wed. The See also:sole See also:link with the See also:Christian tradition is the statement that its virtue is renewed every See also:Good See also:Friday by the agency of a See also:dove from See also:heaven. The discrepancy between this and the other Grail romances is most startling. In the See also:short prose romance known as the " See also:Didot " Perceval we have, for the first See also:time, the whole history of the relic logically set forth. The Perceval forms the third and concluding See also:section of a group of short romances, die two preceding being the Joseph of Arimathea and the See also:Merlin. In the first we have the precise history of the Grail, how it was the dish of the Last Supper, confided by our See also:Lord to the care of Joseph, whom he miraculously visited in the See also:prison to which he had been committed by the See also:Jews. It was subsequently given by Joseph to his See also:brother-in-See also:law Brons, whose See also:grandson Perceval is destined to be the final winner and guardian of the relic. The Merlin forms the connecting See also:thread between this definitely ecclesiastical romance and the chivalric atmosphere of See also:Arthur's court; and finally, in the Perceval, the hero, son of Alain and grandson to Brons, is warned by Merlin of the quest which awaits him and which he achieves after various adventures. In the Perlesvaus the Grail is the same, but the working out of the See also:scheme is much more complex; a son of Joseph of Arimathea, Josephe, is introduced, and we find a spiritual See also:knighthood similar to that used so effectively in the Parzival.

3. GALAHAD.—The Quite du Saint Graal, the only romance of which Galahad is the hero, is dependent on and a completion of the Lancelot development of the Arthurian See also:

cycle. Lancelot, as See also:lover of Guinevere, could not be permitted to achieve so spiritual an emprise, yet as leading See also:knight of Arthur's court it was impossible to allow him to be surpassed by another. Hence the invention of Galahad, son to Lancelot by the Grail king's daughter; predestined by his lineage to achieve the quest, foredoomed, the quest achieved, to vanish, a See also:sacrifice to his father's fame, which, enhanced by connexion with the Grail-winner, could not See also:risk See also:eclipse by his presence. Here the Grail, the chalice of the Last Supper, is at the same time, as in the Gawain stories, self-acting and food-supplying. The last three romances unite, it will be seen, the quest and the early history. See also:Introductory to the Galahad quest, and dealing only with the early history, is the See also:Grand Saint Graal, a See also:work of interminable length, based upon the Joseph of Arimathea, which has undergone numerous revisions and amplifications: its precise relation to the Lancelot, with which it has now much See also:matter in See also:common, is not easy to determine. To be classed also under the See also:head of early history are certain interpolations in the See also:MSS. of the Perceval, where we find the Joseph tradition, but in a somewhat different See also:form, e.g. he is said to have caused the Grail to be made for the purpose of receiving the holy blood. With this account is also connected the See also:legend of the Volto Santo of See also:Lucca, a crucifix said to have been carved by Nicodemus.. In the conclusion to Chretien's poem, composed by Manessier some fifty years later, the Grail is said to have followed Joseph to See also:Britain, how, is not explained. Another continuation by See also:Gerbert, interpolated between those of Wauchier and Manessier, relates how the Grail was brought to Britain by Perceval's See also:mother in the companionship of Joseph. It will be seen that with the exception of the Grand Saint Graal, which has now been practically converted into an introduction to the Quiite, no two versions agree with each other; indeed, with the exception of the See also:oldest Gawain-Grail visit, that due to Bleheris, they do not agree with themselves, but all show, more or less, the See also:influence of different and discordant versions.

Why should the See also:

vessel of the Last Supper, jealously guarded at See also:Castle Corbenic, visit Arthur's court independently? Why does a sacred relic provide purely material food? What connexion can there be between a precious stone, a See also:baetylus, as Dr See also:Hagen has convincingly shown, and Good Friday? These, and such questions as these, suggest themselves at every turn. Numerous attempts have been made to solve these problems, and to construct a theory of the origin of the Grail See also:story, but so far the difficulty has been to find an See also:hypothesis which would admit of the practically simultaneous existence of apparently contradictory features. At one time considered as an introduction from the See also:East, the theory of the Grail as an See also:Oriental talisman has now been discarded, and the See also:expert See also:opinion of the See also:day may be said to fall into two See also:groups: (I) those who hold the Grail to have been from the first a purely Christian vessel which has accidentally, and in a manner never clearly explained, acquired certain folk-See also:lore characteristics; and (2) those who hold, on the contrary, that the Grail is aborigine folk-lore and See also:Celtic, and that the Christian development is a later and accidental rather than an essential feature of the story. The first view is set forth in the work of See also:Professor See also:Birch-Hirschfeld, the second in that of Mr See also:Alfred Nutt, the two constituting the only travaux d'ensemble which have yet appeared on the subject. It now seems probable that both are in a measure correct, and that the ultimate See also:solution will be recognized to See also:lie in a blending of two originally See also:independent streams of tradition. The researches of Professor Mannhardt in See also:Germany and of J. G. Frazer in See also:England have amply demonstrated the enduring influence exercised on popular thought and See also:custom by certain See also:primitive forms of vegetation See also:worship, of which the most noteworthy example is the so-called mysteries of See also:Adonis. Here the See also:ordinary processes of nature and progression of the seasons were symbolized under the figure of the See also:death and resuscitation of the See also:god.

These See also:

rites are found all over the See also:world, and in his monumental work, The See also:Golden Bough, Dr Frazer has traced a host of extant beliefs and practices to this source. The earliest form of the Grail story, the Gawain-Bleheris version, exhibits a rnarked See also:affinity with the characteristic features of the Adonis or Tammuz worship; we have a castle on the See also:sea-See also:shore, a dead body on a bier, the identity of which is never revealed, mourned over with solemn rites; a wasted See also:country, whose desolation is mysteriously connected with the dead man; and which is restored to fruitfulness when the quester asks the meaning of the marvels he beholds (the two features of the weeping See also:women and the wasted See also:land being retained in versions where they have no significance); finally the mysterious food-providing, self-acting talisman of a common feast—one and all of these features may be explained as survivals of the Adonis See also:ritual. Professor See also:Martin long since suggested that a See also:key to the problems of the Arthurian cycle was to be found in a nature myth: Professor Rhys regards Arthur as an agricultural hero; Dr See also:Lewis See also:Mott has pointed out the See also:correspondence between the so-called Round Table sites and the ritual of nature worship; but it is only with the See also:discovery of the existence of Bleheris as reputed authority for Arthurian tradition, and the consequent recognition that the Grail story connected with his name is the earliest form of the legend, that we have secured a solid basis for such theories. 'With regard to the religious form of the story, recent See also:research has again aided us—we know now that a legend similar in all respects to the Joseph of Arimathea Grail story was widely current at least a See also:century before our earliest Grail texts: The story with Nicodemus as protagonist is told of the Saint-Sang relic at See also:Fecamp; and, as stated already, a similar origin is The Conte del Graal, or Perceval, is only accessible in the edition of M. Potvin (6 vols., 1866–1871). The See also:Mons MS., from which this has been printed, has proved to be an exceedingly poor and untrustworthy text. Parzival, by Wolfram von Eschenbach, has been frequently and well edited; the edition by Bartsch (1875–1877), in Deutsche Classiker See also:des Mittelalters, contains full notes and a glossary. Suitable for the more advanced student are those by K. See also:Lachmann (1891), Leitzmann (1902–1903) and E. Martin (1903). There are See also:modern See also:German See also:translations by See also:Simrock (very See also:close to the original) and See also:Hertz (excellent notes). English translation with notes and appendices by J.

L. See also:

Weston. " Didot " Perceval, ed. Hucher, Le Saint Graal (1875–1878), vol. i. Perlesvaus was printed by Potvin, under the See also:title of Perceval le Gallois, in vol. i. of the edition above referred to; a Welsh version from the Hengwert MS. was published with translation by See also:Canon R. See also:Williams (2 vols., 1876–1892). Under the title of The High History of the Holy Grail a See also:fine version was published by Dr See also:Sebastian See also:Evans in the See also:Temple See also:Classics (2 vols., 1898). The Grand Saint Graal was published by Hucher as given above ; this edition includes the Joseph of Arimathea. A 15th century metrical English adaptation by one See also:Henry Lovelich, was printed by Dr See also:Furnivall for the See also:Roxburghe See also:Club 1861–1863; a new edition was undertaken for the Early English Text Society. Queete du Saint Graal can best be studied in 1Vlalory's somewhat abridged translation, books xiii.-xviii. of the Morte Arthur. It has also been printed by Dr Furnivall for the Roxburghe Club, from a MS. in the See also:British Museum. Neither of these texts is, however, very good, and the student who can decipher old Dutch would do well to read it in the metrical translation published by Joenckbloet, See also:Roman See also:van Lanceloet, as the original here was considerably See also:fuller.

For See also:

general treatment of the subject see Legend of See also:Sir Perceval, by J. L. Weston, See also:Grimm Library, vol. xvii. (1906) ; Studies on the Legend of the Holy Grail, by A. Nutt (1888), and a more concise treatment of the subject by the same writer in No. 14 of Popular Studies (1902) ; Professor Birch-Hirschfeld's Die See also:Sage vom Gral (1877). The See also:late Professor Heinzel's Die alt franzosischen Gral-Romane contains a See also:mass of valuable matter, but is very confused and See also:ill-arranged. For the Fecamp legend see See also:Leroux de Lincey's Essai sur l'abbaye de Fescamp (184o); for the Volto Santo and kindred legends, Ernest von Dobschiitz, Christus-Bilder (See also:Leipzig, 1899)• (J. L.

End of Article: GRAIL, THE HOLY

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