Studies on the Legend of the Holy Grail Part 16

The various arguments for and against the use of any other French source than Chrestien by Wolfram have been clearly summed up by G. Botticher, Die Wolfram Literatur seit Lachmann, Berlin, 1880. The chief representative of the negative opinion is Birch-Hirschfeld, who first gives, Chapter VIII.

of his work, a useful collection of pa.s.sages relating to the Grail, the Castle, and the Quest, from both authors. His chief argument is this:--The Grail in all the romances except in Wolfram is a cup or vessel, but in Wolfram a stone, a peculiarity only to be explained by Wolfram's ignorance of any source than Chrestien, and by the fact that the latter, in accordance with his usual practice of leaving objects and persons in as mysterious an atmosphere as possible, nowhere gives a clear description of the Grail. He undoubtedly would have done so if he had finished his work.

Such indications as he gave led Wolfram, who did not understand the word _Graal_, to think it was a stone. It is inconceivable that Kyot, if such a personage existed, should have so far departed from all other versions as not to picture the Grail as a vessel, inconceivable, again, that his account of it should have been just as vague as Chrestien's, that he should have afforded Wolfram no hint of the real nature of the object. In Chrestien Perceval's question refers to the Grail, but Wolfram, missing the significance of the holy vessel owing to the meagreness of the information respecting it given to him by Chrestien, was compelled to transform the whole incident, and to refer it solely to the sufferings of the wounded King. Again, Chrestien meant to utilise the sword, and to bring Gawain to the Grail Castle; but his unfinished work did not carry out his intention, and in Wolfram Gawain also fails to come to the Grail Castle; the sword is pa.s.sed over in silence in the latter part of the poem.--Simrock, jealous for the credit of Wolfram, claimed for him the invention of all that could not be traced to Chrestien, resting the claim chiefly upon consideration of a sentimental patriotic nature.--In opposition to these views, although the fact is not denied that Wolfram followed Chrestien closely for the parts common to both, it is urged to be incredible that he, a German poet, should invent a prologue to Chrestien's unfinished work connecting with an Angevin princely genealogical legend.

It was also pointed out, with greatest fulness by Bartsch, Die Eigennamen im Parcival und t.i.turel, Germanist. Studien, II., 114, _et seq._, that the German poet gives a vast number of proper names which are not to be found in Chrestien, and that these are nearly all of French, and especially Southern French and Provencal origin.--Simrock endeavoured to meet this argument in the fifth edition of his translation, but with little success.--Botticher, whilst admitting the weight of Birch-Hirschfeld's arguments, points out the difficulties which his theory involves. If Wolfram simply misunderstood Chrestien and did not differ from him personally, why should he be at the trouble of inventing an elaborately feigned source to justify a simple addition to the original story? If he only knew of the Grail from Chrestien, what gave him the idea of endowing it, as he did, with mystic properties? Martin points out in addition (Zs.

f. d. A., V. 87) that Wolfram has the same connection of the Grail and Swan Knight story as Gerbert, whom, _ex hypothesi_, he could not have known, and who certainly did not know him.--In his Zur Gralsage, Martin returned to the question of proper names, and showed that a varying redaction of a large part of the romance is vouched for by the different names which Heinrich von dem Turlin applies to personages met with both in Chrestien and in Wolfram. If, then, one French version, that followed by Heinrich, who is obviously a translator, is lost, why not another?

The first thorough comparison of Chrestien and Wolfram is to be found in Otto Kupp's Unmittelbaren Quellen des Parzival, (Zs. f. d. Ph. XVII., l).

He argues for Kyot's existence. Some of the points he mentions in which the two poems differ, and in which Wolfram's account has a more archaic character, may be cited: The mention of Gurnemanz's sons; the food producing properties of the Grail on Parzival's first visit; the reproaches of the varlet to Parzival on his leaving the Grail Castle, "You are a goose, had you but moved your lips and asked the host! Now you have lost great praise;"[160] the statement that the broken sword is to be made whole by dipping in the Lake Lac, and the mention of a sword charm by virtue of which Parzival can become lord of the Grail Castle; the mention that no one seeing the Grail could die within eight days. In addition Kupp finds that many of the names in Wolfram are more archaic than those of Chrestien. On the other hand, Kupp has not noticed that Chrestien has preserved a more archaic feature in the prohibition laid upon Gauvain not to leave for seven days the castle after he had undergone the adventure of the bed.

Kupp has not noticed that some of the special points he singles out in Wolfram are likewise to be found in Chrestien's continuators, _e.g._, the mention of the sons of Gurnemanz, by Gerbert.

I believe I have the first pointed out the insistence by both Wolfram and Gerbert upon the hero's love to and duty towards his wife.

The name of Parzival's uncle in Wolfram, Gurnemanz, is nearer to the form in Gerbert, Gornumant, than to that in Chrestien, Gonemant.

The matter may be summed up thus: it is very improbable that Wolfram should have invented those parts of the story found in him alone; the parts common to him and Chrestien are frequently more archaic in his case; there are numerous points of contact between him and Gerbert. All this speaks for another French source than Chrestien. On the other hand, it is almost inconceivable that such a source should have presented the Grail as Wolfram presents it.

I cannot affect to consider the question decidedly settled one way or the other, and have, therefore, preferred to make no use of Wolfram. I would only point out that if the contentions of the foregoing studies be admitted, they strongly favour the genuineness of the non-Chrestien section of Wolfram's poem,[161] though I admit they throw no light upon his special presentment of the Grail itself.

APPENDIX B.

THE PROLOGUE TO THE GRAND ST. GRAAL AND THE BRANDAN LEGEND.

I believe the only parallel to this prologue to be the one furnished by that form of the Brandan legend of which Schroder has printed a German version (Sanct Brandan) at Erlangen, in 1871, from a MS. of the fourteenth century, but the first composition of which he places (p. 15) in the last quarter of the twelfth century. The text in question will be found pp. 51, _et seq._: Brandan, a servant of G.o.d, seeks out marvels in rare books, he finds that two paradises were on earth, that another world was situated under this one, so that when it is here night it is day there, and of a fish so big that forests grew on his back, also that the grace of G.o.d allowed some respite every Sat.u.r.day night to the torments of Judas. Angry at all these things he burnt the book. But the voice of G.o.d spake to him, "Dear friend Brandan thou hast done wrong, and through thy wrath I see My wonders lost." The holy Christ bade him fare nine years on the ocean, until he see whether these marvels were real or a lie. Thereafter Brandan makes ready a s.h.i.+p to set forth on his travels.

This version was very popular in Germany. Schroder prints a Low German adaptation, and a chap book one, frequently reprinted during the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries. But besides this form there was another, now lost, which can be partially recovered from the allusions to it in the Wartburg Krieg, a German poem of the thirteenth and early fourteenth century, and which is as follows:--An angel brings Brandan a book from heaven: Brandan finds so many incredible things in it that he taxes book and angel with lying, and burns the book. For his unfaith he must wander till he find it. G.o.d's grace grants him this at last; an angel gives him the sign of two fires burning, which are the eyes of an ox, upon whose tongue he shall find the book. He hands it to Uranias, who brings it to _Scotland_ (_i.e._, of course Ireland) Schroder, p. 9.

The closeness of the parallel cannot be denied, and it raises many interesting questions, which I can here only allude to. The Isle of Brandan has always been recognized as a Christian variant of the Celtic Tir-na n-Og, the Land of the Shades, Avalon. Schroder has some instructive remarks on this subject, p. 11. The voyage of Brandan may thus be compared with that of Bran, the son of Febal (_supra_, p. 232), both being versions of the wide-spread myth of a mortal's visit to the otherworld. It is not a little remarkable that in the Latin legend, which differs from the German form by the absence of the above-cited prologue, there is an account (missing in the German), of a "conopeus" ("cover" or "canopy,") _cf._ Ducange and Diez, _sub voce_; the old French version translates it by "Pavillon of the colour of silver but harder than marble, and a column therein of clearest crystal." And on the fourth day they find a window and therein a "calix" of the same nature as the "conopeus" and a "patena" of the colour of the column (Schroder, p. 27, and Note 41).

Thus there is a formal connection between the Brandan legend and the Grail romances in the prologue common to two works of each cycle, and there is a likeness of subject-matter between the Brandan legend and the older Celtic traditions which I have a.s.sumed to be the basis of the romances. But German literature likewise supplies evidence of a connection between Brandan and Bran. Professor Karl Pearson has referred me to a pa.s.sage in the Pfaffe Amis, a thirteenth century South German poem, composed by Der Stricker, the hero of which, a prototype of Eulenspiegel, goes through the world gulling and tricking his contemporaries. In a certain town he persuades the good people to entrust to him their money, by telling them that he has in his possession a very precious relic, the head of St.

Brandan, which has commanded him to build a cathedral (Lambl's Edition, Leipzig, 1872, p. 32). The preservation of the head of Bran is a special feature in the Mabinogi. I have instanced parallels from Celtic tradition (Branwen, p. 14), and Professor Rhys has since (Hibb. Lect., p. 94) connected the whole with Celtic mythological beliefs. This chance reference in a German poem is the only trace to my knowledge of an earlier legend in which, it may be, Bran and Brandan, the visitor to and the lord of the otherworld, were one and the same person.

It is highly desirable that every form of or allusion to the Brandan legend should be examined afresh, as, perhaps, able to throw fresh light upon the origin and growth of the Grail legend. In Pseudo-Chrestien Perceval's mother goes on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Brandan.

INDEX I.

DRAMATIS PERSONae.

[This Index is to the Summaries contained in Chapter II, and the references are not to page and line, but to Version and Incident. The Versions are distinguished by the following abbreviations:--

Conte du Graal =Co=, Pseudo-Chrestien =PC=, Chrestien =C=, Gautier =G=, Manessier =Ma=, Gerbert =Ge=, Wolfram =W=, Heinrich von dem Turlin =H=, Mabinogi of Peredur =M=, Thornton MS. Sir Perceval =T=, Didot-Perceval =D=, Borron's poem =B=, Queste =Q= (=Q={1} and =Q={2} refer to the different drafts of the romance distinguished p. 83) Grand St. Graal =GG=.

With the less important entries, or when the entries are confined to one version, a simple number reference is given. But in the case of the more important personages, notably Perceval, Gawain, and Galahad, an attempt has been made to show the life history, by grouping together references to the same incident from different versions; in this case each incident group is separated from other groups by a long dash ----. Any speciality in the incident presented by a version is bracketed _before_ the reference initial, and, when deemed advisable, reference has been made to allied as well as to similar incidents. This detail, to save s.p.a.ce, is, as a rule, given only once, as under Perceval, and not duplicated under other headings, the number reference alone being given in the latter cases. The fullest entry is Perceval, which practically comprises such entries as Fisher King, Grail, Sword, Lance, etc.]

=ABEL= =Q=37, =GG=24.

=ABRIORIS= =G=9.

=ACHEFLOUR= =T=1.

=ADAM= =Q=37, =GG=24.

=ADDANC OF LAKE= =M=16, 19.

=AGARAN= =Q=23.

=AGRESTES= =GG=40.

=AGUIGRENONS= =Co=, _Kingrun_ =W=, anonymous =M=, =C=6, =W=, =M=8.

=ALAINS=, Celidoine's son =GG=43.

=ALAINS= or =ALEIN= (=li Gros= =D=, =Q=, =GG=) =B=12----=Dprol=, 1, 6, 12, =Q=26, =GG=30, 43, 45, 51, 58, 59.

=ALEINE=, Gawain's niece, =D=1.

=ALFASEM= =GG=51, 58.

=AMANGONS= =PC=1, 2, 4.

=AMFORTAS=, see Fisher King.

=AMINADAP= =GG=58.

=ANGHARAD= Law Eurawc, =M=12, 14.

=ANTIKONIE=, see Facile Damsel.

=ARGASTES= =Q=27.

=ARIDES= of Cavalon =Ma=14, 16 (a King of Cavalon mentioned =C=12 corresponds to _Vergulat_ of Askalon in =W=).

=ARTHUR= =PC=2, 3, 5, =C=1, =Dprol=----arrival of Perceval at his court =C=3, =W=, =M=3, =T=4, =Dprol=----=C=6, 9, 10, =W=, =M=9, 10, 11----=M=13, 14----=C=11, =W=, =M=20----=T=7----=C=18, =W=----=G=1, =W=----=G=2, 3, 6, 9, 11, 13, 16, 19, 20, =Ma=10, 16, 23, =Ge=5, =H=, =D=1, 3, 5, 8, 14, 16, =M=25, =Q=3, 5, 13, =GG=33, 45, 48.

=AUGUSTUS CaeSAR= =GG=11.

=AVALON= or =AVARON= =B=12, 13, =D=9.

=BAGOMMEDES= =G=19, 20.

=BANDAMAGUS= =Q=5, 6, 43.

=BANS= =Q=26, =GG=30, 59.