2°d S. VIII. Oct. 15. '69.1 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



305 



De Borron then proceeds to relate some of the 

 max'vellous properties of the dish in question, which 

 it was the good fortune of Joseph to secure, and 

 amongst the rest (like the magic ring of Aladdin), 

 " it would provide for all, and would grant to all 

 those who served the Lord Jesus faithfully every- 

 thing that their heart could desire." 



The first Breton trouvere whose lays have come 

 down to us, and in which the tradition of the 

 Sangraal appears, is Chrestien de Troyes (1170). 

 It is found in his Percival le Galois (Biblio. de 

 TArsenal, Paris MS. No. 195. A, and in Biblio. 

 du Roi MS., fol. No. 130.), which the poet dedi- 

 cated to his patron, Count Philip of Flanders, who 

 died in 1191. Chrestien did not survive to com- 

 plete this poem. From the 148th fol. of the first 

 MS. it is continued by Gaultier de Denet ; from 

 the 180th fol. by Gerbers (probably Gyrbert, min- 

 strel to the Countess Marie de Ponthie, who died 

 in 1251), and, finally, by Menessier, at the com- 

 mand of the Countess Johanna of Flanders, who 

 died in 1224. In that part of Percival written by 

 Chrestien de Troyes no mention is made of Joseph. 

 Menessier by desire of his patroness reduced the 

 whole of this tedious poem, consisting of near 

 49,000 lines, into prose, of which one edition only 

 has been printed (sm. fol. Paris, 1529). Copies of 

 it are excessively rare. There is one in the library 

 of the British Museum. 



In the German Perceval of Wolfram von Es- 

 chenbach (1205), and in the Titurel of Albrecht 

 von Scharfenberg (1350), the fable of the Sangraal 

 is referred to a common origin ; viz. a poem, which 

 is now lost, in the northern French dialect, by the 

 Provencal Kiot or Guiot (not the Guiot de Pro- 

 vence, who flourished at a later period). Accord- 

 ing to Kiot, no account of the Sangraal existed, at 

 the time he wrote, in the chronicles of those coun- 

 tries that preserved the traditions of Arthur. 

 " In Anjou he found the story," and also in a brief 

 and imperfect work, written in a pagan hand 

 (adds Wolfram), which had been discovered at 

 Toledo by one Flegetanis, a half-Jew and astro- 

 loger. The existence of this Hispano- Arabic ver- 

 sion of the fable fully confirms what Alanus de 

 Insulis recorded (1096-1142) concerning the wide- 

 spread popularity of the Arthurian tales. " Quis 

 inquam Arturum Britonem non loquatur cum 

 pene notior habeatur Asiaticis gentibus quam Bri- 

 tannis ; sicut nobis referunt Palmigeri nostri de 

 orientis partibus redeuntes ? " 



The interpretation and etymology of Sangraal 

 or Savgreal have as much puzzled the learned as 

 the origin of the extraordinary fable to which it 

 gave rise. The difficulty of the former is greatly 

 enhanced by the conflicting applications of the 

 term by medijeval writers. In the earliest 

 romances it was used to designate the dish on 

 which the paschal lamb was served at the Last 

 Supper ; afterwards it was applied to the sacra- 



mental cup used on the same occasion ; and even- 

 tually to the contents of that cup. 



In the Roman de Lancelot it is said : — 

 " Le St. Graal est, le meme qu le St. Vaisseau, en form 

 de calice, qui n'estoit de metail, n'y de bois, n'y de come, 

 n'y d'or, et dans lequel fust mis le sang de nostre Seig- 

 neur." 



And in the Roman de Perceforest the descrip- 

 tion is so vague, that it may be applied either to a 

 platter, a chalice, or a ship : — 



" Le St. Graal le meesme que le St. Vaissel, dont on lit 

 ici I'histoire ; les douze Apotres y avait mang^ I'aignal le 

 jeudi absolu (le jeudi saint) et it fust conserve en Engle- 

 terre danz una tour bastie exprfes a Corbenicy." 



In the Morte d' Arthur, compiled from the French 

 by SirT. Malorie, and printed by Caxton in 1485, 

 the several descriptions of the Sangraal (books 

 xiii.-xvn. inc.) vary so much as to completely 

 bewilder the reader, who is at a loss to determine 

 whether it was at any time visible, except to the 

 initiated few, and then not always. Sometimes it is 

 altogether obscured by the Shekinah ; at others it 

 becomes palpable, and is the medium or object of 

 prayer ; it is openly transported from place to 

 place, and finally carried up into heaven, with the 

 disembodied spirit of Sir Galahad, by invisible 

 agents ; and the romance abruptly terminates with 

 the equivocal announcement : "Sithence there never 

 was no man so hardy for to say that hee had scene 

 the sancgreall ! " 



Roquefort, in his Gloss, de la Lang. Rom. 

 (Paris, 1808), s. v. Graal, Greal, renders it vase 

 a boire, grand plat, grand bassin creux, propre 

 k servir des viandes (cf. Ducange, Gloss, s. v. Ga- 

 rales, and Borel, Tresor des Antiq. Franc. (Paris, 

 1665), s. v. Grasal.) 



Not a few take the term to be a corruption or 

 contraction of the L. sanguinis realis (sang' real'), 

 an opinion that is certainly countenanced by 

 more than one passage in the Morte d' Arthur. 



It would be an easy task to multiply references 

 to writers, who, from the thirteenth to the present 

 century, have touched incidentally upon the sub- 

 ject of the Sangraal ; but their explanations of it 

 would be found to Idc substantially the same as 

 those already offered. 



Of the few, comparatively, who have endea- 

 voured to trace the fable to an age earlier than that 

 of Joseph of Arimathea, it must suffice to remark 

 of them that they severally suppose it to have ori- 

 ginated in the Heliotrapezon or Sun-Table of 

 the pious Egyptians ; in the highly-prized Black- 

 stone of the Kaaba in Mecca; in the Magic Mirror 

 or Cup of Salvation discovered by Dschemschid, 

 the hero of Persian romance; in the Egyptian 

 Hermes-goblet, &c. &c. 



We need not, however, travel to the East or 

 elsewhere to seek for the original of the Sangraal : 

 like the equally famous Round Table, it is purely 

 of domestic growth. Wales was the foundry 



