Holy grail

The Holy Grail (french: Saint Graal, br, Graal Santel, cy, Greal Sanctaidd, kw, Gral) is a treasure that serves as an important motif in Arthurian literature. Various traditions describe the Holy Grail as a cup, dish, or stone with miraculous healing powers, sometimes providing eternal youth or sustenance in infinite abundance, often guarded in the custody of the Fisher King and located in the hidden Grail castle. By analogy, any elusive object or goal of great significance may be perceived as a "holy grail" by those seeking such.

A "grail" (Old French: ''graal'' or ''greal''), wondrous but not unequivocally holy, first appears in '' Perceval, the Story of the Grail'', an unfinished chivalric romance written by Chrétien de Troyes around 1190. Chrétien's story inspired many continuations, translators and interpreters in the later-12th and early-13th centuries, including Wolfram von Eschenbach, who perceived the Grail as a stone. The Christian, Celtic or possibly other origins of the Arthurian grail trope are uncertain and have been debated amongst literary scholars and historians.

In the late-12th century, Robert de Boron in ''Joseph d'Arimathie'' portrayed the Grail as Jesus's vessel from the Last Supper, which Joseph of Arimathea used to catch Christ's blood at the crucifixion. Thereafter, the Holy Grail became interwoven with the legend of the Holy Chalice, the Last Supper cup, an idea continued in works such as the ''Lancelot-Grail'' cycle and consequently the 15th-century '' Le Morte d'Arthur''.Campbell 1990, p. 210. In this form, it is now a popular theme in modern culture and has become the subject of pseudohistorical writings and of conspiracy theories.

Etymology

The word , as it is earliest spelled, comes from Old French or , cognate with Old Occitan and Old Catalan , meaning "a cup or bowl of earth, wood, or metal" (or other various types of vessels in different Occitan dialects).Diez, Friedrich. ''An etymological dictionary of the Romance languages'', Williams and Norgate, 1864, p. 236. The most commonly accepted etymology derives it from Latin or via an earlier form, , a derivative of or , which was, in turn, borrowed from Ancient Greek (, a large wine-mixing vessel). Alternative suggestions include a derivative of , a name for a type of woven basket that came to refer to a dish,Barber 2004, p. 93. or a derivative of Latin meaning "'by degree', 'by stages', applied to a dish brought to the table in different stages or services during a meal".

In the 15th century, English writer John Hardyng invented a fanciful new etymology for Old French (or ), meaning "Holy Grail", by parsing it as , meaning "royal blood". This etymology was used by some later medieval British writers such as Thomas Malory, and became prominent in the conspiracy theory developed in the book ''The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail'', in which refers to the Jesus bloodline.Wood 2012, p. 77.

Medieval literature

The literature surrounding the Grail can be divided into two groups. The first concerns King Arthur's knights visiting the Grail castle or questing after the object. The second concerns the Grail's history in the time of Joseph of Arimathea.

The nine works from the first group are:
* '' Perceval, the Story of the Grail'' by Chrétien de Troyes.
*The Four Continuations of Chrétien's unfinished poem, by authors of differing vision and talent, designed to bring the story to a close.
* ''Parzival'' by Wolfram von Eschenbach, which adapted at least the holiness of Robert's Grail into the framework of Chrétien's story. In Wolfram's telling, the Grail was kept safe at the castle of Munsalvaesche (''mons salvationis''), entrusted to Titurel, the first Grail King. Some, not least the Benedictine monks, have identified the castle with their real sanctuary of Montserrat in Catalonia.
* The Didot ''Perceval'', named after the manuscript's former owner, and purportedly a prosification of Robert de Boron's sequel to ''Joseph d'Arimathie'' and '' Merlin''.
* Welsh romance ''Peredur son of Efrawg'', a loose translation of Chrétien's poem and the Continuations, with some influence from native Welsh literature.
* ''Perlesvaus'', called the "least canonical" Grail romance because of its very different character.
* German poem ''Diu Crône'' (''The Crown''), in which Gawain, rather than Perceval, achieves the Grail.
* The ''Lancelot'' section of the vast Vulgate Cycle introduced the new Grail hero, Galahad. The ''Queste del Saint Graal'', a follow-up part of the cycle, concerns Galahad's eventual achievement of the Grail.

Of the second group there are:
*Robert de Boron's ''Joseph d'Arimathie''.
* The ''Estoire del Saint Graal'', the first part of the Vulgate Cycle (but written after ''Lancelot'' and the ''Queste''), based on Robert's tale but expanding it greatly with many new details.
* Verses by Rigaut de Barbezieux, a late 12th or early 13th-century Provençal troubador, where mention is made of Perceval, the lance, and the Grail ("Like Perceval when he lived, who stood amazed in contemplation, so that he was quite unable to ask what purpose the lance and grail served" – "''Attressi con Persavaus el temps que vivia, que s'esbait d'esgarder tant qu'anc non saup demandar de que servia la lansa ni-l grazaus''").

The Grail was considered a bowl or dish when first described by Chrétien de Troyes. There, it is a processional salver, a tray, used to serve at a feast. Hélinand of Froidmont described a grail as a "wide and deep saucer" (''scutella lata et aliquantulum profunda''); other authors had their own ideas. Robert de Boron portrayed it as the vessel of the Last Supper. ''Peredur son of Efrawg'' had no Grail as such, presenting the hero instead with a platter containing his kinsman's bloody, severed head.

Chrétien de Troyes

The Grail is first featured in ''Perceval, le Conte du Graal'' (''The Story of the Grail'') by Chrétien de Troyes, who claims he was working from a source book given to him by his patron, Count Philip of Flanders. In this incomplete poem, dated sometime between 1180 and 1191, the object has not yet acquired the implications of holiness it would have in later works. While dining in the magical abode of the Fisher King, Perceval witnesses a wondrous procession in which youths carry magnificent objects from one chamber to another, passing before him at each course of the meal. First comes a young man carrying a bleeding lance, then two boys carrying candelabras. Finally, a beautiful young girl emerges bearing an elaborately decorated ''graal'', or "grail".

Chrétien refers to this object not as "The Grail" but as "a grail" (''un graal''), showing the word was used, in its earliest literary context, as a common noun. For Chrétien, a grail was a wide, somewhat deep, dish or bowl, interesting because it contained not a pike, salmon, or lamprey, as the audience may have expected for such a container, but a single Communion wafer which provided sustenance for the Fisher King's crippled father. Perceval, who had been warned against talking too much, remains silent through all of this and wakes up the next morning alone. He later learns that if he had asked the appropriate questions about what he saw, he would have healed his maimed host, much to his honour. The story of the Wounded King's mystical fasting is not unique; several saints were said to have lived without food besides communion, for instance Saint Catherine of Genoa. This may imply that Chrétien intended the Communion wafer to be the significant part of the ritual, and the Grail to be a mere prop.

Robert de Boron

Though Chrétien's account is the earliest and most influential of all Grail texts, it was in the work of Robert de Boron that the Grail truly became the "Holy Grail" and assumed the form most familiar to modern readers in its Christian context. In his verse romance ''Joseph d'Arimathie'', composed between 1191 and 1202, Robert tells the story of Joseph of Arimathea acquiring the chalice of the Last Supper to collect Christ's blood upon his removal from the cross. Joseph is thrown in prison, where Christ visits him and explains the mysteries of the blessed cup. Upon his release, Joseph gathers his in-laws and other followers and travels to the west. He founds a dynasty of Grail keepers that eventually includes Perceval.

Wolfram von Eschenbach

In ''Parzival'', Wolfram von Eschenbach, citing the authority of a certain (probably fictional) Kyot the Provençal, claimed the Grail was a Stone, the sanctuary of the neutral angels who took neither side during Lucifer's rebellion. It is called ''Lapis exillis'', which in alchemy is the name of the Philosopher's stone.Von Eschenbach, Wolfram. ''Parzival''. Hatto, A.T. translator. Penguin Books, 1980, page 239.

Lancelot-Grail

The authors of the Vulgate Cycle used the Grail as a symbol of divine grace; the virgin Galahad, illegitimate son of Lancelot and Elaine, the world's greatest knight and the Grail Bearer at the castle of Corbenic, is destined to achieve the Grail, his spiritual purity making him a greater warrior than even his illustrious father. The ''Queste del Saint Graal'' (''The Quest of The Holy Grail'') tells also of the adventures of various Knights of the Round Table in their eponymous quest. Some of them, including Percival and Bors the Younger, eventually join Galahad as his companions near the successful end of the Grail Quest and are witnesses of his ascension to Heaven.

Galahad and the interpretation of the Grail involving him were picked up in the 15th century by Thomas Malory in '' Le Morte d'Arthur'' and remain popular today. While it is not explicit that the Holy Grail is never to be seen again on Earth, it is stated by Malory that there has since then been no knight capable of obtaining it.

Scholarly hypotheses

Scholars have long speculated on the origins of the Holy Grail before Chrétien, suggesting that it may contain elements of the trope of magical cauldrons from Celtic mythology and later Welsh mythology combined with Christian legend surrounding the Eucharist, the latter found in Eastern Christian sources, conceivably in that of the Byzantine Mass, or even Persian sources. The view that the "origin" of the Grail legend should be seen as deriving from Celtic mythology was championed by Roger Sherman Loomis, Alfred Nutt and Jessie Weston. Loomis traced a number of parallels between medieval Welsh literature and Irish material and the Grail romances, including similarities between the '' Mabinogion''s Bran the Blessed and the Arthurian Fisher King, and between Bran's life-restoring cauldron and the Grail.

The opposing view dismissed the "Celtic" connections as spurious and interpreted the legend as essentially Christian in origin. Joseph Goering has identified sources for Grail imagery in 12th-century wall paintings from churches in the Catalan Pyrenees (now mostly removed to the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya), which present unique iconic images of the Virgin Mary holding a bowl that radiates tongues of fire, images that predate the first literary account by Chrétien de Troyes. Goering argues that they were the original inspiration for the Grail legend.

Psychologists Emma Jung and Marie-Louise von Franz used analytical psychology to interpret the Grail as a series of symbols in their book ''The Grail Legend''.Barber 2004, p. 248–252. This expanded on interpretations by Carl Jung, which were later invoked by Joseph Campbell.

Richard Barber (2004) argued that the Grail legend is connected to the introduction of "more ceremony and mysticism" surrounding the sacrament of the Eucharist in the high medieval period, proposing that the first Grail stories may have been connected to the "renewal in this traditional sacrament". Daniel Scavone (1999, 2003) has argued that the "Grail" in origin referred to the Image of Edessa. Goulven Peron (2016) suggested that the Holy Grail may reflect the horn of the river-god Achelous as described by Ovid in the '' Metamorphoses''.Peron, Goulven. L'influence des Metamorphoses d'Ovide sur la visite de Perceval au chateau du Roi Pecheur, Journal of the International Arthurian Society, Vol. 4, Issue 1, 2016, p. 113-134.

Later traditions

Relics

In the wake of the Arthurian romances, several artifacts came to be identified as the Holy Grail in medieval relic veneration. These artifacts are said to have been the vessel used at the Last Supper, but other details vary. Despite the prominence of the Grail literature, traditions about a Last Supper relic remained rare in contrast to other items associated with Jesus' last days, such as the True Cross and Holy Lance.Wood 2012, p. 91.

One tradition predates the Grail romances: in the 7th century, the pilgrim Arculf reported that the Last Supper chalice was displayed near Jerusalem. In the wake of Robert de Boron's Grail works, several other items came to be claimed as the true Last Supper vessel. In the late 12th century, one was said to be in Byzantium; Albrecht von Scharfenberg's Grail romance '' Der Jüngere Titurel'' associated it explicitly with the Arthurian Grail, but claimed it was only a copy. This item was said to have been looted in the Fourth Crusade and brought to Troyes in France, but it was lost during the French Revolution.Wood 2012, p. 94.

Two relics associated with the Grail survive today. The ''Sacro Catino'' (Sacred Basin, also known as the Genoa Chalice) is a green glass dish held at the Genoa Cathedral said to have been used at the Last Supper. Its provenance is unknown, and there are two divergent accounts of how it was brought to Genoa by Crusaders in the 12th century. It was not associated with the Last Supper until later, in the wake of the Grail romances; the first known association is in Jacobus de Voragine's chronicle of Genoa in the late 13th century, which draws on the Grail literary tradition. The Catino was moved and broken during Napoleon's conquest in the early 19th century, revealing that it is glass rather than emerald.

The Holy Chalice of Valencia is an agate dish with a mounting for use as a chalice. The bowl may date to Greco-Roman times, but its dating is unclear, and its provenance is unknown before 1399, when it was gifted to Martin I of Aragon. By the 14th century an elaborate tradition had developed that this object was the Last Supper chalice. This tradition mirrors aspects of the Grail material, with several major differences, suggesting a separate tradition entirely. It is not associated with Joseph of Arimathea or Jesus' blood; it is said to have been taken to Rome by Saint Peter and later entrusted to Saint Lawrence. Early references do not call the object the "Grail"; the first evidence connecting it to the Grail tradition is from the 15th century. The monarchy sold the cup in the 15th century to Valencia Cathedral, where it remains a significant local icon.

Several objects were identified with the Holy Grail in the 17th century. In the 20th century, a series of new items became associated with it. These include the Nanteos Cup, a medieval wooden bowl found near Rhydyfelin, Wales; a glass dish found near Glastonbury, England; the Antioch chalice, a 6th-century silver-gilt object that became attached to the Grail legend in the 1930s, and the Chalice of Doña Urraca, a cup made between 200 BC and 100 AD, kept in León’s basilica of Saint Isidore.

Locations associated with the Holy Grail

In the modern era, a number of places have become associated with the Holy Grail. One of the most prominent is Glastonbury in Somerset, England. Glastonbury was associated with King Arthur and his resting place of Avalon by the 12th century. In the 13th century, a legend arose that Joseph of Arimathea was the founder of Glastonbury Abbey. Early accounts of Joseph at Glastonbury focus on his role as the evangelist of Britain rather than as the custodian of the Holy Grail, but from the 15th century, the Grail became a more prominent part of the legends surrounding Glastonbury. Interest in Glastonbury resurged in the late 19th century, inspired by renewed interest in the Arthurian legend and contemporary spiritual movements centered on ancient sacred sites. In the late 19th century, John Goodchild hid a glass bowl near Glastonbury; a group of his friends, including Wellesley Tudor Pole, retrieved the cup in 1906 and promoted it as the original Holy Grail. Glastonbury and its Holy Grail legend have since become a point of focus for various New Age and Neopagan groups.

In the early 20th century, esoteric writers identified Montségur, a stronghold of the heretical Cathar sect in the 13th century, as the Grail castle. Similarly, the 14th-century Rosslyn Chapel in Midlothian, Scotland, became attached to the Grail legend in the mid-20th century when a succession of conspiracy books identified it as a secret hiding place of the Grail.

Modern interpretations

Pseudohistory and conspiracy theories

Since the 19th century, the Holy Grail has been linked to various conspiracy theories. In 1818, Austrian pseudohistorical writer Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall connected the Grail to contemporary myths surrounding the Knights Templar that cast the order as a secret society dedicated to mystical knowledge and relics. In Hammer-Purgstall's work, the Grail is not a physical relic but a symbol of the secret knowledge that the Templars sought. There is no historical evidence linking the Templars to a search for the Grail, but subsequent writers have elaborated on the Templar theories.

Starting in the early 20th century, writers, particularly in France, further connected the Templars and Grail to the Cathars. In 1906, French esoteric writer Joséphin Péladan identified the Cathar castle of Montségur with Munsalväsche or Montsalvat, the Grail castle in Wolfram's ''Parzival''. This identification has inspired a wider legend asserting that the Cathars possessed the Holy Grail. According to these stories, the Cathars guarded the Grail at Montségur, and smuggled it out when the castle fell in 1244.

Beginning in 1933, German writer Otto Rahn published a series of books tying the Grail, Templars, and Cathars to modern German nationalist mythology. According to Rahn, the Grail was a symbol of a pure Germanic religion repressed by Christianity. Rahn's books inspired interest in the Grail within the Nazi occultist circles and led to the SS chief Heinrich Himmler's abortive sponsorship of Rahn's search for the Grail, as well as many subsequent conspiracy theories and fictional works about the Nazis searching for the Grail.

In the late 20th century, writers Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh and Henry Lincoln created one of the most widely known conspiracy theories about the Holy Grail. The theory first appeared in the BBC
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