The presence of water,
either sea, or river, is an important feature in the Adonis cult, the
effigy of the dead god being, not buried in the earth, but thrown into
the water.[31]
It will thus be seen that, in suggesting a form of Nature worship,
analogous to this well-known cult, as the possible ultimate source
from which the incidents and mise-en-scene of the Grail stories were
derived, we are relying not upon an isolated parallel, but upon a
group of parallels, which alike in incident and intention offer, not
merely a resemblance to, but also an explanation of, the perplexing
problems of the Grail literature. We must now consider the question
whether incidents so remote in time may fairly and justly be utilized
in this manner.
CHAPTER V
Medieval and Modern Forms of Nature Ritual
Readers of the foregoing pages may, not improbably, object that, while
we have instanced certain curious and isolated parallels from early
Aryan literature and tradition, and, what, from the point of view of
declared intention, appears to be a kindred group of religious belief
and practice in pre-Historic and Classical times, the two, so far,
show no direct signs of affiliation, while both may be held to be far
removed, in point of date, alike from one another, and from the
romantic literature of the twelfth century.
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