[1]
As we noted in the previous chapter, an interesting parallel exists
between Wales, and localities, such as the Alps, and the Vosges,
where we have definite proof that these Mystery cults lingered on
after they had disappeared from public celebration. The Chart
appended to Cumont's Monuments de Mithra shows Mithraic remains in
precisely the locality where we have reason to believe certain of the
Gawain and Perceval stories to have originated.
As to the date of origin, that, of course, is closely connected with
the problem of authorship; if we can, with any possibility, identify
the author we can approximately fix the date. So far as the literary
evidence is concerned, we have no trace of the story before the
twelfth century, but when we do meet with it, it is already in
complete, and crystallized, form. More, there is already evidence of
competing versions; we have no existing Grail romance which we can
claim to be free from contamination, and representing in all respects
the original form.
There is no need here to go over old, and well-trodden, ground; in
my studies of the Perceval Legend, and in the later popular resume
of the evidence,[2] The Quest of the Holy Grail, I have analysed the
texts, and shown that, while the poem of Chretien de Troyes is our
earliest surviving literary version, there is the strongest possible
evidence that Chretien, as he himself admits, was not inventing, but
re-telling, an already popular tale.
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