Page:Studies on the legend of the Holy Grail.djvu/93

Rh Gawain episodes of Diu Crone. In the second class this main incident is missing, though several of its less important features are present in altogether different connection. The story in D, Queste, is largely made up of adventures tallying often detail for detail with those in the Early History version, E, Grand St. Graal, with which it shares similarity in the Quest form.

Whilst each portion of the legend exists in two forms, the great majority of versions in both cases belong to one form. Looking for the moment upon D and E as one whole, there is in both cases only one minority-version, viz., for the Early History, F, Wolfram, for the Quest D-E, Queste, Grand St. Graal. And each of these is only in a minority as far as one portion of the legend is concerned, D-E, agreeing with the majority in the Early History, and F in the Quest. Taking the average of all the versions there results what may be called the Joseph of Arimathea form as the type of the Early History; the Perceval form as the type of the Quest. As a rule, it may be confidently assumed that the larger number of versions represent an older form, an assumption strengthened so far as the Early History is concerned by the fact that the minority version, F, Wolfram, can historically be proved to be one of the latest in date of all the versions, and, so far as the Quest is concerned, by the following considerations:—The minority version, D-E, has three heroes, of whom Perceval is second in importance only to the chief hero, Galahad, indeed he occupies as large a space in the narrative. This position can be due only to his being the original achiever of the Quest. It is obviously inadmissible that seven or eight versions should have conspired to pick out one only, and that one the second, of the three heroes of the Queste, and should have made him the sole hero, whilst it is easy to understand that the author of D, Queste, dissatisfied for certain reasons with the older forms of the story, yet not daring to alter it so far as to entirely burke the original hero, should have taken the course he did.

Two alternative hypotheses now naturally suggest themselves. The two parts of the legend may really form one organic whole, although more frequently found asunder than combined, or the one part may be an explanatory and supplementary after-thought.