Beginning crudely in glimmering half-realizations, it was
quickly defined and heightened as it seized the imaginations
of successive romancers, and won the admiration of eager
readers. First attaching itself to the stories of Gawain,
perhaps, it was quickly found more congenial to the stories
of Percival, the boy reared apart from men by his mother
in the wild wood. Percival became the Grail hero, the pure
knight who alone was found worthy of the heavenly vision.
The increasing popularity of the Lancelot stories led some
romancer, not to attach the Grail quest to him, for he was a
sinner, but to invent for him a son Galahad pure enough to
rise so high. In spite of this, the Grail story remained in the
popular imagination attached to Percival. ¹ The literary
attempt to give the honor to another hero shows two things.
First, even the overshadowing popularity of Lancelot was
not sufficient to permit any violation of the sacred character
of the Grail story. No romancer dared to say that the Grail
was won by a sinner. Secondly, the popularity of the Grail
story is evident. Popularity was the reason for the attempt
to combine it with other popular stories. And this popu-
larity it has kept down to our own day. Tennyson and
Wagner, utterly unlike otherwise, alike testify to the vitality
of the Holy Grail.

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