This is evidently a somewhat confused introduction of the well-known feature that partaking of food in any land brings the eater under the operation of the laws of that land, but we generally find the incident of reverse application, as in the case of Persephone, who having tasted of the pomegranate seeds must needs continue an inhabitant of the other world. Guingamor having already eaten of the food of faëry, would, one would think, be incapable of returning to the other world. Such a fate as befalls him is, however, often brought about by coming in contact with the earth; thus in the Voyage of Bran, when the hero and his companions return from the Magic Isles, they are warned not to set foot on the shore of Ireland; one of the company disobeys the injunction and immediately falls to ashes, as one many years dead. Mr. Hartland, in his work on The Science of Fairy-tales, gives other instances of this belief. From the references made to the story by later writers, however, it is quite clear that Guingamor was supposed to have regained his youth on his return to Fairyland, and to enjoy practical immortality as the lord of its queen.
SIR LAUNFAL.
This is a translation of the Lai de Lanval, by Marie de France, the original source being, as in the case of all the other stories, a Breton lai which the Anglo-Norman poetess translated into French.
The English poem of the same name, by Thomas of Chester, is not, strictly speaking, a translation of Marie's lai, but an adaptation, into which features borrowed from other sources have been worked. Thus the author evidently knew the lay of Graalent, which, as I have stated in the note to Guingamor, recites precisely the same story as Lanval, only with certain variations in the incidents. Dr. Schofield, in the study to which I have previously referred, decides that the original hero is Lanval.
The Graalent version contains a weirdly pathetic feature which was either unknown to Marie or disregarded by her. The hero rides off, not on the lady's steed, but on his own; crossing the river he is swept from the saddle, and only saved from drowning by his mistress, who takes him up behind her on her palfrey. The knight's charger, reaching the shore, vainly seeks for his master, and the Bretons tell how yearly, on the anniversary of Graalent's disappearance, the horse may be heard neighing loudly for the vanished knight. Thomas of Chester refers to this story evidently, but appears to think that the steed had rejoined its master, as after telling how "every yer, upon a certayn day, Men may here Launfale's stede nay," he goes on to tell how any who desires a joust to keep his arms from rusting "may fynde justes anow wyth Syr Launfal the knyght."
TYOLET.
This lay is the translation of one published by M. Gaston Paris (Romania VIII. 1879) from a MS. in the Bibliothèque Nationale, and previously unknown. It will be seen that it really consists of two distinct stories: (a) Tyolet's Enfances; (b) his achieving of the adventure of the white-footed stag. Whether these two stories originally related to the same hero is doubtful, but both are of considerable importance for the criticism of the Arthurian legend.
(a) Tyolet's Enfances.—This story certainly bears a strong resemblance to the "Perceval" story as related by Chrétien de Troyes and Wolfram von Eschenbach; but while in some points it seems to have preserved more archaic features, in others it is distinctly more modern. Thus the lad's confusion of the knight with a beast seems a primitive trait, as does also his fairy gift of attracting beasts by whistling, and the curious transformation of the stag, while his behaviour on arriving at court, on the other hand, is far more civilised than that of Perceval. One naturally asks where had he learnt of tourneys and joustings and the knightly duty of "largesse"? The probability is that we have here a revised, and independent, version of the popular folk-tale which under the hands of certain twelfth-century poets developed into the Perceval romance.