THE MATTER OF BRITAIN.
| Attractions of the Arthurian Legend. Discussions on their sources. The personality of Arthur. The four witnesses. Their testimony. The version of Geoffrey. Its lacunæ. How the Legend grew. Wace. Layamon. The Romances proper. Walter Map. Robert de Borron. Chrestien de Troyes. Prose or verse first? A Latin Graal-book. The Mabinogion. The Legend itself. The story of Joseph of Arimathea. Merlin. Lancelot. The Legend becomes dramatic. Stories of Gawain and other knights. Sir Tristram. His story almost certainly Celtic. Sir Lancelot. The minor knights. Arthur. Guinevere. The Graal. How it perfects the story. Nature of this perfection. No sequel possible. Latin episodes. The Legend as a whole. The theories of its origin. Celtic. French. English. Literary. The Celtic theory. The French claims. The theory of general literary growth. The English or Anglo-Norman pretensions. Attempted hypothesis | [86] |
[CHAPTER IV.]
ANTIQUITY IN ROMANCE.
| Oddity of the Classical Romance. Its importance. The Troy story. The Alexandreid. Callisthenes. Latin versions. Their story. Its developments. Alberic of Besançon. The decasyllabic poem. The great Roman d'Alixandre. Form, &c. Continuations. King Alexander. Characteristics. The Tale of Troy. Dictys and Dares. The Dares story. Its absurdity. Its capabilities. Troilus and Briseida. The Roman de Troie. The phases of Cressid. The Historia Trojana. Meaning of the classical romance | [148] |
[CHAPTER V.]
THE MAKING OF ENGLISH AND THE SETTLEMENT OF EUROPEAN PROSODY.
| Special interest of Early Middle English. Decay of Anglo-Saxon. Early Middle English Literature. Scantiness of its constituents. Layamon. The form of the Brut. Its substance. The Ormulum: Its metre, its spelling. The Ancren Riwle. The Owl and the Nightingale. Proverbs. Robert of Gloucester. Romances. Havelok the Dane. King Horn. The prosody of the modern languages. Historical retrospect. Anglo-Saxon prosody. Romance prosody. English prosody. The later alliteration. The new verse. Rhyme and syllabic equivalence. Accent and quantity. The gain of form. The "accent" theory. Initial fallacies, and final perversities thereof | [187] |