On the whole, I decidedly lean to the opinion that Grand S. Graal and Queste are by one and the same hand—the one based upon and expanded from an older poem, the other a practically new invention, the two being designed to replace the Joseph of Arimathea and Perceval of the earlier Grail cycle. As I said above, the author was very little concerned about the harmony of his work. So long as by a superficial rearrangement and interpolation of incidental adventures he could produce an appearance of harmony, he cared nothing at all about the more important questions of continuity of treatment, and preservation of tone and character. The result is that his work, which stands practically as he left it, is in flagrant contradiction with the story it is designed to complete.
But what was the motive which led to the setting aside of the earlier Perceval Queste, and what the causes which determined the particular form assumed by its successor?
I do not think they are difficult to detect.
During the later years of the twelfth and earlier years of the thirteenth century we see two stories in process of gradual evolution—the Perceval-Grail story and the Lancelot legend. One early took a decidedly mystical and ecclesiastical bent, the other became more and more worldly and secular. The two appear to have had an equal hold on popular imagination, they early came into touch with each other, but they never really blended. The Lancelot, as the younger, borrowed at the outset certain features from the Perceval, but it retained its own distinctive character; while the elder story slowly changed, the Grail, at first a subordinate element in the story, gradually but surely dominating the tale, which became more and more ecclesiastical, while the hero became more and more conventional.[154]
But at a certain point it became evident that these lines of tradition could no longer remain parallel, they must coalesce, or the one must yield to the other. The Grail quest had become the most popular adventure of Arthur's court, one after another the knights were being drawn into the mystic circle; how could the most popular and most valiant of the knights of the Round Table, for this Lancelot had now become, remain outside the chosen group? It was plain that Lancelot must take part in the Grail quest; it was equally plain that the first knight of the court could not be allowed to come out of the ordeal with any detriment to his prestige; yet the Grail demanded purity of life, and Lancelot was the queen's lover. More, the queen's lover he must remain or forfeit his hold on popular sympathy.
How was it possible to preserve intact at once Lancelot's superiority and the purity of the Christian talisman? Only in one way: by giving him a son who should achieve the quest and then vanish, leaving Lancelot still facile princeps among the knights of the Round Table, with the added glory of having been the father of the Grail Winner.
But this son could not be the child of Guinevere. The offspring of a guilty liaison could not be the winner of the sacrosanct talisman; yet Lancelot must be faithful to his queen—how solve this problem? The story in its primitive form gave the hint for the required development. Who more fitted to become the mother of the Grail Winner than the fair maiden who filled the office of Grail-bearer?[155] The obvious propriety of such a relationship was bound sooner or later to strike the imagination of some redactor. The Arthurian story already possessed the machinery by which Lancelot could become father of the elect child, while remaining Guinevere's lover; Brisane had but to do for Elaine what Merlin did for Uther, and the difficulty was overcome. Moreover, Helaine was, in the old story, the name of the Grail Winner's father, nothing more easy than to bestow the same name on the new hero's mother. All this was only a question of clever adjustment of already existing factors.
Perceval, of course, was in possession, but the later development of his story, which had converted him from a genuine, faulty, but loving and lovable human being, true man and faithful husband, into an aggressively proselytising and persecuting celibate, had made it possible for him still to retain a place in the romance; he could act as second to Galahad, and, like him, disappear, the quest once achieved. But having thus disposed in Lancelot's interest of the two who might have seriously challenged his fame as a knight, Perceval, the real, Galahad, the vicarious (for I think we can only regard him as his father's representative), achiever of the quest, it became necessary to add a third, who should bring back to court the tidings of their success. It is quite obvious, from the point of view of the Lancelot story, that Perceval and Galahad could not be permitted to return. The third was easily found in the person of Lancelot's nearest relative, the knight who, his shield unstained by the bar-sinister which marked that of Hector, had been gradually rising in popular favour; Bohort owes his position in the Queste to his position in the Lancelot proper.
The evolution of this character has not, I believe, attracted much attention hitherto, but it is one of the most remarkable features of the Lancelot story. In the earliest versions, represented by the Lanzelet, etc., he is not known at all.[156] When he first appears he plays but a small part, gradually his rôle becomes more and more prominent, till in the later portion of the prose Lancelot he has become a very efficient understudy to the hero, even surpassing in valour Gawain himself. Thus, on the return of the knights from one of their numerous quests in search of Lancelot, when they are called upon to rehearse their adventures, in order that a record of them may be made, it is decided that their rank, in order of merit, is Bohort, Gawain, Hector, Gaheriet, Lionel, and Baudemagus. Gawain and his brother, the representatives of the older stratum of Arthurian tradition, are the only two who can compete with the all-conquering race of Ban, and the bosom friend of that race, Baudemagus.