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... s, meaning a bowl. " There are three likely possibilities for what the Grail represented that are supported by evidence: "The Grail as Celtic talisman, as fertility symbol, as Christian relic" 28 Despite this, the actual of the Grail and the quest for it has been one of the primary attractions in these legends. The Christian interpretation is that the Grail was originally the cup used at the Last Supper, with which Joseph of Arimathea caught the blood of Christ on the cross. However, Loomis says this is only one of the aspects.
In one story of the Grail, Christian de Troyes' Conte del Graal, there is no Christian symbolism associated with the Grail. In other parts of this cycle, the Grail can be seen to represent aspects of "seasonal myth, phallic ritual Celtic vessels of plenty, [and] divine weapons. " 29 Loomis goes on to show that the heroes associated with the Grail, i. e. Gawain, Lancelot, Boors, Perceval, and Glad, through etymological derivation, may have their roots as sun-gods in Celtic mythology. 30 Loomis then turns his attention to the castle in which the Grail was said to have been kept.
In Conte del Graal, Perceval enters the castle and finds the Fisher king lying on a couch in front of a hearth with a fire in it. In another version, there are a hundred other couches beside that of the Fisher king, as well as three fires in the hall. "Now Note has shown that the numerous couches, the central fireplace, with the couch of the chief before it, are regular features in the arrangements of the Irish palace hall, but totally unlike those of a twelfth century French castle. " 31 In one of the legends, the Castle of the Grail has a bridge that is guarded by a figure by the name of Brumaut, a derivation of Curoi in his guise as a churl. Thus the Castle of the Grail is actually the Otherworld palace of Curoi. 32 According to the Arthurian legends, Loomis goes on, the Grail has three powers. One, it can heal. Two, it can fill up with food indefinitely. Three, it will refuse its service if it is not knelt before.
These are derived from a legend in which Gawain encounters all three of these aspects. Loomis goes on to show how this fact is related to ancient Celtic vessels. He links the cauldron of Bran, which has healing properties and is from Irish legend, to the Grail in a series of steps that are difficult to follow. The second property, by which it continuously fills with food, is mirrored in Celtic culture, as well as many others. The third property, which Loomis refers to as "denial of food to the unworthy, " he sees also as a test of virtue. In Welsh legend, there is the Cauldron of Tyrnog, which is said will cook meat in itself for a brave man, yet will not cook the meat for a coward. 33 Loomis sees in Arthur the remnants of Celtic mythology as well.
In one particular story about Arthur, he has received wounds that reopen every year. In this way, Arthur represents a god who is wounded or killed every year and is then revived. "There can be no doubt that the immediate derivation of this conception of Arthur as an embodiment of the vital forces of Nature, particularly the sun, is Celtic. " 34 Toward the end of the book, Loomis takes a look at the History of Geoffrey of Monmouth, "the work which supplied Arthur with a pedigree going back to Aeneas and made him victorious over the legions of Rome itself. " He states that "There is nothing new in maintaining that Geoffrey drew for his Arthurian material on Breton sources or that he introduced figures from Welsh mythology. " 35 It would appear then that Loomis and others are already aware that much of the Arthurian legend is drawn from Celtic mythology. Loomis' aim must be then to draw parallels between specifics in both the Arthurian legends and in Celtic mythology, as there are those who feel that the Arthurian legends were completely fabricated. He concludes: "At least, the burden of proof is upon those who maintain that Geoffrey excavated his materials largely from his own brain. " 36 As can be seen from the preceding, Loomis asks the reader to make leaps of logic to be able to see some of the connections between Arthurian legend and Celtic mythology. While some of these connections are obvious, some are rather dubious.
Loomis does present many good theories, but some seem to be a stretch. Fortunately, Loomis makes these connections more obvious in later works. In a review by Gordon Hall Gerould, the reviewer came to similar conclusions. He feels that Loomis has asked us to accept too much based on too little evidence. While he commends Loomis for his scholarship, he criticizes his methods. "Learning, and enthusiasm, and an agreeable style have not saved the author of this volume from writing what is rather a work of imagination than of scholarship. Mr.
Loomis can believe, one fears, anything he wishes to believe. He lacks the power of seeing things in the dry clear light of commonsense, and he is therefore a peculiarly dangerous guide. " 37 In Wales and the Arthurian Legend, Loomis examines the various roles that Wales played in the origin and transmission of the Arthurian legend. This book is much easier to read, mainly because Loomis breaks the material up into digestible parts, and he does not ask the reader to make spurious connections. He lays the evidence in front of the reader and the conclusions follow logically.
Loomis begins by examining how the ruins of Rome served as a basis for some of the Arthurian legend. "it is not generally recognized how much of medieval legend and romance was twined about those awe-inspiring but crumbling walls which survived for centuries the fall of the imperial city. " 38 In the 800 s, a priest by the name of Nennius in South Wales wrote about the history of the Britons and the Roman occupation, in which he lists 28 Roman settlements or forts. Three of these are located in Wales: "Cair Segeint, Cair Legion guar Us, Cair Get, i. e. the old Segontium, Carbon on Usk, and Caer went. " In fact, Nennius is the author of the first legend concerning these sights. 39 According to Loomis, Cair Segeint came to be known as Snaudon, and it was this name that the contents, bard-like poets, of Breton used in their story telling. It was later incorporated into the romances of the French and Anglo-Normans. 40 Around 1200, Renaud de Beaujeu wrote Le Bel Inconnu in which Snaudon plays a part. Despite the fact that he lived in France, he knew the conditions of the distant town, thus lending evidence that people of the time had been there.
In 1283, Edward I built a castle on the shore below Snaudon, by the name of Caer yn Avon, which came to be known as Caernarvon. The materials in the old fort were used for the construction of the new castle, and nothing remains there. 41 Loomis takes a look at the Grail legend as it was originated by the Irish and built upon by the Welsh. 42 He begins by emphasizing that the Irish would have had no knowledge of the various aspects of the Arthurian legend of the Grail, thus supporting the Irish origin theory. "Yet no other theory explains so much of the Grail legend as that of Irish origin and Welsh development; no other theory accords so well with antecedent probability regarding the Arthurian cycle of romance. " 43 Arthur himself was of Celtic origin, Loomis asserts, and one of the most famous of the Arthurian legends, Gawain and the Green Knight, originated as the Irish telling of the head-cutting story which dates back to the ninth century. In fact, "It is not only possible but also probable that any authentic tradition of the Round Table should be derived from Wales and should contain Irish elements. " 44 When the agents of Christianity swept over Ireland, they only half succeeded in converting the populace, as the old pagan religion survived mostly intact, remnants of which survive today. "It explains the survival into the late Middle Ages of many Irish sagas in which old gods figure; it explains how the Irish stories, passing into Wales, amalgamating with similar Welsh stories, and attaching themselves to the story of Arthur, were in large measure remnants of Irish mythology which had survived the victory of the Cross. " 45 It is interesting that when people think of the legend of the Grail, it is usually thought of in relationship to Christianity. However, Loomis writes, one of the main reasons the church has failed to view the Grail legends as authentic is the pagan nature of their origin. In one early version of the Grail story, the hero spends a good deal of time with a lady in the tale, participating in activities that would have no place in a Christian interpretation.
Additionally, the Grail is a jewel-encrusted platter that is carried around by a beautiful maiden. "Certainly this first author to introduce us to the Grail either had no conception of the proprieties of Christian ethics and ritual, or he did not conceive of the Grail as a Christian object. " 46 In this book, Loomis admits that many of the connections between the Grail and earlier myth must be approached with some skepticism, casting doubt on the assertions of some authors' interpretations, including his own. My own Celtic Myth and Arthurian Romance, I confess, contained chapters on the grail which I would now withdraw and others that were confused and confusing. " 47 He maintains, however, that its properties are mirrored by objects in Celtic myth, as he previously asserted. He goes on to say that many of the contradictions that arise in this pursuit are not necessarily the fault of those involved in the study, but instead are built in to the legend itself. "The real reason for all this tantalizing sense of confusion is precisely this: the Grail legend is a composite of scores of Celtic tales and motifs, often quite independent of each other, and woven into a lovely and mysterious, but quite inharmonious tapestry. " 48 Further, Loomis asserts that while the stories arose in Ireland, they were transmitted to Wales where they were further developed. "The nomenclature of the Grail cycle is, so far as we can detect, Welsh. " 49 He goes on to trace the story of Gawain and the Green Knight to a much earlier legend. One of the main pieces of evidence that link the tale Gawain and the Green Knight to Bricrius' Feast of the eighth century is the similarity of the Beheading Test. Additionally, there are several elements in the English version of Gawain and the Green Knight that do not appear to have similarities in Irish legend.
Instead, Loomis finds antecedents in several tales in Welsh mythology, particularly that of Poll. 50 In the last chapter, Loomis provides the supposition for which all of his research has been accumulated to refute. He quotes J. S. P. Tatlock, a noted Arthurian scholar: "'The plain fact is that, with no possibility of disproving that it existed, there is no evidence for a largely developed Arthur-saga anywhere whatever before Geoffrey. '" While giving due credit to Tatlock for his scholarly achievements, he argues that there exist a good number of contrary views on the subject, espoused by both him and a number of other scholars. "The final appeal, as always, must be not to authority but to facts and logic. " 51 Of which Loomis has provided a good deal.
He then presents eleven arguments that are substantiated by historical fact. 52 Through these he shows that "The plain fact is, then, that ample evidence exists for a widespread, elaborate, fascinating legend of Arthur before the publication of the Historia, and that there is no antecedent probability against such a view. " 53 Loomis ends the book by challenging those who feel that the Arthurian legend originated primarily in the mind of Geoffrey of Monmouth. He goes so far as to say that the belief that Geoffrey created these legends is completely implausible, given the evidence. "It does not fit the facts as does the theory of Welsh traditional development and Breton transmission to the Continent before the year 1100. " 54 Finally, in The Grail: From Celtic Myth to Christian Symbol, Loomis narrows his focus. In the preface of the book, he reiterates the fact that several of the ideas he set forth in Celtic Myth and Arthurian Romance were mistaken, though many are still valid. He sets down his intention to show how the Grail started as an object of Celtic myth and over time became a symbol for Christianity. "That is what one would expect to happen to a Celtic vessel of plenty: at first, a thing of mere magic, it would become in time possessed of miraculous and sacred powers, and emerge at last a Christian symbol. " 55 The legend of the Grail has inspired many scholars due to the nature of the Grail as well as the quest for it.
The stories are filled with fanciful and supernatural aspects that are part of its lure. The myriads of scholars who have studied the legend have arrived at varied and often contradictory conclusions. The location of the Grail has been a matter of much speculation. As examples, Loomis offers "the Punjab in India, to the palace of Atreus at Mycenae and the temple of Zeus at Dodona, to the monastery of Montserrat in Spain, to the palace of Chosroes in Persia, and the Christian shrines of Constantinople. " The possible origins of the Grail, too, are as numerous. "the object itself was derived from the cauldron of the Irish god Dagda, from the eye of the Egyptian god Thoth, from a symbol of the female organ of generation, from a pearl of the Zoroastrian cult named Gear, from a talisman of the heretical Albigensians, once adored in a cavern of the Pyrenees, or from a 'Great Sapphire', formerly preserved in the sacristy of Glastonbury Abbey. " What the Grail actually is has been heatedly debated as well. "The Grail may be described as the dish from which Christ ate the Passover lamb at the Last Supper; or as the chalice of the first sacrament, in which the Saviour's blood was caught as it flowed from His wounded body; or as a stone with miraculous feeding and youth preserving virtues; or as a salver containing a man's head, swimming in blood. " 56 Loomis divides the texts which are concerned primarily with the grail into two groups: those that relate the adventures of the Knights of Arthur and their arriving at the castle in which the Grail is kept, either by chance or intention, and those that detail the history of the Grail and its transference to Britain from the Holy land. Loomis lists ten of these tales, all of which were written within a fifty-year span. 57 The author states that the best way to begin investigation of the Grail Bibliography: WORKS CITED Every, Ann, and Linda Metzger, eds. Contemporary Authors, New Revision Series.
Vol. 8. Michigan: Gale Research Co. , 1983. Gerould, Gordon Hall. "Ritual and Myth. " Times (London) Literary Supplement. 14 November, 1963. Loomis, Roger Sherman. Celtic Myth and Arthurian Romance. New York: Columbia University Press, 1926...
The Grail: From Celtic Myth to Christian Symbol, 2 nd ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 1964... Wales and the Arthurian Legend. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1956. Reprint, Pennsylvania: The Folcroft Press, Inc. , 1969.
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Research essay sample on York Columbia University Gawain And The Green Knight
