Grailic literature was the evocation of a reality both historical and suprahistorical, of a supernatural and immutable reality of the spirit, revealed to those who could understand it, with symbols sometimes simple and sometimes complex and universal, which can be found in all Peoples and in all ages, so as to allow the union of all the symbols, of all the myths and all the cults.

 

It was the evocation of a mystery in a long-since vanished court, that of King Arthur - dux bellorum - of the Nordic Cymry fighting against the Anglo- Saxons, between V and VI A.D.: this evocation, similar to the echo of an occult force, gave a powerful impulse to the Knights of the ‘Round Table’, so that they pass from an earthly to a celestial knighthood, through the “quest of the Holy Grail”, a search consisting of the forcing of the door of heaven, in order to establish a contact with the “divine presence ” of the Grail.

 

As a new evocation of a distant event, the literature of the Grail developed from 1175 to about 1230,with manuscripts in prose or in verse. Among the most popular and oldest we mention the Perceval or Conte du Graal of Chrétien de Troyes. This XII century author was one of the most famous poets of Northern France, and his followers were Wauchier, Manessier and Gerbert de Montreuil.

 

Wauchier drew his inspiration from previous texts, and especially from Gawan, written by Bleheris, a poet of Wales, a land in which the knowledge of the Grail was considerably widespread. As far as prose is concerned, the most well-known texts were Perceval by Robert de Boron, which is part of a trilogy with Joseph de Arimathea and Merlin.

 

This trilogy speaks of the search for the Grail and of the adventurous deeds of the Knights at the court of King Arthur, where a Palamedes appears. In addition to Perceval by Boron, but of lesser importance, there is Perlesvaus by an unknown author, with a main character, Lancelot, a popular knight hampered in his search for the Grail by his love for Queen Guinevere.

 

More engaging instead is the “Quéste du Saint Graal”, a work in prose with a hero named Galahad, thought to be written by Gautier Map. However, Parzifal by Wolfram von Eschenbach, who is known as the Bavarian “minnesinger”, is considered to be more meaningful for its doctrinal richness. It is said to have been inspired by the Provencal poem by Kyot. Parzifal was written between 1205 and 1216.

 

This information should not even remotely lead you to think that we are speaking of a literature, a pure and simple fiction, because the cycle of chivalry for the quest of the Grail is witnessed in the most severe and significant religious architecture: the Cathedrals. In fact, in the cathedral of Modena in Emilia there are the bas-reliefs by Wiligem or of Nicolaus with legendary scenes of the Breton cycle of King Arthur. This Cathedral was built in Lombard- Romanesque style by the architect Lanfranco, and consecrated on 12 July 1184 by Pope Lucius III.

 

The portal, as well as having King Arthur and his knightly companions, bears the names written on the seats that surround the Round Table. Modena Cathedral is therefore linked to the legend of the Grail. This significant bas-relief dates back to 1160c, therefore in the period of the height of the activity of the Knights of the Temple.

 

Other bas-reliefs of the knightly cycle are to be found in Bari on the portal of the Church of Saint Nicholas. Bari was the seat of Frederick II and of Ghibellinism. In all the texts concerning the history of the Grail, the supernaturality of this object is pointed out to the
reader. With different symbols, it is represented as a chalice, cup, patera, an immaterial thing, a cup offering a beverage of life to the knights thirsty for regal dignity.

 

There are also texts affirming the identity of the Grail with a stone, an emerald fallen from Heaven, originally a jewel in Lucifer’s forehead, before his fall caused by his failed rebellion. Always as a stone, it is indicated as the sense of something lost by Adam, but re-conquered by Seth to pass into the hands of Joseph of Arimathaea after the death and resurrection of Jesus.

 

From the moment in which Joseph of Arimathaea, with Nicodemus and others, went to Blue Brittany, reaching it by a supernatural way, he appears as the founding father of the “royalty of the Grail”, whose successors are in the centuries the knights of a dynasty of guardians of the Divine Chalice, called “fisher kings”

 

 

Tommaso Palamidessi

excerpts from "THE EXPERIENCE OF THE GRAIL AND ITS MYTHICAL SOURCES"

from the 18th Booklet