2. PERCEVAL.--The most important _Perceval_ text is the _Conte del Grael_, or _Perceval le Galois_ of Chrétien de Troyes. Here the Grail is wrought of gold richly set with precious stones; it is carried in solemn procession, and the light issuing from it extinguishes that of the candles. What it is is not explained, but inasmuch as it is the vehicle in which is conveyed the Host on which the father of the Fisher king depends for nutriment, it seems not improbable that here, as in _Diu Crône_, it is to be understood as a reliquary. In the _Parzival_ of Wolfram von Eschenbach, the ultimate source of which is identical with that of Chrétien, on the contrary, the Grail is represented as a precious stone, brought to earth by angels, and committed to the guardianship of the Grail king and his descendants. It is guarded by a body of chosen knights, or templars, and acts alike as a life and youth preserving talisman--no man may die within eight days of beholding it, and the maiden who bears it retains perennial youth--and an oracle choosing its own servants, and indicating whom the Grail king shall wed. The sole link with the Christian tradition is the statement that its virtue is renewed every Good Friday by the agency of a dove from heaven. The discrepancy between this and the other Grail romances is most startling.
In the short prose romance known as the "Didot" _Perceval_ we have, for the first time, the whole history of the relic logically set forth. The _Perceval_ forms the third and concluding section of a group of short romances, the two preceding being the _Joseph of Arimathea_ and the _Merlin_. In the first we have the precise history of the Grail, how it was the dish of the Last Supper, confided by our Lord to the care of Joseph, whom he miraculously visited in the prison to which he had been committed by the Jews. It was subsequently given by Joseph to his brother-in-law Brons, whose grandson Perceval is destined to be the final winner and guardian of the relic. The _Merlin_ forms the connecting thread between this definitely ecclesiastical romance and the chivalric atmosphere of Arthur's court; and finally, in the _Perceval_, the hero, son of Alain and grandson to Brons, is warned by Merlin of the quest which awaits him and which he achieves after various adventures.