The Lancelot Compilation is the name given to a Middle Dutch collection, produced ca. 1320, containing seven Arthurian romances folded into the three parts of the Lancelot-Grail cycle.
The Lancelot Compilation is the name given to a Middle Dutch collection, produced ca. 1320, containing seven Arthurian romances folded into the three parts of the Lancelot-Grail cycle.
Arthurian romance must have been widespread orally in the Low Countries; the oldest written remains of Arthurian romance in Middle Dutch date from the second half of the thirteenth century; [1] this compilation is the "largest collection of Arthurian romances in Middle Dutch". [2] There are three main witnesses for the Lancelot en prose tradition: the Lancelot Compilation; the collection of rhyming fragments known as Lantsloot vander Haghedochte; and the prose translation attested by the two so-called Rotterdam Fragments. [3]
Lanceloet en het hert met het witte voet ("Lancelot and the hart with the white foot") is an original romance in which Lancelot fights seven lions to get the white foot from a hart which will allow him to marry a princess. The creation of a new story indicates Lancelot's widespread popularity. [4] The manuscript is the second of two compendiums of translations of Old French Arthurian romances; the first is lost. The manuscript (The Hague, KB129 A 10) has three columns and 480 folio pages, totaling almost 90,000 lines of verse. [5]
Excalibur is the mythical sword of King Arthur that may be attributed with magical powers or associated with the rightful sovereignty of Britain. Traditionally, the sword in the stone that is the proof of Arthur's lineage and the sword given him by a Lady of the Lake are not the same weapon, even as in some versions of the legend both of them share the name of Excalibur. Several similar swords and other weapons also appear within Arthurian texts, as well as in other legends.
King Arthur is a legendary king of Britain, and a central figure in the medieval literary tradition known as the Matter of Britain. In Welsh sources, Arthur is portrayed as a leader of the post-Roman Britons in battles against Anglo-Saxon invaders of Britain in the late 5th and early 6th centuries. He first appears in two early medieval historical sources, the Annales Cambriae and the Historia Brittonum, but these date to 300 years after he is supposed to have lived, and most historians who study the period do not consider him a historical figure. His name also occurs in early Welsh poetic sources such as Y Gododdin. The character developed through Welsh mythology, appearing either as a great warrior defending Britain from human and supernatural enemies or as a magical figure of folklore, sometimes associated with the Welsh otherworld Annwn.
Merlin is a mythical figure prominently featured in the legend of King Arthur and best known as a mage, with several other main roles. The familiar depiction of Merlin, based on an amalgamation of historic and legendary figures, was introduced by the 12th-century British pseudo-historical author Geoffrey of Monmouth and then built on by the French poet Robert de Boron and their prosaic successors in the 13th century.
Gawain, also known in many other forms and spellings, is a character in Arthurian legend, in which he is King Arthur's nephew and a Knight of the Round Table. The prototype of Gawain is mentioned under the name Gwalchmei in the earliest Welsh sources. He has subsequently appeared in many Arthurian tales in Welsh, Latin, French, English, Scottish, Dutch, German, Spanish, and Italian, notably as the protagonist of the Middle English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Other works featuring Gawain as their central character include De Ortu Waluuanii, Diu Crône, Ywain and Gawain, Golagros and Gawane, Sir Gawain and the Carle of Carlisle, L'âtre périlleux, La Mule sans frein, La Vengeance Raguidel, Le Chevalier à l'épée, Le Livre d'Artus, The Awntyrs off Arthure, The Greene Knight, and The Weddynge of Syr Gawen and Dame Ragnell.
Lancelot du Lac, also written as Launcelot and other variants, is a character in some versions of Arthurian legend where he is typically depicted as King Arthur's close companion and one of the greatest Knights of the Round Table. In the French-inspired Arthurian chivalric romance tradition, Lancelot is an orphaned son of King Ban of the lost kingdom of Benoic, raised in a fairy realm by the Lady of the Lake. A hero of many battles, quests and tournaments, and famed as a nearly unrivalled swordsman and jouster, Lancelot becomes the lord of the castle Joyous Gard and personal champion of Arthur's wife, Queen Guinevere, despite suffering from frequent and sometimes prolonged fits of madness. But when his adulterous affair with Guinevere is discovered, it causes a civil war that, once exploited by Mordred, brings an end to Arthur's kingdom.
The Lady of the Lake is a name or a title used by several either fairy or fairy-like but human enchantresses in the Matter of Britain, the body of medieval literature and mythology associated with the legend of King Arthur. They play important roles in many stories, including providing Arthur with the sword Excalibur, eliminating Merlin, raising Lancelot after the death of his father, and helping to take the dying Arthur to Avalon. Different sorceresses known as the Lady of the Lake appear concurrently as separate characters in some versions of the legend since at least the Post-Vulgate Cycle and consequently the seminal Le Morte d'Arthur, with the latter describing them as a hierarchical group, while some texts also give this title to either Morgan or her sister.
Morgan le Fay, alternatively known as Morgan[n]a, Morgain[a/e], Morg[a]ne, Morgant[e], Morge[i]n, and Morgue[in] among other names and spellings, is a powerful and ambiguous enchantress from the legend of King Arthur, in which most often she and he are siblings. Early appearances of Morgan in Arthurian literature do not elaborate her character beyond her role as a goddess, a fay, a witch, or a sorceress, generally benevolent and connected to Arthur as his magical saviour and protector. Her prominence increased as the legend of Arthur developed over time, as did her moral ambivalence, and in some texts there is an evolutionary transformation of her to an antagonist, particularly as portrayed in cyclical prose such as the Lancelot-Grail and the Post-Vulgate Cycle. A significant aspect in many of Morgan's medieval and later iterations is the unpredictable duality of her nature, with potential for both good and evil.
Le Morte d'Arthur is a 15th-century Middle English prose reworking by Sir Thomas Malory of tales about the legendary King Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot, Merlin and the Knights of the Round Table, along with their respective folklore. In order to tell a "complete" story of Arthur from his conception to his death, Malory compiled, rearranged, interpreted and modified material from various French and English sources. Today, this is one of the best-known works of Arthurian literature. Many authors since the 19th-century revival of the legend have used Malory as their principal source.
Gaheris is a Knight of the Round Table in the chivalric romance tradition of Arthurian legend. A nephew of King Arthur, Gaheris is the third son of Arthur's sister or half-sister Morgause and her husband Lot, King of Orkney and Lothian. He is the younger brother of Gawain and Agravain, the older brother of Gareth, and half-brother of Mordred. His figure may have been originally derived from that of a brother of Gawain in the early Welsh tradition, and then later split into a separate character of another brother, today best known as Gareth. German poetry also described him as Gawain's cousin instead of brother.
Robert de Boron was a French poet active around the late 12th and early 13th centuries, notable as the reputed author of the poems Joseph d'Arimathie and Merlin. Although little is known of Robert apart from the poems he allegedly wrote, these works and subsequent prose redactions of them had a strong influence on later incarnations of the Arthurian legend and its prose cycles, in particular through their Christianisation and redefinition of the previously ambiguous Grail motif and the character of Merlin, as well as vastly increasing the prominence of the latter.
The Lancelot-Grail Cycle, also known as the Vulgate Cycle or the Pseudo-Map Cycle, is an early 13th-century French Arthurian literary cycle consisting of interconnected prose episodes of chivalric romance originally written in Old French. The work of unknown authorship, presenting itself as a chronicle of actual events, retells the legend of King Arthur by focusing on the love affair between Lancelot and Guinevere as well as the religious quest for the Holy Grail. The cycle expands on Robert de Boron's "Little Grail Cycle" and the works of Chrétien de Troyes, previously unrelated to each other, by supplementing them with additional details and side stories, as well as lengthy continuations, while tying the entire narrative together into a coherent single tale. Its alternate titles include Philippe Walter's 21st-century edition Le Livre du Graal.
Tristan and Iseult, also known as Tristan and Isolde and other names, is a medieval chivalric romance told in numerous variations since the 12th century. Based on a Celtic legend and possibly other sources, the tale is a tragedy about the illicit love between the Cornish knight Tristan and the Irish princess Iseult. It depicts Tristan's mission to escort Iseult from Ireland to marry his uncle, King Mark of Cornwall. On the journey, Tristan and Iseult ingest a love potion, instigating a forbidden love affair between them.
The Post-Vulgate Cycle, also known as the Post-Vulgate Arthuriad, the Post-Vulgate Roman du Graal or the Pseudo-Robert de Boron Cycle, is one of the major Old French prose cycles of Arthurian literature from the early 13th century. It is considered essentially a rewriting of the earlier and more popular Vulgate Cycle, with much left out but also much added, including characters and scenes from the Prose Tristan. The cycle has not survived in any manuscript in its entirety and has been reconstructed from fragments in various languages.
The Prose Tristan is an adaptation of the Tristan and Iseult story into a long prose romance, and the first to tie the subject entirely into the arc of the Arthurian legend. It was also the first major Arthurian prose cycle commenced after the widely popular Lancelot-Grail, which influenced especially the later portions of the Prose Tristan.
Brunor, Breunor, Branor or Brunoro are various forms of a name given to several different characters in the works of the Tristan tradition of Arthurian legend. They include Knight of the Round Table known as Brunor/Breunor le Noir, as well as his father and others, among them another former knight of Uther's old Round Table and the father of Galehaut.
Perlesvaus, also called Li Hauz Livres du Graal, is an Old French Arthurian romance dating to the first decade of the 13th century. It purports to be a continuation of Chrétien de Troyes' unfinished Perceval, the Story of the Grail, but it has been called the least canonical Arthurian tale because of its striking differences from other versions.
Galehaut is a half-giant knight and sovereign prince in the Arthurian legend. He is most prominent within the Lancelot-Grail prose cycle where he is a noble enemy turned an ally of King Arthur as well as an inseparable friend of Arthur's champion Lancelot. The figure of Galehaut should not be mistaken with Lancelot's son, Galahad, and some other similarly named characters.
Merlin is a partly lost French epic poem written by Robert de Boron in Old French and dating from either the end of the 12th or beginning of the 13th century. The author reworked Geoffrey of Monmouth's material on the legendary Merlin, emphasising Merlin's power to prophesy and linking him to the Holy Grail. The poem tells of his origin and early life as a redeemed Antichrist, his role in the birth of Arthur, and how Arthur became King of Britain. Merlin's story relates to Robert's two other reputed Grail poems, Joseph and Perceval. Its motifs became popular in medieval and later Arthuriana, notably the introduction of the sword in the stone, the redefinition of the Grail, and turning the previously peripheral Merlin into a key character in the legend of King Arthur.
Moriaen is a 13th-century Arthurian romance in Middle Dutch. A 4,720-line version is preserved in the vast Lancelot Compilation, and a short fragment exists at the Royal Library at Brussels. The work tells the story of Morien, the Moorish son of Aglovale, one of King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table.
Bibliothèque nationale de France fr. 113–116 is an Illuminated manuscript, now rebound as four manuscripts, commissioned by Jacques d'Armagnac, Duke of Nemours and executed by the workshop of Évrard d'Espinques around 1475. They contain the Lancelot-Grail cycle of romances, also known as the Vulgate Cycle, and constitute one of the most complete examples of Arthurian texts in prose, illuminated with 209 miniatures.