The Holy Grail and Knights Templar - The Vulgate Cycle
2The Lancelot-Grail, 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 in Old French. The cycle 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, expanding on the works of Robert de Boron and Chrétien de Troyes.
There is no unity of place, but most of the episodes take place in Arthur's kingdom of Logres. Arthur is one of the main characters in the tale, and around him gravitate a host of other heroes, many of whom are Knights of the Round Table. Among them is the famed Lancelot, whose chivalric story is cantered around his illicit romance with King Arthur's wife, Queen Guinevere. However, the cycle also tells of adventures of a more spiritual type; those involve the Holy Grail, the vessel that contained the blood of Christ, for which many of the members of the Round Table are searching, with Lancelot's son Galahad ultimately emerging as the winner of this sacred competition. Other major narratives include the stories of the life of Merlin and the fall of Arthur.
After its completion around 1230–1235, the Lancelot–Grail was soon followed by its major rewrite known as the Post-Vulgate Cycle. Together, the two cycles, with their multiple variants and abundance of characters, represent a major source of the Arthurian legend. They constituted a highly influential and most widespread form of Arthurian romance literature during their time and also contributed the most to the later English compilation Le Morte d'Arthur that formed the basis for Arthuriana's modern canon.