acquainted with their language as to sign himself officially 'The Interpreter.' We have no direct evidence of his literary skill, or knowledge of the traditional history of his country, but a man of his birth could scarcely have failed to possess the latter, while certain peculiarities in that section of the national Chronicle which deals with the aid given by him to the Norman invaders would seem to indicate that Bledri himself may well have been responsible for the record. Again, we know him to have been closely connected with the locality from which came the writer who refers to the famous story-teller of the same name. I would submit that we have here quite sufficient evidence to warrant us in accepting Bledri ap Cadivor as, at least, the possible author of the romantic Grail tradition. In any case, so far, there is no other candidate in the field 1.
Shortly after the publication of the second volume of my Perceval studies, I received a letter from Professor
[paragraph continues] Singer, in which, after expressing his general acceptance of the theories there advanced, in especial of the suggested date and relation of the different versions, which he characterized as "sehr gelungen, und zu meiner Alffassung der Entwickelung der Altfranzösischen Literatur sehr zu stimmen," he proceeded to comment upon the probable character of the literary activity of Bleheris. His remarks are so interesting and suggestive that I venture to submit them for the consideration of my readers.
Professor Singer points out that in Eilhart von Oberge's Tristan we find the name in the form of Pleherin attached to a knight of Mark's court. The same name in a slightly varied form, Pfelerin, occurs in the Tristan of Heinrich von Freiberg; both poems, Professor Singer considers, are derived from a French original. Under a compound form, Blihos, (or Blio)-Bliheris, he appears, in the Gawain-Grail compilation, as a knight at Arthur's court. Now Bréri-Blihis-Bleheris is referred to as authority alike in the Tristan, Grail and Gawain tradition, and Professor Singer makes the interesting suggestion that these references are originally due to Bleheris himself, who not only told the stories in the third person (a common device at that period, v. Chrétien's Erec, and Gerbert's continuation of the Perceval), but also introduced himself as eye-witness of, and actor, in a subordinate rôle, in, the incidents he recorded. Thus in the Tristan he is a knight of Mark's, in the Elucidation and the Gawain stories a knight of Arthur's, court. Professor Singer instances the case of Dares in the De exidio Trojae, and Bishop Pilgrim of Passau in the lost Nibelungias of his secretary Konrad, as illustrations of the theory.
If this be the case such a statement as that which we find in Wauchier, regarding Bleheris's birth and origin, would have emanated from Bleheris himself, and simply been taken over by the later writer from his source; he incorporated
the whole tale of the shield as it stood, a quite natural and normal proceeding 1. Again, this suggestion would do away with the necessity for postulating a certain lapse of time before the story-teller Bleheris could be converted into an Arthurian knight--the two rôles, Gewährsmann und Mithandelnden, as Professor Singer expresses it, are coincident in date. I would also suggest that the double form, Blihos-Bliheris, would have been adopted by the author himself, to indicate the identity of the two, Blihis, and Bleheris. It is worthy of note that, when dealing directly with the Grail, he assumes the title of Master, which would seem to indicate that here he claimed to speak with special authority.
I sent the letter in question to the late Mr Alfred Nutt, who was forcibly struck with the possibilities involved in the suggestion, the full application of which he thought the writer had not grasped. I quote the following passages from the long letter I received from him in return.
"Briefly put we presuppose the existence of a set of semi-dramatic, semi-narrative, poems, in which a Bledri figures as an active, and at the same t