It is unnecessary, here, to outline the various ramifications of the Grail legend, or to summarise the conflicting theories advanced as to its origin and meaning. It comes to be connected with Arthur’s court mainly through the knightly Perceval, who, though ultimately deposed as the Grail hero by Galahad, remains to the end the real protagonist of the story. The Grail romances are usually divided into two classes,--one dealing with the “Quest” proper, and the other with the “Early History” of the Holy Grail. In the “Quest” group of stories--three of which have been named above--the main interest lies in the personality of Perceval, and in his adventures in search of certain talismans, which include a sword, a bleeding lance and a “grail,” the latter, in Chrétien’s poem, a magic vessel, in Wolfram’s, a stone. The “Early History” group--of which the chief representatives are the _Joseph of Arimathea_ and the _Merlin_ of Robert de Borron, and the _Quête del St Graal_ attributed to Map,--dwell chiefly upon the origin and nature of these talismans. The Grail legends, as given in these and other romances, and so far as they can be put into a coherent whole, are undoubtedly a compound of remote mythical and pagan elements, probably Celtic,[107] and of later accretions due to monastic writers deliberately bent upon edification. A flagrant example of the way in which the legends were turned to ecclesiastical uses is furnished by the identification of the Grail with the cup of the Last Supper, which Pilate gave to Joseph of Arimathea, and in which Joseph treasured the blood that flowed from the Saviour’s wounds on the Cross. Joseph brought this cup to Britain, and thus the Grail came to be connected with the mythical story which attributed to Joseph the first evangelisation of these islands.