wrote “Li Romans de Brut” about 1155, with added details from Breton sources, and translated from Wace’s French into Anglo-Saxon by Layamon, who thus anticipated Malory’s adaptations of late French prose romances. Except a few scholars who protested unavailingly, no one doubted its strict historical truth, and it had the important effect of giving to early British history a new dignity in the estimation of Continental and of English princes. To sit upon the throne of Arthur was regarded as in itself a glory by Plantagenet monarchs who had not a trace of Arthur’s or of any British blood. *The Saga in Brittany: Marie de France* The Breton sources must next be considered. Unfortunately, not a line of ancient Breton literature has come down to us, and for our knowledge of it we must rely on the appearances it makes in the work of French writers. One of the earliest of these is the Anglo-Norman poetess who called herself Marie de France, and who wrote about 1150 and afterwards. She wrote, among other things, a number of “Lais,” or tales, which she explicitly and repeatedly tells us were translated or adapted from Breton sources. Sometimes she claims to have rendered a writer’s original exactly: “Les contes que jo sai verais Dunt li Bretun unt fait les lais Vos conterai assez briefment; Et cief [sauf] di cest coumencement Selunc la lettre è l’escriture.” Little is actually said about Arthur in these tales, but the events of them are placed in his time—_en cel tems tint Artus la terre_—and the allusions, which include a mention of the Round Table, evidently imply a general knowledge of the subject among those to whom these Breton “Lais” were addressed. Lancelot is not mentioned, but there is a “Lai” about one Lanval, who is beloved by Arthur’s queen, but rejects her because he has a fairy mistress in the “isle d’Avalon.” Gawain is mentioned, and an episode is told in the “Lai de Chevrefoil” about Tristan and Iseult, whose maid, “Brangien,” is referred to in a way which assumes that the audience knew the part she had played on Iseult’s bridal night. In short, we have evidence here of the existence in Brittany of a well-diffused and well-developed body of chivalric legend gathered about the personality of Arthur. The legends are so well known that mere allusions to characters and episodes in them are as well understood as references to Tennyson’s “Idylls” would be among us to-day. The “Lais” of Marie de France therefore point strongly to Brittany as the true cradle of the Arthurian saga, on its chivalrous and romantic side. They do not, however, mention the Grail. *Chrestien de Troyes*