Editorial note — NOTE A.
Reading edition
The division of the word indicates that the writer adopts the plausible notion that Sangreal means Real (or Royal) Blood; and no doubt in ancient as well as modern times the spelling and sound would suggest this meaning: but Roquefort shows clearly that the other is the proper explanation, both in etymology and (so to speak) historically. And Helinand, a monk of Fromont (A.D. 717), gives the Latin Gradale, which supplies the link between Graal and Crater from which Roquefort derives the former. Helinand’s words are,—‘Hoc tempore, in Britannia, cuidam eremitae monstrata est mirabilis quaedam visio per angelum de sancto Josepho decurione nobili qui corpus Domini deposuit de cruce, et de catino illo vel paropside in quo Dominus coenavit cum discipulis suis; de qua ab eodem eremita descripta est historia quae dicitur de Gradal. Gradalis autem vel Gradale dicitur Gallicè scutella lata et aliquantulum profunda in qua pretiosae dapes, cum suo jure, divitibus solent apponi, et dicitur nomine Graal.... Hanc historiam latine scriptam invenire non potui, sed tantum Gallicè scripta habetur a quibusdam proceribus, nec facile ut aiunt tota inveniri potest.’ Helinandi Historia, quoted in L’Essai Historique et Literaire sur l’Abbaye de Fécamp par Leroux de Lincy, Rouen, 1840.