Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/393

render the sound of the Cymric y, which is something between a French e muet and a short o (Ywein = the modern Welsh Owen), and would have written something like Ewen; their retention of the y (which they undoubtedly sounded like a long e) conclusively shows that they only knew the name by sight, and not by ear. Again, the French romance writers, finding a written Caradoc Breich-Bras (i.e., in Welsh, C. of the strong arms), and misled by similarity of look between Welsh Bras = strong, and French Bras = arm, transcribed it as C. Brie-Bras (or, in French, C. short arms), which they never could have done had they heard the word pronouneed, for in accordance with the rules of Cymric phonology the initial consonants suffered change, so that the epithet was sounded Vreichvras. The demonstration seems conclusive as against Professor Forster, for it is obvious that the French romance writers had no access to Welsh MSS., and could only have derived the Welsh forms from Anglo-Norman sources; but Prof. Zimmer might retort that these Welsh written versions came into existence after the Norman Conquest had brought the Breton romances to the knowledge of the Welsh, but before the French romance writers knew of them. M. Loth, however, whilst cordially recognising, as every true student must do, that Prof Zimmer has successfully vindicated for Brittany many features of the Arthurian romance as we possess it, has little difficulty in showing that he has, more suo, driven his theory too hard, and altogether underrated the Welsh element in the romance. For the moment at least the centre of gravity of Arthurian study has been shifted back from Brittany to Britain. But little has been done towards that adequate solution of the Arthurian problem which must, I think, take into account the following factors: (a) the relation of the legendary account, preserved by the Welsh sources alone, to that found in the French romances; (b) the relation of both accounts to the substratum of fact connected with the historical Arthur; (c) the nature, whether in its origin racial and