form of The Water of Life our difificulties are in great measure resolved.
With this in mind let us consider the three categories. Sometime before the fourteenth century[1] The Water of Life, perhaps in a rather peculiar form, came into contact with The Grateful Dead, both simple and combined with The Ransomed Woman,[2] in eastern or central Europe. With each form it seems to have united, giving rise in the century named to the German romance of Treu Heinrich and the legend of Nicholas by Gobius, as well as, sooner or later, to the folk-tales with which it has been found combined in those regions within the past hundred years. The territorial limitation of the resulting type is a point in the favour of the proposed theory, though I cannot but be aware that this may be disturbed by a variant outside the seemingly fixed circle. Yet even so, the relation of the variants of Class I. to the themes concerned appears to be pretty definitely established. With Class III. the matter is even simpler. According to my view, some form of The Grateful Dead, more or less confused with one of the countless versions of The Thankful Beasts met with a very clear type of The Water of Life in southern or south-western Europe by or before the thirteenth century.[3] With this it united and gave rise to an Old French romance (later turned into Dutch) and to a considerable body of folk-tales, which have not strayed far from the point of departure save in one instance,[4] where the means of transmission is not difficult to ascertain. Apparently the thankful beast was not absolutely in solution, since in Maltese and Venetian the human ghost resumes its characteristic rôle.[5] With Class
- ↑ The date of Treu Heinrich. This gives the date a quo.
- ↑ The compound existed before the fourteenth century certainly. See pp. 117 f.
- ↑ The date is here determined by the existence of Walewein.
- ↑ Brazilian.
- ↑ Venetian has, however, united with other material, which may account for this in the one case.
