The theme of the Grail romance is that the land, the country, the whole territory of concern has been laid waste. It is called a wasteland. And what is the nature of the wasteland? It is a land where everybody is living an inauthentic life, doing as other people do, doing as you're told, with no courage for your own life. That is the Wasteland. And that is what T.S. Eliot meant in his poem The Waste Land." - Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth
The earliest finds of European pattern mail are from the 3rd century BC from Horný Jatov, Slovakia, and a Celtic chieftain's burial located in Ciumeşti, Romania. Its invention is commonly credited to the Celts. It is believed that the Roman Republic first came into contact with mail fighting the Gauls in Cisalpine Gaul, now Northern Italy.
Mail byrnie from the Museum of Bayeux. A chain mail shirt had more than 20,000 hand made links.
hic sunt
dracones
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"These stories (Medieval Grail Romances) tell us that the Grail was guarded by the Fisher King, a descendant of Joseph of Arimathea, whose successor is to prove his fitness for the office by asking a mysterious question. But the future Grail-Winner is unaware of his destiny and knows nothing of the Grail, so he fails to put the question, and thus involves the world in mysterious enchantments which cease only when the question is put correctly."
- Noel Currier-Briggs, The Shroud & the Grail Trischen, uninhabited island, with the mouth of the river Elbe, home to the Saxons.
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