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15-506: De Ortu Waluuanii survives in a single early-14th-century Medieval Latin manuscript believed to be a copy of an earlier work. J. D. Bruce and Roger Sherman Loomis suggested that the romance dates to the 13th century, though details of costume and ship construction suggest an earlier date. However, it was written after Geoffrey of Monmouth 's Historia Regum Britanniae of the mid-12th century, as it borrows passages and plots from that work. Catalog tradition, as recorded by John Bale , lists

30-500: A Persian knight. The second quest involves protecting Arthur's lands from northern raiders. Gawain, traveling incognito, must fight Arthur and Kay before he is allowed to pass, and is eventually rewarded for his service by receiving knowledge of his true identity from his uncle. In describing the boyhood deeds of Gawain, the romance recalls several other Arthurian works, notably the Enfances Gawain . Other works to deal with

45-642: A Rhodes Scholar , a Bachelor of Letters (BLitt) degree at New College, Oxford , in 1913. His BLitt dissertation, written under the supervision of Arthur Napier and C. F. Bell, was titled Illustrations of the Romances in Mediæval English Art . He held honorary degrees from Columbia, Williams, the University of Wales , and the University of Rennes in France. He was an instructor at

60-600: A medieval scholar who shared his interest in Arthurian literature ( Folklore 38.4 1927 405–407). From his early years he studied the influence of Celtic mythology on Arthurian legend , especially the Holy Grail romance. In 1930 Loomis attended the first International Arthurian Congress in Truro, Cornwall, where he, Henry Jenner , Dominica Legge , Eugène Vinaver , and other scholars investigated Arthurian legends. He

75-787: Is a pictorial presentation of drawings, sculpture, paintings and other materials related to Geoffrey Chaucer and his age. His most notable book Arthurian Tradition and Chrétien de Troyes , published by Columbia University in 1949, won the Haskins Medal of the Mediaeval Academy of America. After the death of his first wife in 1921, Loomis married Laura Alandis Hibbard (1883–1960), with whom he collaborated in many of his research and writing efforts. He dedicated one of his final volumes to Gertrude Schoepperle Loomis and Laura Hibbard Loomis "in grateful and loving remembrance" ( The Grail: From Celtic Myth to Christian Symbol published by

90-629: Is so wet. De Ortu Waluuanii also contains one of the earliest European descriptions of the processing and use of the maritime explosive Greek fire . The passage recounts how the pirates Gawain fights in the Mediterranean resort to using the substance when they see Gawain will not submit to them, and then goes into a long description of how it is made. The rough, unlearned description combines elements of folklore and literary tradition about Medea 's magic as it appears in Ovid 's Metamorphoses , but

105-654: Is trained as a cavalry officer to the Roman emperor. Known only as "the Knight of the Surcoat ", he must first work to establish himself as knight in his own right, and then must discover his biological identity by learning his lineage. The narrative is centered around two major quests, involving Gawain's defense of Jerusalem and Arthur's Britain , respectively. The first quest describes Gawain's battles with Greek fire-equipped pirates and culminates with his single combat against

120-492: The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign from 1913 to 1918. During the First World War he edited an Army publication Atenshun 21 . He left Illinois for Columbia University , where he taught from 1919 until 1958: he was a member of Columbia's English faculty and held an emeritus position there from 1958 until his death in 1966. In 1919, also, Loomis married his first wife, Gertrude Schoepperle Loomis , (1882–1921),

135-484: The account of Gawain's early life given in Geoffrey's Historia , which mentions that at the age of twelve Gawain was sent to Rome to serve in the household of the fictional Pope Sulpicius, who educated and knighted him. The structure and plot revolve around the theme of establishing one's identity. Gawain, the illegitimate son of Arthur's sister Anna , is raised ignorant of his parentage and his relationship to Arthur and

150-478: The author as Robert of Torigni , abbot of Mont Saint Michel Abbey from 1154 to 1186. However, no other evidence supports this assertion, though the real author must have been an educated man and was likely a cleric. The author composed another Latin romance, the Historia Meriadoci or The Story of Meriadoc . While the primary basis for John Bale's suggestion that Robert of Torigni might have been

165-436: The author of these two romances was the signature of the author—a single letter "R"—Peter Larkin has suggested several reasons why the anonymous author was more likely to have been Ranulf Higden . Higden, an early fourteenth century monk and chronicler, is chronologically far more plausible a candidate and also he was known to sign his works with a single letter "R" while Robert of Torigni was not. De Ortu Waluuanii expands on

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180-428: The process described would have resulted in a working, napalm -like weapon of thickened gasoline. Roger Sherman Loomis Roger Sherman Loomis (1887–1966) was an American scholar and one of the foremost authorities on medieval and Arthurian literature . Loomis is perhaps best known for showing the roots of Arthurian legend , in particular the Holy Grail , in native Celtic mythology . Roger Sherman Loomis

195-565: The subject include Geoffrey's Historia , works derived from the Historia such as Wace 's Roman de Brut and Layamon's Brut , and the romance Perlesvaus . However, De Ortu Waluuanii contains the only complete account. While chiefly serious in tone, The Rise of Gawain contains some humorous incidents; notably, when Gawain pushes Arthur into the River Usk and the king is forced to explain to his wife Gwendoloena ( Guinevere ) why he

210-918: Was a member of the International Arthurian Society (president of American Branch, 1948–1963), the Modern Language Association , the Mediaeval Academy of America (fellow; second vice-president, 1961–1964), the Modern Humanities Research Association , and the American Humanist Association . In 1955–1956 he was an Eastman Professor at the University of Oxford . Loomis wrote ten scholarly books and numerous journal articles. His book A Mirror of Chaucer's World , published in 1965 by Princeton,

225-618: Was the son of Rev. Henry Loomis and Jane Herring Greene, the grandnephew of William Maxwell Evarts , and the great-great-grandson of American founding father Roger Sherman . Born on October 31, 1887, in Yokohama , Japan, he was educated at the Hotchkiss School in Lakeville , Connecticut . He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Williams College in 1909, a Master of Arts degree from Harvard University in 1910, and, as

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