From Ritual to Romance is Jessie Weston's landmark study of the legends surrounding the mysterious Holy Grail. Weston studied medieval literature under Professor Bruno Gaston Paris and, as an independent scholar, was less hide-bound in her thinking than most tenured academics. After extensive study she rejected the prevailing consensus: that the Grail was simply a courtly work of imagination with no historical antecedents. Instead, Weston put forward the idea that the Arthurian legend of the Grail is a continuation of prehistoric Vegetation/Fertility rituals that...