some it is thought that the Normans took such delight in
the knightly deeds of Geoffrey's heroes that they spread the story
in France when they visited their homes in Normandy. Moreover, they
were in a good position to learn other tales of their favourite
knights, for Normandy bordered on Brittany, the home of the
Bretons, who, being of the same race as the Welsh, honoured the
same heroes in their legends. So in return for Geoffrey's tales,
Breton stories, perhaps, found their way into England; at all
events, marvellous romances of King Arthur and his Round Table were
soon being told in England, in France, in Germany and in Italy.

Now, to some it may seem strange that story-tellers should care to
weave their stories so constantly about the same personages;
strange, too, that they should invent stories about men and women
who were believed actually to have existed. But it must be
remembered that, in those early days, very few could read and
write, and that, before printing was invented, books were so scarce
that four or five constituted quite a library. Those who knew how
to read, and were so fortunate as to have books, read them again
and again. For the rest, though kings and great nobles might have
poets attached to their courts, the majority depended for their
amusement on the professional story-teller. In the long winter
evening, no one was more welcome than the wandering minstrel. He
might be the knightly troubadour who, accompanied by a jongleur to
play his accompaniments, wandered from place to place out of sheer
love of his art and of adventure; more often, however, the minstrel
made story-telling his trade, and gained his living from the bounty
of his audience--be it in castle, market-place, or inn. Most
commonly, the narratives took the form of long rhyming poems; not
because the people in those days were so poetical--indeed, some of
these poems would be thought, in present times, very dreary
doggerel--but because rhyme is easier to remember than prose.
Story-tellers had generally much the same stock-in-trade--stories
of Arthur, Charlemagne, Sir Guy of Warwick, Sir Bevis of
Southampton, and so on. If a minstrel had skill of his own, he
would invent some new episode, and so, perhaps, turn a compliment
to his patron by introducing the exploit of an ancestor, at the
same time that he made his story last longer. People did not weary
of hearing the same tales over and over again, any more than little
children ge