The Holy Grail: An Ancient Vessel Turned Into a Tool of Power

Inside a chapel at Valencia Cathedral in Spain stands a brown-red stone cup. Its upper bowl is an old piece of quartz; its base, handles, and decorations were added at later times. The cathedral calls it the Santo Cáliz, the cup Jesus used at the Last Supper. Pilgrims kneel before it, popes have used it in Mass, and Valencia promotes a pilgrimage route that brings visitors to its chapel.

The name “Holy Grail” does not appear in the Gospels. It first appears in a French poem written around 1180–1190. In that poem, the grail is a strange object carried through the castle of a wounded king. It is not yet Jesus’s cup, it does not yet hold blood, and it does not grant power to whoever owns it.