Editing Lancelot (section)

===Birth and childhood===
{{Further|Lady of the Lake}}

[[File:The Lady Nymue beareth away Launcelot into the Lakes.png|thumb|left|upright|[[Howard Pyle]]'s illustration for ''[[The Story of the Champions of the Round Table]]'' (1905): "The Lady Nymue beareth away Launcelot into the Lakes."|alt=]]

In his backstory, as told in the Vulgate Cycle, Lancelot is born "in the borderland between [[Gaul]] and [[Brittany]]" as '''Galahad''' (originally written ''Galaad'' or ''Galaaz'', not to be confused with his own son [[Galahad|of the same name]]), son of the [[Gallo-Roman culture|Gallo-Roman]] ruler [[King Ban]] of Bénoïc (English 'Benwick', corresponding to the eastern part of [[County of Anjou|Anjou]]). Ban's kingdom has just fallen to his enemy, [[Claudas|King Claudas]], and the mortally wounded king and his wife [[Elaine (legend)#Elaine of Benoic|Queen Élaine]] flee the destruction of their final stronghold of Trebe or Trébes (likely the historic Trèves Castle in today's [[Chênehutte-Trèves-Cunault]]), carrying the infant child with them. As Elaine tends to her dying husband, Lancelot is carried off by a fairy enchantress known as the [[Lady of the Lake]]; the surviving Elaine will later become a nun. In an alternate version as retold in the Italian ''[[La Tavola Ritonda]]'', Lancelot is born when the late Ban's wife Gostanza delivers him two months early and soon after also dies.

The Lady then raises the child in her magical realm. After three years<ref name=young>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cTY44q6n0MgC&pg=PA33|title=Lancelot-Grail: Lancelot, pt. I|isbn=9781843842262|last1=Lacy|first1=Norris J.|year=2010|publisher=Boydell & Brewer }}</ref> pass in human world, the child Lancelot grows up and matures much faster than he would naturally do, and it is from this upbringing that he earns the name ''du Lac''{{dash}}of the Lake. His double-cousins [[Sir Lionel|Lionel]] and [[Bors#Sir Bors the Younger|Bors the Younger]], sons of [[Bors#King Bors the Elder|King Bors]] of Gaul and Elaine's sister Evaine, are first taken by a knight of Claudas and later spirited away to the Lady of the Lake to become Lancelot's junior companions.<ref>Lacy, Norris J. (Ed.) (1995). ''Lancelot–Grail: The Old French Arthurian Vulgate and Post-Vulgate in Translation, Volume 3 of 5''. New York: Garland.</ref> Lancelot's other notable surviving kinsmen often include [[Bleoberis|Bleoberis de Ganis]] and [[Hector de Maris]] among other and usually more distant relatives. Many of them will also join him at the Round Table, as do all of those mentioned above, as well as some of their sons, such as [[Elyan the White]], and Lancelot's own son, too. In the prose ''Lancelot'', the more or less minor [[Knights of the Round Table]] also mentioned as related to Lancelot in one way or another are Aban, Acantan the Agile, Banin, Blamor, Brandinor, Crinides the Black, Danubre the Brave, Gadran, Hebes the Famous, Lelas, Ocursus the Black, Pincados, Tanri, and more<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9ufgmo5uY14C&pg=PA25|title=Lancelot-Grail: The post-Vulgate Quest for the Holy Grail & the post-Vulgate Death of Arthur|first=Norris J.|last=Lacy|date= 2010|publisher=Boydell & Brewer Ltd|isbn=9781843842330 |via=Google Books}}</ref> (they are different and fewer in Malory).

An early part of the Vulgate ''Lancelot'' also describes in a great detail what made him (in a translation by [[Norris J. Lacy]]) "the most handsome lad in the land", noting the feminine qualities of his hands and neck and the just right amount of musculature. Diverging on Lancelot's personality, the narration then adds his proneness to berserk-like combat frenzy to his mental instability already prominent Chrétien's version (where Lancelot is notably relentless on his quest to rescue Guinevere, leaping into danger without thinking and ignoring wounds and pain):

{{quote block|His eyes were bright and smiling and full of delight as long as he was in a good mood, but when he was angry, they looked just like glowing coals and it seemed that drops of red blood stood out from his cheekbones. He would snort like an angry horse and clench and grind his teeth, and it seemed that the breath coming out of his mouth was all red; then he would shout like a trumpet in battle, and whatever he had his teeth in or was gripping in his hands he would pull to pieces. In short, when he was in a rage, he had no sense or awareness of anything else, and this became apparent on many an occasion.<ref name=young/>}}