Also called Armorica in the old days, I assume it was in about the same place but with more territory than the modern province. Brittany, not Great Britain, may well have been the birthplace of Arthurian romance as we know it. France and Brittany almost surely contain such important sites ad Broceliande Forest and the lake in which Lancelot was raised. Sometimes, indeed, the reader of old romances hardly can be sure whether the author had British or Breton places in mind. My putting one Benoye or Benwick in Britain and another in France, and a magical Lake with its Damsel on both sides of the Channel, ultimately may be the result of a fusion or confusion of British and French sites in the original romances.

The works of Chrétien de Troyes indicate Brittany as among Arthur's lands, describing two of his visits there, at both of which his Breton subjects rejoice. One occurs when Arthur for some reason, perhaps topical to Chrétien's own time, chooses Nantes in Brittany for the site of Erec's coronation as king of Outre-Gales. During Alexander's time with Arthur, which we may suppose to take place before Erec's adventures, when Arthur wishes to pay Brittany a visit, he consults his lords as to whom he should leave in charge of Britain. [They unwisely choose Count Angrs.]

Both the care Arthur uses to select a regent and the time he plans to stay suggest that Brittany was not a part of his regular yearly round: he spends the entire summer and might have been about to spend the winter as well, had it not been for his regent's rebellion. Arthur musters men from all of Brittany to swell his army before returning to deal with Angrs. In 'Yvain', however, Chrétien certainly appears to move Broceliande Forest into England.