"The Minor Sources of Sir Thomas Malory's Morte Darthur" explores the possible minor sources of the Morte Darthur. Scholarship has long been aware that Malory adapted the eight tales recognized in the standard edition each from one or more older sources in French and English. Scholarship has more recently recognized that Malory also used minor sources. For example, it has been noted that Malory habitually named characters that his major sources left anonymous and that Malory displayed knowledge from the very beginning of the Morte
Darthur of a number of English Arthurian romances that were not among his primary sources. However, although over fifty years of work has gone into the question of Malory's minor sources, no one has yet surveyed the field to try to evaluate the strength of these various suggestions and to see, once the balance is taken, what conclusions may be drawn of Malory's life, work, and mental furnishings. This dissertation is an attempt to do so.