Thread:Per Ankh/@comment-24588058-20170823014237/@comment-24588058-20170823023153

There are, to possibly someone's surprise, two artifacts which could be considered "The Holy Grail". The first is one that did not survive collection. It is known as the Cauldron of Rebirth, associated with the Welsh goddess Ceridwen. It had the ability to "restore" life to the dead, though it merely reanimated dead soldiers, who were unable to speak or do anything but fight. During a confrontation to collect this artifact during the time of the Hunnic Empire, around 440 AD, the artifact ended up getting destroyed by the same soldiers it reanimated.

The other artifact, which survived to be collected, is the Cauldron of Annwn. It formed based on the legends of the land of Annwn, in the Otherworld, in which the land was free of disease and is a land of eternal youth, where food was abundant. The artifact has the ability to completely restore a person's health, healing all illnesses and reversing a person's age by a few years, as well as removing deathly hunger and thirst. However, this incredible healing ability comes with a critical downside: It can only be used once on a person, and their immediate family (parents, offspring) are unable to use it. Attempting to use it a second time will result in immediate death by apparent disease. It made its way from Ireland over to England, before reaching Europe in the 1200s. After inspiring the initial legends of the Holy Grail for Christianity, it was found by the Church, who came to accept it as a gift from God. It ended up being part of the Seventh and Eighth Cruscades, when King Louis IX brought it with him in the hopes of increasing his success by using a holy artifact. However, after his death (he had previously used the Grail in the Seventh Cruscade to recover from an injury), it fell into the hands of merchants, who ended up bringing it over to the Byzantine Empire, where it slowly made its way back into Europe and the Holy Roman Empire, where it was collected by Warehouse 8 in 1293.