It is amazing how little is known with any amount of certainty about the actual making of the prose Lancelot and the Vulgate Cycle. In this article some issues will be raised concerning the cycle's genesis, especially with regard to the making of the Lancelot from the prose Charrette onwards.

Jean Frappier dates the composition of the Vulgate Cycle between 1215 and 1235 and describes it as a process of composition and growth, under the supervision of an architect. He compares it to the building of a cathedral. The narrative develops in phases: from just Lancelot's tale to a trilogy with the Queste del Saint Graal and Mort le roi Artu, and from there to a fivefold cycle: Estoire dou Saint Graal – Estoire de Merlin plus Suite-Vulgate du Merlin – Lancelot – Queste – Mort Artu.

A chronological survey of the manuscript tradition, however, reveals no sequence of manuscripts dating from the first half of the thirteenth century that demonstrates the growth from one to five texts. The chronological diagram in the appendix shows that, in fact, one of the oldest manuscripts – Rennes 255 – already has the Estoire dou Saint Graal and Estoire de Merlin, which are generally considered later additions. The Lancelot–Queste–Mort Artu trilogy does exist separately in at least eight manuscripts, and in the diagram this configuration is predominant in the upper quarter (from the top to the Bonn 526 manuscript).