(Latin: Presbyter Ioannes)
was a mythical Christian patriarch, presbyter, and king. Stories popular in Europe in the 12th to the 17th centuries told of a Nestorian patriarch and king who was said to rule over a Christian nation lost amid the pagans and Muslims in the Orient
“More recently, rumours have circulated via the knowledge papers of the Golden Dawn and others that Prester John is the current inner guardian of the Grail for our own time. Charles Williams, in his novel War in Heaven, which deals with a modern theft and recovery of the Grail, presents us with the unforgettable words of the priest-king himself: “I am a messenger only,” the voice, if voice it were, uttered, “but I am the precursor of things that are to be, I am John and I am Galahad…I am the bearer of the Holy One, the Graal, and the keeper of the Graal. I have kept it always, whether I dwelt in the remote places of the world and kings rode after me, or whether I removed it to the furthers parts of man’s mind. All magic and all holiness is through me, and though men stole the Graal from me ages since I have been with it forever.” Such a guardian is one who holds the deepest layer of knowledge to the meaning of both Grail and temple.” - Arthurian Magic, John Matthews, Virginia Chandler