Books

Saint George as a symbol of diversity?

The legend of the dragon-slaying saint is known all over the world, but each culture has its own take on the tale

The story is a later version of existing pagan myths

April 23 is Saint George's Day, or the Diada de Sant Jordi in Cat­alo­nia, and a day to cel­e­brate not only the coun­try's pa­tron saint, but the tra­di­tion of ex­chang­ing books and roses on what is, since 1995, also UN­ESCO's World Book and Copy­right Day. Books aside, this pop­u­lar an­nual fes­ti­val pro­vides an ideal op­por­tu­nity to re­view this chival­ric leg­end and its sym­bolic sig­nif­i­cance.

Just about every school­child knows the leg­end of Saint George, as it has all the el­e­ments to be a hit with young­sters: a fire-breath­ing dragon, a knight in shin­ing ar­mour and a damsel in dis­tress. These nar­ra­tive in­gre­di­ents have led to a mem­o­rable tale that has de­vel­oped over the cen­turies in the coun­tries that have adopted George as their pa­tron (from Pales­tine and Eng­land to Cat­alo­nia and Malta).

The Saint George leg­end as we know it is sim­ple enough. When a dragon de­cides to make its nest near a town, the towns­peo­ple pacify the mon­ster with sheep. When the sheep run out, the town sac­ri­fices maid­ens to the dragon, with the young women cho­sen by lot. One day, the king's daugh­ter draws the short straw and, de­spite the king's protests, is of­fered to the dragon. Saint George just hap­pens to be wan­der­ing by, sees the sit­u­a­tion, slays the dragon and res­cues the princess. The towns­peo­ple are so grate­ful that they im­me­di­ately con­vert to Chris­tian­ity.

Yet, to get to this point, the leg­end has gone through many ver­sions as its pop­u­lar­ity has grown, not least be­cause of its in­clu­sion in the Me­dieval best­seller, the 13th-cen­tury Golden Leg­end. It is even likely that the story is a later ver­sion of ex­ist­ing pagan myths, such as the Perseus story in An­cient Greece. What­ever the case, the leg­end is not as sim­ple as it seems, as can be seen in how the de­tails of the story are pre­sented in dif­fer­ent coun­tries.

In Cat­alo­nia, for ex­am­ple, every­thing goes swim­mingly for George but after he slays the dragon, blood droplets from the crea­ture's wounds fall to earth and give rise to a rose bush that flow­ers every April. In this way, the Cata­lans have adapted the leg­end to pro­vide the nec­es­sary link with the mod­ern tra­di­tion of gift­ing roses on April 23 (the real ori­gin of giv­ing roses goes back to a gov­ern­ment de­ci­sion in the 15th cen­tury). What's more, the Cata­lan ver­sion of the leg­end as we know it plays down the re­li­gious sig­nif­i­cance of the story, de­spite George being one of the most ven­er­ated saints.

So, let's have a look at how the leg­end un­folds in an­other coun­try, such as Eng­land, whose very na­tional flag is the cross of Saint George. The leg­end as told to Eng­lish chil­dren pretty much fol­lows the Cata­lan ver­sion, al­beit with­out the mag­i­cal rose bush. In fact, in Eng­land, not only are there no roses, but George does not even slay the dragon, at least not right away. In this ver­sion, George makes the sign of the cross with his sword, be­fore ef­fec­tively daz­ing the an­i­mal with his spear. The dragon at this point is still very much alive, al­beit it not in the best of shape, and George asks the princess for her belt, which he uses as a leash. The princess then leads the sub­dued dragon to the town, which nat­u­rally causes up­roar. George utilises the towns­peo­ple's fear of the dragon to get them to con­vert to Chris­tian­ity, and he only slays the dragon once they agree. In­stead of a rose bush, the newly-con­verted king founds the church of Our Lady and Saint George from which springs “a foun­tain of liv­ing water, which healeth sick peo­ple that drink thereof”.

Dif­fer­ent strokes for dif­fer­ent folks? Cer­tainly. Each cul­ture has its own pri­or­i­ties and needs, and the way uni­ver­sal myths are adapted to suit them is a vital source of cul­tural di­ver­sity and, no doubt, why leg­ends such as that of Saint George have sur­vived to this day.

The Festival of the Book and the Rose

While the legend of Saint George has more of a religious overtone than a romantic one, in Catalonia, the Diada de Sant Jordi has become a day on which people gift their loved ones a rose in exchange for a book. In short, the festival has become something of a Catalan equivalent to Saint Valentine's. At the same time, this popular spring festival, which sees the public thoroughfares thronged with passers-by, flower stalls and books stands, is good for business. In a good year, around six million roses are sold in Catalonia on the day, some 90% of which are imported from places like the Netherlands or Colombia. As the festival has gained in popularity, so have the number of varieties of rose on sale, which have reached a hundred or so. Naturally, it is also a big day for writers, publishers and booksellers. Last year, some 1,530,000 books were sold on the day, with 53% of them in Catalan and most of the rest in Spanish.

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