Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Friday 23 April 2021

St George - Martyrdom and Devotion


Today is the Solemnity of St George.


St George and the Dragon
English tinted alabaster 1375-1420
National Gallery of Art Washington DC

Image: Wikipedia 

Last year on this day I posted ...,,,, which records the later medieval story of St George. When he wrote it James of Voragine must have had access to much earlier accounts, but he chose to omit some of the more spectacullsr torments inflicted upon the Saint - tortured he successfully endured and survived over a period of seven years. 

These stories are well summarised in an account I found quite by chance in, of all newspapers, The Sun - not the place you normally look for early medieval hagiography. The article can be seen at How St George overcame grisly torture of nails hammered into his skull, being boiled alive and drinking molten lead to become patron saint

The similar Coptic tradition about St George is set out at St. George, Prince of Martyrs and the one from Georgia, where his cult was not surprisingly widespread, at Martyrdom of the Great-martyr George of Georgia


File:Saint George et le dragon, enluminure.jpg

St George from s Book of Hours ?circa 1380

Image Wikipedia 

There is a very good survey of the transmission of the stories in medieval England in particular in a 2004 article on The Martyrdom of St. George: Introduction | Robbins Library Digital Projects

There is an online introduction to the cult in late medieval England at ‘Cry God for Harry, England and Saint George!’: Saint George in Late Medieval England

The British Library Medieval Manuscripts blog has a post from last year about their holdings of material relating to the cult of St George and to the Order of the Garter at St George and the Garter

Wikipedia has two  excellent articles about the cult of St George. The first is Saint George and the Dragon and the second at Saint George in devotions, traditions and prayers This also includes a gallery of some of the many paintings of the Saint. He has proved to be a very popular source of artistic commissions over the centuries which testifies to his appeal as a patron and exemplar.

St George by Donatello. Florence, 1415
Image: Wikipedia

St George Pray for us

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