The Wall Painting of St George

We don’t really ‘do’ saints anymore, especially faintly embarrassing ones like St George, who probably never existed and now comes with unwelcome and sometimes ugly political baggage. It is hard for us to understand why saints were once so popular. Since the Reformation our culture has been suspicious of religious images. Five or six hundred years ago the cult of saints was at the heart of Christian life. Saints humanised faith. They were once human like us and we can relate to them more easily than a remote and abstract God. There were at least twelve saints’ cults in Holy Trinity in the fifteenth century.

Just how central to the devotional lives of medieval Christians is evident from one of the chief glories of Holy Trinity, the magnificent mural of St George in the Lady Chapel. Ironically, although twelve other saints’ cults have left traces, we know almost nothing about the cult of St George in the church. There is no documentary evidence, only the painting itself and we only have that by chance. During the Reformation, it was whitewashed and only discovered accidentally by workmen in 1833.

It is difficult to date the wall painting accurately; it dates from the later fifteenth century or perhaps the early sixteenth century. Three elements help us: the date of the vestry wall, the second half of the fifteenth century; the royal coat of arms which was only used from 1461 onwards; and the style of the painting which is similar to one commissioned by Henry VII in 1503-9.

We can be much clearer about what the painting shows. It is an almost textbook account of the version of the story of St George found in the Legenda Aurea of James of Voragine (d. 1295). Better known as the Golden legend this was a large collection of saints’ lives written by an archbishop of Genoa. It was one of the most popular and widely copied books of the middle ages long before it was printed by Caxton in 1483.

There are five key elements in the painting:

1. St George: he is depicted as a knight on horseback, a white charger with a scarlet bridle, holding a lance. He is wearing armour that can be dated to the fifteenth century and a white surcoat with a red cross and his helmet has a plume of three feathers.

2. The Dragon: originally painted green, the dragon has a long serpent-like tongue, fierce teeth, wings and a long, pointed tail.

3. A Lake or Marsh: this is the dragon’s lair which contains the bones of its earlier victims.

4. The Princess: she is the king’s daughter who is to be sacrificed to the dragon. She is depicted as a virgin with flowing hair and a crimson bridal and is accompanied by a lamb.

5. The City of Sylene: the city appears at the top of the painting on top of a hill. To the left the king and queen, the parents of the princess, watch from a high turret of their castle.

Of course, St George kills the dragon and saves the princess. In one sense everyone lives happily ever after. The story is clear but is it really Christian and how should we understand its symbolism?

The Cult of St George in Medieval England

Ironically for the patron saint of England, St George was from the Middle East. He was a Christian army officer from Capadoccia in Asia Minor who was martyred in the late third or early fourth century; his tomb was said to be at Lydda in Palestine. Although his cult was declared apocryphal (lacking any evidence) in 494, a popular cult emerged in the 500s and spread to Europe.

St George was a popular saint in England before the Norman Conquest and only began to emerge as a national saint between the late thirteenth century and the early fifteenth century. Edward I and Edward III used him as a national symbol in their wars against the Scots, the Welsh and the French; St George’s Chapel Windsor was founded in 1349. Henry V also invoked St George at the battle of Agincourt in 1415 and the following year raised the status of his feast day to major double, the most important rank. Fuelled by the Legenda Aurea, St George became a very popular saint as the many guilds, plays, pageants and images about him confirm.

Why was St George such a popular saint?

The most convincing explanation is that his story was attractive to a wide range of patrons and devotees. There are at least four different interpretations of St George.

The patron saint of agriculture: this is the least familiar interpretation, now largely forgotten. The name George means ‘earth worker’; it is made up of two elements, geos, earth and ergon, worker. St George’s day, 23 April, is a spring festival.

The political saint, patron saint of England: England was slow to get a patron saint, not until the mid-fourteenth century. Other countries had one by the eleventh century or earlier and there were several alternative candidates, Augustine, Ethelbert and Edward the Confessor. Later medieval monarchs such as Edward IV and Henry VII used their devotion to St George as a way of showing their worthiness to be king after seizing power from a rival. St George was also a military saint, one who was invoked to change the course of the battle at Agincourt and Bosworth Field.

The colour symbolism, a red cross on a white background, comes from the Golden Legend. James of Voragine reversed the original colours, a white cross on a red background, to reflect the Genoese banner; a red cross on a white banner was common in northern Italy.

The chivalrous saint: from the eleventh century St George was associated with the crusades. In the Golden Legend he is portrayed as a solitary knight saving a princess, protecting the honour of a lady. Because of this St George has strong associations with the Blessed Virgin Mary, a chivalrous knight who was the champion of Our Lady.

St George and the Dragon: the dragon is a late addition to the story of St George which doesn’t appear until the eleventh century. The original lives of St George focused on his death. The dragon, like so much else, was popularised by the Golden Legend. Dragons derive ultimately from the Bible. They were associated with evil, brought death and were widely regarded as real; many sightings were recorded in chronicles. Several other saints battled dragons, such as St Michael and St Margaret of Antioch, but only St George killed one.

St George, like all good myths, bears many meanings. He survived the suppression of the cult of saints during the Reformation and was re-invented in the later nineteenth and twentieth centuries as a nationalist symbol, as he had been in the middle ages and continues to be. The flag of St George has never been more popular.