The feast day for Saint George falls on 23 April.
For the anglophone, Saint George is England. He is its patron saint. His cross, the red cross on the white background, has been the English flag for centuries and remains the centre of the Union Jack.
On 23 April 1348, Edward III founded the Order of the Garter, the senior order of knighthood in the United Kingdom. After the Civil War, Charles II was restored, and 23 April 1661 was coronation day.
Shakespeare died on the day in 1616. But Saint George was a fighter, not a wordsmith. More apt was the death of Rupert Brooke on 23 April 1915. For a half century after, every English school child knew his poem, The Soldier, and its opening lines:
If I should die, think only this of me:
That there’s some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England.”
Whether George existed or not, he had nothing to do with England. He was from what is now Turkey, a soldier in the Praetorian Guard sentenced to death by Diocletian for his Christian faith. During George’s torture, Diocletian’s wife Alexandra confessed her own faith to George. Diocletian promptly ordered her death as well.
The legend of Saint George taming and slaying a dragon that demanded human sacrifices dates from the 11th century AD. There is a peculiar modern twist. In Dracula, the following conversation takes place:
‘Do you know what day it is?’ I answered that it was the fourth of May. She shook her head as she said again:
‘Oh, yes! I know that! I know that, but do you know what day it is?’ On my saying that I did not understand, she went on:
‘It is the eve of St. George’s Day. Do you not know that to-night, when the clock strikes midnight, all the evil things in the world will have full sway? Do you know where you are going, and what you are going to?'”
The different date is Stoker’s accuracy, as Harker was in Eastern Europe and the Orthodox celebratory date held sway. Stoker died in Pimlico in his home at St George’s Square.
