Chapter Geoffrey to George-a-Greene of G by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Geoffrey to George-a-Greene

Geoffrey, archbishop of York.—Sir W. Scott: The Talisman (time, Richard I.).

Geoffrey, the old ostler of John Mengs (innkeeper at Kirchhoff).—Sir W. Scott: Anne of Geierstein (time, Edward IV.).

Geoffrey Crayon, the hypothecal name of the author of the Sketch-Book, by Washington Irving of New York (1818–1820).

GEORGE (Honest). General Monk, George duke of Albemarle, was so called by the votaries of Cromwell (1608–1670).

George (Mr.), a stalwart, handsome, simple-hearted fellow, son of Mrs. Rouncewell the housekeeper at Chesney Wold. He was very wild as a lad, and ran away from his mother to enlist as a soldier; but on his return to England he opened a shooting-gallery in Leicester Square, London. When sir Leicester Dedlock, in his old age, fell into trouble, George became his faithful attendant.—Dickens: Bleak House (1852).

George (St.), the patron saint of England. He was born at Lydda, but brought up in Cappadocia, and suffered martyrdom in the reign of Diocletian, April 23, A.D. 303. Mr. Hogg tells us of a Greek inscription at Ezra, in Syria, dated 346, in which the martyrdom of St. George is referred to. At this date was living George bishop of Alexandria, with whom Gibbon, in his Decline and Fall, has confounded the patron saint of England; but the bishop died in 362, or fifty-nine years after the prince of Cappadocia. (See Red Cross Knight.)

(Mussulmans revere St. George under the name of “Gherghis.”)

St. George’s Bones were taken to the church in the city of Constantine.

St. George’s Head. One of his heads was preserved at Rome. Long forgotten, it was rediscovered in 751, and was given in 1600 to the church of Ferrara. Another of his heads was preserved in the church of Mares-Moutier, in Picardy.

St. George’s Limbs. One of his arms fell from heaven upon the altar of Pantaleon, at Cologne. Another was preserved in a religious house of Barala, and was transferred thence in the ninth century to Cambray. Part of an arm was presented by Robert Flanders to the city of Toulouse; another part was given to the abbey of Auchin, and another to the countess Matilda.

George and the Dragon (St.). St. George, son of lord Albert of Coventry, was stolen in infancy by “the weird lady of the woods,” who brought the lad up to deeds of arms. His body had three marks: a dragon on the breast, a garter round one of the legs, and a blood-red cross on the right arm. When he grew to manhood, he fought against the Saracens. In Libya he heard of a huge dragon, to which a damsel was daily given for food, and it so happened that when he arrived the victim was Sabra, the king’s daughter. She was already tied to the stake when St. George came up. On came the dragon; but the knight, thrusting his lance into the monster’s mouth, killed it on the spot. Sabra, being brought to England, became the wife of her deliverer, and they lived happily in Coventry till death.—Percy: Reliques, III. iii. 2.

This is a mere skit by John Grubb, and has no pretension to an historical fact.

St. George and the Dragon, on old guinea-pieces, was the design of Pistrucci. It was an adaptation of a didrachm of Tarentum, B.C. 250.

The encounter between George and the dragon took place at Berytus (Beyrut).

(The tale of St. George and the dragon is told in the Golden Legends of Jacques de Voragine. See S. Baring-Gould’s Curious Myths of the Middle Ages.)