Secularizing the Saint:
The Journey of St. George’s Day
from Feast Day to Horse Race
By the mid-fourteenth century St. George was accepted as the patron
saint of England, and his feast day, 23 April, was celebrated in communities
large and small throughout the kingdom. With the coming of Protestant reforms
under Edward VI and Elizabeth, diat feast day was abolished, and official St.
George Day celebrations largely disappeared in England. Yet the cities of
Chester and Norwich in particular had traditionally staged elaborate celebrations
to mark St. George’s feast day, and prominent citizens and city fathers strove to
find some way to preserve some sort of St. George’s Day festivities while
attempting to purge the celebration of its Catholic and religious overtones.
Veneration of St. George gained in popularity in England as a result of
the Crusades. William of Malmsbury wrote that Saints. George and Demetrius
were seen aiding the Crusaders at the siege of Antioch in 1098, and Richard the
Lionhearted seems to have believed in St. George’s intercession on behalf of the
English forces during the Third Crusade. In 1222 St. George’s Day was included
among the English church holidays {Butler *s 120-1). Kings Henry HI and
Edward I adopted the red cross of St. George for their royal banners (REED
Kent 1: Ixxxix), and Edward HI named St. George the patron of the Order of the
Garter in the mid-fourteenth century. Under Henry V, in 1415, St. George’s Day
was elevated to one of the chief feasts of the English church calendar (Butler's
120-1). St. George clearly was connected to the reigning monarch, and, by
implication, to the nation. For instance, records of a visit in 1486 by Henry VII
to Hereford describe a welcoming pageant including spoken parts for St.
George, who promises his intercession for the king for the rest of his life (REED
Herefordshire 114). And when Henry’s heir. Prince Arthur, visited Coventry in
1498, St. George was presented killing the dragon, and then giving a speech in
which he promised his protection to the prince (REED Coventry 90).
Though provincial records dating before the fourteenth century are
sketchy, perhaps as early as the twelfth century religious guilds dedicated to St.
George were established in numerous parishes throughout England. From the
fourteenth century into the sixteenth century local records indicate that the feast
day of St. George was widely celebrated with religious plays, pageants, and
processions (REED Kent 1: Ixxxix, Norland 3).
About all that is relatively certain about the historical St. George is that
he was a Roman soldier, probably a cavalry officer, probably fi’om Cappadocia,
probably martyred around A.D. 303 in Palestine during the persecution of
Christians carried out by the Emperor Diocletian (Butler's 120). By the time