Chapter Text
It is said, or so the modern-day bards tell it, that on the 23rd of April each year, along the streets of Barcelona, one can witness clumsy merchants trading books for roses.
And indeed, in Catalonia, truth be told, no other saint—not even a priest who defied the Pope in the name of love, such as Saint Valentine—has ever managed to embody romance in the hearts of the people quite like that soldier from Cappadocia who was martyred for his Christian faith and whom, several centuries later, the Catalans made their patron saint.
At what point Sant Jordi went from being one of the guards of the Roman Emperor Diocletian, who condemned him in his own words to the stake and to wandering into the afterlife decapitated, to roaming the rugged lands of medieval Catalonia hundreds of years later, is a matter of inquiry best left to the most curious minds. Whether or not, when invoked, he lent his favour to King Peter I of Aragon in his arduous campaign to reconquer Huesca from the Muslims, granting him victory on the battlefield, is something that, truth be told, nobody cares about.
Because to the Catalans, Sant Jordi has little of the soldier about him and much of the knight, a distinction that could hardly be more important, however easily those with an untrained eye might overlook it. For a soldier is a man of war, while a knight is a man of love.
The Sant Jordi who inspired one of the most beautiful traditions in Catalan culture is not the soldier who, thousands of miles away, served the emperor for years, only to be put to death over a mere disagreement. Nor is he the one who, on lands much closer to home, may or may not have been invoked by a king on some supposed divine mission. No, the Sant Jordi venerated each spring is the one who, like any good knight, vowed to protect the weak and fight loyally in the name of justice alone, remembering above all the importance of being brave.
And few things in this world require more courage than love.
Legend has it that, many, many, many years ago, the small town of Montblanc was besieged by a fearsome dragon. This monstrous creature devoured everything in its path, and the inhabitants of the humble town, terrified, gave up everything they had to sate the hunger of the dreadful beast and safeguard their lives. Crops and livestock—pigs, cows, and sheep, even horses!—were sacrificed to spare the men and women of the town, who soon found themselves forced to face a terrible truth: the dragon was so cruel that, to give the rest a chance at survival, one of their neighbours would have to be sacrificed to the creature's jaws each day.
To be fair, they decided that fate should choose the victim through a lottery in which every inhabitant was required to take part. It was after a long time, while the town suffered and its population dwindled day by day, that luck decreed that the next victim would be none other than the king's daughter. Despite her father's reluctance, as he desperately tried to prevent his little girl from being sacrificed, the princess was just and courageous. With her head held high, she resolved to be led before the fearsome creature in the name of her people, accepting her fate in the hope that her sacrifice would allow her town to endure for one more day.
On the day of her sacrifice, the princess approached the cave where the dragon dwelled, watching as the fearsome creature opened its enormous claws to seize her in the air, where it would devour her in a single bite. As the dragon's breath filled the air, the young princess heard in the distance the gallop of a white steed, ridden by none other than a knight in shining armour, wielding a sword that gleamed like a ray of light. “Fear not, princess,” said the mysterious hero, who, upon reaching the cave's entrance, charged at the fearsome dragon alongside his mount.
Man and beast engaged in a fierce battle in which the mysterious knight proved that there is no greater courage in a soul than when it acts despite its fear. For when the battle seemed lost for the young man, who had fallen from his noble steed, he turned towards the monster and charged at it, heedless of whether his actions would bring about his death. Guided by the courage of his noble sacrifice, his sword found its way into the dragon's entrails, slaying the creature the moment the blade pierced its dark heart.
It was then, as the beast fell defeated at the knight's feet, that a river of blood poured from its mortal wound, soaking the earth with the evidence of such a noble deed. And so much blood flowed that, from it, a plant sprang forth, and among its thorns bloomed the fairest of all flowers: a rose as red as the dragon's blood. The mysterious young man plucked the flower between his fingers and, without further ado, offered it to the fairest of princesses, with whom he had fallen in love upon witnessing the courage with which she had faced her fate. She accepted the rose, holding it to her breast, and, feeling her heart fill with all the love in the world, asked:
“And what might your name be, good knight?”
“Sant Jordi.”
How a dragon might have come to dwell on Catalan soil, or how the deeds of a soldier from the East gave rise to the legend retold year after year, are questions likewise left to the few who care to discover what lies behind the stories. In other words, few care, and even fewer are affected enough to share their curiosity with those around them. And yet, every twenty-third of April, the story repeats itself as lovers honour the objects of their affection with a rose, in tribute to the patron saint of knights. For there is no more beautiful celebration than one that reminds us that love is the force that moves the world.
And so, the greatest feat of our beloved knight, the one that inspires clumsy declarations of love between books and roses year after year, is none other than the tale of Sant Jordi, the princess, and, of course, the dragon.