St. Margaret

St. Margaret

The chosen type of female innocence and meekness, represented as a young woman of great beauty, bearing the martyr's palm and crown, or with the dragon as an attribute. Sometimes she is delineated as coming from the dragon's mouth, for legend says that the monster swallowed her, but on her making the sign of the cross he suffered her to quit his maw.

Another legend has it that Olybrius, governor of Antioch, captivated by her beauty, wanted to marry her, and, as she rejected him with scorn, threw her into a dungeon, where the Devil came to her in the form of a dragon. Margaret held up the cross, and the dragon fled.

St. Margaret is the patron saint of the ancient borough of Lynn Regis, and on the corporation seal she is represented as standing on a dragon and wounding it with the cross. The inscription is "Sub . Margareta . Teritur . Draco . Stat . Cruce . Laeta." She is commemorated on July 20.

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