Featured Unusual Knight St George? metal shell pendant

This was posted in finds but I’d love to know more about it.
Initially I thought St George and the dragon but those look like people he’s riding over?
Base is magnetic, the rest isn’t. Thankyou

 

Are you sure its not St. Niccolò Machiavelli?

 

I'm not sure of anything Flipper!.
Why do you think Machiavelli?. Apologies if my history is lacking!

 

Scallop shells are symbols of Christian pilgrims to the Holy Land. The best construction I can think to put on this is a Crusader reference. It looks like St. George & Archangel St. Michael mashed up into coquillages St. Jacques.

 

I thought you’d got it there again INH- it’s slightly different but far better than I managed to find. I’m struggling to know why anyone would want to wear a pendant of someone slaughtering their enemy

 

It's St. James, patron saint of Spain. The scallop shell is his emblem. The figure below is a Moor he's vanquishing in battle. A souvenir from Santiago de Compostela.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_the_Great

Debora

 

Thankyou Debora! That’s brilliant of you to know that .
Bizarre what people will buy as a souvenir!

 

By 'Moor' do you mean a Muslim? Islam did not come into being until hundreds of years after the time of James. Or is he being invoked as patron saint, with depiction of him engaged in battle more of a folk image? He's not usually shown as an armed equestrian figure:

https://www.metmuseum.org/blogs/in-season/2015/reclaiming-saint-james

 

The images I've found on jewellery show him as a religious saintly figure.

 

My guess was in jest...
In the field of personality psychology, Machiavellianism is a psychological trait centered on interpersonal manipulation, unemotional coldness, and indifference to morality. A term that originated from the supposed political philosophy of Niccolò Machiavelli. Sorry, I guess I just saw someone stomping on other people to get what they wanted without regard.

 

I personally don't mean anything. That's who the figure is. Patron saint of Spain.

"Saint James the Moor-slayer (Spanish: Santiago Matamoros) is the name given to the representation (painting, sculpture, etc.) of the apostle James, son of Zebedee as a legendary, miraculous figure who appeared at the also legendary Battle of Clavijo, helping the Christians conquer the Muslim Moors."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_James_Matamoros

Debora

 

I was responding to KSW...

 

In Spain, he's as recognizable as Mickey Mouse.

Debora

 

Thankyou Flipper, I’ve heard the term Machiavellian before and know what it means but didn’t know it’s roots so that’s really interesting.

 

That’s given me great search terms and I’ve learned about St James!. Now to see if I can track down the same pendant. I suspect it’s tourist stuff but slightly more interesting than the flat medals as the figure looks to have been soldered on rather than made in one piece. Thanks everyone

 

I've a friend who's walked the Camino de Santiago and is very proud of his scallop shell badge. They weren't exclusive to Jerusalem pilgrimages: Canterbury, for example.

And yes, Los Moros are a commonly used trope for depicting a vanquished foe in Spain, regardless of historical dates. They're also used in Catalunya to be paraded round the streets: els gegants moros, who I am very fond of.

 

That's it. The Spanish battle cry used to be 'Santiago!', and it was used in many battles against the Moors, and later on in the Spanish colonies.

The Spanish Moors were the same as the North African Moors, a mix of Middle Eastern and Berber.
The Moorish rulers came to Spain in two 'waves', the first more Arabic, the second more North African. The first wave is the one that brought the famous Moorish culture to Spain, with its philosophy and fine arts. The second wave is regarded as not as refined.

 

Canterbury is one of the main cities in the British part of the Camino de Santiago. The Camino was a network of pilgrim's roads throughout the western half of Europe (which extends beyond the cultural region called Western Europe):



Some of the many reminders of the Camino in the Netherlands:




Detail of a 15th century bell in a church in Utrecht, a hub town where pilgrims from the north and east met to continue the perilous Camino together: