Banner
In Bernard Burke's Vicissitudes of Families, published in 1869, Burke proposed that Edmund's banner was among those borne during the Norman invasion of Ireland, after which the three crowns on a blue background became the standard for Ireland during the Plantagenet era. Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, Robert Fitz-Stephen and Raymond le Gros who all featured prominently in the Anglo-Norman invasion, dedicated a chapel of Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin to Edmund. When the Scottish castle at Caevlerlock was taken by Edward I of England in 1300, the banners of Edmund, St George and Edward the Confessor were displayed by the victorious English from the castle battlements, as "powerful, unifying symbols of the holy guardians and supporters of their cause". According to the antiquarian Sir Harris Nicolas' account of the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, five banners were flown on the English side, one of which was probably that of St Edmund.
In a preface to the Life of the saint written by the poet John Lydgate, in which Edmund's banners are described, the three crowns are said to represent Edmund's martyrdom, virginity and kingship.
Read more about this topic: Edmund The Martyr
Famous quotes containing the word banner:
“The broken pillar of the wing jags from the clotted shoulder,
The wing trails like a banner in defeat,”
—Robinson Jeffers (1887–1962)
“There appears to be but two grand master passions or movers in the human mind, namely, love and pride. And what constitutes the beauty or deformity of a man’s character is the choice he makes under which banner he determines to enlist himself. But there is a strong distinction between different degress in the same thing and a mixture of two contraries.”
—Sarah Fielding (1710–1768)
“Ay, tear her tattered ensign down!
Long has it waved on high,
And many an eye has danced to see
That banner in the sky;”
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–1894)