“O SAINT George! George, Saint and Soldier! Be present! Protect, Holy Mary, the English in their right! In this hour, there are many righteous Englishmen praying for us in their hearts: O France! down with thy fraud!”
The King, already girt with his own weapons, now placed his crown upon his head, then went forth in full view. Making a clear sign of the cross upon himself, to inspire others likewise, he gave the order for the banner to go forward into battle.
Now the clergy to the rear called out, with a sigh, “Now O God have mercy upon us! Have mercy upon us, O God! Spare the crown of the English! Champion royal rights. Show thy favour, O Virgin Mary, to thine own dowry!* George, Soldier, and Edward, pious King, bring your aid!* May all the saints grant that the constancy of our King be accepted by God through holy prayers.”
* A commentary on Lamentations by John Lathbury (d. 1362) recorded that ‘it is commonly said that England is Mary’s dowry.’ For how long this had been commonly said is unknown. Greek feasts such as the Presentation and Conception of Mary found ready acceptance in eleventh-century England, and their abolition by the Normans in 1070 only underlines England’s reputation as a people devoted to Mary. During the The Peasants’ Revolt in 1381, Richard II appealed to Mary to protect her ‘dowry,’ acknowledging that England had been so called for many years — ‘of old antiquity,’ as the Pynson ballad of c. 1485 quaintly put it.
* St George, a fourth-century Roman soldier who defied an order to persecute Christians, was rapidly becoming England’s patron saint at this time thanks in part to the widespread belief that he had aided an unlikely English victory at Crécy in 1346. See St George, Patron Saint of England. He did however still have some competition from King Edward the Confessor (r. 1042-1066).