SANT JORDI - FETE DU LIVRE ET DE LA ROSE

Books and roses! Come and celebrate Sant Jordi

Join us on 27 April for readings, workshops and exhibitions...

The feast day of the patron saint of Aragon, Valencia, the Balearic Islands and Catalonia, Sant Jordi (St George) requires men to give roses to women and women to give books to men.
This custom comes from the legend that a frightening dragon devoured human beings when it was hungry, and that certain people were even chosen by lot to satisfy it... But one day, it was the king's daughter who was chosen, and just as she was about to join the dragon, resigned, she came across the knight Jordi, who decided, in order to save her, to confront the animal, whose head he ended up cutting off.
Legend also has it that it wasn't blood that spurted from the dragon's neck, but hundreds of roses...
This is where the custom of offering roses (to ladies by gentlemen) comes from, followed later by the custom of exchanging books (from ladies to gentlemen).


Programme for the day: Jardin des Plantes des Capellans

2.30pm: Book exchange and sale of items by the Xarxa Cebrianenca association
3pm: Entertainment for children
- Workshop run by Collections de Saint-Cyprien
- Reading of tales in Catalan by Joan and Mariette

3.30pm: Sardana, organised by the association Foment Ballem Tots, ballada with the Cobla Les Casenoves at the Gymnase de Grand stade les Capellans