File:Saint George Mosaic Portrait A Few Feet From His Buried Bones in Lod, Israel.png

English: This portrait is a depiction of Saint George, and is only a few feet away from where the bones of Saint George are buried in the Church of Saint George in Lod, Israel. It is a mosaic that is as close to a photorealistic mosaic artwork as anyone can find for artwork created at the time that Saint George was alive. The background is overlaid with gold, as was fitting at the time for emperors, kings, and ridiculously wealthy patrons who donated significantly vast sums of money to the church in order to keep it going. The portrait depicts a brown-haired Saint George with a halo of light, as was fitting for a holy person or a saint at the time. He is shown to be wearing a white pearl and gold crown (or diadem) on his head, which was absolutely fitting for the historical kings and queens of Egypt such as Queen Cleopatra of Egypt - who was described in multiple Roman historical accounts as a woman who wore a white diadem on her head frequently as a Queen of Egypt. Romans had an astonishing pearl craze during the first century in the fashions of the wealthy, with women sewing so many pearls to their gowns that they actually walked on pearl-encrusted hems, which is also seen at the neckline hem of Saint George in this mosaic portrait, as well as on one of his belts (as a side note Roman Emperor Caligula loved pearls so much he put a pearl necklace on his horse after he made it a consul). Previously in history the Emperor of Rome Julius Caesar banned women below a certain rank from wearing pearls, and pearls were worn almost exclusively by royalty, the highest nobles, and the extremely wealthy - to the point that when the Roman general Vitellius sold one of his mother's pearl earrings he was able to use the money to finance an entire military campaign and he won the battle. "The value of a pearl necklace was considered to be higher than any other piece of jewelry in the world," at the time since this was at least 1,100 years before the development of the cultured Akoya pearls. This beautiful mosaic portrait of Saint George shows him wearing a white patrashel, which is a still worn today in Coptic churches (as well as in other Orthodox churches all over the world) by second order deacons called the Readers. Saint George is depicted in this photorealistic mosaic portrait as wearing a red cape, which is historically what kings in the Middle East and Europe wore as a symbol of authority. The portrait depicts Saint George wearing armor, which looks remarkably like the Roman Crocodile-Skin Suit of Armour on display in the British Museum. This mosaic portrait of Saint George depicts Saint George wearing a rounded Roman shield on his back that is consistent with the design of a Roman shield type called the clipeus, and resembles the pattern on the 'Clipeus of Iupiter-Ammon, conserved at the Museu Nacional Arqueologic de Tarragonia.' In his left hand Saint George is depicted holding a javelin for throwing or a Roman spear, and typically in Roman times a throwing javelin was held in the dominant hand with the shield held over the non-dominant side shoulder, and indicating that Saint George may have been left-handed. The portrait depicts Saint George standing on a lush, dark green, flat field, with a background of lighter green grass adding the illusion of depth to the picture. At Saint George's left hip is the top part of an ancient Armenian archer quiver and ancient Roman archer quiver, which was worn at the waist with the metal arrow tips facing the outside, as seen at the website https://allinnet.info/antiquities/ancient-armenian-archers/

In the mosaic portrait Saint George is depicted as holding something in his right hand, and it is probably part of his bow for archery [need reference]. Saint George was one of the top generals of the ancient Roman empire. In the mosaic portrait Saint George is depicted as wearing leg guard armor called greaves or ocreae, with a golden band below his knees, in order to protect his shins and tibia from dagger or sword attacks. In the mosaic portrait Saint George is depicted wearing long decorated sleeves, and a very decorated, colorful lower section blue and gold-edged garment - which would have been very expensive at the time - even though the vast majority of ancient romans were depicted wearing short sleeves if any sleeves at all and solid colored chitons.

"St George was born in 280 AD in Cappadocia, Asia Minor. St George's father was martyred for being a Christian, when our saint was nearly 17 years old. Our saint grew up with a lot of faith and love in God. After the martyrdom of our saints father his mother had an aim to see her son grow stronger in the faith, through good deeds, and virtue. St George had joined the Roman Army at 17, & gained many victories, he also had the rank of Tribune. St George lost his mother when he was nearly 20. From then on our Saint abandoned the pleasures of this world, and distributed his possessions among the poor, & set his slaves and maidservants free.

  The Emperor Diocletian, was ruler of the Roman Empire at the time, and he had just sent an edict to destroy the churches, burn all Christian books, dismiss Christians from their jobs, take all their possessions, make most of them slaves, and make them offer sacrifices, & burn incense to the Roman gods.

  St George was at Alexandria at the time when he saw the edict he read it and tore it up, the roman soldiers then took him to Cappadocia to receive punishment. As our Saint had great favour with the emperor the ruler of Cappadocia transferred the matter to Diocletian. Our saint then confessed to the Emperor the true Christian faith. The Emperor jailed our saint, and then sent a lady to try to seduce him, but instead our saint converted her to the faith, hearing this the Emperor ordered her beheading & she received the crown of martydom. The emperor then stretched our saints arms and legs with chains, & placed a huge stone on his chest, then they pulled the saint over iron spikes till his flesh was torn etc.., they also passed flames over his body to burn his wounds, & spread salt over the wounds to increase the pain. When he was put back in his cell the Lord appeared to him, embraced him, and strengthened him.

   St George also experienced many more tortures for 7 years, many people were also converted to Christianity because of the many miracles which they bore witness to. At one time St George raised a dead man by the power of the Lord Jesus Christ and many more believed, and so many more were martyred. In the end when our saint was beheaded, the heathen Roman Emperor Diocletian died a terrible death.

May his prayers be with us all, and glory be to God forever. Amen." - https://st-takla.org/Saints/Saint-George.html