The Lady Half-Devoured by a Dragon and the Iconography of Saint Margaret of Antioch: Interpreting an Anonymous Invención in the Cancionero general (11CG-517)

Abstract

Following in the footsteps of Ian Macpherson, I offer an interpretation of an anonymous invención found in the Cancionero general (11CG-517) and the British Library Cancionero (LB1-251). I maintain that the image displayed by the jouster was inspired by the iconography of the virgin-martyr Saint Margaret of Antioch, and I propose a theory about the identity of the lady addressed and, with less certainty, about the identity of the jouster and the occasion when the invención was displayed, using Pinar’s Juego trobado as a tool of research and invoking a passage on the sinfulness of the fashion among ladies and damsels for wearing hooped petticoats in a treatise by Hernando de Talavera.