Happy St George’s Day to all those Fabulous Beasts!

Como a cavalaria antigo, o Escoteiro combatendo o dragao do mal – a Portuguese caption meaning “Like the old cavalry (or knight), the Scout fighting the evil dragon”

This rather fine dragon being subdued by a Boy Scout on horseback is an interesting web image found and sent to me two years ago by Alan ‘Duchy of Tradgardland’ Gruber for our ongoing Scouting Wide Games for the Tabletop project.

Portugal developed a Scouting Association in 1913 as Scouting spread rapidly round the world. St George is the patron saint not only of England but other countries including Portugal – and apparently, Scouting.

As we develop the RPG / Role Playing Character aspects of this project, Alan suggested that dragons could be introduced through Baden Powell’s ‘Cloak of Romance’ that converts trudging round muddy wet brambly fields for a Wide Game into exotic ImagiNations locations and characters such as pirate islands, Wild West, medieval knights, smugglers, gangsters etc.

https://manoftinblog.wordpress.com/2019/05/05/further-wide-game-design-ideas/

Alan suggests that this cloak of romance could be spread wide or stretched to include national or local folklore and mythical fabulous beasts. These obviously include real or imaginary fantastic characters from the brooding dark misty Scandinavian forests of Tradgardland.

St George’s Day and other days of flag observance, Scouting for Boys (1908)

Chivalry and service, the Knight Errant and the Round Table were all part of the mythology or camp yarns of the early Scouting Movement, much of it based on the Victorian interest in the pseudo-medieval world that spawned poetry and pageants, the Pre-Raphaelites and the Arts and Crafts movement, tournaments and architecture.

Anyway, fantastic beasts those dragons – Happy St George’s Day!

Blog posted by Mark Man of TIN, 1970s Cub Scout, (Bronze Arrow, retired) on St. George’s Day 2021.