Although Catavino is a site about Spanish and Portuguese wine, we’re also about culture, as wine and culture are one in the same. With this in mind, allow me to begin this post with a question, how often do you wake up in the morning, take a long deep stretch, turn to your mate and say, “Happy Dragon Slaying, honey!” Hmmm, I’d bet…not too often, unless your a geeky Dungeons and Dragons fan caught in a bizarre desire to relive the fabulous Medieval times. Today, however, the entire northeastern Spanish region of Cataluna is celebrating Sant Jordi. Sant Jordi is Cataluna’s beloved patron saint and a holiday that honors knights, damsels in distress and those ever common, dragons.

Legend has it that Sant Jordi began when a Roman soldier who was born in the 3rd century in Capadocia, Turkey, was martyred for not carrying out the emperor’s edict to persecute all Christians. Now, add some really gossipy townspeople to the mix who start spinning tall tales about our heroic soldier, and 5 centuries later, watch how suddenly Jordi becomes known for slaying some mysterious dragon determined to take the life of a king’s daughter. And right when his heavy sword pierces the tough, scaly green skin of the mighty beast, the blood that falls from his blade, hits the ground, and in its place, grew one single red rose.

Similar to Saint Valentines Day, on Sant Jordi, it is now customary to give anyone of the female persuasion a single rose, while men are given a book in honor of both William Shakespeare Cervante’s death on April 23, 1616. Seem a bit odd to put these two events together? Historically, the the entire book …