St. Georgious vs Dragon Illusion

Hy guys (and gals)! Just came home from my trip to Austria (Graz), so just a quick update, so that you know I’m alive and well. I’ll write more in the evening, but here is one illusion for all your “Optical Illusion of The Day” widgets and gadgets, so they can update them selves with new optical illusion.

Illusion you see below was submitted by Fabián Vargas, and even though I’m not exactly certain, I believe it pictures a Saint. More precisely – St. Georgius, the saint that is often showed on a white horse, with a sword in his right hand, above the dragon that represents evil. In the beginning of Christianity, dragon symbolized paganism. By the legend, St. Georgius fought the dragon on the beach, outside of city walls. He killed him to protect the king’s daughter which was meant to be sacrificed to the dragon.

Who would tell that religion can be so interesting ;) In many paintings, along with St. Georgious, there was a princess pictured in the corner, while praying for her savior. All these details made me spot similarity with this painting. When you look at it, first you’ll see is a face of young man/girl, but if you look at her/his hair, you can see a person on a horse, fighting with evil dragon. I believe the big face belongs to praying princess, and the hair represents battle with the dragon. Correct me if I’m wrong…


50 Replies to “St. Georgious vs Dragon Illusion”

  1. Anyone any clue why there’s some cubical kind of wireframe in the drawing?

    Adrian

    (and Vurdlak: I’d not mind if you would reject all those “First” posts, though it makes me wonder why people would expect to be the first when they know the reactions are moderated and not visible realtime…)

  2. yeah,

    St Georgius is St. George, in latin.

    it is true that dragon represents evil, but not devil directly, instead paganism, which the church was fighting against. (“false” rituals, idols, witchcraft etc…) browse wiki…

  3. I have seen this picture before; and I am quite familiar with it. This is a picture of Atar and the dragon Azhi Dhaka. Atar is the son of Ahura Mazda (like the car). Atar is the god of fire who chained the dragon to that big mountain northwest of Tehran, Iran.
    This tail :) is very similar to the story of the garden of Eden. The serpent being the dragon.

  4. The dragon was revered as a god in pagan myth, so in Christianity it was shunned as a creature of deep evil. Fire, the giver of warmth and light, was seen as hell.

  5. looks like triple entendres to me… btw the guy who did the 14th post says he is fourth. Its like trying to be sad and failing, becoming even sadder

  6. It’s beautifully done. If you find out more about it I’d like to know where it is from, whether old or recent and who the artist is/was.

  7. I don’t know about the cube around his head, but the large head is St. George’s. You can tell because of the halo around it.

    Nice illusion,

  8. A) I am with Adrian – kill the meaningless ‘First’ updates unless they actually have a comment…

    B) I’ve the same issue as Not At Schol Anymore – I cannot see the image. I’m running Firefox… is there an issue with the method of delivery?

    Thx
    Tom

  9. I can’t see a picture either.
    Thanks for baning the first comment thing I stopped reading the coments it was so annoying.

  10. Does anyone besides me notice a Droste effect in the picture? The head of the figure fighting the dragon is the same as the big picture itself, and I would assume that the head in THAT one is also the same.

  11. I actually saw this up close recently and something is bothering me….

    Does anyone know why a Catholic saint is framed by the Jewish Tree of Life?

    It’s been bothering me for days…

  12. This is one of my favorite illusions and one of my favorite pieces of art. Actually the large person is also St. G. And if you can look closely at the the small knight in his hair, you will see that the small knight has an even smaller knight in his hair, and that smaller knight has an even smaller knight in his hair, etc.

  13. If you look at the head of the horseman,
    you will see that the illusion is repeated
    in the hair… Fractals in ancient art!

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