Ana Maria Gruia - "Saint George on Medieval Stove - PATZINAKIA

<strong>Ana</strong> <strong>Maria</strong> <strong>Gruia</strong>
covers the opening of the tiles. Fragments from 36 tiles of M14 type have been
used in the reconstruction of the stove in the council house in Suceava, showing
indeed how popular the image was. 19 This extensive use of an image, glazed and
unglazed, for different tile shapes and for different context indicates both a
fashion and a shortage of original molds. M7 and M22, although too small to
allow positive conclusions, look like copies. So do tiles M19, M23 and M24, all
from Suceava, certainly produced locally. 20
Several groups of copies come from Wallachia: W14, W16, W17 and
W20, all from the town of Târgovişte, unglazed, dated in to the sixteenth century
and having the same dimensions. W14 and W17 must have beeen created with
the same mold since the image of the saint is identical, but W17 has two added
elements, the bird and the star. The identical dimesions make one believe that
either W14 had the same elements in the missing or unclear upper corners or
that the drawing of W17 is not very accurate. W16 and W20 are very similar in
aspect and they have poorer and slightly different details than the other two, so
they might be imitations of a common prototype. W4, W8, and W11, another
group of directly related tiles, bear a clear eastern depiction of <strong>Saint</strong> <strong>George</strong>,
whose name is probably spelled by the unclear Cyrillic inscription. The group
nicely illustrates just how wide a social distribution could one tile image have:
from the princely court to a town house and even a village dwelling. W3 and
W6 make the same point, being uncovered in rural house and in a town.
Conclusions and interpretations
Several things can be concluded from the above analysis. First, the degree of
popularity of St. <strong>George</strong> on stove tiles from all social strata, from princely down
to rural level. Then, the fact that they adorned the stoves of both
Catholics/Protestants and Orthodox, of Romanians, Hungarians and Szeklers
(certainly also of the Saxons, although there is no strong evidence from this
group of tiles). Tiles with St. <strong>George</strong> were certainly produced locally, data being
very strong in the case of tiles from Feldioara and Suceava. Also the fact that
these tiles have no counterparts on tiles outside the “Romanian” territories, not
even in the neighboring Hungarian Kingdom or in Poland, indicates their local
production. Looking at the groups of directly related tiles (copies and
imitations), one may see that they all come from the same province or state,
19 Popa, Radu, and Monica Mărgineanu-Cârstoiu. Mărturii de civilizaţie medievală românească. O casă a
domniei şi o sobă monumentală de la Suceava din vremea lui Ştefan cel Mare (Testimonies of Romanian
Medieval Civilization. A Princely House and a Monumental Stove from Suceava from the time of
Stephen the Great). Bucharest: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, 1979, 46, 47, fig.
II.A.3, 50, fig. 29, 51, 53, 88, 89, fig. 73.
20 They might even form a single entry, but it is not very clear from the state of publication. M23 was
reportedly from the princely fortification and M24 from the princely court.
22