THE LILY 53 



The miniaturists occasionally used the flower as 

 the attribute of virgin martyrs, but not in repre- 

 sentations of the Virgin. 



It was by a Spanish king that the lily was first 

 definitely, and in a manner pictorially, associated 

 with the Mother of Christ — as her own flower. 

 In the eleventh century Spaniards and Moors 

 were each fighting for their faith, and the Moslems 

 instituted military orders called rdhitos, the 

 members of which were vowed to perpetual 

 warfare against the * infidel.' 



The Christian knights were not to be outdone, 

 and in 1043 Garcias of Navarre founded an order 

 of chivalry vowed to the service of the Virgin, 

 which he named ' the Order of the Lily of 

 Navarre.' 



Edmondson ' writes: 'The Order of "Our 

 Lady of the Lily," or " of Navarre," was in- 

 stituted in the city of Nagera by Garcias, the 

 sixth King of Navarre, in the year 1043, on the 

 occasion of a miraculous image of the Virgin 

 Mary issuing forth of a lily, and holding the 

 Infant Jesus in her arms, being then discovered in 

 that city. This order was composed of thirty 



' Complete Book of Heraldry, 1780, vol. i. 



