St. Martin was the patron saint of vine growers and might be called upon to provide the right amounts of sunshine and moisture at the correct time to
ensure a good harvest.
He was also invoked by wine-makers and tavern-keepers.
The poet Pean Gastineque relates that St. Martin on one occaision during his lifetime turned water into wine.
And Gregiory of Tours tells how he caused the wine to increase in flasks placed in flasks placed by pilgrims on his tomb.
St. Martins feast day, November 11, coincides with the fete of vintage.
And a thirteenth-century proverb suggests the attendant festivities: "a la vielle Saint Martin, toute vielle boit du vin."
The artist who created this artwork for St. Martin's signed it BAMorano.
Click on the image at right for an image of greater detail. Note that the image with greater detail
was scanned at 300 dots per inch of resolution which is much greater than the 75 dots per inch resolution
of the pictured image.
The pictured image is approximately 85-100KB in size, whereas the image with greater detail is approximately 2-3MB
in size (as a compressed file).
