Home › Honorable Ordinaries. - Sub-Ordinaries › Honorable Ordinaries. - Sub-Ordinaries: Gyron

Honorable Ordinaries. - Sub-Ordinaries: Gyron

The old Spanish family of Gyrons, Dukes of Ossona, assumed it with its name, oh, many years ago, and thus they say it happened that they did. King Alphonso VI. of Spain was at one time fighting Gyron.

Gyron, Duke of Ossona. with the Moors, when the battle waxed so hot that his horse was killed, and he, falling headlong to the ground, was thrown into immense peril of capture or death. Don Roderigo de Cisneres saw his danger, and, forgetting all risk to himself, rushed to the rescue of the king. This he effected, and in the tussle cut three pieces from the king's armor, that after the battle he might prove himself to have been the king's deliverer.

The king recognized him as such, and granted him permission to depict those bits of gyrons on his shield. It was not an uncommon occurrence, during these conflicts with the Moors, for the Christian commander to have his mantle torn in pieces by his followers, who divided them among themselves; and as they were frequently more or less stained with blood, it accounts for the gyrons always being of two colors. Gyron means a gore, or triangular piece of cloth. Others think that the divisions between the spokes of a wheel, called girons, accounts for the name.