The sagittary is the centaur of antiquity—half man, half horse, and is said to have been assumed as the arms of king Stephen on account of the great assistance he had received from the archers, and also because he had entered the kingdom while the sun was in the sign Sagittarius.

Byron’s opinion of the book was scathing: “Of all the ineffable Centaurs that were ever begotten by self-love upon a Nightmare, I think ‘this monstrous Sagittary’ the most prodigious.

Hence any deadly shot was called a sagittary.

The row of sculptures immediately above the windows, is probably unique: among them is the Sagittary, very distinctly portrayed; and near him, an animal, probably designed for a horse, whose tail ends in a decided fleur-de-lys, while he holds in his mouth what appears intended to represent another.

The figure of the Sagittary is also repeated upon one of the capitals of the nave, which are altogether of the same style of art, as the most barbarous at St. Georges, and not less fanciful.