Louis IX taken prisoner at the Battle of Fariskur (April 6, 1250) during the Seventh Crusade. He was ransomed for 400,000 dinars and pledged to never return to Egypt and to surrender Damietta to the Egyptians. On May 8, 1250, he left to Acre with his…
Another head of John the Baptist is held at San Silvestro in Rome. Additional head relics can be found at a shrine at the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus (Great Mosque of Damascus) and the Residenz Museum in Munich. This head of John the Baptist first…
According to legend, the relic was brought to Bruges by Thierry of Alsace following the Second Crusade in the 12th century, this reliquary is said to contain a piece of cloth soaked with the blood of Jesus. Thierry may have been presented the relic…
This icon/image/likeness of Christ is held at the Church of St Bartholomew of the Armenians in Genoa, Italy. It was given to the doge of Genoa in the 14th century by Byzantine Emperor John V Palaiologos. The outer frame has been dated to the 14th…
Made in Paris circa 1390 for John, Duke of Berry, the reliquary is currently held in the collection of the British Museum. Made of gold, rock crystal, enamel, pearls, sapphires, and rubies, and decorated with intricately carved figures, is represents…
The Image of Edessa or the Mandylion (see image top right), is a relic of a cloth onto which the face of Christ had been imprinted. Not to be confused with other, similar, relics (such as the Veronica veil or the Shroud of Turin), the story of the…
The “Paris Gregory” was made for Emperor Basil I between 879 and 883, commissioned by the Patriarch Photios I in Constantinople. It contains the Homilies of Gregory of Nazianzus. This illustration shows, at top “the dream of Constantine”, “the battle…
Fol. 67v from Passages d'outremer de Sébastien Mamerot.
June 10, 1098, Peter Bartholomew, a priest from Southern France, claimed that Saint Andrew had come to him in visions and told him where to find the Holy Lance within the city. Despite a relic…
Fol. 216r, from Matthew Paris' Chronica maiora II.
This miniature shows Henry III of England carrying the Relic of the Holy Blood at Westminster Abbey in 1247. This relic of the blood of Christ was sent from the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Robert…
Interior of the Limburg Staurotheke. Staurotheke comes from the Greek meaning “container of the cross.” This reliquary was made in Constantinople in the 10th century. It currently resides in Limburg in Germany. The large cross at the center of the…