Another festival of the holy cross is kept on the 14th of September, and is known as the “Exaltation of the Holy Cross.” It seems to have originated with the dedication, in the year 335, of the churches built on the sites of the crucifixion and the holy sepulchre. The observance of this festival passed from Jerusalem to Constantinople, and thence to Rome, where it appears to have been introduced in the 7th century. By some it is thought that the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross had its origin in Constantine’s vision of the cross in the sky in the year 317, but whether it originated then, or, as is more generally supposed, at the dedication of the churches at Jerusalem, there is no doubt that it was afterwards kept with much greater solemnity in consequence of the recovery of the portion of the cross St Helena had left at Jerusalem, which had been taken away in the Persian victory, and was restored to Jerusalem by Heraclitus in 627. Pope Clement VIII. (1592-1604) raised the festival of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross to the dignity, liturgically known as that of a Greater Double.
Before leaving the story of St Helena and the cross, it may be convenient to allude briefly to the superscription placed over the Saviour’s head, and the nails, which it is said that she found with the cross. The earlier tradition as to the superscription is obscure, but it would seem that it ought to be considered part of the relic which Constantine sent to Rome. By some means it was entirely lost sight of until the year 1492, when it is said that it was accidentally found in a vault in the church of S. Croce in Gerusalemme at Rome. Pope Alexander III. published a bull certifying to the truth of this rediscovery of the relic, and authenticated its character.
As regards the nails, a question has arisen whether there were three or four. In the earliest pictures of the Crucifixion the feet are shown as separately nailed to the cross, but at a later period they are crossed, and a single nail fixes them. In the former case there would be four nails, and in the latter only three. Four is the number generally accepted, and it is said that one was cast by St Helena into the sea, during a storm, in order to subdue the waves, another is said (but the legend cannot be traced far back) to have been beaten out into the iron circlet of the crown of Lombardy, while the remaining two are reputed to be preserved among the relics at Milan and Trier respectively.
The employment of the cross as the Christian symbol has been so manifold in its variety and application, and the different forms to which the figure has been adapted and elaborated are so complex, that it is only possible to deal with the outline of the subject.
We learn from Tertullian and other early Christian writers of the constant use which the Christians of those days made of the sign of the cross. Tertullian (De Cor. Mil. cap. iii.) says: “At each journey and progress, at each coming in and going out, at the putting on of shoes, at the bath, at meals, at the kindling of lights, at bedtime, at sitting down, whatsoever occupation engages us, we mark the brow with the sign of the cross.” With so frequent an employment of the sign of the cross in their domestic life, it would be strange if we did not find that it was very frequently used in the public worship of the church. The earliest liturgical forms are comparatively late, and are without rubrics, but the allusions by different writers in early times to the ceremonial use of the sign of the cross in the public services are so numerous, and so much importance was attached to it, that we are left in no manner of doubt on the point. St Augustine, indeed, speaks of the sacraments as not duly ministered if the use of the sign of the cross were absent from their ministration (Hom. cxviii. in S. Joan.). Of the later liturgical use of the sign of the cross there is little need to speak, as a reference to the service books of the Greek and Latin churches will plainly indicate the frequency of, and the importance attached to, its employment. Its occasional use is retained by the Lutherans, and in the Church of England it is authoritatively used at baptism, and at the “sacring” or anointing of the sovereign at the coronation.
| Fig. 3. Fig. 4. |
Passing from the sign to the material figures of the cross, a very usual classification distinguishes three main forms: (1) the crux immissa, or capitata
(fig. 3) known also as the Latin cross, or if each limb is of the same length,
