In proceeding to the church there were six “receptions.” Three were in various parts of the palace, “and the princes come to the gate (Chalké), and the fourth reception takes place outside the barrier of Chalké; the fifth reception takes place in front of the Great Gate which leads into the Augusteum; and the sixth reception is at the Horologium of S. Sophia.”[168]
“And from thence the princes enter through the Beautiful Gate, and have their crowns removed by the praepositi within the curtain that hangs in the chamber, that is to say, the propylaeum of the narthex. And the patriarch receives them at the door of the narthex with the usual ceremony.... The lords remove their crowns, kiss the holy Gospel carried by the archdeacon, greet the patriarch, and proceed up to the royal doors. Bearing the candles and bowing thrice, the entrance is made after a prayer by the patriarch; then those carrying the sceptres and vessels stand right and left of the church; but those bearing the banners and the books stand on either side in the solea; and the Cross of St. Constantine is placed on the right side of the bema. And when the lords come to the Holy Doors and to the porphyry omphalion, the patriarch alone enters within the screen, by the holy door on the left. The princes, after bowing thrice, enter with the candles, following the patriarch, and coming to the holy table they kiss the holy cloth, and they place as is usual on the holy table the two white veils, and kiss the holy chalices, and the two discs and the holy corporal cloth, which are handed to them by the patriarch. And then by the right-hand side of the bema the princes enter with the patriarch the Kuklis, where is placed the Holy Crucifix of gold, and again they bow with the candles three times praising God; and the patriarch gives the censer to the emperor and he censes the crucifix: then they kiss the patriarch, and take leave of him and enter the oratory, which is in front of the metatorion, and there, bowing three times and praising God, they kiss the Holy Cross as well as all the Instruments of our Lord’s Passion, and then enter the metatorion.”
CHAPTER VI
RELICS, TREASURE, AND THE LIGHTING OF THE CHURCH
§ 1. RELICS.
The True Cross.—There would seem to be little doubt that a discovery was made about 326 of what was supposed to be the true Cross. S. Cyril of Jerusalem, writing some twenty-five years later, says that portions of the Cross were spread all over the world. We have seen (p. [14]) that early historians relate that a portion of this precious relic was sent to Constantinople by Helena. The principal part however remained at Jerusalem until it was taken by Chosroes. It is described by some of the pilgrims to the holy city as being encased in silver. Brought back from Persia by Heraclius in 628 together with the spear and sponge, it rested for a brief interval in S. Sophia, where it was “uplifted”; but it was again returned to Jerusalem until 636,[169] when under the fear of the coming troubles the larger portion at least was removed. Rohault de Fleury, who devoted a folio volume to the Instruments of the Passion, quotes a letter from Anseau, a priest of the Holy Sepulchre in the twelfth century, which was sent to Paris with a portion of the Cross. According to this account the Holy Wood was divided into nineteen small Crosses, of which Constantinople possessed three besides the “Cross of the Emperor,” and Jerusalem retained four. We have positive evidence that in the century before Heraclius Constantinople was a centre where portions of the Cross were to be obtained: thus Radegunde, wife of Clothaire, received a fragment from Justin II. and Sophia in 569.[170] At this time, according to John of Ephesus, there was “a day of the adoration of the Holy Cross of our Saviour; on this festival the Cross is brought out and set up in the Great Church, and the senate and all the people of the city assemble to worship it.”[171] Probably the Exaltation was celebrated concurrently at Jerusalem and at Constantinople.
When we more definitely hear of the True Cross at S. Sophia, it is evident, from the frequent occasions in which it is transported to different parts of the church, and to the palace, that it was quite small, a relic in fact.
Arculf (circa 680), as we have seen, describes it as kept in a chest, on a golden altar, which was only two cubits long by one broad. He says: “it should be specially noticed that there are not two but three short pieces of wood in the cross; that is, the cross beam, and the long one divided into two equal parts.”
Now in the Menologium of Basil we have a representation of the Exaltation of the Cross, which the patriarch is uplifting in an ambo. It is represented as a double cross made up of three pieces, not of two. A miniature of the finding of the Cross in the National Library of Paris shows the same form. Didron remarks that the cross with double branches probably originated in Greece, “for it is constantly seen in Attica, in the Morea, and on Mount Athos.” This form appears frequently on the later coins of Constantinople, and we find that most of the relics of the True Cross which still exist on Mount Athos and other places are made up with double arms. A reliquary for the fragment, said to be that which was sent to Radegunde, was preserved in the monastery of S. Cross at Poitiers in the last century. The field was of cloisonné enamel, blue with here and there a red flower. A drawing of this relic, of which we give an outline,[172] shows that this fragment of the True Cross was made up in the double-armed form, which was repeated in the relic at the Ste. Chapelle.[173] Two such relics now at Venice are doubly interesting, for besides a cross of this form two supporting figures are represented which are inscribed Constantine and Helena.[174] Now Cedrenus and other late writers say that in the Kamara of the Milion were the figures of Constantine and his mother, with the cross between them. The same composition appears in the mosaics at the monastery of S. Luke. The two Venice relics bear the names of the Empresses Maria (1180) and Irene (1350).
