True Cross

In Christian tradition, the True Cross is the original wooden cross on which Jesus of Nazareth was crucified.

It is related by numerous historical accounts and legends that Helen, the mother of Roman emperor Constantine the Great, recovered the True Cross at the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, when she travelled to the Holy Land in the years 326–328. The late fourth-century historians Gelasius of Caesarea and Tyrannius Rufinus wrote that while Helen was there, she discovered the hiding place of three crosses that were believed to have been used at the crucifixion of Jesus and the two thieves, Dismas and Gestas, who were executed with him. To one cross was affixed the titulus bearing Jesus's name, but according to Rufinus, Helen was unsure of its legitimacy until a miracle revealed that it was the True Cross. This event is celebrated on the liturgical calendar as the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross (Roodmas) by the Oriental Orthodox, Eastern Orthodox, Persian, Roman Catholic, Lutheran, and Anglican churches.

The Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox churches, as well as denominations of the Church of the East, have all claimed to possess relics of the True Cross as objects of veneration. Historians generally dispute the authenticity of the relics, as do Protestant and other Christian churches, who do not hold them in as high regard.

Provenance

The Golden Legend

In the Latin-speaking traditions of Western Europe, the story of the True Cross was well established by the 13th century when, in 1260, it was recorded by Jacobus de Voragine, Bishop of Genoa, in the Golden Legend.

The Golden Legend contains several versions of the origin of the True Cross. In The Life of Adam, Voragine writes that the True Cross came from three trees which grew from three seeds from the "Tree of Mercy" which Seth collected and planted in the mouth of Adam's corpse.