Vatican Museums

This cross-shaped reliquary in silver, decorated on the outer surfaces with lively figurative illustrations in relief, is identifiable with one of the three capsae in the same material offered by Paschal I (817-824) to the “Treasury” of the Sancta Sanctorum, for the protection of the most precious relics. This relates to the case for the de auro purissimo adornata gemmis et lapidibus pretiosiis (the "jewelled cross"), in which there would have been the relics of the umbilicus (et preputium Circumcisionis) Domini nostri Iesu Christi, before their theft during the Sack of Rome in 1527. The images embossed on the equilateral arms of the lid represent the episodes of Jesus among the Doctors in the Temple, the Miracle of the Wedding at Cana, Jesus and the Virgin Mary, St. Peter and the Apostles, standing among the vines and the Jesus’ Mission to the Apostles with, at the centre, the image of Christ officiating between the Virgin and St. Peter. On the smaller sides of the case there are twelve other scenes inspired by the theme of the Resurrection, which in turn allude to the content of the reliquary which was believed to have held, along with the relics of Infancy, a particle of the Lignum Crucis.