On a Splinter, Found in a Stone Box

About five years ago archaeologists studying the remains of a 7th century church in Sinope, Turkey, on the southern coast of the Black Sea, found a small stone box.

Inside the box was a splinter of wood.

This type of splinter, inside such a box, was a venerated feature of many churches through the High Middle Ages where it was regarded as a "piece of the True Cross," the cross on which Jesus was crucified.

The 7th century dating of THIS find puts it a good deal earlier than most analogous splinters, though.

Legend holds that it was Helena, the mother of the Emperor Constantine, who on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land discovered the True Cross, and all the splinters that eventually found themselves to churches around Europe (enough to have rebuilt the whole city of Jerusalem, according to cynics) were said to have come from this Cross. Sort of like the use of two fish to feed multitudes?

The historic significance of the find doesn't turn on whether one believes that this splinter had ever been anywhere near Jesus' dying body, or even whether one believes that it had been part of the cross that Helena found and decided was THAT cross. The historic significance involves the institution of pilgrimage and the region of Sinope.

Here's a URL for further discussion.

https://candaceweddle.wordpress.com/

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