¹ Cat. no. 7018, Rolfe-Mayer Coll., Merseyside Co. Museums, Liverpool. Mounted for suspension, the coin alone has the weight of a tremissis.

² So little known that Schapiro, M. and Seminar, , ‘The Miniatures of the Florence Diatessaron (Laurentian MS Or. 81): their Place in Late Medieval Art and Supposed Connection with Early Christian and Insular Art’, Art Bull. 55 (1973), 494–531CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 524, n. 158, mistakenly placed the medalet in the Crondall hoard (c. 650).

³ For discussion of site, see Rigold, S. E., ‘The Sutton Hoo Coins in the Light of the Contemporary Background of Coinage in England’, in The Sutton Hoo Ship Burial I, ed. Bruce-Mitford, R.L.S. (London, 1975), 653–77, at 655.Google Scholar

⁴ The circumstances of discovery are vague, but three of the coins (the Italian tremissis of Justin II, the Liudhard medalet and the Germanic tremissis) were first exhibited by Rolfe, W. H. at a meeting of the Numismatic Society in 1844 (NChron 6 (1844), Proceedings, 27–8)Google Scholar and were published the same year by Smith, C. Roach in the Collectanea Antiqua 1 (London, 1848), 63–4Google Scholar, pl. XXII (although the bound volume of the Collectanea is dated 1848, its fascicules were being published from 1843 on). Shortly after this, Rolfe procured an additional five pieces, and the hoard was published as a whole in 1845; Roach Smith, C., ‘Merovingian Coins, etc. Discovered at St Martin's near Canterbury’, NChron 7 (1845), 187–91Google Scholar, pl. VIII.

⁵ Because one of the coins is more greatly worn than the others and has a loop of a type found elsewhere only in a seventh-century setting, Hawkes, S. C., in Hawkes, S. C., Merrick, J. M. and Metcalf, D., ‘X-Ray Fluorescent Analysis of Some Dark Age Coins and Jewellery’, Archeometry 9 (1966), 98–138CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. 104–6, 120 and 134, argues for two groups comprising the assemblage, the first deposited c. 580, the second c. 630. However, as Grierson, P., ‘Addenda et Corrigenda’, in his Dark Age Numismatics (London, 1979), p. 5Google Scholar, points out, it is not likely that two supposedly conterminous graves, one proposed as approximately fifty years later than the first, should each have contained unique coins of the same age (c. 570–580).

⁶ Cf. Grierson, P., ‘The Canterbury (St Martin's) Hoard of Frankish and Anglo-Saxon Coin-Ornaments’, BNJ 27 (1953), 39–51Google Scholar, at 49 (repr. in his Dark Age Numismatics); Warhurst, M., Ancient British Issues and Later Coins from English, Irish and Scottish Mints to 1279, with Associated Foreign Coins, SCBI 24 (London, 1982), xvi–xviiGoogle Scholar; Grierson, P. and Blackburn, M., Medieval European Coinage I: The Early Middle Ages (5th-10th Centuries) (Cambridge, 1986), pp. 122–4.Google Scholar

⁷ Tremissis from Oloron (Pyrenées-Atlantique); Grierson, , ‘Canterbury Hoard’, p. 49Google Scholar; Grierson, and Blackburn, , Coinage, p. 122Google Scholar; Warhurst, , Ancient British Issues, p. xvii.Google Scholar

⁸ Understanding the obverse inscription as LYVDARDVS EPS, Haigh, D. B., ‘Notes on the Old English Coinage’, NChron ns 9 (1869), 177–8Google Scholar, and idem, ‘Notes in Illustration of the Runic Monuments of Kent’, AC 7 (1872), 233, became the first to link it to the Bishop Liudhard mentioned by Bede. Brooke, G. C., English Coins, 3rd ed. (London, 1950), p. 3Google Scholar, emended the reading to LEVDARDVS. As Grierson, , ‘Canterbury Hoard’, p. 41Google Scholar, points out, ‘the reading is not open to doubt and the dates of the other coin ornaments fit in with the period to which Liudhard's residence in England may be assigned’. Local Canterbury tradition, as recorded by the fourteenth-century monk Thorne, William (Chronicle of Saint Augustine's Abbey, Canterbury, trans. Davis, A. D. (Oxford, 1934), p. 18)Google Scholar, gives Liudhard's bishopric as Senlis.

⁹ For these connections, see Grierson, , ‘Canterbury Hoard’, pp. 42–59Google Scholar, who notes that the dominions of Charibert, Bertha's father, included Agen, Oloron and St Bertrand-de-Comminges – towns represented by coins in the hoard. A flourishing trade between Kent and the Garonne region may be partial explanation for the migration of coins to Canterbury. See also below, n. 38.

¹⁰ However, Blackburn informs me that he believes the idea of a reverse design featuring a large cross may have been inspired by the coinage of Tiberius II (578–82), perhaps indirectly by way of Visigothic issues. Solidi issued early in the reign of Tiberius II display a large cross-on-steps; his tremisses sometimes have a cross potent with bars at the ends of the arms. Similarly, cross-on-steps designs with arms ending as pronounced wedges appear on the second coinage of the Visigothic king Leovigild introduced c. 584; cf. Grierson, and Blackburn, , Coinage, p. 442Google Scholar, no. 210.

¹¹ Sutherland, C. H. V., Anglo-Saxon Gold Coinage in the Light of the Crondall Hoard (London, 1948), p. 32.Google Scholar

¹² Deanesly, M., ‘Canterbury and Paris in the Reign of Æthelberht’, History 26 (1941), 97–104CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 100, points out: ‘The method used at the date was to prepare a plain, circular ‘flan’ of the precious metal: to lay it, heated, on an anvil or carved die, to lay the other above and ‘strike’ the top die until the design appeared on both sides of the flan. If the carver of the die, however, taking some coin as his model, carved the head looking in the same direction, and the legend round the head running from left to right, as his model, he would find that his new coin would come out with the head turned in the other direction (which would not matter) and with the legend ‘retrograde’ running from right to left. This is what happened to Liudhard's coin; it happened occasionally in all early coinages: but it certainly would not have happened if a Frankish moneyer had made it for Liudhard, for they were experienced and turned out no retrograde legends at this date.’

¹³ Grierson, ‘Canterbury Hoard’, p. 42.

¹⁴ Cf. Grierson, and Blackburn, , Coinage, pp. 128–31.Google Scholar

¹⁵ The diadem is clearly copied from imperial coins, and, as Blackburn has pointed out to me, the drapery may be similarly inspired, for the band with pellets running down it is often found on contemporary imperial issues.

¹⁶ Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People, ed. Colgrave, B. and Mynors, R. A. B. (Oxford, 1969), pp. 72–5.Google Scholar

¹⁷ ibid. p. 77.

¹⁸ ibid. p. 148; also Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, s. a. 565, 618.

¹⁹ Liber historiae Francorum (hereafter HF) IX. 26, ed. Arndt, W. and Krusch, B., MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 116Google Scholar. See also ibid. p. 382.

²⁰ Cf. Deanesly, , ‘Canterbury’, pp. 98–9Google Scholar, and Sutherland, , Crondall Hoard, p. 29Google Scholar, n. 1, for c. 560 dating.

²¹ Brooks, N., The Early History of the Church of Canterbury (Leicester, 1984), p. 6.Google Scholar

²² Wood, I. N., The Merovingian North Sea (Alingsås, 1983), pp. 15–16.Google Scholar

²³ For literature on the cult of the True Cross and the patriarchal cross emblem, see Werner, M., ‘The Cross-Carpet Page in the Book of Durrow: the Cult of the True Cross, Adomnan and Iona’, Art Bull. 72 (1990), 174–223.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

²⁴ Crosses in relief appear above loopholes in the central bay of the southeast wall of the monastery. Those at left and centre have large tituli slightly separated from the uprights. The tituli ends are shaped like the tabulae ansatae employed as title boards in contemporaneous Syro-Palestinian Crucifixion scenes. On either side of the central cross at Mt Sinai are kneeling lambs representing the apostles, martyrs and the faithful as the paradisical flock who drink from the rivers of paradise–Golgotha; see Forsyth, G. H. and Weitzmann, K., The Monastery of St Catherine at Mt Sinai: the Church and Fortress of Justinian (Ann Arbor, MI, 1965)Google Scholar, pls. Vb and Villa.

²⁵ The Fieschi-Morgan staurothec has on its face a cloisonné image of Christ on the Cross. The interior has a patriarchal cross-shaped compartment for the cross fragments. Some specialists have assigned the work a date as late as c. 1000, but recent opinion has centred on a date considerably earlier. Thus Frazer, M. E., in The Age of Spirituality: Late Antique and Early Christian Art, Third to Seventh Century, ed. Weitzmann, K. (New York, 1979), pp. 635–6Google Scholar, placed the staurothec in early eighth-century Palestine, and Kartsonis, A. D., Anastasis (Princeton, 1986), pp. 94–123Google Scholar, advocated a date in the first part of the ninth century.

²⁶ A wooden pilgrim's box containing minor relics from the Holy Land labelled ‘from the place of the life-giving resurrection’, its inner cover is painted with scenes from the life of Christ. A patriarchal cross within a mandorla and raised on Golgotha hill appears on the outer cover. Two staves (probably representing the lance and staff respectively held by Longinus and Stephaton) are crossed in front of the Cross. In the upper half of the panel is the inscription IC XC; below we read AΩ. The work has been variously dated, but most cogent are the iconographical arguments in favour of sixth-century Palestinian creation offered by Weitzmann, K., ‘Loca Sancta and the Representational Arts of Palestine’, Dumbarton Oaks Papers 28 (1974), 31–55CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 49 See also Vikan, G., Byzantine Pilgrimage Art (Washington, 1982), pp. 18–20.Google Scholar

²⁷ For her life, see two prose biographies: Vita S. Radegundis libri duo (1) by Venantius Fortunatus, (2) by the nun Baudonivia, MGH, SS rer. Merov. II; Gregory of Tours, HFIX. 39 and 42 (ibid. 1, 393–6 and 401–4). See also ‘Radegonde’, Dictionnaire d'archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie, XIVGoogle Scholar, cols. 2044–55; ‘Poitiers’, ibid. 1319–24; Brittain, F., Saint Radegund (Cambridge, 1928)Google Scholar; Coudanne, L., ‘Baudonivie, moniale de Sainte-Croix et biographe de sainte Radegonde’, Etudes Merovingiennes, Actes des Journées de Poitiers, 1–3 May 1952 (Paris, 1953), pp. 45–9.Google Scholar

²⁸ Cf. Brown, P.R.L., Relics and Social Status in the Age of Gregory of Tours (Reading, 1977), p. 20Google Scholar; Riché, P., Education and Culture in the Barbarian West, Sixth through Eighth Centuries, trans. Contreni, J. (Columbia, SC, 1962).Google Scholar

²⁹ Peebles, B. M., ‘Fortunatus, Poet of the Holy Cross’, American Church Monthly 38 (1933), 153–66Google Scholar, draws attention to the important collection of relics Radegund had assembled even before she established the Convent of the Holy Cross.

³⁰ For an examination of Radegund's motives in requesting relics of the True Cross, see Delaruelle, E., ‘Sainte Radegonde, son type de sainteté et la chrétienté de son temps’, Etudes Merov., pp. 65–74Google Scholar. Also useful is Cameron, A., ‘The Early Religious Policies of Justin II’, Stud, in Church Hist. 13 (1976), 51–68CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Underlining Radegund's interest in Helena is Gregory of Tours' reference to the latter's journey to Jerusalem, her discovery of the True Cross, etc., in HF I. 36 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 51).

³¹ Gregory of Tours, HF IX. 40 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 396–7); HF X. 15 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 425–6); idem, In gloria martyrum, HF I. 5 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 489–90); Baudonivia, Vita S. Radegundis, HF II. 14, 16 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. II, 386–9); Venantius Fortunatus, Ad Iustinum et Sophiam Augustos, 55–9, ed. Leo, F.Google Scholar, MGH, Auct. antiq. IV. 1, 277. Venantius Fortunatus wrote three hymns on the Cross, ibid. 27–35. Vexilla regis was composed for the procession that welcomed the Cross relics to Poitiers, but the other two, though inspired by the reception, may have been composed later; Vexilla regis prodeunt, ibid. 34–5; Crux benedict a nitet, ibid. 27; Pange lingua gloriosi, ibid. 27–8.

³² Particularly interesting is Gregory's report of a supernatural boiling up of oil in a lamp in the same oratory as housed the Cross relics at Tours: In gloria martyrum, HF I. 14 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. 1,498). A similar event occurred later in connection with the Cross relics at Poitiers: In gloria martyrum, ibid. I. 5 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 489–90); HF IX. 40 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 396–7).

³³ In gloria martyrum, I. 6 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. 1,492). See further Vieillard-Troiekouroff, M., ‘Les monuments religieux de Poitiers d'après Grégoire de Tours’, Etudes Merov., pp. 285–92.Google Scholar

³⁴ De virtutibus sancti Martini episcopi, III–VI, MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 584–660. See also Fortunatus, Venantius, Vita S. Martini, MGH, Auct. antiq. IV.1, 292–370.Google Scholar

³⁵ Cf. Bede's Ecclesiastical History, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , p. 76Google Scholar, n. 2.

³⁶ HE II. 5, ed. Colgrave, and Mynors, , p. 150Google Scholar. For references to possible connections between Canterbury and Tours, see Deanesly, M., ‘Early English and Gallic Minsters’, TRHS 4th ser. 13 (1941), 25–69Google Scholar, at 42; Wallace-Hadrill, J. M., ‘Rome and the Early English Church: Some Questions of Transmission’, SettSpoll (Spoleto, 1960), 519–48Google Scholar, at 532–6.

³⁷ Entered into the Pontifical Register for July 596, the letters written by Pope Gregory to the members of Augustine's mission and to bishops and others in a position to protect them along the route indicate a journey following the Rhône and Loire to Tours; S. Gregorii Magni Registrum Epistularum, ed. Norberg, D., 2 vols., CCSL140–140A (Turnhout, 1982) II, 961–2.Google Scholar

³⁸ The many Frankish objects buried in Kent add credence to the idea that Æthelberht's marriage was political confirmation of the significant commercial intercourse between Kent and Gaul; cf. Hawkes, ‘X-Ray’, p. 120. See further Lewis, A. R., The Northern Seas (Princeton, 1958), pp. 65Google Scholar, 71–3and 104–5; Brooks, , Early History, p. 7Google Scholar, n. 17; Wood, , North Sea, pp. 17–18Google Scholar. See Grierson, P., ‘Commerce in the Dark Ages: a Critique of the Evidence’, TRHS 5th ser. 9 (1959), 123–40Google Scholar, for mention of contacts at the St Denis fair.

³⁹ The reliquary was recorded as a triptych in 1740: Poitiers, Coll. Munic, dom Fonteneau 547, fol. 196. During the Middle Ages the reliquary was kept in a small châsse of Carolingian creation, but if we follow Gregory of Tours (In gloria martyrum, I. 5 (MGH, SS rer. Merov. I, 489–92)) it was originally protected by a silver chest; cf. Conway, M., ‘St Radegunde's Reliquary at Poitiers’, Art Jnl 3 (1923), 1–12Google Scholar. Doubts have been cast on the long-standing sixth-century dating of the surviving reliquary face, with Frolow, A., LA Relique de la vraie croix (Paris, 1961), p. 179Google Scholar, proposing a post-Iconoclastic substitution for the original staurothec. However, most modern scholarship supports the traditional attribution; cf. references in Wessel, K., Byzantine Enamels (Shannon, 1967), p. 8Google Scholar; and Werner, , ‘Cross-Carpet Page’, p. 183Google Scholar, n.29. It should be noted that as regards East Christian coinage, the patriarchal cross type is first to be found on issues of Justinian II; Breckenridge, J. D., The Numismatic Iconography of Justinian II (685–695, 705–711 A.D.), Num. Notes and Monographs 144 (New York, 1959), pl. 1 (12)Google Scholar; Frolow, A., Les Reliquaires de la vraie Croix (Paris, 1965), p. 131, n. 4Google Scholar. Blackburn has kindly informed me that a gold solidus of Theodosius II (Vermeule, C.C., ‘Roman Numismatic Art, A.D. 300–400’, NCirc 65 (1957), 5, fig. 7Google Scholar), long thought to picture the Emperor holding a patriarchal cross, was not so intended but results from a fault in the die-cutting, ‘the line forming the shaft of the cross having slipped a little too far, going past the wedge at the top of the cross and so looking a bit like a double barred cross’.

⁴⁰ See von Bogyay, T., ‘Zur Geschichte der Hetoimasie’, Akten des XI. Internationalen Byzantinestenkongresses München, 1958, ed. Dölger, F. and Beck, H. G. (Munich, 1962), pp. 58–61Google Scholar; Schiller, G., Ikonographie der christlichen Kunst III, Die Auferstehung und Erhöhung christi (Gütersloh, 1971), 193–202.Google Scholar

⁴¹ For wreath and cross symbolism, cf. Klauser, T., ‘Aureum Coronarium’, Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum I (1950), cols. 1010–20Google Scholar; Schiller, G., Iconography of Christian Art I (New York, 1971), 100–1, 131 and 133–4Google Scholar; Turcan, R., ‘Girlande’, Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum XI (1981), cols. 1–23.Google Scholar

⁴² Early Christian belief held that those parts of the Crucifixion Cross that touched Christ miraculously ascended to heaven to become the cross of the Second Coming, the signum filii hominis (Matt. XXIV.30). Leo the Great's eighth homily on the Passion (Sermo liv. 6, PL 54, 340–1) preserved in the Roman Breviary as the homily for matins of the Exaltatio, says that in gazing upon the Crucified Christ we should see the dazzling splendour of the Cross – Christ's Judgement throne. And the early Latin Adoratio hymns often refer to the eschatological cross of the Second Coming and Last Judgement.

⁴³ For examples and iconographic analysis, see Brenk, B., Tradition und Neuerung in der christlichen Kunst des ersten Jahrtausends: Studien zur Geschichte des Weltgerichtsbildes (Vienna, 1966), pp. 38–40 and 218–20Google Scholar; Engemann, J., ‘Images parousiaques dans l'art paléochretien’, in L'Apocalypse de Jean: Traditions exégétiques et iconographiques IIIe–XIIIe siècles, ed. Petraglio, P. et al. (Geneva, 1979), pp. 73–107.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ That Hetoimasia representations with wreathed patriarchal crosses existed before the eleventh century is uncertain. Examples are incomplete or cannot be precisely dated. Thus there is the marble relief on the north facade of San Marco, Venice. Restored in the thirteenth century, it features the Hetoimasia supporting a medallion with the Lamb. Six lambs and a palm tree appear on either side and a Greek inscription identifies the lambs as the apostles. At the centre of the throne on a half-circular base is a wreathed patriarchal cross. Archaic in appearance and iconography, the relief has been variously dated from the sixth to the eleventh century, with Schiller, Iconographie III, 197, placing it in the ninth century, and O. Demus, Die Skulpturen von S. Marco in Venedig, Centro Tedesco di Studi Veneziani/Deutsches Studienzentrum in Venedig 3 (1979), no. 62, and Belting, , ‘Ein Gruppe konstantinopler Reliefs aus dem XI. Jahrhundert’, Pantheon 30 (1972), 271Google Scholar, n. 14, in the eleventh.

⁴⁵ Constantine the Great may have commissioned a commemorative cross for Golgotha hill, but if so it was replaced in the early fifth century by a gem-studded cross at the behest of Theodosius II; Dinkler, E., Signum cruets (Tübingen, 1967), p. 68Google Scholar; Hunt, E. D., Holy Land Pilgrimage in the Later Roman Empire, A.D. 314–460 (Oxford, 1982), pp. 228–9, n. 49Google Scholar. A silver cross replaced the Crux Gemmata in 620; Grabar, A., Martyrium (Paris, 1946) III, 273–4Google Scholar. For discussion of representations, see Lapinski, A., ‘La “Croix Gemmata” e il culto della Santa Croce – nei monumenti superstiti e nelle raffigurazioni monumentali’, Felix Ravenna 3rd ser. 30 (1960), 5–62.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Minneapolis, Institute of Arts, The Art of Collecting: Acquisitions 1980–1985 (Minneapolis 1986)Google Scholar, cat. no. 83.126 (p. 101). A Latin cross whose shaft terminates in a narrow tenon inserted into a stepped base is pictured on the textile. A wreath of leaves and fruit is centred behind the crossing. Its dimensions are such as to allow the flared ends of transom and shaft to extend beyond its outer profile. Sixteen gems are shown as set within the cross; nine circles decorate the base. Placed in each of the cantons shaped by cross arms and wreath is a tiny Greek cross, and vertical rows of floral designs flank the central emblem. For an iconographic analysis, see Werner, M., ‘On the Origin of the Form of the Irish High Cross’, Gesta 29 (1990), 98–110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁷ Before 635 the primary relic of the True Cross was kept in the church of Golgotha at the extreme south end of the eastern portico of the forecourt of the Rotunda of the Holy Sepulchre. This church or chapel incorporated or stood next to an open tower-like construction set up above a ciborium over the Cross of Golgotha. Below or to one side was a chapel alternately called the Niketerium or Tomb of Adam; Coüasnon, C., The Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem (London, 1974), pp. 50–3Google Scholar; Wilkinson, J., Pilgrims before the Crusades (Warminster, 1977), pp. 175–9Google Scholar; Kleinbauer, W. E., in Age of Spirituality, pp. 650–1Google Scholar. For early pilgrims’ descriptions of the service of veneration of the ‘sacred wood’ during the Good Friday rite at the Holy Sepulchre, cf. Franceschini, E. and Weber, R., ‘Itinerarium Egeriae’, in Itineraria et alia Geographica, CCSL 175–6 (Turnhout, 1965), 27–90Google Scholar; P. Geyer, ‘Itinerarium Antonini Placentini’, ibid. p. 139.

⁴⁸ Cf. Frolow, La Relique, pp. 124–36.

⁴⁹ See related Crux Gemmata types in Frolow, Les Reliquaires, pp. 39, 42, 46 and 48; Lipinski, ‘Croix Gemmata’, pp. 26, 30, 34, 36, 42–44, 47 and 49.

⁵⁰ For example, see Deer, J., ‘Der Globus des spätrömischen und des byzantinischen Kaisers. Symbol oder Insigne?’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 54 (1961), 53–84CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Grigg, R., ‘“Symphōnian Aeidō tēs Basileias”: an Image of Imperial Harmony on the Base of the Column of Arcadius’, Art bull. 59 (1977), 469–82, at 472, n. 23.Google Scholar

⁵¹ See above, n. 31. Further, Szövérffy, J., ‘Crux Fidelis: Prolegomena to a History of the Holy Cross Hymns’, Traditio 23 (1966), 6–12Google Scholar; Frolow, , La Relique, pp. 179–80.Google Scholar

⁵² We find in the New Testament an identification of the Tree of Life of Genesis, Ezekiel and Proverbs with the sacrificial and redemptive death of Christ (Rev. XXII.1–2); Golgotha is equated with Mt Zion as the heavenly abode where the Lamb is worshipped, the mount of the future paradise, from which flow the four rivers (Rev. XIV). Patristic literature and later tradition identify the Tree of Life as erected on the spot where Adam lived and died, and as the Tree which would carry the second Adam. It rose from Golgotha at the centre of the world. For literature, see Werner, ‘Cross-Carpet Page’, nos. 22–3.

⁵³ Grabar, A., Ampoules de Terre Sainte (Paris, 1958), pl. XXIIGoogle Scholar. See also Fleming, J., ‘Baum, Baüme’, Lexikon christlicher Ikonographie, ed. Aurenhammer, H., 8 vols. (Rome, 1968–1976) I, 89.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ See above, n. 26.

⁵⁵ Adding further complexity to the problem of the base of the Liudhard cross is the probability that sometimes the globe is equated with Golgotha hill. As example we cite a capital in the north side of the nave arcade in the sixth-century church of St Catherine, Mt Sinai; Forsyth and Weitzmann, Mt Sinai, pl. LXIIb. Carved in relief is a single-barred cross mounted on a celestial globe. The alpha and omega are suspended from the beam and below are two drinking lambs (at the rivers of Paradise). Vines grow from the top of the cross and connect to an adjacent Tree of Life. We are reminded of Venantius Fortunatus's reference to the eucharistic symbolism of the vine (John XV.5) and the identity of vine and Tree of Life in Crux benedicta nitet: ‘Appenso et vitis inter tua brachia, de quo dulcia sanguineo vina valore fluent.’ In this setting, there is an obvious correlation of globe with Golgotha hill.

⁵⁶ For analysis and bibliography, see St Clair, A., Age of Spirituality, pp. 579–80, no. 519.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ See above, n. 33. Also worthy of note is Venantius Fortunatus's mention of textiles in the chapel where the fragments were kept at Tours as carrying the figure of a Cross; Carmina II.3 (MGH, Auct. antiq. IV. 1, 32–3).

⁵⁸ Cf. a miniature in the tenth-century Menologium of Basil II (Vatican City, Biblioteca apostolica vaticana, gr. 1613, fol. 108); Walter, C., L'Iconographie des conciles dans la tradition byzantine (Paris, 1970), pp. 37–8Google Scholar, and frontispiece.

⁵⁹ Concilia Galliae, A. 511–A. 695, ed. de Clerq, C., CCSL 148A (Turnhout, 1963), 178Google Scholar.

⁶⁰ Here we follow the translation of Markus, R. A., ‘The Cult of Icons in Sixth-Century Gaul’, JTS ns 29 (1978), 151–7CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 154, who rejects the alternate translation favoured by de Clerq and others: ‘Let the body of the Lord [understood as the consecrated eucharistic particles] be placed on the altar not in some arbitrary order [i.e. following the phantasy of the individual celebrant] but in the form of a cross.’ Markus believes that imaginario ordine refers to sacred images and that the council was objecting to the use of cancelli with such images in Gaul. See also Nees, L., ‘The Iconographic Program of Decorated Chancel Barriers in the Pre-Iconoclastic Period’, Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 46 (1983), 15–26, at 25–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶¹ See Belting-Ihm, C., ‘Das Justins Kreuz in der Schatzkammer der Petirskirche zur Rom’, Jahrbuch der römisch-germanischen Zentralmuseums, Mainsz 12 (1965), 142–66.Google Scholar

⁶² This was the Rule of Caesarius of Aples, the first monastic rule for women and the first to insist that votaries be not permitted to leave the cloister from the time of their profession until the end of their life. Cf. Brittain, , Radegund, p. 22.Google Scholar

⁶³ Ad Iustinum et Sophiam Augustos, 55–9 (MGH, Auct. antiq. IV.1, 275–8).

⁶⁴ Ep. XI. 35 (ed. Norberg, CCSL 140, 923–4). Translation by Markus, R. A., ‘The Chronology of the Gregorian Mission to England: Bede's Narrative and Gregory's Correspondence’, JEH 14 (1963), 16–30, at 18–19.Google Scholar

⁶⁵ Some slight suggestion of Radegund's importance comes from ‘Saint Regedun Street’ in Canterbury. Known as ‘Long Lane’ up to 1794, it takes its name from an allegedly ancient bath called ‘St Radegund's Bath’. Whether, in fact, the bath is as old as the sixth century is open to question. See Brittain, , Radegund, pp. 67–70Google Scholar; Aigrain, R., ‘Un ancien po`me anglais sur la vie de Sainte Radegonde et le culte de Sainte Radegonde en Angleterre’, Etudes Merov., p. 5Google Scholar. More substantial is the evidence of the early influence of Venantius Fortunatus's poetry. The beginning and end of two of his poems were engraved in the seventh century on the wall of a basilica in Wessex; Aldhelm of Malmesbury knew of Venantius's writings. St. Columbanus's writings also reflect the Italian poet's influence, but whether the Irish saint read him at Bangor or later on the Continent is uncertain. See Cordoliani, A., ‘Fortunat, l'lrlande et les irlandais’, Etudes Merov., pp. 34–43Google Scholar; and Lapidge, M., ‘Appendix on the Poems in the Earlier Period’, in R. W. Hunt, ‘Manuscript Evidence of Knowledge of the Poems of Venantius Fortunarus in Late Anglo-Saxon England’, ASE 8 (1979), 279–95Google Scholar, at 288–9.

⁶⁶ Cf. Werner, , ‘Cross-Carpet Page’, pp. 190–222Google Scholar, for discussion of the importance of the cult in Dark Age Britain and Ireland.

⁶⁷ ibid.

⁶⁸ Werner, , ‘Irish High Cross’, pp. 101–7.Google Scholar