Part 1

[Transcriber's Notes: All spelling, capitalization, and punctuation inconsistencies retained with the exception of those few listed at the end of this text.

The following notations were used in the text:

= for bold _ for italics + for an Old English font ^ for superscripted letters or numbers {} for sequential superscripted letters or numbers]

+The Legendary History of the Cross.+

_The Legendary Hiſtory of the Croſs_

A SERIES OF

Sixty-four Woodcuts

_From a Dutch book publiſhed by_ VELDENER, A.D. 1483

WITH _AN INTRODUCTION_

Written and Illuſtrated By JOHN ASHTON

_PREFACE_ By S. BARING GOULD, M.A.

+London+ T. FISHER UNWIN M.D.CCC.LXXXVII

UNWIN BROTHERS, _Old Style Printers_, THE GRESHAM PRESS, LUDGATE HILL, E.C.

_PREFACE._

THE origin of the mediæval romance of the Croſs is hard to diſcover. It was very popular. It occurs in a good number of authors, and is depicted in a good many churches in ſtained glaſs.

I may perhaps be allowed here to repeat what I have ſaid in my article on the Legend of the Croſs, in “Myths of the Middle Ages:”—

“In the churches of the city of Troyes alone it appears in the windows of four: S. Martin-ès-Vignes, S. Pantaléon, S. Madeleine, and S. Nizier. It is freſcoed along the walls of the choir of S. Croce at Florence, by the hand of Agnolo Gaddi. Pietro della Franceſca alſo dedicated his pencil to the hiſtory of the Croſs in a ſeries of freſcoes in the chapel of the Bacci, in the church of S. Franceſco at Arezzo. It occurs as a predella painting among the ſpecimens of early art at the Accademia delle Belle Arti at Venice, and is the ſubject of a picture by Beham, in the Munich Gallery. The Legend is told in full in the ‘Vita Chriſti,’ printed at Troyes in 1517; in the ‘Legenda Aurea’ of Jacques de Voragine; in a French MS. of the thirteenth century, in the Britiſh Muſeum. Gervaſe of Tilbury relates a portion of it in his ‘Otia Imperalia,’ quoting Peter Comeſtor; it appears in the ‘Speculum Hiſtoriale’ of Gottfried of Viterbo, in the ‘Chronicon Engelhuſii,’ and elſewhere.”

In the very curious Creation window of S. Neot’s Church, Cornwall, Seth is repreſented putting three pips of the Tree of Life into the mouth and noſtrils of dead Adam, as he buries him.

Of the popularity of the ſtory of the Croſs there can be no doubt, but its origin is involved in obſcurity. It is generally poſſible to track moſt of the religious and popular folk tales and romances of the Middle Ages to their origin, which is frequently Oriental, but it is not eaſy to do ſo with the Legend of the Croſs. It would rather ſeem that it was made up by ſome romancer out of all kinds of pre-exiſting material, with no other object than to write a religious novel for pious readers, to diſplace the ſenſuous novels which were much in vogue.

We know that this was largely done after the third century, and a number of martyr legends, ſuch as thoſe of S. Apollinaris Syncletica, SS. Cyprian and Juſtina, the ſtory of Duke Procopius, S. Euphroſyne, SS. Zoſimus and Mary, SS. Theophanes and Panſemne, and many others were compoſed with this object. The earlieſt of all is undoubtedly the Clementine Recognitions, which dates from a remotely early period, and carries us into the heart of Petrine Chriſtianity, and in which many a covert attack is made on S. Paul and his teaching. On the other hand, we know that an Asiatic prieſt, as Tertullian tells us, wrote a romance on “Paul and Thecla, out of love to Paul.” S. Jerome ſays that a Pauline zealot, when convicted before his biſhop of having written the romance, tried to exculpate himſelf by ſaying that he had done it out of admiration for S. Paul, but the Biſhop would not accept the excuſe, and deprived him. Unfortunately this romance has not come down to us, though we have another on S. Paul and his relations to Thecla, who is ſaid to have accompanied him on his apoſtolic rambles, diſguiſed in male attire.

The Greek romance literature was not wholeſome reading for Chriſtians. Some of the writers of theſe tales became Chriſtian biſhops, and probably devoted their facile pens to more edifying ſubjects than the difficulties of parted lovers.

Heliodorus, who wrote “Theagenes and Charicheia,” is ſaid to have become Biſhop of Tricca, in Theſſaly. Socrates, in the fifth century, in ſpeaking of clerical celibacy, mentions the ſeverity of the rule impoſed on his clergy by this Heliodorus, “under whoſe name there are love-books extant, called Ethiopica, which he compoſed in his youth.”

Achilles Tatius, author of the “Loves of Clitophon and Leucippe,” is ſaid alſo to have become a biſhop. So alſo Euſtathius of Theſſalonica, author of the “Lives of Hyſemene and Hyſmenias,” but this is more than doubtful.

Three things conduced to the production of a Chriſtian romance literature in the early ages of the Church:—(1) The neceſſity under which the Church lay of ſupplying a want in human nature; (2) The need there was for producing ſome light wholeſome literature to ſupply the place of the popular love-romances then largely read and circulated; (3) The fact that ſome biſhops and converts were experienced novel writers, and therefore ready to lend their hands to ſome better purpoſe than amuſing the leiſure and flattering the paſſions of the idle and young.

Much the ſame conditions exiſted in the Middle Ages. There was an influx of ſenſuous literature from the Eaſt, through the Arabs of Spain and Sicily; Oriental tales eaſily took Weſtern garb, in which the caliphs became kings of Chriſtendom, and the fakirs and imauns were converted into monks and Catholic prieſts. To counteract theſe ſtories, collections of which may be found in Le Grand d’Auſſi and Von der Hagen, and in Boccaccio, the Geſta Romanorum was drawn up, a collection of moral tales, many of them of ſimilar Oriental parentage. But beſide theſe ſhort ſtories, or novels, were long romances, ſome heroic, and founded on early national traditions and ballads. To theſe belong the Niebelungen Lied and Noth, the Gudrun, the Heldenbuch, the cycles of Karlovingian and of Arthurian romance.

As it happens, we have two authors in the Middle Ages, living much about the ſame time, one intenſely heathen in all his conceptions, the other as entirely Chriſtian, each dealing with ſubjects from the ſame cycle, and the one writing in avowed oppoſition to the tendency of the other’s book. I allude to Wolfram of Eschenbach and Gottfried of Straſſburg. The latter wrote the Triſtram, the former the Parzival. In Gottfried, the moral ſenſe ſeems to be abſolutely dead; there is no perception of the ſacredneſs of truth, of chaſtity, of honour, none of religion. Wolfram is his exact converſe. Wolfram gives us the hiſtory of the Grail, but he did not invent the myth of the Grail, he derived it from pre-exiſting material. The Grail myth is almoſt certainly heathen in its origin, but it has been entirely Chriſtianiſed. The holy baſin is that in which the Blood of Chriſt is preſerved, and only the pure of heart can ſee it; but the Grail was really the great cauldron of Nature, the baſin of Ceridwen, the earth goddeſs of the Kelts, or, among Teutonic nations, the ſacrificial cauldron of Odin, in which was brewed the ſpirit of poeſy, of the blood of Mimer. The remembrance of the myſterious veſſel remained after Kelt and Teuton had become Chriſtian, and the poets and romanciſts gave it a new ſpell of life by chriſtening it. It was much the ſame with the ſtory of the Croſs. In the Teutonic North, tree worſhip was widely ſpread; the tree was ſacred to Odin, who himſelf, according to the myſterious Havamal, hung nine nights wounded, as a ſacrifice to himſelf, a voluntary ſacrifice, in “the wind-rocked tree.”

That tree was Yggdraſill, the world tree, whoſe roots extended to hell, and whoſe branches ſpread to heaven.

Northern mythology is full of alluſion to this tree, but we have, unfortunately, little of the hiſtory of it preſerved to us; we know of it only through alluſions. The Chriſtmas tree is its repreſentative; it has been taken up out of paganiſm, and rooted in Chriſtian ſoil, where it flouriſhes to the annual delight of thouſands of children.

Now the mediæval romanciſts laid hold of this tree, as they laid hold of the Grail baſin, and uſed it for Chriſtian purpoſes. The Grail cup became the chalice of the Blood of Chriſt, and the Tree of Odin became the Croſs of Calvary. They worked into the romance all kinds of material gathered from floating folk-tale of heathen anceſtry, and they pieced in with it every ſcrap of alluſion to a tree they could find in Scripture. It is built up of fragments taken from all kinds of old ſtructures, put together with ſome ſkill, and built into a goodly romance; but the tracing of every ſtone to its original quarry has not been done by anyone as yet. The Grail myth has had many ſtudents and interpreters, but not the Croſs myth. That remains to be examined, and it will doubtleſs prove a ſtudy rewarding the labour of inveſtigation.

S. BARING-GOULD.

_The Legendary Hiſtory of the Croſs._

[Sidenote: 1 _A.D. 326._]

[Sidenote: _Rufinus on the Invention._]

[Sidenote: 2 _Hadrian is ſaid to have done this._]

THE Croſs on which our Lord and Saviour ſuffered, would, naturally, if properly authenticated, be an object of the deepeſt veneration to all Chriſtian men, be their creed, or ſhade of opinion what it might; but, for over 300 years it could not be found, and it was reſerved for the Empreſs Helena in her old age (for ſhe was 79 years old) to diſcover its place of concealment.[1] That this _Invention_, or finding of the Croſs was believed in, at the time, there can be no manner of doubt, for it is alluded to by St. Cyril, Patriarch of Jeruſalem (A.D. 350 to 386), and by St. Ambroſe. Rufinus of Aquila, a friend of St. Jerome, in his _Eccleſiaſtical Hiſtory_, gives an account of its finding, in the following words: “About the ſame time, Helena, the mother of Conſtantine, a woman of incomparable faith, whoſe ſincere piety was equalled by her rare munificence, warned by celeſtial viſions, went to Jeruſalem, and inquired of the inhabitants where was the place where the Divine Body had been affixed and hung on a gibbet. This place was difficult to find, for the perſecutors of old had raiſed a ſtatue to Venus,[2] in order that the Chriſtians who might wiſh to adore Chriſt in that place, ſhould appear to addreſs their homage to the goddeſs; and thus it was little frequented, and almoſt forgotten. After clearing away the profane objects which defiled it, and the rubbiſh that was there heaped up, ſhe found three croſſes placed in confuſion. But the joy which this diſcovery cauſed her was tempered by the impoſſibility of diſtinguiſhing to whom each of them had belonged. There, alſo, was found the title written by Pilate in Greek, Latin, and Hebrew characters; but ſtill there was nothing to indicate ſufficiently clearly the Croſs of our Lord. This uncertainty of man was ſettled by the teſtimoTny of heaven.” And then follows the ſtory of the dead woman being raiſed to life.

[Sidenote: _Other Authorities._]

Not only did Rufinus write thus, but Socrates, Theodoret, and Sozomen, all of whom lived within a century after the _Invention_, tell the ſame ſtory, ſo that it muſt have been of current belief.

[Sidenote: _Puniſhment of the Croſs._]

The puniſhment of the Croſs was a very ordinary one, and of far wider extent than many are aware. It was common among the Scythians, the Greeks, the Carthaginians, the Germans, and the Romans, who, however, principally applied it to their ſlaves, and rarely crucified free men, unleſs they were robbers or aſſasſins.

Alexander the Great, after taking the city of Tyre, cauſed two thouſand inhabitants to be crucified.

[Sidenote: _Puniſhment of the Croſs._]

Flavius Joſephus relates, in his _Antiquities of the Jews_, that Alexander, the King of the Jews, on the capture of the town of Betoma, ordered eight hundred of the inhabitants to ſuffer the death of the Croſs, and their wives and children to be maſſacred before their eyes, whilſt they were ſtill alive.

Auguſtus, after the Sicilian War, crucified ſix thouſand ſlaves who had not been claimed by their maſters.

Tiberius crucified the prieſts of Isis, and deſtroyed their temple.

Titus, during the ſiege of Jeruſalem, crucified all thoſe unfortunates who, to the number of five or ſix hundred daily, fled from the city to eſcape the famine; and ſo numerous were theſe executions, that croſſes were wanting, and the land all about ſeemed like a hideous foreſt.

[Sidenote: _The different ſorts of Croſſes._]

Theſe inſtances are ſufficient to ſhow that death by crucifixion was a common puniſhment; but, ſingularly enough, the ſhape of the Croſs has never been ſatiſfactorily ſettled; practically, the queſtion lies between the _Crux capitata_, or _immiſſa_, which is the ordinary form of the Latin Croſs, and the _Crux anſata_, or _commiſſa_, frequently called the _Tau_ Croſs, from the Greek letter T. The _Tau_-shaped Croſs is, undoubtedly, to be met with moſt frequently in the older repreſentations; and the more ancient authorities, ſuch as Tertullian, St. Jerome, St. Paulinus, Sozomen, and Rufinus, are of opinion that this was the ſhape of the Croſs. After the fifteenth century, our Lord is rarely depicted on the _Crux commiſſa_, it being reſerved for the two thieves.

[Sidenote: _Antiquity of the Tau Croſs._]

M. Adolphe Napoleon Didron, in his _Iconographie Chretienne_, gives a few illuſtrations of the antiquity of the _Tau_ Croſs: “The Croſs is our crucified Lord in perſon; ‘Where the Croſs is, there is the martyr,’ ſays St. Paulinus. Conſequently it works miracles, as does Jeſus Himſelf: and the liſt of wonders operated by its power is in truth immenſe. By the ſimple ſign of the Croſs traced upon the forehead or the breaſt, men have been delivered from the moſt imminent danger. It has conſtantly put demons to flight, protected the virginity of women, and the faith of believers; it has reſtored men to life, or health, inſpired them with hope or reſignation.

“Such is the virtue of the Croſs, that a mere alluſion to that ſacred ſign, made even in the Old Teſtament, and long before the exiſtence of the Croſs, ſaved the youthful Isaac from death, redeemed from deſtruction an entire people whoſe houſes were marked by that ſymbol, healed the envenomed bites of thoſe who looked at the ſerpent raiſed in the form of a _Tau_ upon a pole. It called back the ſoul into the dead body of the ſon of that poor widow who had given bread to the prophet.

[Sidenote: _The Tau Croſs._]

“A beautiful painted window, belonging to the thirteenth century, in the Cathedral of Bourges, has a repreſentation of Isaac bearing on his ſhoulders the wood that was to be uſed in his ſacrifice, arranged in the form of a Croſs; the Hebrews, too, marked the lintel of their dwellings with the blood of the Paſchal lamb, in the form of a _Tau_ or Croſs without a ſummit. The widow of Sarepta picked up and held croſſwiſe two pieces of wood, with which ſhe intended to bake her bread. Theſe figures, to which others alſo may be added, ſerve to exalt the triumph of the Croſs, and ſeem to flow from a grand central picture which forms their ſource, and exhibits Jeſus expiring on the Croſs. It is from that real Croſs indeed, bearing the Saviour, that theſe ſubjects from the Old Teſtament derive all their virtue.”

[Sidenote: _Wood of the Croſs._]

[Sidenote: _Croſs made of pine._]

The wood of which it was made is as unſettled as its ſhape. The Venerable Bede ſays that our Lord’s Croſs was made of four kinds of wood: the inſcription of box, the upright beam of cypreſs, the tranſverſe of cedar, and the lower part of pine. John Cantacuméne avers that only three woods were employed: the upright, cedar; the tranſverſe, pine; and the head in cypreſs. Others ſay that the upright was cypreſs, the tranſverſe in palm, and the head in olive; or cedar, cypreſs, and olive. Moſt authorities ſeem to concur that it was made of ſeveral woods, but there is a legend that it was made from the aſpen tree, whoſe leaves ſtill tremble at the awful uſe the tree was put to; whilſt that veritable traveller, Sir John Maundeville, ſays: “And alſo in Iheruſalem toward the Weaſt is a fayre church where the tree grew of the which the Croſſe was made.” Lipſius ſays that it was made of but one wood, and that was oak; but M. Rohault de Fleury (to whoſe wonderful and comprehenſive work, _Mémoire ſur les Inſtruments de la Paſſion de notre Sauveur Jeſus Chriſt_, I am deeply indebted, ſays, “M. Decaiſne, member of the Inſtitut, and M. Pietro Savi, profeſſor at the Univerſity of Piſa, have ſhewn me by the microſcope that the pieces in the Church of the Holy Croſs of Jeruſalem at Rome, in the Cathedral at Piſa, in the Duomo at Florence, and in Notre Dame at Paris, were of _pine_.” And he adds, in a footnote, “Independently of the experiments which M. Savi kindly made in my preſence, he wrote me the reſults of other obſervations, which tended to confirm.”

Starting with the Invention of the Holy Croſs, the loving, but fervid, imaginations of the faithful ſoon wove round it a covering of imagery, as we have juſt ſeen in the caſe of the ſeveral woods of the Croſs, and the ſacred tree became the ſubject of a legend (for ſo it always was only meant to be), which was incorporated in the _Legenda Aurea Sanctorum_, or _Golden Legend of the Saints_, of Jacobus de Voragine, a collection of legends connected with the ſervices of the Church. This book was exceedingly popular, and, when Caxton ſet up his printing-preſs at Weſtminſter, he produced a tranſlation, the hiſtory of which he quaintly tells us in a preface.[A]

[Sidenote: _Caxton’s Golden Legend_]

As this Golden Legend is the ſtandard authority on the ſubject, and as it will much aſſiſt the intelligent appreciation of the wood-blocks, I reproduce it, premiſing that I have uſed throughout the firſt edition, 20 Nov., 1483:—

[Sidenote: 3 _Page 39._]

[Sidenote: 4 _Laughed or ſmiled._]

[Sidenote: 5 _Obtained true mercy._]

[3] But alle the dayes of adam lyvynge here in erthe amounte to the ſomme of +ixCxxx+[B] yere / And in thende of his lyf whan he ſhold dye / it is ſaid but of none auctoryte / that he ſente Seth his ſone in to paradys for to fetch the oyle of mercy / where he receyuyde certayn graynes of the fruyt of the tree of mercy by an angel / And whan he come agayn / he fonde his fader adam yet alyve and told hym what he had don. And thenne Adam lawhed[4] firſt / and then deyed / and thenne he leyed the greynes or kernellis under his faders tonge and buryed hym / in the vale of ebron / and out of his mouth grewe thre trees of the thre graynes / of which the croſſe that our lord ſuffred his paſſion on / was made by vertue of which he gate[5] very mercy and was brought out of darknes in to veray light of heven / to the whiche he brynge us that lyveth and regneth god world with oute ende.

[Sidenote: 6 _Page 167._]

[Sidenote: 7 _Of old._]

THE[6] Invencion[C] of the holy croſſe is ſaid bycauſe that this day the holy croſſe was founden / for to fore[7] it was founden of ſeth in paradyſe tereſtre / lyke as hit ſhal be ſayd here after / and alſo it was founden of ſalamon in the mounte of lybane and of the quene of ſaba / in the temple of ſalamon / And of the Iewes in the water of pyſcyne[D] / And on thys day it was founden of Helayne in the mounte of Calvarye/.

Of the Holy Croſſe.

[Sidenote: 8 _Cured: French, guerir, to heal._]

[Sidenote: 9 _Whole._]

[Sidenote: 10 _Did ſo—cauſed to be: words of frequent occurrence._]

[Sidenote: 11 _Kingdom: French, royaume._]

[Sidenote: 12 _Ceaſe._]

[Sidenote: 13 _Dug, p. part. of delve._]

[Sidenote: 14 _Pond._]

[Sidenote: 15 _The Lăbărum, or Sacred Banner of Conſtantine._]

[Sidenote: 16 _Cauſed to be called together._]

[Sidenote: 17 _Know._]

[Sidenote: 18 _Grandfather._]