THE name, True Cross, was given tothe wooden cross on which Jesus

Christ was crucified and which wasdiscovered by the Empress Helena inJerusalem, or so it was thought. The storyof the True Cross is fascinating, but mostof it is myth and legend. Parts of the storyare not fictional, and it is interesting toconsider some related numismatic items.Let’s begin at the beginning, in theGarden of Eden (Figure 1). According toone account in The Golden Legend byJacobus de Voragine, who was archbishopof Genoa in the 13th century, the wood ofthe True Cross came from the Tree of theKnowledge of Good and Evil, which grewin the middle of the Garden. Anothermore detailed account in the book des-cribes how Adam, after being banishedfrom the Garden of Eden and facingdeath, asked his son, Seth, to go to theGarden and ask for a balm to save himfrom death. When Seth approached thegate of the Garden he saw the great ‘flam-ing sword flashing back and forth toguard the way to the Tree of Life.’ (Gen-esis 3: 24b) According to Jacobus, thesword was in the hand of an archangelwhose wings spread out to block the

entrance, and the archangel told Seththat the time of pardon had not yet come.He said he would give Seth seeds fromthe Tree of Life, which he should put inthe mouth of Adam when he died. Heshould then bury Adam in the earth.

So Seth did this and out of Adam’sgrave a tree grew. King Solomon wantedthe wood for the building of his palacebut the tree would not cooperate andeventually its trunk was buried in Jeru-salem where the Pool of Bethesda wouldlater be situated. That is why the pool hadmiraculous healing powers. Disabledpeople would wait till the water wasagitated before immersing themselves.(John 5: 2-7)Just before the crucifixion of JesusChrist (Figure 2) the trunk rose to thesurface of the pool. It was brought outof the water and when it had dried itwas used to make the cross. After thecrucifixion it was buried near the hill ofCalvary where it was to remain for threehundred years. The hill was calledCalvary, which means ‘skull’, not becauseit was skull-shaped, but because Adam’sskull was buried there, or so the peoplebelieved. In Orthodox iconography Adam’sskull is always shown in the earthbelow the cross. (Figures 3 and 4) In a legend popular in the Middle Agesthe cross on which Jesus was crucifiedwas identified with the World Tree, whichstood at the centre of the cosmos and

Fresco by Piero della Francesca (1415 – 1492) showing Helenafinding the True Cross. (Wikimedia Commons)

Figure 1 – Adam and Eve in the Garden ofEden. Obverse of a gilded silver cast medal byNickel Milicz (1544 – 70). The Latin inscrip-tion is SICVT PER ADAM PECCATVM ESTPROPAGATVM IN OMNES HOMINE (Asthrough Adam sin is extended to all men).(Image courtesy of Chaponnière & FirmenichSA. The medal was Lot 409 in Auction 4.)

stretched from earth to heaven. What-ever the origin of the wood in the cross,Helena, the mother of Constantine theGreat, was credited with the discovery ofthe True Cross that had been buried atCalvary (Figure 5). Constantine was thefirst Roman emperor to be a Christian,and Helena was also a Christian. In 326AD she travelled to the Holy Land andin a dream she was directed to where thecross was buried.The story goes that she unearthedthree wooden crosses and the problemwas, which was the cross on whichChrist was crucified? To solve the prob-lem each cross was tested to see if it hadmiraculous powers. The True Cross wasrevealed when a crippled woman wasstretched out on it and was healed. Inanother version the True Cross washeld over a dead man who came alive.Surprisingly, although Helena’s port-rait appears on coins issued after 326and before her death in 329 (Figure 6)the cross does not appear on them noron any of the coins issued by Constantineand his family. In fact it was not till thereign of Arcadius (383 – 408) that thecross appears on coins as a symbol ofChristianity (Figure 7). This raises doubtwhether it was really Helena who dis-covered the cross. Cyril of Jerusalem

wrote in 346, “The saving wood of theCross was found at Jerusalem in the timeof Constantine and it was disturbedfragment by fragment from this spot.”He does not mention Helena. Similarly,Eusebius in his Life of Constantine,which was unfinished at his death in339, makes no mention of Helena havingfound the True Cross. Averil Cameronand Stuart Hall, in their commentaryon Eusebius’ Life of Constantine (Oxford:Clarendon Press, 1999, 280) conclude:“While later generations universallyascribed the supposed discovery of theTrue Cross to Helena, her name wasattached to the story only later, whetherin Jerusalem itself or by Ambrose in hisfuneral oration for Theodosius I in 395.”Arcadius was the son of Theodosius I andit seems that by this time he and every-one else believed that Helena had dis-covered the True Cross. Helena is stillvenerated as a saint today. On a religiousmedal made in Germany in 1933 shestands holding the Cross (Figure 8).The largest part of the Cross was depos-ited in a church built on the site of thediscovery. One piece was sent to Constan-tinople, and according to the 5th centuryhistorian, Socrates, it was placed insidea statue of Constantine that stood on acolumn in the Forum. Some pieces includ-ing the titulus (headboard) were sent toRome to a church especially built for itand called Santa Croce (Holy Cross).The next chapter in the story of the

True Cross occurs during the reign of theByzantine emperor, Heraclius, 610 – 641AD, (Figure 9). By this time the storyhas a firm historical basis. The Persianking, Khosrow II (Figure 10), invadedthe Byzantine Empire and in 614 aftera siege of about three weeks his armysmashed into Jerusalem. The Church of

Figure 2 – Scene of the Crucifixion. Reverseof medal in Figure 1. The inscription is ITAPER IESVM CHRISTVM GRATIA PROPA-GATUR IN OMNES R 5 (So through JesusChrist grace is extended to all, Romans 5).

Figure 3 – Large brass and enamel crucifix,Russian, 19th century. It shows Adam’s skullin the hill of Calvary below the Cross (Collec-tion of St John’s Cathedral, Brisbane)

Figure 4 – Detail of Figure 3, showing Adam’s skull.

Figure 5 – Detail of ‘Discovery of the TrueCross’, a fresco by Agnolo Gaddi (1350 –1396). (Wikimedia Commons).

Figure 6 – Bronze coin of Helena. It wasminted at Antioch in the period 327-28 AD.Diameter 20 mms. Obverse: Bust of Helenawith FL HELENA AVGVSTA. Reverse: Veiledwoman holding a branch. The legend isSECVRITAS REIPVBLICE with SMANTS(Money struck at Antioch in the 6th workshop)in the exergue. RIC VII 80.

the Holy Sepulchre, built by Constan-tine the Great, was destroyed by fireand the True Cross was carried off toCtesiphon, the Persian capital. In 628Heraclius finally defeated the Persians,and Khosrow was killed by his son, whoreturned the True Cross. Heracliusentered Constantinople with the TrueCross, but in 630 he returned it to Jeru-salem to the rebuilt Church of the HolySepulchre. He personally carried it alongthe Via Dolorosa. The only coin ever to bear the mintname, Jerusalem (IEPOCOΛYMA inGreek), is a bronze follis with the bustand name of Heraclius on the obverse.On the reverse there is a large M (for40) flanked by ANNO 1111 (year 4) andin the exergue there is the mint name(Figure 11). A similar coin (Sear Byz.

852c) has XC NIKA (Christ conquers) inthe exergue. Both coins are very rare.Because the 4th year of Heraclius’ reignwas 614 it was thought that these coinsmust have been minted during the siegeof Jerusalem. However, this has recentlybeen questioned because three weekswould have been too short a time to pre-pare the dies and mint the coins. Theimage of the emperor on a coin bearingthe name, Jerusalem, or the words, ‘Christconquers’, would have encouraged theChristians in the besieged city, but it ismuch more likely that ‘year 4’ refers tothe year of indiction, which was a fiscalperiod of 15 years instituted by Con-stantine the Great for tax purposes andreckoned from 312 AD. During the reignof Heraclius, the 4th year of indiction was630 AD, which is when he returned theTrue Cross to Jerusalem. In this casethese folles were minted to celebrate thatevent. Also to celebrate the event, and to makesome money, it seems that small claytokens were issued (Figure 12). As theonly known hoard of these tokens wasfound in Turkey, Michael Mitchiner inMedieval Pilgrim & Secular Badges(London: 1986, 274) suggested, “Thesepieces may well have been officially pro-

duced for distribution to those who attended the True Cross on its journey.”Presumably this journey was from Con-stantinople to Jerusalem. The tokensshow the Cross with two, sometimesthree, figures at its base. They are verycrude. Why would anybody want one ofthese little baked-clay lumps unless therewas something special about them? Theanswer is probably because it was be-lieved that they were made of clay mixedwith the ash of burnt splinters from theTrue Cross.In the midst of all the turmoil of the7th century there was a saint who is nowlargely forgotten. He was a young sol-dier in the Persian army in 614 ADwhen it captured Jerusalem. In the cityhe became a Christian. His name wasMagundat, but he was renamed Anas-tasius (Resurrection) because he believedin the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Hebecame a monk, but some years laterwhen he preached to the Persian garrisonin Caesarea he was arrested, flogged andpunished with hard labour. Because herefused to renounce his faith he wastaken in chains to the Euphrates regionwhere he was tortured and eventuallystrangled in 628 AD. His face appears onan old religious medal. When the medalis laid back he seems to be dead (Figure13) but when it is stood up vertically, hiseyes are wide open (Figure 14). This is inkeeping with his name, which literallymeans, ‘stand again’. In 640 AD hisrelics were deposited in the Church ofSt Vincent and St Anastasius in Rome.

Figure 7 – Bronze coin of Arcadius (383 – 408AD). It is only 10 mms in diameter. RIC X 132.(Collection of St John’s Cathedral, Brisbane)

Figure 8 – Aluminium medal showing Helena holding the Cross. Diameter 28 mms. The Germaninscription is HEILEGE HELENA BITTE F. U. (Saint Helena, pray for us).

Figure 9 – Gold solidus of the Emperor Her-aclius minted at Constantinople. Diameter 21mms. Dumbarton Oaks, Vol. 2, Pt 1, 1 var.(Collection of St John’s Cathedral, Brisbane)

While the Byzantine and the Persianempires were being exhausted by war anew power was moving out of Arabia. In636 the Byzantine army was defeated byan Arab one and in 638 Caliph Omarrode into Jerusalem. Heraclius, how-ever, had removed the True Cross fromJerusalem and taken it again to Con-stantinople. Part of it remained in Jeru-salem and when the crusaders capturedthe city in 1099 the Orthodox prieststhere were tortured until they revealedits hiding place. Subsequently the crus-aders took the True Cross with themwhenever they went into battle. Whenthey were finally defeated by Saladin in1187 he allowed pilgrims to Jerusalem tosee it. After this it was lost and never seenagain.The True Cross that was taken to Con-

stantinople remained there until thecity was sacked by the Fourth Crusadein 1204. It had been decorated with goldand jewels, and the Latin bishops whonow controlled the churches in Constan-tinople carved it up and distributed thepieces to the crusaders. When theseknights returned to Western Europemany of them donated their pieces to localchurches and monasteries. Fragments

of the wood of the Cross became preciousrelics, much sort after by wealthy Chris-tians. They were often encased in goldreliquaries covered with jewels (Figure15). There was such a demand for theserelics that, in order to explain how thesupply increased to meet the demand,the miracle of multiplication (like theloaves and the fishes) was promulgated.By the time of the Reformation in the16th century so many churches claimedto have pieces of the True Cross thatthe reformer, Jean Calvin, sarcasticallyremarked that there were enough piecesof the True Cross to fill a ship.

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Figure 10 – Silver drachm of Khosrow II. Diameter 32 mms. On the reverse two attendantsstand on either side of a fire altar. Worship of fire was part of Zoroastrianism.

Figure 11 – Bronze follis of Heraclius minted atJerusalem. Diameter 32 mms. Sear Byz. 852B.(Collection of St John’s Cathedral, Brisbane)

Figure 12 – Baked-clay token made in about630 AD and said to contain ash from the TrueCross. Diameter 15 mms. The reverse is blank.(Collection of St John’s Cathedral, Brisbane)

Figure 13 – ‘Anastasius dead’. A bronze medalshowing St Anastasius the Persian. Diameter22 mms. He wears a Persian cap and has ahalo. The Latin inscription is CAPUT S.ANASTASII PERS. M (Head of Saint Anas-tasius the Persian, martyr)

Figure 14 – ‘Anastasius alive’. Same as Fig-ure 14, but the medal is vertical.

Figure 15 – A richly decorated reliquary inPamplona Cathedral in Spain. (WikimediaCommons)