The True Cross is the name for physical remnants which, by the Church tradition, are believed to be from the cross upon which Jesus was crucified. Empress Helena, the mother of Constantine, the first Christian Emperor of Rome, traveled to the Holy Land in 326–28, where she discovered the hiding place of three crosses that were believed to be used at the crucifixion of Jesus and of two thieves, St. Dismas and Gestas, executed with him, and a miracle revealed which of the three was the True Cross. Fragments of the Cross were broken up, and the pieces were widely distributed; in 348, in one of his Catecheses, Cyril of Jerusalem remarked that the "whole earth is full of the relics of the Cross of Christ." Most of the very small relics of the True Cross in Europe came from Constantinople after the city was captured and sacked in 1204 during the Fourth Crusade. They were carved up by the present bishops and divided with other very precious relics.
Translation of the authentics document:
FATHER JOSEPH BARTHOLOMEW MENOCHIO [1741-1823]
Order of Hermits of St. Augustine
By the grace of God and the Apostolic See
Bishop of Porphyreon
Prefect of the Apostolic Shrine
Domestic Prelate of Our Most Holy Lord [the Pope] and Assistant to the Pontifical See.
To all and each who will inspect our [document] we make a sure pact and attest, just as we have for many presented sacred relics, that we recognize them as picked out from authentic places, with legitimate documentation, and confirmed by seal; from these [relics] we have removed a sacred piece of the Most Holy Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ, which in reverence we have placed in a silver theca, oval in shape, guarded by a single pane of glass [and] bound on the back by a cord of true silk, red in color, secured by the impression of our seal in red Spanish wax. We have given said Holy Relic as a gift with the permission to keep it among yourselves, to give it on to others, and to exhibit publicly in whatever church, oratory, or chapel for the adoration of the Faithful, and for the greater glory of God, Greatest and Best, and the veneration and worship of His Saints. Against the promise of these things, etc. Given in Rome on this day, February 11, 1807. Issued for no remuneration but the gratitude,
A. F. Joseph Bartholomeo, Bishop of Porphyreon
Поменять язык на русский 