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 among the knights; who, after their return to the homeland, donated them to churches and monasteries.
The Holy Shroud is considered one of the most important relics of Christianity. Its existence has been documented since the 6th century, when it was venerated in Edessa, Syria. In 944, it was brought to Constantinople, where it was depicted in the “Codex Pray” and described in the homilies of the Patriarchs and the reports of visitors. In 1204, during the 4th Crusade, it was stolen from its reliquary in the Imperial Palace Chapel by the French knight Othon de la Roche and brought to France via Athens. He sent it to his castle near Besancon, where it was shown in the local Cathedral on Good Friday. Since 1357, it was first venerated in Lirey, Champagne, then in Chambery, and finally brought to Turin, Italy by the Savoy Dynasty in 1598.
According to the New Testament, a woven Crown of Thorns was placed on the head of Jesus during the events leading up to his crucifixion. It was one of the instruments of the Passion, employed by Jesus' captors both to cause him pain and to mock his claim of authority. It is mentioned in the gospels of Matthew (Matthew 27:29), Mark (Mark 15:17) and John (John 19:2, 19:5), and is often alluded to by the early Church Fathers, such as Clement of Alexandria, Origen and others, along with being referenced in the apocryphal Gospel of Peter. Since at least around the year 400 AD, a relic of the Crown of Thorns has been venerated. In 1238, the Latin Emperor Baldwin II of Constantinople yielded the relic to French King Louis IX.
Holy Sepulchre or Jesus's empty tomb is one of the holiest sites in Christianity where he is said to have been buried and resurrected. The tomb is enclosed by the 18th-century shrine, called the Edicule in The Church of the Holy Sepulchre located in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem.
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