ca. 1880 French reliquary monstrance with relic of St. Catherine of Alexandria

Large French Gothic-style gilt-bronze monstrance reliquary dating to 1880's housing in the central glass-fronted cavity the first-class ex ossibus (of the bone) relic of Saint Catherine of Alexandria. The relic is affixed to a red velvet ground decorated with gilt paperole ornamentation and identified in French on a manuscript cedula label as Ste Catherine d'Alexandrie. On the back, under a metal protective cap, the theca is secured with a perfectly preserved seal of red Spanish wax with a clear imprint of a coat of arms of Fr. Pierre-Alfred Grimardias (†1896), Bishop of Cahors, France (1863-1893). 

Saint Catherine of Alexandria, also known as Saint Catherine of the Wheel and The Great Martyr Saint Catherine is, according to tradition, a Christian saint and virgin, who was martyred in the early 4th century at the hands of the pagan emperor Maxentius. She is a patron of Unmarried girls, Aalsum; apologists; craftsmen who work with a wheel (potters, spinners); archivists; dying people; educators; girls; jurists; knife sharpeners; lawyers; librarians; libraries; Balliol College; Massey College; maidens; mechanics; millers; milliners; hat-makers; nurses; philosophers; preachers; scholars; schoolchildren; scribes; secretaries; spinsters; stenographers; students; tanners; theologians; University of Oviedo; University of Paris; haberdashers; wheelwrights; Żejtun, Malta; Żurrieq, Malta; Pagbilao, Quezon, Philippines; Carcar City, Cebu, Philippines; and Katerini, Greece.