Vatican reliquary theca with relics of St. Anne, Mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Oval glass-fronted brass reliquary theca housing the first-class ex ossibus (of the bone) relic of Saint Anne, Mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The relic is affixed to a red silk ground and identified in Latin on a typeset cedula label as S. Annae Mo. (Saint Anne, Mother). On the back, under the protective cap with a portrait of the saint, the theca is secured with a seal of red Spanish wax bearing an imprint of a crest of Monsignor Costantino Patrizi Naro (†1876), Dean of the College of Cardinals and the Vicar General of the Roman Curia.

Saint Anne was the mother of Mary and grandmother of Jesus according to apocryphal Christian and Islamic tradition. She is a holy patron of Canada, carpenters; childless people; equestrians; grandparents; homemakers/housewives; lacemakers; lost articles; miners; mothers; moving house; old-clothes dealers; poverty; pregnancy; seamstresses; stablemen; sterility; mothers; and children.