The Titulus Crucis, otherwise known as the Title of the Cross. Can be defined as a religious fetish object when one uses the word ‘fetish’ in it’s antiqued definition. It is a 25 by 14 centimeter plank of walnut wood. The artifact itself is stored in a Catholic Church in Rome outside the Vatican. The markings on the wood are in three languages; Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. The Hebrew portion is damaged beyond recognition, but the Latin and Greek read “Jesus the Nazarene King of the Jews”. Essentially, This artifact is is said to be same inscription described in John 19:19, Mark 15:26, and Luke 23:38. Preserved for all faithful adherents of the Catholic Church.
The Tradition states that St. Helena, the mother of Emperor Constantine, found the cross used to crucify the Christ on or around the year 326. She took the cross to Constantinople and the sign to Rome, where it has remained ever since. Around seven hundred years after the St. Helena discovered the inscription a Cardinal Priest who presumably had the artifact in his procession stored it in a time capsule within the walls of his church. In 1492, the year that Columbus sailed the ocean blue. Workers renovating the church rediscovered the inscription. And such the holy relic has been stored in the Cappella Delle Reliquie to this day.
Is the relic authentic? No, it is almost certainly a forgery. The Tradition is contradicted by a report from a pilgrim who claimed that the same inscription was used in a ceremony in Jerusalem decades after St. Helena died. Another fellow wrote around the year 570 that Constantine had built a church to venerate the artifacts that had allegedly been removed by his own mother. Finally, the coup de grace. Radiocarbon dating revealed that the inscription was from the 12th century, which just so happens to be around the same time the supposedly authentic artifact was deposited in that time capsule.
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