St Luke Reliquary

The Arm of Saint Luke reliquary is similar to the reliquary of Saint Louis of Toulouse. However, the Arm of Saint Luke is slightly smaller. A crystal cylinder held the relic and allowed the viewer to see the relic from all angles, making this reliquary in the round. The base is decorated with coat of arms, like the Arm of Saint Louis of Toulouse, but also with floral detailing engraved in it. There are flour des lis right above the base in blue diamonds on red strips, on the detailing climbing up the crystal cylinder, and then again at the top of the cylinder mimicking the bottom design with blue diamond shapes and red stripes. Even though both of the reliquaries, Arm of Saint Louis of Toulouse and Arm of Saint Luke were commissioned

Saint Luke is best known for his written works in the New Testament. The artists chose to depict his relic holding a pen as a tribute to the fact that he dedicated his life to writing religious pieces for the New Testament. The hand is platted in gold and the detailing is naturalistic. On the back of the hand, the viewer can see the knuckle bones in detail and the skin pulled tight as Saint Luke holds the pen. The palm of the hand is wrinkly and fleshy and the pen sits between the thumb and the index finger. There is no ornamentation or jewelry on the hand, just a simple pen in the hand of a humble

There are four slivers of wood of the true cross in this reliquary. Two of the slivers make a cross shape at the top of the reliquary and the other two make a cross shape in the middle of it. So essentially the true cross figure holds two little cross shapes within it. The reliquary is engraves with circles that hold different animals and plants in them, such as a griffin and eagle, which represents different apostles of Jesus. The gold true cross reliquary within the True Cross reliquary makes the relic easier to manipulate, display, and present on days of celebration or significant ceremonies since it is small enough to carry around and can be taken out (HAHN RELICS 290). This allowed the relic to be paraded around so everyone could see the relic on important days, and then it could go back into the larger reliquary to be protected. It also maintained a balance of what Brown calls praesentia, which is “the physical presence of the holy,” (BROWN PRAESENTIA 88). A tension must be present between the distance and the proximity of relics to ensure pilgrimages which maintains praesentia within the world of the relics (BROWN PRAESENTIA 88). Owning a piece of wood that supposedly comes from the cross of Jesus, boosts the authority of the church by bringing in pilgrims who wanted to see the relic for themselves. While some churches held bone relics of saints, churches with the true cross relic held a