How the Holy Cross Came from Antioch to Brogne: A Critical Edition and Translation of Quomodo Sancta Crux AB Antiochia Allata Sit in Broniense Cenobiu

In 1152, a knight from the southern Low Countries named Manasses of Hierges returned home after eleven years spent crusading in the Holy Land. He carried with him a precious relic, said to be a fragment of the True Cross that had belonged to the princes of Antioch. Nearly sixty years later, a writer associated with a nearby monastery composed a new Latin narrative, hagiographical, and liturgical textual programme known as Quomodo Sancta Crux ab Antiochia allata sit in Broniense cenobium (How the Holy Cross Came from Antioch to the Monastery of Brogne). It tells the story of Manasses, his career in Europe and the Near East, and of the conflict that broke out over possession of the relic after his death.

This volume provides the first critical edition and English translation of a source that contributes greatly to our knowledge of the medieval world, from crusading to material religion to relations between the lay aristocracy and religious communities. The work of a learned author with ambitions to a high literary and homiletic style, it offers a fresh perspective on the question of what motivated crusaders and on the history of the Holy Land under crusader occupation, providing critical new details to the story of the civil war between Queen Melisende of Jerusalem and her son, King Baldwin III. The sustained account of the conflict over a relic provides a window into the importance of sacred objects, and competing notions of sacrality, legal possession, and value. Previously unknown to historians, this work provides a rich illustration of the place of crusading in the memory of a local community. A detailed critical apparatus establishes what can be known about the work's composition and the author's reliance on Classical, Patristic, and Scriptural authorities, while an introduction gives an account of the work's political, cultural, and intellectual context.