THE "LIGNUM CRUCIS"

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"LIGNUM CRUCIS"

Tradition relates it with the origin of the monastery, but it is most likely to have been brought at the same time as the remains of Santo Toribio de Astorga, around 8th century.
According to P. Sandoval, chronicler of the Benedictine Order, this relic is a piece of the left branch of the True Cross, which the Saint Elena (the Emperor Constantine's mother, in the 4th century) left in Jerusalem when she discovered Jesuschrist and the Tieves' crosses.
The piece was serrated and it appears in the upward-cross position so that the sacred hole where Christ's hand was nailed can be fully seen.
The piece is embedded in a gold-plated cross with lily-shaped drawings of a Gothic style made in a workshop of Valladolid in 1679.
The vertical pole of the Lignum Crucis is 635mm. long and the crosspiece 393mm., with both a thickness of 38mm.. This is the largest known piece of the True Cross, even larger than the one preserved in The Vatican.
A scientific analysis of the wood determined that the Lignum Crucis was made of Cupressus Sempervivens L., confirming it was an extraordinary old wood, which therefore can prove nothing against the age claimed.