History
Tradition says that the primitive, undecorated wooden core of this cross was carried against the Muslims of al-Andalus by King Pelagius of Asturias at the Battle of Covadonga. The cross would later be kept by his son Favila of Asturias in the Church of Santa Cruz de Cangas de Onís erected by Favila and his wife Froiluba in 737and dedicated to True Cross in Cangas de Onís, the first capital of the Kingdom of Asturias. The ornate casing, similar to that upon the Cross of the Angels, was added later, and contains 152 gems and imitation gems. An inscription tells us that this casing was made at the Castle of Gauzón in Asturias in 908. Alfonso III donated this important Pre-Romanesque gold artifact to Cathedral of Oviedo to commemorate a hundred years of the Asturian kingdom's victories and conquests.
During the Spanish Civil War, the Cross, like the rest of the artifacts in the Cámara Sancta, suffered serious damages which required its restoration.
The Victoria Cross recovered its gems from 1942 on, thanks to popular donations for the acquisition and restoration of the relic. However, the work of goldsmiths Horacio Rivero Alvarez and Luis Aguilar did not consider the original design, altering the position of the medallion on both fronts. In 1971 new enamels were placed by German goldsmith Werner Henneberger, but here again the original design was not taken sufficiently into account.
On August 9, 1977, the Cross, together with Agate box and the Cross of the Angels, were stolen and suffered serious damage after the thieves torn their precious stones and gold plating. Its current appearance is the result of careful reconstruction carried out in 1978.
Read more about this topic: Victory Cross
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“As History stands, it is a sort of Chinese Play, without end and without lesson.”
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)
“Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the Word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.”
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809)
“What you don’t understand is that it is possible to be an atheist, it is possible not to know if God exists or why He should, and yet to believe that man does not live in a state of nature but in history, and that history as we know it now began with Christ, it was founded by Him on the Gospels.”
—Boris Pasternak (1890–1960)