A manuscript made of animal skins depicts the Cross of Bromholm. It is believed to have contained a piece of Jesus’ cross and was kept at an English monastery in Norfolk.
The prayer roll measures five inches long and features beautiful artwork and designs. It also contains imagery and text that link to Bromholm Priory in northeast Norfolk, a long-defunct pilgrimage site of which only a few ruins are left.
This monastery was founded in 1113 and was believed to have contained a fragment from the cross in which Jesus was crucified. However, the priory was destroyed and the wooden relic disappeared without a trace.
The manuscript also contains details about Catholic practices before Henry VIII broke with Rome and the Protestant reformation of 500 years ago.
A manuscript made of animal skins describes The Cross of Bromholm. It supposedly contained a piece of Jesus’ cross and was kept in a monastery in Norfolk.
Gail Turner, an art historian, stated in a statement that she had just completed a new research. [the manuscript]The article gives insight into the devotional practices associated with a large crucifix (or ‘Rood’) at Bromholm priory, in Norfolk. It also reveals a direct link between this 16th-century artifact and a well-known religious relic that was once associated with miracles in Christianity.
Although the prayer roll is not new, it was first discovered in the 1960s and 1970s. Turner was the first to attempt to decipher its text and imagery.
The analysis revealed that the manuscript was owned by a wealthy pilgrim. It was made from two pieces of Vellum (animal skins), which were then stitched together.
Turner stated that the roll “reflects a time when laity (non clergy) believed in both visible enemies and invisible enemies.”
This monastery was founded in 1113 and was believed to have housed a fragment from the cross in which Jesus was crucified. However, the priory was destroyed and the wooden relic disappeared without a trace
‘For their owners, prayer rolls…were prized as very personal inspirations to prayer, although during the Reformation and after they were commonly undervalued and dismissed.
“The survival of a such a magnificent role for more than 500 year is therefore remarkable.”
There are also signs throughout the roll of abrasion that correspond to the idea that worshippers touched or kissed images Jesus on the cross to try and experience Christ’s Passion’more directly and powerfully’.
“Indeed, historians reveal that abrasion marks can be seen on the Bromholm rolls where the owner engaged in such a devotional act as identified in other similar rolls.
The roll also features three nails that are stabbed through a heart with their hands, and the hands on either side of them have stab wounds. The manuscript also contains information about Catholic practices prior to Henry VIII’s break from Rome and the Protestant reformation that took place 500 years ago.
Other images of the roll include the three nails that are stabbed through a heart and the hands that have stab wounds on their palms.
Turner wrote that the ends of the nails were reddish-brown as if they were stained with blood and were painted against a background of a green hill, presumably Golgoth in the study published by the British Archaeological Association.
‘As in the Coverham roll mentioned above, the Crown of Thorns (stylized and not to scale) is interwoven with the nails, and here encompasses images of the Five Wounds of Christ — hands, feet and side/heart, all of which drip blood.’
The priory is now in ruins in a field close to Bacto. A study suggests that the Rood of Bromholm could be found in London – according a 1537 letter to Thomas Cromwell written by Sir Richard Southwell, a Norfolk courtier.
Bromholm Priory is said to have acquired the wooden relic from an English chaplain who fled the sack of Constantinople in 1204.