Arthur Evans
Sir Arthur John Evans FRS FREng was an English archaeologist and pioneer in the study of Aegean civilization in the Bronze Age. He is most famous for unearthing the palace of Knossos on the Greek island of Crete, Evans was the first to define Cretan scripts Linear A and Linear B, as well as an earlier pictographic writing. He was, on request of the organizations of the peoples of the Balkans. Arthur Evans was born in Nash Mills, the first child of John Evans and Harriet Ann Dickinson, the daughter of Johns employer and founder of Messrs John Dickinson, a paper mill. John Evans came from a family of men who were educated and intellectually active, they were nevertheless undistinguished by either wealth or aristocratic connection. Johns father, Arthur Benoni Evans, Arthurs grandfather, had been headmaster of Market Bosworth Grammar School, John knew Latin and could quote the classical authors. In 1840, instead of going to college, John started work in the mill owned by his maternal uncle and he married his cousin, Harriet, in 1850, which entitled him, in 1851, to a junior partnership in the family business.
Profits from the mill would eventually help fund Arthurs excavations, restorations at Knossos, for the time being they were an unpretentious and affectionate family. They moved into a row house built for the purpose near the mill. Grandmother Evans called Arthur darling Trot, asserting in a note that, compared to his father, in 1856, with Harriets declining health and Jacks growing reputation and prosperity, they moved into Harriets childhood home, a mansion with a garden, where the children ran free. John maintained his status as an officer in the company, which eventually became John Dickinson Stationery and his interest in geology came from an assignment by the company to study the diminishing water resources in the area with a view toward protecting the company from lawsuits. The mill consumed large amounts of water, which was needed for the canals and he became an expert and a legal consultant. However, collecting was endemic to the family, his father and grandfather both had done it and he was more interested in the stone-age artifacts he was discovering while mapping stream beds.
As Arthur grew older, he was allowed to assist John in looking for artifacts, ultimately John became a distinguished antiquary, publishing numerous books and articles. In 1859 he conducted a survey of the Somme Valley with Joseph Prestwich. His connections and invaluable advice were indispensable to Arthurs career throughout the remainder of his long life, Arthurs mother, died in 1858 when Arthur was seven. He had two brothers, Philip Norman and Lewis, and two sisters and Harriet and he would remain on excellent terms with all of them all of his life. He was raised by a stepmother, Fanny, née Phelps and she had no children of her own and predeceased her husband
Patriarchal cross
The Patriarchal cross is a variant of the Christian cross, the religious symbol of Christianity. Similar to the familiar Latin cross, the Patriarchal cross possesses a smaller crossbar placed above the main one, sometimes the patriarchal cross has a short, slanted crosspiece near its foot. This slanted, lower crosspiece often appears in Byzantine Greek and Eastern European iconography, the Byzantine Christianization came to the Morava empire in the year 863, provided at the request of Rastislav sent Byzantine Emperor Michael III. The symbol, often referred to as the cross, appeared in the Byzantine Empire in large numbers in the 10th century. For a long time, it was thought to have given to Saint Stephen by the pope as the symbol of the apostolic Kingdom of Hungary. The two-barred cross is one of the elements in the coats of arms of Hungary since 1190. It appeared during the reign of King Béla III, who was raised in the Byzantine court, Béla was the son of Russian princess Eufrosina Mstislavovna.
The cross appears floating in the coat of arms and on the coins from this era, in medieval Kingdom of Hungary was extended Byzantine Cyril-Methodian and western Latin church was expanded later. The two-barred cross in the Hungarian coat of arms comes from the source of Byzantine Empire in the 12th century. Unlike the ordinary Christian cross, the symbolism and meaning of the cross is not well understood. The top beam represents the plaque bearing the inscription Jesus of Nazareth, a popular view is that the slanted bottom beam is a foot rest, however there is no evidence of foot rests ever being used during crucifixion, and it has a deeper meaning. The bottom beam may represent a balance of justice, many symbolic interpretations of the double cross have been put forth. One of them says that the first horizontal line symbolized the secular power, that the first cross bar represents the death and the second cross the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Russian cross can be considered a version of the Patriarchal cross.
One suggestion is the lower crossbeam represents the footrest to which the feet of Jesus were nailed, in some earlier representations the crossbar near the bottom is straight, or slanted upwards. In Slavic and other traditions, it came to be depicted as slanted, during 1577–1625 the Russian use of the cross was between the heads of the double-headed eagle in the coat of arms of Russia. One tradition says that this comes from the idea that as Jesus Christ took his last breath, in this manner it reminds the viewer of the Last Judgment. Another form of the cross was used by the Jagiellonian dynasty in Poland and this cross now features on the coat of arms of Lithuania, where it appears on the shield of the knight
Church of the Holy Sepulchre
The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is a church in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, a few steps away from the Muristan. The tomb is enclosed by the 18th-century shrine, called the Aedicule, within the church proper are the last four Stations of the Via Dolorosa, representing the final episodes of Jesus Passion. The main denominations sharing property over parts of the church are the Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox and Roman Catholic, and to a lesser degree the Egyptian Copts and Ethiopians. According to Eusebius of Caesarea, the Roman emperor Hadrian in the 2nd century AD built a dedicated to the goddess Venus in order to bury the cave in which Jesus had been buried. The first Christian emperor, Constantine the Great, ordered in about 325/326 that the temple be replaced by a church, during the building of the Church, Constantines mother, Helena, is believed to have rediscovered the tomb. Socrates Scholasticus, in his Ecclesiastical History, gives a description of the discovery.
The remains are enveloped by a marble sheath placed some 500 years before to protect the ledge from Ottoman attacks. However, there are several thick window wells extending through the marble sheath and they appear to reveal an underlying limestone rock, which may be part of the original living rock of the tomb. The church was starting in 325/326, and was consecrated on 13 September 335. From pilgrim reports it seems that the housing the tomb of Jesus was freestanding at first. Each year, the Eastern Orthodox Church celebrates the anniversary of the consecration of the Church of the Resurrection on 13 September and this building was damaged by fire in May of 614 when the Sassanid Empire, under Khosrau II, invaded Jerusalem and captured the True Cross. In 630, the Emperor Heraclius restored it and rebuilt the church after recapturing the city, after Jerusalem came under Arab rule, it remained a Christian church, with the early Muslim rulers protecting the citys Christian sites. A story reports that the Caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab visited the church and stopped to pray on the balcony and he feared that future generations would misinterpret this gesture, taking it as a pretext to turn the church into a mosque.
Eutychius added that Umar wrote a decree prohibiting Muslims from praying at this location, the building suffered severe damage due to an earthquake in 746. Early in the century, another earthquake damaged the dome of the Anastasis. The damage was repaired in 810 by Patriarch Thomas, in the year 841, the church suffered a fire. In 935, the Orthodox Christians prevented the construction of a Muslim mosque adjacent the Church, in 938, a new fire damaged the inside of the basilica and came close to the rotunda. In 966, due to a defeat of Muslim armies in the region of Syria, the doors and roof were burnt, and the Patriarch John VII was murdered
History of Anglo-Saxon England
Anglo-Saxon England was early medieval England, existing from the 5th to the 11th century from the end of Roman Britain until the Norman conquest in 1066. It consisted of various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms until 927 when it was united as the Kingdom of England by King Æthelstan and it became part of the North Sea Empire of Cnut the Great, a personal union between England and Norway in the 11th century. The Anglo-Saxons were the members of Germanic-speaking groups who migrated to the half of the island from continental Europe. Anglo-Saxon identity survived beyond the Norman conquest, came to be known as Englishry under Norman rule, Bede completed his book Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum in around 731. Thus the term for English people was in use by to distinguish Germanic groups in Britain from those on the continent, the historian James Campbell suggested that it was not until the late Anglo-Saxon period that England could be described as a nation state. It is certain that the concept of Englishness only developed very slowly, as the Roman occupation of Britain was coming to an end, Constantine III withdrew the remains of the army, in reaction to the barbarian invasion of Europe.
The Romano-British leaders were faced with a security problem from seaborne raids. The expedient adopted by the Romano-British leaders was to enlist the help of Anglo-Saxon mercenaries, in about 442 the Anglo-Saxons mutinied, apparently because they had not been paid. There followed several years of fighting between the British and the Anglo-Saxons, the fighting continued until around 500, when, at the Battle of Mount Badon, the Britons inflicted a severe defeat on the Anglo-Saxons. There are records of Germanic infiltration into Britain that date before the collapse of the Roman Empire and it is believed that the earliest Germanic visitors were eight cohorts of Batavians attached to the 14th Legion in the original invasion force under Aulus Plautius in AD43. There is a hypothesis that some of the tribes, identified as Britons by the Romans. It was quite common for Rome to swell its legions with foederati recruited from the German homelands and this practice extended to the army serving in Britain, and graves of these mercenaries, along with their families, can be identified in the Roman cemeteries of the period.
The migration continued with the departure of the Roman army, when Anglo-Saxons were recruited to defend Britain, and during the period of the Anglo-Saxon first rebellion of 442. The arrival of the Anglo-Saxons into Britain can be seen in the context of a movement of Germanic peoples around Europe between the years 300 and 700, known as the Migration period. In the same there were migrations of Britons to the Armorican peninsula, initially around 383 during Roman rule. The historian Peter Hunter-Blair expounded what is now regarded as the view of the Anglo-Saxon arrival in Britain. He suggested a mass immigration and driving the Sub-Roman Britons off their land and into the extremities of the islands. This view was influenced by sources such as Bede, where he talks about the Britons being slaughtered or going into perpetual servitude
Valens
Valens, fully Flavius Julius Valens Augustus, was Eastern Roman Emperor from 364 to 378. He was given the half of the empire by his brother Valentinian I after the latters accession to the throne. Valens, sometimes known as the Last True Roman, was defeated and killed in the Battle of Adrianople and his brother Valentinian were both born in Cibalae into an Illyrian family in 328 and 321 respectively. They had grown up on estates purchased by their father Gratian the Elder in Africa, while Valentinian had enjoyed a successful military career prior to his appointment as emperor, Valens apparently had not. He had spent much of his youth on the estate and only joined the army in the 360s. In February 364, reigning Emperor Jovian, while hastening to Constantinople to secure his claim to the throne, was asphyxiated during a stop at Dadastana,100 miles east of Ankara, among Jovians lieutenants was Valentinian, a tribunus scutariorum. He was proclaimed Augustus on 26 February,364, Valentinian felt that he needed help to govern the large and troublesome empire, and, on 28 March of the same year, appointed his brother Valens as co-emperor in the palace of Hebdomon.
The two Augusti travelled together through Adrianople and Naissus to Sirmium, where they divided their personnel, Valens obtained the eastern half of the Empire Greece, Egypt and Anatolia as far east as Persia. Valens was back in his capital of Constantinople by December 364, in 365, an undersea earthquake between magnitudes 8 and 9 near Crete caused a tsunami that hit the coasts of the Eastern Mediterranean. Valenss first priority after the winter of 365 was to move east in hopes of shoring up the situation, by the autumn of 365 he had reached Cappadocian Caesarea when he learned that a usurper, named Procopius, had proclaimed himself in Constantinople. When he died, Julian the emperor had left one surviving relative. Procopius had been charged with overseeing a northern division of his relatives army during the Persian expedition and had not been present when Jovian was named his successor, though Jovian made accommodations to appease this potential claimant, Procopius fell increasingly under suspicion in the first year of Valens reign.
This program met with success, particularly among soldiers loyal to the Constantinians. When news arrived that Procopius had revolted, Valens considered abdication, even so, Valens sent two legions to march on Procopius, who easily persuaded them to desert to him. Later that year, Valens himself was captured in a scramble near Chalcedon. Troubles were exacerbated by the refusal of Valentinian to do any more than protect his own territory from encroachment, the failure of imperial resistance in 365 allowed Procopius to gain control of the dioceses of Thrace and Asiana by years end. Only in the spring of 366 had Valens assembled enough troops to deal with Procopius effectively, marching out from Ancyra through Pessinus, Valens proceeded into Phrygia where he defeated Procopiuss general Gomoarius at the Battle of Thyatira. He met Procopius himself at Nacoleia and convinced his troops to desert him, Procopius was executed on 27 May and his head sent to Valentinian in Trier for inspection
Kingdom of Kent
The kingdom of the Kentish, today referred to as the Kingdom of Kent, was an early medieval kingdom in what is now South East England. Establishing itself in either the fifth or sixth centuries CE, it continued to exist until being absorbed into the Kingdom of England in the tenth century. Following the end of Roman administration in 410, further linguistically Germanic tribal groups moved into the area and it has been argued that an East Saxon community initially settled West Kent, before being conquered by the expanding East Kentish in the sixth century. The earliest recorded king of Kent was Æthelberht, who as bretwalda wielded significant influence over other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the sixth century. The Christianization of the Anglo-Saxons began in Kent under Æthelberht’s reign with the arrival of the monk Augustine of Canterbury and it was one of the seven traditional kingdoms of the so-called Anglo-Saxon heptarchy, but it lost its independence in the 8th century when it became a sub-kingdom of Mercia.
In the 9th century, it became a sub-kingdom of Wessex and its name has been carried forward ever since as the county of Kent. In the Romano-British period, the area of modern Kent that lay east of the River Medway was a known as Cantiaca. Its name had taken from an older Common Brittonic place-name, Cantium used in the preceding pre-Roman Iron Age. During the late third and fourth centuries, Roman Britain had been raided repeatedly by Franks, Saxons and these foederati would have assimilated into Romano-British culture, making it difficult to distinguish them archaeologically. In 407, the Roman legions left Britain in order to deal with incursions into the Empires continental heartlands and this may represent a memory of a genuine exodus of the Roman aristocracy. According to archaeologist Martin Welch, the century witnessed a radical transformation of what became Kent, socially. Both literary and archaeological records show the migration of linguistically Germanic peoples from northern Europe into Britain during this century, the fate of the Romano-British is debated, many may have fled to Western Britain or Brittany.
In Kent, it is likely that some the Romano-British population remained, as the Roman name for the area, influenced the name of the new Anglo-Saxon kingdom, the Cantware. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a king of the Britons known as Vortigern invited two Germanic leaders and Horsa, to Britain to help defend against Pictish raiders. After arriving at Ebbas Creek in Kent in 449, Hengist and Horsa led the defeat of the Picts before turning on the British and inviting more Germanic tribes to colonise Briton. Among these were the Old Saxons, the Angles, and the Jutes, the latter settled in Kent, according to the Chronicle, in 455 Hengist and Horsa fought Vortigern at Ægelesthrep, in which battle Horsa was killed. Hengist succeeded him as king, followed in turn by his son Æsc, in 456 Hengest and Æsc battled the Britons at Crecganford. The Britons fled Kent for their London stronghold, the accuracy of these accounts is questioned, S. E. Kelly states that the legendary details are easy to dismiss
Diadem
A diadem is a type of crown, specifically an ornamental headband worn by monarchs and others as a badge of royalty. The word derives from the Greek διάδημα diádēma, band or fillet, from διαδέω diadéō, I bind round, such ribbons were used to crown victorious athletes in important sports games in antiquity. It was applied to a crown, generally in a circular or fillet shape. For example, the worn by Juliana was a diadem. The ancient Celts were believed to have used a thin, semioval gold plate called a mind as a diadem. Some of the earliest examples of types of crowns can be found in ancient Egypt, from the simple fabric type to the more elaborate metallic type. A diadem is a jewelled ornament in the shape of a crown, worn by women. In some societies, it may be a wreath worn around the head, the ancient Persians wore a high and erect royal tiara encircled with a diadem. Hera, queen of the Greek gods, wore a crown called the diadem. By extension, diadem can be used generally for an emblem of power or dignity.
The head regalia worn by Roman Emperors, from the time of Diocletian onwards, is described as a diadem in the original sources and it was this object that the Foederatus general Odoacer returned to Emperor Zeno after his expulsion of the usurper Romulus Augustus from Rome in 476 CE. Civic crown Tainia Fillet Tiara Diadem
Bracteate
A bracteate is a flat, single-sided gold medal worn as jewelry that was produced in Northern Europe predominantly during the Migration Period of the Germanic Iron Age. Gold bracteates commonly denote a type of jewelry, made mainly in the 5th to 7th century AD. Bead-rimmed and fitted with a loop, most were intended to be suspended by a string around the neck. The gold for the bracteates came from coins paid as peace money by the Roman Empire to their Northern Germanic neighbors, the motifs are commonly those of Germanic mythology and some are believed to be Germanic pagan icons giving protection or for divination. For this reason the bracteates are a target of iconographic studies by scholars interested in Germanic religion, several bracteates feature runic alphabet inscriptions. Numerous Bracteates feature swastikas as a common motif, of these,135 bear Elder Futhark inscriptions which are often very short, the most notable inscriptions are found on the Seeland-II-C, Vadstena and Tjurkö bracteates.
To these can be added the ca.270 E-bracteates, which belong to the Vendel Period and they were produced only on Gotland, and while the earlier bracteates all were made from gold, many E-bracteates were made from silver or bronze. This has been published in three volumes in German named Die Goldbrakteaten der Völkerwanderungszeit, a catalogue supplement is included in Heizmann & Axboe 2011. In some cantons of Switzerland, bracteate-like rappen, the term bracteate for these coins was not used contemporarily. It was first used in the 17th century, the bracteates were usually called back regularly, about once or twice a year, and could be exchanged for new coins with a deduction. This system worked like a demurrage, People wouldnt hoard their coins, so this money was used more as a medium of exchange than for storing value. This increased the velocity of money and stimulated the economy, medieval silver bracteates may be large, but most are about 15 millimeters across and weigh about 1 gram. Sometimes the coins could be divided to pay smaller amounts, the town leagues were not interested in such a system and introduced in 1413 the Ewiger Pfennig without this decay.
Pesch, Die Goldbrakteaten der Völkerwanderungszeit – Thema und Variation, hoards from the Roman Iron Age – Early Viking Age Evidence of the Jutes BBC list of Danish bracteates with runic inscriptions
Calvary
Calvary, was, according to the Gospels, a site immediately outside Jerusalems walls where Jesus was crucified. Golgotha is the Greek transcription in the New Testament of the Aramaic term Gagultâ, the Bible translates the term to mean place of skull, which in Greek is Κρανίου Τόπος, and in Latin is Calvariæ Locus, from which the English word Calvary is derived. Since the 6th century it has referred to as the location of a mountain. The Gospels describe it as a place near enough to the city that those coming in, the location itself is mentioned in all four canonical Gospels, And they brought him to the place called Golgotha. Matthew, And when they came to a place called Golgotha, And when they came to the place which is called The Skull, there they crucified him, and the criminals, one on the right and one on the left. John, So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the called the place of a skull. The “place of an etymology is based on the Hebrew verbal root גלל g-l-l, from which the Hebrew word for skull. A number of explanations have been given for the name.
In some Christian and Jewish traditions, the name Golgotha refers to the location of the skull of Adam. This tradition appears in older sources, including the Kitab al-Magall, the Conflict of Adam and Eve with Satan, the Cave of Treasures. It is suggested that the landscape resembled the shape of a skull. The traditional location of Golgotha derives from its identification by Helena, in 333, the Pilgrim of Bordeaux, entering from the east described the result, On the left hand is the little hill of Golgotha where the Lord was crucified. About a stones throw from thence is a vault wherein his body was laid, there, at present, by the command of the Emperor Constantine, has been built a basilica, that is to say, a church of wondrous beauty. In Nazénie Garibian de Vartavans doctoral thesis, now published as La Jérusalem Nouvelle et les premiers sanctuaires chrétiens de l’Arménie, Helenas Chapel, alternatively called St. Vartans Chapel. Prior to Helenas identification, the site had been a temple to Aphrodite, a typical Roman city was built according to a Hippodamian grid plan, a North-South arterial road, the Cardo, and an East-West arterial road, the Decumanus Maximus.
The forum would traditionally be located on the intersection of the two roads, with the main temples adjacent, the New Testament describes the crucifixion site, Golgotha, as being near the city, and outside the city wall. Matthew 27,39 and Mark 15,29 both note that the location would have been accessible to passers-by, in 2003, Professor Sir Henry Chadwick argued that when Hadrians builders replanned the old city, they incidentally confirm the bringing of Golgotha inside a new town wall. That means, this place outside of the city, without any doubt…, casting doubt on the Strategic Weakness, Helena are now accessible from within the chapel
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city and UNESCO World Heritage Site, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a local government district of Kent, England. It lies on the River Stour, a journey of pilgrims to Beckets shrine served as the frame for Geoffrey Chaucers 14th century classic The Canterbury Tales. Canterbury is a popular tourist destination, consistently one of the cities in the United Kingdom. The city has been occupied since Paleolithic times and served as the capital of the Celtic Cantiaci, modern additions include the Marlowe Theatre and the St Lawrence Ground, home of the Kent County Cricket Club. Canterbury remains, however, a city in terms of geographical size and population. In Sub-Roman Britain, it was known in Old Welsh as Cair Ceint, occupied by the Jutes, it became known in Old English as Cantwareburh, which developed into its present name. The Canterbury area has been inhabited since prehistoric times, lower Paleolithic axes, and Neolithic and Bronze Age pots have been found in the area.
Canterbury was first recorded as the settlement of the Celtic tribe of the Cantiaci. In the 1st century AD, the Romans captured the settlement, the Romans rebuilt the city, with new streets in a grid pattern, a theatre, a temple, a forum, and public baths. In the late 3rd century, to defend against attack from barbarians, the Romans built an earth bank around the city and a wall with seven gates, which enclosed an area of 130 acres. Over the next 100 years, an Anglo-Saxon community formed within the city walls, as Jutish refugees arrived, in 597, Pope Gregory the Great sent Augustine to convert its King Æthelberht to Christianity. After the conversion, being a Roman town, was chosen by Augustine as the centre for his see in Kent. Augustine thus became the first Archbishop of Canterbury, the towns new importance led to its revival, and trades developed in pottery and leather. By 630, gold coins were being struck at the Canterbury mint, in 672, the Synod of Hertford gave the see of Canterbury authority over the entire English Church.
In 842 and 851, Canterbury suffered great loss of life during Danish raids, in 978, Archbishop Dunstan refounded the abbey built by Augustine, and named it St Augustines Abbey. A second wave of Danish attacks began in 991, and in 1011 the cathedral was burnt, remembering the destruction caused by the Danes, the inhabitants of Canterbury did not resist William the Conquerors invasion in 1066. William immediately ordered a wooden motte-and-bailey castle to be built by the Roman city wall, in the early 12th century, the castle was rebuilt with stone. After the murder of Archbishop Thomas Becket at the cathedral in 1170, Canterbury became one of the most notable towns in Europe and this pilgrimage provided the framework for Geoffrey Chaucers 14th-century collection of stories, The Canterbury Tales
Hetoimasia
In Ancient Greece it represented Zeus, chief of the gods, and in early Buddhist art it represented the Buddha. In Early Christian art and Early Medieval art it is found in both the East and Western churches, and represents either Christ, or sometimes God the Father as part of the Trinity. The motif consists of an empty throne and various symbolic objects. It is usually placed centrally in schemes of composition, very often in a roundel, the empty throne had a long pre-Christian history. An Assyrian relief in Berlin of c.1243 BCE shows King Tukulti-Ninurta I kneeling before the empty throne of the fire-god Nusku, occupied by what appears to be a flame. A somewhat controversial theory, held by specialists, sees the Israelite Ark of the Covenant, or the figures of the cherubim above it. Early Buddhist art used an empty throne, often under a parasol or Bodhi Tree and this was, in the traditional view, an aniconic symbol for the Buddha, they avoided depicting the Buddha in human form, like early Christians with God the Father.
Alternatively, it has argued that these images represent actual relic-thrones at the major pilgrimage sites which were objects of worship. The throne often contains a symbol such as the wheel or Buddha footprint. A seat for these was called a pulvinar, from pulvinus, a seat with jewelled wreath is seen on coins from the Emperor Titus onwards, and on those of Diocletian a seat with a helmet on it represents Mars. Commodus chose to be represented by a seat with the club and lion skin of Hercules, the empty throne continued to be used as a secular symbol of power by the first Christian Emperors, and appears on the Arch of Constantine. In the Balinese version of Hinduism, the most prominent element in most temples is the padmasana or Lotus Throne, there are several elements found in the image which reflect its changing meaning. The throne itself is present, and is often backless and armless. In Ancient Greek, a thronos was a specific but ordinary type of chair with a footstool, there is often a prominent cushion, and a cloth variously interpreted as Christs mantle or a sudarium may cover or sit on the throne.
There may be a crown on the throne, there is nearly always a cross, often a crux gemmata, and in examples a patriarchal cross with two crossbars. The cloth may be draped round the cross, as may the crown of thorns and it has been suggested that the wreathed cross motif was the origin of the Celtic cross. The dove of the Holy Spirit may be present, in versions two of the instruments of the Passion, the Spear and sponge on a stick, stand behind or beside the throne, or are held by angels. The nails from the cross and crown of thorns may sit on the throne, if angels or archangels are included they are symmetrically placed on either side, either facing the throne or facing out and gesturing towards it, if there is a roundel they may be outside it
Visigoths
The Visigoths were the western branches of the nomadic tribes of Germanic peoples referred to collectively as the Goths. These tribes flourished and spread throughout the late Roman Empire in Late Antiquity, the Visigoths emerged from earlier Gothic groups who had invaded the Roman Empire beginning in 376 and had defeated the Romans at the Battle of Adrianople in 378. Relations between the Romans and the Visigoths were variable, alternately warring with one another and making treaties when convenient, the Visigoths invaded Italy under Alaric I and sacked Rome in 410. The Visigoths first settled in southern Gaul as foederati of the Romans – a relationship established in 418, they soon fell out with their Roman hosts and established their own kingdom with its capital at Toulouse. They next extended their authority into Hispania at the expense of the Suebi, in 507, their rule in Gaul was ended by the Franks under Clovis I, who defeated them in the Battle of Vouillé. After that, the Visigoth kingdom was limited to Hispania, in or around 589, the Visigoths under Reccared I converted from Arianism to Nicene Christianity, gradually adopting the culture of their Hispano-Roman subjects.
Their legal code, the Visigothic Code abolished the practice of applying different laws for Romans. Once legal distinctions were no longer being made between Romani and Gothi, they became known collectively as Hispani, in the century that followed, the region was dominated by the Councils of Toledo and the episcopacy. In 711 or 712, a force of invading African Moors defeated the Visigoths in the Battle of Guadalete and their king and many members of their governing elite were killed, and their kingdom rapidly collapsed. During their governance of the Kingdom of Hispania, the Visigoths built several churches that survive and they left many artifacts, which have been discovered in increasing numbers by archaeologists in recent times. The Treasure of Guarrazar of votive crowns and crosses is the most spectacular and they founded the only new cities in western Europe from the fall of the Western half of the Roman Empire until the rise of the Carolingian dynasty. Many Visigothic names are still in use in modern Spanish and Portuguese, contemporaneous references to the Gothic tribes use the terms Vesi, Ostrogothi and Greuthungi.
Most scholars have concluded that the terms Vesi and Tervingi were both used to refer to one particular tribe, while the terms Ostrogothi and Greuthungi were used to refer to another. In addition, the Notitia Dignitatum equates the Vesi with the Tervingi in a reference to the years 388–391, the earliest sources for each of the four names are roughly contemporaneous. The first recorded reference to the Tervingi is in a eulogy of the emperor Maximian, delivered in or shortly after 291 and it says that the Tervingi, another division of the Goths, joined with the Taifali to attack the Vandals and Gepidae. The first known use of the term Ostrogoths is in a document dated September 392 from Milan and this would explain why the latter terms dropped out of use shortly after 400, when the Goths were displaced by the Hunnic invasions. Wolfram believes that the people Zosimus describes were those Tervingi who had remained behind after the Hunnic conquest, for the most part, all of the terms discriminating between different Gothic tribes gradually disappeared after they moved into the Roman Empire.
The last indication that the Goths whose king reigned at Toulouse thought of themselves as Vesi is found in a panegyric on Avitus by Sidonius Apollinaris dated 1 January 456, most recent scholars have concluded that Visigothic group identity emerged only within the Roman Empire
