"Lance of Longinus" reexamined

In today's Sunday Times Magazine, the cover story is on the recent reexamination of the spearhead in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, long known as the Lance of Longinus and treasured as a relic of the Crucifixion.

While the spearhead's documented chain of ownership runs back through the Holy Roman Emperors to the tenth century, by all indications it is an ordinary early medieval weapon, to be dated no earlier than the 7th century. The extent to which devotees of the occult have fixed upon what they term "the spear of destiny", however, is quite remarkable. The article covers these perfervid imaginings in some depth, as will likely the BBC2 version to be shown in May

Posted by David on April 20, 2003 3:10 PM