Between Rome and Jerusalem: The Cross at the Center of a Herrscherbild Composition

Representations of the Adoration of the Cross usually show the cross flanked by saints or angels, making up an imperial composition. I will concentrate on two groups of Adoration by Peter and Paul that directly and indirectly relate to Jerusalem. The first has an elevated Christogram as the object of veneration. Made in Rome in the second half of the fourth century, it may have been associated with the Apparition of the Cross reported by Cyril of Jerusalem in 351. The second, with an acclamation of a monumental cross, is an example of the decorated portable Palestinian art of the sixth and seventh centuries. I will argue that the two variations of a cross as the focus of a Herrscherbild composition reflect adoration and veneration of a place with a significant local memory of past history.