(Vol. ii., p. 308.)
I am not aware of any record in which mention of this relique occurs before
the time of St. Margaret. It seems very probable that the venerated
crucifix which was so termed was one of the treasures which descended with
the crown of the Anglo-Saxon kings. When the princess Margaret, with her
brother Edgar, the lawful heir to the throne of St. Edward the Confessor,
fled into Scotland, after the victory of William, she carried this cross
with her amongst her other treasures. Aelred of Rievaulx (ap. Twysd. 350.)
gives a reason why it was so highly valued, and some description of the
rood itself:
"Est autem crux illa longitudinem habens palmæ de auro purissimo
mirabili opere fabricats, quæ in modum techæ clauditur et aperitur.
Cernitur in ea quædarn Dominicæ crucis portio, (sicut sæpe multorum
miraculorum argumento probatum est). Salvatoris nostri ymaginem habens
de ebore densissime sculptam et aureis distinctionibus mirabiliter
decoratam."
St. Margaret appears to have destined it for the abbey which she and her
royal husband, Malcolm III., founded at Dunfermline in honour of the Holy
Trinity: and this cross seems to have engaged her last thoughts for her
confessor relates that, when dying, she caused it to be brought to her, and
that she embraced, and gazed steadfastly upon it, until her soul passed
from time to eternity. Upon her death (16th Nov., 1093), the Black Rood was
deposited upon the altar of Dunfermline Abbey, where St. Margaret was
interred.
The next mention of it that I have been enabled to make note of, occurs in
1292, in the Catalogue of Scottish Muniments which were received within the
Castle of Edinburgh, in the presence of the Abbots of Dunfermline and Holy
Rood, and the Commissioners of Edward I., on the 23rd August in that year,
and were conveyed to Berwick-upon-Tweed. Under the head
"Omnia ista inventa fuerunt in quadam cista in Dormitorio S. Crucis, et
ibidem reposita prædictos Abbates et altos, sub ecrum sigillis."
we find
"Unum scrinium argenteum deauratum, in quo reponitur crux quo vocatur
_la blake rode_."--Robertson's _Index_, Introd. xiii.
It does not appear that any such fatality was ascribed to this relique as
that which the Scots attributed to the possession of the famous stone on
which their kings were crowned, or it might be conjectured that when Edward
I. brought "the fatal seat" from Scone to Westminster, he brought the Black
Rood of Scotland too. That amiable and pleasing historian, Miss Strickland,
has stated that the English viewed the possession of this relique by the
Scottish kings with jealousy; that it was seized upon by Edward I., but
restored on the treaty of peace in 1327. This statement is erroneous; the
rood having been mistaken for the stone, which, by the way, as your readers
know, was never restored.
We next find it in the possession of King David Bruce, who lost this
treasured relique, with his own liberty, at the battle of Durham (18th
Oct., 1346), and from that time the monks of Durham became its possessors.
In the _Description of the Ancient Monuments, Rites, and Customs of the
Abbey Church of Durham_, as they existed at the dissolution, which was
written in 1593, and was published by Davies in 1672, and subsequently by
the Surtees Society, we find it described as
"A most faire roode or picture of our Saviour, in silver, called the
Black Roode of Scotland, brought out of Holy Rood House, by King David
Bruce ... with the picture of Our Lady on the one side of our Saviour,
and St. John's on the other side, very richly wrought in silver, all
three having crownes of pure beaten gold of goldsmith's work, with a
device or rest to take them off or on."
The writer then describes the "fine wainscote work" to which this costly
"rood and pictures" were fastened on a pillar at the east end of the
southern aisle of the quire. And in a subsequent chapter (p. 21. of Surtees
Soc. volume) we have an account of the cross miraculously received by David
I. (whom the writer confounds with the King David Bruce captured at the
battle of Durham, notwithstanding that his _Auntient Memorial_ professes to
be "collected forthe of the best antiquaries"), and in honour of which he
founded Holy Rood Abbey in 1128 from which account it clearly appears that
this cross was distinct from the Black Rood of Scotland. For the writer,
after stating that this miraculous cross had been brought from Holy Rood
House by the king, as a "most fortunate relique," says:
"He lost _the said crosse_, which was taiken upon him, and many other
most wourthie and excellent jewells ... which all weare offred up at
the shryne of Saint Cuthbert, _together with the Blacke Rude of
Scotland_ (so termed), with Mary and John, maid of silver, being, as yt
were, smoked all over, which was placed and sett up most exactlie in
the pillar next St. Cuthbert's shrine," &c.
In the description written in 1593, as printed, the size of the Black Rood
is not mentioned; but in Sanderson's _Antiquities of Durham_, in which he
follows that description, but with many variations and omissions, he says
(p. 22.), in mentioning the Black Rood of Scotland, with the images, as
above described,--
"Which rood and pictures were all three very richly wrought in silver,
and were all smoked blacke over, {410} being large pictures of a yard
or five quarters long, and on every one of their leads a crown of pure
beaten gold," &c.
I have one more (too brief) notice of this famous rood. It occurs in the
list of reliques preserved in the Feretory of St. Cuthhert, under the care
of the shrine-keeper, which was drawn up in 1383 by Richard de Sedbrok, and
is as follows:
"A black crosse, called the _Black Rode of Scotland_."--MS. Dunelm., B.
ii. 35.
Strange to say, Mr. Raine, in his _St. Cuthbert_, p. 108., appears to
confound the cross brought from Holy Rood House, and in honour of which it
was founded, with the Black Rood of Scotland. He was misled, no doubt, by
the statement in the passage above extracted from the _Ancient Monuments_,
that this cross was brought out of Holy Rood House.
I fear that the fact that it was formed of silver and gold, gives little
reason to hope that this historical relique escaped destruction when it
came into the hands of King Henry's church robbers. Its sanctity may,
indeed, have induced the monks to send it with some other reliques to a
place of refuge on the Continent, until the tyranny should be overpast; but
there is not any tradition at Durham, that I am aware of, to throw light on
the concluding Query of your correspondent P.A.F., as to "what became of
the 'Holy Cross,' or 'Black Rood,' at the dissolution of Durham Priory?"
That the Black Rood of Scotland, and the Cross of Holy Rood House were
distinct, there can, I think, be no doubt. The cross mentioned by Aelred is
not mentioned as the "Black Rood:" probably it acquired this designation
after his time. But Fordoun, in the _Scoti-Chronicon_, Lord Hailes in his
_Annals_, and other historians, have taken Aelred's account as referring to
the Black Rood of Scotland. Whether it had been brought from Dunfermline to
Edinburgh before Edward's campaign, and remained thenceforth deposited in
Holy Rood Abbey, does not appear: but it is probable that a relique to
which the sovereigns of Scotland attached so much veneration was kept at
the latter place.