Saint Helena Discovers the True Cross of the Lord

Saint Helena Discovers the True Cross of the Lord. Jan van Eyck, 1424. Perhaps it is precisely this legend that lies behind the custom of knocking on wood three times, to ward off bad luck or to invite good. The aged mother of the Emperor Constantine, Helena, searched long in Jerusalem for the Tomb of the Lord, until an old Jew pointed her to a pagan shrine of Venus, which had been built over the razed Golgotha; in the excavations three crosses were found. To identify the miraculous cross, all three were brought to a dead or dying man, and at the touch of the third he rose again.

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September digest: archaeological finds, exhibitions, museums, theatre and the Church

In the finale of the Strugatskys' Roadside Picnic, the Golden Ball is told: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to offend nobody, but the digest really does come free of charge. So, here is the main business of the

Frederic Leighton

Frederic Leighton. “Daedalus and Icarus”, 1869 Daedalus warns his son not to climb too high: the heat of the sun may melt the wax, but Icarus is already gazing into the distance, and the lamentations of a foolish old man interest him not in the least

Saint Helena Discovers the True Cross of the Lord

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September digest: archaeological finds, exhibitions, museums, theatre and the Church

Frederic Leighton

Attempts to resolve the problems of many years of uncontrolled mass migration

Characters from Gogol's "Petersburg Tales" on the pedestal of the monument to Nikolai Gogol on Nikitsky Boulevard, photograph of the 1960s