Secondary relic

Eastern Orthodoxy

The importance of relics in the Byzantine world can be seen from the veneration given to the pieces of the True Cross. Many great works of Byzantine enamel are staurothekes, or relics containing fragments of the True Cross. Other significant relics included the girdle worn by the Virgin, and pieces of the body or clothing of saints. Such relics (called contact relics, or secondary relics) were, however, scarce and did not provide most believers with ready access to proximity to the holy. The growth in the production and popularity of reproducible contact relics in the fifth and sixth centuries testifies to the need felt for more widespread access to the divine.