Unlike the Roman elites, slaves and members of the lower class were unfortunately very familiar with the cross. This incident recorded in Cicero’s speech against Verres reveals that, at least for Roman elites, crucifixion was extremely rare to witness or suffer. 5 Worst of all, Verres ordered for Gavius to be crucified on the shore facing the Italian mainland since he claimed Roman citizenship. “Yes, a cross,” says Cicero, was prepared for this “broken sufferer, who had never seen such an accursed thing till then” ( Against Verres 2.5.162). Cicero reports that while Gavius was flogged in the marketplace, the only sounds from his lips were the words, “I am a Roman citizen.” Despite his claim of Roman citizenship, a cross was prepared for him.
According to Verres, the Roman citizen named P. In 70 B.C.E., Cicero accused a former governor of Sicily named Gaius Verres of crucifying a Roman citizen. 4 In fact, even the Latin word for cross ( crux) sounded harsh to the ears, according to St. The Roman writer Plautus, for instance, uses the phrase “go to an evil cross” as slang for “go to hell” (e.g., Pseudolus 331). One Roman insulted another by using it on a graffito discovered in the Stabian baths of Pompeii: “May you be nailed to the cross!” Classical texts similarly use the term “cross” in curses. The word “cross” was offensive to Romans. 2 Since it took approximately 400 years for Jesus’s crucifixion to become an acceptable public image, scholars have traditionally believed that this means the cross did not originally function as a symbol for Christians. Scholars believe that the first surviving public image of Jesus’s crucifixion was on the fifth-century wooden doors of the Basilica of Santa Sabina, which is located on the Aventine Hill in Rome.
But, interestingly, most scholars believe that early Christians did not use the cross as an image of their religion because crucifixion evoked the shameful death of a slave or criminal. And for some Christians, each year during the beginning of Lent, they receive the cross on their foreheads in ash.Ĭlearly, today the cross is accepted as the most popular symbol of Christianity. In Egypt, among other countries, for example, Christians wear a tattoo of the cross on their wrists. Sometimes the cross even adorns the body of a Christian in permanent ink. For some Christians, the cross is part of their daily attire worn around their necks. Throughout the world, images of the cross adorn the walls and steeples of churches.
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