This decorative cross is 14 inches tall including the base. The decorative cross is made of durable bonded marble and has a moss like finish that gives it an antique look. Both sides of the decorative cross have an intricate design going through each arm. The design starts in the center of the decorative cross with a small flower inside a diamond shape. From there the pattern stretches out into all four arms of the decorative cross.
History of The Maltese Cross.
The Maltese Cross is a symbol of protection, a badge of honor, and its story is hundreds of years old. When a courageous band of crusaders, known as the Knights of St. John, fought the Saracens for possession of the Holy Land, they were faced with a new weapon not known to European fighters. It was a simple but horrible device of war. The Saracens weapon was fire.
As the crusaders advanced on the walls of the city, they were bombarded with glass bombs containing naphtha. When they were saturated with the liquid, the Saracens threw flaming torches into the crusaders. Hundreds of knights were burned alive while others risked their lives in an effort to save their kinsmen from painful fiery deaths. Thus these men became the first Firemen, and the first of a long line of Firefighters. Their heroic efforts were recognized by fellow crusaders who awarded each other with a badge of honor similar to the cross firefighters wear today.
Since the Knights of St. John lived for close to four centuries on the island of Malta, in the Mediterranean Sea, the cross came to be known as the Maltese Cross.
Information on Gothic Art.
Gothic art is the name given to the art of the later middle ages, especially from the mid 1100’s to about 1400. The term Gothic originated with Italian Renaissance scholars called humanists. It refers to the Germanic Goths who invaded Italy in the A.D. 400’s Humanists considered medieval art so barbaric that they thought it was created by the uncivilized Goths.
Gothic art is one of the few artistic styles whose precise date of creation is known. The style was first introduced at the Abbey of St. Denis, the burial place of French kings, located just north of Paris. Abbot Suger supervised the rebuilding of the west and east ends of the church in this new style. The work was completed in 1144. The Gothic style was an immediate success, and by about 1250 it had spread through Europe. During the 1200’s many regions in Europe developed distinctive variations.
The Gothic style is associated with the age of cathedral construction in northern Europe. The style often is identified with such constructional devices as pointed arches, ribbed vaults and flying buttresses.
Gothic sculpture first appeared at St. Denis and at Chartres. Romanesque sculpture was vigorous, dramatic and abstract. In comparison, Gothic sculpture was calmer, grander and more humane.
Most of the early Gothic sculpture was created to decorate cathedral entrances. Some of the finest examples decorate the west façade of Chartres Cathedral. The late Gothic of the 1400’s is best known for the development of oil painting in Flanders. Jan van Eyck, Robert Campin and Rogier van der Weyden perfected this new technique.
The Gothic novel was a type of fiction that became popular in England during the late 1700’s and early 1800’s. The plots of Gothic novels included mysterious and supernatural events intended to frighten the reader. The stories were called Gothic because most of them took place in gloomy, medieval castles built in the Gothic style of architecture. Such buildings had many secret passageways, dungeons and towers that provided ideal settings for strange happenings. Most gothic novels were set in Italy or Spain because those countries seemed remote and mysterious to the English.