Artistic originality, in Aralar

The Cross of Saint Michael is a gift that, according to legend, the Archangel himself made to the knight Teodosio.

The Cross of Saint Michael is a gift that, according to legend, the Archangel himself made to the knight Teodosio. Initially, around the 8th century, the image would have been an icon. Later, the intercession of St Michael, which was required for commemorations and battles by the Navarrese, meant that it went from being an object of veneration to a sacred banner.

Over time, the icon was transformed into a wooden statue, simple but possible to carry up high as the banner of the troops of Pamplona. It was also venerated in the liturgy and in processions.

Later, the statue was coated in silver and gold during the Romanesque, Gothic and Renaissance periods. Its devotional use and thefts meant that it was newly coated in silver in the 18th century, a decision by Bishop Juan Lorenzo Irigoyen y Dutari, advised by the Capuchin priest Tomás de Burgui.

They did not only protect the effigy, but on the cross held by the Archangel they commissioned the inclusion of the fragments of the lignum crucis,brought from Jerusalem by bishop Pedro de Roda around the year 1100. These relics are fragments of red cypress and walnut wood that correspond to the patibulum, or horizontal bar of Jesus’ cross, and to the titulus, or the Lord’s sentencing panel, better known by the name INRI.