Cross
The cross is the most formative Christian symbol of mourning and remembrance - from the medieval reliquary cross via the Victorian jet cross to the modern memorial pendant; in all its formal variety (Latin cross, Celtic cross, patriarchal cross, cross patté) it always points to death, redemption and resurrection.
Written by Dr. Helene Vasall
The cross is by a wide margin the most important symbol of European mourning and memorial jewellery. From the medieval reliquary cross (see Reliquary Pendant) via the Victorian jet cross to the modern memorial pendant, it is a continuous iconographic constant. Unlike other mourning symbols - the weeping willow, for instance, emerges only in the late eighteenth century, the butterfly as a symbol of resurrection in the nineteenth - the cross has been present since Christian antiquity and overlays several cultural strata.
Symbolic meaning
In a Christian context the cross carries a many-layered meaning:
- Death and torment - its primary charge as an instrument of execution in Roman antiquity; in the Christian context specifically as the place where Jesus Christ died
- Redemption - through the death on the cross the redemption of humanity is (in Christian theology) sealed
- Resurrection - the empty cross (without the corpus) points to the overcoming of death
- Eternal life - a central message in mourning: death is not the end
- Faith and confession - visible identification with the Christian tradition
Before its Christian meaning, cross forms existed as solar symbols (the ancient Egyptian sun cross), as symbols of the cardinal directions (the saltire as a joining of the four quarters of the sky) and as symbols of the tree of life (in the Near East and among the Celts). These pre-Christian strata still resonate in some variants - above all in the Celtic cross.
Formal variants
The mourning jewellery cross exists in several typical forms:
Latin cross (crux immissa). A long vertical bar (height roughly 1.5–2 times the width) and a shorter horizontal bar. The most frequent form in Western European mourning jewellery. Dominant above all in Catholic and Protestant contexts.
Greek cross (crux quadrata). Four bars of equal length. Used in Orthodox mourning pieces, in early Christian pieces and in symbolically reduced modern designs.
Celtic cross (high cross). A Latin cross with a circle at the intersection of the bars. An Irish and Scottish tradition, frequent in bog oak mourning jewellery (see Bog Oak) and in Irish-American memorial pieces.
Patriarchal cross (crux gemina). With two horizontal bars. In Orthodox and reliquary contexts - the shorter upper bar represents the tablet with the inscription (INRI).
Cross patté (crux patens). With bar ends widening towards their tips. In military memorial jewellery (the Iron Cross, variants of the Maltese cross) and in heraldic pieces.
Anchor cross. A hybrid of cross and anchor - the vertical bar terminates below in an anchor. Symbolically: faith (cross) and hope (anchor) united. See Anchor.
Russian cross (crux russica). With two horizontal bars and a slanting lower bar (the suppedaneum). In East Slavic Orthodox mourning pieces.
History in mourning jewellery
Antiquity and the early Christian period. Crosses as a jewellery form are not documented in the first three Christian centuries - at that time the cross was still primarily a symbol of execution and taboo for early Christians. Only after the Constantinian turn (313) was the cross used publicly; cross-shaped jewellery is attested by the fifth century at the latest.
Middle Ages. Reliquary crosses (see Reliquary Pendant) become the dominant form. The high medieval encolpia (crosses worn at the neck) of Eastern Christendom and Western pectoral crosses (pectoralia) emerge in parallel. In this period there is no specific mourning context - the cross is a general Christian confession.
Renaissance and Baroque (see Baroque (c. 1600–1750)). Memento mori crosses (see Memento mori) appear - crosses with engraved skulls, hourglasses (see Hourglass) and inscriptions such as "Memento Mori" or "Vanitas Vanitatum". In the seventeenth century a jewellery genre in its own right, above all in Spain, Italy and southern Germany.
Georgian and sentimental (see The Georgian Era (1714–1837)). Crosses become the discreet mourning pendant of sentimental jewellery. Hollow settings holding a lock of the deceased's hair behind rock crystal, or with inlaid initials, are integrated into cross-shaped gold mounts.
Victorian (see The Victorian Era (1837–1901)). The high point of the mourning cross. Whitby jet crosses (see Whitby Jet) are carved in vast numbers; bog oak crosses (see Bog Oak) dominate the Irish market. Black enamel crosses on gold (see Black Enamel (Schwarzemail)) belong to the standard mourning toilette. The typical Victorian mourning chain (see Mourning Necklace) carries a central cross pendant.
Edwardian (see The Edwardian Era (1901–1910/1914)) and the twentieth century. Crosses continue to be worn but lose their dominant position in mourning contexts in favour of discreet, non-iconographic pendants. In practising religious milieux the cross remains present.
Today. Crosses are one option among many in the modern memorial jewellery market. Popular above all with practising religious families; secular mourners often reach for other symbols (butterfly, anchor, heart, fingerprint jewellery - see Fingerprint Pendant).
Materials and workmanship
Crosses were made in practically every jewellery material:
- Gold (see Gold in Mourning Jewellery) - continuously from early Christendom to the present
- Silver (see Silver in Mourning Jewellery) - above all in vernacular tradition and in modern pieces
- Jet, vulcanite, bog oak - a Victorian mourning speciality (see Whitby Jet, Vulcanite (Ebonite), Bog Oak)
- Onyx and black enamel - Victorian half-mourning
- Wood and ivory - religious and vernacular, often carved
- Stainless steel, titanium - modern material choices, hypoallergenic
In modern memorial pieces, crosses are often combined with a relic setting - a gold cross with a small ash capsule at its core (see Ash Pendant), for instance, or a silver cross with an integrated fingerprint element (see Fingerprint Pendant).
Conventions of wear
Crosses are classically worn at the neck - on a gold chain, a leather cord or a rosary. The conventions vary:
- Worn visibly over the clothing: a deliberate declaration of faith or a deliberately visible statement of mourning
- Concealed under the clothing: private, intimate wear; in some cultures this is the convention (crosses are not relevant in Orthodox Jewish practice; in Sufi Muslim contexts pendants are often worn covered)
- On the rosary: a cross at the end of the rosary - above all in Catholic contexts
- As the outer motif of a mourning ring: usual in the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries; the cross is integrated into the bezel
The cross in the modern memorial market
Several typical applications exist in today's market:
The classic memorial cross. A discreet gold or silver cross with an engraved inscription (name, date of death, a short biblical phrase). Prices: 80–500 €. Popular in practising religious families.
Cross as relic setting. A larger cross with a hollow setting at the centre for ashes, a fingerprint or a lock of hair. Prices: 300–1,500 €.
The antique mourning cross. Whitby jet crosses, bog oak crosses and black enamel gold crosses of the nineteenth century form an auction category of their own. Prices: 100–3,000 € depending on material, size and condition.
Combination pendants. Cross plus anchor plus heart (faith, hope, love) as a threefold symbol - a Victorian tradition becoming popular again in the modern market. See Anchor, Heart.
Questions about this entry
- Which cross forms are used in mourning jewellery?
Several variants dominate. The Latin cross (long vertical bar, shorter horizontal bar) - the classic Western Christian form, dominant in Catholic and Protestant mourning pieces. The Greek cross (four bars of equal length) - usual in Orthodox and early Christian pieces. The Celtic cross (a Latin cross with a circle at the intersection) - in Irish and Scottish mourning pieces, above all in bog oak jewellery (see Bog Oak). The cross patté (widened bar ends) - in military and heraldic memorial pieces. The anchor cross (a hybrid with an anchor at the foot) - a double symbol of faith and hope (see Anchor).
- Is the cross in mourning jewellery always meant religiously?
Not necessarily any more. Historically - from the Middle Ages into the nineteenth century - the cross in a mourning context was practically always Christian in charge. In the modern memorial jewellery market the cross is also used as a general symbol of death, finitude and remembrance, without any explicit confessional character. Non-religious mourners occasionally turn to other symbols instead - butterfly (see Butterfly), anchor, decorative heart - while practising Christian families choose the cross deliberately.
- What distinguishes a pectoral cross from a mourning cross?
The pectoral cross (Latin pectorale) is a badge of office for senior clergy (bishops, cardinals) - a large cross worn prominently, often set with gemstones. The mourning cross is a small, private jewellery form worn in a mourning context - usually as a pendant on a chain, often in a dark material (jet, onyx, black enamel) or with a small relic setting at its core. The two overlap in design, but differ in who wears them and on what occasion.
Further reading
- Lexikon christlicher Symbole - Jutta Seibert (2002)
- Sentimental Jewellery - Shire Library - Ann Louise Luthi (2007)
- Mourning Dress - A Costume and Social History - Lou Taylor (1983)
Related entries
- Core conceptsMourning Jewellery
Mourning jewellery is body adornment that signals a death, binds the memory of a deceased person, or does both at once - since the 17th century a jewellery type in its own right, with a material language of its own.
- Core conceptsMemorial Jewellery
Memorial jewellery is jewellery that deliberately binds itself to one particular person - through an inscription, a photograph, hair, ashes or, the defining medium today, a digitally captured fingerprint.
- Core conceptsMemento mori
Memento mori is the Christian-Stoic exhortation to be mindful of one's own death - and at the same time the iconographic soil from which European mourning jewellery of the 17th century grew.
- Symbols & motifsAnchor
In mourning and memorial jewellery the anchor is the classic symbol of *hope* - usually paired with the cross (faith) and the heart (love) as a threefold emblem of the virtues; a constant form in Victorian jewellery, and living on in modern memorial jewellery as a many-layered symbol of steadiness, anchorage and constancy.
- Symbols & motifsHeart
The heart is the third element of the Christian triad of virtues (faith - hope - love) and at the same time the strongest secular symbol of love and affection in mourning and memorial jewellery - from the medieval Sacred Heart via the Georgian heart locket to the modern ash pendant in the shape of a heart.
- Jewellery formsReliquary Pendant
The reliquary pendant is the religious ancestor of the remembrance locket - a pendant worn at the neck with an interior compartment that originally held the relics of saints and, from the seventeenth century onwards, was secularised into a keepsake of deceased family members.
- Jewellery formsMourning Necklace
The mourning necklace is a chain worn at the neck in black or muted material which, in the second half of the nineteenth century, became the standard daytime wear of the mourning period, and which lives on today as a reduced remembrance variant with a pendant.
- Jewellery formsMourning Locket
The mourning locket is a pendant worn on a neck chain with an interior compartment - a concealed carrier of hair, photograph or inscription that keeps the memento close to the body and has been, from the eighteenth century to the present, the most important private form of mourning jewellery.
- MaterialsGold in Mourning Jewellery
Gold is historically the most dominant carrier material of mourning and memorial jewellery - usually in muted alloys, often contrasted with black enamel or as a restrained gold setting around a dark principal material such as jet, onyx or a plait of hair.
- MaterialsSilver in Mourning Jewellery
In the 19th century silver was the popular mourning carrier material of the bourgeois middle class and is today the most widespread material of modern memorial jewellery - cheaper than gold, more precise to engrave than stainless steel and with a long symbolic tradition as a material of purity and of memento mori iconography.
- People & cultural historyMourning Rituals in the German-Speaking World
German-speaking mourning rituals differ perceptibly from the English court-mourning tradition - shaped by confessional division (Catholic / Protestant), middle-class sensibility, Biedermeier domesticity and an independent culture of memorial jewellery which carried different emphases in Vienna, Berlin and Munich according to region.
- PeriodsThe Victorian Era (1837–1901)
The Victorian era is the heyday of mourning jewellery - a period of more than sixty years in which court mourning codes, industrial mass production, new materials (jet, vulcanite, Berlin iron) and Queen Victoria's personal widowhood combined to produce a system of public and private mourning visibility without precedent in European history.