25 



Meissner here sketched the subsequent history of this image at 

 Constantinople, Rome, and Genoa. 



Gems, on which are carved heathen deities and scenes from 

 heathen mythology, have been frequently used in the ornamen- 

 tation of shrines, processional crosses and other church furniture, 

 such as the Theofanu-cross, and the cross of Mathildis at Essen, 

 the shrine of S. Elizabeth at Marburg, the pulpit at Aix-la- 

 Chapelle. As late as the 17th century a similar ornamentation 

 was employed in the sacramental plate of the Protestant Church 

 at Hermannstadt. The use of secular dyptichs as covers for 

 mass and gospel-books is well known. 



Holy wells were frequently enclosed in churches, and their 

 real or supposed miraculous powers hallowed by the church. 

 Most of these have been now covered up — e.g., Strassburg, 

 Wiirzburg, Freiburg in Baden, Carlisle. On the enclosure of 

 the well in Ratisbon Cathedral are sculptured Christ and the 

 Samaritan woman. 



Idols were mostly destroyed, but the few remaining ones are 

 of the greatest interest. Chief of all, the famous Irminsul which 

 Charlemagne overthrew in 772 at Eresburg, and is now in the 

 cathedral at Hildesheim. After the dissolution of the Abbey of 

 Corvey, this idol was removed to its present position. A heathen 

 idol, formerly in the Conventual Church of Colbatz in Pomerania, 

 is now in the Vaterlandisihes Museum at Berlin. Also the 

 Wendic idol, the Piisterich, has been removed to the Museum 

 at Sondershausen. But the old idol Swantevit still occupies its 

 place in the east end of the Church at Altenkirchen, in the 

 island of Riigen. The brazen serpent, which Archbishop Arnulf 

 brought, in the year 1001 from Constantinople, fondly believing 

 it to be the brazen serpent which Moses erected in the wilderness, 

 still occupies its old place in the Church of S. Ambrogio at 

 Milan. It most probably belonged to a temple of Aesculapius, 

 or was, as some think, an Egyptian talisman of the third or 

 fourth century. 



