Golden Rose

GOLDEN ROSE. - It is a symbolic gift that the pontiffs are accustomed to send, as a sign of particular esteem and benevolence, only to queens, although in the past they were wont to honor with this distinction sovereigns, princes and eminent personalities as a reward for important services rendered to the Church and to society, as well as illustrious sanctuaries and important cities.

It consisted at times of a simple flower without stem or leaves and, at others, of a flowering branch, with leaves and thorns, until it assumed, in the time of Sixtus IV (1471-84), its present form, that is, of a cluster of roses entirely of gold and adorned with precious stones, whose central flower, larger than the others, bears at its center, within a small cup, balsam and musk.

It is not possible to establish with exactness its first origin. It is known only that in 1049 Leo IX, in exchange for the exemption from the jurisdiction of the local Ordinary which he granted to the monastery of St. Cross of Tulle in Alsace, imposed on those religious the annual sending to the Pope of a g. r.; but in the relevant document the same Leo IX speaks of the g. r. as of something not new. The most ancient record, historically established, of the concession of a g. r. on the part of the Pope, goes back to 1096, when Urban II, passing through Angers, during the preaching of the first Crusade, made a gift of it to Count Fulk of Anjou. In the Avignon period there then began to spread the custom of offering the g. r. to various illustrious personages of both sexes, to churches and to cities. It suffices to mention, besides the various emperors, the kings of France Louis VII, Charles VI and VII, the king of Naples and Aragon Alfonso, who received it in 1451 from Nicholas V for the victory over the Turks, John of Austria, one of the victors of Lepanto, to whom it was given by Gregory XIII in 1576, and Queen Casimira of Poland in 1684 for the victory of Vienna. Among the principal churches benefited with the g. r. are to be remembered the Roman basilicas of St. Peter (5 times), St. John Lateran (4 times), St. Mary Major (2 times) and the churches of St. Mary sopra Minerva and St. Anthony of the Portuguese, as well as, outside Rome, the sanctuary of Loreto, St. Mary of the Flower of Florence, St. Dominic of Perugia and the basilica of Notre-Dame of Lourdes. Among the cities, on the other hand, are to be numbered Venice, which received it several times, Bologna, Siena, Savona and Lucca.

The last of the male sex to receive the g. r. was the doge of Venice Franc. Loredan, who had it from Clement XIII in 1759; from then on, except for a few churches, it was reserved exclusively to sovereigns, among whom

Those who received it were the former queen of Sardinia Maria Teresa (1825), the queens Isabella (1868) and Maria Christina of Spain (1886), the empresses Eugénie of France (1856) and Elizabeth of Brazil (1888), the queens Amelia of Portugal (1892) and Marie Henriette of Belgium (1893).

The ceremony of the blessing of the r. of g. formerly took place in S. Croce in Gerusalemme; but when the emperor was in Rome, in order to be crowned there, it was destined for him and the ceremony of the blessing took place in S. Maria in Cosmedin. At present the r. of g. is blessed by the Pope on the Sunday Laetare (IV of Lent), before the Mass in the Sala dei paramenti in the presence of many cardinals, and then carried by him himself into the Sistine Chapel, where he entrusts it to one of the cardinal deacons, and it is then placed on the altar. When the person for whom the r. of g. is destined is in Rome, it is the Pope himself who hands it to them, on leaving the Sistine Chapel; otherwise an official bearer is appointed, chosen from among the participating supernumerary Camerieri di spada e cappa.

The tradition of the offering of the r. of g., interrupted in the times of Pius X and Benedict XV, was resumed by Pius XI, who conferred it in 1923 on the queen of Spain Victoria Eugenie, in 1925 on Elizabeth, queen of the Belgians, and in 1937 on Elena, queen of Italy (d. 28 Nov. 1952).

Niccolò Del Re