It is said that Constantine’s army also witnessed this miracle. This was a battle between the armies of two Roman emperors, Maxentius and Constantine I, which ended with the victory of the latter.īoth Lactantius, Constantine’s advisor on Christianity-related matters, and Eusebius of Caesarea in his work named Vita Constantini (The Life of Constantine), wrote that the Chi-Rho symbol was adopted by the Roman emperor after a vision he had.Īccording to the story, after seeing the bitter fates of many commanders who worshipped several different gods, the emperor decided to pray for and asked the help of the One Supreme God.Īfter noon, Constantine saw a sign imposed on the sun (although some accounts say that the sign was ‘above the sun’) along with a message that said in Greek “With this symbol, you will conquer”. The story of how the symbol came to be a common Christian symbol dates back to the 4th century, to the Battle of Milvian Bridge on October 28, 312, to be exact. In that sense, the symbol was just an abbreviation of the Greek word anglicized as ‘Chreston’ meaning “good”. It is known that Greek scribes of pagan faith used the symbol to mark passages in texts they consider important. That, however, was not the only non-Christian use of the Chi-Rho symbol. It was inscribed on the coins of Ptolemy III Euergetes who ruled the Ptolemaic Dynasty in Egypt between the years of 246 and 222 BC. (‘To superimpose’ means ‘placing or laying one thing over another’) Where Did The Chi-Rho Monogram Originate and When Was It First Used?Īlthough it is mostly known as a Christian symbol, the Chi-Rho monogram existed before Christianity. These two letters were not selected randomly though, they are taken from the Greek word ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ (Christos) meaning “the one who is anointed”. The Chi-Rho symbol (☧) simply is the superimposition of two Greek letters onto each other Χ (Chi) and Ρ (Rho). It is simply pronounced as “KEE-roe” in English.
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