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one offered by Philip Augustus to the Abbey of Saint-Denis in 1205 and depicted in Félibien’s
seventeenth-century engraving of the church’s treasury where the tri-lobe terminations of the
cross recall the form of a fleur-de-lis (fig. 20). 63 As the popularity of this type of reliquary grew
during the thirteenth century, the form was adapted for other uses. At the Sainte-Chapelle one of
the statues of the twelve Apostles located on the interior of the upper chapel holds a disk
containing a Greek cross with arms ending in fleurs-de-lis. 64 The appearance of a croix
fleurdelisée is especially appropriate at this royal chapel, which housed additional pieces of the
True Cross and the other relics of the Passion acquired by Louis IX.
The importance conferred on the kingdom of France by the True Cross was so great that
in the thirteenth century royal mints began using the image on the reverse of coins and continued
doing so into the eighteenth century. 65 Indeed, in 1642 Louis XIII issued an écu d’or with a
croix fleurdelisée on the reverse (fig. 21). As Rebecca Zorach has shown, coinage was thought to
have a memory-preserving function. 66 The ruling monarch’s face on the coin supported the
king’s legitimacy throughout the extent of the French nation. 67 A similar effect could be
achieved with just the king’s symbolic body on gold coins such as the écu d’or, which had the
royal coat of arms displayed within a shield. 68 The croix fleurdelisée on the reverse served as a
reminder that the kingdom of France possessed the most important relics in Christendom. By
incorporating the motif of the fleur-de-lis into the church of the Oratory, Louis XIII not only
reinforced the connection of his new palace chapel to the Sainte-Chapelle but he reaffirmed the
prestige of the French capital, the city in which many of the relics of Christ’s Passion were
enshrined. 69
Yet another motif on the interior of the church, surprisingly not mentioned in the
literature, further illustrates the king’s sovereign will, a serliana in the gallery of the apse’s axial
bay (fig. 8). Jacques Lemercier was the architect who introduced the design, and it is the first
example of the motif in his work as well as in Parisian religious architecture. 70 The serliana, a
central arch framed by two smaller rectangular openings supported on columns, was an antique
architectural motif associated with Roman imperial ceremonies. 71 The courtyard of Diocletian’s
palace at Split is a well known example where the emperor’s appearance in the central arch
would have provided an honorific setting and emphasized the leader’s sovereign rule (fig. 22).
The Renaissance architect Bramante revived the serliana, employing it in 1507 as a window in
the Vatican’s Sala Regia, a throne room for the reception of dignitaries visiting the papal
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