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Discovery of the Holy Lance

Miniature taken from Sébastien Mamerot's Overseas Passages (ca. 1474).

Raymond became the foremost noble attached to the cult of the Sacred Lance, a relic allegedly found by Peter Bartholomew while rummaging in the Bascilica of St. Peter. (The lance was rumored that which pieced the side of Christ at Golgotha and Peter was led to it by a vision of St. Andrew.) The Franks rallied around it when they went out to break the Abbasid seige of Antioch on 28 Jun 1098. St. Andrew continued to trouble Peter along with that of the recently departed spirit of Bishop Adhémar; the shades confided that Raymond was called to lead the assembled Franks in Antioch and beyond, a classic case of "mission creep." Only rebellion within his own camp caused Raymond to abandon his contest for Antioch and push him, by fits and starts, towards Jerusalem. In Lebanon even this bid for the mantle was dealt a serious blow when Peter died after a voluntary ordeal by fire.

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