Abstract

Occasionally over the centuries an incident occurs that shifts a center of gravity and draws the attention and energy of formerly disinterested bystanders. In the opening decades of the ninth century, an abandoned Roman mausoleum in remote northwest Spain was proclaimed the resting place of the Apostle St. James the Greater, the only original companion of Jesus buried in Europe other than Peter and Paul in Rome. All three were martyred for the faith, but the celebrated presence of the two greatest princes of the Church in a single city that subsequently became the home of a continuous line of successors to Peter – and interpreters of Paul – had long given Rome the edge.