But the Holy Foreskin didn't appear only in art. The actual physical
artifact — or what people claimed was the real thing — was a popular
object of veneration.

The Holy Foreskin first made an appearance in medieval Europe around 800
ad, when King Charlemagne presented it as a gift to Pope Leo III.
Charlemagne said it had been given to him by an angel.


However, rival foreskins soon began to pop up all over Europe. All told, twenty-one different churches claimed to have the Holy Foreskin, often at
the same time. Various miraculous powers were attributed to these
foreskins. In particular, they were supposed to be able to protect women
during childbirth.

Given the glut of Holy Foreskins, churches made efforts to have their
foreskin authenticated by Church leaders as the sole genuine article. In
the early 12th century, the monks of San Giovanni in Laterano, Rome asked
Pope Innocent III to rule on the authenticity of their foreskin, but he declined to do so. Later, the monks of Charroux claimed their foreskin to
be the only real one, pointing out that it apparently yielded drops of
blood. This convinced Pope Clement VII (1523-1534) who declared theirs to
be the authentic thing.


Some medieval theologians argued that all the Holy Foreskins necessarily
had to be frauds since the actual Holy Foreskin had, they asserted,
ascended into Heaven with Christ. The 17th century theologian Leo Allatius speculated in his essay De Praeputio Domini Nostri Jesu Christi Diatriba
that the holy foreskin had ascended into heaven at the same time as Jesus,
and had become the rings of Saturn.

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