Wood slats from the Holy Crib are encased in a reliquary and are on display at Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. (Image credit: Antoine Taveneaux/Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0))

QUICK FACTS

Name: Holy Crib

What it is: Five pieces of sycamore wood

Where it is from: Jerusalem

When it was made: Circa 4 to 6 B.C.

In the 640s, Sophronius, the patriarch of Jerusalem, sent several unassuming wooden slats to Rome for safekeeping after the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem. Sophronius asked Pope Theodore I to protect the pieces of wood, which he said were the remains of the Holy Crib — Jesus' manger.

According to Monsignor Piero Marini, who is the guardian of the Holy Crib, four of the wooden slats once formed two X's, while the fifth slat ran down the middle to hold them together. Wooden mangers in the late first century B.C. would have been topped with straw for animals to eat. But this particular manger is much more significant: It is said to have once held the baby Jesus.

The Gospel of Luke mentions that Jesus was born in Bethlehem. Because there was nowhere for Mary and Joseph to stay in town, the newborn Jesus was laid in a manger. Many biblical scholars believe that Jesus was born between 6 and 4 B.C. And while his birth is celebrated on Dec. 25 every year, scholars are unsure of his exact birth date.

The first historical mention of the manger pieces comes from Origen, an early Christian scholar, who wrote in A.D. 220 that the crib was preserved in Bethlehem, according to Marini. Then, around A.D. 400, St. Jerome discussed the Holy Crib and many people's pilgrimages to it in the Grotto of the Nativity in Bethlehem. Ever since the wood pieces made their way to Rome in the seventh century, the manger has remained in Santa Maria Maggiore.

In 1894, abbot Giuseppe Cozza-Luzi was the first to study the remains of the Holy Crib. His examination revealed that there are two longer pieces of wood and three shorter pieces — ranging from about 25 to 33.5 inches (64 to 85 centimeters) in length — and that all of them had been damaged over time. Several of the wooden pieces also had holes and traces of metal, suggesting they had once been constructed into a manger.