Elena Maria Gagliardi

A relic, supposed to be St. Mary’s sash (Sacra Fascia), was brought from the Holy Land to Tortona in 1237. A report of this travel is preserved in a 15th-Century chronicle, MS Milano, Braid. AF IX 11/1, and in later MSS (Ambr. C 74 inf., Ambr. C 103 inf., Vat. lat. 7924). During the 17th Century the relic was moved to the Jesuit church of S. Maria in Brera of Milan. La Sacra Fascia di S. Maria di Brera della Compagnia di Giesu in Milano (1701) is a booklet published by the Jesuits in order to foster the devotion to it: here the Sacra Fascia is connected with the Infant Jesus’ swaddling clothes, described in the visions of Veronica da Binasco, a mystic who lived in Milan in the early 16th Century. After the French Revolution the relic was apparently transferred to the church of S. Marco of Milan.