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The article presents information about a trove of relics possessed by a church in Exeter, England, and a legend that they were collected and donated in the 10th century by King Æthelstan. Traditional ideas of the religious significance of relics and reliquaries are described, and their symbolism is analyzed in historical and political terms. The example of Pippin the Short, who founded the Carolingian dynasty in Europe, is cited as an instance of the usefulness of relics in politics. Pippin used ceremonies involving relics on several occasions as a means of sanctifying his usurpation of power from the Merovingian dynasty. Æthelstan's relationships with Pippin's heirs is also discussed.

National museums, housing 'national antiquities', were a nineteenth-century cultural phenomenon throughout Europe. In the United Kingdom, they afforded the Treasury a means of preserving relics of antiquity claimed as treasure trove. While satisfying the desire of the scientific community for the preservation of archaeological finds, and national sentiment in Scotland and Ireland, Treasury practice undermined the British Museum's eponymous mission. This paper traces the development and legal consequences of the Treasury policy of national allocation of treasure trove, including the discussion in the Museums Committee of 1898-99 of the 'nationality' of objects and artefacts, and considers the potential wider significance of 'national antiquity' in the context of changing constitutional arrangements in the United Kingdom in the 1920s, and in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]