The head is reported to have been brought from Machærus to Jerusalem and there buried. In the time of Constantine it was taken to Emesa and hidden away in a cave. Why this was necessary at that particular period is not stated. Here it was discovered by a priest called Marcellus, the superior of a monastery in those parts. He composed a long and detailed account of the discovery, containing also a history of the previous vicissitudes of the relic.[479] The discovery was made in consequence of many dreams, and a fiery star is said to have guided Marcellus to the spot where the sacred treasure rested in an urn, deeply buried in the earth. Marcellus informed Bishop Uranius of Emesa of his discovery, and the bishop solemnly removed the relic on the 24th February, 452. It was first of all placed in the cathedral, and then soon afterwards in a chapel expressly built to receive it, to which it was conveyed on the 26th September of the same year. Here it rested under the Mohammedan dominion, and in 760 a large church was even built to replace the chapel. We have here a threefold translation of the head of St John the Baptist. It is asserted that a part of it is preserved at Amiens which was brought thither from Constantinople in the thirteenth century. Two of the three days commemorating these translations are marked in the Greek menologies, the 24th February and the 26th September.[480] The story of these translations throws no light upon the choice of 29th August for the beheading of the saint.