Even in the Catacombs two palms are sometimes placed crossways, not on the tombs of martyrs only, but on other Christian tombs, to signify the victory of the cross. For life as a declared Christian in the early days of the faith was sufficiently difficult and perilous, even if it did not end in death at the hands of the executioner. In the same way the pilgrim who had overcome difficulties and encountered possible death on a journey of piety to the holy sepulchre was permitted to take the name of palmer when he ‘brings home his staff enwreathed with palm.’[157] Meanwhile palms never fell into disuse as a secular symbol. When they appear on the seals and coins of emperors and kings they indicate entirely worldly power and authority, and it is not in recognition of sainthood that the winged genius presents Henri IV with palm and wreath of laurel in the fine allegorical picture of his ‘Entry into Paris after the Battle of Ivry.’[158] In a hymn of Saint Augustine, Jesus Christ is designated the ‘Palma bellatorum,’ but, perhaps by reason of its pagan origin, and also because it has never been exclusively a religious symbol, Christ as the conqueror of sin and death is seldom depicted with the palm of victory. In a few devotional Crucifixions palms are placed crossways above the Saviour’s head, and very rarely it is seen in the hand of the newly-risen Christ. He almost invariably carries instead the banner of the Resurrection with a scarlet cross upon a white ground. In one of the rare representations[159] where He holds a palm He holds also the banner in His other hand, and it is striking how the adding of the lesser symbol to the greater, an error the early masters carefully avoided, detracts from the dignity of the figure. In the four canonical gospels, palms as a symbol are only mentioned once, the occasion being the entry of Jesus Christ ‘riding lowly upon an ass’ into Jerusalem before the feast of the Passover. ‘They ... took branches of palm trees and went forth to meet Him, and cried Hosanna!’ It was a respect paid to a reigning sovereign and would support the accusation of the Jews that He sought to make Himself a king. The entry into Jerusalem is not an incident in the life of Christ which is used for devotional contemplation, though it occurred usually in the series of scenes from the life of Christ which were frequent in pre-Renaissance art, executed in carved wood, ivory and marble; and in the hands of the villagers of the Mount of Olives the palms signified, of course, simply triumph, for they had not yet gained the full Christian meaning of victory through the Cross. In representations of the entry of Christ into Jerusalem, the palms are merely a historical detail, but it is a true symbol, in defiance of the probable fact, when the Saviour Himself is represented carrying the palm, as in the _Biblia Pauperum_ of 1440.[160] It is then purely a symbol of His triumph over sin and death.