The first feast in honor of the Crown of Thorns [Festum susceptionis coronae Domini] was instituted at Paris in 1239, when St. Louis brought there the relic of the Crown of Thorns, which was deposited later in the Royal Chapel, in August, and though at first special to the Royal Chapel, the feast was gradually observed as the Feast of the Holy Crown on May 4, celebrated along with the Feast of the Cross in parts of Spain, Germany, and Scandinavia.

It is still kept in not a few Spanish dioceses and is observed by the Dominicans on April 24.

A special feast on the Monday after Passion Sunday was granted to the Diocese of Freising in Bavaria by Clement X [1676] and Innocent XI [1689] in honor of the Crown of Christ. It was celebrated at Venice in 1766 on the second Friday of March. In 1831 it was adopted at Rome as a double major and is observed on the Friday following Ash Wednesday. As it is not kept throughout  the universal Church, the Mass and Office are placed in the appendices to the Breviary and the Missal. The hymns of the Office, taken from the "Analecta hymnica" of Dreves and Blume contains a large number of rhythmical offices, hymns, and sequences for this feast.
 

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