“The worship of relics, and the belief in them as remedies and a protection against evil, originated in the 4th century. They first (?) appear in writings, none of which are earlier than the year 370: but they prevailed rapidly when they had once taken root” (Scudamore, Dict. Chr. Antiq. “Relics,” p. 1770). Bingham (Ant. xxiii. 4, § 7) quotes a law of Theodosius, “that no one should remove any dead body that was buried, from one place to another; that no one should sell or buy the relics of Martyrs: but if any one was minded to build over the grave where a martyr was buried, a church to be called a martyrium, in respect to him, he should have liberty to do it.” The law wholly failed to suppress a superstition which was sanctioned by such men as Cyril, Basil, Chrysostom, Ambrose, and Augustine.