18th century / 1891
Unknown workshop
Gold, silver, diamond, amethyst
PFM IM ApÉk. 1

Housing amethyst stones, the trying-life of pectoral cross was originally produced in the 18th-century. In 1891, on the occasion of Kolos Vaszary's appointment as Archbishop of Esztergom, the Benedictine community altered the back of it with an enamel-inlaid gold plate bearing the engraving “To Kolos, the noblest Father, his sons from the mountain of Saint Martin, 1891.” Following the death of Vaszary, the pectoral cross was returned by his suffragan bishop, Medard Kohl, also a Benedictine. In 1937, when Cardinal Jusztinian Serédi (1884-1945) consecrated the Saint Maurus Chapel above the left aisle of the basilica, Archabbot Krizosztom Kelemen (1884-1950) presented the cardinal with the memorial pectoral cross and chain of Vaszary. When Serédi passed away, the pectoral cross was once again returned to Pannonhalma in 1945, and was hidden, together with other golden items, under a doorstep of the lower library. It was discovered only in 1972 by masons working there; merely to be confiscated by state authorities. The abbey treasury recovered the pectoral cross in the 1980s.