In their recent publication “Los Reyes del Grial” (“The Kings of the Grail”), medieval history lecturer Margarita Torres and art historian José Miguel Ortega del Rio assert that the Holy Grail is housed within the Basilica of San Isidoro in the northern Spanish city of León. After a three-year investigation, the historians concluded that the revered cup, believed to have been used by Jesus Christ during the Last Supper and to have collected his precious blood, is a jewel-encrusted goblet known as the Chalice of the Infanta Doña Urraca, named after the daughter of King Ferdinand I, who ruled León and Castile from 1037 to 1065.

During their exploration of Islamic remains in the Basilica of San Isidoro, the researchers stumbled upon medieval Egyptian parchments mentioning that the holy chalice had been transported from Jerusalem to Cairo and then presented to an emir ruling an Islamic kingdom on Spain’s Mediterranean coast in exchange for aid provided to famine-stricken Egypt. The emir subsequently offered the chalice as a gesture of peace to the Christian King Ferdinand. Since the 11th century, the goblet has been in the basilica’s possession and has been on display in the church’s basement museum since the 1950s.

The chalice, crafted from gold and onyx and adorned with precious stones, consists of two fused goblets, one inverted over the other. Torres and del Rio note that the upper half, composed of agate and missing a fragment, corresponds exactly to the description in the Egyptian parchments. Scientific dating places the origin of the cup between 200 B.C. and 100 A.D. However, the co-authors acknowledge they cannot definitively prove that the chalice touched Jesus’s lips, only that it was revered by early Christians as the vessel used at the Last Supper. Since the book’s release, the basilica has experienced a surge in visitors, prompting curators to temporarily remove the relic from display until larger exhibition space can be arranged.

While this claim marks another chapter in the ongoing quest for the Holy Grail, skepticism abounds among historians, and there is no concrete evidence of its existence. The cup is mentioned only briefly in the Bible, and its religious significance emerged primarily from medieval legends intertwining ancient Celtic myths with the Christian tradition of the Holy Chalice used by Jesus. “The Grail legend is a literary invention of the 12th century with no historical basis,” remarked Carlos de Ayala, a medieval historian at a Madrid university. Even if the Holy Grail exists, proving its authenticity as the goblet used by Jesus would be exceedingly difficult. Nonetheless, the search for history’s most elusive treasure is bound to persist despite the latest announcement.