Crucifixion is a method of capital punishment in which the victim is tied or nailed to a large wooden beam. The victim is left to hang for several days until eventual death from exhaustion and asphyxiation. The crucifixion of Jesus is a central narrative in Christianity, and the cross (sometimes depicting Jesus nailed onto it) is the main religious symbol for many Christian churches. The English term cross derives from the Latin word crux. The Latin term crux classically referred to a tree or any construction of wood used to hang criminals as a form of execution. The term later came to refer specifically to a cross.
The Sibylline Oracles are a collection of oracular utterances written in Greek hexameters ascribed to the Sibyls. Sibyls were prophetesses who uttered divine revelations in a frenzied state. Fourteen books and eight fragments of Sibylline Oracles survive, in an edition of the 6th or 7th century AD.
The text is an "odd pastiche" of Hellenistic and Roman mythology interspersed with Jewish, Gnostic and early Christian legend. The Sibylline Oracles are a valuable source for information about classical mythology and early first millennium Gnostic, Hellenistic Jewish and Christian beliefs. Some apocalyptic passages scattered throughout seem to present similar themes of the Christian Biblical Book of Revelation.