Heads up

The Nativity of St. John the Baptist (or Birth of John the Baptist, or Nativity of the Forerunner) is a Christian feast day celebrating the birth of John the Baptist, a prophet who foretold the coming of the Messiah in the person of Jesus, whom he later baptized. Because the Baptist was believed to have been born six months before Jesus -- based on an interpretation of the first chapter of Luke, which says Elizabeth (John's mother) was six months pregnant when Gabriel announced to Mary that she would give birth to the Messiah -- the feast is kept six months before Christmas, that is, today, June 24.

John's beheading is commemorated on August 29.

And it is of that head that we speak.

Here is the alleged relic of John's head that is venerated in the Cathedral of Amiens, some 75 miles north of Paris.

Muslims, however, believe the head is kept in the Ummayad Mosque in Damascus. The Church of St. Sylvester in Rome also claims to have the head in its possession. And there are other claimants ...

Without suggesting that any of these skulls is the head of John, I note that the scriptural accounts of the beheading say that the skull was given to Herodias by her daughter. It was not uncommon for political leaders to keep the skulls of defeated enemies as a sign of their victory over them, and it is at least conceivable that the authentic head was passed down in some way and made its way into the possession of Christians who might have been followers of John before embracing the cause of Jesus. This does not resolve the question of whether that skull still exists or which, if any, of those now venerated by the faithful is the real thing.

John's imprisonment and execution is mentioned in the The Antiquities of the Jews, composed by Josephus around 93 CE, some 60 years after the event.