Holy Grail Quest: Cops Search Baby’s Diapers, 15th-Century Pub For Missing Relic

The Holy Grail. No one knows exactly what it is, or if it even really exists. The most common belief is that the Holy Grail is the cup used by Jesus to drink his wine at the Last Supper. Another interpretation says that the famous Shroud of Turin, a mysterious sheet of linen said to bear the image of Jesus, is the Holy Grail. A bestselling book in the 1980s claimed that the Holy Grail was not an object at all, but was the bloodline of Jesus, who supposedly married and had children.

According to legend, a wealthy disciple of Jesus called Joseph of Arimathea escaped with the sacred cup, reputed to have magical powers, after the crucifixion of Jesus by the Romans sometime around 33 C.E., and sailed with the cup to the islands that later became Great Britain.

In April of this year, a group of historians said they found the Holy Grail — in a Spanish church where the jewel-encrusted drinking cup had been sitting for at least 1,000 years. But others believe that the Holy Grail is a simple wooden cup — the Nanteos Cup — that somehow ended up in the home of a British woman. But burglars broke into her house in July and stole the alleged Holy Grail.

That explains why police last Sunday searched for the Holy Grail in a bundle of baby’s diapers.

Cops in Lea, a town in England’s West Midlands, said they received “intelligence” indicating that the Nanteos Cup — the Holy Grail — was being kept in the Crown Inn, a 15th Century pub in the town. So they obtained a search warrant and turned the place upside down.

But after a three-hour search by 12 police officers, the closest thing to a Holy Grail they found was a salad bowl.

“We had our 13-week old baby Archie here and they searched his pram, the nappy bag, the lot,” said the Crown Inn’s landlord Michael Trotter, 36, who also helps operate the old pub. “And every time we wanted the toilet, we had to be escorted.”

Trotter said police told him that their reports indicated that customers at the Crown Inn were spotted quaffing brew from the Holy Grail at the establishment’s bar.

“But I certainly haven’t seen it,” Trotter said. “If I had, I probably would have wanted to take a sip out of it for eternal youth, too. We have made our own Holy Grail bowl now and if anybody wants to drink out of it, they can, legally.”

Police there say that even though they didn’t find the Holy Grail in the pub, or among the baby’s “nappies,” their search for the Holy Grail remains ongoing.