The Cross.
The holy ensign of the Cross was often used in dress in order to command a homage the wearer would not otherwise have received. In 1363, the father of the Doge of Venice preferred always going bareheaded to pulling off his cap to his son, until the Doge thought of placing a golden cross in front of his cap. The father then re-assumed his cap, and when he met his son pulled it off, saying, “It is not him I salute, but the cross;” and from that time the cross became an ornament of the ducal cap.