According to the legends and news reported in the Chronicon Atinense Ecclesiae (1145-1150) of the benedictine monk Pietro Diacono, Marco, a galilean disciple of the apostle Pietro and ordained bishop by him, was killed in Atina during the persecution of Domiziano (95-96), martyred by two nails in the head. His cult was recovered following some miracles performed in the mid of XI century; the body was then found and brought to the church of Santa Maria Assunta.
The reliquary, created to contain and expose a finger of the martyred saint through a small window, dates back to the XVIII century., as attested by the stamp stamped on the lower end of the sleeve, and then repeated a second time on the base.
The base is supported by four cherub-shaped feet and is decorated with ovules and disks. The arm with the blessing hand is covered by a sleeve with an embroidered cuff and a wide fringed border, with decorative floral motifs.
Although the reliquary is stamped, its authorship is not well defined: the object can be traced back to two silversmiths working between the end of the seventeenth century and the beginning of the following century, Nicola d’Aula and Nicola De Angelis.
Both used as personal stamp two punches bearing the same initials “NDA” arranged “in line” (in 1973 it is attributed by Catello to De Angelis, in 1997 to d’Aula), which over time has created a confusion attributable to the first works of the second and vice versa (this uncertainty has been summarized, but not dissolved , from Iannelli, 2008).
The valuable object was also punched with the consular stamp of Giambattista d’Aula, a Neapolitan silversmith who held the position of consul from 1702 until 1736.
The presence, in the same church, of a valuable cross, punched with clearly legible stamps (stamp of the silversmith NDA, consular stamp GBAC, and stamp of the art, NAP712) can suggest that the reliquary arm was also made by the same master in the same year in which the cross was made, that is in 1712: this dating seems indicate De Angelis as probable performer of the work, since its period of activity is included in the first thirty years of the XVIII century.
The same punches (NDA and GBAC) appear on the bust of Sant’Annocenzo a Grassano (MT), with the stamp of the art of 1718, and in the arm of San Francesco di Sales di Nardò (Boraccesi, 2013, pp. 44-45).
In an act of perpetual devotion, on April 28 (dies natalis of the saint patron of Atina) and on October 1 (date of the translation of the body) the reliquary is carried in procession, at the end of which it is offered to the churchgoers for the devotional kiss.