Ecclesiastical Vestments: Their development and historyMacalister, Robert Alexander Stewart
History
Ecclesiastical Vestments: Their development and history
Macalister, Robert Alexander Stewart
Church vestments
There is one other series of vestments which deserves a passing
notice—the vestments in which the newly-baptized were clothed. In the
sixth or seventh century these consisted of the _alba_, the _sabanum_,
the _chrismale_, and the _garland_. The alba was probably similar to the
clerical alba; the form of the sabanum (=sabanon=) is uncertain, but it
was possibly not more than its name implies—simply a towel. The
chrismale was a piece of white linen tied on the head, intended to keep
the chrism in its place during the week in which these vestments were
worn. The garland was a chaplet of flowers with which the baptized were
crowned after baptism.
There is a rite in the Armenian Church in which the priest twists two
threads, one white and one red, lifts them up under the cross, and then
lays them on the person to be baptized. The white and red is obviously
symbolical of the mingled blood and water which flowed from our Lord's
side, but there are obscure traces in early writers which seem to
indicate that this observance was of more general acceptance, and that
the present rite is a corruption of something quite different. Durandus,
in the 'Rationale Div. Off.,' vi, c. 82, speaks of the alba of baptism
having upon it a red band like a 'corona,' and elsewhere we find a
combination of red and white mentioned in connection with the robes of
the neophytes.
These vestments were worn throughout the week after baptism, and put off
on the Sunday following, hence called _Dominica in albis depositis_.
They were either retained after baptism as a memorial of the
sacrament—and often used as shrouds after death—or else presented to the
church by the baptized.
[Illustration: FIG. 21.]
In the mediaeval church this comparatively elaborate suit was reduced to
one cloth, the chrysome, or chrism cloth, in which the body of a
newly-baptized infant was swathed. This cloth was kept upon the child
for a month, and if it died within the month the child was buried in it
as a shroud. Several monumental brasses are extant in which children are
represented in their baptismal robes; we reproduce an example in Chesham
Bois Church, Buckinghamshire. In the modern Roman Church the white cloth
is merely placed on the head; it is now too small to cover the body.
[Illustration: FIG. 22.—A COPE CHEST, YORK MINSTER.]
The chrism cloth was taken off if the child survived till the end of the
month, and returned to the church, in whose custody it was kept. These
cloths were used for the reparation of vestments and altar hangings, and
other sacred textile fabrics connected with the church. Thus in the
Treasurer's Rolls for Ripon we read (1470-71) the following entries:
'Est de ccᵐᵃlxvj vestibus crismalibus de reman. ultimi compoti
praedicti. Et de cᵐᵃiij vestibus crismalibus rec. de tot pueris
baptizatis hoc anno. Summa ccciiijˣˣix.[86] De quibus.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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