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    The Cambridge Handbooks of Liturgical Study

    GENERAL EDITORS:
    H. B. SWEET, D.D.
    J. H. SRAWLEY, D.D.

    THE CHURCH YEAR AND KALENDAR




                       CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS

                        London: FETTER LANE, E.C.
                           C. F. CLAY, MANAGER

                             [Illustration]

                     Edinburgh: 100, PRINCES STREET
                        Berlin: A. ASHER AND CO.
                        Leipzig: F. A. BROCKHAUS
                      New York: G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
              Bombay and Calcutta: MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD.

                          _All rights reserved_




[Illustration: Kalendar of Peterborough Psalter (March)

Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (MS. 12). Cent. xiii.]




                           THE CHURCH YEAR AND
                                KALENDAR

                                   BY
                           JOHN DOWDEN, D.D.,
            Hon. LL.D. (Edinburgh), late Bishop of Edinburgh

                               Cambridge:
                         at the University Press
                                  1910

                               Cambridge:
                       PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A.
                         AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS




NOTE BY THE EDITORS


The purpose of _The Cambridge Handbooks of Liturgical Study_ is to offer
to students who are entering upon the study of Liturgies such help as may
enable them to proceed with advantage to the use of the larger and more
technical works upon the subject which are already at their service.

The series will treat of the history and rationale of the several rites
and ceremonies which have found a place in Christian worship, with some
account of the ancient liturgical books in which they are contained.
Attention will also be called to the importance which liturgical forms
possess as expressions of Christian conceptions and beliefs.

Each volume will provide a list or lists of the books in which the study
of its subject may be pursued, and will contain a table of Contents and
an Index.

The editors do not hold themselves responsible for the opinions expressed
in the several volumes of the series. While offering suggestions on
points of detail, they have left each writer to treat his subject in his
own way, regard being had to the general plan and purpose of the series.

                                                                 H. B. S.
                                                                 J. H. S.




[The manuscript of the present volume was sent to the press only a few
weeks before the lamented death of the author, and therefore the work
did not receive final revision at his hands. In its original draft the
manuscript contained a somewhat fuller discussion of some of the topics
handled, _e.g._ the work of the mediaeval computists, and such technical
terms as ‘Sunday Letters,’ ‘Epacts,’ etc., as well as a fuller treatment
of the various Eastern Kalendars. Exigencies of space, however, and the
scope of the present series, made it necessary for the author to curtail
these portions of his work, while suggesting books in which the study of
these topics may be pursued by the student. The Editors have endeavoured,
as far as possible, to verify the references and to supplement them,
where it seemed necessary to do so. In a few cases they have added short
additional notes, enclosed in brackets, and bearing an indication that
they are the work of the Editors.]




CONTENTS


                                                                      PAGE

    INTRODUCTION                                                        xi

    A SHORT BIBLIOGRAPHY                                               xxi

       I. THE ‘WEEK’ ADOPTED FROM THE JEWS. The Lord’s Day: early
            notices. The Sabbath (Saturday) perhaps not observed by
            Christians before the fourth century: varieties in the
            character of its observance. The word _feria_ applied
            to ordinary week days: conjectures as to its origin.
            Wednesdays and Fridays observed as ‘stations,’ or days
            of fasting                                                   1

      II. DAYS OF THE MARTYRS. Local observances at the burial places
            of Martyrs. Early Kalendars: the Bucherian; the Syrian
            (Arian) Kalendar; the Kalendar of Polemius Silvius; the
            Carthaginian. The Sacramentary of Leo; the Gregorian
            Sacramentary. All Saints’ Day; All Souls’ Day. The days
            of Martyrs the dominant feature in early Kalendars: the
            Maccabees                                                   12

     III. ORIGINS OF THE FEASTS OF THE LORD’S NATIVITY AND THE
            EPIPHANY. Festivals associated with the Nativity in
            early Kalendars                                             27

      IV. OTHER COMMEMORATIONS OF THE LORD. The Circumcision;
            Passiontide, Holy Week; mimetic character of
            observances. The Ascension. The Transfiguration.
            Pentecost                                                   37

       V. FESTIVALS OF THE VIRGIN MARY. Hypapante (the Purification),
            originally a festival of the Lord. The same true of the
            Annunciation. The Nativity and the Sleep (_Dormitio_)
            of the Virgin. The Presentation. The Conception. The
            epithet ‘Immaculate’ prefixed to the title in 1854.
            Festivals of the Theotokos in the East                      47

      VI. FESTIVALS OF APOSTLES, EVANGELISTS, AND OTHER PERSONS
            NAMED IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. St Peter and St Paul.
            St Peter’s Chair,—the Chair at Antioch. St Peter’s
            Chains. St Andrew. St James the Great. St John: St John
            before the Latin gate, a Western festival. St Matthew.
            St Luke. St Mark. St Philip and St James. St Simon
            and St Jude. St Thomas. St Bartholomew. St John the
            Baptist; his Nativity, his Decollation. The Conversion
            of St Paul. St Mary Magdalene. St Barnabas. Eastern
            commemorations of the Seventy disciples (_apostles_).
            Octaves. Vigils                                             58

     VII. SEASONS OF PREPARATION AND PENITENCE. Advent: varieties
            in its observance. Lent: its historical development;
            varieties as to its commencement and its length. Other
            special times of fasting: the three fasts known in the
            West as _Quadragesima_. Rogation days. The Four Seasons
            (Ember Days). Fasts of Eastern Churches                     76

    VIII. WESTERN KALENDARS AND MARTYROLOGIES: Bede, Florus, Ado,
            Usuard. Old Irish Martyrologies. Value of Kalendars
            towards ascertaining the dates and origins of
            liturgical manuscripts. _Claves Festorum._ The modern
            Roman Martyrology                                           93

      IX. EASTER AND THE MOVEABLE COMMEMORATIONS. Early Paschal
            controversies. Rule as to the full moon after the
            vernal equinox. Hippolytus and his cycle: the so-called
            Cyprianic cycle; Dionysius of Alexandria. Anatolius.
            The Council of Nicaea and the Easter controversy.
            Later differences between the computations of Rome and
            Alexandria. Festal (or Paschal) Letters of the Bishops
            of Alexandria. _Supputatio Romana._ Victorius of
            Aquitaine. Dionysius Exiguus. The Nineteen-year Cycle.
            The Paschal Limits. The Gregorian Reform. The adoption
            of the New Style                                           104

       X. THE KALENDAR OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCH OF THE EAST. The
            Menologies. I. Immoveable Commemorations. The twelve
            great primary festivals; the four great secondary
            festivals. The middle class, greater and lesser
            festivals. The minor festivals, and subdivisions.
            Explanation of terms used in the Greek Kalendar. II.
            The Cycle of Sundays, or Dominical Kalendar                133

    APPENDIX   I. The Paschal Question in the Celtic Churches          146

    APPENDIX  II. Note on the Kalendars of the separated Churches of
                    the East                                           147

    APPENDIX III. Note on the history of the Kalendar of the Church
                    of England since the Reformation                   149



PLATES

    1. KALENDAR OF THE PETERBOROUGH PSALTER      _to face Title_

    2. THE SYRIAC MARTYROLOGY                      ”     _p. 15_

    3. KALENDAR OF THE WORCESTER BOOK              ”     _p. 93_

    4. KALENDAR OF THE DURHAM PSALTER              ”     _p. 99_




INTRODUCTION


The Church’s Year, as it has been known for many centuries throughout
Christendom, is characterised, first, by the weekly festival of the
Lord’s Day (a feature which dates from the dawn of the Church’s life
and the age of the Apostles) and, secondly, by the annual recurrence of
fasts and festivals, of certain days and certain seasons of religious
observance. These latter emerged, and came to find places in the Kalendar
at various periods.

In order of time the season of the Pascha, the commemoration of the
death, and, subsequently, of the resurrection of the Saviour, is the
first of the annual observances to appear in history. Again, at an
early date local commemorations of the deaths of victims of the great
persecutions under the pagan Emperors were observed yearly. And some of
these (notably those who suffered at Rome) gradually gained positions
in the Church’s Year in regions remote from the places of their origin.
Speaking generally, little as it might be thought probable beforehand,
it is a fact that martyrs of local celebrity emerge in the history of
the Kalendar at an earlier date than any but the most eminent of the
Apostles (who were also martyrs), and earlier than some of the festivals
of the Lord Himself. The Kalendar had its origin in the historical events
of the martyrdoms.

So far the growth of the Kalendar was the outcome of natural and
spontaneous feeling. But at a later time we have manifest indications of
artificial constructiveness, the laboured studies of the cloister, and
the work of professional martyrologists and Kalendar-makers. To take,
for the purpose of illustration, an extreme case, it is obvious that the
assignment of days in the Kalendar of the Eastern Church to Trophimus,
Sosipater and Erastus, Philemon and Archippus, Onesimus, Agabus, Rufus,
Asyncretus, Phlegon, Hermas, the woman of Samaria (to whom the name
Photina was given), and other persons whose names occur in the New
Testament, is the outcome of deliberate and elaborate constructiveness.
The same is true of the days of Old Testament Patriarchs and Prophets,
once, in a measure, a feature of Western, as they are still of Eastern
Kalendars. But even all the festivals of our Lord, save the Pascha,
though doubtless suggested by a spontaneous feeling of reverence, could
be assigned to particular days of the year only after some processes of
investigation and inference, or of conjecture. Whether the birthday of
the Founder of the Christian religion should be placed on January 6 or
on December 25 was a matter of debate and argument. Commentators on the
history of the Gospels, the conjectures of interpreters of Old Testament
prophecy, and such information as might be fancied to be derivable from
ancient annals, had of necessity to be considered. The assignment of the
feast of the Nativity to a particular day was a product of the reflective
and constructive spirit.

It is not absolutely impossible that ancient tradition, if not actual
record, may be the source of June 29 being assigned for the martyrdom
of St Peter and St Paul; but a more probable origin of the date is that
it marks the translation of relics. Certainly the days of most of the
Apostles (considered as the days of their martyrdoms) have little or no
support from sources that have any claim to be regarded as historical.
They find their places but gradually, and, it would seem, as the result
of a resolve that none of them should be forgotten.

Commemorations which mark the definition of a dogma, or which originated
in the special emphasis given at some particular epoch to certain
aspects of popular belief and sentiment, have all appeared at times
well within the ken of the historical student. Thus, ‘Orthodoxy Sunday’
(the first Sunday in Lent) in the Kalendar of the Greek Church is but
little concerned with the controversies on the right faith which occupied
the great Councils of the fourth and fifth centuries. It commemorates
the triumph of the party that secured the use of images over the
iconoclasts; this was the ‘orthodoxy’ which was chiefly celebrated;
and we can fix the date of the establishment of the festival as A.D.
842. Again, the commemoration of All Souls in the West was the outcome
of a growing sense of the need of prayers and masses on behalf of the
faithful departed. The ninth century shows traces of the observance
of some such day; but it was not till the close of the tenth century,
under the special impetus supplied by the reported visions of a pilgrim
from Jerusalem, who declared that he had seen the tortures of the souls
suffering purgatorial fire, that the observance made headway. We then
find Nov. 2 assigned for the festival, which came to be gradually and
slowly adopted. The feast of Corpus Christi, which now figures so largely
in the popular devotions of several countries of Europe, and is marked
as a ‘double of the first class’ in the service-books of the Church of
Rome, emerges for the first time in the thirteenth century, and was not
formally enjoined till the fourteenth. The feast of the Conception of St
Mary the Virgin seems to have originated in the East, and to have been
simply a historical commemoration, even as the Greeks commemorate the
conception of St John the Baptist. The Eastern tradition represents Anna
as barren and well stricken in years, when, in answer to her prayers
and those of Joachim her spouse, God revealed to them by an angel that
they should have a child. This conception was according to the Greek
Menology ‘contrary to the laws of nature,’ like that of the Baptist.
In the West the festival of the Conception appears at the end of the
eleventh or beginning of the twelfth century. The controversies as to its
doctrinal significance form part of the history of dogma, and are full
of instruction: but they cannot be considered here. Up to the year 1854
the name of the festival in the Kalendars of the authorised service-books
of the Roman Church was simply _Conceptio B. Mariae Virginis_. It was as
recently as Dec. 8, 1854, by an ordinance of Pope Pius IX, that the name
was changed into _Immaculata Conceptio B. Mariae Virginis_. It will thus
be seen how changes in the Kalendar illustrate the changes and accretions
of dogma, facts which are further exhibited by the changes in the rank
and dignity of festivals of this kind, at first only tolerated perhaps,
and of local usage, but eventually enjoined as of universal obligation,
and elevated in the order and grade of festal classification. Again,
the considerable number of festivals of the Greek and Russian Churches
connected with relics and wonder-working _icons_ throws a light on the
intellectual standpoint and the current beliefs in these ancient branches
of the Catholic Church.

Not less instructive in exhibiting the extraordinary growth in the
_cultus_ of the Blessed Virgin in the West are the inferences which may
be gathered from a knowledge of the fact that no festival of the Virgin
was celebrated in the Church of Rome before the seventh century, when we
compare the crowd of festivals, major and minor, devoted to the Virgin in
the Roman Kalendar of to-day. But considerations of this kind are only
incidentally touched on in the following pages; and they are referred to
here simply with a view to show that the study of the Kalendar is not an
enquiry interesting merely to dry-as-dust antiquaries, but one which
is intimately connected with the study of the history of belief, and is
inwoven with far-reaching issues.

In the enquiry into the origins of ecclesiastical observances the
discovery within recent years of early documents, hitherto unknown in
modern days, enforces the obvious thought that our conceptions on such
subjects must be liable to re-adjustment from time to time in the light
of new evidence. Until the day comes, if it ever comes, when it can be
said with truth that the materials supplied by the early manuscripts
of the East and West have been exhausted, there can be no finality.
The document discovered some ten or twelve years ago, in which a lady
from Gaul or Spain, who had gone on pilgrimage to the East, records her
impressions of religious observances which she had witnessed at Jerusalem
towards the close of the fourth century, has furnished some important
light on the subject before us, as well as on the history of ceremonial.
In the following pages this document is referred to as the _Pilgrimage
of Silvia_ (‘Peregrinatio Silviae’), without prejudice to the question
relating to the true name of the writer. The period when the work was
written is the important question for our purposes; and those who are
most competent to express an opinion consider that it belongs to the time
of Theodosius the Great, and to a date between the years 383 and 394.

The influence of the early mediaeval martyrologists, Bede, Florus,
Ado, and Usuard, upon the mediaeval Kalendars, is unquestionable; but
the relations of their works to one another, the variations of the
different recensions and the sources from which they were drawn, are
still subjects of investigation. In addition to the brief notices of the
martyrologists which will be found in the following pages, the enquirer
who desires further information should not fail to study with care the
recent treatise of Dom Henri Quentin, of Solesmes, _Les Martyrologes
historiques_.

Of necessity a general outline sketch of the formation of the Kalendar
is all that can be attempted in the following pages. Local Kalendars,
more especially, for most of our readers, those of the service-books of
England, Scotland, and Ireland, present many interesting and attractive
features; but it has been impossible to deal with them in an adequate
manner. Some space has, however, been devoted to the consideration of
the Kalendar and Ecclesiastical Year of the Orthodox Church of the East,
including the peculiar arrangement of the grouping of Sundays; and brief
notices are given of the fasts and festivals of some of the separated
Churches of the East.

The questions concerning the determination of Easter will form the main
trial of the patience of the student.

The early controversies on the Paschal question are not free from
obscurity; and the interests attaching to the construction of the various
systems of cycles, intended to form a perpetual table for the unerring
determination of the date of Easter, are mainly the interests which
are awakened by the history of human ingenuity grappling more or less
successfully with a problem which called for astronomical knowledge and
mathematical skill. Religious interests are not touched even remotely.
Profound as are the thoughts and emotions which cluster around the
commemoration of the Lord’s Resurrection, they are quite independent of
any considerations connected with the age of the moon and the date of the
vernal equinox. The scheme for a time seriously entertained by Gregory
XIII of making the celebration of Easter to fall on a fixed Sunday,
the same in every year, has much to commend it. Had it been adopted we
should, at all events, have been spared many practical inconveniences,
and the ecclesiastical computists would have been saved a vast amount of
labour. But we must take things as they are.

If anyone contends that the safest ‘Rule for finding Easter’ is ‘Buy
a penny almanack,’ I give in a ready assent. It has in principle high
ecclesiastical precedent; for it was exactly the same reasonable plan of
accepting the determinations of those whom one has good reason to think
competent authorities, which in ancient times made the Christian world
await the pronouncements as to the date of Easter which came year by
year from the Patriarchs of Alexandria in their Paschal Epistles: while
for the date of Easter in any particular year in the distant past, or
in the future, there are few who will not prefer the Tables supplied in
such works as _L’Art de vérifier les Dates_, or Mas Latrie’s _Trésor de
Chronologie_, to any calculations of their own, based on the Golden
Numbers and Sunday Letters[1]. In the present volume the limits of space
forbid any detailed discussion of the principles involved and the methods
employed in the determination of Easter by the computists both ancient
and modern. A brief historical sketch of the successive reforms of the
Kalendar is all that has been found possible. Those who seek for fuller
information can resort to the treatises mentioned above or in the course
of the volume. The chapter on Easter has for convenience been placed near
the conclusion of this volume.

In dealing with both Eastern and Western Kalendars the student will bear
in mind that only comparatively few of the festivals affected the life
of the great body of the faithful. A very large number of festivals were
marked in the services of the Church by certain liturgical changes or
additions. Many of them had their special _propria_; others were grouped
in classes; and each class had its own special liturgical features. Only
comparatively few made themselves felt outside the walls of the churches.
Some of them carried a cessation from servile labour, or caused the
closing of the law courts, or, as chiefly in the Greek Church, mitigated
in various degrees (according to the dignity of the festival) the rigour
of fasting. The distinction between _festa chori_ and _festa fori_ is
always worthy of observation. A relic of the distinction is preserved in
an expression of common currency in France, when one speaks of a person
as of insignificant importance, _C’est un saint qu’on ne chôme pas_.

Although the general scope of the following pages is wide in intention,
the origins of the Kalendar and the rise of the principal seasons
and days of observance have chiefly attracted the interest of the
writer. Later developments are not wholly neglected, but they occupy a
subordinate place.

The enactments of civil legislation under the Christian Emperors and
other rulers, in respect to the observance of Sunday and other Christian
holy days, is an interesting field of study; but it has been impossible
to enter upon it here in view of the limits of space at our disposal.

The study of Kalendars brings one into constant contact with hagiology,
the acts of martyrs, and the lives of saints. It would however have been
obviously vain to deal seriously in the present volume with so vast a
subject, even in broadest outline.

A short Bibliography of some important or serviceable works dealing with
various branches of the subject before us is prefixed.




A SHORT BIBLIOGRAPHY


ACHELIS, H. _Die Martyrologien, ihre Geschichte und ihr Werth._ (Berlin,
1900.)

ACTA SANCTORVM. [Of the Bollandists. This vast collection, of which
the first volume appeared in 1643, had attained by the middle of the
nineteenth century, after various interruptions in the labours of the
compilers, to 55 volumes, folio, and the work is still in process,
having now reached the early days of November. Various Kalendars
and Martyrologies have been printed in the work. The Martyrology of
Venerable Bede, with the additions of Florus and others, will be found
in the second volume for March; the metrical Ephemerides of the Greeks
and Russians in the first volume for May; Usuard’s Martyrology in the
sixth and seventh volumes for June, and also an abbreviated form of
the Hieronymian. The second volume for November contains the Syriac
Martyrology of Dr Wright edited afresh by R. Graffin with a translation
into Greek by Duchesne. The same volume contains the Hieronymian
Martyrology edited by De Rossi and Duchesne.]

ASSEMANUS, JOSEPHUS SIMON. _Kalendaria Ecclesiae Universae, in quibus tum
ex vetustis marmoribus, tum ex codicibus, tabulis, parietinis, pictis,
scriptis scalptisve Sanctorum nomina, imagines, et festi per annum dies
Ecclesiarum Orientis et Occidentis, praemissis uniuscujusque Ecclesiae
originibus, recensentur, describuntur, notisque illustrantur._ 4to, 6
tom. Romae, 1755. The title raises hopes which are not verified. [This
work of the learned Syrian, who for his services to sacred erudition was
made Prefect of the Library of the Vatican, was planned on a colossal
scale, but it was never completed, and indeed we may truly say only
begun. The six volumes which alone remain are wholly concerned with the
Slavonic Church. The first four volumes, together with a large part of
the fifth, are devoted mainly to the history of Slavonic Christianity.
The concluding part of the fifth and the whole of the sixth volume deal
with a Russian Kalendar, commencing the year, as in the Greek Church,
with 1 September. This is treated very fully, but the work ends here.]

BAILLET, ADRIEN. _Les Vies des Saints._ 2nd Ed. 10 vols. 4to. 1739. [The
ninth volume on the moveable feasts abounds in valuable information; and,
generally, this work may be consulted on the history of the festivals
with much profit.]

BINGHAM, JOSEPH. _Origines Ecclesiasticae, or the Antiquities of the
Christian Church_, etc. [Of the numerous editions of this important
work, which has been by no means superseded, the most serviceable is the
edition to be found in Bingham’s _Works_, 9 vols. 8vo. (1840) ‘with the
quotations at length in the original languages.’ The editor is J. R.
Pitman. Volume 7 contains most of what is pertinent to the antiquities of
the feasts and fasts of the early Church.]

BINTERIM, A. J. _Die vorzüglichsten Denkwürdigkeiten der Christ-Kathol.
Kirche._ Vol. V. (Mainz, 1829.)

CABROL, FERNAND. _Dictionnaire d’archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie._
Paris, 1907 (in process of publication).

D’ACHERY, LUCAS. _Spicilegium._ Tom. II. fol. Paris, 1723. [This contains
the Hieronymian Martyrology; the metrical Martyrology attributed to Bede;
the Martyrology known as _Gellonense_ (from the monastery at Gellone,
on the borders of the diocese of Lodève in the province of Narbonne),
assigned to about A.D. 804; the metrical Martyrology of Wandalbert the
deacon, of the diocese of Trèves, about A.D. 850; and an old Kalendar
(A.D. 826) from a manuscript of Corbie.]

DUCHESNE, L. _Origines du Culte chrétien._ 3rd Ed. 8vo. Paris, 1902.
[There is an English translation by M. L. McClure, London (S.P.C.K.),
1903. The merits of Duchesne are so generally recognised that it is
unnecessary to speak of them here.]

GROTEFEND, H. _Zeitrechnung des deutschen Mittelalters und der Neuzeit._
4to. 2 vols. Hanover, 1891, 1892-8. [Besides exhibiting in full a large
collection of Kalendars of Dioceses and Monastic Orders, not only of
Germany, but also of Denmark, Scandinavia, and Switzerland, this work
contains an index of Saints marking their days in various Kalendars,
including certain Kalendars of England. There is also a Glossary,
explaining both technical terms and the words of popular speech and
folk-lore in connexion with days and seasons.]

HAMPSON, R. T. _Medii Ævi Kalendarium, or dates, charters, and customs
of the middle ages, with Kalendars from the tenth to the fifteenth
century; and an alphabetical digest of obsolete names of days: forming
a Glossary of the dates of the middle ages, with Tables and other aids
for ascertaining dates._ 8vo. 2 vols. London, 1841. [The first volume is
mainly occupied with ‘popular customs and superstitions’; but it also
contains reprints of various Anglo-Saxon and early English Kalendars.
The second volume is given over wholly to a useful, though occasionally
somewhat uncritical glossary.]

HOSPINIAN, RUDOLPH. _Festa Christianorum, hoc est, De origine, progressu,
ceremoniis et ritibus festorum dierum Christianorum Liber unus_ (folio).
Tiguri, 1593. [This is a work of considerable learning for its day,
written from the standpoint of a Swiss Protestant. A second edition,
in which replies are made to the criticisms of Cardinal Bellarmine and
Gretser, appeared, also at Zurich, and in folio, in 1612.]

IDELER, LUDWIG. _Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen
Chronologie._ 8vo. 2 vols. Berlin, 1825-26. [Ideler was Royal Astronomer
and Professor in the University of Berlin. His discussion of the Easter
cycles cannot be dispensed with. This and his account of the computation
of time in the Christian Church will be found in Vol. 2 (pp. 175-470).
The Gregorian reform is well dealt with.]

KELLNER, K. A. HEINRICH. _Heortology: a history of the Christian
Festivals from their origin to the present day._ Translated from the
second German edition. 8vo. London, 1908. [Dr Kellner is Professor of
Catholic Theology in the University of Bonn. An interesting and useful
volume, though occasionally exhibiting, as is not unnatural, marked
ecclesiastical predilections. It contains prefixed a useful bibliography.]

LIETZMANN, H. _Die drei ältesten Martyrologien._ E. tr. 8vo. Cambridge,
1904. [This little pamphlet of 16 pages exhibits conveniently the
texts of (1) what is variously known as the Bucherian, or Liberian,
or Philocalian Martyrology, (2) The Martyrology of Carthage, and (3)
Wright’s Syrian Martyrology.]

MACLEAN, ARTHUR JOHN (Bishop of Moray). The article ‘Calendar,
the Christian’ in Hastings’ _Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels_
[admirable, generally, for the early period.]

MACLEAN, ARTHUR JOHN (Bishop of Moray). _East Syrian Daily Offices._
London, 8vo., 1894. [An appendix deals with the Kalendar of the modern
Nestorians (Assyrian Christians).]

NEALE, JOHN MASON. _A History of the Holy Eastern Church. General
Introduction._ London, 8vo., 1850. [Vol. II. gives information at
considerable length on the Kalendars of the Byzantine, Russian, Armenian,
and Ethiopic Churches.]

NILLES, NICOLAUS. _Kalendarium Manuale utriusque Ecclesiae Orientalis et
Occidentalis, academiis clericorum accommodatum._ 2 tom. 8vo. Oeniponte,
1896, 1897. [N. Nilles, S.J., Professor in the University of Innsbruck,
deals mainly in these volumes with the ecclesiastical year in Eastern
Churches.]

QUENTIN, HENRI. _Les Martyrologes historiques du moyen age, étude sur la
formation du Martyrologe romain._ 8vo. Paris, 1907.

SAXONY, MAXIMILIAN, PRINCE OF. _Praelectiones de Liturgiis Orientalibus._
Tom. I. 8vo. Friburgi Brisgoviae, 1908. [This volume is mainly concerned
with the Kalendars and Liturgical Year of the Greek and Slavonic
Churches. It is lucid and interesting.]

SEABURY, SAMUEL, D.D. _The Theory and Use of the Church Calendar in the
measurement and distribution of Time; being an account of the origin and
use of the Calendar; of its reformation from the Old to the New Style;
and of its adaptation to the use of the English Church by the British
Parliament under George II._ 8vo. New York, 1872. [Excellent on the
restricted subject with which it deals. It does not deal with Christian
Festivals beyond the question of the determination of Easter, but is
largely concerned with matters of technical chronology, the ancient
cycles, golden numbers, epacts, etc.]

SMITH, WILLIAM, AND CHEETHAM, SAMUEL. _A Dictionary of Christian
Antiquities._ 2 vols. London, 1875, 1880. [The articles contributed by
various scholars, as was inevitable, vary much in merit. Those on the
festivals by the Rev. Robert Sinker are particularly valuable. This work
is cited in the following pages as _D. C. A._]

WORDSWORTH, JOHN, Bishop of Salisbury. _The Ministry of Grace._ London,
8vo., 1901. [This learned work, under a not very illuminative title,
discusses, _inter alia_, with a thorough knowledge of the best and most
recent literature of the subject, the development of the Church’s fasts
and festivals. It stands pre-eminent among English works dealing with the
subject.]

[GASQUET, ABBOT, AND BISHOP, EDMUND. _The Bosworth Psalter._ London,
1908. Contains valuable information about some Mediaeval Kalendars, with
discussions of them. Edd.]




CHAPTER I

THE WEEK


The Church of Christ, founded in Judaea by Him who, after the flesh, was
of the family of David, and advanced and guided in its earlier years by
leaders of Jewish descent, could not fail to bear traces of its Hebrew
origin. The attitude and trend of minds that had been long familiar with
the religious polity of the Hebrews, and with the worship of the Temple
and the Synagogue, showed themselves in the institutions and worship of
the early Church. This truth is observable to some extent in the Church’s
polity and scheme of government, and even more clearly in the methods
and forms of its liturgical worship. It is not then to be wondered at
that the same influences were at work in the ordering of the times and
seasons, the fasts and festivals, of the Church’s year.


_The Week and the Lord’s Day._

Most potent in affecting the whole daily life of Christendom in all ages
was the passing on from Judaism of the Week of seven days. Inwoven, as
it is, with the history of our lives, and taken very much as matter of
course, as if it were something like a law of nature, the dominating
influence and far reaching effects of this seven-day division of time are
seldom fully realised.

The Week, known in the Roman world at the time of our Lord only in
connexion with the obscure speculations of Eastern astrology, or as
a feature, in its Sabbath, of the lives of the widely-spread Jewish
settlers in the great cities of the Empire, had been from remote times
accepted among various oriental peoples. It would be outside our province
to enquire into its origin, though much can be said in favour of the view
that it took its rise out of a rough division into four of the lunar
month. But, so far as Christianity is concerned, it is enough to know
that it was beyond all doubt taken over from the religion of the Hebrews.

It is not improbable that at the outset some of the Christian converts
from Judaism may have continued to observe the Jewish Sabbath, the
seventh or last day of the week: and that attempts were made to fasten
its obligations upon Gentile converts is evident from St Paul’s Epistle
to the Colossians (ii. 16). But it is certain that at an early date
among Christians the first day of the week was marked by special
religious observances. The testimony of the Acts of the Apostles and the
Epistles of St Paul shows us the first day of the week as a time for
the assembling of Christians for instruction and for worship, when ‘the
breaking of bread’ formed part of the service, and when offerings for
charitable and religious purposes might be laid up in store[2]. The name
‘the Lord’s day,’ applied to the first day of the week, may probably be
traced to New Testament times. The occurrence of the expression in the
Revelation of St John (i. 10) has been commonly regarded as a testimony
to this application[3].

In the _Epistle of Barnabas_ (tentatively assigned by Bishop Lightfoot to
between A.D. 70 and 79, and by others to about A.D. 130-131) we find the
passage (c. 15), ‘We keep the eighth day for rejoicing, in the which also
Jesus rose from the dead.’ The date of the _Teaching of the Apostles_ is
still reckoned by some scholars as _sub judice_. But, if it is rightly
assigned to the first century, its testimony may be cited here. In it is
the following passage:—‘On the Lord’s own day (κατὰ κυριακὴν δὲ Κυρίον)
gather yourselves together and break bread, and give thanks, first
confessing your transgressions, that your sacrifice may be pure’ (c. 14).

The next evidence, in point of time, is a passage in the _Epistle of
Ignatius to the Magnesians_ (cc. 8, 9, 10), in which the writer dissuades
those to whom he wrote from observing sabbaths (μηκέτι σαββατίζοντες)
and urges them to live ‘according to the Lord’s day (κατὰ κυριακὴν) on
which our life also rose through Him.’ It is impossible to suppose
that in early times the Lord’s day was held to be a day of rest. The
work of the servant and labouring class had to be done; and it has been
reasonably conjectured that the assemblies of Christians before dawn
were to meet the necessities of the situation. Lastly, the passage from
the _Apology_ of Justin Martyr (_Ap._ i. 67) is too well known to be
cited in full. He describes to the Emperor the character and procedure
of the Christian assemblies on ‘the day of the sun,’ which we know from
other sources to have been the first day of the week. Writings of the
Apostles or of the Prophets were read: the President of the assembly
instructed and exhorted: bread, and wine and water were consecrated and
distributed to those present and sent by the Deacons to the absent:
alms were collected and deposited with the President for the relief of
widows and orphans, the sick and the poor, prisoners and strangers. Later
than Justin we need not go, as the evidence from all quarters pours in
abundantly to establish the universal observance of ‘the first day of the
week,’ ‘Sunday,’ ‘the Lord’s day,’ as a day for worship and religious
instruction[4].


_The Sabbath (Saturday)._

Lack of positive evidence prevents us from speaking with any certainty
as to whether there was among Christians any recognised and approved
observance of Saturday (the Sabbath) in the first, second and third
centuries. There is no hint of such observance in early Christian
literature; and there are passages which rather go to discountenance the
notion[5].

Duchesne, whose opinion deservedly carries much weight, comes to the
conclusion that the observance of Saturday in the fourth century was not
a survival of an attempt of primitive times to effect a conciliation
between Jewish and Christian practices, but an institution of
comparatively late date[6]. Certainly one cannot speak confidently of the
existence of Saturday as a day of religious observance among Christians
before the fourth century.

Epiphanius[7], in the second half of the fourth century, speaks of
synaxes being held _in some places_ on the Sabbath; from which it may
probably be inferred that it was not so in his time in Cyprus.

In the Canons of the Council of Laodicea (which can hardly be placed
earlier than about the middle of the fourth century, and is probably
later) we find it enjoined that ‘on the Sabbath the Gospels with other
Scriptures shall be read’ (16); that ‘in Lent bread ought not to be
offered, save only on the Sabbath and the Lord’s day’ (49); and that ‘in
Lent the feasts of martyrs should not be kept, but that a commemoration
of the holy martyrs should be made on Sabbaths and Lord’s days’ (50).
Yet it was forbidden ‘to Judaize and be idle on the Sabbath,’ while,
‘if they can,’ Christians are directed to rest on the Lord’s day. The
_Apostolic Constitutions_ go further; and, under the names of St Peter
and St Paul, it is enjoined that servants should work only five days
in the week, and be free from labour on the Sabbath and the Lord’s day
‘with a view to the teaching of godliness’ (viii. 33). Uncertain as are
the date and origin of the _Constitutions_ they may be regarded as in
some measure reflecting the general sentiment in the East in the fifth,
or possibly the close of the fourth century[8]. From these testimonies
it appears that the Sabbath was a day of special religious observance,
and that in the East it partook of a festal character. Falling in
with this way of regarding Saturday we find Canon 64 of the so-called
_Apostolic Canons_ (of uncertain date, but possibly early in the fifth
century[9]) declaring, ‘If any cleric be found fasting on the Lord’s
day, or on the Sabbath, except one only [that is, doubtless “the Great
Sabbath,” or Easter Eve], let him be deprived, and, if he be a layman,
let him be segregated[10].’ The _Apostolic Constitutions_ emphasise the
position of the Sabbath by the exhortation that Christians should ‘gather
together especially on the Sabbath, and on the Lord’s day, the day of the
Resurrection’ (ii. 59); and again, ‘Keep the Sabbath and the Lord’s day
as feasts, for the one is the commemoration of the Creation, the other
of the Resurrection’ (vii. 23³). We find also that one of the canons of
Laodicea referred to above is in substance re-enacted at a much later
date by the Council in Trullo (A.D. 692) in this form, that except on the
Sabbath, the Lord’s day, and the Feast of the Annunciation, the Liturgy
of the Pre-sanctified should be said on all days in Lent (c. 52).

In the city of Alexandria in the time of the historian Socrates the
Eucharist was not celebrated on Saturday; but other parts of Egypt
followed the general practice of the East. Socrates says that Rome agreed
with Alexandria in this respect[11].

It is certain that very commonly, though not universally, in the East
the Sabbath was regarded as possessing the features of a weekly festival
(with a eucharistic celebration) second in importance only to the Lord’s
day. And Gregory of Nyssa says, ‘If thou hast despised the Sabbath, with
what face wilt thou dare to behold the Lord’s day.... They are sister
days’ (_de Castigatione_, Migne, _P.G._ xlvi. 309).

In the West we find also that the Sabbath was a day of special religious
observance; but there was a variety of local usage in regard to the
mode of its observance. At Rome the Sabbath was a fast-day in the time
of St Augustine[12]; and the same is true of some other places; but the
majority of the Western Churches, like the East, did not so regard it.
In North Africa there was a variety of practice, some places observed
the day as a fast, others as a feast. At Milan the day was not treated as
a fast; and St Ambrose, in reply to a question put by Augustine at the
instance of his mother Monnica, stated that he regarded the matter as one
of local discipline, and gave the sensible rule to do in such matters at
Rome as the Romans do[13]. In the early part of the fourth century the
Spanish Council of Elvira corrected the error that every Sabbath should
be observed as a fast[14].

As to the origin of the Saturday fast we are left almost wholly to
conjecture. It has been supposed by some to be an exhibition of
antagonism to Judaism, which regarded the Sabbath as a festival; while
others consider that it is a continuation of the Friday fast, as a kind
of preparatory vigil of the Lord’s day. It is outside our scope to go
into this question.

A relic of the ancient position of distinction occupied by Saturday may
perhaps be found in the persistence of the name ‘Sabbatum’ in the Western
service-books. Abstinence (from flesh) continued, ‘de mandate ecclesiae,’
on Saturdays in the Roman Church. For Roman Catholics in England it
ceased in 1830 by authority of Pope Pius VIII.

    This seems a convenient place for saying something as to
    the use of the word _Feria_ in ecclesiastical language to
    designate an ordinary week-day. The names most commonly
    given to the days of the week in the service-books and other
    ecclesiastical records are ‘Dies Dominica’ (rarely ‘Dominicus’)
    for the Lord’s Day, or Sunday; ‘Feria II’ for Monday; ‘Feria
    III’ for Tuesday, and so on to Saturday which (with rare
    exceptions) is not Feria VII but ‘Sabbatum.’

    Why the ordinary week-day is called ‘Feria,’ when in classical
    Latin ‘feriae’ was used for ‘days of rest,’ ‘holidays,’
    ‘festivals,’ is a question that cannot be answered with
    any confidence. A conjecture which seems open to various
    objections, though it has found supporters, is as follows: all
    the days of Easter week were holidays, ‘feriatae’; and, this
    being the first week of the ecclesiastical year, the other
    weeks followed the mode of naming the days which had been used
    in regard to the first week. A fatal objection to this theory,
    for which the authority of St Jerome has been claimed, is
    that we find ‘feria’ used, as in Tertullian, for an ordinary
    week-day long before we have any reason to think that there was
    any ordinance for the observance of the whole of Easter week by
    a cessation from labour[15].

    Another conjecture, presented however with too much confidence,
    is that put forward on the authority of Isidore of Seville[16]
    by the learned Henri de Valois (Valesius). He alleges that the
    ancient Christians, receiving, as they did, the week of seven
    days from the Jews, imitated the Jewish practice, which used
    the expression ‘the second of the Sabbath,’ ‘the third of the
    Sabbath,’ and so on for the days of the week: that ‘Feria’
    means a day of rest, in effect the same as ‘Sabbath,’ and that
    in this way the ‘second Feria’ and ‘third Feria,’ etc., came to
    be used for the second and third days of the week[17].

    The astrological names for the days of the week, as of the Sun,
    of the Moon, of Mars, of Mercury, etc., were generally avoided
    by Christians; but they are not wholly unknown in Christian
    writers, and sometimes appear even in Christian epitaphs.

    In the ecclesiastical records of the Greeks the first day of
    the week is ‘the Lord’s day’; and the seventh, the Sabbath,
    as in the West. But Friday is _Parasceve_ (παρασκευή), a
    name which in the Latin Church is confined to one Friday in
    the year, the Friday of the Lord’s Passion, which day in the
    Eastern Church is known as ‘the Great Parasceve.’ With these
    exceptions the days of the week are ‘the second,’ ‘the third,’
    ‘the fourth,’ etc., the word ‘day’ being understood.

    It is worth recording that among the Portuguese the current
    names for the week-days are: _segunda feira_, _terça feira_,
    etc.


_Wednesday and Friday._

Long prior to any clear evidence for the special observance among
Christians of the last day of the week we find testimonies to a religious
character attaching to the fourth and sixth days.

The devout Jews were accustomed to observe a fast twice a week, on the
second and fifth days, Monday and Thursday[18]; and these days, together
with the Christian fasts substituted for them, are referred to in the
_Teaching of the Apostles_ (8), ‘Let not your fastings be with the
hypocrites, for they fast on the second and fifth day of the week; but
do ye keep your fast on the fourth and parasceve (the sixth).’ In the
_Shepherd of Hermas_ we find the writer relating that he was fasting and
holding a _station_[19]. And this peculiar term is applied by Tertullian
to fasts (whether partial or entire we need not here discuss) observed on
the fourth and sixth days of the week[20]. Clement of Alexandria, though
not using the word _station_, speaks of fasts being held on the fourth
day of the week and on the parasceve[21].

At a much later date than the authorities cited above we find the
_Apostolic Canons_ decreeing under severe penalties that, unless for
reasons of bodily infirmity, not only the clergy but the laity must fast
on the fourth day of the week and on the sixth (_parasceve_). And the
rule of fasting on Wednesdays and Fridays still obtains in the Eastern
Church[22].

These two days were marked by the assembling of Christians for
worship. But the character of the service was not everywhere the same.
Duchesne[23] has exhibited the facts thus: In Africa in the time of
Tertullian the Eucharist was celebrated, and it was so at Jerusalem
towards the close of the fourth century. In the Church of Alexandria the
Eucharist was not celebrated on these days; but the Scriptures were read
and interpreted. And in this matter, as in many others, the Church at
Rome probably agreed with Alexandria. It is certain, at least as regards
Friday, that the mysteries were not publicly celebrated on these days at
Rome about the beginning of the fifth century. The observance of Friday
as a day of abstinence is still of obligation in the West.




CHAPTER II

DAYS OF THE MARTYRS


We now pass from features of every week to days and seasons of yearly
occurrence.

In point of time the celebrations connected with the Pascha are the
earliest to emerge of sacred days observed annually by the whole Church.
But for reasons of convenience it has been thought better to defer
the consideration of the difficult questions relating to the Easter
controversies till the origin of the days of Martyrs and Saints has been
dealt with.

The Kalendar in some of its later stages exhibits a highly artificial
elaboration. But in its beginnings it was, to a large extent, the outcome
of a natural and spontaneous feeling which could not fail to remember in
various localities the cruel deaths of men and women who had suffered
for the Faith with courage and constancy in such places, or their
neighbourhoods. The origins of the Kalendar show in various churches,
widely separated, the natural desire to commemorate their own local
martyrs on the days on which they had actually suffered.

As regards the order of time there is ample reason to convince us that
the commemorations of martyrs were features of Church life much earlier
than those of St Mary the Virgin, of most of the Apostles, and even of
many of the festivals of the Lord Himself.

The marks of antiquity that characterise generally the older Kalendars
and Martyrologies are (1) the comparative paucity of entries, (2) the
fewness of festivals of the Virgin, (3) the fewness of saints who were
not martyrs, (4) the absence of the title ‘saint,’ and (5) the absence of
feasts in Lent.

Again, the local character of the observance of the days of martyrs is
a marked feature of the earlier records which illustrate the subject.
Now and then the name of some martyr of pre-eminent distinction in other
lands finds its way into the lists; but it remains generally true that
in each place the martyrs and saints of that place and its neighbourhood
form the great body of those commemorated. And in addition to the
natural feeling that prompted the remembrance of those more particularly
associated with a particular place, the fact that the commemorations were
originally observed by religious services in cemeteries, at the tombs
or burial places of the martyrs, tended at first to discountenance the
commemoration of the martyrs of other places whose story was known only
by report, whether written or oral.

The day of a martyr’s death was by an exercise of the triumphant faith
of the Church known as his birthday (_natale_, or _dies natalis_, or
_natalitia_). It was regarded as the day of his entrance into a new and
better world. The expression occurs in its Greek form as early as the
letter of the Church of Smyrna concerning the martyrdom of Polycarp (_c._
18).

There can be no doubt that at an early date records were kept of the
day of the death of martyrs. Cyprian required that even the death-days
of those who died in prison for the faith should be communicated to him
with a view to his offering an oblation on that day (_Ep._ xii. (xxxvii.)
2). It is in this way probably that the earliest Kalendars of the Church
originated.

[Illustration: Ancient Syriac Martyrology, written A D. 412

(Brit. Mus. Or. Add. 12150, _fol._ 252 _v_, _ll._ 1-20, _col._ 1.) The
plate shows the entries from St Stephen’s Day to Epiphany.]

We purpose dealing more particularly with the early Roman Kalendars.
The earliest martyrology that has survived is contained in a Roman
record transcribed in A.D. 354. It is known, sometimes as the _Liberian
Martyrology_ (from the name of Liberius, who was bishop of Rome at
the time), sometimes as the _Bucherian Martyrology_, from the name
of the scholar who first made it known to the learned world[24], and
not uncommonly as the _Philocalian_, from the name of the scribe. It
presents many interesting, and some perplexing features, which cannot be
dealt with here. We must content ourselves with noticing that, besides
recording, as in a serviceable almanack, several pagan festivals, it
marks the days of the month of the burials (_depositiones_) of the
bishops of Rome from A.D. 254 to A.D. 354, and also the burial-days of
martyrs, twenty-five in number. In both lists the cemeteries at Rome
where the burials took place are noted. But there are also entered three
ecclesiastical commemorations which do not mark entombments, (1) ‘viij
Kal. Jan. (Dec. 25) Natus Christus in Bethleem Judeae’; (2) ‘viij Kal.
Mart. (Feb. 22) Natale (_sic_) Petri de Cathedra’; (3) ‘Nonis Martii
(March 7) Perpetuae et Felicitatis Africae[25].’ The appearance of St
Perpetua and St Felicitas in a characteristically Roman document is a
striking testimony to the fame of these two African sufferers for the
Faith[26]. The use of the word _natale_ in connexion with St Peter’s
chair not improbably marks the dedication of a church; and, at all events
at a later period, the word seems sometimes used as equivalent simply to
a festival, or perhaps a festival marking an origin or beginning—as, for
example, _Natale Calicis_, of which something will be said hereafter (p.
40). Easter could not appear in the Kalendar properly so-called; but the
document contains cycles for the calculation of Easter, and a list of the
days on which it would fall from A.D. 312 to A.D. 412.

Early Kalendars would be of much value in our enquiries; but they are
few in number. The following three deserve notice. (1) The _Syrian
Martyrology_ first published by Dr W. Wright in the _Journal of Sacred
Literature_ (Oct. 1866). It was written in A.D. 411-12, but represents
an original of perhaps about A.D. 380. It is Arian in origin, and has
elements that show connexions with Alexandria, Antioch, and Nicomedia;
and its range of martyrs is much wider than that of other early documents
of the kind. Yet of Western martyrs we find only in Africa Perpetua and
Satornilos and ten other martyrs[27] (March 7) and ‘Akistus (?Xystus II)
bishop of Rome’ (Aug. 1). We find St Peter and St Paul on Dec. 28; St
John and St James on Dec. 27; and ‘St Stephen, apostle’ on the 26th[28].
(2) The _Kalendar of Polemius Silvius_, bishop of Sedunum, in the upper
valley of the Rhone (A.D. 448). It contains the birthdays of the Emperors
and some of the more eminent of the heathen festivals, such as the
Lupercalia and Caristia, but with a view, apparently, of supplanting them
by Christian commemorations. The Christian festivals recorded are few
in number, those of our Lord being Christmas, Epiphany, and the fixed
dates, March 25 for the Crucifixion, and March 27 for the Resurrection.
There are only six saints’ days. The _depositio_ of Peter and Paul on
Feb. 22; Vincent, Lawrence, Hippolytus, Stephen, and the Maccabees on
their usual days. Other features of interest must be passed over[29].
(3) The _Carthaginian Kalendar_[30] has been assigned as probably about
A.D. 500[31]. It is thus described by Bishop J. Wordsworth, ‘It has, in
the Eastern manner, no entries between February 16 and April 19, _i.e._
during Lent. Its Saints are mostly local, but some twenty are Roman,
and a few other Italian, Sicilian, and Spanish. It also marks SS. John
Baptist (June 24), Maccabees, Luke [Oct. 13], Andrew, Christmas, Stephen
[Dec. 26], John Baptist [probably an error of the pen for John the
Evangelist] and James (Dec. 27) [‘the Apostle whom Herod slew’], Infants
[Dec. 28] and Epiphany [sanctum Epefania][32].’ It may be added that
this Kalendar marks the _depositiones_ of seven bishops of Carthage, not
martyrs, whose anniversaries were kept.

In one of the African Councils of the fourth century it was enacted
that the Acts of the martyrs should be read in the church on their
anniversaries. But Rome was slow in adopting this practice[33].

It will be seen that as time went on the strictly local character
of the martyrs commemorated was invaded by a desire to record the
famous sufferers of other parts of the Christian world. Rome, with its
characteristic conservatism in matters liturgical, seems to have been
slower than other places to yield to this impulse. At Hippo we find
Augustine commemorating, beside local martyrs, the Roman Lawrence and
Agnes, the Spanish Vincent and Fructuosus, and the Milanese Protasius and
Gervasius whose bones (as was believed) had been recently discovered. He
also commemorated the Maccabees, St Stephen, and both the Nativity and
Decollation of the Baptist. On the other hand in the laudatory sermons
that have come down to us we find Chrysostom at Antioch commemorating
only the saints of Antioch, and Basil, at Caesarea in Cappadocia, only
those of his own country.

The Sacramentary, which is called after Pope Leo (A.D. 440-461), shows
signs of a somewhat later date; but it is unquestionably a Roman book;
and the Kalendar which we can construct from it represents the Kalendar
of Rome as it was not later than about the middle of the sixth century.
It gives us the following days; but it must be observed that the months
of January, February, March, and part of April are unfortunately
missing[34].

    The first is April 14, Tiburtius (a Roman martyr). There follow
    ‘Paschal time’: April 23, George (Eastern)[?][35]; Dedication
    of the Basilica of St Peter, the Apostle; the Ascension of the
    Lord; the day before Pentecost; the Sunday of Pentecost; the
    fast of the fourth month; June 24, natale of St John Baptist;
    June 26, natale of SS. John and Paul (two Romans, brothers,
    martyrs under Julian); June 29, natale of the Apostles Peter
    and Paul (at Rome); July 10, natale of seven martyrs who are
    named (all at Rome; and the cemeteries where their bodies
    rest are named); Aug. 3[36], natale of St Stephen (bishop of
    Rome and martyr, more commonly commemorated on Aug. 2); Aug.
    6, natale of St Xystus and of Felicissimus and Agapitus (all
    martyrs at Rome); Aug. 10, natale of St Lawrence (Rome); Aug.
    13, natale of SS. Hippolytus and Pontianus (Romans); Aug.
    30, natale of Adauctus and Felix (at Rome); Sept. 14, natale
    of SS. Cornelius and Cyprian (the former bishop of Rome, the
    latter bishop of Carthage, his contemporary); Sept. 16, natale
    of St Euphemia (at Rome); Fast of the seventh month; Sept.
    30, natale (_sic_) of the basilica of the Angel in Salaria
    (on the Via Salaria: evidently for the foundation or the
    dedication of a church at Rome, probably under the name of St
    Michael); Depositio of St Silvester (bishop of Rome, no date:
    in the Bucherian Martyrology it is at Dec. 31); Nov. 8 (or
    9), natale of the four crowned saints (all at Rome); Nov. 22,
    natale of St Caecilia (Roman martyr); Nov. 23, natale of SS.
    Clement and Felicitas (both Roman martyrs); Nov. 24, natale
    of SS. Chrysogonus and Gregorius (the first, a Roman martyr,
    the second, uncertain[37]); Nov. 30, natale of St Andrew,
    Apostle; Dec. 25, natale of the Lord; and of the martyrs,
    Pastor, Basilius, Jovianus, Victorinus, Eugenia, Felicitas, and
    Anastasia (Eugenia was perhaps the Roman lady martyred with
    Agape; Anastasia was of Roman origin, though she suffered death
    in Illyria: her name appears in the canon of the Roman mass.
    The persons intended by the other names are more uncertain);
    Dec. 27, natale of St John, Evangelist; Dec. 28, natale of the
    Innocents.

It has been thought well to give in full this list, defective though it
is (as lacking the opening months of the year). It exhibits indeed a
large preponderance of celebrations of local interest; but there are
clear indications that already the martyrs of other places than Rome are
securing themselves positions in the Roman Kalendar.

The collection of masses and other liturgical offices known as the
Gelasian Sacramentary are not without interest in illustrating the
development of the Kalendar, more particularly among the Franks. But we
pass on to consider the features of the distinctively Roman service book,
which, by a somewhat misleading name, has been called the _Gregorian
Sacramentary_. In its present form (though it contains many ancient
elements) it is probably not earlier than the close of the eighth
century. Omitting notices of moveable days, and exhibiting the dates
by the days of the month in our modern fashion, the Kalendar runs as
follows[38], some remarks being added within marks of parenthesis.

    =January.= 1. Octava Domini (the octave of Christmas). 6.
    Epiphania (called in the older Roman Kalendar ‘Theophania,’ as
    by the Greeks). 14. St Felix ‘in Pincis’ (on the Pincian). 16.
    St Marcellus, Pope. 18. St Prisca (at Rome). 20. SS. Fabian and
    Sebastian (both at Rome). 21. St Agnes (at Rome)[39]. 22. St
    Vincent (Spain). 28. Second of St Agnes (Octave).

    =February.= 2. Ypapante, or Purification of St Mary. 5. St
    Agatha (Sicily: a church at Rome dedicated to her). 14. St
    Valentine (presbyter at Rome).

    =March.= 12. St Gregory, Pope. 25. Annunciation of St Mary.

    =April.= 14. SS. Tiburtius and Valerian (at Rome). 23. St
    George (Eastern: church ‘in Velabro’ at Rome). 28. St Vitalis
    (of Ravenna: a church at Rome).

    =May.= 1. SS. Philip and James, Apostles. 3. SS. Alexander,
    Eventius and Theodulus (Pope, and two presbyters at Rome). 6.
    Natale of St John before the Latin gate (Rome). 10. SS. Gordian
    and Epimachus (both at Rome). 12. St Pancratius (at Rome, where
    a church was dedicated to him). 13. Natale of St Mary ‘ad
    Martyres’ (dedication of the Pantheon at Rome by Boniface IV).
    25. St Urban, Pope.

    =June.= 1. Dedication of the Basilica of St Nicomedes (at
    Rome). 2. SS. Marcellinus and Peter (at Rome: a church in their
    honour is said to have been erected by the Emperor Constantine
    on the Via Lavicana). 18. SS. Marcus and Marcellianus (both at
    Rome). 19. SS. Protasius and Gervasius (Milan). 24. Natale of
    St John Baptist. 26. SS. John and Paul (two brothers at Rome).
    28. St Leo, Pope. 29. Natale of SS. Peter and Paul, Apostles
    (Rome). 30. Natale of St Paul (the Apostle).

    =July.= 2. SS. Processus and Martinianus (legendary
    soldier-martyrs at Rome). 10. Natale of the Seven Brethren
    (at Rome). 29. SS. Felix, Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrix
    (Pope Felix II; the others commemorated at Rome on the Via
    Portuensis). 30. SS. Abdon and Sennen (martyrs at Rome).

    =August.= 1. St Peter ‘in Vincula’ (more commonly ‘ad Vincula’:
    it is probable that the date marks the dedication of a church
    at Rome). 2. St Stephen, bishop (of Rome). 5. SS. Xystus,
    bishop, Felicissimus and Agapitus (all of Rome). 8. St Cyriacus
    (deacon, at Rome: perhaps marks the date of his translation
    by Pope Marcellus). 10. Natale of St Lawrence (Rome). 11. St
    Tiburtius (martyred outside Rome on the Via Lavicana). 13. St
    Hippolytus (martyr according to the legend at Rome). 14. St
    Eusebius, presbyter (at Rome). 15. Assumption of St Mary. 17.
    St Agapitus (at Praeneste). 22. St Timotheus (martyr at Rome).
    28. St Hermes (at Rome). 29. St Sabina (virgin-martyr at Rome).
    30. SS. Felix and Adauctus (both at Rome).

    =September.= 8. Nativity of St Mary. 11. SS. Protus and
    Hyacinthus (both at Rome). 14. SS. Cornelius and Cyprian:
    also Exaltation of Holy Cross (Cornelius, Pope, Cyprian of
    Carthage). 15. Natale of St Nicomedes (presbyter martyr
    at Rome). 16. Natale of St Euphemia, and of SS. Lucia and
    Geminianus (all at Rome). 27. SS. Cosmas and Damian (Eastern).
    29. Dedication of the Basilica of the Holy Angel Michael.

    =October.= 7. Natale of St Marcus, Pope. 14. Natale of St
    Callistus, Pope.

    =November.= 1. St Caesarius (an African deacon martyred in
    Campania). 8. The four crowned saints (at Rome). 9. Natale of
    St Theodorus (Asia Minor). 11. Natale of St Menna: likewise St
    Martin, bishop (Menna, Asia Minor: Martin of Tours). 22. St
    Caecilia (Roman). 23. St Clement: likewise St Felicitas (both
    Roman). 24. St Chrysogonus (Roman). 29. St Saturninus (a Roman,
    martyred at Toulouse). 30. St Andrew, Apostle.

    =December.= 13. St Lucia (Syracuse). 25. Nativity of the Lord.
    26. Natale of St Stephen. 27. St John, Evangelist. 28. Holy
    Innocents. 31. St Silvester, Pope.

When we examine these lists we find (1) the principal festivals of
the Lord, of His Mother, and of His Apostles placed as they are still
noted in the Kalendar. It may be observed that Jan. 1 is not styled
the Circumcision; and there is no reference to the Circumcision in the
collect. In the mass for the Epiphany the leading of the Gentiles by a
star and the gifts of the Magi are the prominent features. The use of the
name Ypapante as the first name for the Purification (Feb. 2) suggests
the Eastern origin of the festival. We find (2) the great majority of
the saints recorded to be Roman martyrs—or of martyrs connected with
Rome, either in fact or by legend; but (3) there are a few famous martyrs
from other regions of the world, as St George, St Vincent, SS. Cosmas
and Damian, and St Lucy, of Dec. 13. And Martin of Tours has a place. We
also find that some of the obscurer saints of the earlier list disappear.
Frequent pilgrimages to the East, together with the interchange of
literary correspondence between the churches, are sufficient to account
for the appearance of the Oriental martyrs. The leading features of
the Western Kalendar, as it prevailed in the mediaeval period, and has
subsisted to the present day, are already apparent.

It will be seen that All Saints does not appear on Nov. 1; and yet it
was certainly observed in many churches in England, France, and Germany
during the eighth century. It is placed at Nov. 1 in the _Metrical
Martyrology_ attributed to Bede, who died in A.D. 735. Though therefore
this Martyrology, as we now possess it, shows signs of having been
re-handled, it seems hazardous to attribute the origin of the festival,
as is done by some, to the dedication of a church at Rome ‘in honorem
Omnium Sanctorum’ by Pope Gregory III (A.D. 731-741).

Much obscurity attends the origin of All Souls’ Day. It would seem that
Amalarius of Metz, early in the ninth century, had inserted in his
Kalendar an anniversary commemoration of all the departed, and this was
probably (as the context suggests) immediately after All Saints’ Day; but
the practice of observing the day did not at once become general, and the
earliest clear testimony to Nov. 2 does not emerge till the end of the
tenth century, when Odilo, abbot of Clugny, stimulated by a vision of the
sufferings of souls in purgatory, reported to him by a pilgrim returning
from Jerusalem, enjoined on the monastic churches subject to Clugny the
observance of Nov. 2. The practice rapidly spread.

The dominant influence of the Roman Church in Europe carried eventually
the main features of the Roman Kalendar into all regions of the West. In
early times at Rome the anniversary of a martyr was ordinarily kept, not
in the various churches of the city and suburbs, but at the particular
cemetery or catacomb where he was buried, or at the tomb within some
church which had been erected over the place where his remains rested.
Outside the walls, and at various distances along the great roads that
led from the city, most of these commemorations were celebrated. As
M. Batiffol has put it, with substantial correctness, ‘the old Roman
_Sanctorale_ is the _Sanctorale_ of the cemeteries[40].’ It is a striking
and impressive illustration of the looking of the Western peoples to Rome
for guidance in matters of religion that even obscure saints buried in
the cemeteries of the neighbourhood of the Apostolic See now have places
in the religious commemorations of all the remotest Churches of the Roman
obedience.

The study of the origins of the Kalendar of the city of Rome illustrates
the general proposition that the martyrdoms of a particular city or
district form the main feature of each local Kalendar. To enter into
detail in respect to the early Kalendars of the other provinces and
dioceses of Europe, even when the scanty evidence surviving makes the
enquiry possible, is too large a task to be attempted here.

The account of the commemorations of the early martyrs may be brought
to a close by calling attention to a festival of general and perhaps
universal observance before the fifth century—the festival of the
pre-Christian martyrs, the seven Maccabees, on Aug. 1. It was not
unnatural in the age of persecution, or when the memories of the great
persecutions were still fresh, to fasten upon the Old Testament story
of heroic constancy. After the Feast of St Peter’s Chains in the West,
and the Procession of the Holy Cross in the East had displaced it from a
position of primary importance, it was not wholly forgotten; and even now
in both East and West in a subsidiary manner the memory of the Maccabees
is still preserved in the services of the Church on Aug. 1. Chrysostom
speaks of the celebration being attended in his day by a great concourse
of the faithful, and we possess three homilies of his for the festival.
Augustine shows us that the festival was observed in Africa in his
time, and mentions that there was a church called after the Maccabees
at Antioch, a city named, he makes a point to inform us, after their
persecutor, Antiochus Epiphanes. There are still extant sermons for the
festival preached by Gregory Nazianzen, and, at a later date, by Pope Leo
the Great.




CHAPTER III

THE LORD’S NATIVITY: THE EPIPHANY: THE FESTIVALS WHICH IN EARLY TIMES
FOLLOWED IMMEDIATELY ON THE NATIVITY


It is certain that the assigning of the birth of the Lord to Dec. 25
appears first in the West; and it is not till the last quarter of the
fourth century that we find it becoming established in some parts of
the East. St Chrysostom in a homily delivered in A.D. 386 distinctly
relates that it was about ten years earlier the festival of Dec. 25 came
to be observed at Antioch, and that the festival had been observed in
the West from early times (ἄνωθεν)[41]. At Constantinople the festival
was kept on Dec. 25, apparently for the first time, in A.D. 379 or 380;
and about the same time it appears in Cappadocia, as we learn from the
funeral oration on Basil the Great pronounced by his brother, Gregory of
Nyssa. At Alexandria this date was adopted before A.D. 432. At Jerusalem,
however, the Nativity was observed on Jan. 6 not only in the time of the
_Pilgrimage_ of ‘Silvia,’ but, if we may credit the Egyptian monk Cosmas
Indicopleustes, even as late as at the middle of the sixth century. This
writer relates that the people of Jerusalem, arguing from Luke iii. 23
(where, as he interprets the passage, Jesus is said to be _beginning_ to
be thirty years of age at His baptism) celebrated the Nativity together
with the Baptism on Jan. 6[42].

But when did the observance of Dec. 25 make its appearance in the West?
It must have been a well-marked festival at Rome when it appeared in
the Bucherian Kalendar in A.D. 336 (see p. 15). And about one hundred
years earlier (as we learn from his commentaries on Daniel) Hippolytus
was led to infer, partly from a belief (however it originated) that
the Incarnation took place at the Passover, and partly by a process of
calculation with the help of his cycle, that the actual Incarnation
took place on March 25 in the year of the world 5500 (or B.C. 3), and
consequently the Nativity on Dec. 25[43].

The Bishop of Salisbury (J. Wordsworth) offers an ingenious conjecture
which may possibly point to the early Eastern practice of commemorating
the Nativity on Jan. 6 having originated in a similar way. Sozomen, the
historian, writing in the fifth century, states that the Montanists
always celebrated the pascha on the eighth day before the Ides of April
(_i.e._ April 6), if it fell on a Sunday, otherwise on the following
Sunday (_H.E._ vii. 18). The Bishop thinks that the belief that April 6
was the proper day of the pascha ‘may probably have been an opinion quite
unconnected with their [the Montanists’] sect.’ But he rightly admits
that ‘actual facts are not yet forthcoming[44].’

Conjectures of this kind, though at present unsupported, are well worth
remembering, if for no other reason, because students of early Christian
literature are thus put on the alert to note any testimonies which make
for, or else go to invalidate, the suggestion offered. I may add that the
Montanist notion, as recorded by Sozomen, that the creation of the sun
in the heavens took place on April 6, is of a kind that would well fall
in, among fanciful speculators, with the notion that the Incarnation also
took place on the same day[45].

Why this time of the year, late in December or early in January, was
assigned for the Nativity is a question which it is not possible
to answer with confidence. It is conceivable that the insecure and
blundering argument alleged, among others, by Chrysostom may have had
weight. He supposes that Zacharias, the father of the Baptist, was the
High Priest, and that he had entered the Holy of Holies on the day of
Atonement when the angel appeared to him. The day of Atonement was in
September. Six months later (Luke i. 26) the Annunciation was made to St
Mary; and after nine months the Saviour was born.

By others it has been suggested that the festival of Christmas on Dec.
25 did not originate in any such calculations; but was suggested by the
pagan festival _Natalis Solis Invicti_ marked at that day. The solstice
was passed. The sun was entering on its new increases. ‘The Light of the
world,’ ‘the Sun of righteousness’ was to take the place of the sun-god
in the heavens[46].

The Theophany, or Epiphany (Jan. 6), is, like its name, as
characteristically Eastern in its origin as the feast of the Nativity
(Dec. 25) is Western; but when it passed into the West it was in thought,
either at the outset or certainly soon, separated from the Nativity; and
eventually, while the baptism of Christ was not ignored, the main stress
of liturgical allusion was on the visit of the Magi, so that the festival
is not uncommonly designated simply as the feast of the Three Kings. In
the East the dominant thought is the manifestation of Christ’s divinity
at his baptism: and in the Basilian Menology the day is simply named ‘The
Baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ.’ And it is to this connexion, baptism
among the Greeks being known as ‘illumination,’ that has been attributed
another name for the day, ‘the lights’ (τὰ φῶτα)[47].

It is not improbable that the feast of the Epiphany made its way to the
West, through the churches of Southern Gaul, whose affinities with the
East are recognised facts of history. At all events it is in connexion
with Gaul that we find the first reference to the Epiphany in the West.
The pagan historian Ammianus Marcellinus, in his account of the Emperor
Julian in A.D. 361 visiting a Christian church at Vienne, says that
it happened on the day in the month of January which Christians call
‘Epiphania’ (_Hist._ xxi. 2).

The Epiphany was observed in the African Church by the orthodox in the
time of Augustine, but he tells us that the Donatists did not observe
it, ‘because they love not unity, nor do they communicate with the
Eastern Church.’ The latter expression falls in with the supposition that
the West derived the festival from the East. In the ancient Kalendar
called the Kalendar of Carthage (unfortunately of uncertain date) we
find at Jan. 6 the entry ‘Sanctum Epefania’ (_sic_). In Spain, as we
learn from the canons of the Council of Saragossa (can. 4), the festival
was recognised as a considerable commemoration before A.D. 380. For
Rome, we have to note the silence of the Bucherian Kalendar; but for
the fifth century we have the testimony of Pope Leo, and we possess no
fewer than eight sermons of his upon the festival of the Epiphany; in
these the manifestation of Christ to the Magi is the truth upon which
he chiefly enlarges. Elsewhere in the West we have references to other
manifestations of the Deity of Christ, as at His baptism, and His first
miracle at Cana. But generally, as in the East the baptism, so in the
West the manifestation to the Gentiles is the leading note of preachers
or theologians[48].

Among the Armenians the Epiphany is reckoned one of the five chief
festivals: it is preceded by a week’s fast, and is followed by an octave.
It is by them still reckoned as the day of the Nativity.


_The festivals of the days immediately following Christmas._

We see that in the Gregorian Kalendar the commemorations of St Stephen
(Dec. 26), St John the Evangelist (Dec. 27), and Holy Innocents (Dec.
28), in the order with which we are familiar, were already established
in the West. And long before the period of the Gregorian Kalendar we
have evidence that in some parts of the East before the close of the
fourth century a group of festivals commemorating eminent saints of the
New Testament were celebrated between the feast of the Nativity and
the first of January. Basil the Great died on Jan. 1 A.D. 379; and his
brother Gregory of Nyssa delivered the funeral oration at his burial. In
this discourse the preacher speaks of a group of feasts preceding the
first of January, namely of St Stephen, St Peter, St James and St John,
and St Paul. It may with some reason be believed that the dates of these
festivals had no relation, real or fancied, to the days of the deaths of
these saints of the Church’s beginnings.

    As regards St James we know that he was killed at the time
    of the Passover, so that the Hieronymian Martyrology makes
    the day in December to be the day of his consecration to the
    episcopate. Liturgists have said it was becoming that the
    King of glory should come into the world accompanied by the
    chiefs of his court. And it is not a wholly baseless fancy that
    already there was a desire (of which at a later period we have
    many illustrations) to connect a great festival with one or
    more other commemorations associated with it in thought. The
    memories of the age of the martyrs would naturally suggest the
    name of the protomartyr; while the relations of the Lord to St
    James, St John, and St Peter, and the eminence of St Paul may
    perhaps sufficiently account for their appearance here.

There is little doubt that at the close of the fourth century the
churches of Asia Minor had festivals of St Stephen on Dec. 26, St James
and St John on Dec. 27, and St Peter and St Paul on Dec. 28[49]. And in
the West our earliest information shows us St Stephen on Dec. 26; but
there are variations as regards the other festivals. The ancient Kalendar
of Carthage shows us on Dec. 27 ‘St John _the Baptist_ and James the
Apostle, whom Herod slew,’ and Holy Innocents on Dec. 28[50].

The earliest Roman service-books show us only St John on Dec. 27, and he
is St John _the Evangelist_[51]. Yet in the so-called Martyrology of St
Jerome (which, though interpolated, contains many ancient features), we
find at this day, together with ‘the Assumption of St John at Ephesus,’
‘the ordination to the episcopate of James, the Lord’s brother, who was
crowned with martyrdom at the paschal time[52].’ The Holy Innocents
(Dec. 28) is known in the Latin books since the sixth century, and may
well have been earlier; but Peter and Paul are found together on another
day (June 29), the day of their martyrdom at Rome, as was generally
assumed. Though we are not able to determine with precision on what day
the Innocents of Bethlehem were commemorated in early times, there can
be little doubt that there was some commemoration of those whom, as St
Augustine says, ‘the Church has received to the honour of the martyrs.’

There are some reasons for conjecturing that the commemoration of the
Innocents was at first in association with the Epiphany. In the second
half of the fourth century the poet Prudentius has some pretty lines on
the Holy Innocents as martyrs in his hymn on the Epiphany[53]. And Leo
the Great in more than one of his sermons on the Epiphany has laudatory
passages on the martyrdom of the Innocents. Yet in estimating the
weight that should attach to such references it should be remembered
that Herod’s slaughter of the children at Bethlehem is in the Gospel
narrative so closely connected with the visit of the Magi that it would
not be unnatural for both poet and preacher to touch on that striking
story, although there were no intentional commemoration of the Innocents
attached by the Church to that day. In the Byzantine Kalendar the
Fourteen Thousand Holy Infants are commemorated on Dec. 29. In the
Armenian Kalendar the Fourteen Thousand Innocent Martyrs are commemorated
on June 10. It deserves notice that in the Mozarabic Kalendars we find
‘St James the Lord’s Brother’ at Dec. 28; ‘St John Evangelist’ at Dec.
29; and ‘St James the Brother of John’ at Dec. 30.




CHAPTER IV

OTHER COMMEMORATIONS OF EVENTS IN THE LORD’S LIFE. PENTECOST


The commemoration of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ was in
the nature of things a natural and inevitable outcome of the religious
beliefs and feelings of the infant Church. The fixing of days for the
commemoration of other events in the life of our Lord came with thought
and reflection; they belong to the period of constructiveness, and we
have no evidence to show that their appearance was very early. Tertullian
is silent about other days than Sunday (the Lord’s Day), the Pasch
(including the Passion and the Resurrection), and Pentecost[54]; and
Origen particularises the Lord’s Day, the Parasceve (perhaps in the sense
of the weekly Friday ‘station’), the Pasch, and Pentecost, as being days
specially observed by Christians[55].

=The Circumcision= is obviously dependent on whatever was regarded
as the date of the Nativity, and is the result of reflection and
ecclesiastical constructiveness. It is eight days after the Nativity
on Jan. 1, with all Christendom, save the Armenians, who celebrating
the Nativity (together with other Epiphanies of the Lord) on Jan. 6,
naturally observe Jan. 13 as the day of the Circumcision. The day is not
noted in the Bucherian Kalendar, nor in the Carthaginian. Baillet[56]
comes to the conclusion that it appears first as appointed for general
observance as a festival, about the middle of the seventh century, and
in Spain, where servile work was forbidden on this day. But it would
appear from the Canons of the Fourth Council of Toledo that the day was
then observed with penitential features (canon 11). From the Sermons of
Augustine we learn that in his time Jan. 1 was observed by Christians as
a solemn fast, in protest against the licentious revelry and excesses
of the pagans at this time of the year[57]. And as late as the Second
Council of Tours (A.D. 567) it is enjoined that, while all other days
between the Nativity and the Epiphany are to be treated (in regard to
use of food) as festivals, an exception is to be made for the space of
three days at the beginning of January, for which time the fathers had
appointed litanies to be made ‘ad calcandam Gentilium consuetudinem.’
But it should be remarked that the canon (17) dealing with the subject
has special reference to fasts to be observed by monks. It is therefore
not impossible that the fast had by this time ceased to be observed by
the general body of the faithful, but, in a spirit of conservatism,
was regarded as proper to be maintained in the monasteries. The canon
is interesting for another reason; it affords perhaps the earliest
example of the use of the term ‘Circumcision’ as applied to this day,
which appears in the Gelasian and Gregorian Sacramentaries simply as
_Octava Domini_, _i.e._ the octave of the Nativity. In the Gelasian
Sacramentary there is no emphasis in the service on the Circumcision,
while the prayer called _Ad populum_ distinctly points to a prohibition
against partaking of the _convivium diabolicum_ of the pagans. And a mass
immediately following that for the Octave, entitled _Ad prohibendum ab
idolis_, points in the same direction. The Gregorian Sacramentary shows
no reference to the Circumcision in the prayers of the mass[58].

Even in the early part of the seventh century Isidore of Seville condemns
the indecent gaieties indulged in on this day, and recalls the ancient
injunction that the day should be observed as a fast[59]. The fourth
Council of Toledo (canon 11) represents as the practice of Spain and Gaul
the omission of the singing of _Alleluia_ on the Kalends of January,
_propter errorem gentilium_.

In the later Western service-books the thought of the Circumcision is
given greater prominence, and intermingles with the thoughts suggested by
the Octave. The feast of the Circumcision appears in the Greek Church in
the eighth century[60].

=Commemoration of Passiontide; Holy Week= (the ‘Great Week,’ as it is
styled in the East). The commemoration of the death of the Saviour is
the primitive and essential element: other days were given places as
the result of reflection, and of the desire to reproduce liturgically
in a mimetic way the events of the Lord’s history during the last
paschal week. We possess the early testimony of Tertullian for the _dies
Paschae_, for so he names the day. He tells us that it was a public and
general fast, and that the kiss of peace was omitted from the services
of the Church[61]. But for Palm Sunday, _Coena Domini_, and the Great
Sabbath we have no evidence till much later. It is from Palestine that
we get the earliest notice of the rites of Palm Sunday. In her account
of the ceremonies at Jerusalem ‘Silvia’ describes the procession of
palm-bearers on the Sunday of the Great Week. The feast of Palms is also
mentioned in the life of Euthymius, abbot in Palestine, who died at a
very advanced age in A.D. 473. But in the West the carrying of palms does
not appear earlier than the ninth century. The commemoration (_Natalis
Calicis_) of the institution of the Eucharist on the night before the
Lord suffered probably had its rise about the same time as Palm Sunday;
and a certain mimetic character was given to the rites of the Thursday
by delaying the celebration of the Liturgy till the evening. This was
further enhanced in the Church of Carthage (A.D. 397), which in view of
the original institution of the Eucharist having been after supper, made
an express synodical declaration that the rule of fasting communion was
binding ‘excepto uno die anniversario, quo coena domini celebratur[62].’
And St Augustine expressly affirms that the practice of the Church did
not condemn communion after the evening meal on the Thursday in Holy
Week[63]. The name _Dies Mandati_ (which has probably given us our
_Maundy Thursday_) is not very ancient. In mediaeval times the particular
mandate of the Lord was taken to be the feet-washing, before or during
which were sung the words ‘Mandatum novum do vobis[64].’

At Rome, as late as the time of St Leo, in regard to the days specially
observed in Holy Week, the only distinction from ordinary weeks seems
to have been the commemoration of the institution of the Eucharist on
Thursday. The adoration of the Cross on Good Friday (which we find at
Jerusalem in the days of ‘Silvia’) and the mass of the pre-sanctified
were later additions, and are regarded by Duchesne as having been
introduced into the West in the seventh or eighth century[65]. The
observances of the Saturday were those of the vigil of Easter.

=The Ascension=: in the Greek Kalendar, and frequently in Greek
writers, with a different connotation, ‘the Taking up,’ ‘Assumption’
(ἀνάληψις)[66], was celebrated forty days after Easter, as the actual
Ascension took place forty days after the Resurrection; it is obviously
a festival of the constructive period. There is no mention of it in
the earliest Christian writings; but, without here going into details
of evidence, it may be stated that the festival was observed, possibly
early in, and certainly before, the close of the fourth century. It is
noticed by ‘Silvia’ (though the name Ascensa is not given to it) as
a day on which at Bethlehem, where the vigil was kept, the bishop of
Jerusalem and the presbyters preached, but it does not appear that the
Eucharist was celebrated. There was a procession back to Jerusalem in the
evening. Augustine classes the day with the Passion, the Resurrection,
and the advent of the Holy Spirit (Pentecost), as observed ‘anniversaria
solemnitate[67].’ In the Sacramentary of Leo many masses _in Ascensa_
(= _Ascensione_) _Domini_ are to be found. Both in the East and in some
parts of the West it was customary to celebrate the festival outside the
cities,—a practice suggested doubtless by Luke xxiv. 50.

It may be remarked that many old English writers, both before and after
the Reformation, use the term ‘Holy Thursday’ for this day.

=The Transfiguration= (Aug. 6 in the Byzantine[68], Ethiopic, and
later mediaeval and modern Roman Kalendars: on the 7th Sunday after
Pentecost in the Armenian) is of late appearance. If a certain canon
(or prose hymn) on the Transfiguration attributed to John of Damascus
be really his, it would point to the probable observance of the day in
the eighth century in the East. In the West the festival appears much
later; but the evidence indicates its having had a partial and local
observance long before it was enjoined by Pope Calixtus III for the
Church generally in A.D. 1457. This Pope appointed an office for the day,
which was afterwards somewhat altered by Pius V. The action of Calixtus
was prompted by thankfulness for a victory over the Turks at Belgrade.
Among the Greeks the Transfiguration is a day of great solemnity. It is
preceded by a ‘proheortia’ and affects the following eight days. The
Armenians observe a preparatory fast for a week[69].

=Pentecost.= This word as commonly employed by early Christian writers
signifies the whole period of fifty days after the Resurrection. It
is thus that the term is used by Tertullian in a passage (_de Idolat._
14) where he compares the number of festival days among the pagans with
the number of Christian festivals. The same is probably true where he
speaks of Pentecost as ‘ordinandis lavacris latissimum spatium’ (_de
Baptismo_ 19). During that period fasting, and kneeling at prayer, at
least in the public assemblies, were forbidden: and _Alleluia_, which
had been silent, was resumed. It seems, however, that once at least
Tertullian had in view, in the use of the word, the day on which the
period closed[70]. Origen in a similar way uses the word for the whole
period, but also seems to distinguish between the general and more
restricted signification of the word[71]. Earlier than either of these
is the testimony of Irenaeus (if we may accept it as his) cited, as from
his lost book _On the Pascha_, by Pseudo-Justin (_Quaest. et Respons. ad
Orthodoxos_, 115), where Irenaeus speaks of not kneeling in Pentecost,
as that time is of equal dignity with the Lord’s day, ‘Pentecost’ being
here used evidently for a season. On the other hand, the compiler,
whoever he was, of the _Quaestiones_, in which Irenaeus is quoted, in
the same place speaks of not kneeling ‘from the Pascha to Pentecost,’
using the latter term in its restricted sense. In the newly-recovered
_Testament of the Lord_[72] Pentecost is used for the fifty days between
Easter and our Whitsunday (i. 28, 42; ii. 12). An interesting survival
of the old signification of Pentecost is still to be found in the Greek
service-books, where the term _Mesopentecoste_ is used for special festal
observances mid-way between Easter and Whitsunday, commencing on the
Wednesday following the third Sunday after Easter, and lasting for a week.

In the forty-third canon of the Council of Elvira (A.D. 305) we have a
clear example of the use of the word Pentecost for the fiftieth day. And
after that date the word is widely used in that sense: while the festival
itself assumes gradually more and more dignity and importance. ‘Silvia’
describes the elaborate ceremonial observed on this day at Jerusalem
towards the close of the fourth century.

There are considerable difficulties attendant on an attempt to assign
a precise date to the addition of an octave to this festival; and the
festal character of the octave week was affected by the ember days
occurring in that week. In the Gelasian Sacramentary, as it has come
down to us, we have the ‘propers’ for a mass on the Sunday of the octave
of Pentecost. The mass may be described as a mass of the Holy Spirit,
praying for protection for the Church from the allurements of the vain
and deceitful philosophy of the world; true knowledge of the nature of
God was given by the bestowal of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of wisdom,
and knowledge, and understanding, and counsel. The benedictions, which
immediately follow, on those who return to the Catholic unity from the
Arian and other heresies, suggest that it was in this way that the
octave of Pentecost came at a later date to be made a festival in honour
of the mystery of the blessed Trinity[73]. The public reception to the
Catholic unity of Arian and other heretics would gradually cease to be a
feature of the season: but the liturgical colouring of the service would
remain, and would have to be accounted for. As a matter of fact, however,
the establishment of a festival of the Trinity with a special office and
mass was of late date. It makes its appearance in the Low Countries in
the tenth century, and made its way but slowly, and with varying success.
Pope Alexander II, who died in A.D. 1073, when consulted on the subject,
wrote that according to the Roman rite there was no day set apart to
commemorate the Trinity any more than the Unity of the Divine Being,
and that every day of the year was truly consecrated to the honour of
the Trinity in Unity. It was not till the fourteenth century, under the
pontificate of John XXII, that the Roman Church received the feast of the
Trinity and attached it to the first Sunday after Pentecost[74].

In England, according to Gervase of Canterbury, Archbishop Thomas
Becket instituted the principal feast of the Trinity on the octave of
Pentecost[75].




CHAPTER V

FESTIVALS OF ST MARY THE VIRGIN


I. _Western Kalendars._

The history of the origin of some of the following festivals is obscure;
and it is impossible to be precise as to the dates of their first
appearance. We speak with some reservation of the Festival of Feb. 2,
known first in the West, as well as in the East, by the name Hypapante
(_i.e._ ‘the Meeting’ of Simeon with the Lord and His Mother), and
afterwards as the Purification of the Virgin. It seems at first in the
West to have been a festival of our Lord rather than of the Virgin. In
the _propria_ for ‘Yppapanti’ (_sic_) in the Gregorian Sacramentary the
allusion to St Mary is of the slightest. Hence at the time when it first
appeared in the West it may be reckoned as having no special reference to
St Mary. The Church of Rome does not appear (according to Duchesne) to
have observed any festival of the Virgin before the seventh century, when
it adopted the four following festivals from the Church of Byzantium.

1. =The Purification= (or, in early times, Hypapante). Its date (Feb.
2) is determined by counting forty days from Christmas (Luke ii. 22:
compare Levit. xii. 2, 4).

A feast of much dignity and importance (_cum summa laetitia, ac si
per Pascha_) commemorating the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple
is noticed as celebrated (towards the close of the fourth century) at
Jerusalem at the time of the pilgrimage of ‘Silvia.’ It was observed on
Feb. 14 (the 40th day after the Epiphany, reckoned as the day of the
Lord’s Nativity): but ‘Silvia’ does not appear to have regarded it as in
any sense having special reference to St Mary. The words of the pilgrim
simply record the incident in the Temple; and it looks as if the feast
were only commemorative of a remarkable event in the history of the Lord.

It may be pointed out that the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in
the Temple is still observed by the Armenians on Feb. 14, as they still
celebrate the Nativity on Jan. 6.

The origin of the consecrating of candles and carrying them in procession
which has given us the low Latin names _candelaria_ and _candelcisa_, the
French _chandeleur_, the Italian _candelora_, the German _Lichtmesse_,
and our English name _Candlemas_, and which from early times formed a
striking feature in the ritual of the Feast, has been conjecturally
connected by some with a symbolical setting forth of the words of
Simeon (Luke ii. 32); and by others with the ceremonial of the heathen
_Lupercalia_. But the matter is still involved in doubt.

In the East the establishment of the festival throughout the Empire
is generally assigned to Justinian in the year 542. The appearance of
Hypapante in the so-called Gregorian Sacramentary is, it need scarcely be
said, no proof that the festival was observed in the time of Gregory the
Great.

The word ‘Hypapante’ lingered long in the West. We find it as the only
name of the festival in the Martyrology of Bede; and one hundred and
fifty years later the day is marked in Usuard as simply ‘Hypapante
Domini.’

2. =The Annunciation= (March 25) like ‘Hypapante’ was probably
originally a feast of our Lord, as marking the time of the Incarnation.
Inferentially it may be considered as well established both in the
East and West considerably before the close of the seventh century.
Duchesne considers that we have very clear testimony to this feast before
the Council in Trullo (A.D. 692), where it was spoken of as already
established. Perhaps earlier, or, at latest, almost contemporary, in the
West is the testimony of what is known as the tenth Council of Toledo
(?A.D. 694)[76] where the complaint is made that in various parts of
Spain the festival of St Mary was observed on various days, and it is
further added that as the festival cannot be fitly celebrated either in
Lent, or when overshadowed by the Paschal festival, the Council ordains
that for the future the day should be xv Kal. Jan. (Dec. 18) and the
Nativity of the Lord on viii Kal. Jan. (Dec. 25). It is plain that
something of the nature of an octave was to follow the festival of Dec.
18; and there is added in a somewhat apologetic tone, ‘nam quid festum
matris nisi incarnatio verbi?’ (canon 1). The Trullan Council took a
different course. While continuing to prohibit all other festivals during
Lent, it sanctioned the celebration of this. In the Milanese rite the
feast was celebrated on the fourth Sunday in Advent. In the Mozarabic
Missal we find in the Kalendar the Annunciation of St Mary marked both on
March 25 and Dec. 18; the latter being distinguished as the ‘Annunciation
of the O,’ referring to the great Antiphons sung at that season.

The older titles of the festival were the ‘Annunciation of the Lord,’
‘the Annunciation of the Angel to the Blessed Virgin Mary,’ or ‘the
Conception of Christ.’

The rules in the Roman rite for transferring the Annunciation to another
day under certain circumstances will be found in technical works of the
commentators.

3. =The Nativity of the Virgin= (Sept. 8). This also is found in the West
towards the close of the seventh century. Durandus, who is often more
fanciful than wise, had in this case perhaps some historical foundation
for his assertion that the festival was founded by Pope Sergius I in A.D.
695. The story of Joachim and Anna, the parents of St Mary, is found in
certain apocryphal Gospels which circulated among the Gnostics[77].

4. =The Sleep, or (later) Assumption, of the Virgin= (Aug. 15) appears in
the West about the same time as the _Annunciation_ and the _Nativity of
the Virgin_. All three were unknown to Gregory the Great. It originated
in the East, and was there known as the Sleep and (afterwards) the
Translation. According to the historian, Nicephorus Callistus, the
festival was founded by the Emperor Maurice (A.D. 582-602). It is beyond
our province here to deal with the legend of St Mary’s body as well as
soul being taken up to heaven. The festival made its way slowly in Gaul,
but was eventually adopted by Charlemagne. As late as the twelfth century
it was not universally observed in the East.

The advance in the titles of the festival from _depositio_, _pausatio_,
_dormitio_ to _transitus_ and _assumptio_ is not without significance. In
Bede the name is _Dormitio_.

It will be observed that all these four festivals came to Rome from
Byzantium. In the later mediaeval period they were of universal
obligation in the West[78].

For notices of the observance of the death of St Mary on Jan. 18, see
Baillet, _op. cit._, VI. 11.

5. =The Presentation of St Mary= (_praesentatio_, _illatio_, _oblatio_)
in the Temple at Jerusalem. In the modern Roman Kalendar at Nov. 21, it
is a ‘greater double.’ It does not appear in the Kalendar of the Sarum
Breviary or Missal; but the _Sarum Enchiridion_ (1530) gives Nov. 21,
and the Office is printed in the Breviary. There were many exceptions to
this feast being observed[79]. The festival is based on a legend[80] that
at an early age Mary was dedicated to the service of God in the Temple,
and that there she grew up, and served under the priests and Levites.
The first appearance of the festival is at Constantinople; and there is
evidence for it there in A.D. 1150. It passed to the West towards the
close of the fourteenth century[81]. And with more certainty than is
usually possible in such enquiries we can trace its introduction to the
impression made by the accounts, brought back from Cyprus, by Philip
de Mazières, of the solemnities of the feast in the East. Pius V (A.D.
1566-1572) withdrew it from the Roman Kalendar; but it was restored by
Sixtus V (A.D. 1585-1590).

6. =The Conception of St Mary= (Dec. 8). Since Dec. 8, 1854, when Pius
IX (in the Apostolic Letters _Ineffabilis Deus_) decreed the doctrine
of the _Immaculate Conception_ to be a necessary article of the Faith,
the epithet _Immaculate_ has been prefixed to the original title in
the service-books of the Roman Communion. In the Greek Church the
day observed is Dec. 9, and the title is the _Conception of St Anna,
grandmother of God_, the Easterns connecting the word ‘conception’ with
the person who conceived, while the Latins connected it with the person
who was conceived. The festival was commanded to be observed throughout
the Empire of the East by the Emperor Manuel Comnenus in the middle of
the twelfth century.

The evidence seems to point to the fact that, like several other
festivals of the Virgin, this originated in the East. In the Greek
_Horologion_ we find it related that, according to the ancient tradition
of the Church, Anna was barren and well stricken in years, and also that
her spouse Joachim was an aged man. In sorrow for their childlessness
they prayed to the Lord, who hearing their prayers intimated to them
by an angel that they would have a child, and in accordance with the
promise Anna conceived[82]. It appears that the festival had no dogmatic
significance; and it had its parallel in the historical festival, still
observed in the Greek Church on Sept. 23, of the Conception of St
John the Baptist, a festival which also had a place in the old Latin
Martyrologies.

In the West the local observance of the day is associated commonly with
the name of St Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury, who, in one form of
the story, on a voyage from England to Normandy during a storm vowed to
establish the festival. But the day is marked in some English Kalendars
just before the Norman Conquest, though at first it had a very limited
acceptance[83]. It is plain that at an early date there were some who
connected the festival with the belief that St Mary differed from other
mortals in being without original sin. For when the Chapter of the
Cathedral of Lyons were about to institute the festival in that church,
St Bernard of Clairvaux wrote (A.D. 1140) expostulating with them partly
on the ground that though St Mary was, as he believed, sanctified in
the womb, yet her conception was not holy. He added that this was a
novel festival, ‘quam ritus Ecclesiae nescit, non probat ratio, non
commendat antiqua traditio’; and declares that it was the outcome of the
simplicity of a few unlearned persons, the daughter of inconsiderateness
(_levitatis_), and the sister of superstition (_Epist._ 174).

John Beleth, Dean of the Faculty of Theology at Paris, towards the close
of the twelfth century argued much in the same way as St Bernard. And in
the following century, and towards its close, such a leading authority as
Durandus, bishop of Mende, in his _Rationale_ says that there were some
who would celebrate this festival, but that he could not approve of it,
because St Mary was conceived in original sin, though she was sanctified
in the womb.

As regards the Church of Rome (properly so called), Innocent III in
the beginning of the thirteenth century declares in one of his sermons
(_Serm._ II _de Joan. Bapt._) that no other conception than that of the
Lord Jesus was celebrated in the Church. Nevertheless the celebration of
the day spread both in France, and, more particularly, in England. The
Council of Oxford (A.D. 1222) approved of the feast, but distinguished
it from the other feasts of the Virgin by leaving it to be observed or
not at discretion. In the province of Canterbury the day was made of
obligation by Archbishop Simon Mepeham (A.D. 1328-33).

In 1263 the Franciscans resolved to celebrate the festival publicly in
their churches. But even the Franciscans were not agreed among themselves
as to the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. Alvarus Pelagius, the
Spanish Theologian, Great Penitentiary of Pope John XXII, in his _de
Planctu Ecclesiae_ (1332) declares that ‘the new and fantastic opinion
should be cancelled by the faithful.’

As is well known, the Dominicans took a strong and even violent part
against the doctrine. The greatest doctor of the thirteenth century,
Thomas Aquinas, had clearly pronounced that St Mary was not sanctified
till the infusion of her _anima rationalis_. But with regard to the feast
of the Conception he states that inasmuch as the Roman Church, though not
celebrating the Conception of the Blessed Virgin, tolerates the practice
of certain Churches which do celebrate it, the celebration of the feast
is not to be wholly reprobated; and he adds that we must not infer from
the observance of the day that St Mary was holy in her conception, but
because we are ignorant as to the time when she was sanctified, the feast
of her sanctification rather than of her conception is celebrated on the
day of her conception[84]. Accordingly in Dominican Kalendars we find
the day marked as _Sanctificatio Mariae_.

The Council of Bâle (1439) adopted a constitution applicable to the whole
Church that the feast should be observed according to the ancient and
laudable custom on Dec. 8, and that it should be known under the title of
the _Conception_ of the Blessed Virgin Mary, forbidding the use of the
name _Sanctification_, as having a less extended use. The Roman See, not
recognising this Council, did not take action till A.D. 1477, when Sixtus
IV, who had been a Franciscan, published an ordinance (and it is the
very first decree of any Pope on the subject) granting large indulgences
to all the faithful who celebrated, or assisted at, the Mass and Office
of the Conception on the festival or throughout its octave. In 1483 the
same Pope pronounced excommunication on any preachers who asserted that
St Mary was conceived in original sin or that those who observed the
festival sinned[85]. Clement VIII (1592-1605) raised the festival to
the rank of a greater double. The later history of the festival can be
pursued in Baillet, and in recent writers dealing with Pius IX.

For minor festivals of the Virgin, such as ‘St Mary at Snows,’ the
Visitation of St Mary, the Espousals (_Desponsatio_), the Most Holy Name
of Mary, the Seven Sorrows, the Rosary of St Mary, Blessed Mary of Mount
Carmel, the Expectation of the Delivery (_partûs_), and others, the
reader may consult Baillet, the _Catholic Dictionary_, etc.


II. _The Orthodox Church of the East._

A reference to the classification of Feasts in the Eastern Church[86]
will show that among the twelve principal Feasts are found (1) The
_Evangelismos of the Theotokos_, March 25, corresponding to the Western
feast of the Annunciation; (2) the Repose of the Theotokos, Aug. 15;
(3) the Nativity of the Theotokos, Sept. 8; and (4) the Entrance of the
Theotokos into the Temple, Nov. 21, corresponding to the Presentation of
the Virgin in the West.

To these have to be added the following feasts of lesser dignity: (5)
Hypapante (the Meeting of St Mary with Simeon and Anna in the Temple),
Feb. 2, corresponding to the Western Purification. This is a day of
obligation: but (as has been already remarked) it is perhaps to be
regarded rather as a festival of the Lord than of St Mary. (6) The
Deposition of the precious Vestment of the Theotokos in the Church of
Blachernae at Constantinople, July 2: (7) the Deposition of the precious
Zone of the Theotokos at Constantinople, Aug. 31: (8) the Conception of
St Anna (_i.e._ her conception of St Mary), Dec. 9, a day of obligation:
(9) the Synaxis of the Theotokos and Joseph, her spouse, Dec. 26, a day
of obligation. This day is also called the Synaxis of the Theotokos
fleeing into Egypt. The Greeks consider that the visit of the Magi was
exactly one year after the birth of Christ, and that the flight into
Egypt was on the day following that visit.




CHAPTER VI

FESTIVALS OF THE APOSTLES, THE EVANGELISTS, AND OF OTHER PERSONS NAMED IN
THE NEW TESTAMENT. OCTAVES AND VIGILS


In the Greek Church there has continued to the present day a Synaxis
of the Twelve Apostles on the day following St Peter and St Paul (June
29); and in the West we find a commemoration of all the Apostles,
connected with the festival of St Peter and St Paul, in the Leonine
Sacramentary[87]. There is a _Natale Omnium Apostolorum_ with a vigil in
the Gelasian Sacramentary. This festival may have preceded all separate
commemorations. It would seem to have been observed close to the date of
St Peter and St Paul.

With certain notable exceptions, feasts of the New Testament Saints came
but slowly into the cycle of Christian solemnities. With some exceptions,
more or less doubtful, there is no reason to think that the days of the
deaths of the Apostles were known to those who gave them places in
the Kalendars. It is highly probable in some cases, and not improbable
in others, that the dates assigned for the festivals really mark some
deposition or translation of the supposed relics of those commemorated,
or the dedication of some church named in their honour. Considerations of
the space at our disposal demand that the subject should be only lightly
touched; but references are given to easily accessible works. And we deal
only with the more notable festivals, or festivals of early appearance.

=St Peter and St Paul= (June 29). There is no question that at an early
date this festival was celebrated at Rome. The belief was entertained by
several ancient writers that these two Saints suffered death upon the
same day of the month, but in different years.

We have seen already (p. 33 f.) that in the East at an early date there
was a commemoration of St Peter in close connexion with the commemoration
of the Lord’s Nativity. But at Rome in the earliest Western Kalendar (the
Bucherian) we find two festivals that deserve consideration: (1) _Natale
Petri de Cathedra_ at Feb. 22; and (2) _Petri in Catacumbas et Pauli
Os[t]iense_, at June 29, to which are added the words, _Tusco et Basso
Coss_. To deal first with the latter entry; as the consulate of Tuscus
and Bassus marks A.D. 258, it has been not unnaturally conjectured that
the record marks the date of some translation of the Apostles’ relics.
But that conjecture does not absolutely exclude the supposition that the
day chosen for the translation was the day which was believed to have
been the day of their martyrdom. The translation, as Bishop Pearson[88]
long ago supposed, was the removal, perhaps with a view to safety, of the
remains to a place at the third milestone on the Appian Way, called ‘Ad
Catacumbas,’ during the heat of the persecution under Valerian.

The observance of a commemoration of St Paul on June 30 (still so
marked in the Roman Kalendar), has been accounted for by the fact that
the bishop of Rome celebrating mass first at the tomb of St Peter, and
afterwards on the same day having to go a long distance to the tomb of St
Paul, there to celebrate again, it was arranged to observe the festival
of St Paul on the day after June 29, with a view to avoiding the fatigue
and inconvenience of the two functions on the one day.

=Cathedra Petri.= The entry cited above from the Bucherian Kalendar,
_Natale Petri de cathedra_, ‘the Festival of Peter of the Chair,’ looks
very like the record of the dedication of a church, where perhaps a
seated statue of the Apostle was placed[89]. We are at once reminded
of the large seated figure of Hippolytus discovered in 1551 on the Via
Tiburtina. Or, as De Rossi supposes, the festival may have had to do with
the actual wooden chair (as was supposed) which St Peter had used, and
of which we hear in the time of Gregory the Great. But, whatever may have
been the origin of the festival, it came at a later time to be regarded
as marking the date of the beginning of St Peter’s episcopate; and there
is some evidence that the festival was made much of as a Christian set
off against the popular pagan solemnity of _Cara cognatio_ on Feb. 22,
when the dead members of each family were commemorated.

Duchesne asserts, with something of undue confidence, that this was
without doubt the ground for the selection of the date Feb. 22 for the
Christian festival; but without committing ourselves to the acceptance
of Duchesne’s view, we may say that it may well have been a reason why
efforts were made to draw off the faithful, by means of the Christian
solemnity, from the temptation to join in rites incompatible with
their profession. The festival was unknown in the East, and, what is
more remarkable, equally unknown in the Church of North Africa; but it
appeared early in Gaul, and, as has been conjectured, with a view to
prevent the festival falling, as would occasionally happen, in Lent, the
date was pushed back to Jan. 18. At Rome it continued to be observed on
Feb. 22.

It would seem to have been due to the anxiety of the early mediaeval
Kalendar-makers and Martyrologists to comprehend in their lists
everything in the way of church solemnities recorded in any Kalendar that
we have the invention of St Peter’s Chair at Antioch. They found some
Kalendars marking _Cathedra Petri_ at Jan. 18, and others at Feb. 22.
Might not, they would argue, these double dates be accounted for by the
old accounts that St Peter had exercised an episcopate at Antioch before
he came to Rome?

Venerable Bede does not mark any Festival of St Peter’s Chair at Jan.
18, but at Feb. 22 writes ‘Apud Antiochiam Cathedra S. Petri.’ But in
the Martyrology, known as _Gellonense_ (circ. 800), and in Usuard’s
Martyrology we find at Jan. 18, ‘Cathedrae S. Petri Apostoli quâ Romae
primo sedit,’ and at Feb. 22 ‘Cathedrae S. Petri Apostoli quâ sedit
apud Antiochiam’ (_Gellonense_), ‘Apud Antiochiam Cathedrae S. Petri’
(_Usuard_). There continued to be a variety of use in different dioceses
as to the day on which ‘St Peter’s Chair’ was celebrated; and it was not
till as late as 1558 that Pope Paul IV settled the question by ordering
that the feast of the Roman Chair should be observed on Jan. 18, while
Gregory XIII restored Feb. 22 as the feast of the Chair at Antioch. This
is not the place to discuss whether there was, properly speaking, any
episcopate of St Peter at Antioch. It is significant that the churches
of Greece and the East knew nothing of the feast of St Peter’s Chair at
Antioch[90].

=St Peter ‘ad vincula,’= ‘St Peter’s Chains.’ The Eastern Church
celebrates the festival of _St Peter’s Chain_ on Jan. 16; the Latin
Church celebrates the corresponding festival on Aug. 1. Both festivals
not improbably had their origins in the dedication of churches, where
what were supposed to be a chain or chains which had bound Peter were
preserved. The plural, ‘chains,’ in the Roman name is significant, and
will be understood by reference to the 4th and 5th Lections for the feast
in the Roman Breviary. The feast does not appear in Western Kalendars
till the eighth century.

The seventeenth century building, S. Pietro in Vincoli, on the Esquiline,
occupies the site of the church of the Apostles, reconstructed at the
expense of the imperial family between A.D. 432 and A.D. 440, where the
precious relics were deposited.

In connexion with this feast attention should be called to the fact that
in the so-called Hieronymian Martyrology at Aug. 1, we find no reference
to the chains, but there is the particularly interesting entry: ‘At
Rome, dedication of the first church both constructed and consecrated by
blessed Peter the Apostle[91].’

=St Andrew= (Nov. 30). The Martyrologies agree in giving Nov. 30 as
the day of the martyrdom. The festival appeared early at Rome, and was
given a place of high dignity[92]. In fact there is authority for the
feast being kept at Rome in early times with no less solemnity than St
Peter’s Day. It will be remembered that in the prayer _Libera nos_ in
the Canon of the Mass Andrew is named together with Peter and Paul. The
Sacramentary of St Leo has four sets of ‘propers’ for masses on this
festival. It is a day of much importance in the Greek Church, as St
Andrew, the Protoclete, is reckoned the apostle of Greece. St Andrew is
the patron of the Russian Church[93]. Relics of St Andrew, said to have
been brought by a monk named Regulus from Patras to Scotland, gave the
name of St Andrew to the place in Fife previously known as Kilrymont; and
St Andrew became the patron saint of Scotland. In the Aberdeen Breviary
his day is a ‘greater double.’

Bishop Wordsworth remarks that St Andrew’s Day ‘is perhaps the only
festival of an Apostle claiming to be really on the anniversary of his
death.’ Nov. 30 is given as the day of his martyrdom in the apocryphal
_Acta Andreae_, describing his death at Patras[94].

=St James the Great= (July 25), the son of Zebedee, does not appear very
early. The day is not noticed in either the Leonine or the Gelasian
Sacramentary, and made its way to general acceptance but slowly. In the
canons of the Council of Oxford (A.D. 1222) it does not appear among the
chief festivals for general observance in England, although in England
it was certainly a _festum chori_ long before that date.

It would seem (Acts xii. 2, 3) that the death of James took place about
the time of the Paschal commemoration; the Coptic Kalendar marks St
James’s day on April 12, and the Syrian lectionary of Antioch on April
30, on which day also the Greek Church keeps a festival of St James,
using for the Epistle Acts xii. 1, etc. The placing of the festival in
the West so far from Easter as July 25, suggests that the latter date was
connected with some translation of relics, or such like.

As we have already seen (p. 16) the ancient Syriac Kalendar edited
originally by Wright, commemorates James together with his brother John
on Dec. 27.

=St John, Apostle and Evangelist.= The principal festival on Dec. 27 is
found in the fourth century in the East, where he was conjoined with
James. Traces of this conjunction are to be found in the West. It is
interesting to find in the Gothic Missal, printed by Muratori, a mass
for the Natale of the Apostles James and John placed between St Stephen
and Holy Innocents. And in the Hieronymian Martyrology we find at Dec.
27 ‘the ordination to the episcopate of St James, the Lord’s brother [a
confusion], and the assumption of St John, the Evangelist, at Ephesus.’

The Greek Church commemorates the _metastasis_, or migration of John, on
Sept. 26, and an important festival in honour of the holy dust (called
_manna_) from his tomb at Ephesus on May 8.

=St John before the Latin gate= (May 6). The story of the caldron of
boiling oil is as old as Tertullian (_de Praescript._ c. 36). But of
the festival there is no notice before the closing years of the eighth
century. The day of the month probably marks the date of the dedication
of a church near the Latin gate[95]. It is characteristically a Western
festival. In the Roman rite it was, about the thirteenth century, a
semi-double: it was made a double by Pius V (1566-1572), and a greater
double by Clement VIII (1592-1605).

=St Matthew= (Sept. 21): in the Greek, Russian, Syrian and Armenian
Churches, Nov. 16: in the Egyptian and Ethiopic Kalendars of Ludolf,
Oct. 9. The festival of Sept. 21 is certainly late in appearing. It is
wanting in the Leonine, Gelasian, and Gallican Sacramentaries, and in
Muratori’s edition of the Gregorian. It is found, however, generally in
the martyrologies, which fact, of course, does not necessarily imply that
there was any liturgical observance of the day[96].

=St Luke= (Oct. 18); and on the same day generally in the East. The day
perhaps marks a translation of relics in the East, as is stated in the
so-called Hieronymian Martyrology. St Luke does not appear in the older
Sacramentaries; but in some manuscripts of the Gregorian we find a proper
preface for St Luke on v Kal. Nov. (Oct. 28).

=St Mark= (April 25): on the same day in the East. The day is of late
appearance, not perhaps before the ninth century. The great processional
litanies on April 25 appear at Rome long before St Mark’s name was
attached to the day. In their origin these litanies were distinctively
Roman.

=St Philip and St James= (May 1). This was the day of the dedication of a
church at Rome in their honour in the second half of the sixth century.
The word _natale_ is applied at a later time to the day; which may have
been in error, or, as can be proved by many examples, the word _natale_
came to be used loosely as equivalent to festival or commemoration. In
the Greek Church St James, ‘the brother of God,’ is commemorated on Oct.
23, and St Philip, ‘one of the twelve,’ on Nov. 14. The Greeks celebrate
Philip, the deacon, on Oct. 11, and he appears in Usuard’s Martyrology at
June 6.

Why Philip and James should be associated we know not. The deposition of
relics of both at the time of the dedication of the church at Rome may
perhaps account for the conjunction of the names.

=St Simon and St Jude= (Oct. 28). Legend associates these two Apostles as
having together laboured for thirteen years in Persia, and as there dying
martyrs’ deaths. In the Sacramentaries they do not appear till they are
found in a late form of the Gregorian. In the East the commemoration of
these Apostles is divided and a day assigned to each. In the Greek Church
Simon Zelotes appears at May 10, and Judas (Thaddaeus) at June 19.

=St Thomas, Apostle and Martyr= (Dec. 21); his Translation is marked at
July 3 in the West. In the Greek Church St Thomas is commemorated on Oct.
6, a day also observed by the Syrians, who add a translation on July 3.
In the fourth century there was a magnificent basilica of St Thomas at
Edessa, and to this church the remains of the Apostle were translated
(from India according to the legend) before the close of the century. St
Thomas (at Dec. 21) is not found in the Leonine, and only in some texts
of the Gregorian Sacramentary. He appears, however, in the Gelasian.

=St Bartholomew= (Aug. 24); and at Rome on Aug. 25. The Latin churches
generally, including that of mediaeval England, observed Aug. 24. The
Greek Church commemorates Bartholomew together with Barnabas on June 11,
and a translation of the relics of Bartholomew on Aug. 25. In the West
the introduction of the feast was late. There is no trace of it in the
early forms of the great Sacramentaries[97].

=St John the Baptist, the Nativity= (June 24); so too in the Greek
Church. The date was doubtless assigned on the strength of the inference
drawn from the Gospels, that the birth of the baptist preceded that of
the Saviour by six months. It appeared early, and was a recognised day
in the time of St Augustine[98]. It has its masses in the Sacramentaries
from the Leonine downwards.

=The Decollation of St John the Baptist= (generally Aug. 29). This
festival is also early, but, so far as evidence goes, not so early as the
Nativity[99]. It was known in Gaul before it was adopted at Rome. The
Greek churches celebrate the day on Aug. 29[100].

=The Conversion of St Paul= (Jan. 25), was of late introduction. It does
not appear in the correct text of Bede’s Martyrology, and in only late
texts of the Gregorian Sacramentary. There is reason for believing that
the day was first observed to mark the translation of relics of St Paul
at Rome, for so it appears in the Hieronymian Martyrology, and the period
of transition seems to be marked in the Martyrology of Rabanus Maurus
(ninth century), where we find at Jan. 25, ‘Translation and Conversion
of St Paul.’ It is not found in England in the Pontifical of Egbert,
Archbishop of York (A.D. 732-766), but it appears in the Leofric Missal,
in the second half of the eleventh century. It is unknown in the Greek
Church.

=St Mary Magdalene= (July 22), who is identified in the West with
the woman who was a sinner, and with Mary the sister of Lazarus, is
distinguished from each of these in the Greek service-books which also
mark her festival on July 22. Among the Easterns she is thought of as
‘the holy myrrh-bearer,’ one of the women who brought the spices to the
tomb of the Lord. In various places in the West, though not at Rome,
the day was a day of obligation in the middle ages. It appears in some
service-books in the tenth and eleventh centuries, but not in missals,
_secundum consuetudinem Romanae curiae_, till the thirteenth[101].

There was a festival of St Mary Magdalene (July 22) in the English Prayer
Book of 1549. The collect and gospel (Luke vii. 36 to the end of the
chapter) show that no English Reformers identified the Magdalene with the
woman who was a sinner. The festival disappears in the Prayer Book of
1552.

=St Barnabas, the Apostle= (June 11). The Greeks commemorate on this
day ‘Bartholomew and Barnabas, Apostles.’ The festival probably marks
the supposed finding of the body of Barnabas (having a copy of St
Matthew’s Gospel in his hand) in the island of Cyprus in the fifth
century. Barnabas is not found at June 11 in the so-called Hieronymian
Martyrology; nor in the Martyrology known as _Gellonense_, but it is
noted in Bede (though there is some doubt whether the entry is not due to
Florus), and in the later Martyrologies.

The Greek Church commemorates (many of them with proper names attached)
the seventy disciples of Luke x. 1, called in the service-books
‘apostles.’

=Octaves.= The word Octave is used sometimes for the eighth day after
a festival, sometimes (in later documents) for the space of eight days
which follow the festival. It may be regarded as an echo or prolongation
of the festival. In the Eastern Church what is known as the _Apodosis_
(see p. 135) in a measure corresponds to the Western Octave. It has not
unreasonably been conjectured that they owe their origin to an imitation
of the festal practices of the Hebrews (Levit. xxiii. 6; Num. xxviii.
17; Deut. xvi. 3). Octaves were originally few: they appear first
in connexion with Easter and Pentecost, and, occasionally, with the
Epiphany. In the eighth and ninth centuries Octaves became more numerous.
Yet in the Corbie Kalendar (A.D. 826), assuming that the movable feasts
of Easter and Pentecost had their Octaves, we find in addition only the
Octaves of Christmas, Epiphany, Peter and Paul, Lawrence and Andrew. This
falls in well with what is said by Amalarius (about the same date) who,
after noticing the Octaves of Christmas, Epiphany, Easter, and Pentecost,
adds, ‘We are accustomed to celebrate the Octaves of the _natalitia_
of some saints, that is, of those whose festivals are esteemed as more
illustrious amongst us’ (_De ecclesiasticis officiis_, iv. 36). At Rome
we find St Agnes having an Octave (Jan. 28) at a date earlier than that
with which we have been dealing[102]; and even to-day in the Roman Missal
and Breviary there is an interesting survival in the persistence of the
old name, _Agnetis secundo_, and of ‘propers’ for the day. Liturgically,
the ancient practice in the West was to insert a simple commemoration on
the eighth day of festivals.

The prolongation of a festival for eight days may be found illustrated
by the practice of the Church at Jerusalem in the fourth century, as
recounted by ‘Silvia’ in her descriptions of the Epiphany, the Pascha,
and the feast of the dedication of the churches known as the Martyrium
and the Church of the Resurrection.

The great multiplication of Octaves in mediaeval times has been
attributed to the influence of the Franciscans, who in the language of
Kellner ‘provided an inordinate number of Octaves in their Breviary, and
observed each day of the Octave with the rite of a _festum duplex_[103].’

The somewhat elaborate rules with respect to Octaves and their relation
to the observance of other festivals, as enjoined in the modern Roman
rite, can be found in such technical works as those of Gavantus and
Ferraris. It must suffice here to observe that within the Octaves of
Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, the Epiphany, and Corpus Christi, Votive
and Requiem masses are prohibited.

=Vigils.= The origin of vigils is obscure. The proper service of each
Lord’s Day was preceded in early times by what may be regarded as
something like a vigil, a service before the dawn of day; and some
think that this view may be deduced from Pliny’s well-known letter to
Trajan. But in this there would seem, perhaps, to be a reading into the
document of more than its contents warrant. However this may be, we
find as early as Tertullian that there were among Christians ‘nocturnae
convocationes,’ the solemnities of the Pascha being more particularly
referred to[104]. The exact nature and object of these assemblies are not
described. Evidence is more full at a later date for vigils of some kind,
not only before the Lord’s Day but also before the Sabbath[105]. At the
period when ‘Silvia’ visited Jerusalem the faithful seem to have engaged
in services before the dawn on every Lord’s Day. And in Gaul in the fifth
century, as we gather from Sidonius Apollinaris[106], the vigils were
not all night-watches but services before day-break. About a century
later than Tertullian, we find the Council of Elvira, near Granada, some
time in the first quarter of the fourth century, enacting a canon (35),
declaring that women should not spend the night-watches (_pervigilent_)
in cemeteries, ‘because often under the pretext of prayer they secretly
commit serious offences (_scelera_).’ There is no further explanation;
and the probable conjecture has been offered that it may have been
the practice to have vigils in the cemeteries on the night before the
oblation was offered at the tomb of one of the martyrs. That there was
in Spain at this date some kind of service in the cemeteries seems not
improbable from the fact that the canon immediately preceding that which
we have noticed forbids the lighting of wax tapers in cemeteries in the
day time.

By the end of the fourth century, there is ample evidence for the
observance of nocturnal or early morning vigils before the greater
festivals in both East and West. Early in the fifth century Vigilantius
protested against the scandals which arose from the nocturnal watchings
in the basilicas, and for this, among other assaults upon the current
abuses and superstitions of the time, he drew upon himself the violent
and coarse invective of Jerome. Yet Jerome himself may be quoted for the
fact that there were moral dangers attending these nocturnal vigils, for
while advising the lady Laeta to inure her daughter, the younger Paula,
to days of vigil and solemn pernoctations, he warns her that she should
keep the girl close by her side[107]. To Pope Boniface I (A.D. 418-422)
has been attributed the prohibition of nocturnal vigils in the Roman
cemeteries.

With regard to the Paschal Vigil, Jerome expresses the opinion that it
originated in the belief that Christ would come again in the night of the
Pascha[108].

In process of time, the day before the feast (_dies profestus_) assumed
the name of vigil, and was in the West commonly, though not universally,
associated with a fast. Mediaeval ritualists, such as Honorius of Autun
(who died a little after A.D. 1130), connect the change with the popular
abuses of the nocturnal vigils.

There is an interesting letter of Innocent III (about A.D. 1213), laying
down the rule in the Roman Church, which still prevails. The vigils of
the Apostles are to be observed as fasts, with the exception of St John
the Evangelist and St Philip and St James, the former occurring in the
season of Christmas, and the latter in that of Easter[109]. Beside the
vigils of the Apostles, the vigils of Christmas and the Assumption are
fasts _de jure_, and by custom the vigils of Pentecost, the Nativity of
the Baptist, St Lawrence, and All Saints. These rules were often locally
modified by papal indults.




CHAPTER VII

SEASONS OF PREPARATION AND PENITENCE


ADVENT

Advent, as the term is now employed, signifies a season, regarded as
preparatory to the Festival of the Nativity of the Lord, including four
Sundays and a variable number of days, as affected by the day of the week
upon which December 25 falls.

As no evidence has been adduced for an established celebration of the
Feast of the Nativity before the fourth century, so it is obvious that
we cannot expect to find the appointment of a season of preparation
before that date. As a matter of fact, it would seem that the earliest
distinct notice of such a season, prescribed for general use, belongs to
the latter part of the sixth century; and that the practice originated in
Gaul. In a small council held at Tours about A.D. 567 there is vaguely
indicated a fast _for monks_ in December, to be kept every day ‘usque
ad natale domini’ (can. 17). A few years later, in the south of Gaul,
we find what seems a canon of general application, but less exacting in
regard to the number of days on which the fast was to be observed. In
the ninth canon of the Council of Mâcon (A.D. 581) it is enjoined that
from the festival of St Martin (Nov. 11) the second, fourth and sixth
days of the week should be fasting days, that the sacrifices should be
celebrated in the quadragesimal order, and that on these days the canons
(probably meaning the canons of this synod) should be read, so that no
one could plead that he erred through ignorance. We have here something
that at once reminds us of the pre-paschal season, as observed in some
Churches. The season came to be known as _Quadragesima S. Martini_. But
the length of this season (as was also true of Lent) seems to have varied
much. The six Sundays which it covered, as we may infer from the canon of
Mâcon referred to above, we find indicated probably by the six _missae_
of Sundays of Advent in the Ambrosian and Mozarabic rites. Yet the oldest
Gallican Sacramentary records only three Sundays, and the Gothic-Gallican
only two[110].

In England, as we learn from Bede, forty days of fasting ‘ante natale
domini’ were observed by Cuthbert († 687) and by Ecbert († 729). In both
cases, however, it should be remarked, the observance seems mentioned as
an indication of exceptional piety[111].

At the close of the sixth century Rome, under Gregory the Great, adopted
the rule of the four Sundays in Advent; and in the following century
this rule became prevalent (though not universal) in the West.

In the Greek Church the general observance of forty days’ penitential
preparation for Christmas does not appear to have been established before
the thirteenth century. In the Greek Church of to-day the forty days’
preparation begins on Nov. 15. It is sometimes called the Fast of St
Philip, doubtless because the festival of St Philip was celebrated on
Nov. 14. On Wednesdays and Fridays the fast is rigorous; but on other
days, wine, oil, and fish are allowed.

The practice of the Armenians is peculiar: they observe a fast for the
week preceding the Nativity, and for one week commencing fifty days
before the Nativity. The conjecture has been offered that these two weeks
are a survival of a fast that had originally lasted for the whole of
fifty days.

In Churches of the Roman Communion at the present day, the practice as
to fasting varies. In Great Britain and Ireland Wednesdays and Fridays
are expected to be observed; but in many parts of the continent of Europe
there is no distinction between weeks in Advent and ordinary weeks.

On December 16 in the West it was the practice to sing as an antiphon to
the Magnificat the first of a series of seven antiphons, each beginning
with ‘O’; thus, ‘O Sapientia’ (Dec. 16), ‘O Adonai’ (17), ‘O Radix
Jesse’ (18), etc. In the Kalendar of the Book of Common Prayer the
words ‘O Sapientia’ appear at Dec. 16. This is not, strictly speaking,
a _survival_ of mediaeval times; for it was first introduced into the
English Prayer Book Kalendar in A.D. 1604.

The rule of the English Book of Common Prayer (1662) for determining
Advent runs thus: ‘Advent Sunday is always the nearest Sunday to the
Feast of St Andrew, whether before or after.’ As thus expressed, the
rule does not seem to contemplate the case of Advent Sunday falling on
St Andrew’s Day. It was a mistake not to add the additional words which
were in the Scottish Prayer Book of 1637, namely, ‘or that Sunday which
falleth upon any day from the twenty-seventh of November to the third of
December inclusively.’ The word ‘or’ does not imply that the second part
of the rule is an equivalent of the first; but it gives a rule to meet a
case not contemplated in the first part.


THE FAST PRECEDING EASTER (LENT)

That a fast preliminary to the Pascha was observed in the early Church is
beyond question. Irenaeus, in his letter to Victor, bishop of Rome[112],
states that at the time there were several differences as to the length
of the fast; but in no case was a prolonged series of days prescribed.
‘Some,’ he says, ‘think they ought to fast one day; others, two; others
more than two; others reckon together forty hours both of the day and
the night as the day [of fasting][113].’ And Irenaeus adds that these
differences existed long before (πολὺ πρότερον) the time when he wrote.
The words about the forty hours may perhaps be illustrated by passages
of Tertullian[114], where he speaks of persons fasting in the days ‘when
the bridegroom was taken away,’ or, in other words, the time during which
the Lord was under the power of death, _i.e._ certain hours of the day of
the Crucifixion, the twenty-four hours of Saturday, and certain hours of
the early part of Easter Day. We shall not delay to discuss the questions
connected with the exact time of commencing and of closing the forty
hours.

About the middle of the third century at Alexandria the whole week before
Easter was observed as a time of fasting by some; but there were those
who fasted only on four days; others contented themselves with three or
even two; while there were some (evidently exceptional persons) who did
not fast even one day[115]. It is plain that as yet no fixed rule was
enforced.

In the fourth century we meet with the term τεσσαρακοστή, or
Quadragesima. In the fifth canon of the Council of Nicaea it is ordered
that one of the two annual provincial Synods should be held before
‘the tessarakoste.’ The sense of the term is assumed to be known, and
is not explained. But it must not be inferred that the word necessarily
signifies here forty _days_, or that forty _days_ were assigned to
fasting.

The classical authority for the variations of later usages is the passage
of Socrates[116], where he describes many differences of practice in
his own day (_c._ A.D. 440) and the varieties in the length of the fast
in different countries. At Rome, he says, there was a fast of three
weeks, excepting Saturdays and Sundays; at Alexandria and in Achaia and
Illyricum a fast of six weeks; in other places the fast began seven
weeks before Easter, but was limited to fifteen days, with an interval
between each five days[117]. Not long after his time there were two
prevailing usages—that of the Churches which deducted from the fasting
days Sundays and Saturdays (always excepting the Saturday in Holy Week),
and that of the Churches which deducted only the Sundays. The former was
the prevailing usage in the East; the latter, in the West. The seven
weeks in the East, with thirteen days deducted (seven Sundays and six
Saturdays), and the six weeks of the West, with only six days deducted,
agree precisely in each having only thirty-six fasting days.

At the time of the _Peregrinatio Silviae_ (about the end of the fourth
century), if we may trust the writer, at Jerusalem eight weeks of fasting
preceded Easter, which, deducting eight Sundays and seven Saturdays,
gave, as she expressly says, forty-one days of fasting. This is highly
exceptional, if not unique. At any rate, the practice did not long
continue.

The number 36 is nearly the tenth of 365—the number of the days of the
year; and this thought struck the fancy of more than one writer. We
were bound, they urged, to offer to God the holy tithe, not only of our
increase, but of our time. And in the fifth century John Cassian presses
this point, and attempts to bring the length of the fast to correspond
more closely with the tithe of the year by observing that the fast
was prolonged for some hours, ‘usque in gallorum cantum,’ on Easter
morning[118].

At a later period the thought of the fasts of Moses and Elijah, and
more particularly of the Lord’s fast of forty days in the wilderness,
seems to have suggested that the fast of the faithful should correspond
in length. The addition of four days—the Wednesday and three following
days immediately preceding the first Sunday in Lent—has been frequently
attributed to Gregory the Great. But the writings of Gregory testify
to his knowing only thirty-six fasting days. And it is now generally
acknowledged that no support for the supposition can be based on the
language of the collects for Feria IV and Feria VI in the week begun on
Quinquagesima, which speak of the beginning of the fast, and are to be
found in the Gregorian Sacramentary[119]. The Sacramentary, as we now
possess it, abounds in additions later than the time of Gregory.

It is impossible to say precisely when, or by whom, the additional four
days were introduced. Approximately we may assign this change to about
the beginning of the eighth century, and to Rome. It did not obtain
everywhere. It was not till near the close of the eleventh century that
the Scottish Church, at the persuasion of the Saxon princess, Queen
Margaret of Scotland, fell into line with most of the other Western
Churches, by accepting the four fasting days in the week before the
first Sunday in Lent[120]. The Mozarabic Liturgy adopted it only at
the instance of Cardinal Ximenes about the beginning of the sixteenth
century. The Church of Milan still preserves, among its interesting
survivals, the commencement of the rigorous Lenten Fast on the Monday
after the first Sunday. But in 1563 St Charles Borromeo, then archbishop
of Milan, succeeded, against vigorous local protests, in making the first
Sunday in Lent a day of abstinence.

The term _caput jejunii_ was applied sometimes to the Wednesday, known as
Ash Wednesday, and frequently in service-books to the period of the four
days preceding the first Sunday in Lent. Thus, these days are designated
‘Feria IV, Feria V, Feria VI, et Sabbatum, in capite jejunii.’ The
distribution of ashes on the Wednesday in the Western Church is a much
modified survival and relic of the ancient penitential discipline.

In the Orthodox Church of the East at the present day ‘the great and
holy Tessarakoste’ contains, as in the West, six Sundays. But the
Lenten offices commence at Vespers on the Sunday (known as Tyrinis, or
Tyrophagus) preceding the first Sunday in Lent. In the week preceding
this Sunday (corresponding to the Western Quinquagesima) the faithful
give up the use of flesh meat, and confine themselves to cheese (τυρός)
and other _lacticinia_. And it may be observed, in passing, that in
the Greek Church there are other examples of the week being named from
the Sunday which _follows_ it. Thus, ‘the week of Palms’ is the week
_followed_ by Palm Sunday[121]. The Sunday (our Sexagesima) preceding
_Tyrinis_ is called _Apocreos_ (_Dominica carnisprivii_). It is the
last day upon which flesh may be eaten. After the Sunday ‘Tyrinis’ a
more rigorous fast is prescribed; but Sundays and Saturdays (except the
Saturday in Holy week) are exempted, so that there are only thirty-six
days of rigid fasting; five days in each of the first six weeks, and six
days in the last week[122].

The word _quadragesima_ is the source of the Italian _quaresima_, and
the French _carême_ (in old French, _quaresme_); while our English word,
_Lent_, is simply indicative of the season of the year when the fast
occurs, being derived from the Anglo-Saxon _Lencten_, the spring-time.


OTHER SPECIAL TIMES OF FASTING


I. _Western Church—The three fasts called ‘Quadragesima’; Rogation Days;
the Four Seasons._

In addition to Advent, which, as we have seen, is sometimes spoken
of as the _quadragesima of St Martin_, and Lent (_quadragesima ante
Pascha_)[123], we find in the eighth, ninth and tenth centuries in
writers of Germany, France, Britain, and Ireland references to a third
_quadragesima_ which is styled sometimes the _quadragesima_ after
Pentecost, and sometimes the _quadragesima_ before St John the Baptist.
In the _Paenitentiale_ of Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury († A.D.
690), it is declared that ‘there are three fasts established by law
(_jejunia legitima_) for the people generally (_per populum_)[124], forty
days and nights before Pascha, when we pay the tithes of the year, and
forty before the Nativity of the Lord, and forty after Pentecost[125].’
The remarkable collection of canons of the ancient Irish Church, which
is known as the _Hibernensis_, is of uncertain date, but is attributed
by such eminent authorities as Wasserschleben, Henry Bradshaw, Whitley
Stokes, and J. B. Bury, to the end of the seventh or early part of the
eighth century. The three penitential seasons called _quadragesima_ are
distinctly referred to[126]. In the _Capitula_ of Charlemagne, priests
are directed to announce to the people that these three seasons are
_legitima jejunia_. In the canons collected by Burchard, Bishop of Worms
(A.D. 1006), the three seasons called _quadragesima_ are referred to, and
the third is defined as the forty days before the festival of St John
the Baptist. Many interesting questions are suggested by these passages
with which we are unable to deal here. It must suffice to say that the
_quadragesima_ after Pentecost did not long survive. It disappeared, and
has left no mark upon the Church’s year.

=Rogation Days.= There is a general agreement that the observance of the
Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday before the Ascension as days of special
prayer and fasting, owes its origin to Mamertus, bishop of Vienne
(about A.D. 470), who appointed litanies or rogations to be said, at a
time when the people of his city were in great terror by reason of a
severe earthquake and a conflagration consequent thereupon. The shaken
walls and the destruction of public buildings, as vividly described
by Sidonius Apollinaris, may have suggested practical reasons for the
litanies being chanted out of doors. The practice of Rogations soon
spread through the whole of Gaul, and in the Council of Orleans (A.D.
511), where thirty-two bishops were present, the three days’ fast, with
Rogations, was enjoined upon all their churches. In England, the practice
of observing the Rogations had evidently been long established when the
Council of Cloveshoe (A.D. 747) enjoined it ‘according to the custom of
our predecessors.’ At Rome, in the opinion of Baillet, and recently of
Duchesne, the Rogation days were not introduced till about A.D. 800[127].

In the East there is nothing corresponding to the Rogation Days; and
the ordinary fast of Wednesday is on the Wednesday before Ascension Day
relaxed by a dispensation for oil, wine, and fish; for in the East the
_dies profestus_ commonly possesses something of a festal character,
anticipatory of the morrow.

In the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle the term ‘gang-days’ is used more than once
for the Rogation days; and in the Laws of Athelstan we find ‘gang-days’
and ‘gang-week.’ The name originated in the walking in procession on
these days.

=The Fasts of the Four Seasons= (_jejunia quatuor temporum_). The
earliest distinct reference to these fasts is to be found in the Sermons
of Pope Leo I (A.D. 440-461), who speaks of the spring fast being in
Lent, the summer fast ‘in Pentecost,’ the autumn fast in the seventh,
and the winter fast in the tenth month. From St Leo we also learn that
the fast was on Wednesday and Friday, and that on the Saturday a vigil
was observed at St Peter’s[128]. The observance is characteristically
Roman, and is found at first only at Rome, and in Churches in immediate
dependence on Rome. Duchesne holds that the weeks in which these fasts
occurred differed from other weeks mainly in the rigour of the fast,
_i.e._ ‘the substitution of a real fast for the half-fast of the ordinary
stations.’ And he adds the suggestion that on the Wednesday of the
Four Seasons, if not on the Friday, the Eucharist was from the outset
celebrated[129].

In England the Council of Cloveshoe (A.D. 747) enjoins that no one should
neglect ‘the fasts of the fourth, seventh, and tenth month.’ The omission
of any notice of the Ember days in Lent will be noticed later on.

In the Churches of Gaul we do not find the Ember days established long
before the time of Charlemagne.

At first we find no trace of a connexion between the Ember seasons and
the holding of ordinations; and, as is observed by Dr Sinker, ‘everything
points to the conclusion that the solemnity attaching to the seasons led
to their being chosen as fitting times for the rite[130].’

The Sacramentary that is known as St Leo’s exhibits ‘propers’ for
masses of the fasts in the fourth, seventh, and tenth months, _i.e._
June, September and December[131]; and from these we can gather that on
‘the festival of the fasts’ assemblies and processions had been made on
the Wednesdays and Fridays, and a vigil (with the Eucharist) held on
the Saturdays. In these there is not only no reference to ordinations
of the clergy, but also no reference that would suggest the special
intention and significance of these days of fasting. The conjecture is
not unreasonable that there was the desire to dedicate in penitence the
year in its four several parts to the service of God; but neither the
history nor the literature of the early Church is decisive in confirming
the conjecture.

The practice of the Church at Rome spread gradually, with some varieties
as to the particular weeks in which the three days of fasting were
observed. For England the notices of the Ember days are earlier than
they are for France. At first, at Rome, the spring fast seems to have
been in the first week in March, but afterwards always in Lent. And as
soon as it came to be observed in Lent it would (as regards the fast)
require no special injunction. This may perhaps account for the omission
of any mention of the fast of the first month in the canon of the Council
of Cloveshoe referred to above. The fixing of the particular days now
observed in the West is generally assigned to about the close of the
eleventh century; but in England, as late as A.D. 1222, the Council of
Oxford still speaks of the fast in the first week in March[132].

In the Eastern Church there is nothing corresponding to the fasts of the
Four Seasons.

    There is some uncertainty as to the etymology of our English
    phrase ‘Ember Days.’ The weight of authority is in favour of
    the derivation from the Old English words _ymb_, ‘about,’
    ‘round,’ and _ryne_, ‘course,’ ‘running’; but the _New English
    Dictionary_ (Oxford) adds that it is not wholly impossible
    that the word may have been due to popular etymology working
    upon some vulgar Latin corruption of _quatuor tempora_, as the
    German _quatember_, ‘ember tide.’


II. _Eastern Churches._

The fasts before the Nativity and Easter have been treated of under
Advent and Lent. In the Greek Church the season before Easter is called
‘the great Tessarakoste,’ for the word Tessarakoste is also applied
to three other penitential seasons, (1) to the fast before the Lord’s
Nativity, (2) the fast of the Apostles (Peter and Paul), and (3) the fast
of the Assumption of the Theotokos. But, though the word Tessarakoste
is applied to each of these, there is no apparent connexion between the
number _forty_ and the number of days observed as fasting-days; and this
is notably the case in regard to the third and fourth. The fast of the
Apostles extends for a variable number of days from the Monday after the
Sunday of All Saints (_i.e._ the first Sunday after Pentecost) to June
28, both inclusive.

Examination will show that the interval between these two limits can very
rarely amount to forty days; and when Easter falls at its latest possible
date (April 25) the first Sunday after Pentecost is June 20, so that the
Tessarakoste of the Apostles would in that case be only eight days in
length.

The length of the Tessarakoste of the Assumption is fixed, and extends
only from Aug. 1 to Aug. 14.

It would appear then that the term Tessarakoste has come in practice to
signify simply a fast of a number of days, and has lost all reference to
the number 40.

The Exaltation of the Cross (Sept. 14), although regarded as a festival
(ἑορτή) of the highest dignity, is observed as a strict fast.

The same is true of the Decollation of the Forerunner (Aug. 29), because
of ‘the murder of him who is greater than all the prophets.’ When it is
remembered that all Wednesdays as well as Fridays are fasting days, it
will not be a surprise to be told that the fasting days of the Greek
Church amount in each year to some 190 in number.

The Armenians on fast-days abstain from flesh, milk, butter, eggs, and
oil. Every day in Lent except Sundays is kept as a fast. Among peculiar
observances is (1) the Fast of Nineveh, for two weeks commencing
in the week before our Septuagesima. It is called by the Armenians
_Aratschavor-atz_, meaning, it is said, ‘preceding abstinence,’ and this
term has taken shape among the Greeks as ‘Artziburion.’ In the frequent
controversies between the Greeks and Armenians the former denounce this
fast as execrable and satanic. (2) The Armenians also observe as a fast
the week after Pentecost. It has been maintained that in early times this
fast was observed in the week before Pentecost, and that afterwards,
in compliance with the general rule that the days between Easter and
Pentecost should not be observed as fasts, a change was made.

[Illustration: Kalendar of Worcester Book (October)

(_Portiforium S. Oswaldi._) Corpus Christi College, Cambridge (MS. 391).
_Circa_ A.D. 1064.]




CHAPTER VIII

WESTERN MEDIAEVAL KALENDARS: MARTYROLOGIES


The word _Martyrology_ has been sometimes applied to mere records of
names placed opposite days of the month, like the document which goes
under the name of Liberius (see p. 14), as well as to the fuller and
more elaborate accounts of saints and martyrs, with often something
of biographical detail, and notices of time and place, and (in the
case of martyrs) the manner of the passions, such as are to be found,
for example, in the Martyrology of Bede, and more particularly in the
additions of Florus, and the Martyrologies of Ado and Usuard.

The study of the Martyrologies is surrounded by many difficulties. They
were again and again copied, and re-handled. It demands much knowledge
and critical acumen to sever from the documents as they have come down to
us later additions, so that we may get at what may reasonably be regarded
as the original texts. Such work is always attended with considerable
uncertainty, and scholars are often divided in opinion as to the
results[133].

The influence of the later Martyrologies upon the mediaeval Kalendars of
the West is marked. Bede’s valuable work is the outcome of honest and
patient research; many days, however, were left blank—an offence to the
professional Martyrologist. It was much enlarged, about one hundred years
after his death, by one Florus, who (with some differences of opinion)
is generally supposed to have been a sub-deacon of Lyons. Ado, bishop
of Vienne, some twenty or thirty years later than Florus, prepared an
extensive Martyrology, which, together with the work of Florus, was
in turn utilised and abridged about A.D. 875 by Usuard, a priest and
Benedictine monk of the monastery of St Germain-des-Prés, then outside
the walls of Paris, who undertook his work at the instance of the Emperor
Charles the Bald. The book when completed was dedicated to the Emperor;
and before long Usuard’s Martyrology came in general to supersede
previous attempts of the same kind. Its influence on subsequent mediaeval
Kalendars is unmistakeable. Usuard came to be adopted almost universally
for use.

In monasteries and cathedral churches it was a common practice to read
aloud each day, sometimes in chapter, sometimes in choir, after Prime,
the part of the Martyrology which had reference to the commemorations
of the day or of the following day, together with notices of obits
and anniversaries of members of the ecclesiastical corporation and of
benefactors, which on the following day would be observed. Indeed, in
later times the name Martyrology is not infrequently applied to the mere
lists of such obits and anniversaries. The mediaeval martyrologies are
generally Usuard’s, but they have local additions.

    The student who desires to know something of other early
    Martyrologies, such as that which is called the Hieronymian,
    the Lesser Roman, and the Martyrology of Rabanus, bishop of
    Mainz, may consult Kellner (pp. 401-410) and Mr Birk’s article,
    _Martyrology_, in _D. C. A._ Since the publication of the
    latter article the _Henry Bradshaw Society_ has issued, under
    the competent editorship of Mr Whitley Stokes, the metrical
    _Martyrology of Oengus the Culdee_ (about A.D. 800) and the
    metrical _Martyrology of Gorman_ (latter part of the twelfth
    century), which are of much value in illustrating the hagiology
    of the Irish Church. The scanty materials for the study of
    Scottish mediaeval Kalendars (all of them late) have been
    gathered together by Bishop A. P. Forbes in his _Kalendars of
    Scottish Saints_, 1872. The _Martiloge in Englysshe_ printed
    by Wynkyn de Worde (1526) and reprinted by the _Henry Bradshaw
    Society_ (1893) is the Martyrology of the Church of Sarum, with
    many additions.

By the tenth century the general features of Kalendars throughout Europe
are substantially identical as regards the greater days of observance.
But differences, often of much interest, arise through different churches
commemorating saints of local or national celebrity. It often happens
that by this means alone we are able to determine, or to conjecture
with considerable probability, the place or region where some liturgical
manuscript had its origin. When we find in a Kalendar a large proportion
of more or less obscure saints belonging to the Rhine valley, we may be
confident that the manuscript belongs to that region of Germany. When
an English Kalendar contains no notice of St Osmund we may be sure that
it did not originate at Salisbury. When we find St Margaret on Nov. 16,
St Fillan on Jan. 9, St Triduana on Oct. 8, and St Regulus on March 30,
there is an overwhelming probability that the manuscript belongs to
Scotland. In the Kalendar of York we find St Aidan (Aug. 31), St Hilda
of Whitby (Aug. 25), and St Paulinus, the archbishop (Oct. 10), but
these are all wanting to the Sarum Kalendar. St Kunnegund, the German
Empress, who died in A.D. 1040, figures largely in German Kalendars.
Sometimes we find marked not only her obit, but her canonization, and
her translation; and at Bamberg the octave of her translation was
observed. Outside Germany she is all but unknown. St Louis is naturally
an important personage in French Kalendars; and he appears as far north
as the Kalendars of Scandinavia. He never obtained a place in any of
the leading ‘uses’ of England. On the other hand, at an earlier date
continental influences on ecclesiastical affairs (not unknown before the
Conquest) became potent when Norman churchmen poured into this country
after A.D. 1066, and obtained places of the highest dignity. It is thus
probably that St Batildis, wife of Clovis II (Jan. 30), St Sulpicius,
bishop of Bourges (Jan. 17), St Medard, bishop of Noyon, with St Gildard,
bishop of Rouen (June 8), and St Andoen, another bishop of Rouen (Aug.
24), obtained days in our English Kalendars. All these are absent from
the Anglo-Saxon Kalendars printed by Hampson[134].

Again, occasionally a Church Kalendar exhibits features which may
be attributed to merely accidental circumstances. Relics of some
saint belonging to another and distant region may happen to have
been presented to some church; and thereupon his name is inserted
in its Kalendars. It is thus, with much probability, that Mr Warren
accounts for the appearance of the names of one northern bishop and
two northern abbots—Aidan, bishop of Lindisfarne,—Benedict, first
abbot, and Ceolfrith, second abbot of Wearmouth—in the Kalendar of the
Leofric Missal. In William of Malmesbury, we read that in A.D. 703
relics of these saints were brought to Glastonbury. And in the case of
two of these, Aidan (Aug. 31) and Ceolfrith (Sept. 25), the Leofric
Kalendar adds to each name the word, ‘in Glaestonia.’ Other evidence
makes it all but certain that Glastonbury and its history affected the
Leofric Kalendar. At Cologne, which claims to possess the heads of the
Three Kings, one cannot wonder that their Translation (July 23) is a
‘summum festum.’ In the Kalendars of the Orthodox Church of the East
the deposition of relics is frequently the occasion of the annual
commemoration of the event, and the insertion of a festival in the
Menology. In all countries translations of the bodies of saints are found
entered; and when the dates of such translations are known from history,
we are at once enabled to say of any particular manuscript service-book
that the Kalendar, in which some particular translation is marked _prima
manu_, was written after the known date. On the other side, when we find
any important festival absent, or, as is frequently the case, inserted in
a later handwriting, the strong presumption is raised that the original
Kalendar belongs to a time before the establishment of the festival.
Thus, the absence of the Conception of St Mary (Dec. 8) from a Kalendar
suggests that it is earlier than the last quarter of the eleventh
century; while the appearance of Corpus Christi goes to determine a
Kalendar to be later than A.D. 1260.

From what has been said, it will seen that, even apart from the style
of the handwriting, the formation of the various letters, the manner of
punctuation, and other palaeographical indications, the mere contents of
a Kalendar will often help the student to make a good conjecture as to
both the place of the origin of a manuscript and the time when it was
penned.

[Illustration: Kalendar of Durham Psalter (September)

Jesus College, Cambridge (MS. Q. B. 6). Cent. xii.]

As regards the particular Church for the use of which any Kalendar was
intended, attention should be directed not only to the appearance of
certain festivals, but to the rank and dignity of the festivals, which
are often indicated by some such notes as ‘principal,’ ‘of ix Lessons,’
‘of iii Lessons,’ ‘greater double,’ ‘lesser double,’ or some other term
of classification[135]. Classification in continental Kalendars is often
otherwise expressed[136]. In the Kalendar of the Missal of Westminster
Abbey the dignity of the greater festivals is marked by indicating the
number of copes (varying from two to eight) which were to be used, as
has been thought, by the monks who sang the Invitatory to _Venite_ at
Mattins. No one will be surprised to learn that at Westminster the Feast
of St Edward the Confessor (Jan. 5), and his Translation (Oct. 13) are
marked ‘viii cape,’ a dignity which is reached only in the cases of St
Peter and St Paul, the Assumption, All Saints, and Christmas: while in
the Sarum Kalendar St Edward is marked on Jan. 5 only by a ‘memory,’
and his Translation is but a ‘lower double.’ At Holyrood Abbey, near
Edinburgh, Holy Cross Day was naturally one of the greatest festivals
of the year, while in the Aberdeen Breviary the Invention of the Cross
and the Exaltation were both ‘lesser doubles.’ At Hereford, Thomas of
Hereford (Oct. 2) was a ‘principal feast,’ and so was his Translation
(Oct. 25); neither day appears in the Sarum Kalendar. The Translation
of the Three Kings, already referred to, which is a ‘summum festum’ at
Cologne, is all but unknown elsewhere. These examples will suffice for
our purpose.

It remains to notice entries of other kinds not uncommon in mediaeval
Kalendars. There are notices of what I may call an antiquarian kind,
which did not at all, or but seldom, affect the service of the day,
but which are not without an interest of their own. Thus, such entries
as the following are not uncommon. ‘The first day of the world’ (March
18); ‘Adam was created’ (March 23); ‘Noah entered the ark’ (March 17);
‘The Resurrection of the Lord’ (March 27), by which is meant that the
actual resurrection of the Saviour took place on this day of the month,
in the year in which the Lord was crucified. This assigned date is of
great antiquity. We find it in Tertullian (_adv. Judaeos_ c. 8); and
later it was accepted by Hippolytus and Augustine, and it is frequent
in the Kalendars of the early mediaeval period. In the Sarum Kalendar
it is marked as a principal feast of three lessons, but there is no
service answering to the day in the Breviary. We find ‘Noah comes forth
from the ark’ (April 29); ‘The devil departs from the Lord’ (Feb. 15);
‘The Ascension of the Lord’ (May 5); this last mentioned day is plainly
a corollary to the date assigned to the Resurrection, but it is not so
frequently inserted in the Kalendars.

We may pass without comment entries of astronomical interest, such as
‘Sol in aquario,’ ‘Sol in piscibus,’ and such like; the solstices and the
equinoxes; the days when the four seasons began; and such weather-notes
as the dates when the dog-days (_dies caniculares_) began and ended.
It will be observed that there was at least ancient precedent for what
gave offence to Bishop Wren when he wrote of the Kalendar of the Book of
Common Prayer, ‘Out with the dog-days from among the Saints.’

Some of the features just noticed continued to make their appearance in
various English Kalendars after the Reformation. The Kalendar, indeed,
of the Prayer Book of 1549 looks to our eyes singularly bare, with no
days marked other than what we call the red-letter festivals. In 1552,
the ‘dog-days’ reappear, and also the astronomical notes as to dates of
the sun’s entrance into the various signs of the zodiac. To these are
added, for reasons of practical convenience, the Term days. The Prayer
Book of 1559 adds further the hours of the rising and setting of the sun
at the beginning of each month. In the Primer of Edward VI (1553) the
names of a very large number of the old Saints’ Days are introduced, and
the convenient reminder of ‘Fish’ is placed at the days preceding the
Purification, St Matthias, the Annunciation, St John Baptist, St Peter,
St James, St Bartholomew, St Matthew, St Simon and St Jude, All Saints,
St Andrew, St Thomas, and Christmas. This Kalendar also, after the manner
of many mediaeval Kalendars, marks the first possible day for Easter,
and ‘first of the Ascension,’ ‘uttermost Ascension,’ ‘first Pentecost,’
‘uttermost Pentecost.’ In some of the unauthorised books of devotion
issued in Elizabeth’s reign we find some of the dates inferred rightly
or wrongly from the Scripture history, which had long before appeared
in mediaeval Kalendars, such as days connected with Noah’s story, the
Passion, Resurrection, and Ascension of the Lord; and to these many other
days of historical interest are added[137].

In many of the mediaeval Kalendars we find entered at Jan. 28, March 11,
and April 15, respectively, the words ‘Claves Quadragesimae,’ ‘Claves
Paschae,’ and ‘Claves Rogationum.’ The number of days to be counted
from each of these dates to the beginning of Lent, to Easter, and to
the Rogation Days, varying according to the place which any given year
occupies in the Cycle of Golden Numbers, may be found with the help of a
table prefixed to the Kalendar. It should be noted that the ‘terminus’ of
the key never falls on the day of the fast or festival sought, and if the
terminus of the key for Easter falls on a Sunday, Easter is the following
Sunday.

Several of the old Kalendars exhibit the days on which ‘the months of
the Egyptians’ and ‘the months of the Greeks’ begin, with the names of
these several months. In some early English Kalendars the Saxon names
of the months are also inserted. This feature may have been of use to
historical students, but having no bearing on ecclesiastical life in the
West it is passed over here without further notice.

For a similar reason we do not describe the verses frequently inserted
at the various months, with advice as to agricultural operations,
blood-letting, rules of health, and the unlucky, or Egyptian days.

    Occasionally attached to early Kalendars and Martyrologies is
    to be found the Horologium or Shadow-clock—a set of rules for
    determining, in a rough way, the hour of the day by measuring
    one’s own shadow on the ground[138].

The modern Roman Martyrology was preceded towards the close of the
fifteenth century and in the sixteenth century by several attempts to
provide what was thought to be a more serviceable work than that of
Usuard. Among the more remarkable of these are the Martyrology of the
Italian mathematician Francesco Maurolico, and that of Pietro Galesini,
published first at Milan in the year 1577. The latter work had the
effect of making manifest that there was need for the correction of the
Roman Martyrology. Gregory XIII appointed a commission to deal with the
subject. The result of the labours of the commission was printed in 1584.
Further corrections were made by Cardinal Baronius; and the work as
revised by him is in substance the modern Roman Martyrology[139].




CHAPTER IX

EASTER AND THE MOVEABLE COMMEMORATIONS


I. _Paschal Controversies prior to the Council of Nicaea._

The commemoration of the Pascha is the first annual Christian solemnity
with which history makes us acquainted. And it will be well that the
student should bear in mind that the term ‘Pascha’ was used in early
times to signify, more particularly, not Easter (for which it was used
in later times), but the day of the Lord’s Crucifixion, more commonly
without, and sometimes together with, the succeeding two days, including
the day of the Resurrection. But most commonly the word is employed in
the earlier literature of the subject to signify the commemoration of the
day of the Crucifixion, which was generally held to have corresponded in
the history of the Passion to the day upon which the Paschal lamb was
sacrificed in the Jewish ritual[140].

It is scarcely possible to conceive that, even if the Christian religion
had taken its rise in circumstances altogether dissimilar from those
amid which as a matter of history it actually emerged, there would have
been no commemoration of such great events as the death and rising again
of its Founder. But the first disciples of Christ being Hebrews, and
their converts at first being also in a large measure Hebrews, it was
inevitable that the great Hebrew festival of the Passover should take
to itself a new colouring and a new significance in Christian thought.
Thus we find St Paul speaking of Christ as ‘our Pascha’ (_i.e._ Paschal
victim), which ‘hath been sacrificed for us’ (1 Cor. v. 7). And he
adds, ‘therefore let us keep the feast (_or_ keep festival) not with
the old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but
with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.’ It would indeed
be unwarrantable to infer from this passage that a Christian Pascha
was actually observed as a festival at the time when St Paul wrote
to the Corinthians. But it is obvious that the passage is steeped
in reminiscences of the Hebrew festival, and that these are already
receiving a new complexion and a new meaning.

The observance of the Christian Pascha first comes into marked prominence
about the middle of the second century. At that date it was everywhere
a recognised institution of the Church; but there were differences
between the Churches of proconsular Asia (the Asia of the seven Churches
of the Apocalypse) and the Church at Rome and in other places, as to
the particular day upon which the commemoration should be observed. The
evidence with regard to the early stages of the dispute is scanty. Such
details as we possess are not free from obscurity and have been variously
interpreted.

In a work like the present volume we can do no more than lay before
the student the results which seem to us to have the greater weight of
probability in their favour.

The Asiatics, it would seem, began to celebrate the festival of the
Pascha on the fourteenth day of the moon of the Hebrew month Nisan, the
day upon which the Jews put away all leaven from their houses and slew
the lamb of the Passover. On the whole, the evidence seems to make for
the Asiatic Christians terminating the preceding fast on the evening
of that day, and on the same evening celebrating the Paschal feast
consisting of the Eucharist, accompanied, perhaps, by the Agape. It was
on the fourteenth Nisan, according to the prevailing Asiatic belief,
that the Lord suffered death upon the cross, and in His sacrifice became
the true representative of the Paschal lamb which had been his antitype.
Foreign as it must be to us with our habits of thought to conceive of
a festival being kept on the day of the Crucifixion (that is, on the
evening which was regarded as the beginning of the following day), we
must suppose that the realisation of the blessings of the redemption
purchased by the Saviour’s blood _overtoned_ (to borrow a term from the
art of music) the imaginative presentment of the historical sufferings of
the Cross. Our own English term, ‘Good Friday,’ seems to have originated
with a similar way of regarding the facts[141].

From what has been said, it will be apparent that, as the fourteenth day
of the moon might fall upon any day in the week, the commemoration of the
Resurrection, three days later, might also fall upon any day of the week.
At Rome, and in various other places, the festival of the Resurrection
was always observed on a Sunday, because it was on the first day of the
week that the Saviour rose from the dead. The Asiatics laid stress on
the day of the _month_—the lunar month—on which the Saviour suffered:
the Roman Church insisted that the sixth day of the _week_, Friday, was
the proper day for commemorating the Crucifixion, and that the following
Sunday should be kept as the feast of the Resurrection. Those who
made the fourteenth day of the moon to be necessarily the day for the
celebration of the Pascha were known as ‘Quartodecimans[142].’

The dispute was further complicated by the difference with regard to the
observance of the fast. The Asiatics terminated their fast on the evening
of the day of the Crucifixion. The Romans continued it till the morning
of the day of the Resurrection.

The Asiatics claimed St John and St Philip, the Apostles, as the
originators of the usage which they followed; and at the close of the
second century they were able to recite a long list of holy bishops and
martyrs who had never deviated from the practice of their Churches.

It was some time about the middle of the second century that St
Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, the personal disciple of St John, visited
Rome, and conferred with Anicetus, the bishop of that city, on this and
other subjects. On the Paschal question neither bishop was convinced
by the other; but it was agreed that on such a matter it was not
essential that there should be uniformity. The discussion was carried
on with moderation, the two bishops received the Eucharist together,
and Anicetus, ‘out of reverence’ for Polycarp permitted him to act as
celebrant in his church[143].

The subject of the proper time for observing the Christian Pascha
continued to excite discussion; and between A.D. 164 and 166, on
the occasion of disputes at Laodicea, a defence of the practice of
proconsular Asia came from the pen of one of the bishops of that region,
Melito, bishop of Sardis. Unfortunately no remains of the work of Melito
survive of such a kind as would help us to understand the writer’s
argument, or to clear the difficulties which surround the attempt to form
a well assured picture of the practice of his part of the Christian
world. It has indeed been conjectured that the work of Melito was
directed mainly against certain sectaries, perhaps Ebionites, who on
the fourteenth day of Nisan feasted after the manner of the Jews upon
a paschal lamb. This practice was so distinctly Judaistic, that it was
rejected everywhere by the orthodox.

Of vastly more importance and significance, as affecting the whole
Church, were incidents which occurred towards the close of the century.
Victor, bishop of Rome, successor next but one to Anicetus, was a man
of different temper; or, at all events, he attached a much higher
importance to uniformity as to the time of observing Easter. Interest
in the question was roused in various quarters. Councils of bishops (at
the instance of Victor) discussed it in Gaul, in Greece, in Palestine,
in Pontus, and as far east as Osrhoene beyond the Euphrates. By this
time it was found that what, for convenience, we may style the Western
practice was also largely followed in the East. The churches, however, of
proconsular Asia still maintained their old position. A letter written by
Polycrates, bishop of Ephesus, to Victor on their behalf is preserved by
Eusebius[144].

Victor, departing from the moderate policy of his predecessor Anicetus,
thought the time had come for dealing more drastically with his opponents
on the Paschal question, and sought to cut them off from the communion of
the Catholic Church[145]. Victor’s attitude called forth remonstrances
from various quarters, and was the occasion of a remarkable letter
written by Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons, in the name of the brethren in
Gaul, over whom he presided. He declares that the mystery of the Lord’s
Resurrection should indeed be celebrated only on a Sunday, yet he
strongly urges the impropriety of Victor’s cutting off ‘whole Churches
of God’ because of differences on such a matter. He then adds that the
controversy was not only on the question as to the day on which Easter
should be celebrated, but also on the length and manner of the preceding
fast, varieties as to which he recounts (see p. 79); and he goes on
to remind Victor that bishops of Rome in former times, while strictly
preserving their own usages, did not break the peace of the Church by
excommunications directed against those who followed other ways[146].
Letters of similar purport were addressed by Irenaeus to various other
bishops. The result of this intervention was that the Asiatic Churches
were for the time left undisturbed in the practice of their traditional
usages. How soon the Asiatic Churches fell into line with the majority is
not apparent. But it seems evident that the change had taken place before
the Council of Nicaea.

We have seen that in the attempts to commemorate on the proper days the
death and resurrection of the Lord, the Asiatics thought most of the
_day of the month_, and the Westerns and those who concurred with them
thought most of the _day of the week_. But the latter party had obviously
to make some attempt to lay down a rule which would at least approximate
the date of their Pascha to the time of the year when the Lord suffered.
The vernal equinox was taken by them, and by the Church of Alexandria,
as the fixed point to which the date of Easter should bear some settled
relation.

It is perhaps impossible to determine with precision when the rule came
to be generally accepted that the full moon, which was to regulate the
date of Easter, was the first full moon _after_ the vernal equinox. We
find that this is the rule which governs the Paschal Tables of Hippolytus
(of which more will be said hereafter), and we find it expressly enjoined
in that ancient collection of Church law which goes under the name of
the Apostolic Canons. The Tables of Hippolytus can, with reasonable
certainty, be assigned to A.D. 222. In the Apostolic Constitutions, the
date of which it is impossible to determine with any close approach to
certainty[147], the rule runs, ‘Observe the days of the Pascha with all
care after the vernal equinox, that ye keep not the memorial of the one
passion twice in a year. Keep it once only in a year for Him who died
but once[148].’ The mystical reason assigned here also appears in the
letter of the Emperor Constantine, announcing the decision to which the
Nicene Council came upon the Paschal question[149]. Later on the reader
will find what is probably meant by keeping the Pascha twice in the same
year[150].

It would not perhaps be fitting to pass over in silence the attempt
made in the early part of the third century by the Roman ecclesiastic,
Hippolytus, to construct a cycle which would make it possible to predict
the day on which Easter would fall in any future year.

As to who this Hippolytus was, Eusebius and subsequent students among
the Fathers appear to have known scarcely anything. Eusebius speaks of
the many writings of Hippolytus, and gives the titles of some of them,
and describes one more particularly. This was a treatise _Concerning the
Pascha_, in which was to be found a certain sixteen-year rule (canon)
about the Pascha, the boundary of the writer’s computation being the
first year of the Emperor Alexander[151], _i.e._ Alexander Severus, whose
first year was A.D. 222.

The brief statement of Eusebius, dull and prosaic in itself, acquired
suddenly a new and extraordinary interest in the year 1551, when during
some excavations made in the neighbourhood of Rome, in the Via Tiburtina
(the road to Tivoli), a much shattered statue was unearthed, which on
being pieced together exhibited, on the sides of the chair in which
the figure of a venerable looking man was represented as seated, two
elaborate numerical tables, in Greek characters, one showing the day of
the month on which the Pascha, or fourteenth day of the moon, would
fall from A.D. 222 to A.D. 333: the other showing, for the same number
of years, the day of the month upon which Easter ought to be kept. The
statue, as restored, may now be seen in the Museum of the Vatican.
The Tables are constructed in seven columns of sixteen years each. On
the back of the chair were inscribed in Greek the titles of various
books, many of which corresponded with the titles of works attributed
to Hippolytus by Eusebius. There could be no reasonable doubt that the
statue was the statue of Hippolytus, and that the Tables represented his
calculations as to the time for keeping Easter.

A further confirmation of the correctness of this inference (though
confirmation was indeed scarcely needed) emerged when a Syriac version
of the Cycle of Hippolytus was discovered in a chronological treatise by
Elias of Nisibis[152]. It corresponds exactly with the Tables inscribed
on the chair.

An examination of the Tables of Hippolytus reveals that he assumed ‘that
after eight years the full moons returned to the same day of the solar
month; and he took notice that after sixteen years the days of the week
moved one backward; that is to say, the full moon in the first year
of the cycle being Saturday, April 13, after sixteen years it would
be Friday, April 13, and so on[153].’ But for the purposes of what he
supposed would be a perpetual Kalendar, Hippolytus desired to ascertain
after what interval the full moon would fall not only on the same day of
the solar month, but on the same day of the week. He assumed that this
would happen after seven cycles of sixteen years.

We can also infer that Hippolytus probably placed the vernal equinox on
March 18, for every full moon entered in his Tables is placed either on
(as in the case of A.D. 235) or after that date.

Again, the examination of his Tables reveals what may seem to us the
somewhat arbitrary regulation that if the full moon fell upon Saturday
the Feast of the Resurrection should not be kept on the following day,
but on Sunday a week later. The explanation probably is that it was
considered that Easter should never be held earlier than the sixteenth
day of the moon, that is, two days after the day of the Crucifixion.
If the full moon fell upon Friday, then the following Sunday would
be Easter; but if the full moon fell upon Saturday, the day of the
Crucifixion was taken to be the following Friday, and Easter would be two
days after.

No Easter cycle yet devised is free from errors, which have to be met
by adjustments; but the Cycle of Hippolytus was such that the errors
accumulated rapidly. It was more than two days wrong at the end of the
first sixteen years; and five days wrong at the end of the second cycle;
at the end of the third cycle it would be nine days wrong[154]. This
must have been soon discovered; and the cycle had to be discarded. It is
the earliest Easter cycle known to us.

A cycle on the same lines as that of Hippolytus, which has been (probably
incorrectly) attributed to St Cyprian, will be found in Fell’s edition
of Cyprian (1682), among the works commonly assigned to that writer. By
whomsoever it was composed it is ushered in with a great flourish of
trumpets, and the author feels sure that he has been led by nothing short
of divine inspiration to the discovery. These Tables can be assigned to
A.D. 243. One cannot but suspect that the author had got hold of the
Hippolytean Tables before their worthlessness was discovered.

Such seem to have been the best efforts of the learning of Western
Christendom in the third century to deal with the Paschal problem. Nor
at this period was the Church of Alexandria, which at a later date
became the paramount authority on such questions, any better equipped.
Dionysius, about the middle of the third century, justly styled by
Eusebius ‘the great bishop of Alexandria,’ made use of the eight-year
cycle, which, like its variant, the sixteen-year cycle, gathered error
rapidly.

It was, however, another distinguished Alexandrian, more than a quarter
of a century later, who was the first, so far as we know, to make use
of the old nineteen-year cycle for the determination of Easter. This
was Anatolius, a native of Alexandria, and eminent for learning of
various kinds (among which arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy are
particularised), who became bishop of Laodicea in Syria Prima in A.D.
270. The nineteen-year cycle, with some modifications, eventually, though
slowly, displaced all rivals[155].


II. _The Council of Nicaea and the Easter Controversy._

We may pass on now to the consideration of the determinations on this
question arrived at by the Council of Nicaea.

The varieties of usage as to the dates of keeping the Pascha had
disturbed the mind of Constantine before he issued his invitations to the
bishops of the empire to attend the Council. His trusted adviser, Hosius,
bishop of Corduba, had been sent by him to the East in the hopes that by
his arguments and persuasion the followers of the Eastern practice might
be induced to yield. But the mission was ineffective, and the matter was
submitted to the great Council in A.D. 325. We have no record of any of
the proceedings connected with the matter beyond what is to be found in
a Synodical Letter of the Council, and a circular letter of the Emperor.
We cannot help feeling some surprise that the Council did not enact any
canon on the subject; but it was probably believed that the adoption of
a rigid canon, with an attendant anathema, might have produced a formal
schism, while a statement of the opinion of the Council could scarcely
fail to be highly influential in eventually securing uniformity. The
letter of the Council, preserved by Socrates[156], is addressed to the
Church of Alexandria and the brethren in Egypt, Libya, and Pentapolis. It
simply announces ‘the good news’ that, in accordance with the desire of
those to whom the letter was addressed, the question had been elucidated
by the Council, and that all the brethren of the East, who had formerly
celebrated the Pascha ‘with the Jews,’ will henceforth keep it ‘at the
same time as the Romans, and ourselves, and all those who from ancient
times celebrated the day at the same time with us[157].’

The Emperor is more full. He says that it was thought by all that it
would be fitting that the Pascha should be kept on one day by all; that
it was declared to be particularly unworthy to follow the custom of the
Jews who had soiled their hands with the most dreadful of crimes, and
who are blinded with error, so that they even frequently celebrate two
Paschas in one year. ‘Our Saviour has left us only one festal day of our
deliverance, that is to say, of his holy passion; and he has willed that
his Catholic Church should be one.’ How unseemly is it that some should
be fasting while others are seated at the banquet! He hopes that every
one will agree in this. It had been resolved that the Pascha should be
kept everywhere on one and the same day[158].

There is nothing in these letters to show what rule had been established.
All that is laid down is that the Pascha should be kept everywhere on
the same day; and it assumed that the Roman and Alexandrian rules as to
Easter were identical, and were well known. As a matter of fact, while
the Churches of Rome and Alexandria were at one both in keeping Easter on
a Sunday, and on a Sunday after the vernal equinox, they were not agreed
in their methods of calculating the Sunday upon which Easter would fall.
Hence, long after the Council of Nicaea, several instances occur in which
a day was taken for the Easter festival at Rome which differed from the
day which the Alexandrian experts had calculated to be the correct day.

It is worthy of observation that the Emperor in his letter reprobates
what he assumes was the Jewish practice of frequently celebrating two
Paschas in the same year. What is probably meant is that the Jews at that
time (whatever their earlier practice may have been) did not think it
necessary to keep the Passover _after_ the vernal equinox. Now the vernal
equinox was taken as the beginning of the tropical or solar year; and it
might happen from time to time that the full moon of Nisan fell in one
year after the vernal equinox, and in the following civil year before
the equinox, which would give two passovers in the same solar year. If
this interpretation of the words of Constantine’s letter be correct, it
would imply that the Christian Pascha should always be celebrated after
the equinox, which was certainly already the general practice. But no
specific rule with reference to the equinox is laid down in express terms
either by the Fathers of the Council or by the Emperor.

It will be observed that in the Letter of Constantine he states that the
Lord has left us ‘only one festal day of our deliverance, that is to
say, of his holy passion.’ The dominant thought connected with the word
Pascha was still that of the Crucifixion. At a later period writers, for
the sake of accuracy, made the distinction between the ‘Pascha of the
Crucifixion’ (πάσχα σταυρώσιμον) and the ‘Pascha of the Resurrection’
(πάσχα ἀναστάσιμον); and eventually the thought of the Crucifixion
disappears from the connotation of the word, which has given the name for
what we call Easter to the French (_pâques_); the Italians (_pasqua_);
and the Spaniards (_pascua_)[159].

After the Council of Nicaea, although the Quartodeciman practice lingered
on among unorthodox sectaries, the differences among Catholics were in
the main confined to such questions as, When was the equinox? and What
Tables should be used for predicting the Sunday which should be observed
as Easter Day? The Synod of Antioch in A.D. 341 (can. 1) could now
make bold to advance a step beyond the Oecumenical Council, and enacted
a canon pronouncing excommunication against any who acted contrary to
the command of the great and holy Synod assembled at Nicaea regarding
the Pascha[160]. In principle the Church was united; but there were
differences in the application of the principle. In A.D. 444, and eleven
years later, in A.D. 455, Pope Leo the Great was in perplexity as to the
day upon which Easter should be kept. In A.D. 444 he wrote to Cyril of
Alexandria on the subject. The answer he received was that the proper
day was not March 26 (as the Latins would make it) but April 23. In
A.D. 455 Leo was much moved by finding that the Alexandrian computists
had given April 24 for Easter Day, while those at Rome had assigned
the festival to April 17, a week earlier. The matter seemed to him of
sufficient importance to justify his writing to Marcianus, Emperor of the
East, whom he now besought to intervene, and direct the Alexandrians not
to name April 24, declaring that so late a date was beyond the ancient
Paschal limits. Leo also wrote on the same subject to the learned and
once beautiful Eudocia Augusta, who, though now spending her old age
in retirement and devotion at Jerusalem, was not without influence in
church affairs. The Emperor had enquiries made among certain bishops of
the East and communicated with the Alexandrians. The result was that
the observance of April 24 was reaffirmed, and the bishop of Rome
reluctantly submitted for the sake of peace[161].

The account of the matter lies in the fact that while the Alexandrians
had long before adopted the Paschal limits that still continue to rule
our Easter, that is, from March 22 to April 25, the Latins, though at
this date accepting the prior limit, hesitated as to the later, because
the Easter Tables then in use among them had placed the later Paschal
limit on April 23.

The position of authority conceded to the Church of Alexandria on the
question as to the date of the Pascha was due to the acknowledged
learning and skill of the astronomers and mathematicians of that city in
matters of chronology and the computation of time. It was the practice of
the bishop of Alexandria, as early at least as the middle of the third
century, to issue what were styled ‘Festal Letters’ or, at a later date,
‘Paschal Letters,’ commonly of the nature of a homily on the religious
lessons of the Paschal season, with an announcement as to the date of the
next Pascha. These letters were commonly issued by the bishop a year in
advance, and were sent by special messengers to his comprovincial bishops.

It has been supposed by several ecclesiastical historians of repute that
the Council of Nicaea expressly authorised the bishop of Alexandria
to issue these preparatory notices to the authorities in the various
churches of Christendom. The evidence for this opinion is lacking; but
certainly, as a matter of fact, the judgment of Alexandria carried great
weight. In the West, however, the general practice was that Metropolitans
should determine the date, and announce the day to their suffragans. In
the sixth century the Council of Orleans (A.D. 541) directs that if the
Metropolitan were in doubt he should consult the Apostolic see (Rome),
and act in accordance with its decision (can. 1). About one hundred years
later it would appear from the fifth canon of the Council of Toledo (A.D.
633) that the Spanish Metropolitan bishops did not receive information
as to the date of Easter from any external source. They are directed to
enquire among themselves by letter three months before the Epiphany, and
make the announcement; and the reason assigned for this canon is that
erroneous Easter Tables had caused differences.

To attempt anything like a detailed account of the varieties in the
methods adopted for the determination of Easter which held their ground
for a time, some in the East, some in the West, would be unsuitable in
an introductory work like the present. The extraordinary persistence
exhibited by the Celtic Churches of Britain and Ireland in maintaining
for a long time their own method of computing Easter against the Roman
method introduced by Augustine of Canterbury and his followers, is
an important and interesting feature in the history of Christianity
in these countries. It is enough here to say that the native Churches
were not Quartodecimans (as has sometimes been incorrectly alleged),
but were adhering to a cycle which they had received long before the
Roman missionaries arrived in Britain[162]. We must here be content with
briefly noticing some of the leading features in the history of the
change which gradually led up to the adoption of the Nineteen-Year Cycle
as modified and propounded by Dionysius Exiguus in the early part of the
sixth century.

After the abandonment of the Cycle of Hippolytus there is found in use
at Rome an 84-year cycle. In this the date of Easter is believed to have
oscillated between March 25 and April 21; and between the fourteenth
and twentieth day of the moon. This system, according to the results of
recent research, was modified in A.D. 312 and again in A.D. 343. This
cycle (still of 84 years) came to be known as the _supputatio Romana_.
Easter could not now fall earlier than the sixteenth, nor later than the
twenty-second of the moon, while its date limits were March 22 and April
21. This _supputatio_, with some modifications, served the bishops of
Rome during the fourth and the greater part of the fifth century. The
Alexandrians, on the other hand, had about A.D. 277 come to use the more
exact Nineteen-Year cycle, with possible Easters between March 22 and
April 25, and between the fifteenth and twenty-second of the moon[163].

In the pontificate of Leo the Great the differences which he had with the
Church of Alexandria as to the date of Easter caused him to direct his
archdeacon, Hilary (who afterwards succeeded to the papal throne), to
investigate the whole question. Hilary resorted to the aid of Victorius
of Aquitaine, who happened to be then at Rome. Victorius devised, or
adopted, a cycle of 532 years, a combination of the lunar cycle of 19
years with the so-called solar cycle of 28 years (19 × 28 = 532). His
Easter limits were March 22 and April 24.

The cycle of Victorius met with favourable acceptance, more particularly
in Gaul, where it continued in use till nearly the end of the eighth
century.

At Rome, whatever may have been the position actually attained by the
cycle of Victorius, it and all other devices for determining Easter
gave way in the sixth century (A.D. 527) before the Paschal Tables
of Dionysius Exiguus. This remarkable person, who came to occupy an
eminent place in the science of chronology generally, as well as in
the computations necessary for ecclesiastical purposes, was a monk, a
Scythian by birth, who settled in a monastery at Rome. It is to him that
we owe in chronology the adoption by Western Christendom of what we know
as the ‘Christian Era’ and ‘the year of our Lord,’ now in universal use
for the dating of the events of history, and of all our documents public
and private.

The system of Dionysius was, practically, the adoption of the
Nineteen-Year Cycle of the Alexandrians. It fixed the date of the vernal
equinox at March 21, placed the Paschal limits at March 22 and April 25,
and declared Easter to be the next Sunday after the Paschal full moon. We
have here in full the rule which eventually came to prevail everywhere.
But its adoption was not immediate in all countries[164].

The space at our disposal will not allow of our treating in detail of
the work of the computists, and of the ‘Sunday Letters,’ ‘Epacts,’ and
other technical terms which appear in the old Church Kalendars. For
these, as well as for such terms as ‘Indiction,’ ‘Lunar Regulars,’ ‘Solar
Regulars,’ and ‘Concurrents,’ reference may be made to such books as Sir
Harris Nicholas’ _Chronology of History_, and Giry’s fuller and lucid
_Manuel de Diplomatique_.


_The Gregorian Reform._

The defects of the Nineteen-Year Cycle became apparent after some lapse
of time. There were two grave sources of error. First, the Kalendar
proceeded on the assumption that the solar year consisted of 365¼ days;
but the true solar year is 11 minutes and some seconds shorter than the
Kalendar year, and the accumulation of this error gradually brought
confusion into the system. In one hundred and thirty years the Kalendar
will have gained on the true solar year by almost exactly one day. At the
date of the Council of Nicaea (A.D. 325) the vernal equinox was placed at
March 21, but in the year A.D. 450 the true vernal equinox would be on
March 20. In A.D. 585 the equinox would be on March 19; in A.D. 715 on
March 18, and so on. And thus it will be seen that in A.D. 1582, when the
Kalendar was reformed, the real vernal equinox was about ten days earlier
than the March 21 of the Kalendar.

The second source of error lay in the assumption that at the close of a
cycle of nineteen years there was an exact agreement of solar and lunar
time. Nineteen solar years, of 365¼ days, make 6939 days and 18 hours;
but 235 moons of 29 days, 12 hours, 44 minutes, and 3 seconds and a
fraction make 6939 days, 16 hours, and a fraction over 31 minutes. So it
comes about that the solar time in nineteen years is nearly 1½ hours in
excess of the real lunar time. In other words, the moons in the second
cycle of nineteen years make their changes nearly 1½ hours earlier than
they did in the first cycle. It is easy then to show that in about 308
years this difference would amount to a whole day; and in A.D. 1582,
when the Gregorian reform was effected, the moon in the heavens made its
changes nearly four days before the time which was indicated for these
changes in the Kalendar.

We must omit any notice of the various schemes for reforming the Kalendar
prior to the reformation of Gregory XIII. After he had consented to the
general idea that a reformation should be undertaken, various schemes
were proposed. Of these, that of Luigi Lilio, a physician and astronomer
of the city of Rome, obtained the preference[165]. And it is on the lines
suggested by Lilio that the work was accomplished, mainly by a German
mathematician then resident at Rome, the Jesuit, Christopher Schlüssel
(or, in the Latin form of his name, Clavius), who afterwards published at
Rome, in folio, an exposition of the work done, under the title _Romani
Calendarii a Gregorio XIII Pontifice Maximo restituti Explicatio_ (1603).


LEADING FEATURES OF THE GREGORIAN REFORM

The Gregorian Reform is an ingenious and, indeed, brilliant practical
solution of the problems presented by the condition of the Kalendar at
the close of the sixteenth century. The characteristic features of the
Gregorian system will now be described.

1. It was known that the true vernal equinox was at this date (1582)
about ten days earlier than March 21 as marked in the Kalendar. Should
the equinox be fixed as at March 11? It was resolved to keep the equinox
at the nominal date of March 21, and to bring the date into conformity
with facts by the simple process of striking out ten nominal days. It
was decreed that the day following Oct. 4, 1582 (when what is known as
the New Style was to make its beginning), should be counted, not as Oct.
5, but as Oct. 15. And thus in the following year, 1583, the true vernal
equinox would fall on March 21, as it was supposed to have fallen in A.D.
325, the date of the Council of Nicaea.

2. But how was it to be provided that in the future the same errors which
had vitiated the old Kalendar should not come in time to vitiate the new?

It will be remembered that the time of the old Kalendar had gained on
true solar time at the rate, almost precisely, of one day in every 130
years. If the counting of one day could be suppressed in every 130 years,
the end would be obtained. For purposes of practical convenience the
reformers of the Kalendar assumed that 133 years should be taken as the
period in which the Kalendar time exceeded the solar time by one day.
The difference, for the purpose in hand, was insignificant; and, as
will be seen hereafter, this deliberately chosen error will not affect
the Kalendar to the extent of one day till A.D. 5200, while it makes
calculations much simpler.

Now the plan adopted to prevent the accumulation of the error in the
old Kalendar was as follows: if one day could be withdrawn in every 133
years, or, what is the same thing, three days in every 399 years, the
object would be attained.

In the Old Style, every year of an exact century—every centurial (or,
as it was sometimes called, secular) year—was a leap-year of 366 days.
What would be the effect of treating every centurial year as a common
year of 365 days? We should have suppressed four days at the end of
four centuries when we ought to suppress only three in 399 years. So
it was suggested that while three successive centurial years should be
regarded as common years, the fourth centurial year should be treated
as a leap-year. Thus, in both Old and New Style the years 1600 and 2000
are leap-years; but 1700, 1800, and 1900, which in the Old Style were
leap-years, are in the New Style treated as common years of 365 days.
And the rule laid down in the Gregorian system was that if the number
expressed by the first two figures of the century was exactly divisible
by 4 it should be a leap-year, but if not exactly divisible by 4 it
should be treated as a common year. The numbers 16 and 20 are exactly
divisible by 4, but 17, 18, and 19 are not so divisible. The years 1600
and 2000 are in the New Style leap-years, but the years 1700, 1800, and
1900 are in the New Style common years.

It is true that the adoption of 133 years, instead of 130 years, as the
time in which in the Old Style one day was gained by the Kalendar on the
sun, imports an error into the system, which causes the Kalendar to fall
behind the sun. This error, as has been said, will accumulate to the
extent of one day in A.D. 5200. It may be thought that, if men be on the
earth at that date, they will know how to deal with the case. Yet it is
suggested for the instruction of our remote posterity that they will have
only to make A.D. 5200 a common year, instead of a leap-year, to bring
things back to correctness[166].

For the Sunday letters in the New Style and for the Cycle of Epacts in
the Gregorian Kalendar, see Dr Seabury, _Theory and Use of the Church
Calendar_.

The work of the Gregorian reformation is marvellous in its elaborate
ingenuity. It even provides for a case which will not occur till
Dec. 31, A.D. 8600. Yet it does not reach the attainment of an exact
correspondence with astronomical phenomena. And it has been frequently
observed that the new moons of the Kalendar may occur one, two, or
even three days _later_ than the new moons of the astronomer. In fact
the astronomical new moon rarely occurs on the date marked for the
ecclesiastical new moon. But care has been taken that the new moon of the
Kalendar never occurs _earlier_ than the new moon of astronomy.


_The adoption of the New Style._

As was to be expected, the countries of Europe which recognised
the authority of the bishop of Rome were not long in accepting the
reformation of the Kalendar. Spain, Portugal, and part of Italy made
the change on the same day as at Rome, that is on Oct. 15 (5), 1582.
In France and Lorraine the change was made on December 20 (10) in the
same year; in the Roman Catholic cantons of Switzerland in 1583 or
1584; in Poland in 1586; in Hungary in 1587. In Protestant countries
and countries where Protestants were numerous the alteration was more
slowly effected. But Denmark was an exception, for the New Style was
adopted in 1582. In Holland and the Low Countries the provinces were
divided in their acceptance of the New Style, and in some places the
change was not effected till the year 1700. In Germany we also find a
variety of usages: Austria and Roman Catholics in other parts accepted
the change in 1584, but Protestants did not yield till 1700, when they
adopted the Kalendar of the German astronomer, Erhard Weigel, which
differed from the Gregorian Kalendar only in the rule for determining
Easter. This variation brought about the result that the Protestants and
Roman Catholics sometimes celebrated Easter on different days. In 1778
Frederick the Great ordained that from that time Easter should be kept at
the time ascertained from the Gregorian Paschal moon. Weigel’s Kalendar
was also adopted in the Protestant cantons of Switzerland in 1700. In
Russia, Greece, and throughout the Christian East the Old Kalendar is
still in use[167].

Great Britain was the last of the countries of Western Europe to adopt
the New Style. It is true that as early as March 16, 1584-5, a bill was
introduced in the House of Lords under the title, ‘An Act giving her
Majesty [Queen Elizabeth] authority to alter and new make a Calendar
according to the Calendar used in other countries.’ The bill was read a
second time in the House of Lords, and proceeded no further.

Through an extraordinary blunder, it has been stated by writers of repute
that Scotland adopted the New Style in A.D. 1600. The error originated in
the fact that King James VI, with the advice of the Lords of his Privy
Council, ordered by proclamation dated Haliruidhous, Dec. 17, 1599, that
on and after Jan. 1, 1600, the year should be held to begin on Jan. 1
instead of March 25: but there was no rectification of the Kalendar by
the omission of nominal days. In England the legal year continued to
begin on March 25 till 1752. The accession of James VI to the throne of
England on the death of Elizabeth occurred on March 24, 1602, according
to the English style, but on March 24, 1603, according to the Scottish
style. In this and such like cases the double dates may be wisely
employed, thus, March 24, 1602-3. But Scotland did not use the New Style
till it was adopted in 1752, in accordance with the provision of the
Act of Parliament of Great Britain (24 George II, c. 23), entitled ‘An
Act for regulating the commencement of the Year, and for correcting the
Calendar now in use.’




CHAPTER X

THE KALENDAR OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCH OF THE EAST


The modern Kalendar of the Byzantine Church is here dealt with. The early
Menologies (which corresponded pretty closely to the Martyrologies of
the West) show the usual phenomena of comparative simplicity passing
into forms of great elaboration. The best known are the Menology of
Constantinople of the eighth century and that which is known as the
_Basilianum_, now most commonly associated with the Emperor Basil II
(A.D. 976-1025), at whose instance it is said to have been composed[168].

The history of the growth and variations of the Kalendar of the Greeks
cannot be here attempted; we confine ourselves to the Kalendar now in use.


I. _Immoveable commemorations._

This Kalendar, or the Kalendar of Saints, begins on Sept. 1, the first
day of the year of the Indiction. With us in the West the civil year
has left no mark upon the services of the Church. In the Greek Church in
the hymns the divine blessing is invoked on the new year; and two of the
lessons at Vespers are chosen as bearing references applicable to the day.

The services of the Church have frequently several commemorations of
various saints upon the same day; and this general statement may be
illustrated from Sept. 1. In addition to the _propria_ of the new year,
we find commemorations of Simeon Stylites senior; his mother, St Martha;
forty women martyrs with the Deacon Ammun; and a miraculous _icon_ of St
Mary. To these must be added a commemoration of the Old Testament worthy,
Joshua, the son of Nun. This specimen will suffice to show that it would
be impossible in the space at our disposal to exhibit the commemorations
of every day in the year[169]. We shall confine ourselves to exhibiting
the Greek classification of festivals, and marking the dates of some of
the more eminent commemorations. But it must be observed that days that
are not regarded as festivals frequently contain canons (metrical hymns)
which commemorate saints or martyrs. Indeed the offices of the Eastern
service-books are packed with an extraordinary abundance of hagiological
reference and allusion.

As regards dignity and importance in the Greek Church, in addition to
Easter, which stands pre-eminent and is known by way of distinction as
‘the Feast’ (ἡ ἑορτή), there are twelve festivals of the first rank, some
of them being moveable. These are: (1) the Nativity of the Lord, Dec.
25; (2) the Theophany (Epiphany), Jan. 6; (3) Hypapante (Purification),
Feb. 2; (4) the Annunciation of the Theotokos, March 25; (5) the festival
of Palms, which with the Sabbath of Lazarus on the preceding day makes
one festival; (6) the Ascension of the Lord; (7) Pentecost; (8) the
Transfiguration, Aug. 6; (9) the Repose of Theotokos, Aug. 15; (10)
the Nativity of Theotokos, Sept. 8; (11) the Exaltation of the Cross,
Sept. 14; (12) the Entrance of the Theotokos into the Temple (_i.e._ her
presentation), Nov. 21.

Each of these is marked first by the day preceding (_proheortia_)
partaking of a _festive_ character, and secondly, by having an echo of
the festival on certain following days, which are known as the _apodosis_
of the feast; but the name is often applied to the final day of the
observance. The apodosis, unlike the Western Octave, is in some cases
shorter than a week and in some cases longer. Thus, the apodosis of
the Nativity of the Virgin (Sept. 8) terminates on Sept. 12; while the
apodosis of the Theophany (Jan. 6) ordinarily extends to Jan. 14.

Next in dignity are four festivals of high rank, though not having either
_proheortia_ or _apodosis_. They are: (1) the Circumcision, Jan. 1;
(2) the Nativity of the Forerunner (St John Baptist), June 24; (3) St
Peter and St Paul, the Koryphaeoi, June 29; (4) the Decollation of the
Forerunner, Aug. 29.

The twelve of the first group and the four of the second may be taken as
together corresponding in a measure to festivals of the first class in
the Roman classification.

Similarly corresponding to feasts of the second class in the West is
a group which is divided into greater and lesser. The greater feasts
of this group are marked liturgically by the singing of a canon of the
Virgin in addition to the canon proper to the feast. The lesser are
marked by the singing in the service of what is known as _Polyeleos_, a
name given to Psalms cxxxiv, cxxxv (Pss. cxxxv, cxxxvi in the enumeration
of the English Prayer Book).

The greater feasts of the middle class are: (1) the common festival of
the three Doctors of the Church [Chrysostom, Basil, Gregory Nazianzen],
Jan. 30; (2) St George, martyr, April 23; (3) St John the Evangelist, May
8; (4) the Translation of the image of Christ, made without hands, from
Edessa, Aug. 16; (5) the Migration of St John the Evangelist, Sept. 26.
This festival is based on the ancient legend that St John did not die,
but was translated; (6) St Sabbas, the Sanctified [Abbot of Palestine,
who died A.D. 531], Dec. 5; (7) St Nicholas of Myra, the wonder-worker,
Dec. 6.

The lesser feasts of the middle class include: (1) St Anthony, hermit,
Jan. 17; (2) the forty Martyrs [of Sebaste, under Licinius], March 9; (3)
St Constantine and St Helena, May 21; (4) St Cosmas and St Damian, the
unmercenary physicians, July 1; (5) St Elias, the prophet, July 20; (6)
St Demetrius, Great Martyr [of Thessalonica, under Diocletian], Oct.
26; (7) Synaxis of the Archangel, St Michael, Nov. 8; (8) St Andrew the
Apostle, Nov. 30.

There is a third class subdivided into (_a_) festivals with the great
doxology, and (_b_) festivals without the great doxology[170]. Festivals
of the third class are very numerous, but they are festivals rather of
the service-books than of actual life, upon which they leave little or
no impression. The number of festivals kept by the Greeks and observed
either by a complete or a partial cessation from trade and servile labour
far surpasses the festivals so observed in any of the countries of
Western Christendom.

The Russian Kalendar corresponds largely to the Byzantine; but there are,
as might be expected, not a few commemorations of persons, events, and of
miraculous _icons_, peculiar to Russia.

A few explanatory observations may here be added: (1) The Eastern
Kalendars contrast in a striking way with the Western in the prominence
given to commemorations of the saints and heroes of the Old Testament.
All the prophets and many of the righteous men of Hebrew history have
their days. And the service-books contain a _common_ of Prophets as well
as a _common_ of Apostles, etc.

(2) Honorary epithets are freely bestowed upon the various saints without
any very precise significance. Thus ‘God-bearing’ (_theophorus_), which
is a natural epithet in the case of Ignatius, as being used of himself
in his writings, is bestowed on various distinguished ascetics, as
Anthony, Euthymius, Sabbas, Onuphrius.

(3) The ground for the distinction between ‘Martyrs’ and ‘Great Martyrs’
is not apparent. ‘Hieromartyrs’ are martyrs who were bishops or priests;
‘Hosiomartyrs’ are martyrs who were living as religious. Thekla, as well
as Stephen, is ‘Protomartyr.’

(4) The word ‘Apostle’ is not confined to the twelve. The seventy
disciples whom the Lord sent forth are the ‘Seventy Apostles,’ among
whom were reckoned many of the persons named in the salutations of St
Paul’s Epistles. And the word is also applied to certain companions or
acquaintances of St Paul, as _e.g._ Ananias of Damascus, Agabus, Titus,
etc. ‘Equal to the Apostles’ (_Isapostolos_) is applied (_a_) to very
early saints, _e.g._ Abercius of Hierapolis, Mary Magdalene, Junia,
Thekla, etc.; and (_b_) to great princes who were distinguished for their
services to the Church, as Constantine and Helena.

‘Wonder-worker’ (_thaumaturgos_) is used of various saints famous for
their miracles, as _e.g._ Charilampes (Feb. 10), Spiridion (Dec. 12),
Gregory, bishop of Neocaesarea in Pontus (Nov. 17), the Saint Elizabeth
(April 24), of uncertain date, who never washed her body with water, and
others.

John, son of Zacharias and Elizabeth, who with us is the Baptist, appears
as the Precursor or Forerunner (_Prodromos_). He figures much in the
services of the Church: and several days are dedicated to his honour;
his Conception (Sept. 23), his Nativity (June 24), his Decollation (Aug.
29) and the great feast known as his Synaxis (Jan. 7). In addition, the
first and second finding of his head is commemorated on Feb. 24, and the
third finding of his head on May 25.

St Mary the Virgin is almost invariably the Theotokos, and Joachim and
Anna are the Theopator and Theometor (Sept. 9).

The ‘unmercenary’ (_anarguroi_) saints are generally physicians who
took no fees, as Cosmas and Damian, Cyrus and his companion John, and
Pantaleon.

The term _Synaxis_ in such phrases as the Synaxis of the Archangel
Michael (Nov. 8), the Synaxis of the Theotokos (Dec. 26), the Synaxis
of the seventy Apostles (Jan. 4), the Synaxis of the Forerunner (Jan.
7), the Synaxis of the Archangel Gabriel (March 26), the Synaxis of the
twelve Apostles (June 30), is not easily rendered into English; and its
precise significance (as used in the Kalendar) is not obvious. It is
sometimes used for a gathering or assembly of people; but more commonly
it is employed to signify a Eucharistic Communion[171].

It is customary after the great feasts of our Lord and of the Virgin Mary
to subjoin on the following day the commemoration of saints associated
with the event commemorated on the preceding day. Thus, the Epiphany
(Theophany) in the Greek Church being chiefly concerned with the
Baptism of Christ, we have on the following day (Jan. 7) the feast of
St John Baptist; after the Hypapante, or meeting with Simeon and Anna
in the Temple (on Feb. 2, the day of the Purification of the Virgin, in
the West), we find (Feb. 3) Simeon and Anna the prophetess; after the
Nativity of the Lord, the synaxis of the Theotokos, Dec. 26; after the
Nativity of the Virgin (Sept. 8) we have on Sept. 9 Joachim and Anna,
her parents; after the Annunciation (March 25) we have on March 26 the
synaxis of the Archangel Gabriel, who made the great announcement.

It remains to be added that, as in the Orthodox Church of the East
Wednesdays and Fridays are observed as strict fasts alike by the clergy,
the monks, and the laity, most of the important festivals carry with them
either a partial dispensation (as in some cases for the use of oil and
wine, and in others for the use of oil, wine, and fish) or a dispensation
for all kinds of food, when a festival falls on one of these fast days.

We now proceed to describe the annual cycle of Sundays.


II. _The Dominical Kalendar of the Orthodox Church of the East._

The arrangement of the Sundays falls into two divisions, the first
beginning with the Sunday before our Western Septuagesima; and the
second, immediately after our Trinity Sunday, which, with the Greeks,
is called the Sunday of All Saints. In the following table, opposite
the names of the Sundays for the earlier part of the Dominical cycle,
as given in the Greek service-books, are placed the names of the
corresponding Sundays in the West, as known to English churchmen.

  Publican and Pharisee                  Sunday before Septuagesima
  The Prodigal Son                       Septuagesima
  Apocreos                               Sexagesima
  Tyrinis, or Tyrophagus                 Quinquagesima
  First of the Fasts (or Orthodoxy)      First Sunday in Lent
  Second of the Fasts                    Second Sunday in Lent
  Third of the Fasts (or Adoration of    Third Sunday in Lent
    the Cross)
  Fourth of the Fasts                    Fourth Sunday in Lent
  Fifth of the Fasts                     Fifth Sunday in Lent
  Palms                                  Sixth Sunday in Lent (Palm Sunday)
  Holy Pasch                             Easter
  Antipasch (or St Thomas)               First Sunday after Easter
  Myrrh-bearers                          Second Sunday after Easter
  Paralytic                              Third Sunday after Easter
  Samaritan Woman                        Fourth Sunday after Easter
  Blind Man                              Fifth Sunday after Easter
  The Three hundred and eighteen[172]    Sunday after Ascension-day
  Pentecost                              Whitsunday
  First after Pentecost (or All Saints)  Trinity Sunday

The following Sundays are numbered the Second, Third, Fourth after
Pentecost, and so on, till we reach the Sunday of the Publican (the
Sunday before Septuagesima) in the following year. But while the numbers
are continuous, special names are given to certain Sundays. Thus we find
the Sunday before and the Sunday after the Exaltation of the Cross (Sept.
14); the Sundays before and after the Nativity; the Sundays before and
after the Lights (_i.e._ the Epiphany).

Again, we sometimes find the Sundays after Pentecost referred to as the
First, Second, Third, etc., of Matthew; because the liturgical Gospel
on these Sundays, on to the Exaltation of the Cross, is taken from St
Matthew. Similarly, after the Exaltation of the Cross and on to Apocreos
the liturgical Gospel for the Sundays is taken from St Luke, and the
Sundays are named First, Second, Third, etc., of Luke.

It is the subject-matter of the Gospel for the day which gives its
name to the Sundays called the Publican, the Prodigal, St Thomas, the
Myrrh-bearers (_i.e._ the women bringing spices to the tomb), etc.

On the Sunday of Orthodoxy (the first in Lent) some sixty anathemas
against heresy of various kinds are recited, including several against
the Iconoclasts who were condemned at the second Council of Nicaea (A.D.
787). Tyrinis (or Tyrophagus) and Apocreos are explained elsewhere[173].

The name ‘Antipasch,’ for the first Sunday after Easter (Low Sunday;
_Dominica in Albis_), implies that it is ‘over against’ or ‘answering to’
the Pasch. On the Sunday of the Three hundred and eighteen holy Fathers
of Nicaea a canon (or metrical hymn) in honour of the Council is sung.

The naming of the week in relation to the Sunday is peculiar, and does
not follow, as in the West, a consistent rule. In some cases, the week
_preceding_ a Sunday is given its name: in other cases the week is called
after the Sunday with which it begins. And when the determination of
dates is in view the student should be on the alert. Thus, the week of
Apocreos (the last week of flesh-eating) precedes the Sunday Apocreos;
the week of Tyrine (when cheese, butter and milk are allowed) precedes
the Sunday of that name; and the first week of the Lenten fast precedes
the Sunday that is the first in Lent. On the other hand, after Antipascha
and on to the second Sunday after Pentecost the weeks are named from the
Sunday which they follow: while the naming the week from the Sunday which
follows is resumed at the latter date[174].

The period from the Sunday of the Publican to Easter Eve inclusive
is sometimes called the time of the Triodion (Τριῴδιον), because the
_propria_ for that time are contained in a service-book which bears
that name; while the period from Easter Day to the Sunday of All Saints
(first Sunday after Pentecost), both inclusive, is called the time of the
Pentekostarion (Πεντηκοστάριον) from the name of the service-book used at
that time.

A few words must be said on certain week-days observed with special
dignity, the position of which in the almanack varies with the position
of Sundays as affected by the incidence of Easter. It will be remembered
that in the East the Sabbath (Saturday) is reckoned as a day of special
religious observance; and some Sabbaths are distinguished by special
names. The Sabbath of Apocreos is a day for the solemn commemoration of
all the faithful departed; and vigils are kept during the night. It is
known as the Sabbath of the Dead. The next following Sabbath serves for
the commemoration of religious and ascetics; it is named the Sabbath of
Ascetics. On the Sabbath of the first week of Lent (known as the Sabbath
of Kollyba) there is a commemoration of St Theodore Tyro, martyr, who,
according to the legend, in the time of Julian the apostate, appeared
to the bishop of Constantinople, and ordered him in a great emergency
to make _Kollyba_ and distribute them to the people. The bishop said in
reply that he did not know what _Kollyba_ were, and the saint explained
that they were wheaten cakes. We need not pursue the story further. The
Sabbath before the fifth Sunday in Lent is the Sabbath of the Akathist.
A hymn, so called, in honour of the Virgin, was sung throughout the
night by the people, _not sitting down_. The Sabbath before the Sixth
Sunday commemorates the raising of Lazarus, and is called the Sabbath of
Lazarus. Easter Eve is the ‘Great Sabbath.’

It may be observed that while in the West the word _Parasceve_ is used
exclusively for Good Friday, in the East the word is used for every
Friday, and Good Friday is distinguished by the epithet _Great_.

A detailed exhibition of the Byzantine Kalendar cannot be attempted here,
but the student will find it treated by J. M. Neale in the _General
Introduction_ to his _History of the Holy Eastern Church_ (vol. II.) and
with great fulness in Nilles’ _Kalendarium manuale utriusque Ecclesiae_.

Notes on the Kalendars of some of the separated Churches of the East will
be found in Appendix III.




APPENDIX I

THE PASCHAL QUESTION IN THE CELTIC CHURCHES


The controversies as to the calculation of Easter between the Roman
ecclesiastics, on the one hand, and, on the other, the ecclesiastics
of Ireland (Scotia), Scotland (Alban), and Wales, arose from the fact
that our native Churches continued to follow a cycle which had, at
the beginning of the fourth century, prevailed at Rome, but which was
afterwards abandoned by the Church of that city. An admirable account of
the matter will be found in Prof. Bury’s _Life of St Patrick_, 371-374.
The improved Roman computation was eventually adopted in the south of
Ireland about A.D. 650; in the north of Ireland in A.D. 703; among the
Picts of Scotland in A.D. 710; at Iona in A.D. 716; and in South Wales in
A.D. 802.




APPENDIX II

NOTE ON THE KALENDARS OF THE SEPARATED CHURCHES OF THE EAST


I. The Armenians. The year is counted from the year 551 of our era,
when the Catholicos, Moses II, who reformed the Kalendar, ascended the
patriarchal throne. Thus A.D. 1910 is the year 1359 among the Armenians.

One noteworthy feature of the Armenian observance is that, with the
exception of the Nativity (Jan. 6), the Circumcision, the Presentation of
the Lord in the Temple, and the Annunciation, various important festivals
are transferred to the following Sunday. Certain minor Holy Days, if they
fall on Wednesday, Friday, or Sunday, are in some cases omitted, while
others are transferred to the following Saturday. In regard to days of
fasting, in addition to Lent, the most remarkable feature is ‘the fast
of Nineveh,’ kept for two weeks, one month before the beginning of Lent.
The days of the week following Pentecost are fast days (see p. 91 f.).
For details see E. F. K. Fortescue’s _Armenian Church_, and Nilles, _op.
cit._ (vol. II.).

II. The Eastern Syrian (Chaldean, Assyrian, Nestorian) Church. The
Kalendar, Lectionary, and a list of days of Martyrs and others for which
no special lessons are appointed will be found in Bishop A. J. Maclean’s
_East Syrian Daily Offices_. One of the most interesting features is the
frequency with which Friday is observed as a commemoration of saints; and
sometimes the Friday commemoration is related in history or in thought
with the event commemorated on the preceding Sunday or great festival.
Thus St John Baptist is commemorated on the Friday after the Epiphany
(Jan. 6), of which festival the baptism of the Lord is the dominant
thought. The festival is popularly called at Urmi ‘The New waters.’ For
details see Maclean.

III. The Coptic (Egyptian) and Abyssinian Churches, both Monophysite.
The Copts compute their years according to ‘the era of the martyrs’ (of
Diocletian), commencing A.D. 284. The year begins on the first of the
month Tout, a day corresponding to Sept. 10. Each month consists of 30
days; and the five (or in leap-year six) days necessary to complete
the solar year are called ‘the little month.’ There are fourteen
principal feasts. The most peculiar features are commemorations of the
Four-and-twenty Elders, and of the Four Beasts, of the Revelation.

The Ethiopic Kalendar runs on broadly similar lines; but it is a peculiar
feature of this Kalendar that there are monthly celebrations of the
Lord’s Nativity (except that the Lord’s Conception is substituted on
March 25), as well as of St Mary, of St Michael, and of Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob. Pontius Pilate is commemorated on June 25. See Neale’s
_Eastern Church_ (II. 805-815).




APPENDIX III

NOTE ON THE HISTORY OF THE KALENDAR OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND SINCE THE
REFORMATION


As early as 1532 we find a Petition of the Commons (really emanating from
the Court) to Henry VIII that, with the advice of his most honourable
council, prelates, and ordinaries, holy days, ‘and specially such as fall
in the harvest,’ may be ‘made fewer in number.’ To this the ordinaries
answered, objecting to change, and, with reference to holy days in
harvest, stating that ‘there be in August but St Lawrence, the Assumption
of our Blessed Lady, St Bartholomew, and in September the Nativity of our
Lady, the Exaltation of the Cross, and St Matthew the Apostle, before
which days harvest is commonly ended[175].’ The reference both in the
Petition and the answer is obviously to holy days carrying with them a
cessation of labour.

In 1536 Convocation passed an ordinance abrogating superfluous holy days.
It was ordained that in term time no holy days should be kept except
Ascension Day, the Nativity of the Baptist, Allhallen, and Candlemas,
nor in harvest except feasts of the Apostles and our Lady. St George was
to continue to be celebrated. The feast of the patron of each church
was to be abolished; and the feast of every church’s dedication was to
be observed on the first Sunday in October. By this ordinance the great
festival of St Thomas Becket, the translation of his relics (July 7),
fell, as occurring in the season of harvest. Two years later by a royal
proclamation the festival of his martyrdom (Dec. 29) met the same fate.

The Kalendar of the First Prayer Book of Edward VI (1549) exhibits a
clean sweep of all festivals except the red-letter days still observed,
together with ‘Magdalen’ (July 22), for which a collect, epistle, and
gospel are supplied. St Matthias is placed at Feb. 24.

The Kalendar of the Second Prayer Book of Edward VI (1552) differs from
that of the First Prayer Book, by omitting St Mary Magdalene and St
Barnabas (June 11): but this latter would seem to have been omitted only
_per incuriam_, as the collect, epistle, and gospel are found in the body
of the book; and by the insertion of the following black-letter days, St
George (April 23), Lammas (Aug. 1), St Lawrence (Aug. 10), St Clement
(Nov. 23), together with Term days, ‘Dog days,’ ‘Equinoctium’ (March
10) and the days of the entrance of the sun into the several signs of
the zodiac. It is an interesting problem how in the Prayer Book, which
represents emphatically the action of the more thorough-going of the
Protestant party, these black-letter days came to be inserted.

In the Prayer Book of 1559 ‘Barnabe Ap.’ reappears; the astronomical
notes are somewhat fuller, and the hours of the rising and setting of the
sun at certain dates are recorded.

As regards the black-letter days in the present Kalendar of the Church of
England we have first to call attention to the Latin Prayer Book issued
by the authority of Elizabeth in April 1560. It seems to have been ready
for the press as early as Aug. 11, 1559. Its Kalendar is adorned with a
great crowd of black-letter saints; and there are but few days blank.
In 1561 appeared a new Kalendar in English, the work of Ecclesiastical
Commissioners acting upon a royal letter. The Commissioners were
directed to peruse the order of the lessons throughout the year, and
to cause some new Kalendars to be imprinted, ‘whereby such chapters or
parcels of less edification may be removed, and others more profitable
may supply their rooms.’ As a matter of fact the Commissioners went
beyond their instructions, and inserted in the Kalendar the names
of black-letter saints almost as they were a century later approved
by Convocation in 1661. These were inserted in the later issues of
Elizabeth’s Prayer Book.

After the accession of James I the Birth-Day of Queen Elizabeth ceased to
appear in the Kalendar at Sept. 7, and St Enurchus takes its place.

The only changes made in 1661 were the addition of Ven. Bede (May 27), St
Alban (June 17), and the continuance of St Enurchus (Sept. 7), together
with the shifting (probably through mistake) of St Mary Magdalene from
July 22 to July 21.

With regard to the date of St Mary Magdalene a reference to the
photo-zincographic facsimile of the Black-Letter Prayer Book, in which
corrections were made at the last revision, will show at once how easily
the scribe who copied from this book might make the mistake.

St Enurchus, who had appeared in this form of the name in the Prayer
Book of 1604, and still earlier in the Kalendar of the _Preces Privatae_
(which had been issued, as _Regia authoritate approbatae_, in 1564), is
obviously a faulty form, arising from an error of transcription, for
St Euurtius. The first letter _u_, after the initial _E_, was read as
_n_ (the confusion of _u_ and _n_ is one of the most frequent of the
errors of copyists), and the _ti_ (in a manner not surprising to those
familiar with sixteenth century script) was apparently read as _ch_. It
may be added that Bede and Alban had also appeared in the Kalendar of
the _Preces Privatae_. We have stated that St Enurchus appears in the
Kalendar of the Prayer Book of 1604, and it was introduced then as the
only addition to the black-letter saints of the Kalendar of 1561. It is
perhaps impossible to account for its introduction; but the conjecture
has been offered that it was inserted to fill the gap caused by the
omission of the Nativity of Queen Elizabeth which had formerly occupied
Sept. 7[176].

The above are not the only errors of our present Kalendar. The revisers
of 1661 added explanatory comments to the names of the saints, and in
doing so have sometimes blundered. Thus they found ‘Cyprian’ at Sept. 26,
and they added ‘Archbishop of Carthage and Martyr.’ If they had taken
the trouble to look at the old Sarum or York Kalendars they would have
seen that the Cyprian commemorated on this day was the converted magician
of Antioch. This error is probably to be traced to Cosin’s _Devotions_
(1627).

It must be confessed that the black-letter saints of the modern English
Kalendar form by no means an ideal presentation of the worthies and
heroes of the Church Catholic. The Bishop of Salisbury (J. Wordsworth)
has some admirable remarks on the future reform of our English Kalendar
in his _Ministry of Grace_ (pp. 421-425).

Certain errors in the placing of the Golden Numbers in the Kalendar of
the Prayer Book of 1662 for the month of January were soon discovered.
They are noticed in Nicholl’s _Commentary on the Book of Common Prayer_
(1712).

Among the red-letter days of 1662 were ‘King Charles. Martyr’ (Jan.
30), ‘King Charles II. Nativity and Restoration’ (May 29), ‘Papists’
Conspiracy’ (Nov. 5). These days have the authority of the Act of
Uniformity of 1662, all of them appearing in the Book annexed to the
Act. On the authority of a Royal Warrant (Jan. 17, 1859), the legal
sufficiency of which has been questioned, these days have ceased to be
entered in the Kalendars of modern Prayer Books.

It may be added that the Kalendar of the Scottish Prayer Book of 1637
(known commonly, though not correctly as ‘Archbishop Laud’s Prayer Book’)
exhibited, in addition to the black-letter saints of the English Prayer
Book of the day, the following national or local commemorations:—David,
King, Jan. 11; Mungo, Bishop, Jan. 13; Colman, Feb. 18; Constantine III,
King, March 11; Patrick, March 17; Cuthbert, March 20; Gilbert, Bishop,
April 1; Serf, Bishop, April 20; Columba, June 9; Palladius, July 6;
Ninian, Bishop, Sept. 18; Adaman (_sic_), Bishop (_sic_), Sept. 25;
Margaret, Queen, Nov. 16; Ode, Virgin, Nov. 27; Drostan, Dec. 4.

The Kalendar of the Prayer Book of the Church of Ireland has since 1877
omitted all black-letter days. The same is true of the American Prayer
Book since 1790.




FOOTNOTES


[1] Less costly works are Giry’s admirable _Manuel de Diplomatique_
(1894), Sir Harris Nicholas’ _Chronology of History_, and Mr J. J. Bond’s
_Handy-Book of Rules and Tables for verifying dates_.

[2] Acts xx. 7; 1 Cor. xvi. 2.

[3] The view that St John is here representing himself as rapt in vision
to the time of judgment spoken of by St Paul (1 Cor. i. 8; 2 Thess. ii.
2) is the only other interpretation which deserves serious consideration.
(For the view mentioned see Hort, _Apocalypse_, p. 15.) But it does not,
as it seems to the present writer, dislodge the commonly accepted view.

[4] The Italian ‘Domenica’ and the French ‘Dimanche’ follow the language
of the Latin Church in designating what we call ‘Sunday.’ In the Greek
Church ‘the Lord’s Day’ is still the term employed.

[5] _E.g._ _Epist. to Diognetus_ 4.

[6] _Christian Worship_, E. tr. 231.

[7] _Expos. Fid._ 24.

[8] See Maclean, _Ancient Church Orders_, p. 149 f.

[9] _Ibid._, p. 171 f.

[10] This last word (ἀφοριζέσθω) points to a temporary deprival of
communion.

[11] _H.E._ v. 22.

[12] _Epist._ xxxvi. 2, _ad Casulanum_.

[13] Augustine, _Ep._ liv. 3, _ad Bonifacium_.

[14] Canon XXVI. ‘Errorem placuit corrigi, ut omni sabbati die
superpositiones celebremus.’ On _superpositio jejunii_ see _D.C.A._ It
would seem that once a month (except in July and August, _ob quorumdam
infirmitatem_) the added fast of Saturday was to be observed; Canon XXIII.

[15] Tertullian (_de Jejuniis_ 2) speaks of ‘stations’ being held on the
fourth and sixth _feria_.

[16] _De Natura Rerum_, c. 3.

[17] See the Notes of Valesius on Eusebius’ _Martyrs of Palestine_
(Paris, 1659), pp. 173 f.

[18] Compare Luke xviii. 12.

[19] _Simil._ v. 1, στατίωνα ἔχω.

[20] _De Jejuniis_ 14.

[21] _Strom._ vii. p. 877, Potter’s edit. On conjectures as to the origin
of the word _statio_ in this sense, see _D.C.A._

[22] See p. 91.

[23] _Christian Worship_, E. tr. 230.

[24] Aegidius Bucherius (Gilles Boucher), a learned French Jesuit, whose
_De doctrina temporum_ appeared at Antwerp in 1634.

[25] Ruinart’s _Acta Martyrum_ (1731), p. 541, and Lietzmann, _Three
oldest Martyrologies_, 1904.

[26] It will be remembered that Felicitas and Perpetua are named in the
Canon of the Roman Mass.

[27] _Satornilos_ is presumably a transcriptional variant of _Saturninus_.

[28] Duchesne has assisted R. Graffin in editing this Martyrology in
_Acta Sanctorum Boll._, Nov. II., under the title _Breviarium Syriacum_.

[29] See Mommsen, _Corpus Inscript. Lat._ I. 333.

[30] Lietzmann has printed the text in _The Three Oldest Martyrologies_.
See also Ruinart, _Acta Martyrum_, pp. 541 f.

[31] [From the mention of Eugenius, bishop of Carthage († 505), Lietzmann
concludes that the Kalendar received its present form shortly after the
death of Eugenius. Edd.]

[32] _Ministry of Grace_, 65.

[33] See Hefele II. 400, English translation.

[34] _Liturgia Romana Vetus_, Muratori I. 38-40. See as to the date of
the Sacramentary, Duchesne, _Chr. Worship_, E. tr. pp. 137-139. It has
been edited by C. L. Feltoe (_Sacramentarium Leonianum_, Cambridge, 1896).

[35] [‘Georgii’ is a conjecture of Muratori. The MS. has ‘Gregorii.’ See
Feltoe’s note, _op. cit._ p. 177. Edd.]

[36] [But Feltoe reads ‘iiii. n̅o̅n̅. a̅u̅g̅.,’ which corresponds with
the ordinary date, Aug. 2. The actual prayers, however, in the _Leonine_
_Sacramentary_ refer to St Stephen the protomartyr, whose ‘Invention’ the
Roman Kalendar still keeps on Aug. 3. See Feltoe, pp. 85 f., with notes.
Edd.]

[37] Gregorius disappears from this day in the Gregorian Kalendar.

[38] See Muratori’s _Liturg. Rom. Vet._ I. 48-50.

[39] It will interest English students to know that the synod of
Worcester, under Cantilupe, in A.D. 1240 appointed this day, with three
others, St Margaret’s, St Lucy’s, and St Agatha’s, to be free from labour
for women.

[40] _Histoire du Bréviaire romain_, p. 132.

[41] _in Diem Natal._ 1.

[42] _Topograph. Christ._ v. 194 (Migne, _P. G._ lxxxviii. 197).

[43] See the late Dr George Salmon’s masterly article ‘The Commentary of
Hippolytus on Daniel’ in _Hermathena_, vol. VIII. 1893, and Bishop J.
Wordsworth’s exposition in the _Ministry of Grace_, pp. 393-398.

[44] _Ministry of Grace_, 399.

[45] There are unfortunately some grave doubts as to the correct text
of Sozomen, and as to the accuracy of his computation. See what is said
by Ussher in his Dissertation _de Macedonum et Asianorum anno solari_,
c. 2. Compare also Jerome’s Commentary on Ezekiel where the time of the
prophet’s vision (thirtieth year, fourth month, _fifth_ day, I. 1) is set
forth as corresponding to the day of the Lord’s baptism and Epiphany.
Jerome makes the fourth month ‘of the orientals’ correspond to the
January of the Romans.

[46] This view (fanciful though it seems) should not be summarily
dismissed; see Kellner, pp. 101-2.

[47] [According to Clement of Alexandria (_Strom._ i. 145, 146) the
Basilidians kept Jan. 6 as the festival of the Baptism, and it was
preceded by a Vigil. Edd.]

[48] It may interest the English student to be given a sketch of the
principal features of the Sarum Breviary and Missal in relation to the
subject of the festival. At Mattins the first three lessons are from
Isaiah (lv. 1-5, 6-12; lx. 1-7), speaking of light, and the calling of
the Gentiles. The versicle after the 1st lesson is ‘and the nations,
shall walk in thy light, and kings in the brightness of thy rising.’ The
response and versicle after the 2nd lesson touch on the gifts of gold
and incense from Saba; ‘the kings of the Arabs and of Saba shall bring
gifts’; and this note is sounded again and again. The 4th, 5th and 6th
lessons are from a sermon of St Leo, and the responses and versicles
relate to the visit of the Magi. In the response and versicle to the 7th
lesson the baptism of Christ is recounted; and subsequently there are
several references to the baptism. The collect is solely confined to the
thought of the revelation of God’s only begotten Son to the Gentiles by
the guiding of a star; and this is the dominant (though not exclusive)
feature of the rest of the service. During the octave the baptism is
given greater prominence; and on the octave itself the miracle at Cana
has an important place, as well as the baptism. In the Missal the propers
are confined to the revelation to the Gentiles and the visit of the Magi.
But on the octave and the Sunday within the octave the baptism of Christ
forms the leading thought.

[49] Duchesne, _Chr. Worship_, E. tr., 266 f., where certain variations
in the Armenian and Nestorian Kalendars are exhibited.

[50] Possibly ‘the Baptist’ is a bungle of the transcriber.

[51] [On these commemorations of St James and St John see further C. L.
Feltoe in _J. Th. St._ x. 589 f. Edd.]

[52] The Hieronymian Martyrology is a mechanical and unintelligent
piecing together of Eastern and Western lists, to which African additions
were made as late as A.D. 600. Its origin has been investigated by De
Rossi and Duchesne, V. de Buck and Achelis: see Wordsworth’s _Ministry of
Grace_, p. 66.

[53] _Cathemerinon_, Hymnus XII.

[54] _De Corona_, 3.

[55] _Contra Celsum_, VIII. 22.

[56] _Les Vies des Saints_ (Paris, 1739), II. 4.

[57] _Serm._ 197, 198.

[58] This is so as regards the text printed by Muratori; but in Menard’s
text there is a benediction that in its language is not unlike the
collect in the Book of Common Prayer.

[59] _De Eccl. Off._ I. 40, 41.

[60] In Dom Cabrol’s _Les Origines liturgiques_ (Appendice C.) will be
found an interesting collection of liturgical passages illustrating the
Church’s protest against idolatry on the Kalends of January.

[61] _De Orat._ 18.

[62] _Concil. Carthag._ III. c. 29.

[63] _Ep._ LIV. 7, _ad Januarium_. The well-known passage in Socrates
(_H.E._ v. 22) seems to indicate that he believed that, excluding
Alexandria, the Egyptians and the inhabitants of the Thebais _ordinarily_
partook of the mysteries in the evening after a full meal.

[64] Spelman (_Glossarium Archaeologicum_, s.v.) derives our _Maundy_
from _maund_, ‘a basket,’ because gifts for the poor were carried in
baskets; and this derivation has attained some popularity. But there is
little to support it. In Germany from the later mediaeval period _Der
grüne Donnerstag_ (Green Thursday) has been the popular name of the day.
No entirely satisfactory explanation of the term has been offered. There
is no question that in several German churches green vestments were worn
by the priest and his ministers at the Mass of Maundy Thursday.

[65] _Chr. Worship_, E. tr., p. 248. See also Cabrol, _Les Origines
liturgiques_, pp. 173 f.

[66] See Luke ix. 51.

[67] _Epist._ LIV. 1, _ad Januarium_.

[68] Ἡ ἁγία Μεταμόρφωσις.

[69] In 1892 the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of
America introduced into its Prayer Book the Transfiguration (Aug. 6) as a
red-letter day with proper Lessons, Collect, Epistle, and Gospel.

[70] _De Corona_, 3.

[71] _c. Celsum_, VIII. 22.

[72] On the date of this Church Order, see Maclean, _Ancient Church
Orders_, p. 163 f.

[73] See Wilson’s edit. 129-131.

[74] For details the student may consult Baillet, tom. IX. ii. 152-158.

[75] Twysden’s _Decem. Scriptores_, col. 1383.

[76] The date of this Council is sometimes placed as early as A.D. 656.

[77] [See esp. the _Protevangelium Jacobi_. Edd.]

[78] In the printed Sarum books the Assumption was a ‘principal double’;
the Purification and Nativity ‘greater doubles’; and the Annunciation a
‘lesser double.’

[79] For these, and varieties as to the day of observance, see Grotefend,
_Zeitrechnung des deutsch. Mittelalters u. der Neuzeit_.

[80] [See the _Protevangelium_ (cc. 7, 8). Edd.]

[81] [See however Gasquet and Bishop, _Bosworth Psalter_, pp. 49 f. Edd.]

[82] [This legend also appears in the _Protevangelium_ (cc. 1-5). Edd.]

[83] [Gasquet and Bishop, _Bosworth Psalter_, pp. 43 ff. Edd.]

[84] _Summa_, P. III. qu. 27, art. 2.

[85] Both these constitutions will be found in the _Common Extravagants_,
lib. iii. tit. 12.

[86] See p. 135.

[87] [See the prayer in Feltoe’s edition, p. 46; ‘omnipotens sempiterne
deus qui nos omnium apostolorum merita sub una tribuisti celebritate
venerari.’ Edd.]

[88] _Annales Cyprianici_, sub anno 258.

[89] In the (so-called) Hieronymian Martyrology the entry at Jan. 18 runs
‘Dedicatio Cathedrae S. Petri Apostoli, quâ primo Romae sedit.’

[90] The student may consult the scholarly article of Dr Sinker on ‘Peter
S., Festivals of’ in _D.C.A._, together with Duchesne’s _Christian
Worship_, E. tr. (pp. 277-281), Wordsworth’s _Ministry of Grace_, and
Kellner’s _Heortology_, pp. 301-308. It should be added however with
regard to Kellner that the notion that the feast is connected with the
Primacy, as distinguished from the Episcopacy of St Peter, seems to be
devoid of evidence.

[91] D’Achery’s _Spicilegium_, tom. ii. 15.

[92] [It is found in the Carthaginian Kalendar, but not in the Bucherian,
nor in that of Polemius Silvius. Edd.]

[93] Other festivals connected with St Andrew are noticed in _D.C.A._

[94] _Ministry of Grace_, 419.

[95] See Duchesne, _Chr. Worship_, E. tr. 281.

[96] See Sinker’s article in _D.C.A._

[97] For variations as to the day of observance see Baillet, and Sinker
in _D.C.A._

[98] _Serm._ 196, 287.

[99] [It is found in the Gelasian and in some forms of the Gregorian
Sacramentary. Edd.]

[100] For other variations as to the day see Sinker’s article in _D.C.A._

[101] Kellner, 313.

[102] See the Gelasian and Gregorian Sacramentaries.

[103] _Heortology_, p. 15.

[104] _Ad Uxor._ ii. 4.

[105] See for details of evidence Bingham, bk. xiii. c. 9.

[106] _Epp._ lib. v. 17.

[107] _Ep. ad Laetam_, 9.

[108] _Comment. in Matth._ XXV. 6.

[109] This letter is to be found in the _Corpus Juris Canonici,
Decretal._ lib. iii. tit. 46.

[110] Muratori, _Liturg. Rom._ II. 786-790: 702-703.

[111] _H.E._ IV. 30: III. 27.

[112] See p. 110.

[113] Euseb. _H.E._ v. 24. The words as to the forty hours are not
unattended with difficulty; but the interpretation given above is that
adopted by the soundest scholars. See Duchesne (_Christ. Worship_, E.
tr., p. 241), and the notes on the place by Valesius. The meaning is
probably that no food was partaken for forty continuous hours.

[114] _de Jejunio_, 2, 13, 14.

[115] Dionysius of Alexandria, _Ep. to Basilides_, in Feltoe, _Letters of
Dionysius of Alex._, p. 94 f.

[116] _H.E._ v. 22.

[117] The account in Socrates cannot be confidently regarded as strictly
accurate in some of its details. We cannot readily accept the statement
that the Saturdays at Rome were not fasting days.

[118] _Collat._ xxi. 25.

[119] _Liturgia Romana Vetus_ (Muratori), II. 28, 29.

[120] _Vita S. Margaritae_, c. II. § 18.

[121] See pp. 143 f.

[122] The whole subject of the Lent of the Eastern Church is very
fully dealt with by Nilles in his _Kalendarium Manuale_ and by Prince
Maximilian of Saxony in his _Praelectiones de Liturgiis Orientalibus_,
1908.

[123] See pp. 77, 80 f.

[124] Another reading is _pro populo_.

[125] _Paenitentiale_, II. xiv. 1 (Haddon and Stubbs, _Councils_, III.
202).

[126] ‘In tribus quadragesimis anni et in dominica die et in feriis
quartis et in sextis feriis conjuges continere se debent.’ Lib. xlvi. c.
11: Wasserschleben, _Die Irische Kanonensammlung_ (ed. 1885), p. 187.

[127] The Great Litany on St Mark’s day at Rome was much earlier.

[128] See _Serm._ xix. 2; lxxx. 4.

[129] For the reasons for his ingenious conjecture see _Christian
Worship_, E. tr. p. 223.

[130] See Sinker’s scholarly article ‘Ember Days’ in the _Dictionary of
Christian Antiquities_, for many valuable details.

[131] The MS. is wanting for the part before April.

[132] Can. 8 (Labbe xi. 274). It is to be observed that in the Leofric
Missal, of much earlier date, the Ember days are noted as falling in the
first week of Lent; in the week of Pentecost; in the full week before the
autumnal equinox; and in the full week before the Nativity.

[133] The study of the Martyrologies of Bede, Florus, Ado, and Usuard
has been recently approached in the true scientific spirit by Dom Henri
Quentin, of Solesmes. Manuscripts in the various libraries of Europe
have been examined and classified, and the sources of the entries traced
in most cases with great success. See this writer’s _Les Martyrologes
historiques du moyen age_ (1908).

[134] _Med. Æv. Kal._ I. 397-420.

[135] [On these terms see Ducange, _Glossarium_, s.v. _Festum_; Addis and
Arnold, _Catholic Dictionary_, art. ‘Festival.’ Edd.]

[136] The classification of festivals in the Kalendars of Germany with
Tyrol, Holland, Denmark, and Scandinavia, as printed by Grotefend, varies
much. We find such terms as ‘Triplex’ as well as ‘Duplex’ (Breslau);
‘Duplex compositum’ (Utrecht); ‘ix Psalmorum’ (Metz); ‘Bini’ (_i.e._
bini chori) at Salzburg; ‘Festa Prelatorum,’ ‘Festa Canonicorum,’ ‘Festa
vicariorum’ (Roskilde); ‘Summum’ and ‘semi-summum’ (Erfurt), and many
forms that are unfamiliar to English students.

[137] For further observations on the Kalendars of the Church of England
and of Churches in communion with it see Appendix III.

[138] See Quentin’s _Les Martyrologes historiques_, pp. 27, 28.

[139] For details see Baillet, _Les Vies des Saints_, tom. I, in his
_Discours_, pp. xxxiii.-xxxix.

[140] In the recently discovered _Testament of the Lord_, the word
‘Pascha’ is used for the season preceding Easter, even as ‘Pentecost’ is
used for the season of fifty days preceding Whitsunday.

[141] _Gute Freitag_ is found occasionally in the German Church Orders of
the Reformation Period.

[142] In Greek writers τεσσαρεσκαιδεκατῖται. [For a full discussion of
the whole question, with reference to the authorities, see V. H. Stanton,
_The Gospels as Historical Documents_, Part I., pp. 173-197. Edd.]

[143] See Eusebius, _H.E._ v. 24, where the full context scarcely leaves
a doubt that παρεχώρησεν τὴν εὐχαριστίαν must be understood in the sense
that Anicetus yielded the place of celebrant to Polycarp.

[144] _H.E._ v. 24.

[145] We do not enter upon the discussion of the question whether he
actually proceeded to the length of a formal excommunication. In certain
of his letters he undoubtedly spoke of them as ἀκοινωνήτους. Euseb.
_H.E._ v. 24.

[146] _Ibid._

[147] See the discussion by Bp Maclean, _Ancient Church Orders_ (in the
present series), p. 149 f.

[148] Lib. V. c. 7.

[149] See p. 117.

[150] See p. 118 f.

[151] _H.E._ VI. 22.

[152] Lagarde, _Analecta Syriaca_, p. 89.

[153] See Dr George Salmon’s article on ‘Hippolytus Romanus’ in Smith and
Wace’s _Dictionary of Christian Biography_.

[154] See Ludwig Ideler, _Handbuch der mathematischen u. techn.
Chronologie_, II. 219.

[155] See for a full treatment of the subject Ideler, II. 226-231.

[156] _H.E._ I. 9.

[157] In the opinion of Duchesne the controversy dealt with in A.D.
325 was between the system of Antioch, which celebrated Easter on the
Sunday next after the Jewish Pascha, and the system of Alexandria, which
insisted on Easter being always after the vernal equinox. See _Christian
Worship_, E. tr., 237.

[158] Eusebius, _Vita Const._ III. 18: Socrates _H.E._ I. 9.

[159] In French there is a trace of the more extended meaning in the
phrase ‘quinzaine de Pâques,’ meaning ‘Holy week and Easter week.’ In
Scotland and the north of England gifts of ‘pasch eggs’ (pronounced
‘paise eggs’), hard-boiled eggs stained with various colours, at Easter
are still not unknown.

[160] Hefele, _Councils_, E. tr. II. 67.

[161] For the history of the paschal controversies in the time of
Pope Leo see Bruno Krusch, _Studien zur christlich-mittelalterlichen
Chronologie. Der 84 jährige Ostercyclus und seine Quellen_ (Leipzig,
1880).

[162] See Appendix I.

[163] See Bruno Krusch, _Studien_, p. 32 f.

[164] The student who desires further details of the history of the
controversies about the date of Easter, prior to the time of Dionysius
Exiguus, may consult with profit the dissertation of Adrian Baillet in
the ninth volume of his _Les Vies des Saints_ (ed. 1739).

[165] The author died before his work was presented to the Pope, a duty
performed by his brother Antonio Lilio, who was also a physician. Now and
then we find the Gregorian Kalendar spoken of as the Lilian Kalendar.

[166] See Seabury, _The theory and use of the Church Calendar in
measurement and distribution of time_, p. 120. Other devices of the
astronomers which would reduce the error to only one day in a thousand
centuries are noticed in the same work.

[167] Sir Harris Nicholas, _Chronology of History_, pp. 32-34; Giry,
_Manuel de Diplomatique_, pp. 165-167.

[168] Notices of these Menologies will be found in Kellner’s
_Heortology_, 387-393: and on both the Menology and the Menaea (in twelve
volumes, corresponding to the months from September to August) see the
Dissertation _de libris et officiis ecclesiasticis Graecorum_ appended to
Cave’s _Historia Literaria_.

[169] Nilles’ _Kalendarium Manuale_, tom I., and Prince Maximilian’s
_Praelectiones_, pp. 122-221, may be consulted by the curious.

[170] The great doxology corresponds substantially to _Gloria in
excelsis_; and the little doxology to _Gloria Patri_, etc.

[171] See _Suicer’s Thesaurus_, s.v.

[172] The 318 bishops at Nicaea in A.D. 325.

[173] p. 84.

[174] See Neale’s _Holy Eastern Church_, II. pp. 743, 749, 753.

[175] See Gee and Hardy, _Documents illustrative of the history of the
Church of England_, pp. 150, 173.

[176] See V. Staley’s _The Liturgical Year_, where the Kalendar of the
Church of England is treated with much fulness.




INDEX

[_See also Table of Contents_, p. vii.]


  Abyssinian Kalendar, see Kalendar

  Ado, martyrology of xvi, 93, 94

  Advent, observance of 76 ff.

  Agnes, St, octave of 20, 71

  Akathist, sabbath of 144

  Alexandria, church of, its authority in settling date of Easter 121

  All Saints (Allhallen), festival of 23, 149;
    Sunday of 91, 141;
    vigil of 75

  All Souls’ Day xiii, 24

  Ambrosian rite 77

  _anarguroi_, see Unmercenary

  Anatolius, Paschal cycle of 115

  Andrew, St, commemoration of 17, 19, 22, 63 f., 137;
    octave of 71;
    relation of Advent to festival of 79

  Anna, St, conception of, see Mary, festivals of

  Annunciation, see Mary, festivals of

  Antipasch 141, 142

  Antiphons, in Advent 78 f.

  Apocreos, Sunday of 84, 141, 143;
    Sabbath of 144

  _Apodosis_ 71, 135

  Apostles, commemoration of 22, 58 ff.;
    Fast of the 90 f.;
    Synaxis of the Twelve 58, 139;
    Seventy 70, 138, 139

  Apostolic Canons 6, 111

  Apostolic Constitutions 6, 111

  _Aratschavor-atz_ 92

  Armenians, their observance of Epiphany and Christmas 32, 38;
    rules of fasting 78, 91 f.;
    Kalendar of 36, 43, 147 f.

  Artziburion 92

  Ascension, commemoration of 18, 42 f., 135, 149

  Ascetics, Sabbath of 144

  Ash Wednesday 82, 83 f.

  Asiatics, commemoration of the Pascha by 106 ff.

  Assumption, see Mary, festivals of


  Baptism, of Christ, commemoration of 30, 31 n., 32, 139 f.

  Barnabas, St, commemoration of 70, 150

  Baronius, Cardinal 103

  Bartholomew, St, commemoration of 68

  Basilian Menology, see Menology

  Basilidians, festival of Baptism of Christ kept by 31

  Becket, Thomas, institution of festival of Trinity by 46;
    feasts of his martyrdom and translation 150

  Bede, martyrology of xvi, 23, 49, 62, 69, 70, 93, 94

  Borromeo, Charles 83


  Candlemas, meaning of 48;
    festival of, see Purification

  _caput jejunii_ 83

  _Cara cognatio_, pagan solemnity of 61

  Celtic churches, Paschal cycle of 122, 146

  Charlemagne, _Capitula_ of 86

  Christmas, see Nativity

  Circumcision, feast of 22 f., 37 ff., 135, 147

  _claves quadragesimae, Paschae, Rogationum_ 102

  Clavius, see Schlüssel

  _Coena Domini_ 40

  Conception, see Mary, feasts of

  Constantine, letter of, on Paschal question 111 f., 117 ff.

  Coptic Kalendar, see Kalendar

  Corbie Kalendar 71

  Corpus Christi, feast of xiv, 98;
    octave of 72

  Cross, Holy, adoration of 41 f.;
    Sunday of Adoration of 141;
    Exaltation of 22, 99, 135, 142,
      (a fast in Eastern Church) 91;
    Invention of 99;
    Procession of 25

  Cyprian, St, Paschal cycle attributed to 115;
    commemoration of, in English Prayer Book 152


  Dead, Sabbath of 144

  Decollation, see John Baptist

  _depositiones_, of martyrs and bishops 14, 16, 17

  _dies caniculares_ 101

  _dies profestus_ 74, 87

  Dionysius of Alexandria, Paschal cycle of 115

  Dionysius Exiguus, Paschal cycle of 123, 124 f.

  _dominica carnisprivii_, see Apocreos

  _dominica in albis_ 142

  Dominical Kalendar, of Orthodox Eastern Church 140 ff.

  _Dormitio_, see Mary, feasts of

  Doxology, the great and the little 137


  Easter, regulations for date of 15, 111 f., 122 ff.
    See also Pascha, Paschal cycle etc.;
      octave of 71, 72

  Edward, St, the Confessor, feast and translation of 99

  Egbert, Abp, Pontifical of 69

  Elias of Nisibis 113

  Ember Days, meaning of term 90.
    See Fasts

  English Prayer Book, see Prayer Book

  Enurchus, St 151

  Epiphany, feast of 17, 20, 23, 30 f., 135, 139;
    octave of 71, 72, 135

  Ethiopic Kalendar, see Kalendar

  Evangelists, commemoration of 65 ff.


  Fasts, in Advent 78;
    before Easter (Lent) 79 ff.;
    after Pentecost 85, 92, 147;
    Rogation days 86;
    of four seasons (Ember Days) 18 f., 87 ff.;
    of vigils 74 f.;
    of Eastern Church 90 f.;
    of Nineveh 91 f., 147

  _feria_, meaning of term 8

  _festa chori, festa fori_ xix

  Festal Letters, see Paschal Epistles

  Festivals, rank and dignity of 98 f.

  Florus, martyrology of xvi, 93, 94

  Friday, Christian observance of 10 f.;
    fast in Advent 78;
    a fast in Eastern Church 91, 140;
    commemoration of Saints among East Syrians on 147


  Gabriel, archangel, Synaxis of 139, 140

  Galesini, Pietro, martyrology of 103

  gang-days 87

  Gelasian Sacramentary, see Sacramentary

  _Gellonense_, see Martyrologies

  George, St, commemoration of 21, 23, 136, 149

  Good Friday 41 f., 107

  Gorman, martyrology of 95

  Gothic Missal 65

  Gregorian reform, see Kalendar

  Gregory the Great 77, 82

  Gregory XIII, Pope, his scheme for a fixed Easter xviii;
    appoints a commission to revive Martyrology 103;
    his reform of Kalendar 127 ff.


  Hieromartyr 138

  Hippolytus, Paschal Tables of 111, 112 ff.;
    statue of 112

  Holy Thursday, see Ascension

  Holy Week, observance of 40 ff.

  Horologium 103

  Hosiomartyr 138

  Hypapante, see Purification


  Immaculate Conception, see Mary, feasts of

  Innocent III, Pope, rules of, concerning vigils 74 f.

  Innocents, Holy, commemoration of 17, 19, 22, 33 ff.

  Irenaeus, letter of, to Victor of Rome 79, 110

  Irish canons, collection of 85 f.

  _Isapostolos_ 138


  James, St, son of Zebedee, commemoration of 17, 34, 36, 64 f.

  James, St, the Lord’s brother, commemoration of 34, 36, 67.
    See also Philip and James

  James and John, SS., commemoration of 16, 33 f., 65

  January, Kalends of, observed as a fast 38 f.

  Jerome, see Martyrologies (Hieronymian)

  John Baptist, St, commemoration of 17, 18, 21, 34;
    Conception of 53, 139;
    Nativity of 18, 68, 135, 139, 149;
    Decollation of 18, 69, 135, 139, (a fast) 91;
    Synaxis of 139, 140;
    East Syrian commemoration of 148;
    vigil of Nativity of 75

  John, St, the Evangelist, commemoration of 17, 19, 22, 33 f., 65, 75,
      136;
    before the Latin Gate 21, 66;
    Migration (or Assumption) of 34, 65, 136

  Jude, St (Thaddaeus), commemorated in Greek Church 67


  Kalendar, causes of growth of xii f., 95 ff.;
    antiquarian notices in 100, 102;
    artificial construction of xii;
    astronomical notes in 101;
    influences affecting 97 f.;
    marks of antiquity in 13;
    value of, for study of MSS 95 f.;
    Gregorian reform of 125 ff.;
    Bucherian (Liberian, or Philocalian) 14, 28, 31, 38, 59, 63 n.;
    Carthaginian 16, 31, 34, 38, 63 n.;
    of Polemius Silvius, 16, 63 n.;
    Abyssinian 148;
    Armenian 147;
    Coptic 148;
    East Syrian 147;
    of English Prayer Books 149 ff.;
    Ethiopic 148;
    Mozarabic 36;
    of Orthodox Eastern Church 133 ff.
    See also Martyrologies, Sacramentary

  Kings, the Three, Translation of 97, 100

  Kollyba, Sabbath of 144

  Koryphaeoi 135


  Lawrence, St, octave of 71;
    vigil of 75

  Lazarus, Sabbath of 135, 144

  Lent, observance of 79 ff., 141 ff.

  Leo, St, correspondence of, on Paschal limits 120 f., 124;
    Sacramentary of, see Sacramentary

  Leofric Missal 69, 97

  Lights, Feast of (Epiphany) 30 f., 142

  Lilio, Luigi, reformation of Kalendar by 127

  Litanies, origin of 86 f.;
    at Rome 67

  Lord, festivals of the, xii, 27 ff.

  Lord’s Day, Christian observance of xi, 3 f., 5, 6, 7, 10, 37;
    vigil preceding 73.
    See also Dominical Kalendar

  Luke, St, commemoration of 17, 66

  Lupercalia, heathen festival of 48


  Maccabees, commemoration of 16, 17, 25 f.

  Mamertus, bishop of Vienne, rogations appointed by 86

  Margaret, Queen of Scotland 83

  Mark, St, commemoration of 66 f.

  Martyrologies, use of term 93 f.;
    influence on later Kalendars 94;
    marks of antiquity in 13;
    Bucherian (Liberian or Philocalian) 14;
    Carthaginian 16 f.;
    Syrian 15, 65;
    _Gellonense_ 62, 70;
    Hieronymian 34, 63, 65, 66, 69, 70;
    modern Roman 103.
    See also Ado, Bede, Florus, Usuard, and Kalendar

  Martyrs, days of, observed locally xi, 12 ff., (at cemeteries) 24;
    Acts of, read in churches 17;
    oblations offered for 14

  Mary, St, the Virgin (Theotokos), feasts of xv, 47 ff., 148;
    Annunciation of 21, 49 f., 57, 135, 140, 147;
    Assumption (_dormitio_, Repose) of 22, 51, 57, 75, 135,
      (fast before) 75, 90;
    Conception of xiv f., 52 ff., 57, 98;
    Immaculate Conception of 52 ff.;
    Nativity of 22, 50, 51 n., 57, 135, 140;
    Presentation of 51, 57, 135;
    Synaxis of Theotokos 57, 139, 140.
    See also Purification

  Mary Magdalene, St, commemoration of 69 f.;
    the ‘myrrh-bearer’ 69;
    in English Prayer Book 70, 150, 151

  Matthew. St, commemoration of 66

  Matthias, St, commemoration of, in English Prayer Book 150

  Maundy Thursday (_dies mandati_), observance of 40 f.;
    meaning of term 41 n.

  Maurolico, Francesco, martyrology of 103

  Melito, Bp of Sardis, defence of Asiatic Paschal observance by 108 f.

  Menology, character of early Eastern 133;
    of Constantinople 133;
    Basilian 30, 133

  Michael, St, Synaxis of 137, 139;
    monthly commemoration of, by Ethiopic Church 148

  _missa ad prohibendum ab idolis_ 39

  Montanists, celebration of Pascha by 28 f.

  Mozarabic rite 77, 83

  Myrrh-bearers, Sunday of 141, 142.
    See also Mary Magdalene


  _natale, dies natalis, natalitia_ 13, 15, 67

  _natale Calicis_ 15, 40

  _natale Petri de Cathedra_, see Peter, St

  _natalis Solis Invicti_ 30

  Nativity, of the Lord (Christmas), feast of 15, 17, 19, 22, 27 f., 49,
      76, 135, 140, 147, 148;
    origin of feast of 29 f.;
    octave of 71, 72;
    fast before 90;
    vigil of 75

  Nicaea, Council of, decisions of, on Paschal question 116 f.;
    commemoration of the 318 fathers of 141, 143


  Octaves, meaning of term 70 f.;
    history of 71

  Oengus, the Culdee, martyrology of 95

  Old Testament worthies, commemoration of xii, 134, 136, 148

  Orthodoxy Sunday xiii, 141, 142

  _O sapientia_ 78 f.


  Palm Sunday (Feast of Palms) 40, 84, 135, 141

  Parasceve 10, 11, 37, 144 f.

  Pascha, original use of term 104 ff.;
    Christian commemoration of xi, 37, 104 ff.;
    _dies Paschae_ 40

  Paschal Cycles, of Hippolytus 111, 112 ff.;
    of Dionysius Al. 115;
    of Anatolius 115;
    Roman 123;
    Alexandrine 123;
    of Victorius 124;
    of Dionysius Exiguus 123, 124 f.

  Paschal Epistles xviii, 121

  Paschal limits 120 f.

  Paschal question xvii, 105 ff.

  Paschal Tables, see Paschal Cycles

  Passiontide, observance of 40 ff.

  Paul, St, commemoration of 21, 33;
    Conversion of 69;
    Translation of 69.
    See also Peter and Paul

  Pentecost, meaning of term 43 ff.;
    observance of 18, 37, 43 ff., 135, 141;
    octave of 71, 72;
    vigil of 75

  Peter, St, commemoration of 33;
    Chains of (_ad Vincula_) 21, 25, 63;
    Chair of (_Cathedra Petri_) 15, 59, 60 ff.;
    Dedication of Basilica of 18, 63

  Peter and Paul, SS., commemoration of 16, 18, 21, 34, 35, 135;
    _depositio_ of 16;
    origin of festival of xiii, 59 f.;
    fast before 90;
    octave of 71

  Philip, the deacon 67

  Philip, St, feast of 67, 78;
    fast of 78

  Philip and James, SS., commemoration of 21, 67, 75

  Pliny, letter of, to Trajan 72

  Polycarp, St, conference of, with Anicetus on Paschal question 108

  Polycrates, letter of, on Paschal controversy 109

  _Polyeleos_ 136

  Pontius Pilate, commemorated by Ethiopians 148

  Prayer Book, American 43, 153;
    English (1549, 1552) 70, 101, 150,
      (1559) 101, 150,
      (1604) 151,
      (1662) 79, 151;
    Irish 153;
    Latin (1560) 150;
    Scottish (1637) 79, 153

  _Preces Privatae_ (1564) 151

  Pre-sanctified, Mass of 42

  Presentation, of the Lord in Temple 48, 147.
    See also Purification;
    of St Mary, see Mary, feasts of

  Primer, of Edward VI 101

  _Prodromos_ 138

  _proheortia_ 43, 135

  _Protevangelium Jacobi_ 50 n., 52 n., 53 n.

  Purification (Hypapante, Candlemas), feast of 20, 23, 47 ff., 51 n.,
      57, 101, 135, 140, 149


  _Quadragesima, ante Pascha_ (Lent) 80 f., 85;
    of St Martin 77, 85;
    after Pentecost 85;
    before St John Baptist 85 f.
    See also Fasts

  Quartodecimans 107

  Quinquagesima 84


  Rabanus Maurus, martyrology of 69, 95

  Relics, translation of, as affecting Kalendars 97

  Requiem masses, prohibited within certain octaves, 72

  Rogation Days, origin of 86 f.

  Roman Breviary and Missal 63, 71

  Roman Kalendar 52


  Sabbath, see Saturday

  Sacramentary, Gallican 77;
    Gothic-Gallican 77;
    Gelasian 20, 39, 58, 64, 66, 68;
    Gregorian 20 f., 33, 39, 49, 66, 68, 69, 83;
    Leonine 18 f., 42, 58, 64, 66, 68, 88 f.

  Samaria, woman of (Photina), commemorated xii, 141

  Sarum, Breviary 32, 51, 52;
    _Enchiridion_ 51 f.;
    Missal 32, 51

  Saturday (or Sabbath), Christian observance of 2, 4 ff.;
    special observances of, in Greek Church 144;
    Great Sabbath 6, 40, 144

  Schlüssel, Christopher, reformation of Kalendar by 127

  Seventy Apostles (disciples) 70, 138, 139

  Sexagesima 84

  _Silvia, Pilgrimage_ of xvi, 27, 40, 42, 48, 72, 73, 82

  Simon and Jude, SS., commemoration of, 67

  Simon Zelotes, St, commemorated in Greek Church 67

  Station (_statio_) 11

  Stephen, St, commemoration of 16, 17, 18 n., 22, 33, 34

  Style, New, history of adoption of 130 ff.

  Sunday, see Lord’s Day

  _supputatio Romana_ 123

  Synaxis, use of term in Eastern Kalendars 139

  Syrians, East, Kalendar of 147 f.


  Tessarakoste, use of term 80, 90 f.

  Thaddaeus, see Jude

  _thaumaturgos_ 138

  Theodore, of Canterbury, _Paenitentiale_ of 85

  Theodore Tyro, St, 144

  Theometor, Theopator, 139

  Theophany, see Epiphany

  _theophorus_ 137

  Theotokos, see Mary, feasts of

  Thomas, St, commemoration of 67 f.

  Three hundred and eighteen, see Nicaea

  Transfiguration, commemoration of 43, 135

  Trinity Sunday, observance of 45 f.

  Tyrinis or Tyrophagus (Sunday) 84, 141, 143


  Unmercenary saints 139

  Usuard, martyrology of xvi, 49, 62, 67, 93, 94, 95


  Victor, Bp of Rome, attitude of, on Paschal question 109 f.

  Victorius of Aquitaine, Paschal cycle of 124

  Vigils, origin of 72 ff.;
    rules for 74 f.;
    at Ember seasons 88

  Votive masses, prohibited within certain octaves 72


  Wednesday, observance of 10 f.;
    fast in Advent 78;
    a fast in Eastern Church 91, 140

  Week, Jewish and Christian 2;
    first day of, see Lord’s Day;
    Great, see Holy Week

  Weigel, Erhard, Kalendar of 131


  Ximenes, Cardinal 83


  ἀνάληψις 42


  μεταμόρφωσις 43


  παρασκευή 10

  πάσχα ἀναστάσιμον 119

  πάσχα σταυρώσιμον 119

  πεντηκοστάριον 143


  τεσσαρακοστή 80

  τεσσαρεσκαιδεκατῖται 107

  τριῴδιον 143


CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.





End of Project Gutenberg's The Church Year and Kalendar, by John Dowden