The last chapter has carried us down to the end of the fourth century A.D. For some time back the Roman Empire had been showing signs of disintegration. Already the three sons of Constantine had divided the imperial power among themselves; but the rule thus severed had again been united in the person of Constantius. In 395, however, the emperor Theodosius died, and left the empire of the world to be parted between his two sons, Arcadius and Honorius.

It would be outside our scope to enter into the details of the far-reaching consequences of this great event. For our present purpose it is sufficient to state that, with the empire in which it had been born and nurtured, the church was divided into two parts, which were thenceforth to {25} develop independently, now in parallel, now in widely divergent lines.

It will be convenient to regard the first chapter as dealing with the period between the institution of Christianity and the partition of the Roman Empire; and in the present chapter to discuss the interval between the latter event and the accession of Charles the Great. We thereby divide the history into two epochs of approximately four centuries each, with characteristics sufficiently well marked to distinguish one from the other. Following Marriott, we shall name the first the primitive, the second the transitional period. We have seen that there is no evidence that vestments of any definite form were prescribed for use during the former epoch; we shall see in the present chapter how vestment-usage rapidly developed in the churches of the West till it culminated in the gorgeous enrichment of mediaeval times.

Although the differences between the vestments of the Western and the Eastern churches consist largely in matters of detail, they are sufficiently conspicuous, and their histories are sufficiently divergent, to render their independent treatment advisable. We shall therefore postpone the discussion of the latter till we have investigated the evolution and subsequent elaboration of the former.

The empire to which Honorius succeeded consisted {26} of Italy, Spain, Gaul, and Britain. Although the evidence which is extant does not permit us to trace completely the history of vestments throughout this period, yet from scattered documents we are able to see that for the most part the development of ecclesiastical costume proceeded on the same lines throughout this vast area.

Ritual in matters of dress had rapidly been growing. Pope Celestine, who occupied the Roman See from 423 till 432, found it necessary to write a sharp letter to the Bishops of Vienne and Narbonne for \'devoting themselves rather to superstitious observances in dress than to purity of heart and faith.\' Certain monks, it appears, had attained to episcopal rank, but had retained their ascetic costume. Some of Celestine\'s sentences are very striking in this connection; and although they refer primarily to outdoor costume, we cannot but think that, in a later age, when the regulations governing the ritual uses of vestments had been formulated, and the vestments themselves had been elaborated to their ultimate form, the force of his words would have been somewhat modified. \'By dressing in a cloak [pallium],\' he says, \'and by girding themselves with a girdle, they think to fulfil the truth of Scripture, not in the spirit, but in the letter. For if these precepts were given to the end that they should be obeyed in this wise, why do they not likewise that which {27} follows, and carry burning lights in their hands as well as their pastoral staves? We should be distinguished from the common people, or from all others, by our learning, not by our dress; by our habit of life, not by our clothing; by the purity of our minds, not by the cut of our garments. For if we begin to introduce novelties, we shall trample under foot the usage which our fathers have handed down to us, and give place to vain superstitions.\'

The fullest information on the subject of vestments during this period comes from Spain, in the oft-quoted acts of the fourth council of Toledo, which sat under the presidency of St Isidore of Seville in the year 633. Of the canons which were drawn up at this council that which is of the highest importance in this inquiry is the twenty-eighth, although it is not directly connected with vestment-usage. It provides for the case of a cleric who had been unjustly degraded from his order, and ordains that such a one, if he be found innocent in a subsequent synod, \'cannot be reinstated in his former position unless he regain his lost dignities before the altar, at the hands of a bishop. If he be a bishop, he must receive the orarium,[15] ring, and staff; if a priest, the orarium {28} and planeta; if a deacon, the orarium and alba; if a subdeacon, the paten and chalice, and similarly for the other orders—they must receive, on their restoration, whatever they received on their ordination.\'[16]

On the principle which is all but universal, that the clergy of the higher orders added the insignia of the lower orders to those of their own, we are enabled by the help of this act to draw up a table of the vestments recognised in Spain, which shows at a glance the manner in which they were distributed among the different orders of clergy:

    Alba: worn by all alike.
    Orarium: worn by deacons, priests, and bishops.
    Planeta: worn by priests and bishops.
    Ring and staff: exclusively for bishops.

Some letters of Gregory the Great (Bishop of Rome 590-604) give us particulars relating to {29} three other vestments not in general use throughout the church. These are the dalmatica, the mappula, and the pallium. Lastly, an anonymous MS. of uncertain date[17] enumerates the pallium, casula, manualia, vestimentum, alba, and stola as the vestments worn in the Gallican Church. It is to be regretted that none of the British authors of the period have preserved any record of contemporary vestment-usage in this country; we have, however, no reason to suppose that it differed from that of the Continent.

Let us now take each of the above vestments in order, and collect whatever information is obtainable upon their appearance and history, comparing each in turn with its supposed Roman prototype.

I. The Alba.—This word is the abbreviated form of the full name, tunica alba, by which a flowing tunic of white linen was denoted. It appears that the first use of this word as a technical term for a special robe is in a passage of Trebellius Pollio (in Claud., xiv, xvii), who {30} speaks of an alba subserica, mentioned in a letter sent from Valerian to Zosimio, Procurator of Syria, about 260-270 A.D. In the 41st canon of the fourth council of Carthage (circa 400 A.D.)[18] we meet with the first use of this word in an ecclesiastical connection, in one of the earliest (if not the earliest) regulations ever passed to govern the ritual usage of vestments. This ordains that the deacon shall wear an alba only \'tempore oblationis tantum vel lectionis.\'

The constant evidence of contemporary pictures indicates that the alba was a long, full, and flowing vesture. In this respect it differed from the Mosaic tunic, on the one hand, and the mediaeval alb on the other. Both these vestments fitted closely to the body for reasons of convenience, for a flowing tunic would obviously hamper the Levitical priest in the discharge of his sacrificial duties, and would not sit comfortably under the vestments with which it was overlaid in mediaeval times.

Nearly two centuries after the fourth council of Carthage we find the first council of Narbonne (A.D. 589) enacting that \'neither deacon nor subdeacon, nor yet the lector, shall presume to put off his alba till after mass is over.\'[19] To this {31} canon, which was clearly framed to check some tendency to irregularity that had become noticeable in the celebration of mass, we are indebted for two facts: first, that ritual usage in vestments was now firmly established; and second, that the alba was the dress of the minor orders of clergy. This latter point is not clearly brought out in the Toletan canon already quoted.

Of the garments worn in everyday life by the Roman citizen, the innermost was the tunica talaris, or long tunic. This article of dress was white, usually of wool; it was passed over the head and reached to the feet, the epithet talaris (\'reaching to the ankles\') being employed to distinguish it, as the tunic of ceremony, from the short tunics worn when freedom was required for active exertion.[20] It fitted tolerably closely to the body, though it was sufficiently loose to require a girdle to confine it. The tunics of senators and equites were distinguished by two bands of purple, in the former case broad (lati clavi), in the latter narrow (angusti clavi), which passed from the sides of the aperture for the head down to the lower hem of the garment.

A comparison of the ecclesiastical tunica alba with the civil tunica talaris will bring out some remarkable points of resemblance. Both were {32} worn in the same manner, and both reached to the feet; it is true that the ecclesiastical dress was slightly fuller than the civil, but this was necessary, as room was required underneath the alba for the wearer\'s everyday dress. Further, we find ecclesiastics represented in ancient frescoes wearing albae which actually show ornaments disposed like the clavi of the tunica talaris. These clavi were early employed by the Christians to distinguish, by their relative width, the representations of Our Lord from those of the Apostles, or to discriminate between the figures of ecclesiastics of different orders.

It is also important to notice that the alba is invariably furnished with tight sleeves reaching to the wrist. The tunic was originally a sleeveless garment; but with the growth of luxury, a new kind provided with sleeves gradually came into favour. These two forms of tunic were distinguished by different names: the older or sleeveless tunic was called colobium, a Latinization of the Greek name κολόβιον;[21] and the latter or sleeved tunic was named tunica manicata or tunica dalmatica, from the name of the province to which its invention was ascribed.

In the early days of Rome the use of a tunica dalmatica stamped the wearer with the stigma of effeminacy and utter want of self-respect. The {33} parents of Cornelius Scipio and of Fabius are said to have openly disgraced them in their boyhood, as a punishment ad corrigendos mores, by compelling them to appear in public in this attire. The despicable emperors Commodus and Elagabalus offended all persons of good taste by coming out before all the people in the same costume: the latter impudently calling himself another Scipio or Fabius, in reference to the incident just related.[22] This, however, cannot mean that the scandal lay in the adoption of the luxurious tunica dalmatica in preference to the colobium (for Rome in the time of Elagabalus was too deeply steeped in luxury and vice to feel shocked at an Emperor merely preferring an under-garment with sleeves to one without those appendages); it rather consisted in his neglecting to put on his pallium, or outer dress, over it. In fact, the tunica dalmatica must have quite ousted its severer rival in popular favour by the time of Elagabalus: for we find that in 258, only thirty-six years after the death of that emperor, St Cyprian of Carthage wore a tunica dalmatica, over which was a byrrhus, or cloak, when led out to martyrdom.[23] It is absurd to suppose that Cyprian, on such a solemn occasion, {34} would have assumed a merely luxurious garment, and equally absurd to imagine that he would have worn ecclesiastical vestments at the time, as some commentators on the passage have held. There remains only one other alternative—that the tunica dalmatica was the form of tunic which was in regular use at the time, and this seems quite the most satisfactory hypothesis.

The most important mention of the tunica dalmatica in connection with ecclesiastical matters is in the decree of Sylvester, Bishop of Rome, 253-257. That prelate ordained \'that deacons should use the dalmatica in the church, and that their left hands should be covered with a cloth of mingled wool and linen.\'[24] Various authors supplement this passage; thus, the anonymous author of the tract \'De Divinis Officiis,\' formerly attributed to Alcuin, tells us that \'the use of dalmaticae was instituted by Pope Sylvester, for previously colobia had been worn.\'[25]

Much importance has been attached to this decree. It is regarded as an additional and incontrovertible proof that ecclesiastical vestments {35} were in use in the primitive church. But on examination, however, it will be found no more to bear such a construction than St Paul\'s request for his φαιλόνη. The ordinance merely shows that Sylvester had a laudable desire to improve the aesthetics of public worship, and, with this end in view, decreed that thenceforward ecclesiastics should all wear the tunica dalmatica—which had quite outgrown its early evil reputation, and must be admitted to have been a better-looking garment than the scanty and somewhat undignified colobium. It is not at all improbable that many of the clergy wore dalmaticae even before Sylvester\'s edict: in this case the edict would have the additional advantage of securing uniformity.

All attempts to set up the dalmatica as a separate vestment in early times fail hopelessly. It is unknown to the drafters of the Toletan canons, and no early representation of an ecclesiastic is extant having two vestments visible under the planeta.[26] This would certainly be the case if the two were independent vestments. It is true that St Isidore of Seville wrote, \'Dalmatica vestis primum in Dalmatia provincia Graecia texta est sacerdotalis, candida cum clavis ex purpura;\'[27] (the dalmatica is a priestly vestment first made in {36} Dalmatia, a province of Greece, white with purple clavi); but the concluding words show that he was merely thinking of the alba under its more specific name, dalmatica.

A brief recapitulation of this somewhat lengthy argument may not be out of place. Two forms of tunic may be said to have contended one with another for the favour of the Roman people—the sleeveless colobium and the sleeved dalmatica. The latter ultimately gained the victory; and the decree of Pope Sylvester, commanding all ecclesiastics under his authority to assume it in place of the former, finally established its use in the church. Now, when we find that, two or three centuries after Sylvester\'s time, a vestment was worn by ecclesiastics in Divine service identical with the tunica dalmatica in almost every respect, even to the presence of the clavi, which (in the secular dress) indicated the rank of the wearer, it is only natural to regard the one as directly derived from the other.

There is one other point of importance in the history of this vestment in the transitional period. It was found that such a flowing garment as the alba seriously incommoded the priest on some occasions, particularly in administering baptism by immersion. Accordingly, an alba fitting closely to the body was invented for use on such occasions, and is represented in certain MS. illuminations, {37} particularly a ninth-century pontifical now in the St Minerva Library at Rome. The special importance of this point is due to the fact that this baptismal alba was probably the immediate parent of the mediaeval alb; the closer vestment being found more convenient on other occasions as well as that of baptism, and having gradually become adopted in all the other offices of the Church as well.
ill-p037

Fig. 2.—A Bishop administering Baptism.

II. The Orarium.—Both this vestment and the name by which it was known have given much trouble to scholars. The following list of the various derivations which have been suggested for the word orarium (arranged in order of probability) is not uninteresting:
{38}

    1. Ora, because used to wipe the face.
    2. Orare, because used in prayer.
    3. ὥρα, because it indicated the time of the different parts of the service.
    4. ὡραΐζειν, because the deacon was beautified with it.
    5. Ora (a coast), because (alleged to have been) originally the edging of a lost garment.
    6. ὁράω, because the sight of it indicated whether a priest or deacon was ministering (!).

There can be little doubt that the first is the true etymology. The others are all more or less fanciful; and the orarium was certainly employed originally as a scarf. Ambrose speaks of the face of the dead Lazarus being bound with an orarium; and Augustine uses the same word to indicate a bandage employed to tie up a wounded eye.

Numerous effigies of late date are extant which exhibit a kind of scarf, passing over the left shoulder diagonally downwards to the right side, and fastened under the right arm. As Albertus Rubenius long ago pointed out, these scarves must not be confused with the clavi which ornamented the tunics of senators and equites; for they are worn over the pallium, or outer garment, and are disposed in a manner quite different from that in which the clavi fall.

What, then, are these scarves? The answer to this question is supplied by Flavius Vopiscus in his Life of Aurelian, who, he says, \'was the first to grant oraria to the Roman people, to be worn as {39} favours.\'[28] Now, the references which we have just made to Ambrose and Augustine—not to mention others which might equally well be quoted—show that the oraria, whatever may have been the method in which they were worn, must have been narrow strips of some kind of cloth. These peculiar scarves, which are to be seen on certain monuments, do not appear on any effigy dating before the time of Aurelian; the natural inference, therefore, is that the scarves which we see thus represented are actually the oraria, granted to the Roman people by that emperor and his successors. If this argument be not valid, then it is impossible to say either what these scarves really are, or what was the true appearance of the civil orarium.

It is probable that considerable laxity existed in the manner of wearing the ecclesiastical orarium, for the fourth Council of Toledo thought it necessary to enact a special canon to regulate the method in which this vestment should be disposed. The fortieth act of this assembly restricts the number of oraria to one, and enjoins that deacons should wear the orarium over the left shoulder, leaving the right side free so as to facilitate the {40} execution of their duties in Divine service.[29] This act also provides that the diaconal orarium should be plain, not ornamented with gold or embroidery. It will be noticed that this Toletan council favoured the derivation of the word orarium from orare.

The wearing of the orarium was still further regulated by two of the councils which met at Braga. The second council of Braga (563 A.D.) decreed that \'since in some churches of this province the deacons wear their oraria hidden under the tunic, so that they cannot be distinguished from the subdeacons, for the future they must be placed over their shoulders.\'[30] The fourth {41} council (675 A.D.) made an important decree regulating the wearing of the orarium by priests, which has been since followed universally. The vestment was to be passed round the neck, over each shoulder, crossed in front, and secured in this position under the girdle of the alba.[31]

The last enactment of importance is that of the council of Mayence (813 A.D.), which ordered that priests should wear their oraria \'without intermission.\'[32]

{42} The orarium, then, was a narrow strip of cloth, disposed about the persons of the clergy in various manners according to their rank. To it corresponded in name, shape, and method of disposition, a garment common among the Romans, though admittedly rather an honourable ornament than an actual article of clothing. Yet when we remember how the clavi were employed to distinguish rank among the earlier clerg............