Mitres, part the second.

What should we find on the Blogs today, but a splendid snap by that indefatigable photographer of Catholic Tradition, Tom Kwok. This photograph was taken in the Sacred Heart Cathedral Bendigo during a Pontifical Mass celebrated by the Most Rev'd Peter Elliott, auxiliary bishop of Melbourne, on the Feast of Christ the King, 2008.

Ornamenting His Lordship's head is mitre made by the Saint Bede Studio and presented to him by the Australian Confraternity of Catholic Clergy upon his consecration as a bishop in 2007.

Mitres

This is the first of a series of posts illustrating past projects of the Saint Bede Studio.

Adjacent is a collage of three precious mitres made for some noteworthy clients. On the left is a mitre made for the Archbishop of Adelaide, the Most Rev'd Philip Wilson. Ornament on this mitre was based on a design of AWN Pugin. In the middle is the mitre made for HH Pope Benedict for World Youth Day (Sydney) 2008. The ornament on this mitre was based on the famous mitre of S' Thomas Becket, housed at the Sens Cathedral. On the right, a simpler mitre, made for HE Cardinal Pell, Archbishop of Sydney.

The design of mitres is all too often underestimated or ignored in choosing vestments for a bishop. The use of headgear makes such a notable change to the appearance of a man, that sound consideration needs to be given to the design of a mitre. Mitres of the Saint Bede Studio are custom made. Particular attention is paid to the shape, height and decoration of its mitres in order to make them most appropriate for the wearer.

Enquiries: stbede62@gmail.com

2010

Greetings to all our clients and readers of this Blog.

Our other website - a tired old thing - is undergoing a major revamp. In the meantime, however, there are some temporary changes and improvements.

Note that the Studio website can be visited here.

Photographs on the Studio website now link directly to postings on this Blog. This is a new approach so that the two sites will be interconnected and not two distantly-related entities.

To all readers of this Blog, friends and customers of the Saint Bede Studio, my best wishes for a Blessed Christmas, filled with the graces of this Holy Season.

Photographs of Christmas Matins celebrated at S' Aloysius Church, Caulfield (Archdiocese of Melbourne, Australia). Photographs taken by Dr Chris Steward.

On raising the chasuble at the Elevations

In the celebration of the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, the minister (deacon or altar server) is directed to raise the chasuble slightly in his left hand as the celebrant elevates the Sacred Host and then the Chalice. This direction is given in the Ritus Servandus VIII,8; the Caeremoniale Episcoporum II, viii and a decision of the Congregation of Sacred Rites no 3535.

What is the origin of this practice? It dates from that period when chasubles were voluminous and constrained the celebrant from raising his arms above his head. Lifting the lower right hand corner of the chasuble actually enables the celebrant a greater movement of the arms. Thus, the origin of this ceremonial action is purely practical. Much has been written about mystic and symbolic meanings as being the origin of this action, all of which is complete nonsense.

The ceremonial books direct that the raising of the chasuble be a very subtle action. It was never intended that the chasuble be raised half-way up the celebrant's back or - worse still - be held up by both hands of the minister, making the chasuble seem like some fantastical ecclesiastical sail. Most assuredly such exaggerated movements are distracting both to the celebrant and to the congregation.

If the chasuble is not very ample at all, there is even more reason for its raising at the Elevation to be a very modest action: just a couple of inches at most. Furthermore, this gesture only accompanies the actual Elevations, and not the celebrant's accompanying genuflections.

Attached is a beautiful photograph of a Low Mass celebrated at Prinknash Abbey (UK) in 1940, illustrating perfectly how it should be done.

Maria Regina Vestments

The Saint Bede Studio was commissioned by Saint Mary's Parish, Charleston, South Carolina, to prepare a Solemn Mass set of vestments based upon the Maria Regina design. The Pastor of Saint Mary's is also the Rector of the Charleston Cathedral.

The Studio regularly receives enquiries for the Maria Regina chasuble, which is derived from a design of AWN Pugin.

Pictured adjacent are parts of the set: the chasuble, cope and a tunic.

Click on the photographs for enlarged views.

Enquiries: stbede62@gmail.com

A Rose by any other name but pink

Twice a year, the Church breaks the tone of its penitential seasons by the use of rose-coloured vestments. Rose-coloured vestments were never commonplace and they still are not. Nevertheless, you will find various pronouncements these days (usually on websites) about what the real or authentic shade of rose is which is to be used for vestments.

Newsflash: there is no official shade of Rose designated by the Church, nor has there ever been. The reason for this is rather simple: only in the last century did the process of dyeing fabric become sufficiently sophisticated to ensure that much the same shade of a colour emerged from one batch of fabric dyeing to another.

Many different colours have been deemed by the Church as acceptable as liturgical Rose. Some of these are a salmon shade; some a silvery-pink, almost mushroom-colour; some close to what we would call Bishop's purple or fuchsia.

Another thing is certain: Bubblegum Pink is not Rose, nor has it been a traditional variation for use on these days. Whilst not intending to get into the argument as to whether the use of a such a vibrant pink is a fitting colour for a man to wear, Bubblegum Pink certainly manifests a lamentable lack of liturgical good taste.

At the Blog, The New Liturgical Movement, we find a number of interesting vestments in that shade of Rose commonly found in Italy in centuries past: a salmon colour. Go there and take a look.

Adjacent are three pictures of other shades of Rose. One is a set of vestments worn by Pope Paul VI on Laetare Sunday, 1978 (photographs of L'Osservatore Romano). The vestment is made from dupion silk of a very subdued mushroom-pink, with overtones of silver. Ornamenting it is a column almost fuchsia in colour.

The other picture is the cope made by the Saint Bede Studio for the Latin Mass Apostolate in Melbourne. It has overtones of subdued red in it, yet decidedly unlike the colours used for Liturgical Red. This cope is ornamented with a brocade of forest green, and a braid of Gothic foliage ornament.

Another set of Rose vestments made last year by the Studio for the Cathedral of Atlanta, Georgia can be seen here.

Enquiries: stbede62@gmail.com

Penitential Vestments continued

UPDATED 4th December

Continuing today with another work of art depicting sacred vestments and in particular the colour used for Penitential Days and Seasons.

Shewn adjacent is a vignette from a larger painting titled Scenes from the Life of Saint Augustine. It was painted in Bruges around 1490 by the artist who is referred to as The Master of Saint Augustine. This painting is housed now in the marvellous setting of The Cloisters, from whose website I was able to obtain this enlarged view.

Saint Augustine is shewn here being ordained a priest. What Augustine, the bishop and the lesser ministers are wearing is typical of the style of vestments found throughout the Low Countries (what we would now identify as the Netherlands and Belgium) in the 15th century. Let us examine that in detail.

All four are wearing well-gathered albs, which are decorated with rectangles of damask (called apparels) along the lower edge on the front and the back and also on the cuffs. Note also, how closely-fitting the sleeves of the albs are, and that the apparels of the ministers match the violet colour of the priest's chasuble. Apparelled albs and apparelled amices like this were worn all over Europe (including in Rome) throughout the mediaeval period.

An exceedingly slender maniple and stole is worn by Augustine (a form typical of England and Northern Europe) which are made from the same fabric as the apparels of his alb and amice.

Both the chasubles are decorated with the Y shape of orphrey. Although this form of decoration was centuries old when this work was painted, it was more commonly found in some places and less in others. It was not as common in Germany and southern Europe.

The ornament of the Augustine's chasuble appears to be tabernacle-like work of saints, embroidered on a dark background. This contrasts beautifully with the lighter violet colour of the chasuble. In our previous post, shewing Mass being offered in Siena Cathedral, we find the a very similar colour scheme of chasuble and ornament. The colour is blue-ish and not too dark. Note how much more penitential and striking in character these sombre orphreys are compared with the all-too-common use of gold on purple or violet vestments: a decorative scheme which displays a real lack of imagination.

Both chasubles are semi-conical in form, or perhaps more precisely a modified version of the semi-conical shape. Were Augustine and the bishop pictured to have their arms by their sides instead of raised, the chasubles they are wearing would fall just about to their wrists. This is a more abbreviated width from earlier centuries. The curving folds from the bottom of the chasuble were produced when the shoulders of the vestments were very steeply sloped: quite unlike the poncho-like form of the modern chasuble and the sandwich-boards effect of the fiddleback chasuble.

The bishop is shewn in Pontificals. Beneath his chasuble of scarlet-red is seen an ornamented golden dalmatic. The tunic cannot be seen. He is wearing a precious mitre; the horizontal and vertical ornamental bands are worked onto a base of gold fabric and enriched with precious stones.

Lastly, a word on the colours of the vestments. The more modern concept of matching colours did not exist in the mediaeval period, when the whole scheme of the Liturgical Colours (as we know them now) was far less developed. A practical reason for this "mix and match" was the lack of available fabric in matching colours. But that does not fully account for the more familiar approach we see in paintings and illuminations of the mediaeval period, where a chasuble was made up from one fabric, but the stole, maniple and apparels were made up from another, and usually contrasting, fabric. What a varied and pleasing effect this produces!

Thanks to Brother Stephen O. Cist for helping to clarify the scene depicted in this vignette.

Click on the image for an enlarged view.

The colour for vestments in the Penitential Seasons

A couple of years ago, I researched and posted an article on the use of penitential colours for the Seasons of Advent, Lent &c. That post may be read here and here, so I don't intend to rehearse its findings.

Instead, always most interesting, an historic work of art to illustrate the practice of our forebears. This work (adjacent) was painted by an artist known as the Master of Osservanza in the year 1440 and depicts a Low Mass being offered at a side chapel in the Siena Cathedral (Italy).

Some observations. The chasuble being worn by the celebrant is violet: in other words, much the same colour as the flower "violets". It is a blue-ish colour, not purple and it is not too dark either. The chasuble is the full conical shape and is ornamented with a simple column-orphrey of dark fabric (possibly even black). Most likely, the front of the chasuble would have been decorated with the familiar "tau". The celebrant is wearing decorative apparels on his alb and amice, which match the colour of the chasuble's ornament. That is a very typical practice of the Mediaeval period. Note, too, the very full folds of the alb.

We see, also, that the boy assisting the celebrant is wearing a full-length surplice, according to the style typically found in Renaissance Italy. Those who claim that such surplices are "Church of England" practice should note this well.

Lastly, the altar itself. It is clothed in a dark antependium or altar frontal, ornamented with scarlet red. On the altar is a Crucifix and a single candle. Although it may seem peculiar that there is but a single candle instead of a pair, it might be remarked that not until the 16th century was it a usual practice to have a pair of candlesticks on an altar.

Click on the image for an enlarged view.

New vestments: Rome

A seminarist from one of the Roman Colleges commissioned the Saint Bede Studio to prepare a Solemn Mass set of vestments in the style of the 16th century. The set, which is to be used for both the Ordinary and Extraordinary Forms of the Roman Rite, comprises a chasuble, dalmatic and tunic, cope &c. Adjacent is shewn the chasuble and dalmatic.

The vestments are made from an ivory and straw-coloured brocade and ornamented with a copper and old-gold-coloured silk damask. They are fully lined in wine-red silk taffeta.

Although chasubles after the style of this period have frequently appeared on these pages, this is the first dalmatic of the period which we have made.

In the Archbasilica of S' Mary's Major, Rome is a display of historic vestments and recently, we included a photograph of a chasuble from that collection owned by S' Charles Borromeo. Adjacent to those vestments, is a dalmatic from the same period; it is shewn in the picture below.

By the 16th century, less and less was a distinction to be found between the form of the dalmatic and that of the tunic (the vestment worn by the subdeacon). Exactly why this is the case is unclear. The tunic came to be of the same size, shape and ornament as the dalmatic.

Some things are noteworthy about the dalmatic shewn in the adjacent picture. Firstly, it is very ample: a real garment, which would have extended almost to the wrist of the wearer and well below the knees. Secondly, the sleeves are sewn together, so that the wearer must pass his arm through them, according to the ancient form of the dalmatic. Notably absent from this dalmatic is the execrable degradation (originating in France and spreading throughout Europe during the Baroque), whereby the sleeves were not joined together but became large flaps of stiffened fabric moving about freely. Sad to say, brand new dalmatics for the Extraordinary Form are being made now in this debased manner, in the misguided belief that they are somehow "Traditional".

Secondly, we may observe the ornamentation, which by the 16th century had become somewhat stylised and continued to be so, typically, until well into the 20th century. The ancient practice was to decorate the dalmatic with two parallel lines called clavi (plural), running from either side of the collar of the vestment to its hem. In the mediaeval period, decorative rectangles of fabric called apparels began to be inserted in between the clavi, usually at the chest level, but also on the cuffs of the dalmatic. The dalmatic in the picture shews a later development: the clavi are very narrow and instead of a decorative apparel in between them, further parallel lines of braid are placed, at right angles to the clavi. Sometimes coats of arms and other devices were embroidered in this space.

Lastly may be observed the tassles. The origin of these had nothing to do with ornament. They were cords used to tie together the front and the back of the dalmatic at the neckline. Splitting the dalmatic in this manner at the shoulder seam made it much easier to put the garment on over the head. From something practical the tassles developed into something highly decorative - and often impractical.

Click on the pictures for an enlarged view.

Enquiries: stbede62@gmail.com