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or if it were in England (for our domestic scene will apply to all the Christian world) it might be a magnificent covering for the high altar, with a scripture history embroidered in the centre, and the border, of regal purple, inwrought with gold and precious stones. We say, if in England, because so celebrated was the English work, the Opus Anglicum,* that other nations eagerly desired to possess it. The embroidered vestments of some English clergymen were so much admired at the Papal Court, that the Pope, asking where they had been made, and being told "in England," despatched bulls to several English abbots, commanding them to procure similar ones for him. Some of the vestments of these days were almost covered with gold and precious

stones.

Or it might be a magnificent pall, in the days in which this garment had lost its primitive character, that taxed the skill and the patience of the fair needlewoman. It was about the year a. D. 601 that Pope Gregory sent two archbishop's palls into England; the one for London, which see was afterwards removed to Canterbury, and the other to York. Fuller gives the following account of this garment primitively:

66

:

The pall is a pontificall vestment, considerable for the matter, making, and mysteries thereof. For

thankfully accepted of the mitres and sandals, being charmed with their exquisite beauty. These admired pieces of embroidery were the work of Christina, Abbess of Markgate.

"Anglica nationis feminæ multum acu et auri textura, egregie viri in omni valeant artificio. Però fu renomato Opus Anglicum." From MURATORI.

For

the matter, it is made of lamb's-wooll and superstition. I say, of lamb's-wooll, as it comes from the sheep's back, without any other artificiall colour, spun (say some) by a peculiar order of nunnes, first cast into the tombe of St. Peter, taken from his body (say others); surely most sacred if from both; and (superstitiously) adorned with little black crosses. the form thereof, the breadth exceeded not three fingers (one of our bachelor's lamb-skin hoods in Cambridge would make three of them), having two labells hanging down before and behind, which the archbishops onely, when going to the altar, put about their necks, above their other pontificall ornaments. Three mysteries were couched therein. First, humility, which beautifies the clergy above all their costly copes; secondly, innocency, to imitate lamblike simplicitie; and thirdly, industry, to follow him who fetched his wandering sheep home on his shoulders. But to speak plainly, the mystery of mysteries in this pall was, that the archbishops receiving it showed therein their dependence on Rome; and a mote in this manner ceremoniously taken was a sufficient acknowledgment of their subjection. And, as it owned Rome's power, so in after ages it increased their profit. For, though now such palls were freely given to archbishops, whose places in Britain for the present were rather cumbersome than commodious, having little more than their paines for their labour; yet in after ages the archbishop of Canterburie's pall was sold for five thousand florenes:* so that the Pope might well have the

* A florene is 4s. 6d.

Golden Fleece, if he could sell all his lamb's-wooll at that rate.”*

The accounts of the rich embroidered ecclesiastical vestments-robes, sandals, girdles, tunics, vests, palls, cloaks, altar-cloths, and veils or hangings of various descriptions, common in churches in the dark ages-would almost surpass belief, if the minuteness with which they are enumerated in some few ancient authors did not attest the fact. Still these in the most diffuse writers are a mere catalogue of church properties, and, as such, would, in the dry detail, be but little interesting to our readers. There is enough said of them, however, to attest their variety, their beauty, their magnificence; and to impress one with a very favourable idea of the female ingenuity and perseverance of those days. The cost of many of these garments was enormous, for pearls and precious jewels were literally interwrought, and the time and labour bestowed on them was almost incredible. It was no uncommon circumstance for three years to be spent even by these assiduous and indefatigable votaries of the needle on one garment. But it is only casually, in the pages of the antiquarian, that there is any record of them :—

"With their names

No bard embalms and sanctifies his song:
And history, so warm on meaner themes,
Is cold on this."

"Noi" (says Muratori) "che ammiriamo, e con

* "The pall was a bishop's vestment, going over the shoulders, made of sheep-skin, in memory of him who sought the lost sheep, and when he had found it laid it on his shoulders; and it was embroidered with crosses, and taken off the body or coffin of St. Peter."

CAMDEN.

ragione, la beltà e varietà di tante drapperie dei nostri tempi, abbiam nondimeno da confessare un obbligo non lieve a gli antichi, che ci hanno prima spianata la via, e senza i lumi loro non potremmo oggidi vantare un si gran progresso nell' Arti."

And that this was the case a few instances may suffice to show; and it may not be quite out of place here to refer to one out of a thousand articles of value and beauty which were lost in the great conflagration ("which so cruelly laid waste the habitations of the servants of God") of the doomed and often suffering, but always magnificent, Croyland Abbey. It was "that beautiful and costly sphere, most curiously constructed of different metals, according to the different planets. Saturn was of copper, Jupiter of gold, Mars of iron, the Sun of brass, Mercury of amber, Venus of tin, and the Moon of silver the colours of all the signs of the Zodiac had their several figures and colours variously finished, and adorned with such a mixture of precious stones and metals as amused the eye, while it informed the mind of every beholder. Such another sphere was not known or heard of in England; and it was a present from the King of France."

:

No insignificant proof this of the mechanical skill of the eleventh century.

We are told that Pope Eutychianus, who lived in the reign of the Emperor Aurelian, buried in different places 342 martyrs with his own hands; and he ordained that a faithful martyr should on no account be interred without a dalmatic robe or a purple colobio. This is perhaps one of the earliest notices of ecclesiastical pomp or pride in vestments.

But some forty years afterwards Pope Silvester was invested by the hands of his attendants with a Phrygian robe of snowy white, on which was traced in sparkling threads by busy female hands the resurrection of our Lord; and so magnificent was this garment considered that it was ordained to be worn by his successors on state occasions: and to pass at once to the seventh century, there are records of various church hangings which had become injured by old age being carefully repaired at considerable expense; which expense and trouble would not, we may fairly infer, have been incurred if the articles in question, even at this more advanced period, had not been considered of value and of beauty.

Leo the Third, in the eighth century, was a magnificent benefactor to the church. With the vessels of rich plate and jewels of various descriptions which were in all ages offering to the church we have nothing to do amongst various other vestments, Leo gave to the high altar of the blessed Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, a covering spangled with gold (chrysoclabam) and adorned with precious stones; having the histories both of our Saviour giving to the blessed Apostle Peter the power of binding and loosing, and also representing the suffering of Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, and Paul. It was of great size, and exhibited on St. Peter and St. Paul's days.*

* Anastasius Bibliothecarius. De Vitis Romanorum Pontificum. As this work is the fountain whence subsequent writers have chiefly obtained their information with regard to church vestments, that is to say, decorative ones, it may not be amiss to transcribe a passage,

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