Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 4.djvu/268

 348 NOTICES OF ANCIENT ORNAMENTS &C. more properly termed refrofabuhe ; or, as Ducange supposes, the term may here denote the ciboriiim, usually placed above the altar, for the reception of the consecrated host therein to be reserved. Wats, however, in the glossary appended to his edition of the works of M. Paris, concludes that these orna- ments were the portable altars of consecrated stone, marked with a cross, such as were used by the priests in the visitation of the sick, and commonly called, before the Reformation, "howselling altars." The description given by the historian seems scarcely to accord with this supposition. The privilege of making use of portal)le altars appears to have been frequently a special concession from the Roman pontiff to individuals or communities. Blomefield has printed a grant from Pope Clement VI., A.D. 1353, to Sir John Bardolf, lord of Wermegay, and his Avife, "ut liceat vobis habere altare portabile, cum reverencia et honore, super quod in locis ad hoc convenientibus et honestis possit quilibet ves- tri per proprium sacerdotem ydoneum missam et alia divina officia, sine juris alieni prejudicio, in vestra presencia facere celebrari'*." Weever cites a bull of Pope Martin V. (A.D. 1417 — 31) granting the like indulgence to the English mer- chants of the staple of Calais ; and one of the privileges con- ceded to the gild of our lady in St. Botolph's, at Boston, confirmed by Julius II., A.D. 1510, was the license "to carie about with them an aultar stone, whereby they might have a priest to sale them masse or other divine service, where they would, without prejudice of any other church or chapel, though it were also before day, yea and at iij. of the clock after midnight in the summer time. Item, that having their aultar stone, they might have masse said in any place, though it were unhallowed." In the Greek Church the lapis sacratus, or portable altar of stone does not appear ever to have been used. Where a con- secrated altar did not exist, it was customary to provide as a substitute the Antimensium {avTiyuivcnov), formed of a portion of the covering which had been placed upon an altar during the ceremony of dedication. The customary Ordo for the 'conse- cration of antimensia is given by Goar, in whose Ritual and in the Glossaries of Du Cange full information may be obtained regarding this ancient usage of the Eastern Church ^. a. w. a Hist, of Norf., vol. iv. p. 210. in Glossariis Med. Latin, et infuxiJE Grsecit. '' Goar, Rituale Grseconim, p. 648. ad vocem. ])om. Marer, in Hierolexico. Du Cange,