Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 1.djvu/407

ALTAR concerning the use of the former for this purpose the English Synod of Calchut (Celicyth, Chelsea, 816) made a regulation (can. 22, in Wilkins, Concilia Angliæ, London, 1737, I, 169; Mansi Coll. Conc., XIV, 355). Up to the middle of the sixth century in the Roman Church the solemn celebration of Mass was the only form of dedication. If, however, it had been decided to place in the altar the relics of a martyr, this ceremony preceded the first solemn function in the new edifice. Duchesne points out (op. cit., 406) that the liturgical prayers of the Gelasian Sacramentary recited for the consecration of altars bear the unmistakable stamp of the funeral liturgy, this fact is evidently attributable to the Custom of entombing relics, regarded as representing the bodies of the saints, at the time of dedication. The translation of relics was a second solemn interment of the saint's body, and hence the liturgical prayers composed for such occasions appropriately bore the characteristics of the burial service. The principal features of the earliest form of consecration in the Roman Church, as given in the Gelasian Sacramentary, are as follows: The bishop with his clergy, chanting the litany, first proceeded in solemn procession to the place where the relics were kept. A prayer was then chanted and the relics were borne by the bishop to the door of the church and there placed in the custody of a priest. The bishop then entered the church, accompanied by his immediate attendants, and after exorcising the water and mixing with it a few drops of chrism, he prepared the mortar for enclosing the sepulchre. With a sponge he then washed the table of the altar, and returning to the door he sprinkled the people with what remained of the holy water. After this he took the relics and re-entered the church, followed by the clergy and people chanting another litany. The sepulchre was then anointed with chrism, the relics were placed therein, and the tomb sealed. The ceremony concluded with the solemn celebration of Mass. The Gallican liturgy of consecration, unlike that of Rome, partook of the character of the liturgy for the administration of baptism and confirmation rather than that of the funeral liturgy. "Just as the Christian is dedicated by water and oil, by baptism and confirmation, so the altar first, then the church, is consecrated by ablution and unction" (Duchesne, op. cit., 407–409). In the eighth and ninth centuries attempts were made by Frankish liturgists to combine the two liturgies of Rome and Gaul, from the result then achieved has developed the actual consecration ritual of the Western Church. In the Greek Church the dedication of the altar was a ceremony distinct from that of the deposition of relics, the two functions were ordinarily performed on different days. On the first day the table of the altar was placed on its support of columns by the bishop in person. After this he proceeded to the consecration which consisted of washing the table, first with baptismal water, then with wine. The altar was next anointed with chrism and incensed. The following day the relics were placed in the sepulchre with the greatest solemnity. Duchesne calls attention to the close resemblance between the Gallican and the Byzantine liturgy for the consecration of altars (op. cit., 416).

VIII. .—The custom of praying with faces turned towards the East is probably as old as Christianity. The earliest allusion to it in Christian literature is in the second book of the Apostolic Constitutions (200–250, probably) which prescribes that a church should be oblong "with its head to the East". Tertullian also speaks of churches as erected in "high and open places, and facing the light (Adv. Valent., iii). The reason for this practice, which did not originate with Christianity, was given by St. Gregory of Nyssa (De Orat. Dominic., P. G., XLIV, 1183), is that the Orient is the first home of the human race, the seat of the earthly paradise. In the Middle Ages additional reasons for orientation were given, namely, that Our Lord from the Cross looked towards the West, and from the East He shall come for the Last Judgment (Durand, Rationale, V, 2; St. Thomas, Summa Theol., II–II, Q. lxxiv, a, 3). The existence of the custom among pagans is referred to by Clement of Alexandria, who states that their "most ancient temples looked towards the West, that people might be taught to turn to the East when facing the images" (Stromata, vii. 17, 43). The form of orientation which in the Middle Ages was generally adopted consisted in placing the apse and altar in the Eastern end of the basilica. A system of orientation exactly the opposite of this was adopted in the basilicas of the age of Constantine. The Lateran, St. Peter's, St. Paul's, and San Lorenzo in Rome, as well as the Basilicas of Tyre and Antioch and the Church of the Resurrection at Jerusalem, had their apses facing the West. Thus, in these cases the bishop from his throne in the apse looked towards the East. At Rome the second Basilica of St. Paul, erected in 389, and the Basilica of San Pietro in Vincoli, erected probably in the latter half of the fourth century reversed this order and complied with the rule. The Eastern apse is the rule also in the churches of Ravenna, and generally throughout the East. Whether this form of orientation exercised any influence on the change of the celebrant from the back to the front of the altar cannot well be determined but at all events this custom gradually supplanted the older one, and it became the rule for both priest and people to look in the same direction, namely, towards the East (Mabillon, Museum Italicum, ii, 9). Strict adherence to either form of orientation was, necessarily, in many instances impossible, the direction of streets in cities naturally governed the position of churches. Some of the most ancient churches of Rome were directed towards various points of the compass.

IX. .—Few ancient altars have survived the ravages of time. Probably the oldest of these is the fifth-century altar discovered at Auriol, near Marseilles. The stone table, on the front of which the monogram of Christ, with twelve doves, is engraved, rests on a single column. Similar in construction to this are three altars in the confessio of the Church of St. Cæcilia in Rome, which are attributed to the ninth century. In two sixth-century mosaics of San Vitale and Sant' Apollinare in Classe, Ravenna, two table altars of wood, resting on four feet, are represented. They are covered by a long cloth which completely hides the tables. Enlart regards it as probable that the tables enclosed in the altars of the Lateran and Santa Pudenziana are similar in appearance (Manuel d'archéol. Française, I, Archit. Relig., note 1). Altars of the tomb type, like the sarcophagi of the Constantinian epoch, offered a surface the front of which was well adapted to sculptured decoration. The earliest existing example of an altar with a carved antependium, however, in the Church of Cividale, dates from the beginning of the eighth century. Our Lord is here represented in the centre of the antependium, accompanied by angels, while the hand of the Father appears above His head. Of greater interest is the antependium, as well as the side panels, of the altar of the Ambrosian basilica in Milan. The front, over seven feet in length, is of gold, the back and sides of silver. Both front and back are paneled into three compartments, in which reliefs from the life of Christ and St. Ambrose are represented. The subjects of the central panel of the front are a Greek cross, in the centre of which Our Lord is represented; in the arms of the cross are