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 CHAPEL

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CHAPEL

Byzantine) elaborated into a preliminary offering at a subsidiary altar or "table of prothesis", the pre- pared oblations being solemnly conveyed to the main altar in the course of the actual liturgy. The north- ern apse or chapel became the place of prothesis, and the other remained a sacristy or diaconicon. Al- though the architectural feature of parallel apses was early introduced into the West, they had no effect upon the rite in places where the Roman Liturgy was in use, but remained at first mere sacristies. _ In France and Spain, where the Gallican Rite prevailed, they would doubtless be used in the Oriental way. Paulinus of Nola, in the fifth century (Ep., xxxii), speaks of two chambers, possibly apses, flanking the altar of Iris church whereof the right-hand one was a sacristy and the other a library or place of retirement for prayer. In the ninth century the Roman church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin was altered for the use of the Orientals by the addition of side apses, and the well-known basilica of Torcello was similarly fur- nished at about the same time. If the word chapel in- cludes places set apart for prayer as well as those for the celebration of the liturgy, theseexamples must be considered as rightly coming under this division of the subject. The same must be said also of the apart ments opening out from the naves of the churches of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme and Santa Balbina, both at Rome and dating probably from the fifth century. Similar chapels existed in the ninth-century churches of Santa Christina at Pola de Lena and Santa Maria de Naranco, both near Oviedo in Spain. . All these ex- amples and many others that might be enumerated differed only from the side-chapels of later ages in hay- ing no altars. The ancient discipline of " one altar in one church" has always been preserved in the East, at least in theory, though an exception to its corollary "one Mass at one altar" must be made in the case of Jerusalem, where in the fourth century Mass was of- fered twice on the Calvary altar on Maundy Thursday, and twice in the Anastasis on Easter Day. The Gal- lican Rite required this latter restriction; thus, in a synod of Auxerre, it is decreed that two Masses must not be said at one altar on the same day, and, more- over, that no presbyter may celebrate at an altar which had that day been used by the bishop. Also, for many centuries, the Ambrosian Rite preserved the same theory and it was for one altar only that Milan cathe- dral was designed. But when the members of the priesthood, instead of concelebrating with the bishop in the basilica, began each to say his own Mass, a plu- rality of altars became a necessity if the ancient rule of "one Mass at one altar" was to be kept. In the East, where the matter was not of great urgency, as individual Masses remained the exception, the sub- sidiary altar, if required, was enclosed in a chapel forming a complete though miniature church. The Blazhenny church in Moscow, which contains eight complete and enclosed chapels grouped round a cen- t nil one, is probably an extreme example. In churches subject t<> ( leltic rule a group of separate chapels was sometimes formed, e. g. the Seven Churches at Glenda- lough, Ireland, the Ten Churches of Twineham, in Eng- land (remaining as late as the eleventh century), and ili.' marvellous group of sanctuaries at Rocamadour, in France, a famous place of pilgrimage in tin 1 Middle Ages ami probably an isolated survival of the Celtic plan. In churches of the Roman Rite altar- were simply set up in any convenient pari of the church, al- though, in the Middle Ages, they were partly screened off. An extreme example of tins may I"- seen in the well-known plan, never carried out. for the abbey church of St. ( iall (ninth century), which is so filled up with enclosed altars thai congregational worship would have been impossible. In existing churches the par- allel apses at once suggested a pair of chapels, and those which larked this feature were sometimes al- tered accordingly. I n others, smaller apses were often

built out from the main apse; the church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem seems to have been thus treated in the tenth century, if not earlier, and other chapels were added to the original plan. The sanc- tuary or "station" on the site of the Crucifixion, which stood between the Holy Sepulchre and the basilica of the Holy Cross, may be taken as an early example of a chapel within a church, for although it was originally in the open air and not included under the roof of the church, as at present, it was used daily in the fourth century after the morning and evening Offices in the Sepulchre church (Anastasis) and had an altar on which the Holy Oblation was offered on Maundy Thursday and the True Cross exhibited on Good Fri- day (Peregrinatio ad Loca Sancta, ed. Gamurrini, Rome, 1S88).

As access to the chapels radiating from the main apse was inconvenient, later builders devised the ambulatory, or passage behind the apse proper and connecting all the apsidal chapels with the "proces- sion path". This was an important innovation des- tined to revolutionize the plan of most large churches; it issued at length in the chevet, or crown of chapels, a design which found favour in most European coun- tries, but was nowhere carried to the height of beauty and elaboration that it realized in France. The basilica of St.-Martin at Tours is considered to have been the common source from which most examples of this idea were copied, none of them being older than about 900. They were comparatively rare in England, owing to the prevalent square east -end, but there are beautiful examples, as at Westminster, Nor- wich, and Peterborough. The transept, eastern or western, also invited the formation of chapels, and this position is almost universal in the great Norman cross-churches. It was used in preference to the chew I plan in England, where the transept was a more fre- quent and more developed feature than elsewhere; for while in continental churches the need for increased chapel space was supplied by utilizing the intervals between buttresses (first at Notre-Dame, Paris, in 1290), the English preferred to form extra chapels along the east wall of the transept, and even to lengthen or rebuild the transept for that purpose, their buttresses being as a rule too shallow to afford the space required. At Gloucester there are three stories of chapels, one above the other, the crypt and the triforium containing altars exactly corresponding with those of the ground level. Where the buttresses were interior, as at Albi, the church was from the out- set provided with a series of chapels, sometimes in two stories, along its whole perimeter.

The dedication of the chevet chapels to important saints led naturally to the easternmost being assigned to Our Lady. In France this chapel is frequently somewhat larger than the rest, as at Bayeux, Reims, Seez, and Troyes; much larger at Amiens and Le Mans; and very much larger at Rouen (both in the cathedral and iii the abbey church of St. Ouen) and < loutances. The number of the chevet chapels varies from three at St-Etienne of Nevers to the magnificent sweep of thirteen which are the glory of Le Mans. Langres is singular, for so large a church, in having but one such chapel, and Sens seems to have had originally on.' circular chapel :ii the east end. like "Becket's Crown" at Canterbury. It was in the Lady chapel towards the close of the Middle Ages, that innova- tions in church music were allowed, only the strict .■ham being heard in the choir. At Gloucester the Lady chapel is furnished with two galleries (with chantry chapels below) for the singing of "priek- sonn"; each is provided with a broad stone desk for

the necessary books, thus differing from the choir where 8Uch accommodation was unusual and unneces- sary, but few books being used there except on the lectern.

Keirlenee III i\ here lie made lot; '111. . - I'l'l anle-