Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 4.djvu/437

 CORONATION

381

CORONATION

wearing a gorgeous diadem set with jewels. In the case

of Valentinian (364) and his son Gratian (367) we have

equally mention of a crown assumed amid profuse

acclamations of the assembled army. In each case,

also, the newlj-elected sovereign made a speech and

promised a largess to the troops, which Julian fixed at

five gold pieces and a pound of silver to each man.

Informal as the proceedings in all these cases seem to

have been, most of the elements so far mentioned took

a permanent place in the coronation ceremonial which

W!is ultimately evolved. Even the Teutonic

practice of hoisting upon a buckler (see

Tacitus, Ann., XV," 29) though rarely

mentioned explicitly, was probably

maintained for a considerable

time, for it certainly was

observed in the election of

Anastasius (491) and

Ju-stin II (565), and

the miniature of

the election of

David in a

tenth-cent\ir\

psalter :i'

Paris, in

which he

is repre-

the selection of the patriarch may possibly have been due simply to the desire to preclude jealousy and to avoid giving offence to more powerful claimants of the honour. But already in 473, when Leo II was crowned in the lifetime of his grandfather, we find the Patriarch Acacius not only figuring in the ceremony but reciting a prayer before the imposition of the diadem. If it was Leo's grandfather and not Acacius who actually imposed it, that is only on aecoimt of the accepted rule, that the reigning emperor in his lifetime is alone the fount of honour whenever he chooses to conunit any portion of his authority to colleague or consort. Following close upon the first intervention of the patriarch, the ecclesiastical element in the coronation ceremonial rapidly de- velops. At the elec- tion of Anastasius (491) the patri- arch is present at the assem- bly of the .senate and notables when they

'^ I't. il .^landing upon a buckler supported by young

while another sets a diadem on his head, im-

Ihat this ceremony w.is generally familiar at a

date. The di.idem. though the military torque

1 the analogy of Julian's election was often re-

' d as well, w,a.s and continued to be the symbol of

• ine power, and along with it, from the time of

iiintine onward, went the ceremony of "adora-

of the monarch by |)rostration. II' next epoch-making change seems to have been iitroduction of the P.-itriarch of Constantinople to III' diadem upon the head of the elected sovereign. date at which this first took place is disputed, I' cannot altogether ignore the alleged dream of "iosius I who saw himself crowned by a bishop idoret, Hist. Eccl., VI, vi), but Sickel (loc. cit., triarch Anatolius in 4.50 crowned Marcian and by 'lilt act originated a ceremony which became of the i;ri'!itest possible significance in the later conception of kini^ship. At first there seems to have been no idea of lending any religious character to this investiture ; and
 * ."il": cf. Gibbon, ch. xx.xvi) holds that the Pa-

.\achcn )

make their formal choice, and the book of the Holy Gospels is exposed in their midst (Const. Porph., De Caer.. I, 92). The coronation does not take place in a sacred building, but an oath is taken by the emperor to govern justly and another written oath is exacted of him by the patriarch that he will keep the Faith entire and introduce no novelty into the Church. Then after the emperor had donned a portion of the regalia, the patriarch made a prayer, and the " KjTie eleison" (possibly an ektene or litany) being said, put ujion his sovereign the imperial chlamys and the jewelled crown. The acclamations also which .accompany and follow the emperor's speech with its jjromises of the usual largess, are pronouncedly religious in character; for e.xample "God will pre- serve a Christian Emperor! These are common prayers! These are the prayers of the world! Lord help the pious! Holy Lord uplift Thy world! . . . God 1)0 with you! " Moreover at the conclusion of the ceremony the emperor went straight to St. Sophia, putting off his crown and offering it at the altar. The first emperor to be crowned in church was Pho-