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Psalmi ante sacrificium and the origin of the introit

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 September 2011

Joseph Dyer
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Abstract

The biography of Pope Celestine I (422–32) in the first edition of the Liber pontificalis (c.530) credits him with introducing the singing of ‘psalmi ante sacrificium’ at Mass. Several decades later, the second edition added that these psalms were sung ‘antephanatim ex omnibus’. Since the early ninth century, these statements have been interpreted to mean that Celestine introduced the introit chant, a conclusion challenged for the first time about twenty-five years ago. The new interpretation of the passage proposed that Celestine did not introduce the introit, but the responsorial psalm sung between the (two) readings at Mass. An analysis of the terminology used in Celestine's biography, especially the word sacrificium, indicates that the Liber pontificalis author did most likely intend to attribute to him the introduction of the introit, which was certainly in existence by the early sixth century. The presence of a processional solea in certain churches of Rome and the North Adriatic littoral indicates that architectural accommodations were being made for the entrance procession by the fifth century. Psalmic texts form the basis of the repertoire, and non-psalmic introits give every indication of post-dating those with texts drawn from the Psalter.

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Research Article
Information
Plainsong & Medieval Music , Volume 20 , Issue 2 , October 2011 , pp. 91 - 121
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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References

1 Liber officialis 3.5.1–3; Amalarii episcopi opera liturgica omnia, ed. Johannes M. Hanssens, 3 vols., Studi e Testi 138–40 (Vatican City, 1948–50), 2:271–2.

2 Among alternate readings are ‘antiphonatim’, ‘antephanatim’, and ‘antiphonati’. See Louis Duchesne, ed., Le Liber Pontificalis. Texte, introduction et commentaire, 2 vols. (Paris, 1886–92), complemented by Cyrille Vogel, Additions et Corrections (Paris, 1957), 1:230 (variantes des manuscrites); hereafter LP. English translation by Davis, Raymond, The Book of Pontiffs (Liber Pontificalis): The Ancient Biographies of the First Ninety Roman Pontiffs to AD 715, Translated Texts for Historians, Latin Series 5 (Liverpool, 1989), 16–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

3 Amalar titled this discussion ‘officium quod vocatur introitus missae’. Officium was a medieval term for the introit (the norm in the Dominican rite until its suppression in the 1960s); see Guillelmi Duranti, Rationale divinorum officiorum, ed. Anselme Davril and Timothy M. Thibodeau, 3 vols., Corpus Christianorum Continuatio Mediaevalis 140, 140A–B (Turnhout, 1995–2000), 1:167 (4.5.1).

4 Liber officialis 3.5.4–34; ed. Hanssens, 2:272–82; for a detailed treatment of the passage see Rudolf Suntrup, ‘Zahlenbedeutung in der mittelalterlichen Liturgieallegorese’, Archiv für Liturgiewissenschaft, 26 (1984), 336–45 (321–46).

5 LP 1:88–9 (the two abrégés and the reconstituted ‘first edition’) and 230 (second edition). The second edition adds information about Celestine's benefactions to the basilica Iuli (which he rebuilt) and to St Peter's and St Paul's. Though Duchesne identified the basilica Iuli with S. Maria in Trastevere, Herman Geertman has proposed that this church stood on the site of the present SS. Apostoli near the Forum Romanum; see ‘Le biografie del Liber Pontificalis dal 311 al 535: Testo e commento’, in Atti del colloquio internazionale: Il Liber Pontificalis e la storia materiale, Roma, 21–22 febbraio 2002, Mededelingen van het Nederlands Instituut te Rome 60–61 (Assen, 2003), 310 and 325 (284–355).

6 Geertman, ‘Le biografie’, 287; LP 1:cxciii–cciii.

7 Fortescue, Adrian, The Mass: A Study of the Roman Liturgy (London, 1930), 214–224Google Scholar ; Mario Righetti, Manuale di storia liturgica, 2nd edn, 4 vols. (Milan, 1950–53), 3:165–9 (‘non molto chiaro invero’); Ludwig Eisenhofer, Handbuch der katholischen Liturgik, 2 vols. (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1932–33), 2:83–7; Josef Jungmann, Missarum Solemnia: Eine genetische Erklärung der römischen Messe, 5th edn, 2 vols. (Vienna-Freiburg-Basel, 1962), 1:414–29; Camillus Callewaert, ‘Introitus’, Ephemerides Liturgicae, 52 (1938), 488 (484–9).

8 Sed non in initio mos iste cantandi fuit qui nunc in ecclesia ante sacrificium celebratur, sed tamen ‘epistolae pauli recitabantur et sanctum evengelium’; De institutione clericorum 1.32 (De officio missae), ed. with German trans. in Detlev Zimpel, De institutione clericorum/Über die Unterweisung der Geistlichen, 2 vols., Fontes Christiani 61 (Turnhout, 2006), 1:236. Hrabanus Maurus, obviously dependent on the Liber pontificalis, also attributes the introit to Celestine in De sacris ordinibus 19 (PL 112:1177f.).

9 Peter Jeffery, ‘The Introduction of Psalmody into the Roman Mass by Pope Celestine I (422–432)’, Archiv für Liturgiewissenschaft, 26 (1984), 147–65 (with references to medieval liturgical commentators).

10 Jungmann (Missarum Sollemnia, 1:341) says that the terms ‘Mass of the catechumens’ and ‘ Mass of the faithful’ were common only from the eleventh century.

11 Liber officialis 3.36.9; ed. Hanssens, 2:371.

12 John F. Baldovin, ‘Liturgy and Reform: What Ecumenism Can Learn at the Altar’, Commonweal, March 27 (2009), 16 (review of George Hunsinger, The Eucharist and Ecumenism: Let Us Keep the Feast (Cambridge, 2008)).

13 The bibliography on this subject is extensive: for the Old Testament background, see Goossens, Werner, Les origines de l'Eucharistie: Sacrement et sacrifice (Gembloux-Paris, 1931)Google Scholar ; Raphael Schulte, Die Messe als Opfer der Kirche: Die Lehre frühmittelalterlicherAutoren über das eucharistische Opfer, Liturgiegeschichtliche Quellen und Forschungen 35 (Münster in Westfalen, 1959). The breadth of meaning attached to sacrificium can be surmised from the index to Kenneth Stevenson, Eucharist and Offering (New York, 1986); another aspect of the theme is covered in his ‘The Unbloody Sacrifice: The Origins and Development of a Description of the Eucharist’, in Fountain of Faith, ed. Gerard Austin (Washington, 1991), 103–30. The most recent comprehensive study is Robert J. Daly, Sacrifice Unveiled: The True Meaning of Christian Sacrifice (London, 2009).

14 Didachē 14.1 and 3; La doctrine des douze apôtres (Didachè), ed. Willy Rordorf and André Tuilier, Sources Chrétiennes 248bis (Paris, 1998), 192–3 (hereafter SC).

15 Cf. Rowan Williams: ‘now that the temporary injunctions of the Law are abolished, the hidden purposes of God are manifest’; Eucharistic Sacrifice: The Roots of a Metaphor, Grove Liturgical Studies 31 (Bramcote, 1982), 7.

16 Dialogue with Trypho 41.3; ed. with French trans. in Philippe Bobichon, Justin Martyr, Dialogue avec Tryphon, 2 vols., Paradosis 47 (Fribourg, 2003), 286.

17 Dialogue 117; ed. Bobichon, 1:496.

18 Adversus hereses 4.18.1, Contre les hérésies, livre IV, ed. Adelin Rousseau, et al., SC 100 (Paris, 1965), 596–7; Robert J. Daly, The Origins of the Christian Doctrine of Sacrifice (Philadelphia, 1978), 91–8. D'Alès, A., ‘La doctrine de l’Eucharistie dans St. Irenée', Recherches de science religieuse 13 (1923), 24–46Google Scholar ; Dominic Unger, ‘The Holy Eucharist According to Irenaeus’, Laurentianum, 20 (1979), 103–64.

19 Adversus hereses 4.18.2–3; SC 100:600–1; see also Unger, ‘The Holy Eucharist According to St. Irenaeus’, 123. Cf. Eph 5:2 (Christ gave himself up as an offering and sacrifice) and Heb 10:5 (quoting Ps 40:6): ‘sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire’.

20 Epp. 12, 34, 39, 57, 63; Gerard F. Diercks, ed., Sancti Cypriani episcopi epistularium, 3 vols., Corpus Christianorum Series Latina 3B–D (Turnhout, 1994–99; hereafter CCSL); Graeme W. Clark, trans., The Letters of St. Cyprian of Carthage, 4 vols., Ancient Christian Writers 43–44, 46–47 (New York, 1984–). My discussion is indebted to Raymond Johanny, ‘Cyprian of Carthage’, in The Eucharist of the Early Christians (Collegeville, MN, 2001), 156–82.

21 Non hoc faciunt quod Jesus Christus, dominus et deus noster, sacrificii huius auctor et doctor, fecit et docuit; Ep. 63.1, CCSL 3C:389ff.; trans. Clarke, 3:98. Augustine quotes Cyprian in De doctrina Christi 4.21.25; CCSL 32:152, lines 29–33. See also Michael McGuckian, The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: A Search for an Acceptable Notion of Sacrifice (Leominster and Chicago, 2005), 13f.

22 Quia passionis eius mentionem in sacrificiis omnibus facimus, passio est enim domini sacrificium quod offerimus; nihil aliud quam quod ille fecit facere debemus; Ep. 63.17.1, CCSL 3B:413; trans. Clarke, 3:107.

23 For sacrificium in the sense of an offering of bread or wine for Mass, see De opere et eleemosynis 15 (Locuples et dives domincum celebrare te credis quae corban omnino non respicis, quae in dominicum sine sacrificio venis, quae partem de sacrificio quod pauper obtulit sumis?); Cyprien de Carthage, La bienfaisance et les aumônes, ed. Michel Poirier, SC 440 (Paris, 1999), 118 and 178–82 (explanation of ‘corban’ as a possession, money or property dedicated exclusively to religious use, with an interpretation of its possible meanings in the De opere context).

24 Male facit ergo romanus episcopus, qui super mortuorum hominum Petri et Pauli, secundum nos ossa veneranda, secundum te vilem pulvisculum, offert domino sacrificia et tumulos eorum Christi arbitratur altaria; Adversus Vigilantium 8; ed. Jean-Louis Feiertag, S. Hieronymi presbyteri Opera polemica 3, CCSL 79C (Turnhout, 2005), 18.

25 Neque negandum est defunctorum animas pietate suorum viventium relevari, cum pro illis sacrificium mediatoris offertur vel eleemosynae in ecclesia fiunt; Enchiridion ad Laurentium de fide et spe et caritatis, ed. E. Evans, CCSL 46 (Turnhout, 1969), 108 (no. 110).

26 Utrum oblatio quae fit pro quiescentibus aliquid eorum conferat animabus; De octo Dulcitii quaestionibus 2; ed. Almut Mutzenbecher, CCSL 44A (Turnhout, 1975), 255–70.

27 Cum ergo sacrificia sive altaris sive quarumcumque eleemosynarum pro baptizatis defunctis omnibus offeruntur, … nulla ratione conceditur ut pro non baptizatis cuiuslibet aetatis hominibus offeratur sacrificium corporis et sanguinis Christi; De natura et origine animae libri quattuor, CSEL 60, ed. Carolus Urba and Josephus Zycha (Vienna, 1913), 108–9.

28 Hoc est sacrificium Christianorum: multi unum corpus in Christo. Quod etiam sacramento altaris fidelibus noto frequentat ecclesia, ubi et demonstratur, quod in ea re quam offert, ipsa offeratur; De civitate dei 10.6; Sancti Aurelii Augustini episcopi De civitate dei libri XXII, ed. Emanuel Hoffmann, 2 vols., CSEL 40/1–2 (Vienna, 1899), 2:456.

29 In a sermon to the neophytes (no. 227), Augustine calls the Mass ‘mense dominice sacramentum’; Augustin d'Hippone, Sermons pour la Pâque, ed. Suzanne Poque, SC 116:240. H. Kellner, ‘Wo und seit wann wurde Missa stehende Bezeichnung für das Messopfer?’ Theologische Quartalschrift, 83 (1901), 431 (427–43); see also Wunibald Roetzer, Des heiligen Augustinus Schriften als liturgie-geschichtliche Quelle (Munich, 1930), 94 and the index to Patrologia Latina 46:579–81.

30 Augustine, Retractationum libri II, ed. Almut Mutzenbecher, CCSL 57 (1984), 98 (2.11). See also Klaus Gamber, ‘Ordo Missae Africanae: Der nordafrikanische Messeritus zur Zeit des hieligen Augustinus’, Römische Quartalschrift für Altertumskunde und Kirchengeschichte, 64 (1969), 139–53, esp. 143; and Joseph Dyer, ‘Augustine and the Hymni ante oblationem: The Earliest Offertory Chants?’ Revue des Études Augustiniennes, 27 (1981), 85–99. The Celestine and Augustine texts were related in a brief note by R. Galdos, ‘Psalmi ad missam’, Ephemerides Liturgicae, 47 (1933), 13f.

31 Nihil eis prodest quod lectiones divinas audiunt, si antequam divina mysteria compleantur abscedunt; Sermo 73.1 and 3, Sancti Caesarii episcopi Arelatensis Opera omnia, ed. Germain Morin, 2 vols. (Maredsous, 1937), 2:295 and 298.

32 Missa tempore sacrificii est quando catechumeni foris mittuntur; Etymologiarum sive originum libri XX, ed. Wallace M. Lindsay (Oxford, 1911), 6.19.4. Cf. Isidore, De ecclesiasticis officiis 1.18 (De sacrificio); ed. Christopher M. Lawson, CCSL 113 (Turnhout, 1989), 19–23.

33 Conrad Kirsch, Enchiridion Fontium Historiae Ecclesiasticae Antiquae, 4th edn (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1923), 708.

34 In De anima (9.4) Tertullian seems to describe the first part of the liturgy: ‘the Scriptures are read, psalms are sung, sermons are given, prayers are offered’, though this could be the description of a non-Eucharistic gathering.

35 ‘Hic fecit ut natalem domini nostri Jesu Christi noctu missae celebrarentur et in ingressu sacrificii hymnus diceretur angelicus Gloria in excelsis deo, tantum noctu natale domini’ (LP 1:57). The anomalous position of the Gloria after the gospel (and not between the readings as the responsorial psalm) in a (non-Roman) liturgical manuscript now at Mount Sinai, to which Peter Jeffery drew attention, does not illuminate the Roman situation. See Bonifatius Fischer, ‘Zur Liturgie der lateinischen Handschriften vom Sinai’, Revue Bénédictine, 74 (1964), 284–97; the fragments are edited in Elias A. Lowe, ‘Two New Latin Liturgical Fragments on Mount Sinai’, Revue Bénédictine, 74 (1964), 252–83.

36 John N.D. Kelly, The Oxford Dictionary of the Popes (Oxford, 1986), 9 (where the end of the reign of Emperor Hadrian (117–38) is thought to be the more likely date).

37 Hans Förster, Die Feier der Geburt Christi in der Alten Kirche: Beiträge zur Erforschung des Epiphanie- und Weihnachtsfestes, Studien und Texte zur Antike und Christentum 4 (Tübingen, 2000).

38 Bernard Capelle, ‘Le texte du “Gloria in excelsis”’, Revue d’histoire ecclésiastique 44 (1949), 439–57 (reprinted in the author's Travaux liturgiques, 3 vols. (Louvain: Abbaye du Mont César, 1955–67), 2:176–91).

39 Hic constituit ut sacrificium altaris non in siricum neque in pannum tinctum celebraretur, nisi tantum in lineum terrenum procreatum, sicut corpus domini nostri Iesu Christi in sindonem lineam mundam sepultus est; LP 1:171 and 190, n. 24.

40 See Joseph Braun, Der christliche Altar, 2 vols. (Munich, 1924), 2:21–30.

41 The biographies written shortly after the death of their subjects can be assumed to be more accurate, but Cyrille Vogel pointed to many inaccuracies even in these, see ‘Le “Liber pontificalis” dans l’édition de Louis Duchesne', in Monseigneur Duchesne et son temps: Actes du colloque organisé par l'École française de Rome, Palais Farnese, 23–25 mai 1973 (Rome, 1975), 99–127.

42 Emmanuel Bourque, Étude sur les sacramentaires romains. (1) Les textes primitifs, Studi di Antichità Cristiana 20 (Vatican City, 1949), 19.

43 Victor Saxer, ‘La chiesa di Roma dal V al X secolo: Amministrazione centrale e organizzazione territoriale’, in Ecclesiae Urbis. Atti del congresso internazionale di studi sulle chiese di Roma (IV-X secolo). Roma, 4–10 settembre 2000, 3 vols., ed. Federica Guidobaldi and Alessandra Giuglia Guidobaldi, Studi di Antichità Cristiana 59 (Vatican City, 2002), 2:499 (493–632).

44 Ecce nunc domus domini orationibus vacant et vestrum per omnes ecclesias deo nostro oblatis sacrificiis commendatur imperium (Ep. 23); Eduard Schwartz, ed., Acta conciliorum oecumenicorum: Concilium Universale Ephesenum, 5 vols. (Berlin-Leipzig, 1925–26), 1, pt. 2:88–90; Detlev Jasper and Horst Fuhrmann, Papal Letters in the Early Middle Ages (Washington, 2001), 38–41.

45 According to the LP he was a native of Tuscia, the area north and east of Rome.

46 Ep. 9.2; PL 54:626C/627A. See Leo Eizenhöfer, ‘Das Opfer der Gläubigen in den Sermonen Leos der Grossen’, in Die Messe in der Glaubensverkündigung, ed. Franz Xaver Arnold and Balthasar Fischer (Freiburg, 1970), 79–107, especially 101–7. In Leo's vocabulary oblatio could mean Jesus's offering on the cross, the individual Christian's offering, or the Eucharist.

47 The sacrificium in the last sentence refers to the offerings of the people, a very common meaning in the secret (super oblata) prayers of the sacramentaries. In the Regula coenobialis of the Irish abbot Columban (c.543–615), it signifies communion; Sancti Columbani Opera, Scriptores Latini Hiberniae 2, ed. G.S.M. Walker (Dublin, 1957), 2:158–60.

48 LP 1:239; the translation of this passage by Raymond Davis (The Book of Pontiffs, 38) does not make the sense entirely clear.

49 The first edition of the Liber pontificalis attributes to Sixtus I (c.116–c.125) a decree that the Sanctus at the conclusion of the Preface should be sung by the entire congregation ‘intra actionem’ (LP 1:56–7), but only one class of ‘mixed’ manuscripts (D) of the second edition preserves this phrase.

50 Cunibert Mohlberg, Liber sacramentorum Romanae aeclesiae ordinis anni circuli, Rerum Ecclesiasticarum Documenta, Series maior: Fontes 4 (Rome, 1960 (21968)), 183; cf. the Gelasian rubric, ‘infra accionem’ that precedes Proper versions of the prayer ‘Hanc igitur’ (119, 124, etc.); see also Pierre Battifol, Leçons sur la messe (Paris, 1927), 169–71.

51 Robert Cabié, La lettre du pape Innocent Ier à Décentius de Gubbio (19 mars 416): Texte critique, traduction et commentaire, Bibliothèque de le Revue d'Histoire Ecclésiastique 58 (Louvain, 1973), 20–2.

52 Quis enim nesciat aut non advertat id quod a principe apostolorum Petro romanae ecclesiae traditum est, ac nunc usque custoditur ab omnibus debere servari nec superduci aut introduci aliquid quod aut auctoritatem non habeat; ed. Cabié, La lettre, 18.

53 Jeffrey, ‘The Introduction of Psalmody’, 156–9.

54 Dirigamus vestri fraternitati, quia contentio orta est in tota ecclesia romana de sacrificio, qua hora licet sacrificare, et non invenimus exinde finem; Hieronimi responsum ad quaestionem Damasi, Patrologia Latina Supplementum 5, ed. Adalbert Hamman (Paris, 1974), 396–7.

55 Nam vir venerabilis Cassius, Narniensis episcopus, qui cotidianum Deo sacrificium offere consueverat seque in lacrimis inter ipsa sacrificiorum arcana mactabat; Dialogues 4.58, ed. Adalbert de Vogüé and Paul Antin, SC 265 (Paris, 1980), 194–7.

56 Dialogues 4.59; SC 265:196–201.

57 Mary Pierre Ellebracht, Remarks on the Vocabulary of the Ancient Orations in the Missale Romanum, Latinitas Christianorum Primaeva 22 (Nijmegen-Utrecht, 1966), 77.

58 The question of two vs. three readings at Mass has been largely settled in favour of the former; the Liber Pontificalis assumes the presence of two. Aimé-George Martimort, ‘A propos du nombre des lectures à la messe’, Revue des sciences religieuses, 58 (1984), 42–51.

59 Ordo Romanus 23.17; ed. Andrieu, 3:271. The Good Friday liturgy is sensitively treated in Éamonn Ó Carragáin, Ritual and the Rood: Liturgical Images and the Old English Poems of the Dream of the Rood Tradition (London and Toronto, 2005), 180–222.

60 Responsorial psalmody is amply documented in the sermons of Celestine's contemporary, Augustine, who often preached on the responsorial psalm. For examples, see James McKinnon, Music in Early Christian Literature (Cambridge, 1987), nos. 364, 366, 371, 372, 374; Angelo Marini, ‘La partecipazione dei fedeli alla messe negli scritti di sant’Agostino', Ephemerides Liturgicae, 93 (1979), 3–37. Helmut Leeb, Die Psalmodie bei Ambrosius, Wiener Beiträge zur Theologie 18 (Vienna, 1967), 90–8. Peter Jeffrey drew attention to the fact that Celestine may have heard responsorial psalmody at Milan, as he certainly did hymns of Ambrose; ‘The Introduction of Psalmody’, 162.

61 Apostolic Constitutions 2.57; ed. Franz Xaver Funk, Didasacalia et Constitutiones Apostolorum (Paderborn, 1905), 161; James McKinnon, ‘The Fourth-Century Origin of the Gradual’, Early Music History, 7 (1987), 91–106.

62 Leo I, Sermo 3.1; Sancti Leonis magni romani pontificis Tractatus septem et nonaginta, ed. Antoine Chavasse, 2 vols., CCSL 138–138A (Turnhout, 1973), 1:10.

63 Michel Huglo, ‘Le répons-graduel de la messe’, Actes du xiiie Congrès de la Société Internationale de Musicologie, Strasbourg, 29 août – 3 septembre 1982, 2 vols. (Strasbourg, 1986), 1:294–6; reprinted in Chant grégorien et musique médiévale, Variorum Collected Studies 814 (Aldershot, 2005), III.

64 Arnobii iunioris Commentarii in psalmos, ed. Klaus-D. Daur, CCSL 25 (Turnhout, 1990), 35. The reading of the Roman Psalter is ‘expecta dominum, et viriliter age et confortetur cor tuum et sustine dominum’; Robert Weber, Le Psautier latin et les autres anciens psautiers latins, Collectanea Biblica Latina 10 (Rome, 1953), 52.

65 René-Jean Hesbert, Antiphonale Missarum Sextuplex (Brussels, 1935).

66 Lk 1:13ff. (Vigil of St John Baptist), Jn 31:18–19 (Vigil of St Peter).

67 Christof Tietze, Hymn Introits for the Liturgical Year: The Origin and Early Development of the Latin Texts (Chicago, 2005).

68 Joseph Dyer, ‘Advent and the Antiphonale Missarum’, in Lingua mea calamus scribae: Mélanges offerts à madame Marie-Noël Colette [=Études grégoriennes, 36], ed. Daniel Saulnier et al. (Solesmes, 2009), 101–29.

69 Gaudete in domino is the unique example in the Temporale of a non-psalmic introit that quotes the epistle of the day. Dum sanctificatus fuero for Wednesday in the fourth week of Lent quotes the prophetic reading (Ezekiel 36:23–6) of the Mass.

70 Louis Duchesne observed that Celestine received the decisions of the Council of Ephesus on Christmas Day and had them read ‘at the assembly of all the Christian people at St. Peter's’; Christian Worship: Its Origins and Evolution, 5th edn, trans. M.L. McClure (London, 1931), 265; Philipp Jaffe, Regesta romanorum pontificum … (Berlin, 1851), 33 (anno 432 (165)); the pope wrote to Emperor Theodosius II that he had read the decrees (se legisse) ‘in totius congregtione christianae plebis apud beatissimum apostolum Petrum die Christi natale’.

71 LP 1:129; trans. Davis, The Book of Pontiffs, 4; cf. note 36 above. The stational church of the midnight Mass, S. Maria Maggiore, was built only under Celestine's successor, Sixtus III, as a memorial to the Council of Ephesus (431).

72 Hom. in evang. 8.1, Giuseppe Cremascoli, ed. and trans., San Gregorio Magno: Omelie sui Vangeli, Gregorii Magni Opera 2 (Rome, 1994), 129.

73 Jacques Froger, ‘Les anticipations du jeûne quadragésimale’, Mélanges de science religieuse 3 (1946), 207–34; Kenneth W. Stevenson, ‘Origins and Development of Ash Wednesday’, in his Worship: Wonderful and Sacred Mystery (Washington, 1992), 159–87.

74 The choice of chant texts for the second Sunday of Advent seems to have been guided by a similar principle: Populis Sion (introit), Ex Sion species decoris eius (gradual), Laetatus sum (alleluia … ‘in domum domini ibimus’), and Jerusalem surge (communion).

75 For the chronology related to the communions, see Joseph Dyer, ‘The Weekday Communions of Lent’, in Studi in onore di Giacomo Baroffio, ed. Leandra Scappaticci (Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, forthcoming).

76 Antoine Chavasse, ‘Le cycle pascal’, in L'Église en prière. Introduction à la liturgie, 3rd edn, ed. Aimé-Georges Martimort (Paris-Tournai, 1965), 722–6.

77 Ludovico Gatto, Storia di Roma nel Medioevo: Politica, religione, cultura. economia e urbanistica della Città Eterna tra l'avvento di Costantino e il sacheggio di Carlo V, I volti della storia 50 (Rome, 1999), 73–7.

78 Liber pontificalis, 1:244.

79 The high medieval choir enclosures are discussed in Elaine De Benedictis, ‘The “Schola Cantorum” in Rome during the High Middle Ages’, Ph.D. diss., Bryn Mawr College (1983).

80 A monumental solea is described by Paul the Silentiary in his poem in praise of the Justinianic church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople; see Stephen G. Xydis, ‘The Chancel Barrier, Solea, and Ambo of Hagia Sophia’, The Art Bulletin, 29 (1947), 1–24.

81 Giuseppe Cuscito, ‘Riquadri musivi a destinazione liturgica nelle basiliche paleocristiane dell’alto medioevo', Antichità Altoadriatiche, 8 (1975), 177–216, esp. 198–200.

82 His monogram can be faintly seen on two others, where it was replaced by verde antico marble disks.

83 Some of the impost blocks into which the pilasters were inserted can still be seen in the excavated lower church.

84 Sible de Blaauw, Cultus et Decor. Liturgia e architettura nella Roma tardoantica e medievale, 2 vols., Studi e Testi 355–6 (Rome, 1994), 1:127–9; see the axonometric reconstruction in Hugo Brandenburg, ‘Santo Stefano Rotondo in Roma: funzione urbanistica, tipologia architettonica, liturgia ed allestimento liturgico’, in Atti del colloquio internazionale, Arredi di culto e disposizioni liturgiche a Roma da Costantino a Sisto IV, Istituto Olandese a Roma, 3–4 dicembre 1999, ed. Sible de Blaauw, Papers of the Netherlands Institute in Rome 59 (Assen, 2001), 42 (27–54).

85 ‘Struttura e cronologia delle recinzioni liturgiche nelle chiese di Roma dal VI al IX secolo’, in Arredi di culto, 96 (81–99); a general overview in the same volume is Franz Alto Bauer, ‘The Liturgical Arrangement of Early Medieval Roman Church Buildings’, 101–28.

86 Guidobaldi, ‘Struttura’, 85; A. Marcos Pous, ‘Untersuchungen zum Kompositionsschema vorromanischer römischer Chorschranken von der byzantinischen bis zu langobardischen Zeit’, in Karolingische und ottonische Kunst, Forschungen zur Geschichte und christlichen Archäologie 3 (Wiesbaden, 1957), 236–52; E. Russo, ‘Fasi e modi della scultura a Roma nel VI e VII secolo’, Mélanges de l'École française de Rome: Moyen Âge, 96 (1984), 7–48.

87 It was ‘etwas willkürlich zusammengesetzt’ according to Hugo Brandenburg, Die frühchristlichen Kirchen Roms vom 4. bis zum 7. Jahrhundert: Der Beginn der abendländischen Kirchenbaukunst (Milan 2004), 175.

88 Brandenburg, Die frühchristlichen Kirchen, 193; the date is deemed uncertain by Gabriele Bartolozzi Casti and Giuliana Zandri, San Pietro in Vincoli, Le chiese di Roma illustrate, n.s. 31 (Rome, 1999), 75.

89 Richard Krautheimer, Corpus Basilicarum Christianarum Romae (Vatican City, 1976?), 4:241–53; Brandenburg, Die frühchristlichen Kirchen, 235f.

90 The church was founded by Pope Mark in 336f. On the various renovations that the church underwent see Margherita Cecchelli, ‘La basilica di S. Marco a Piazza Venezia (Roma): Nuove scoperte e indagini’, in Akten des XII. Internationalen Kongresses für christliche Archäologie, 2 vols. (Münster, 1995), 2:640–4.

91 Maurice Mesnard, La basilique de Saint Chrysogone à Rome, Studi di Antichità Cristiana 9 (Rome, 1935), 89–91.

92 ‘Il restauro di una basilica cristiana’, Capitolium 7 (1931), 34–43, as quoted in Roberta Flaminio, ‘Testimonianze altomedievale a S. Balbina’, Ecclesiae Urbis, 1:477, n. 13 (473–501).

93 Federico Guidobaldi, ‘Strutture liturgiche negli edifici cristiani di Roma dal IV al VI secolo’, in Materiale tecniche dell'edilizia paleocristiana a Roma, ed. Margherita Cecchelli (Rome, 2001), 171–90; see p. 187 for a list of urban and cemeterial churches that had masonry soleae.

94 Victor Saxer, ‘Recinzioni liturgiche secondo le fonti letterarie’, in Arredi di culto, 71–79; Charles du Cange, Glossarium mediae et infimae Latinitatis … editio nova aucta pluribus verbis aliorum scriptorum a Léopold Favre, 10 vols. (Niort, 1883–87; repr. Paris, 1938), 7:234; Du Cange's extended commentary is published in Pauli silentiarii descriptio S. Sophiae et ambonis eius, ed. Immanuel Bekker, Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae [1] (Bonn, 1837), 138–43 (note 73); reprinted in Jacques-Paul Migne, Patrologia Graeca 86:2233–38.

95 LP 1:517 (note 38); cf. LP 1:522 (note 113) and the index, s.v. ‘rugae’, LP 3:224. It appears in the singular in Ordo Romanus 1.129, where it is said that the acolytes watch over the ruga (acolyti qui rugam observant), ed. Andrieu, 2:108. The manuscript variants (regiam, virugam, rumgam, rugas, virgam) imply that copyists did not know what to make of this word.

96 Among the most important studies are Giovanni Brusin, Gli scavi di Aquileia (Udine, 1934), 187–95; Mario Mirabella Roberti, ‘La posizione dell’altare nelle più antiche basiliche di Aquileia e di Parenzo', Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana, 26 (1950), 181–94; idem, ‘L’arredo delle basiliche paleocristiane nell'alto Adriatico e in Africa', Antichità Altoadriatiche 5 (1974), 369–83; Sergio Tavano, Aquileia Cristiana, Antichità Altoadriatiche 3 (Udine, 1972), 47–81.

97 Cf. the early fifth-century church at Celje (Slovenia, north of the Sava River); Franz Glaser, Frühes Christentum im Alpenraum: Eine archäologische Entdeckungsreise (Regensburg, 1997), 65–7 (Abb. 20).

98 For an overview of the building see Sergio Tavano, Grado: Guida storica e artistica (Udine, 1976), 57–104; a splendid colour photograph of the nave is available in Giuseppe Cuscito, Grado e le sue basiliche paleocristiane (Bologna, 1979), fig. 7.

99 Mario Mirabella Roberti, ‘Indagini nel duomo di Pola’, Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana 23–24 (1947–48), 222–7 (209–29). On Aosta see the photographs in Glaser, Frühes Christentum im Alpenraum (Regensburg, 1997), 195, and Charles Bonnet and Renato Perinetti, Aoste au premiers temps chrétiens (Aosta, 1986).

100 Rita Lizzi, Vescovi e strutture ecclesiastiche nella città tardoantica (L'Italia Annonaria nel IV–V secolo d. C.), Biblioteca de Athanaeum 9 (Como, 1989), 139–69 (‘Aqileia e le sue costruzioni sacre’); Luisa Bertacchi, ‘Un decennio di scavi e scoperte d’interesse paleocristiana ad Aquileia', Antichità Altoadriatiche, 6 (1974), 63–91.

101 Giovanni Brusin, Gli scavi di Aquileia: Un quadrennio di attività dell'Associazione nazionale per Aquileia (1929-1932) (Udine, 1934), 187–95; Giuseppe Cuscito, ‘L’arredo liturgico nelle basiliche paleocristiane della ‘Venetia’ orientale', Hortus Artium Medievalium, 5 (1999), pp. 87–8 and figs. 11–14; this church was under construction when Athanasius visited Aquileia for Easter in 345; Apologia in Constantium imperatorem 14–15; ed. Jan M. Szymusiak, Athanase d'Alexandrie: Deux apologies à l'empereur Constance pour sa fuite, SC 56bis (Paris, 1987), 114–19.

102 A general survey is Giuseppe Cuscito, ‘L’antica liturgia di Aquileia', in Anno domini 1208: Ottocento anni della parrochia di Cortina d'Ampezzo, ed. Giorgio Fedalto (Trieste, 2009), 49–85.

103 Cusicto, ‘Lo spazio’, fig. 21; Tavano, Grado, 183–92. Germana Marchesan-Chinese, ‘La basilica di Piazza della Vittoria a Grado’, in Grado nella storia e nell'arte, 2 vols. (= Antichità Altoadriatiche 27) (1980), 309–23.

104 Volker Bierbrauer, Invillino–Ibligo in Friul II: Die spätantiken und frühmittelalterlichen Kirchen (Munich, 1988), 60–9, Abb, Tafel 5.2 and 32.1; Giuseppe Cuscito, ‘Lo spazio sacro negli edifici cultuali paleocristiani dell’Alto Adriatico', Hortus Artium Medievalium, 1 (1995), 90–110; idem, ‘L’arredo', 87–104.

105 Sermo 26 in dedicatione ecclesiae concordensis, in Chromatii aquiliensis opera, ed. Raymund Étaix and Jean Lemarié, CCSL 9A (Turnhout, 1974), 119–22. Rita Lizzi (Vescovi, 148–5) notes that Chromatius dubbed his friend Rufinus ‘Beseleel’ after the builder of the Temple (p. 159). See also Da Aquileia a Venezia: Una mediazione tra l'Europa et l'Oriente dal II secolo a.C. al secolo VI d.C., ed. Bruna Forlati Tamaro et al. (Milan, 1980), 310–6 and figs. 274–6.

106 Bierbrauer, Invillino, Abb. 11.

107 Cuscito ‘Lo spazio’, figs. 27–8; idem, ‘L’arredo', fig. 27.

108 Sebastian Ristow, ‘Ambonen und Soleae in Gallien, Germanien, Raetien und Noricum im Frühmittelalter’, Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana, 80 (2004), 289–312, who calls them ‘keyhole soleae’ from their shape; also Glaser, Frühes Christentum.

109 This principle was well stated by Nicolas Huyghebaert: ‘si une légende n’offre que des fictions pour le temps dont elle parle, il lui arrive de révéler des chose intéressantes pour le temps où elle parle', in ‘Une légende de fondation: le Constitum Constantini’, Le Moyen Âge, 85 (1979), 194 (177–209).

110 Located 10km from Monfalcone and 30km from Gorizia (Friuli-Venezia Giulia); Menis, G.C., ‘La diffusione del cristianesimo nel territorio friulano in epoca cristiana’, Antichità Altoadriatiche 6 (1974), 49–61Google Scholar ; Cuscito, ‘Aspetti sociali’, 239ff.