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The Rite for Taking the Cross in the Twelfth Century*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

Kenneth Pennington
Kenneth Pennington*
Affiliation:
Syracuse University
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Extract

The liturgical ceremony for the taking of the crusading cross did not develop until well into the twelfth century. Texts which reveal how the cross was bestowed are relatively rare from the period 1095 to 1200. It was not until the thirteenth century that pontificals commonly contained such a ceremony. It is not clear why the rite for taking the cross took so long to develop, but two twelfth-century Italian pontificals from the Graz University library shed some light on how the liturgical ceremony evolved on the continent.

Type
Miscellany
Information
Traditio , Volume 30 , 1974 , pp. 429 - 435
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 Three twelfth-century English rites are published in Brundage, J. A., ‘Cruce signari: The Rite for Taking the Cross in England,’ Traditio 22 (1966) 289–310.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Andrieu, Michel, Le Pontifical romain au moyen äge [Studi e Testi 86–88; 99: Cittá del Vaticano 1938] contains the thirteenth-century Roman curial rite (2.418-20) and Gulielmus Durandus' Pontifical (3.541-45). These texts are analyzed by Brundage, ‘Cruce signari,’ 300-01. See also Franz, Adolph, Die kirchlichen Benediktionem in Mittelalter, 2 vols. (Freiburg i/Br. 1909; repr. Graz 1960) 2.271-89, 302-7. Brundage, , Medieval Canon Law and the Crusader (Madison, Milwaukee, and London 1969) 120, reports from the inventories of. Leroquais, V., Les pontificaux manuscrits des bibliothèques publiques de France, 4 vols. (Paris 1937), that twenty-seven pontifical manuscripts contain a rite for taking the cross. None of them, however, is from the twelfth century.Google Scholar

3 See the remarks of Brundage,‘ Cruce signari’ 291-95 and his Medieval Canon Law 118-121. This point is graphically illustrated by a pontifical from the monastery of St. Benedict in Wessobrunn. In the prayer which was said after the staff was given to the pilgrim [Omnipotens sempiterne deus, humani generis reformator; cf. Andrieu, , Le Pontifical 2.544], a margina gloss added to ‘hos qui ad beatorum apostolorum tuorum et sancti Michaelis archangeli pergentes limina,’ the addition ‘uel ad sepulchrum domini pergentes.’ This is an obvious adaptation of the pilgrimage rite for the crusade. The pontifical is contained in Clm 22039 fol. 206r-210r. It contains a long, detailed pilgrimage rite from the twelfth century.Google Scholar

4 Andrieu, , Le Pontifical printed the twelfth-century Roman curial Pontifical's pilgrimage rite (1.265). See Brundage, , ‘Cruce signari’ appendix I, tables I, II, III, V, VI for other twelfth-century rites.Google Scholar

5 Andrieu, , Le Pontifical 2.418-20 (Roman curial), 3.541-45 (Durandus). The rites of the Ely and Coventry pontificals are printed in Brundage, ‘Cruce signari’ 303-07.Google Scholar

6 The rite of the Lincoln Pontifical is printed in Brundage, ‘Cruce signari’ 307-10.Google Scholar

7 The manuscript is dated by Kern, A., Die Handschriften der Universitätsbibliothek Graz (Leipzig 1942) 124, to the second half of the twelfth century. I agree with his dating. Kern noted that the thirteenth-century additions on fols. 24r and 203r probably indicated a southern Italian provenance. Most likely, Kern hypothesized, Bari might have been the place of origin.Google Scholar

8 Kern, , Die Handschriften 94. A later scribe bracketed the entire ordo for bestowing the cross with a uacat. He included, however, not only the ordo for the cross, but, inadvertently, the rite De aduentu fratrum on fol. 84v. Kern dated this manuscript in the twelfth century. The script is definitely Italian. Because of the unusual position of the rite for blessing a ship in this pontifical, the pontifical might have been from an Italian seaport city. It would be natural to have the blessing of a ship done with the crusading rite if the crusaders were to leave by boat.Google Scholar

9 Brundage, , Medieval Canon Law 82–3, notes that the twelfth-century canonists did not include any of the famous crusading bulls in their canonical collections.Google Scholar

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2 Ps. 118.1.Google Scholar

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10 Ps. 101.2.Google Scholar

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20 expun. ualeas post securus.Google Scholar

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26 Neumes are provided for Saluator ————– noster.Google Scholar

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28 Neumes are provided for O————–crux————-redemptus.Google Scholar

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