Although it is impossible to enter in detail into any history of an
object so well known, by name at least, as the pastoral crook of a
bishop, it may yet be not without interest to offer a few remarks upon
it in explanation of the varieties of shape of old ivory croziers still
existing, and as a subject not without interest in our own days to
many people. The Tau, spoken of in the last chapter, is but a form of
the pastoral staff, adopted in more than one country of western Europe
early in the middle ages.
The most ancient shape of the episcopal staff is found represented in
the catacombs; a short handle, with a plain boss or oval knob bent
aside at the top like the pagan _lituus_. Sometimes in the catacombs we
also find the truer form of a shepherd’s crook, a plain but complete
curve at the extremity. The Tau is commonly seen and given without
apparent distinction to bishops and abbots in manuscripts of the
eighth and ninth centuries, about which period there came in another
fashion, unpleasing and hardly intelligible in its design, where the
crook is but slightly bent and extended almost horizontally from the
staff itself. One more shape, and more rare, was a double plain crook
like horns joined together. After all these came the admirable design,
of which the South Kensington museum possesses one or two splendid
examples, wherein the volute is carried half round again and frequently
contains within the circle other ornaments or groups of figures.
[Illustration: IVORY CARVING, HEAD OF A TAU OR T SHAPED STAFF, IN
WALRUS TUSK, THE COMPARTMENTS CONTAINING THE SIGNS OF THE ZODIAC.
12^{th} CENT (SOLTIKOFF COLL) L, 5 IN S. K. M. (N^o 215 ’65)
F. A. SLOCOMBE FECIT]
The extremities of the Taus were often hollowed, to receive relics.
The beautiful Tau now at Kensington, engraved in the etching,
shows the old recesses; but the crystal ends are lost. It is of
this Tau that a learned author writes as follows, in the Mélanges
archéologiques:—“Avant de quitter ce beau monument, je ferai observer
la riche ciselure du treillis séparant les signes. Il est à peine
croyable que chaque petite perle d’ivoire le long des entrelacs
enchâsse une pierre précieuse, et que les yeux des animaux sont ainsi
formés.” A very fine ivory of the same admirable kind and style is
preserved in the library at Rouen, probably of earlier date, of the
tenth century; and another is in the Cluny museum, unusually simple in
shape and plain in ornament, which was found at St. Germain-des-Prés in
the tomb of Morard, abbot of that monastery from 990 to 1014. In the
etching is another Tau, also at Kensington.
Ivory Taus are of great rarity. They were gradually superseded towards
the end of the twelfth century by that form which, with certain
varieties of ornament, has continued down to our own times. The most
common mode of treating the volute itself was to imitate a serpent; and
the termination of the crook was the head of the serpent, sometimes
with widely-expanded jaws.
It may appear unreasonable that the serpent was so constantly used as a
religious emblem in such a way; but the symbol was certainly adopted in
Christian art and with several pious significations from the first ages
of the Christian faith. As the chief decoration of a bishop’s pastoral
staff it might be regarded as an emblem of prudence, or as a record of
the rod of Moses, which was changed into a serpent and destroyed those
which had been cast down by the magicians; or again, as an emblem of
the subtlety or wisdom required in a ruler over Christ’s flock. When
the serpent is also chained or entangled, then, perhaps, the triumph of
the Church over Satan is symbolised; or the contest itself between the
two, when the head and open jaws seem to be on the point of closing
over the lamb and cross, as in the pastoral staff of the Ashmolean
museum at Oxford. Once more, the triumph would be shown when our Lord
in glory is represented within the sweep of the serpent’s body. It is
also probable that the men twisted and twined with serpents and animals
and branches of trees, in the older examples, were meant to typify the
struggle against the evil influences of the world, the flesh, and the
devil.
The triumph of Christianity over the world is of a class of ornament
which was largely introduced towards the middle of the thirteenth
century, and which included others of a like character: such as,
especially, the Crucifixion (as in the etching) or the Virgin standing
with the Child in her arms, sometimes attended by angels, or the
adoration of the Magi; and, a little later, the coronation of the
Virgin; or the destruction of the dragon by the archangel Michael.
The author of the paper in the Mélanges d’archéologie speaks of a
pastoral staff of ivory having “the Coronation” so early as the time
of St. Gautier, abbot of St. Martin de Pontoise about 1070, to whom
it is attributed. An engraving of it is in that publication; and it
is worthy of especial notice because, although of wood, the handle is
not only enriched with decorations like the handle of the fan at South
Kensington, no. 373 and the corresponding piece in the British museum,
but the ornaments are placed within exactly similar small square
compartments.
Sometimes the volutes of croziers were filled merely with foliage and
twisted branches; but these were more commonly of copper or silver, for
the further purpose of being enamelled.
We must not fail to observe how cleverly in many of the mediæval ivory
heads of bishops’ staffs the volute is occupied by a double subject,
placed back to back, so that one of the two might face the people as
it was borne along. These are generally, on one side the Crucifixion,
on the other the Virgin and Child. The figures standing upon the one
side on either hand of the cross are carved on the reverse as angels
in attendance on the Virgin. This is well shown in the woodcut, from a
pastoral staff of the thirteenth century, preserved in the cathedral at
Metz.
[Illustration: CROSIER IN CARVED IVORY AND GILT METAL.
FRENCH XIV CENT. (7952) W M M^cGILL]
[Illustration]
In remote times the pastoral staff of a bishop was usually made of
wood; at least, we may suppose so from the jest of Guy Coquille:—
“Au temps passé du siècle d’or,
Crosse de bois, évêque d’or;
Maintenant, changeant les lois,
Crosse d’or, évêque de bois.”
These lines are not, perhaps, all in jest, for the wooden staff of St.
Erhard exists at Ratisbonne: and another is in the church of St. Ursula
at Cologne. The two Benedictines in their famous travels (as recorded
in the “Voyage littéraire”) come to Maurienne, and tell us: “Nous
vîmes aussi dans le trésor une croce d’yvoire: car les anciens évêques
aimoient mieux employer leur argent à soulager les pauvres, qu’en des
ornemens vains et superflus.” They saw other ivory pastoral staffs
before their journeys ended: one at Marseilles, in the abbey of St.
Victor; and one of the eleventh century at St. Savin, in the diocese of
Tarbes; another, worthy of special mention, at Cluny: “La croce de S.
Hugue, qui est de bois couvert de feuilles d’argent, dont le dessus est
d’yvoire.”
In later days the use of wood was generally limited to the staffs
and croziers which were buried in their graves with archbishops and
bishops, abbots and abbesses. A few of these have been found: one, very
remarkable and in a fair state of preservation, in Westminster abbey
in the tomb of bishop Lyndwood, the great canonist. This is now in
the British museum. A full account of the opening of this tomb, with
engravings, is printed in one of the volumes of the Archæologia.
Probably the pastoral staff mentioned in the will of Richard Martyn
bishop of St. David’s, who died about the year 1498, was of wood. He
bequeathed to the church of Lyde “the cross-hed that Oliver the joiner
made.”
Inscriptions are sometimes found upon ivory pastoral staffs. For
example on that of St. Aunon, archbishop of Cologne: “Sterne
resistentes, stantes rege, tolle jacentes;” others on those of St.
Saturnin at Toulouse, and of Otho, bishop of Hildesheim.
The old Sarum pontificals order, in the first rubric for consecrating a
bishop, that the _baculus pastoralis_ should be provided with the other
necessary episcopal ornaments and vestments; and the staff is delivered
to the new bishop in the course of the office. “_Quum datur baculus
dicat ordinator_, Accipe baculum pastoralis officii,” etc., and the
purpose is further alluded to as the ceremony proceeds.
The symbolism of the shape and ornaments of the ivory pastoral staffs
is clearly explained by Hugo St. Victor: “Episcopo, dum regimen
ecclesiæ committitur, baculus quasi pastori traditur, in quo tria
notantur, quæ significatione non carent, recurvitas, virga, cuspis;
significatio hoc carmine continetur:—
“Attraho peccantes, justos rogo, pungo vagantes,
Officio triplici servio pontifici.”
It remains only to notice that the Pope uses neither pastoral staff
nor crozier, nor is it delivered to him at his consecration, if at
his election he be only a simple priest. It is said, however, that
he should carry one in the diocese of Treves because St. Peter gave
his own to the first bishop of that place, where it is preserved as a
famous relic. This tradition is mentioned by St. Thomas Aquinas: “Et
ideo in diœcesi Treverensi papa baculum portat, et non in aliis.”
An engraving is given (p. 90) of the head of a pastoral staff, rather
more than five inches in height, not only unusual and remarkable in
style but probably of English work. This was preserved in the Meyrick
collection and is carved from bone. The outside of the upright part and
the volute are decorated with pierced work, now slightly mutilated.
Inside the volute, which terminates with the open mouth of a serpent,
is a man in a grotesque position, his feet within the serpent’s jaws. A
rich interlaced scroll decorates both sides of the head of the staff.
[Illustration]
It is perhaps not to be wondered at that a Tau should be, as we
know it is, amongst the most rare of ornaments or utensils in ivory
which have been preserved. The early and total disuse of them would
have naturally led to their destruction and loss, sometimes wilful,
sometimes accidental. But that the pastoral staff (that is, the head of
it) should be of almost equal rarity is less easily to be explained.
Few collections possess a good example; still fewer more than one.
Nevertheless, in England alone pastoral staffs must have been almost
without number at the beginning of the sixteenth century; and although
many were probably of metal, silver or copper enamelled and having
some intrinsic value, yet an equal or perhaps greater number were of
ivory. Not merely bishops but the heads of religious houses, abbots and
abbesses, carried them as official tokens of their rank and dignity.
We find frequent mention of them in the old inventories. For example,
at St. Paul’s, in 1295; “Item, baculus cum cambuca eburnea, continente
agnum.” “Item, baculus de peciis eburneis, et summitate crystallina,”
etc. “Cambuca” is a word often used in the middle ages for the staff
itself; derived, perhaps, from κάμπτω, I bend.
Yet numerous as they must once have been, the heads of English pastoral
staffs are now among the rarest of ivory carvings. It is true that
no. 298 at South Kensington can, with some kind of probability, be
attributed to an English artist and may have been used in England;
but no other in that collection can be referred to. The almost
complete destruction in England of all ecclesiastical ornaments—books,
vestments, reliquaries, and the like—in the middle of the sixteenth
century will account for the extreme rarity of them in this country.
But it is very difficult to explain the reason why so few should still
be found in France, or Germany, or Italy. The bishop’s pastoral staff,
again, has not dropped out of use like the pax or the flabellum.
There are examples of the pax in the South Kensington collection, nos.
246 and 247. It was used in the middle ages at high mass and sometimes
at low mass also, for sending the kiss of peace from the celebrant,
first to the deacon and subdeacon or to the acolyte, afterwards to the
people. With regard to the custom in England, provincial and diocesan
statutes repeat again and again the obligation upon parishes to provide
the pax, “osculatorium” or “asser ad pacem,” equally with the proper
vestments or books or other furniture of the altar. The rubrics of the
Sarum missal—the use most largely observed in England before the reign
of queen Elizabeth—direct the priest, immediately after the _Agnus
Dei_, to kiss the outside rim of the chalice in which was the Sacred
Blood, and then to give the pax to the deacon who delivered it in
regular order to the ministers and choristers in the sanctuary.
Everything connected with the correct text of the plays of Shakespeare
is of the highest interest to every Englishman; and will serve, it is
hoped, as some excuse for a few words by way of remark upon a passage
where he alludes to a pax. The unfortunate Bardolph came to an untimely
end on account of it:
“Fortune is Bardolph’s foe, and frowns on him:
For he hath stolen a pax: and hang’d must’a be.
——Exeter hath given the doom of death,
For pax of little price.”
HENRY V., _act_ iii., _sc._ 5.
Until lately the editors of Shakspeare printed _pyx_ on the emendation
(so-called) of Theobald. Johnson, who approved the new reading, informs
us in his note upon the place that the two words “signified the same
thing.” As far as Bardolph was concerned it mattered not; he had
“conveyed” a sacred thing and, as Holinshed tells us, the king would
not move on till the thief was hanged.
The quartos of 1600 and 1608 (and also the three folios) read _pax_:
“he hath stolne a packs;” “a packs of pettie price,” in both editions.
Shakspeare very well knew that a pax exposed or left carelessly on
an altar was much more likely to be stolen than a pyx, which would
be taken infinitely greater care of and locked up in the tabernacle.
Even Dr. Johnson was ignorant upon some subjects; and the way in which
editors “emend” their authors is something marvellous. When Shakspeare
lived, and when the quartos were printed, people had not forgotten the
distinction between the pax and the pyx; and many even could still
remember when that now mysterious thing, the pax, had been brought down
to them in the services of the Church from the altar.
The introduction of the pax instead of the old practice of mutual
salutation was not until about the thirteenth century. The earliest
mention in England occurs in a council held at York, A.D. 1250, under
archbishop Walter Gray, where it is called “osculatorium.” A like order
was made in the province of Canterbury, at the council of Merton, 1305,
directing every parish to provide “tabulas pacis ad osculatorium.”
Several figures of the pax are given in works relating to the subject;
and we find it almost always represented as part of the furniture of
an altar in the woodcut which often precedes the service for advent
sunday, in the printed editions of the Salisbury missal from about 1500
to 1557. Le Brun has an interesting disquisition on the pax: and he
tells us in a note that in its turn it also fell into disuse, because
of quarrels about precedency which were occasioned among the people. Le
Brun is borne out by Chaucer who, in the Parson’s Tale, speaking of the
proud man explains that “also he awaited to sit, or els to go above him
in the waie, or kisse paxe, or be encenced before his neighbour, _etc._”
Occasionally, paxes in ivory have inscriptions upon them. One of the
three in the Liverpool museum has the appropriate prayer, “Da pacem
Domine in diebus nostris.” Two exhibited at Norwich in 1847 had
legends. On one, the Annunciation, “Ave Maria;” on the other, the
Nativity with the shepherds, “Gloria in excelsis Deo, et in terra pax,
_etc._”
Notices of the pax are common in monastic and church inventories. In
the Rites of Durham abbey we are told that they possessed “a marvelous
faire booke, which had the epistles and gospels in it, the which booke
had on the outside of the coveringe the picture of our Saviour Christ
all of silver—which booke did serve for the paxe in the masse.” A
book which an abbot of Glastonbury gave to his church there probably
answered the same purpose; and other then existing examples might be
referred to. “Unum textum argenteum et auratum cum crucifixo, Maria,
et Johanne, splendidus emalatum.” A mediæval English pax made of wood
does not now, probably, exist: but there is a curious entry in the
inventory of church goods belonging to the parish of St. Peter Cheap,
in the year 1431; “item iij lyttel pax breds of tre.” Many such wooden
paxes are mentioned as having been burnt in the diocese of Lincoln in
1566 by the royal commissioners: “a paxe of wood” at Baston, another at
Dunsbie, another at Haconbie.
We have a remarkable illustration of the late use of the pax in England
in one of the injunctions issued by the king’s visitors to the clergy
within the deanery of Doncaster, in the first year of Edward the sixth,
and printed by Burnet in his Records: “The clerk was ordered at the
proper time to bring down the pax, and standing without the church
door to say these words aloud to the people. This is a token of joyful
peace which is betwixt God and men’s conscience, _etc._” The “church
door” here means the door in the screen which in those days divided the
chancel from the body of the church. As in Chaucer, where he says of
the wife of Bath
“Husbands at the church door had she had five.”
In England before the change of religion in the fifteenth century the
marriage ceremony was performed outside the chancel, sometimes at the
great door of the church itself; and then all proceeded towards the
sanctuary for mass and communion.
One of the most beautiful as well as one of the most rare objects
in the South Kensington collection is part of the handle of an
ecclesiastical fan, or flabellum. It is, probably, one half of a
handle; and another half, so nearly alike that it is a question whether
it does or does not belong to the same handle, is in the British
museum. The fan is still used in the Catholic Church in the east,
where the purpose and benefit of it in order to keep off flies from
the sacred vessels, or on account of the heat, are obvious. But in the
west, except perhaps for part of the year in Italy, the fan was a kind
of fashion and, having no symbolism, an unmeaning introduction from
the oriental rite. The various churches of France and England had
dropped the use of it before the sixteenth century; but we have plenty
of evidence that the fan was commonly adopted in the thirteenth and the
twelfth. Illuminations in two of the manuscripts in the public library
at Rouen are very clear in this matter. One represents the deacon
raising the flabellum, a circular fan with a long handle, over the head
of the priest standing at the altar. In the other, the deacon is in the
act of waving the fan, holding it by a short handle, over the head of a
bishop who is elevating the Host.
A very curious flabellum, supposed to be of the ninth century, is
described by Du Sommerard; it had long been preserved in the abbey of
Tournus, south of Chalons, and was said to be in the possession of M.
Carraud about twenty years ago. The fan of queen Theodolinda, of purple
vellum with ivory handle, given by her to the cathedral of Monza is
still preserved there. Other examples are, perhaps, still existing; two
or three are mentioned by writers of the last century.
Inventories of churches and monasteries include the fan. In one
of Amiens, about 1300, is “flabellum factum de serico et auro ad
repellendas muscas.” Another, of the Sainte Chapelle at Paris, 1363,
gives “Item, duo flabella, vulgariter nuncupata muscalia, ornata
perlis.” Nor ought we to omit some entries of the same kind in English
inventories. In one, of the cathedral of Salisbury, in 1314, are “ij
flabella de serico et pergameno.” The church of St. Faith, in the crypt
of St. Paul’s, possessed among its ornaments in 1298 “unum muscatorium
de pennis pavonum.” Still more to our present purpose was the fan
given to a chantry in the cathedral of Rochester, by bishop Hanno, in
1346; “unum flabellum de serico cum virga eburnea:” or the “flabellum
de serico” named in the inventory of the property of Robert Bilton,
bishop of Exeter, in 1330. John Newton, treasurer of York minster,
gave to that church about the year 1400 a splendid fan, which was
in the treasury there when everything of the kind was destroyed by
the commissioners of Edward the sixth: “Manubrium flabelli argenteum
deauratum, ex dono Joh. Newton, cum ymagine episcopi in fine enameled,
pond’ v. unc.” It is not at all improbable that fans were used in
England at mass even in parochial or country churches until a late
period. The following entry occurs in the accounts of the churchwardens
of Walberswick, in Suffolk: a payment in the year 1493 for “a bessume
of pekok’s fethers, iv. d.”
Care must be observed, however, not to set down all works in
ivory which are similar to no. 373 as having been the handles of
ecclesiastical fans. Other church ceremonies required utensils of the
same kind; though, probably, they were seldom if ever so profusely
decorated and enriched with carving. For example, holy-water sprinklers
would often have had ivory handles; and one is specified as belonging
to St. Paul’s in 1295, “aspersorium de ebore.” More than this; whip
handles, which we see on mirror cases and in illuminations, and other
like things were made and ornamented for secular purposes. Hearne
gives a copy of a curious inscription on the handle of a whip found in
the ruins of the abbey of St. Alban. It commemorates the gift of four
horses to the monks of that house from Gilbert of Newcastle. Hearne
leaves the date of the handle doubtful, but is disposed to put it about
the end of the fourteenth century.
The wife of Roger de Mortimer of Wigmore castle in Herefordshire had,
among other valuable things as specified in the inventory taken in
Edward the second’s reign (before quoted) “item, j scourgiam de ebore.”
The etching represents a very beautiful reliquary, French work of the
sixteenth century, in the Kensington museum.
[Illustration: TRIPTYCH, SERVING AS A RELIQUARY IN CARVED IVORY ABOUT
1480. ENTIRE WIDTH OPENED 10¼ in. S.K.M. (N^o 4336)
D. JONES FECIT.]