Terms for Ecclesiastical Garb

One advantage in being brought up in a liturgical religious tradition (which I was not) is that you have a series of words to describe garments, parts of the church, portions of the liturgy and items in that liturgy that are foreign to those not in the tradition. Those of us, however, brought up in a Protestant tradition knew only about the simple Geneva robe. As a means of educating myself more fully on the traditions which I don't share, then, I thought it would be good to learn some of their words, especially for religious garb. This essay is devoted to some of the words. Here is a online guide.

Let's begin with some "epi" words from the Greek Orthodox tradition. "Epi" is a preposition meaning "upon," and it has bequeathed to us the following: epitaphios, epitrachelion, epimanikia, epigonation. The epitaphion (literally "upon the tomb") is a cloth depicting Christ after he has been removed from the cross, lying supine, as his body is prepared for burial. Around him are various disciples, including Joseph of Arimathea, and some women. The cloth plays an important and elaborate role in the liturgy of Good (Great) Friday and Holy Saturday. Here is an article. The other three "epis" refer to garments worn by priests. The first, an epitrachelion, pictured often online, is a stole that goes around the neck and reaches almost to the ground in front of the priest. The word literally means "upon" or "around" the neck. Then, the epigonation is something "upon the knee." This diamond-shaped vestment, hanging from the right side of the bishop's vestments, is a descendant of the old Roman 'thigh-protectors' which a soldier wore to protect the thigh against constant abrasion from his sword. It is kissed by priests in an ordination ceremony in some traditions. There is not too much of a market for an epigonation today, even in the church...

I will devote a paragraph to the last "epi," the epimanikia. The singular is epimanikion, but the plural is much more common online. Usually this word is simply anglicized to "cuffs," because the epimanikia are large cuffs which keep the sleeves of the undergarment (the sticharion) from flapping and getting in the way. Spiritual explanations for this practical garment emphasize this as a symbol of the "fight against sin," but that seems a bit of a stretch to me. Here is a picture.

The just-linked web site talks about the worship of the Orthodox faith, including the prothesis (the preparation and preliminary oblation of the elements, performed by priest and deacon), the garments and the ceremony of the Divine Liturgy. The five garments pictured on this site, which the priest puts on, are the sticharion (undergarment), the epitrachelion, the zone (belt; two syllables); the epimanikia and the phelonion, the outward garment which "arms" the priest with the gifts of the Holy Spirit so that he is ready for the service of worship.

There are also a few other terms in the Greek tradition, such as the sakkos and omophorion, both of which are only worn by a bishop when he conducts the Divine Liturgy. The latter is a vestment worn by patriarchs and bishops, and literally means "the shoulders bearing," which indicates that it is to be worn around the shoulders. People in the Orthodox tradition aren't the only ones who use these kinds of words. We have, for example, this passage from Joyce's Ulysses: "In a Greek watercloset he breathed his last:...stalled upon his throne,...with upstiffed omophorion, with clotted hinderparts. The sakkos is worn by Orthodox bishops instead of the priest's phelonion. Here is a picture of this tunic with wide sleeves, reaching below the knees and fastened up th esides with buttons or tied with ribbons. In addition, we also run into the orarion in the Greek tradition, which is a stole worn by a deacon in the Greek Church over his left shoulder. An older source tells us that it was originally a long narrow Towel, the primary use of which was to wipe the mouth or fingers as there was occasion. It certainly takes away some of the "spirituality" of the garment to realize this might be true, as with the epimanikia. I also like the word Aer, one of the coverings for the Eucharistic elements.

Latin or Italian Terms

But this work so far on the Greek terms only begins to whet our appetite for Latin and Italian words that describe more "Western" ecclesiastical garments. When we turn to those, we run into a bewildering mass of words, each of which probably had its significance at a time (and even now), but many of which seem redundant. Like a real estate contract that prohibits the "sale, vending, demise, descent," etc. of real estate, terms which either mean nothing or are so overlapping with each other as to mean almost nothing, so I think that many Latin terms may have a a meaning, but are probably not that useful for our lives today. Let me list a few of the garments.

We have an alb and a cassock, a surplice and a stole, a cope and a dalmatic, and a chasuble. That enough for you? Each of these is a little different of course, but no one wears them all at once. Then, when we get up to the papal rank, it seems we have a pallium and a fanon. In adition, we have amices and rochets and birettas, zucchettos and mozzettas, along with an occasional mantelletta, which is like mozzetta but which reaches to the knee (the mozzetta--also spelled mozetta--is the familiar tunic of the priests/bishops which only reaches about to mid belly-button. In this regard, if I learned mozetta for a spelling bee, I would also have to figure out which dictionary was being used in the bee, because a more frequent spelling is mozzetta).

The maniple is especially interesting--a handkerchief tied to the left wrist which was originally used to wipe away perspiration. I guess someone could suggest a "spiritualized" reading of this handkerchief as something which the soldiers offered to the dying Christ...

Conclusion

This, of course, doesn't exhaust the terms, but it does drain me now of my energy for going further. I suppose if you are "in the business," each of the garments means something to you. The Protestants tried to break through all of this with the pure truth of the Word of God. But even if I am a Protestant at heart, or a person leaning deeper into secularism than that, I recognize that all these words and garments not only have a story to tell, but they fill out our knowledge of the language (or many languages), and can help us think more precisely as we try to describe the world in writing or speaking. For that reason, then, this was well worth it. Would you agree?

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