medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Christopher Crockett wrote:
> From John Briggs:
>> Christopher Crockett wrote:
>>> From John Briggs:
>
>>>> Introducing the term 'gospel ambo' just presents us with another
>>>> undefined entity!
>
>>> p'rhaps, but, since "gospel ambo" is more or less self-explanitory,
>
>> No, my point is that it is *not* self-explanatory.
>
> ?
>
> which one of those words don't you understand, John?
"ambo" - it is Latin for 'pulpit'!
>> I would keep an open mind: it means 'lectern' or 'pulpit'
>
> my point is to keep an open mind: 'lectern' or 'pulpit' is only the
> [chronologically] original meaning.
No, I am saying those are two meanings.
> by the 13th c. (if not before --that's the original issue which
> coerced me to start this thread), _pulpitum_ means, essentially,
> "jubé".
Maybe - or it may still have all three meanings, and we have to decide from
the context which is meant.
> this is, as understand it, because (at Chartres at least) the jubé
> happened to have a [the?] _pulpitum_ on top of it.
>
>> - I wouldn't like to say which is the primary meaning.
>
> viday soupra, if by "primary" you mean "chronologically prior".
>
Perhaps I do - or perhaps I mean "the default meaning".
>>> though the Ravenna example is screenish in form, since there is no
>>> allowance for a doorway or passage through it, i assume that it did
>>> *not* act as a screen seperating the choir from the nave and was
>>> probably positioned between two piers of the nave.
>
>> But is the Ravenna example in the "nave" or "choir"?
>
> i don't know.
>
> for the purposes of this discussion, i don't see what difference it
> might make --as long as the "ambo of Ravenna" was *not* a *jubé*,
> i.e., in addition to being a "pulpit", it was a screen which closed
> off the choir from the nave.
>
> which, given the absence of any doorway(s) or passage(s) in it,
> appears to have been the case.
>
>> I would expect a "pulpit" to be in the nave, but an "ambo" in the
>> choir.
>
> this is a distinction which i did not pick up on in Leclerq's "Ambon"
> article in the DACL, nor in any other source i've seen.
>
> is it based on any specific textual references?
It is based on me trying to make sense of the function. I am assuming that
a pulpit in the nave was used (primarily) for preaching, whereeas one in the
choir would be used for gospel readings or responses.
>> But we have to make allowance for changes in the liturgy, cf the
>> introduction of choir screens, for example.
>
> yes.
>
> precisely.
>
> and the placing of the _pulpitum_ atop the "jubé" which, apparently,
> led to the latter structure being called (in some contemporary french
> sources at least) a _pulpitum_.
>
> for reasons which i attempt to Mare's Nest below.
>
>>> both of those are "pulpits" and, i assume, were referred to in
>>> contemporary sources as a _pulpitum_.
>
>> Yes, but do allow for the fact that contemporaries may have been
>> referring to the reading-desk rather than the structure.
>
> viday soupra.
No, we still haven't adequately distinguished the three meanings.
>>> however, at some point --apparently during the course of the 12th c.--
>>> we have what appears to have been an innovation: a screen built across
>>> the eastern end of the choir, pierced with doorway(s) to allow access to
>>> the choir, and upon which was a pulpit/lectern and (frequently) a large
>>> crucifix or crucifixion scene.
>>>
>>> this is what we had at Chartres, from the 1230s:
>
>> Do remember that the pulpit/lectern would have faced into the choir.
>> The Rood wouold have faced into the nave.
>
> yet another distinction.
>
> in your Insular terminology, is the "jubé" at Chartres
>
> http://ariadne.org/cc/jube/reconstruction-mallion.jpg
>
> a "Rood"?
The "Rood" is the crucifixion group (Crucifix, Virgin, St John). A screen
which has a Rood on it is called a Rood Screen. In English secular
cathedrals, the choir screen seems to have combined the functions of
Pulpitum and Rood Screen. In monastic churches, they seem to have been
separate screens. The situation in cathedral priory churches (e.g. Ely) is
not absolutely clear, but they appear to have conformed to the monastic
pattern.
> as i say (repeatedly) the 13th c. ordinal contemporary with the
> construction of the thing calls it a _pulpitum_.
>
> i have added all of the mentions of it in the ordinal i could find
> below.
>
>
>>> the problem is that when we find mention of this structure in the
>>> contemporary sources (in the case of Chartres, in the precisely
>>> contemporary 13th c. ordinal of the cathedral), it is called a
>>> _pulpitum_.
>
>>> which is to say, the word used for it is *not* based on what *we* would
>>> now think of as its most important feature --or even its most important
>>> function.
>
>> Well, strictly speaking, that is its only active function - the
>> division function is a passive one.
>
> my point, eggsactly.
>
> the ordinal is a working liturgical script, not an architectural or
> aesthetic treatise.
>
>>> we call it a "screen", or, perversely, a "jubé" --which latter term
>>> originally comes from its use as a *pulpit*, but which now, to us,
>>> means, literally, a screen which seperates the choir from the nave.
Well, technically, choir from not-choir.
>> Well, the [[word/term]] "jubé" comes from its use as a lectern,
>
> "lectern", apparently, in the sense of a structure from which the
> _lectio_ is given; rather than the smaller do-hickey (yet another
> technical term) upon which the book to be read from is placed.
>
>> for chanting into the choir space.
>
> is this distinction of "chanting [only] into the choir space" (as
> opposed to the nave space) clear from the examples from the 13th c.
> ordinal which i've included below??
I would say that the only westward function is addressing the procession as
it approaches from the west.
>>> (i'm keeping in mind Jim's earlier admonition to make a distinction
>>> between the "choir screen" and the "jubé", the former a screen which
>>> goes round the inner piers of the choir and ambulatory, the latter
> only across the east end of the choir.)
>
>> West end :-)
>
> touché.
>
> i'm getting Punchy, it seems.
>
>> And I still say Jim's admonition is a perverse one - "choir screen"
>> is the normal English term (especially for secular cathedrals, where it
>> combined the functions of a pulpitum and a rood screen.)
>
> i don't think you understand Jim's point.
I do :-)
> using Chartres as an example, the "choir screen" ("cloture du
> choeur", in French, i believe) survives: it is a tall screen which
> seperates the sides of the choir and the "rond point" from the side
> aisles and ambulatory.
I'm not happy with using "choir screen" to translate that term.
> there is no _pulpitum_ on it, nor has there ever been one.
>
> the jubé, which was built in the 13th c. and destroyed in the 18th,
> was a screen which was built across the west end of the choir,
> seperating it from the crossing bay/nave.
>
> and it had a _pulpitum_ on it and is, therefore, referred to in the
> contemporary documents as the _pulpitum_.
Not necessarily - we may have to examine each instance to see what is meant.
>>> but, for the midevils, it was the *pulpit* atop the screen which was its
>>> most important feature
>
>> Or that the top of the screen *was* a pulpit, because it contained a
>> lectern.
>
> this should have a little smiley face after it, right?
No, remember that I am making a distinction between the two. A pulpit is a
structure that contains a lectern. And the function of a "pulpit" may vary
according to its location (it may be used for preaching, reading, giving
blessings, giving responses.)
>>> obviously, they were thinking in terms of its functional aspect in the
>>> context of the rituals described in the ordinal; while we are thinking
>>> of the structural/architectural/aesthetic nature of the beast.
>
>> That is fair enough, there is some evidence that they didn't think
>> in structural terms
>
> certainly not in the ordinal.
>
> eg., in that the _portam regiam_ is simply the west portal(s) of the
> church which one can process in and out of, perhaps stand in front of
> and say a few appropriate words at the appropriate time.
>
>> - that they didn't see screens as actually dividing the space, but
>> rather as symbolic boundaries: they wouldn't have understood our view
>> that screens ruined the aesthetic unity of a building.
>
> the Jung article in the (2000?) Art Bulletin which Jim mentioned
> earlier (and which i have some significant problems with, btw)
> discusses this, though sometimes with insufficient circularity.
Or do you mean too much circularity?
> the evidence of the ordinal --again, which is not an aesthetic or
> architectural treatise, but rather a liturgical script-- is silent on
> this point.
>
> "go here and do this" is its operative purpose.
>
>
> below are the mentions of the _pulpitum_ in the ordinal:
>
>
> Folio 89 : Matines de Noël : « Pergit processio in pulpitum cum cruce
> et texto et thuribulis et candelabris et legitur evangelium.»
"in pulpitum"? "Pulpitum" is in the accusative, but I would read that as
"The procession proceeds to(wards) the pulpitum". Using the passive voice
for "read the gospel" is not particularly helpful!
> Folio 89 : Messe de minuit : « Diaconus lecturus evangelium ascendit
> pulpitum. »
No preposition. The deacon ascends (to?) the pulpitum.
> Folio 96 : Epiphanie. Matines : « Diaconus ascendit pulpitum cum
> processione ad legendam generationem. »
Again, the deacon ascends the pulpit, but I flatly refuse to believe that
the procession does so!
> Folio 133 : Jeudi Saint : « Evangelium ante diem festum quod legitur
> in pulpito. »
"in pulpito"? "Pulpitum" is presumably in the ablative: "The gospel is read
in (from?) the pulpitum"
> Folio 140 : Samedi Saint : « Mox paratus sit qui légat in pulpito
> lectionem in principio. »
As above.
> Folio 142 : Samedi Saint : [Note marginale contemporaine du
> manuscrit] « Processio in pulpitum cum uno candelabre et uno
> thuribulo cum cruce et uno texto. Et in vigilia Pentecostes
> similiter. »
"Procession to the pulpitum"
> Folio 184 : Vigile de l'Ascension. Retour de la procession des
> Rogations : « Clerici qui sunt in pulpito cantant preces...
> ebdomadarius cum subdiaconibus et ceteris clericis inferioris ordinis
> qui respondunt illis qui sunt in pulpito. »
"Clerks who are in the pulpitum" (pulpit?)
> Folio 186 : Ascension, retour de la procession : « Vexilla cum
> drachone attollantur in pulpito. »
Yes, fair enough - except that we have the ablative. And which side, west
or east?
> Folio 199 : Fête de la Trinité : « Post impletorium reponantur forme in
> choro et vexilla de pulpito auferantur. »
"de" + ablative: 'down from'
> Folio 232 : Purification, retour de la procession : « Si vero aliam
> benedictionem dixerit ibi [Episcopus] ut quidam volunt, tunc non ibit
> in pulpitum cum diacono ante evangelium. »
A bit more mysterious, but comprehensible - except that "in" + accusative.
So, 'to' the pulpitum! The blessing is presumably given into the choir.
> Folio 239 : Annonciation : « Ad processionem in pulpito portentur tot
> cruces quot texti et mox reponantur cruces in thesauro et texti super
> altare. »
"in" + ablative: what that means is anyone's guess!
John Briggs
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