HOLY
434
HOLY
pion's Ritual (see Holy Water). In the Byzantine
Ritual tlie prayer used for this blessing, similar to
that of the Kucharistic Epiklesis, invokes the Holy
Spirit upon the waters. Like the species of bread
and wine, holy water is called ayla<Tiia. In the Bar-
berini Euchologion of the eighth or ninth century, the
title of a prayer shows us that holy water renewed the
effects of baptism.
The few Greek inscriptions founrl on vessels in- tended for holy water in ho wise indicate that these were destined for so high a dignity. The holy water font of Carthage and various marble urns preserved in museums or described by antiquarians merely have copies of a formula taken from Holy Scripture: "Take water joj-fuUy for the voice of the Lord is uj^on the waters"; or "Offer thy prayer after washing thyself"; or,finally, "Wash not only thy face but thy iniquities." We have no information whatever con- cerning the vessels in which the faithful kept the incorruptible holy water in their homes. However, on this subject, we can always refer to a vase font found at Carthage, and preserved in the Lavigerie Museum, measuring 10 inches in height and decorated with a cross and two fishes. These details once given, we can enter more fully into the history of holy water fonts in the West.
Stationary holy water fonts, usually made of bronze, marble, granite, or any other solid stone, and also of terra-cotta, consist of a small tub or basin sometimes detached or resting on a base or pedicle, sometimes imbedded in the wall or in one of the pillars of the church. Occasionally these are under the porch. In the West there were scarcely any stationary fonts prior to the eleventh century. However, it must be observed that, up to this time, churches were few and that most of their number had been repeatedly plun- dered, dismantled, redecorated, and, indeed, altered in every way; therefore, in view of this fact, it is possible to admit that certain stone basins, hemi- spherical in form and imbedded in the piedroitsof the doors of very old churches, were so placed when the church was built. Some fonts are antique objects, urns or hoUowed-out capitals, made to serve a purpose other than that for which they were first intended. Wlien the stone is porous it is lined with lead or tin, so as to prevent absorption, the same course being followed with copper fonts to guard against oxidation.
Some fonts are exterior, being fastened to the piers or jambs of the portal. They vary greatly in size, at times being as large as liaptismal fonts; however, it is chiefly in Brittany that they attain such propor- tions. Usually they are not very large. Cavedoni announced that in .a third- or fourth-cent urv cemetery at Chiusi there was a small column which he thought must have supported a holy water font. Boldetti, who is always very cautious, claims to have found different fonts in the catacombs, some made of marble, others of terra-cotta, and still others of glass. A sort of tufa basin, which may have served the same pur- pose, was also found. In the cemetery of Callistus there is a truncated column which, according to J.-B. de Rossi, must have held the .same kind of a vessel as those containing holy water in our churches. We could enumerate other probable examples, especially in the catacomb of St. Saturninus, in the crj-pt of St. Cornelius, and in the basilica of St. Alexander on the Via Xomentana.
The further we withdraw from the time of their origin the more numerous the monuments appear. A magnificent vase in lilack marble preserved in the ICircher museum aiul decorated with ba.s-reliefs, two broken urns from Cuicul (Djemila) in Algeria, and a large marble table, the upper side of which is slightly hollowed, belong to the fourth centmy. A stone basin found in the vicinity of the cathedral of Bath, England, measures '■'.) inches in height, the diameter of its upper part being 1-4 inches. Stationary fonts
sometimes rest on a corbel-table or a small column and,
although such is rarely the case, two fonts may be
communicating, one being on the outside of the church
and one on the inside. Many fonts are dated or else
bear the name of the sculptor or donor.
There seems to have been no rule governing the shape of the receiver and the basin. The baptisteries usually represented a cross or a circle, but here fancy is freer, and in the Roman era we find a circular basin hollowed out of a square block with the four corners carved sometimes with a trefoil, a quatrefoil, or a star, or perhaps with flutes converging towards a common centre and representing a sea-shell, ^'iollet- le-Duc, after alluding to the stone tables placed within the porch of the primitive churches of the Order of Cluny and serving as supports for the portable holy water fonts, mentions a twelfth-century font at Mou- tier-Saint-Jean, the basin part of which rests on a Corinthian column. In the beginning of the thirteenth century fonts were cut from stone and assumed in- teriorly the form of a hemisphere and exteriorly that of a polygonal prism. But from this time forward, and during a part of the Gothic period, architects, although still continuing to place the reservoirs of fonts against pillars or clusters of columns, increased their importance and surmounted them with a carved canopy, such as is seen at Villeneuve-sur-Yonne (Yonne); in like manner the little fonts dug out of tombstones, chiefly in the cemeteries of France and the West. Many fonts are set in a niche in the wall.
It occasions no little surprise to find in the Middle Ages fonts reserved for the exclusive use of a certain class of the faithful. This is proved by the inscription on a font preserved in the museum of Angers, reading to the effect that none save clerics and nobles had the privilege of dipping their fingers therein, the bour- geoisie, the labouring classes and the poor having vessels set apart for them alone: —
Clericus et miles; pergant ad cetera viles Nam locus hie primus; decet illos vilis et imus.
In the churches of the Pyrenees are still to be seen fonts which, of old, were reserved for the use of the despised race of Cagots, while the general horror which lepers inspired, and the care with which all contact with them was avoided, sufficiently ex- plains the existence of a special font for them at Saint- Savin (Hautes-Pyr6n<^es) and at Milhac de Neutron (Dordogne).
In England, during the Middle Ages, fonts called " stoups", or " holy water stones", consisted of a small niche somewhat resembling a piscina and containing a stone basin partly sunk in the wall, the niche being either under the porch or inside, but always near the entrance to the church. During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries fonts again became movable and generally consisted of a till) placed upon an elevated socle, the medium height being about forty inches. The decoration of these small monuments underwent a complete modification. Italy and Spain have preserved admiralile sculpt ureil fonts dating from the Renaissance; most of these are of marble, and their bulk sometimes causes them to be mistaken for bap- tismal fonts, from which they are mainly distinguish- able because of having no lids. In Italy this style is founil in the cathedral of Florence, where the font or pilii d'aqua snnta is ascrilied to Giotto; and in the cathedral of Siena it is in the form of a beautiful tub ornamented with angels' heads, between which are stnmg rich garlands, and resting on a circular socle decorated with luidc figures in chains, this, in its turn being placeilon a lower socle, likewise embellished with angels' heads. Later on, in the seventeenth century anil down to the present day, the valves of a shell known as the tridacna gigas, a mollusc indige- nous to Oceania, liid service as fonts. Some shells of this species are very large and weigh as much as 500
