Everything about The Sarum Rite totally explained
The
Sarum Rite was a variant of the
Roman Rite widely used for the ordering of Christian public worship, including the Mass or
Eucharist, in the
British Isles before the
English Reformation.
Various parts of Britain and Ireland developed local variants of the
Pre-Tridentine Mass, and the Sarum Rite was originally the local form used in the
Cathedral and
Diocese of Salisbury in the west of
England, but it later became prevalent throughout the
British Isles, particularly in southern England. Although abandoned after the 16th century, it was also a notable influence on the pattern of
Anglican liturgy represented in the
Book of Common Prayer.
History
In
1078,
William of Normandy appointed
St Osmund, a
Norman nobleman, as
bishop of Salisbury (the modern name of the city known in Latin as "
Sarum"). As
bishop, Osmund initiated some revisions to the extant Celtic-Anglo-Saxon rite and the local adaptations of the Roman rite, drawing on both Norman and
Anglo-Saxon traditions.
19th century liturgists theorized that the liturgical usage of
Rouen in northern
France served as an inspiration for the creation of the Sarum
liturgical books. Because the Normans deposed the Anglo-Saxon episcopate, replacing them with Norman bishops, of which Osmund was one, and in light of the similarities between the liturgy in Rouen and that of Sarum, it appears the Normans imposed their French liturgical books as well.
The revisions during Osmund's episcopate resulted in the compilation of a new
Missal,
Breviary, and other liturgical manuals, which came to be used throughout southern
England,
Wales, and parts of
Ireland.
Some
dioceses issued their own missals, inspired by the Sarum rite, but with their own particular prayers and ceremonies. Some of these are so different that they've been identified as effectively distinct liturgies, such as those of
Hereford,
York,
Bangor, and
Aberdeen. Other missals (such as those of
Lincoln Cathedral or
Westminster Abbey) were more evidently based on the Sarum rite and varied only in details.
Liturgical historians believe the Sarum rite had a distinct influence upon other usages of the
Roman rite outside England, such as the
Nidaros rite in
Norway and the
Braga rite in
Portugal.
When the
Church of England separated from the Roman Church in the 1530s, it initially retained the Sarum rite, but Protestant pressure for public worship in English resulted in its replacement by successive versions of the
Book of Common Prayer, although it was briefly reintroduced to general use in England under
Queen Mary. The Sarum rite continued to be used by Roman Catholic
recusants until the mid
16th century, when it was gradually replaced by the Tridentine use.
Revival
Many of the practices of the Sarum rite - though not the full liturgy itself - were revived in the Anglican Communion in the late 19th and early
20th centuries, as part of the Anglo-Catholic
Oxford Movement in the Church of England. Some Anglo-Catholics wanted to find a traditional formal liturgy that was characteristically "English" rather than "Roman", and they took advantage of the 'Ornaments Rubric' of 1559 which directed that English churches were to be furnished as they'd been at the start of Edward VI's reign, which is to say, in Sarum fashion with few concessions to Protestant practice. However, there was a tendency to read back
Victorian centralizing tendencies into mediaeval texts, and so a rather rubrical spirit was applied to liturgical discoveries. It was asserted, for instance, that Sarum had a well-developed series of colours of
vestments for different
feasts. Indeed, there may have been tendencies to use a particular colour for a particular feast (red, for instance, was used on Sundays, as in the
Ambrosian rite), but most churches were simply too poor to have several sets of vestments, and so used what they had. There was considerable variation from diocese to diocese, or even church to church, in the details of the rubrics: the place where the
Epistle was sung, for instance, varied enormously; from a
lectern at the
altar, from a lectern in the
quire, or even on the
rood screen.
Chief among the proponents of Sarum customs was the Anglican priest
Percy Dearmer, who put these into practice at his parish of St Mary's,
Primrose Hill, in
London, and explained them at length in
The Parson's Handbook, which ran through several editions. The rite has been retained in use into the present in some Anglican churches and monastic institutions.
The Sarum Mass has occasionally been celebrated within the Roman Catholic Church. A brief resurgence of interest in the
19th century didn't lead to a revival. It had been suggested for the opening of
Westminster Cathedral in 1903, but the idea was rejected.
Another notable Roman Catholic use of the Sarum Mass occurred on the Feast of
Candelmas at
Merton College in
Oxford, England, in 1997. It was celebrated recently in April 2000, when
Mario Joseph Conti, the
Roman Catholic Archbishop of Glasgow, celebrated the Sarum Mass in the
University of Aberdeen's King's College Chapel to commemorate the quincentenary of the pre-Reformation founding of the chapel by
William Elphinstone, Bishop of
Aberdeen.
The Sarum Use also is used by
Western rite members of the
Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, and in particular by Saint Petroc Monastery and its missions.
Sarum ritual
The ceremonies of the Sarum liturgy are often elaborate, compared to many other Roman rites. The Mass of Sundays and great feasts involved up to four sacred ministers:
priest,
deacon,
subdeacon, and
acolyte. It was customary to visit in procession all the altars of the church and cense them, ending at the great rood screen, where
antiphons and collects would be sung. Finally here at the screen would be read the Bidding Prayers, prayers in the vernacular directing the people to pray for various intentions. The procession then went to vest for Mass. (This vesting would usually have taken place at the altar where Mass was to be celebrated, since vestries and sacristies are, except in the largest churches, largely a modern introduction.)
Some of the prayers of the mass are unique, such as the priest's preparation prayers for Holy Communion. The ceremonies are unique also: the offering of the bread and wine was made by one act; after the Elevation the celebrant stood with his arms outstretched in the form of a cross; the Particle was put into the chalice after the
Agnus Dei. Communion under one kind was followed by a 'rinse' of unconsecrated wine. The Last
Gospel (the first chapter of St John's Gospel) was read while the priest made his way back to the sacristy.
(External Link
) Two candles on the altar were customary, though others were placed around it and on the rood screen. The Sarum missal suggests that the
genuflection isn't used, a low bow being customary, but it isn't impossible that by the sixteenth century it had been introduced.
The Sarum rite was the original basis of the liturgy in the
Anglican Book of Common Prayer. This is most evident in its sequence of Major Propers for the Sundays in
Advent, which vary considerably from those used in the Roman
Tridentine Rite. It also inspired the counting of Sundays after Trinity rather than Pentecost. One may also take note of the marriage rite and the Sarum custom of "plighting troths".
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