A brief recapitulation of this somewhat lengthy argument may not be out of place. Two forms of tunic may be said to have contended one with another for the favour of the Roman people—the sleeveless colobium and the sleeved dalmatica. The latter ultimately gained the victory; and the decree of Pope Sylvester, commanding all ecclesiastics under his authority to assume it in place of the former, finally established its use in the church. Now, when we find that, two or three centuries after Sylvester's time, a vestment was worn by ecclesiastics in Divine service identical with the tunica dalmatica in almost every respect, even to the presence of the clavi, which (in the secular dress) indicated the rank of the wearer, it is only natural to regard the one as directly derived from the other.
There is one other point of importance in the history of this vestment in the transitional period. It was found that such a flowing garment as the alba seriously incommoded the priest on some occasions, particularly in administering baptism by immersion. Accordingly, an alba fitting closely to the body was invented for use on such occasions, and is represented in certain MS. illuminations, particularly a ninth-century pontifical now in the St Minerva Library at Rome. The special importance of this point is due to the fact that this baptismal alba was probably the immediate parent of the mediaeval alb; the closer vestment being found more convenient on other occasions as well as that of baptism, and having gradually become adopted in all the other offices of the Church as well.
Fig. 2.—A Bishop administering Baptism.
II. The Orarium.—Both this vestment and the name by which it was known have given much trouble to scholars. The following list of the various derivations which have been suggested for the word orarium (arranged in order of probability) is not uninteresting:
- 1. Ora, because used to wipe the face.
- 2. Orare, because used in prayer.
- 3. ὥρα, because it indicated the time of the different parts of the service.
- 4. ὡραΐζειν, because the deacon was beautified with it.
- 5. Ora (a coast), because (alleged to have been) originally the edging of a lost garment.
- 6. ὁράω, because the sight of it indicated whether a priest or deacon was ministering (!).
There can be little doubt that the first is the true etymology. The others are all more or less fanciful; and the orarium was certainly employed originally as a scarf. Ambrose speaks of the face of the dead Lazarus being bound with an orarium; and Augustine uses the same word to indicate a bandage employed to tie up a wounded eye.
Numerous effigies of late date are extant which exhibit a kind of scarf, passing over the left shoulder diagonally downwards to the right side, and fastened under the right arm. As Albertus Rubenius long ago pointed out, these scarves must not be confused with the clavi which ornamented the tunics of senators and equites; for they are worn over the pallium, or outer garment, and are disposed in a manner quite different from that in which the clavi fall.
What, then, are these scarves? The answer to this question is supplied by Flavius Vopiscus in his Life of Aurelian, who, he says, 'was the first to grant oraria to the Roman people, to be worn as favours.'[28] Now, the references which we have just made to Ambrose and Augustine—not to mention others which might equally well be quoted—show that the oraria, whatever may have been the method in which they were worn, must have been narrow strips of some kind of cloth. These peculiar scarves, which are to be seen on certain monuments, do not appear on any effigy dating before the time of Aurelian; the natural inference, therefore, is that the scarves which we see thus represented are actually the oraria, granted to the Roman people by that emperor and his successors. If this argument be not valid, then it is impossible to say either what these scarves really are, or what was the true appearance of the civil orarium.