Coptica 15, 2016

Evolution of Coptic Liturgical Vestments

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The stabilization of the Coptic tradition of liturgical vestments by the 14 th century can be seen in yet another source. In The Lamp of Darkness and Elucidation of the Service of the 14 th -century presbyter of the Mu c allaqah church in Cairo, Abū al-Barakāt ibn Kabar, the description of vestments is nearly identical to those in earlier sources across all ranks. Innemée, in his analysis of Ibn Kabar’s work, quotes from an edition of the text by Samir Khalil from an unknown manuscript in the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate. 46 However, the oldest known manuscript for ibn Kabar’s work is manuscript BnF Ar. 203 (14 th c.). The ordination of deacons in The Lamp , in which the orarion is placed on the left shoulder of the candidate, is identical to the description in manuscript Coptic Museum 253 Lit (AD 1364) . 47 The same is true also for his description of the vestments given during the ordination of priests. 48 The only minor peculiarity is Ibn Kabar’s description of the vestments the priest is to wear before celebrating the liturgy. While in the chapter on priest ordinations the text merely has the generic term “vestment [ ḥullah ],” 49 this is expanded in the chapter on the liturgy as follows:

And he wears the garments of service, and these are the white tunic [ tūnyah ] and c arḍī . And he may wear the sleeves [ al- akmām ], whether silk or otherwise. And some of the monk priests and the Egyptians [i.e. the Cairenes] wear a white wool phelonion [ burnus ] without a hood [ qaṣlah ] and sometimes of silk. But the priests in the monastery of St. Macarius do not wear a phelonion [ burnus ] at the time of the service of the liturgy, but

ويلبس ثياب الخدمه وهى التونيه و العرضي البيض وله ان يلبس الاكمام حريراً كانت او غيرها وبعض قسوس الرهبان والمصريين يلبس برنس صوف ابيض بغير قصله وتارهً حرير والكهنه بدياره ابو مقار لا يلبسون برنساً فى وقت خدمة القداس بل يلبسونه فى الصلاه بمقتضى قانونهم 50

wear it during the prayers according to their canon.

46 Innemée, Ecclesiastical Dress , 18. Cf. Samir Khalil, Mişbāḥ al-Ẓulmah li-Īḍāḥ al- Khidmah (Cairo, 1971). 47 BnF Ar. 203 (14 th c.), fol. 183r. 48 BnF Ar. 203 (14 th c.), fol. 176v. 49 BnF Ar. 203 (14 th c.), fol. 176v. 50 BnF Ar. 203 (14 th c.), fol. 204r. Cf. Louis Villecourt, “Les observances liturgiques et la discipline du jeûne dans l’Eglise copte,” Le Muséon 37 (1924), 202-280, here 248.