144 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 69. 



ixCpIt'CiS. 



THE EPISCOPAL MITRE ANI> PAPAL TIARA. 



(Vol. iii., p. 62.) 



In answer to the question of an " Inquirer " 

 respecting the origin of the peculiar form and first 

 use of the episcopal niiire, I take the liberty of 

 suggesting that it will be found to be of Oriental 

 extraction, and to have descended from that coun- 

 try, either directly, or through the medium of 

 other nations, to the ecclesiastics of Christian 

 Kome. The writers of the Romish, as well as 

 lieforme<l Churches, now admit, that most, if not 

 all, of the external symbols, whether of dress or 

 ceremonial pageantry, exhibited by the Iloman 

 Catholic priesthood, were adopted from the Pa- 

 gans, under the plea of being " indifferent in them- 

 selves, and applicable as symbolical in their own 

 rites and usages" (Marangoni, Delle cose goitili e 

 profane trasportate ncl uso ed ornamcnto ildle 

 cliiesi) ; in the same manner as many Romish 

 customs were retained at the Reformation i'or the 

 puriDose of inducing the Papists to "come in," and 

 conform to the other changes then made (Southey, 

 History of the Church). Thus, while the disciples 

 of Dr. Pusey extract tlieir forms and symbols from 

 the practices of Papal Rome, the disciples of the 

 Pope deduce theirs from the practices of Pagan 

 Rome. 



With this preface I proceed to show that the 

 episcopal mitre and the ])apal tiara are respectively 

 the copies each of a distinct head-dress originally 

 worn by the kings of Persia and the conterminous 

 countries, and by the chiefs of their priesthood, 

 the Magi. The nomenclature alone indicates a 

 foreign extraction. It comes to us through the 

 Romans from the Greeks; both of which nations 

 employed the terms /j-lrpa, Lat. milra, and Tiapo, 

 Lat. tiara, to designate two dilferent kinds of 

 eoverintr for the head in use amonn;st the Oriental 

 races, each one of a distinct and jieculiar form, 

 though as being foreigners, and consequently not 

 possessing the technical accuracy of a native, they 

 not unfreqnently confound the two words, and 

 apply them indiscriminately to both objects. 

 Strictly speaking, the Greek fj.irpa, in its primitive 

 notion, means a long sca)]f, whence it cnme to 

 signify, in a secondary sense, various articles of 

 attire composed with a scarf, and amongst others 

 the Oriental turhan (Herod, vii. 62.). Rut as we 

 descend in time, and remove in distance from the 

 country where this object was worn, we find that 

 the Romans affixed another notion to the word, 

 which they used verj' commonly to designate the 

 Asiatic or Phrygian cap (Virg. ^7!. iv. 216.; 

 Servius, 1. c.) ; and this sense has likewise been 

 adopted in our own language : 



" That Paris now with his unmanly sort, 

 With mitred hat." — Surrey, Virgil, JEn. iv. 



Thus the word mitra in its later usage came to 



signify a cap or honnet, instead of a turban ; and it 

 is needless to observe that the priests of a religion 

 comparatively modern, when they adopted the 

 term, would have taken it in the sense which was ■ 

 current at their own day. Now, though the com- 

 mon people were not permitted to wear high 

 bonnets, nor of any other than a soft and flexible 

 material, the kings and personages of distinction 

 had theirs of a lofty form, and stiffened for the 

 ex|iress purpose of making them stand up at an 

 imposing elevation above the crown of the head. 

 In the national collection at Paris there is pre- 

 served an antique gem, engraved by Caylus 

 (Recueil cCAnliq., vol. ii. ]). 124.), on which is en- 

 graved the head of some Oriental personage, 

 probably a king of Parthia, Persia, or Armenia, 

 who wears a tall upstanding bonnet, mitred at the 

 top exactly like a bishop's, with the exception 

 that it has three incisions at the side instead of a 

 single one. These separate incisions had no doubt 

 a symbolical meaning amongst the native races, 

 although their allusive properties are unknown to 

 us ; but it is not an unwarrantable inference, 

 nor inconsistent with the customs of these nations 

 as enduring at this day, to conclude that the num- 

 bers of one, two, or three, were ajipropriated as 

 distinctions of diiTerent degrees in rank ; and that 

 their priests, the ]\Jagi, like those of other coun- 

 tries where the sovereign did not invest himself 

 with priestly dignities, imitated the habiliments as 

 they assvnued the powers of the sovereign, and 

 wore a bonnet closely resembling his in form and 

 dignity, with the difference of one large mitre at 

 each side, in place of the three smaller ones. 



If this account be true respecting the origin of 

 the mitre, it will lead us by an easy step to deter- 

 mine the place where it was first used — at An- 

 tioch, the " Queen of the East," where, as we are 

 tdld in the Acts of the Apostles, the followers of 

 Christ were first called " Christians ; " thus indi- 

 cating that they were sufliciently numerous and 

 influential to be distinguished as a se])arate class 

 in that city, while those in Rome yet remained 

 despised and unknown. Antioch was the imperial 

 residence of the Macedonian dynasty, which suc- 

 ceeded Alexander, who himself assumed the up- 

 right bonnet of the Persian king (Arrian. iv. 7.), 

 and transmitted it to his successors, who ruled 

 over Syria tor several hundred years, where its 

 form would be ready at hand as a model emblematic 

 of authority for the bishop who ruled over the 

 primitive church in those parts. 



The tiara of the popes has, in like manner, an 

 Eastern origin ; but instead of being adopted by 

 them directJy from its native birth-place, it de- 

 scended through Etruria to the Pagan priesthood 

 of ancient Rome, and thence to the head of the 

 Roman Catholic Church. The napx of the Greeks, 

 and tiara of the Latins, expresses the cloth cap or 

 fez of the Parthians, Persians, Armenians, &c., 



