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RINGS
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episcopal mitre. This was not, however, a seal ring.
The
so-called "mitred abbots", those who governed the larger monasteries,
or whose notable services in the cause of the Church were thought to
merit some special mark of honor, were sometimes given the right of
wearing the episcopal ring at solemn ceremonies. We are told that at
the deposition of Abbot Rainaldus, head of the great Benedictine Abbey
of Monte Casino, not far from Naples, he publicly laid his staff and
his ring upon the shrine containing the body of St. Benedict.57
The
energy with which some of the leading theologians of the twelfth
century protested against the use of episcopal rings by abbots, merits
illustration by an extract from the writings of St. Bernard, who in a
tractate addressed to Henri, Archbishop of Sens, writes :58
"
Several have clearly enough indicated where were their thoughts when,
having obtained apostolic privileges by many intrigues and by bribery,
they appropriated to themselves and use, in virtue of these
concessions, the mitre, the ring and the sandals, just as do the
pontiffs themselves. . . . Oh, Monks, whither will this lead you? Have
you banished all fear from your souls? Can the blush of shame no longer
rise to your cheeks? "
Not
only abbots, but abbesses also, are represented on their monuments as
wearing rings, as for example Agnes Jordan, Abbess of the Bridgetine
Convent of Syon, whose brass figure at Denham, Bucks County, England,60 shows a ring on her finger. However, in 1572, the year of his accession to the papal throne,
57 Kirchmann, " De anulis," Lugd. Bat., 1672, p. 185.
58 Tractatus de officio episcopi, ad Henricum Senonensem episcopum, cap. ix.
60 H. Druitt, Costume in Brass, p. 98.
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