Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A vaulted canopy permanently placed over an altar.
- noun A covered receptacle for holding the consecrated wafers of the Eucharist.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A permanent canopy erected over a high altar; a baldachin.
- noun Any vessel designed to contain the consecrated bread or sacred wafers for the eucharist.
- noun A larger receptacle, often of marble, supported on a high stand raised over the altar or elsewhere, containing the pyx or the wafers themselves.
- noun A sort of ambry or cupboard in the wall used for the same purpose.
- noun In conchology, the glossy impression on the inside of the valves of shells where the adductor muscles of the mollusk have been attached; the muscular impression or cicatrix.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Arch.) A canopy usually standing free and supported on four columns, covering the high altar, or, very rarely, a secondary altar.
- noun (R. C. Ch.) The coffer or case in which the host is kept; the pyx.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A
fixed vaulted canopy over aChristian altar ,supported on fourcolumns . - noun A
covered receptacle forholding theconsecrated wafers of theEucharist .
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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While it would be additionally wonderful were the Mass to be celebrated ad orientem (it will be celebrated versus populum) the use of the original high altar with its ciborium is a spectacular bit of news.
Installation of Vincent Nichols to Westminster to be Celebrated at Original High Altar 2009
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Atop the ciborium is written "Beati qui ad coenam nuptiarum Agni vocati sunt" taken from the Book of Revelation, chapter 19, verse 9: "Blessed are they that are called to the marriage supper of the Lamb"
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As has been noted numerous times before, in an age of free-standing altars, the ciborium is one particularly suitable way to lend presence and verticality to our altars -- something the high altar should have, and something which has often been lost in newer or renovated church buildings.
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For this reason, in the minds of the early Christians, the altar could never be without the halo of its sacred nature -- that is, the ciborium or baldacchino in marble or in silver.
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In ecclesiastical architecture, a ciborium is a canopy or covering supported by columns, freestanding in the sanctuary, that covers the altar in a basilica or other church.
Archive 2009-05-01 2009
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In ecclesiastical architecture, a ciborium is a canopy or covering supported by columns, freestanding in the sanctuary, that covers the altar in a basilica or other church.
Ciborium 2009
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During the mass, Fr. W skipped the confession (after preaching about sin) and Fr. M almost blessed the bread with the words of consecration for the wine ... that's easy to do when one is using a ciborium, which is a bread box that's shaped like a chalice.
trinityboy Diary Entry trinityboy 2006
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The ciborium is the bowl that contains the consecrated eucharistic Host prepared for Holy Communion.
A Handbook of Symbols in Christian Art Gertrude Grace Sill 1975
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The ciborium is the bowl that contains the consecrated eucharistic Host prepared for Holy Communion.
A Handbook of Symbols in Christian Art Gertrude Grace Sill 1975
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The altar is covered, at least in basilicas and also in large churches, by a canopy supported by columns, called the ciborium
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 1: Aachen-Assize 1840-1916 1913
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