Customer Reviews

Church Vestments: Their Origin and Development

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This is a wonderful little book that explains how vestments came about, with chapters that cover everything from the alb, to the chasuble and even the mitre (the hats bishops wear). For example, why do priests wear stoles? As it turns out, that's from Roman and Greek times during the first century when nobles wore stolas that were used as wear-all-day napkins of a sort - who would have thought? Or when did chasubles come about? Apparently all the common folk used to wear these in the first century, and then later priests continued to wear them as a sign of humility and simplicity, and later as a uniform of sorts so others would recognize them.

Although there is no specific information about modern vestments - i.e. how they are made, fabrics they are made out of, etc. - this is still a great book if you're wondering how all those parts of a vestment set came about. Very easy to read, I thought, and quite interesting.

Like all of Norris's books (that I know of, anyway), all works of art are reproduced by hand rather than as photos, so they should be taken with a grain of salt, as usual. He meticulously goes through the various pieces of liturgical garments.

On the other hand, having purchased the book to help me with a historical nun costume, I was disappointed to find almost nothing - just one picture and a few sentences that I could find.

Good resource for historical biblical garb and for learning the proper names of the garments.

This book describes in detail the history of church vestments and their origin in detail.It can be very helpful for church research.