Pre-Tridentine Mass refers to the evolving and regional forms of the CatholicMass in the West from antiquity to 1570. The basic structure solidified early and has been preserved, as well as important prayers such as theRoman Canon.

Following theCouncil of Trent's desire for standardization,Pope Pius V, with his bullQuo primum, made theRoman Missal obligatory throughout theLatin Church, except for those places and congregations whose distinct rites could demonstrate an antiquity of two hundred years or more.

In the 1500s, the Pre-Tridentine Roman Rite became the basis for theEvangelical-Lutheran Rite of the Mass.^[1]

A surviving account of the celebration of theEucharist or theMass in Rome is that of SaintJustin Martyr (died c. 165), in chapter 67 of hisFirst Apology:^[3]

On the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits; then, when the reader has ceased, the president verbally instructs, and exhorts to the imitation of these good things. Then we all rise together and pray, and, as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by the deacons.

In chapter 65, Justin Martyr says that thekiss of peace was given before the bread and the wine mixed with water were brought to "the president of the brethren". The initial liturgical language used wasGreek, before approximately the year 190 underPope Victor I, when the Church in Rome changed from Greek to Latin, except in particular for theHebrew word "Amen", whose meaning Justin explains in Greek (γένοιτο), saying that by it "all the people present express their assent" when the president of the brethren "has concluded the prayers and thanksgivings".^[4]

According to some scholars, the early Christian liturgy was a continuation of the liturgy of contemporary Jewishsynagogues (as distinct from the temple liturgy): Catholic historianLouis Duschesne commented "the only permanent element, on the whole, which Christianity added to the liturgy of the synagogue was [...] the sacred meal instituted by Jesus Christ as a perpetual commemoration of himself."^[5] This tradition included unaccompanied psalms,^[6] cantillation (half-way between recitation and singing), andchant. According to Catholic historian Mark Kirby "By the fourth century, the fully sung liturgy, with its roots in Semitic chant, had become normative in both East and West.^[7] According to Orthodox historianAlexander Schmemann every word pronounced in church had a "singing quality": the "entire service, which was thought of in all its parts as a singing of praise to God."^[8]: 165 This sung liturgy was held to be an imitation of, participation in, and foretaste of the divine liturgy.^[7] Congregations could singresponses to versicles,antiphons andhymns.^[9]

It is unclear when the language of the celebration finished changing fromGreek toLatin.Pope Victor I (190–202) may have been the first to use Latin in the liturgy in Rome. Others think Latin was finally adopted nearly a century later.^{[note 1]} The change was probably gradual, with both languages being used for a while.^{[note 2]}

With regard to theRoman Canon of the Mass, the prayers beginningTe igitur,Memento Domine andQuam oblationem were already in use, even if not with quite the same wording as now, by the year 400; theCommunicantes, theHanc igitur, and the post-consecrationMemento etiam andNobis quoque were added in the fifth century.^[10][11]

Jerome heard the long, melismatic sungAlleluia in Bethlehem and it was gradually introduced in the Western liturgy. TheAgnus Dei chant seems to have been instituted byPope Sergius I (687–701), and theCredo chant sporadically from 800 AD.^[9]

Before the pontificate ofPope Gregory I (590–604), the Roman Mass rite underwent many changes, including a "complete recasting of theCanon" (a term that in this context means theAnaphora or Eucharistic Prayer).^{[note 3]} At the time of Gregory I, regional customisation of liturgies were encouraged in missionary areas: according toBede Gregory instructedAugustine of Canterbury to select "any customs in the Roman or the Gaulish Church or any other Church which may be more pleasing to Almighty God", and to teach them to the church of the English.^[12]: 45

In Gaul, theMerovingian period (~500–750) has been called "the experimental age of liturgy," with the propers constructed freely: according to historian Yitzhak Hen "each bishop, abbot or priest was free to choose the prayers he found suitable."^[12]: 57 Cross-pollenation and recycling of liturgical prayers was common, as priests and bishops took sacramentaries (manuscripts of liturgical prayers) between regions, and new prayers were composed.^{[12][page needed]}

In the eighth century the Meringovian dynasty had been replaced by theCarolingians in Frankish Gaul. In the late eighth century,Pepin the Short ordered theRoman chant be used throughout his domains.^[13]: 150 However, some elements of the precedingGallican rites were fused with it north of the Alps, and the resulting mixed rite was introduced into Rome under the influence of the emperors who succeeded Charlemagne. Gallican influence is responsible for the introduction into the Roman rite of dramatic and symbolic ceremonies such as the blessing of candles, ashes, palms, and much of theHoly Week ritual.^[14] The chant style that mixed Gallican and old Roman chant styles became known asGregorian chant.

During the Carolingian period, the language diverged with Latin going back to its classical forms and the vernacular recognized as separate tongues. Consequently, the Council of Tours (813) mandated that sermons be given in the Romance or Teutonic vernacular.^[15]

Thechants and musical settings of the Mass were divided into:

• the parts that do not change during the year (theOrdinary: the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei), and;
• the parts that belonged to the particular day and occasion (theProper): Introit, Gradual, Alleluia, Offertory, Communion.^[16]

The major difference between the various rites or uses was not the basic structure or components of the ordinary parts of the liturgy, but of different arrangements, selection and allocation of prayers on different days, as well as mention of regionally-popular saints, and differentrubrics.^{[17]: Preface}

Towards the end of the first millennium,organ, previously a secular instrument, was introduced as did more complicated singing of components of the Mass by choirs.^[18] Important liturgies might be preceded, followed or interrupted by elaborate processions with songs, dramatic rituals involving props, and acted plays or tableau, with the laity trained to understand the symbolism.^[19] In several locations, the story of theThree Magi would be enacted by three costumed men who would follow a star through the church, search at various locations, until finding the altar, while singing the Gospel alternatively and polyphonically.^[20]: 54

The recitation of theCredo (Nicene Creed) after theGospel is attributed to the influence of EmperorHenry II. Gallican influence explains the practice of incensing persons, introduced in the 11th or 12th century; "before that time incense was burned only during processions (the entrance and Gospel procession)".^[21]

Private prayers for the priest to say before Communion were another novelty to Rome. From the 9th century, theOrdo Missae texts — which appeared as part of missals as well as priestly handbooks or prayer books — flourished in variety and content, particularly in theFrankish Kingdom and along theRhine. Going beyond earlier types of liturgical writing, they incorporated ritual instructions and private prayers for the celebrant to recite as an aid to the devout offering of sacrifice. These private prayers distinctively included prayers directly addressed to Christ and direct invocations of the Holy Trinity (such as during the Offertory) —Gallican responses againstArianism among Germanic peoples. The prayers also reflected a Frankish tendency to verbalise non-verbal gestures.^[22] By the reign ofGregory VII, such Rhenish elements had become integral to the rite of the Pope and the Papal Curia, at the same time that the Roman Church began encouraging liturgical unity across Western Christendom.^[22] These prayers varied considerably until standardized byPope Pius V in 1570.^{[note 4]} The rites had some differences in the prayers on the boundaries of the Mass: Pre-Tridentine prayers said mostly in the sacristy or during the procession to the altar as part of the priest's preparation were formalized in the1570 missal of Pope Pius V as thePrayers at the Foot of the Altar; prayers that followed theIte missa est changed or changed position (for example, in the 1570 edition, theCanticle of the Three Young Men andPsalm 150 in Pius V's edition the priest was to say while leaving the altar were later omitted).^[23]

The historical record of liturgical practice, especially for smaller churches, is highly incomplete in much of Europe: historian Matthew Cheung Salisbury estimates that only 1 in 1,000 English liturgical manuscripts survived theiconoclastic English Reformation, with similar destruction at the French Revolution.^[24]: 21

Between 1478 and 1501, the bishops of 52 dioceses, including the primates of France, Castile, England, the Holy Roman Empire and Poland each independently published, in print, official liturgical texts for their diocese, because of the extent of parish and monastery variation.^{[note 5]}

From 1474 until Pope Pius V's 1570 text, there were at least 14 different printed editions that purported to present the text of the Mass as celebrated in Rome, rather than elsewhere, and which therefore were published under the title of "Roman Missal" (Latin:Missale romanum.) These were produced in Milan, Venice, Paris and Lyon. Even these show variations. Local Missals, such as the Parisian Missal, of which at least 16 printed editions appeared between 1481 and 1738, showed more important differences.^[25] The MilaneseRoman Missal of 1474, which reproduces the Papal Chapel missal of the late 1200s, "hardly differs at all" from the initial Tridentine missal promulgated in 1570, apart from local feasts.^[26]

In the 1500s, the Pre-Tridentine Roman Rite became the basis for the WesternEvangelical-Lutheran Rite of theMass.^[1] With respect to its similarity with the Tridentine Rite, Jesuit priestRune P. Thuringer, writing in 1965, noted that "The eucharistic liturgy of the stateChurch of Sweden, which isLutheran, is closer in many respects to the rite of the Roman Mass than that of any other Protestant church."^[27][28]

With the exception of the relatively few places where no form of the Roman Rite had ever been adopted, the coreCanon of the Mass remained generally uniform, but the prayers in theOrdo Missae, and still more theProprium Sanctorum and theProprium de Tempore, varied widely.^[29]

Even areas that had accepted the Roman Rite had introduced changes and additions. As a result, every ecclesiastical province and almost every diocese had its local use.^[24]: ch1

In mostChristian countries, the language used for celebrating pre-Tridentine Masses was Latin, which had become the language of the Roman liturgy in the late 4th century. (As Latin receded, non-liturgical sections, such as sermons for the general populace and bidding prayers were typically preached in the vernacular, and included translations of the readings.)^{[note 6]}

However, there have been exceptions:^[30]

• InDalmatia and parts ofIstria inCroatia, the Roman Rite liturgy was celebrated inOld Church Slavonic from the time ofCyril and Methodius, and authorization for use of this language was extended to some other Slavic regions between 1886 and 1935.^{[note 7][note 8]}
• In the 14th century,Dominican missionaries converted a monastery near Qrna,Armenia to Catholicism, and translated the liturgical books of theDominican Rite, a variant of the Roman Rite, intoArmenian for the community's use. The monks were deterred from becoming members of the Dominican Order itself by the severefasting requirements of the Dominican Constitutions, as well as the prohibition on owning any land other than that on which the monastery stood, and therefore became the Order of the United Friars of St. Gregory the Illuminator, a new order confirmed byPope Innocent VI in 1356 whose Constitutions were similar to the Dominicans' except for these two laws. This order established monasteries over a vast amount of territory in Greater and Lesser Armenia, Persia, and Georgia, using the Dominican Rite in Armenian until the end of the order's existence in 1794.^[31][30]
• On February 25, 1398,Pope Boniface IX also authorizedMaximus Chrysoberges to found a monastery in Greece where Mass would be celebrated inGreek according to the Dominican Rite, andManuel Chrysoloras translated the Dominican missal into Greek in pursuance of the plan, but nothing further is known of this undertaking.^[31][30]

At various times there were calls for the prayers of the Mass to be in the vernacular, such as byErasmus.^[32]: 67

There may have sometimes been more flexibility in other liturgies than the Mass: in the mid-1400s, when theCongregation of Windesheim moved to theRule of St Augustine,^[33] the fairly new convent Jerusalem in Venray was granted by their bishop to say the new liturgy in the vernacular, until they had mastered the Latin.^[34]: 54

The pre-Tridentine Mass survived post-Trent in some Anglican and Lutheran areas with some local modification from the basic Roman rite until the time when worship switched to the vernacular. Dates of switching to the vernacular, in whole or in part, varied widely by location. In some Lutheran areas this took three hundred years, as choral liturgies were sung by schoolchildren who were learning Latin.^[35]

Historian Virginia Reinburg has noted that the medieval Eucharistic liturgy as experienced by (French) lay people, and shown in their prayer books, was a distinct experience from that of the clergy and the clerical missal.^[36]: 529

What the lay prayer books reveal—and missals do not—is the pre-Reformation mass as a ritual drama in which the priests and the congregation had distinct, but equally necessary parts to play.^[36]: 530

In theCarolingian period, the Mass was increasingly performed as sacred drama, with the people as active participants not passive spectators:^[37]: 460 ArchbishopAmalarius of Metz (c. 830) was accused of imparting "theatrical elements and stage mannerisms" to theFrankish liturgy.^[38]

The medieval lay experience was often highly sensory:^[39] churches featured chanting and singing, bells, highly technical organs, incense, busy paintings, brilliant robes, rare colours, shiny utensils, clouds of saints and angels, and stained-glass light.^{[note 9]} Some larger churches even hadarticulated puppet/statues to delight and inspire the congregation.^[40]

By theRenaissance, churches were full of depictions in art of biblical and hagiographical people and events to illustrate notable days in the church calendar; cathedrals could have artwork on a monumental scale: for exampleLuca Signorelli andFra Angelico's frescoes inOrvieto Cathedral are based around the liturgy for theFeast of All Saints.^[41] In Northern Europe, such art rarely survived theiconoclasm of theProtestant Reformation.

The priests and deacons attended to the ceremony in thechancel orside altar:

For the priest, the most important important parts of themass would be scripture readings, offertory of bread and wine, consecration, and priest's communion.^[36]: 532

The laity enjoyed the ceremony from thenave:

For the lay congregation, however, the mass was a series of collective devotions and ritual actions; the most important elements would be the Gospel,prône ("bidding prayers", see below), offertory procession, and distribution of thepain bénit at the end of the mass. [...] The laity's mass was less sacrifice and sacrament than a communal rite of greeting, sharing, giving, receiving and making peace."^{[36]: 532 [note 10]}

Lay prayer-books, for the educated middle and upper classes, not only gave the communal actions of the liturgy, but provided almost an unofficial parallel liturgy of silent prayers and devotions for the laity to perform in between and in preparation for the actions.^[42]: 59

For the congregation, which would not have heard the sacred words "This is my body", theelevation was the emotional climax of the mass. It was also the focus of popular liturgical devotion. Virtually no lay books actually explain the consecration [...] [or] the doctrine of transubstantiation. [...] Yet the ritual of the elevation was intended to express thereal presence of Christ on the altar.^[36]: 533

Notable parts of the lay experience of the liturgy (especially the Sunday Mass) included:

• The reading of the Gospel could be an elaborate and reverential event, with all people standing and genuflecting at any (Latin) mention of the name Jesus.Erasmus mentioned approvingly that in his day it was the practice, after the reading, for the sumptuousevangeliary (Gospel book) to be carried around the people and kissed by all in adoration.^[43]: 197
• ThePrône (French:Prières du Prône,German:Pronaus,Latin:pronaüm) mentioned above was a vernacular service that came to be included as a para-liturgy in medieval Latin High Masses (typically at the Sermon), dating back at least toRegino of Prüm (d. 915).[44]^: 487 It was named after thescreen at thechancel entrance, where the priest would speak in the local language.^[45]: 118 It could include well-known prayers, translations of the Gospel and Epistle, the homily nominally on the Gospel, catechetical instruction,^{[46][47]: 721} comprehensive prayers for the living and the dead,^{[note 11]: 352} acknowledging benefactors, open confession (forvenial sins),^[44]: 493 teaching the diocese's domestic morning prayer,^[48]: 142 announcements including weddings, upcomingfasts andfeasts,^[44]: 491 village assembly meetings, royal or seigneurial decrees of note, and salutory crime reports.^[49]: 281 It was regarded as vital by laypeople even into the post-Reformation period.^[47]: 727
  It was universally folded into the Sunday Mass by theCouncil of Trent and with collated bidding prayers such asPeter Canisius'German:Allgemeines Gebet.^[50] (In Ireland (c. 1785), "the prône" became the name for a book of prepared sermons and prayers which were "a key tool in remodelling older oral versions of the (vernacular portion of the) liturgy to newer standardised ones."[51]^: 93)
• Preaching: Written and spoken Latin had diverged enough that by 813 theCouncil of Tours instructed that homilies should be given in the local spoken vernacular, whether Romance or Teutonic.^[52] It was the common practice^{[note 12]} that at the beginning of the vernacular homily (sermon),^{[note 13]: 224} the Gospel reading and perhaps the Epistle reading would be rendered loosely in the vernacular by the priest.^{[44]: 408 [54]} In a pinch, this translation could be used as the sermon itself: inability or slackness to preach in the vernacular was repeatedly regarded as a failure of a priest's or bishop's duty,^{[note 14]} but must have happened over the centuries:John Purvey quoted English bishopRobert Grosseteste:

If any priest says he cannot preach (i.e. give composed or extemporized vernacular sermons), one remedy is: resign; [...] Another remedy, if he does not want that, is: record (i.e., recollect or write out)^[56] he in the week the naked text of the Sunday's gospel, that he understands the gross story, and tell it to the people, that is if he understands Latin and does it every week of the year. And if he understands no Latin, go he to one of his neighbours that understands, which will charitably expound it to him, and thus edify he his flock[...]

• At times, vernacular hymns were sung.^{[44]: 147, 440} For example, aGerman:Leis hymn, sung after the sermon from the 12th century.^[44]: 486
• Thepain bénit was bread given in the general offering by the laity, blessed by the priest, and given back to the laity for devotional use and as alms, especially when lay communion was infrequent.
• Anothersacramental activity performed with the laity was thekiss of peace andpax-board with its emphasis on mutual forgiveness.^[36]: 539

Historian Eamon Duffy has noted that the Medieval laity were not passive in church, but as the sacraments progressively became celebrated in their minimal forms (e.g., dribbling not washing, communion in one kind once a year, etc.) they compensated by the development many para-liturgical practices, such as thepax board andHoly Loaf (pain bénit), which demonstrates "a vigorous lay appropriation of the meaning of the sacraments" by the people who inhabited a shared culture of Christian symbolism.^[58]

There are few records about the liturgy in remote, rural areas.^{[citation needed]}

This table is indicative. Depending on calendar, occasion, participants, region and period, some parts might be augmented or commented on (tropes).^[59] "Gifts" primarily means the unconsecrated bread, wine and water.

TheAmbrosian Rite has different prayers, prefaces, readings, calendar and vestments to the Roman Rite. It omits theAgnus Dei. The Gesture of Peace occurs before the Offertory.^[60]

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• Sodi, Manlio; Triacca, Achille Maria, eds. (1998).Missale Romanum [Roman missal] (in Latin) (Princeps ed.). Libreria Editrice Vaticana.ISBN 88-209-2547-8.

• Atchley, E. G. (1905),Ordo Romanus Primus, Archive.
• Usuarium, A Digital Library and Database for the Study of Latin Liturgical History in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period

• Latin liturgical rites

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