Biretta

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A square cap with three ridges or peaks on its upper surface, worn byclerics of all grades fromcardinals downwards. The use of such a cap is prescribed by therubrics both at solemn Mass and in otherecclesiastical functions. Etymologically, the wordbiretta is Italian in origin and would more correctly be writtenberetta (cf. however the Frenchbarette and the Spanishbireta). It probably comes frombirrus, a rough cloak with a hood, from the Greekpyrros, flame-coloured, and thebirretum may originally have meant the hood. We hear of the birettum in the tenth century, but, like most other questions of costume, the history is extremely perplexed. The wearing of any head-covering, other than hood or cowl, on state occasions within doors seems to have originally been a distinction reserved for the privileged few. The constitutions of Cardinal Ottoboni issued by him forEngland in 1268 forbid the wearing of caps vulgarly called "coyphae" (cf. the coif of the serjeant-at-law) toclerics, except when on journey. In church and when in the presence of their superiors their heads are to remain uncovered. From thelaw the higher graduates of theuniversities were excepted, thus Giovanni d'Andrea, in his gloss on the ClementineDecretals, declares (c. 1320) that at Bologna the insignia of the Doctorate were thecathedra (chair) and the birettum.

At first the birettum was a kind of skull-cap with a small tuft, but it developed into a soft round cap easily indented by the fingers in putting it on and off, and it acquired in this way the rudimentary outline of its present three peaks. We may find such a cap delineated in many drawings of the fifteenth century, one of which, representinguniversity dignitaries at theCouncil of Constance, who are described in the accompanying text as birrectati, is here reproduced. The same kind of cap is worn by thecardinals sitting inconclave and depicted in the same contemporary series of drawings, as also by preachers addressing the assembly. The privilege of wearing some such head-dress was extended in the course of the sixteenth century to the lower grades of theclergy, and after a while the chief distinction became one of colour, thecardinals always wearing red birettas, andbishops violet. The shape during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was everywhere considerably modified, and, though the question is very complicated, there seems no good reason to reject the identification, proposed by several modern writers, of the old doctor's birettum with the square college cap, popularly known as the "mortar-board", of the modernEnglishuniversities. The college cap andecclesiastical biretta have probably developed from the same original, but along different lines. Even at the present day birettas vary considerably in shape. Those worn by the French, German, andSpanishclergy as a rule have four peaks instead of three; while Roman custom prescribes that acardinal's biretta should have no tassel. As regards usage in wearing the biretta, the reader must be referred for details to some of the works mentioned in the bibliography. It may be said in general that the biretta is worn in processions and when seated, as also when thepriest is performing any act ofjurisdiction, e.g. reconciling a convert. It was formerly the rule that apriest should always wear it in givingabsolution in confession, and it is probable that the ancient usage which requires an English judge assume the "black cap" in pronouncing sentence ofdeath is of identical origin.

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