Sarum Missal and King Edward VI
The words of the Book of Common Prayer have permeated deep in the English language all over the world. For nearly 500 years, and for countless people, they have provided a background fanfare for a marriage or a funeral march at a burial. Yet this familiarity also hides a violent and controversial history. When it was first produced the book provoked riots and rebellion; it was burned and banned before being translated into a host of global languages and adopted as the basis for worship in the USA and elsewhere to the present day.
The book's chief maker, Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, created it to unite a religiously divided country, Catholic and Protestant. A book of “common” prayer was a wholly new concept in the mid-sixteenth century. The Church of England was then evolving from its western Catholic origins into a national church with its own distinctive ethos. The liturgical genius of Archbishop Cranmer ensured that its Anglican ethos found its best expression in a prayer book. A written liturgy, he thought, could express the mind of a church more subtly and flexibly and hence more permanently, than any set of doctrinal formulations. The new manual of worship drew its inspiration from the Bible itself, from traditional Catholicism and from continental Protestantism and was thus a multiple departure from medieval precedent. Not only had it been compiled in English rather than Latin, it also replaced some seven distinct medieval liturgical books, known and used almost exclusively by the clergy.
The book's chief maker, Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, created it to unite a religiously divided country, Catholic and Protestant. A book of “common” prayer was a wholly new concept in the mid-sixteenth century. The Church of England was then evolving from its western Catholic origins into a national church with its own distinctive ethos. The liturgical genius of Archbishop Cranmer ensured that its Anglican ethos found its best expression in a prayer book. A written liturgy, he thought, could express the mind of a church more subtly and flexibly and hence more permanently, than any set of doctrinal formulations. The new manual of worship drew its inspiration from the Bible itself, from traditional Catholicism and from continental Protestantism and was thus a multiple departure from medieval precedent. Not only had it been compiled in English rather than Latin, it also replaced some seven distinct medieval liturgical books, known and used almost exclusively by the clergy.
The Missal was printed on 264 leaves of folio [large size] handmade paper by Martin Morin, master printer active in Rouen between about 1490 and 1518. Morin learned the trade in the Rhine region and then became a printer in his native city. His 1492 Brevarium Saresberiense, is said to be the first recorded liturgical book printed for the English market. This is Morin’s “new” or second edition/printing. The book is bound in full vellum ( calf skin ) by Peter Franck, noted Rouen binder of the day.
The original Book of Common Prayer published in 1549 was a product of the English Reformation following Henry VIII’s break with the Roman Catholic Church. Despite his rift with the Pope in 1533 over divorce. Henry was not a “hot-gospeler” or a raving Protestant. He was a “satisfied Catholic” as long as he was in charge. The Latin mass would continue, except for mention of the Pope in church payers. The mass he continued to favor was the Sarum Missal, a medieval prayer book used in England’s Diocese of Salisbury since the 13th Century. The first Sarum Missal to be printed was in Paris in 1487 and not in London until 1498.
This painting represents the handing over of power from Henry VIII to his son Edward VI. Henry lies in bed, and Edward sits on a dais beneath a cloth of state, with a book at his feet containing a text from Isaiah THE WORDE OF THE LORD ENDURETH FOR EVER. The purity of the Bible crushes down the impure Roman Pontiff. The Pope wears a triple tiara, tips of which are adorned with the words IDOLATRY and SYPERSTICION, and he is attired in a pink alb and golden cope. The front of the alb is inscribed ALL FLESH IS GRASSE and nearby is a further inscription: FEYNED HOLYNESS.
The pope points a triple cross towards two monks, lower left, who pull on chains attached to Edward’s dais. Standing to Edward’s side is Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset and Lord Protector. Other figures on the right represent Edward’s Privy Council and Including the Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer (in white surplice and black stole). At top right is a picture of iconoclasm, the smashing of idols, approved by Cranmer and many Protestant reformers.