HOLY WATER STOUP. - It is the vessel intended to hold holy water. When it is placed near the entrance doors of churches, it generally has the form of a basin or a font, supported by a shaft and fixed permanently to the ground. As a rule it is carved from stone or marble, and sometimes, in the major churches, it takes on artistic and monumental forms. If, on the other hand, it serves to carry blessed water here and there as needed, it consists of a metal bucket fitted with a handle. The water is then sprinkled on persons or things to be blessed by means of an instrument called an aspergillum.
The a. in churches is not, as some have claimed, the successor of the cantharus (v. CANTARO) or fountain, which in ancient times stood in the middle of the basilical atrium, and where the faithful, for the purpose of interior purification, washed their hands and face with unblessed water before entering the temple for prayer.
It arose instead from the desire to give those who had not been able to attend the Sunday aspersion a way to sign themselves with holy water and to take some for their private devotions. In fact, the use of the a. in churches is not earlier than the 10th century, and is therefore slightly later than the introduction of the solemn Sunday aspersion. Around this same period, the synodal epistle that goes under the name of Leo IV (PL. 96, 1376) ordains that every rector of a church must have a special vessel for keeping holy water. Of these portable a. we have a magnificent example in the ivory bucket of Archbishop Gotfred (10th century), preserved in the treasury of the cathedral of Milan. Several ancient vessels in metal or wood, bearing Christian emblems or inscriptions, cannot be called a. in the proper sense, since they had the purpose of keeping water specially sanctified for use in baptism. Such are the so-called "bucket of Tunis" and other vessels of a similar kind, whose list and illustration may be seen in DACL, I, col. 758 ff. Diocesan synods recommend that the a. be kept very clean and that the holy water in them be renewed frequently, at least every week, and even more often. As for the methods of ensuring the necessary disinfection of the a., v. the study by A. Gemelli, Il problema igienico nelle Chiese, in Scuola Cattolica, 1 (1908), pp. 375 ff. Mario Rubietti
ART
The forms of the a. varied over the centuries. Some Byzantine-style examples, such as those of the cathedral of Torcello and the cathedral of Atri, have the basin adorned with rampant animals. The stem of the a. often lost, in the Gothic age, its architectural simplicity to become animated with figures, as in that of S. Giovanni Fuorcivitas in Pistoia attributed to Giovanni Pisano.
In the Renaissance the architectural simplicity of the support returns, variously enriched with fruits and garlands, as in that of the cathedral of Lucca by M. Civitali and in the even richer one by A. Federighi in the cathedral of Siena.
A fine sixteenth-century example is that of the cathedral of Orvieto, where the pictorial tendencies that would prevail in the Baroque age already appear, to the point of composing, as in those of St. Peter's in the Vatican, a monumental complex of basin, angels and draperies agitated by an inner dynamism, made even more sumptuous by the polychromy. In general, however, the a. keep a very simple form that reduces the characteristics of style to a minimum; therefore in modern architecture, alongside some drop-shaped examples, there are others essentially bound to their function and resolved with a careful study of proportions.
Tiny examples, which variously repeat stylistic forms proper to the minor arts and form part of furnishing accessories, are intended for private use. - See Plates XIX-XX.
Bibliography3 works
Guglielmo Matthiae