CALZARI (FOOTWEAR). - Under the name c. it is commonly understood to mean everything that covers the foot and the leg, whether shoe or stocking; but in liturgical terms the c. are distinguished from sandals: the latter are the outer footwear, the former are the stockings properly so called, which wrap the whole foot and the leg up to the knee.
At first the clergy, also as regards footwear, used the same as in civil life. But then, as early as the 5th century, the c. (caligae, tibialia, campagi, udones) used by senators and imperial dignitaries passed into the use of the higher clergy, not only in Rome, but in Milan and Ravenna: a manifest sign of the growing influence of the ecclesiastical authorities, especially in the imperial cities. In the 6th century the Pope and his deacons had c. (campagi) of a special shape, as appears from a letter of St. Gregory the Great to John, bishop of Syracuse. In the 8th century the false donation of Constantine grants to all the Roman clergy the right to use, like the Senate, footwear "cum udonibus, id est candido linteamine": these udones would be our c. In the mosaics of Rome and Ravenna one can see c. of various shapes and colors. Then gradually this general use was restricted, and from the 10th century onward the c. were reserved to bishops alone. In the 12th century cardinal priests also had them. The concession to abbots was general from the 11th century onward.
In present-day discipline we must distinguish the stockings from the c. properly so called. The stockings are part of ecclesiastical dress and follow, as regards their color, the rules for the garments of clerics. The Supreme Pontiff wears white stockings, over which in pontifical ceremonies he puts on the white or red c. according to the rite. Cardinals have red stockings, except on Good Friday and during the vacancy of the Apostolic See, when they take purple ones. Cardinals belonging to monastic or mendicant orders do not wear red footwear, but retain the color of the religious habit. Patriarchs, archbishops, bishops have the use of purple silk stockings, but with that same distinction that has been stated for religious cardinals. In the time of a vacant See and on Good Friday they wear black stockings. All prelates of the Holy See wear purple stockings with the exceptions mentioned above. Monsignors of the mantellone wear black stockings.
The c., on the other hand, have an exclusively liturgical use and are employed in pontifical Masses by cardinals, bishops, abbots and by the prelates who have the privilege. They are not worn at funeral Masses, and on Good Friday. Their shape is that of a somewhat wider stocking, and they are of silk, or of gold and silver lamé, in all the liturgical colors, except black.
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Enrico Dante