CAPSA. — From the Greek καύφα, properly a case for books; it could also be called a scriminare; usually circular, made of wood if very small (capella), of bronze if larger (cista). In the passio of the Scillitan martyrs of 17 July 180, the judge Saturninus asks: «quae sunt res in capsa vestra?» (cf. BHL, 7527). Wilpert has identified a representation of a c. for books in a painting from the cemetery of Praetextatus (Wilpert, 19).
C. was also the name given to the small container that held the elements to be used for the celebration of the Eucharist: capsa cum sanctis apertas (but see PISSIDE). Archaeologists have applied the term capsele to the numerous reliquaries of wood, ivory, terracotta, stone, and silver found in altars and containing relics.
Such, for example, are the reliquaries of Brescia, Grado, etc., and the Egyptian workmanship of the first half of the 6th century, from the Sancta Sanctorum, now in the Museo Sacro of the Vatican Library (C. R. Morey, Gli oggetti di avorio e di osso del museo Sacro Vaticano, Città del Vaticano 1936, p. 58, n. A. 59). Typical is the reliquary illustrated by G. B. De Rossi, found in the little basilica of Ain Zirara, 8 km from Ain-Beida in Numidia between Tebessa and Constantine. It is of silver, elliptical in shape; on the lid a martyr is depicted holding in his hands a gemmed laurel wreath; above him the hand of God emerges from the clouds and is about to place the crown on the saint’s head. At the martyr’s feet the four rivers of Paradise flow out, while on either side two torches burn. On the outer faces of the c., on one side eight sheep emerge from two cities and move toward the centre where the divine Lamb stands, behind which is the Latin cross. On the other side, above a rock, is the Signum Christi; below it the four rivers flow forth, to which two stags come to drink (G. B. De Rossi, La capsella argentea africana offerta al sommo Pontefice Leone XIII dell'e.mo card. Lavigerie arcivescovo di Cartagine, Roma 1889).
The reliquaries found at Henchir-Akhrib in Numidia are datable to between 580 and 581 (S. Gsell, Chapelle chrétienne d'Henchir-Akhrib, in Mélanges d'archéologie et d'histoire, 23 [1903], pp. 3-25).
Africa has yielded very many such capselle, which are in fact true reliquaries. Indeed, in the humble terracotta reliquary found in the territory of ancient Lamasha in Numidia, near the present-day indigenous village of Kṣar-Belezma in Algeria, the inscription reads: in isto vaso congregabuntur membra Christi (J. Gagé, Eglise et reliquaire d'Afrique, in Mélanges d'archéologie et d'histoire, 44 [1927], pp. 103-18).