Mansionary

MANSIONARY. — The meanings of this term were various in the past (cf. Du Cange, s.v. in Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, V, Paris 1938, pp. 227-28) as they still are; however, in the liturgical language of the early Middle Ages, by m. was meant the custodian of a church near which he lived and in which he served more or less as sacristan.

In the cemetery churches the « mansionarius de confessione » had to look after the feeding of the lamps at the martyr's tomb. The m. were distinguished both from the « custodes, qui dicuntur cubicularii, ex clero Romano », instituted by Leo I for the honorary custody of the apostolic tombs (cf. Lib. Pont., I, p. 239, n. 14 at p. 241 and a sepulchral inscription of the 6th century, in A. Silvagni, Inscriptiones Christ. Urbis Romae..., new series, II, Rome 1935, nos. 5088, 5179, 5180) and from the « praepositi », who administered the revenues of the cemetery basilicas, destined in particular for the lamps that were to adorn the martyrs' tombs (cf. inscriptions of the 6th century, in G. B. De Rossi, Inscriptiones Christ. Urbis Romae..., I, Rome 1861, nos. 975, 989, 1004-05, 1085; A. Silvagni, op. cit., nos. 4279, 4790; diploma of Gregory the Great of 604).

In Rome they enjoyed a certain notoriety and had formed themselves into a « schola ». The popes Benedict II, John V, Conon and Gregory II left them a donative (cf. Lib. Pont., I, pp. 364, 367, 369, 410). The Ordo Romanus, I, n. 21 (ed. M. Andrieu, Les Ordines Romani du haut moyen âge, II, Louvain 1948, p. 73) recalls the « primus mansionarius » of the Lateran basilica having charge of the sacred vessels destined for the pope (called by Ordo VI, n. 7: « custos dominicalis vestiarii »: ed. cit., p. 242) and the « mansionarii iuniores » who entered last into the « secretarium » after the papal Mass (Ordo I, n. 126: ed. cit., p. 108; Ordo V, n. 98, ibid., p. 227). In the deaconries the m. with the censer was found together with the « Pater diaconiae » and the priest on the threshold of the church to await the pope there (cf. Ordo I, n. 26: ed. cit., p. 75; Ordo V, n. 3, ibid., p. 209).

The m. were not part of the clergy, but belonged to the category of servants, as is gathered: 1st from the inscription of the 50s that recalls a « Clementinus mansionarius », formerly a fossor (cf. O. Marucchi, in Nuovo Bullettino di Arch. Christ., 1917, p. 116; other inscriptions in A. Silvagni, op. cit., 5177-78; Gregory the Great, Dialogues, III, 24-25, also calls the m. « custos »); 2nd from the Roman Synod of 732 (Hefele-Leclercq, III, II, p. 684); 3rd from the biography of Stephen V in the Lib. Pont. (II, p. 196); 4th from the Constitutions of the Lateran of Card. Pietro, afterwards Gregory XI: PL, 78, 1395, etc.

The m. still exercise their functions, often identical to the ancient ones, in many churches and confraternities; the m. of the patriarchal basilicas of Rome still have a certain notoriety.

A. Pietro Frutaz