PROSTRAZIONE (προσκύνησις). — It is the act of throwing oneself to the ground and touching it with the forehead, a sign of the deepest humiliation and submission.
A natural act found in various ancient cults, in the Jewish religion, and in the rituals of the Eastern courts. Holy Scripture speaks of it (Gen. 42:6; 43:26, 28; Jos. 5:15). Thus the Magi venerated the Child Jesus (Mt. 2:11); thus Jesus himself prayed in the garden (Mt. 26:39); thus the Apocalypse presents the elders in adoration (Apoc. 5:14; 19:4). Prostration, very much in vogue at the ancient Persian court, was not unknown in Rome (Suetonius, Aul. Vitell., 2:5). Tertullian knows it as a posture in urgent prayer (Adv. Marcionem, 3:18). The Byzantine court also adopted it in its ceremonial, and from there it entered the Eastern liturgy, and later also the Western liturgy. The first certain, very late testimony for the Roman liturgy is found in the Breviarium ecclesiastici ordinis, composed ca. 790–800 and of Franco-monastic origin, where it appears as an act of homage to the altar at the beginning of Mass (M. Andrieu, Les Ordines romani du haut moyen âge, III, Louvain 1951, Ordo XVII, n. 25, p. 179). The present Roman liturgy uses it on Good Friday (Andrieu, Ordo XXIII of the eighth century, ibid., p. 271) at the beginning of the sacred services and during solemn consecrations and personal blessings while the litanies are sung or recited.