Our Lady's Veil

...By far the largest portion was restored in 1819 by a Mile...

...But it is well known that many primitive relics were gathered together by Christians of the early Church at Constantinople, and among them several articles of clothing which tradition assigned to the Mother of God...

...Chief among the latter is the Veil which, tradition says, was worn by the Virgin...

...Its color, too, was ecru, but it was perfectly plain, without decoration, even of the simplest...

...In order that the precious fabric might receive no damage it was mounted between two sheets of glass surrounded by a gold frame...

...Others, to whom it was still an object of veneration, may have taken the opportunity to preserve as much as possible with the design of restoring it in happier times...

...The Revolution deprived the cathedral of most of them, though some of the more important afterward found their way back...

...Probably taken from Charlemagne's oratory at Aix-la-Chapelle by Charles le Chauve, it was presented by him to the cathedral at Chartres in the year 876...

...It resulted in unbounded sympathy and in practical generosity while the present cathedral was building...

...After the death of Charlemagne, the diocese of Chartres was ravaged and the city itself taken and destroyed by the terrible Hastings, afterward Count of Chartres...

...From this time on, the Veil, preserved in a chasse or coffer of gold, made in the form of an ark, and set with jewels, was closely associated with the safety of soldiers going to war...

...The story of this miraculous preservation naturally spread far and wide...

...Its reidentificatdon as a true veil, however, did not take place until the eighteenth century, when the worm-eaten condition of the "Ark" made those responsible anxious for its safe-keeping...

...Consumed with grief, they were prepared to abandon the blackened site and rebuild elsewhere, had not the papal legate, Cardinal Melior, who "by the providence of God and the dispensation of the Virgin-Mother herself, was present at the time," exhorted them to set to work and rebuild their church on its old foundations...

...From this time on, records of the Veil were carefully kept...

...It was on the occasion of the siege of Chartres by the Norman pirates that the Veil first acquired its world-wide celebrity...

...A tradition, (justified by recent archaeological research) teaches us that before the evangelization of Gaul, a wooden statue of "The Virgin who should bring forth a child" (the Virgo paritura) was worshipped among other idols...

...In 1876, the millenary of the donation of the Veil by Charles le Chauve, the ecclesiastical authorities decided to bare the relic and carry it in procession...

...In the year 1194 a terrible disaster overtook both town and cathedral...

...For two-thirds of a century, the Norman terror had hung heavy over the land of the Franks, especially in the river basins extending from the Loire to the Seine...

...The relic was designated in old documents by the Latin term "camisa," a word which originally signified almost any feminine garment, but was afterward restricted to "chemise...

...It has not been seen by the public since and, after the coming celebrations are over, it is the intention of the chapter that it shall not be exposed again until another half century has elapsed...

...A custom arose of sending "chemises de Chartres" or even metal "chemisettes" to expectant mothers whose maternity friends wished to place under the protection of the greatest of all mothers...

...It was in the cave or crypt, indeed, where a statue and altar existed to this deity that the first apostles of Christianity, Saint Altin and Saint Eodald founded one of their early churches...

...When carefully unfolded, it was perceived to be, not anything that could be called a chemise, but a seamless veil, raveled at its two ends and measuring about two metres by three...

...This misconception slowly took root and a new interpretation, according perfectly with the literalism of the middle-ages, became attached to the venerable relic It became the chemise which Mary wore when she brought her Divine Son into the world...

...Strange as it may seem, the worship of a virgin at Chartres goes back to a day before Christianity existed...

...By degrees a number of such fragments were collected and sealed in a reliquary...

...No mention is made of the cutting of the Veil itself into several pieces, which, in all probability, took place at this time...

...An official report of the proceedings was published on May 13, 1713, but a design to replace the decayed coffer with one of silver seems never to have been carried out...

...From this arose a very quaint and unusual custom...

...In 1793, at the height of the Revolution, the Veil of Chartres did not escape the notice of the philosophical National Assembly...

...We learn that the ruined inhabitants counted their personal losses as nothing compared to the destruction of their cathedral and above all the loss of the precious Veil...

...The reverence felt for the coffer naturally prevented its being opened for man^ centuries and gradually its contents became rather a misty tradition...

...On a certain solemn feast-day, we are told, when by the mandate of the clergy, the whole body of the people were together on the spot where the church had stood, their astonished eyes beheld the precious coffer, unharmed, being borne forth from the crypt by the bishop and deans...

...Three or four of those who had had charge of the relic when the alarm was given had taken it down into a chapel called the Martyrium which was under the high altar and below the crypt, and remained with it three days while fire raged overhead...

...Especially will it do so on its closing day, Whit Monday, when the "Voile de la Vierge" or Veil of the Virgin, a relic for which Chartres is famous all over the world, will be carried in procession round the town...

...The scarlet and purple of their robes, the gold of the vestments, the black and brown of the monastic habits, the scarlet caps and cassocks and white pleated surplices of the altar-boys, swinging in a rhythm that is cadenced by the chant of the choristers, will compose a symphony of movement and color that is likely to linger long in the memory of all who are privileged to witness it...

...717...

...An account of the fire and the events which followed was translated from the Latin of eye-witnesses by Jean le Marchand, a French poet...

...Officials were sent to remove the precious stones, diamonds and fine pearls which decorated the coffer, and their sale by the municipality was authorized...

...At its foot lies the valley of the Eure and around it dusters the old town whose narrow streets and alleys are practically unchanged since the mediaeval epoch...

...Chartres in the middle-ages was a city of relics...

...On July 29 he raised the "Voile de la Vierge" as their standard, and so heartened the defenders that the Normans were overthrown and driven into the valley of Vauxroux...

...Further back than Charlemagne no written record of it exists...

...Maillard, sister and heiress of a former cure of Notre Dame de Chartres...

...Rather more than half a century later, in 911, the citizens took a signal revenge, when the Normans under Rollo again attacked their town...

...The setting for this great act of faith will be well-nigh perfect...

...The bishop gave permission for the coffer to be opened, "after Vespers on Passion Sunday, 1712...

...It became a custom, before setting out, to pass beneath the chasse and by so doing obtain the protection of the Virgin during action...

...Gantelme, the great soldier-bishop, led them to the defense of their walls...

...The effects of time and damp had injured it in certain places, but it was otherwise intact...

...The first thing to come to light was a piece of oriental material of very fine weave, ecru in color, relieved by bands composed of gold and colored threads, bordered with a fringe, and decorated by the weaver with figures of birds, fishes, animals, and other designs...

...High up on a plateau stands the beautiful cathedral, built and decorated in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries...

...Documents dating back to the tenth century attest to its having been given to Charlemagne by the Emperor Constantine and the Empress Irene...

...No less than fifty cardinals, bishops, mitred abbots and other dignitaries have expressed their intention of being present...

...An iron trap-door had protected them from the burning beams which fell from the roof, from streams of molten lead, and from the heat of the ashes and pulverized stone...

...Monseigneur himself and five canons were alone present...

...This piece of antique material was merely the covering of another, of fine silky tissue and evidently extremely old...

...716 OUR LADY'S VEIL By MARY E. MAYDWELL FROM May 31 to June 6, the picturesque old city of Chartres is to be the theatre of a unique religious pilgrimage, which, in more ways than one, will revive the religious pageantry of the middle-ages...

...The motive of the act is uncertain...

...When the exiled Monseigneur Lubersac returned to Paris after the Concordat and before the episcopal seat at Chartres had been restored, he appealed to these last to give back to the chapter what they had taken...

...Edward III of England and Henry IV of France, among others, are said to have made the brave old gesture...

...It may have been due to the desire of the curious to possess portions of so famous a relic...