St David’s towards the close of the 13th century. Tregaron, Llanwenog, Llandyssul and Llanarth own parish churches with western towers of early date, but for the most part the ecclesiastical structures of Cardiganshire are small in size and mean in appearance, and many of them were entirely rebuilt during the latter half of the 19th century. The little church of Eglwys Newydd, near the Devil’s Bridge, contains one of Sir Francis Chantrey’s masterpieces, a white marble group in memory of Mariamne Johnes (1818), the daughter of Thomas Johnes, of Hafod (1748–1816), the translator of Froissart.
Customs, etc.—The old Welsh costume, customs and superstitions are fast disappearing, although they linger in remote districts such as the neighbourhood of Llangeitho. The steeple-crowned beaver hat has practically vanished, although it was in general use within living memory; but the short petticoat and overskirt (pais-a-gŵn-bâch), the frilled mob-cap, little check shawl and buckled shoes are still worn by many of the older women. Of peculiarly Welsh customs, the bidding (gwahoddiad) is not quite extinct in the county. The bidding was a formal invitation sent by a betrothed pair through a bidder (gwahoddwr) to request the presence and gifts of all their neighbours at the forthcoming marriage. All presents sent were duly registered in a book with a view to repayment, when a similar occasion should arise in the case of the donors. When printing became cheap and common, the services of the professional bidder were often dispensed with, and instead printed leaflets were circulated. The curious horse wedding (priodas ceffylau) at which the man and his friends pursued the future bride to the church porch on horseback, and then returned home at full gallop, became obsolete before the end of the 19th century. Of the practices connected with death, the wake, or watching of the corpse, alone remains; but the habit of attending funerals, even those of strangers, is still popular with both sexes, so that a funeral procession in Cardiganshire is often a very imposing sight. Nearly all the old superstitions, once so prevalent, concerning the fairies (tylwyth teg) and fairy rings, goblins (bwbachod), and the teulu, or phantom funeral, are rapidly dying out; but in the corpse candle (canwll corph), a mysterious light which acts as a death-portent and is traditionally connected with St David, are still found many believers.
Authorities.—Sir S. R. Meyrick, History and Antiquities of Cardiganshire (London, 1806); Rev. G. Eyre Evans, Cardiganshire and its Antiquities (Aberystwyth, 1903); E. R. Horsfall-Turner, Walks and Wanderings in County Cardigan (Bingley).
CARDINAL (Lat. cardinalis), in the Roman Church, the title of (Lat. cardinalis), in the Roman Church, the title of the highest dignitaries next to the pope. The cardinals constitute the council or senate of the sovereign pontiff, his auxiliaries in the general government of the Church; it is they who act as administrators of the Church during a vacancy of the Holy See and elect the new pope. Together they constitute a spiritual body called the Sacred College. The dignity of cardinal is not an essential part of the legal constitution of the Church; it is a reflection of and participation in the sovereign dignity of the Head of the Church, by the chief clergy of the Church of Rome. The present position is the result of a long process of evolution, of which there are several interesting survivals.
The name is derived from cardo, hinge; like many other words (the word pope in particular) it was originally of a more general application, before it was reserved exclusively to the members of the Sacred College, and the word is still used adjectivally in the sense of pre-eminent or that on which everything else “hinges.” As early as the 6th century we find mentioned, in the letters of St Gregory, cardinal bishops and priests. This expression signifies clergy who are attached to their particular church in a stable relation, as a door is attached to a building by its hinges (see Thomassin, Vetus et nova discipl. vol. 1, lib. ii. cap. 113-115). Moreover, this sense is still preserved in the present day in the expressions incardinatio, excardinatio, which signify the act by which a bishop permanently attaches a foreign cleric to his diocese, or allows one of his own clergy to leave his diocese in order to belong to another. For a long time, too, the superior clergy, and especially the canons of cathedrals or the heads of important churches, were cardinales (see examples in Du Cange, Glossarium, s.v.). Gradually, however, this title was confined by usage to the Roman cardinals, until Pius V., by his constitution of the 15th of February 1568, reserved it to them exclusively.
The grouping of the cardinals into a body called the Sacred College, the College of Cardinals, is connected, in the case at least of cardinal priests, with the ancient presbyterium, which existed in each church from the earliest times. The Sacred College as such was not, however, The Sacred College. definitively constituted until the uniting of the three orders of cardinals into a single body, the body which was to elect the pope; and this only took place in the 12th century. Up till that time the elements remained distinct, and there were separate classes: the “Roman” bishops, i.e. bishops of sees near Rome, presbyters of the “titles” (tituli) of Rome, and deacons of the Roman Church. Nowadays, the Sacred College is still composed of three orders or categories: cardinal bishops, cardinal priests, and cardinal deacons. But the process of evolution has not been the same in the case of all these orders.
Cardinal bishops are the bishops of suburbicarian churches, situated in the immediate neighbourhood of Rome. Very early we find them assisting the pope in his ritual functions and in dealing with important business; they formed a kind of permanent synod (cf. the Cardinal bishops. σύνοδος ἐνδημοῦσα of Constantinople): and they also took the place of the pope in the ceremonies of the liturgy, excepting the most important ones, and especially in the service of the cathedral at Rome, the Lateran. A passage from the life of Stephen II. (A.D. 769), in the Liber Pontificalis (ed. Duchesne, i. p. 478), shows clearly that they were seven in number and served for a week in turn: Hic constituit ut omni dominico die a septem Episcopis cardinalibus hebdomadariis, qui in ecclesia Salvatoris (the Lateran) observant, missarum solemnia super altare Beati Petri celebrarentur. They were called “cardinal bishops of the Lateran church,” as recorded by St Peter Damian in 1058 (Ep. 1, lib. ii.). Their sees are the same to-day as they were then: Ostia, Porto, Santa Rufina (Sylva Candida), Albano, Sabina, Tusculum (Frascati) and Palestrina. From time immemorial the bishop of Ostia has had the privilege of sacring the pope, and on this ground he enjoys the right of wearing the “pallium”; he is ex officio dean of the suburbicarian bishops, and consequently dean of the Sacred College. His episcopal see having been in ruins for a long time, that of Velletri has been joined to it. The second rank belongs to the bishop of Porto, who is ex officio vice-dean of the Sacred College; his episcopal see being also in ruins Calixtus II. added to it that of Santa Rufina, thus reducing the number of suburbicarian bishoprics and cardinal bishops to six; this number was adhered to by Sixtus V., and has not varied since.
The second order of cardinals is that of the cardinal priests. It represents and is a continuation of the ancient presbyterium; but in Rome the process of evolution was different from that in the other episcopal towns. In the latter, the division into parishes was but slowly accomplished; Cardinal priests. there is no authority for their existence before the year 1000; the bishop with the higher clergy, now developed into the chapter, were in residence at the cathedral, which formed, as it were, the one parish in the town. At Rome, on the contrary (and doubtless at Alexandria), certain churches, to which were attached certain districts, were at an early date entrusted to one or more priests. These churches, in which the liturgy was celebrated, or certain sacraments administered, were called tituli (titles). According to the Liber Pontificalis (ed. Duchesne, i. pp. 122, 126, 164), the titles of Rome, numbering twenty-five, were already established as early as the 1st century; this seems hardly probable, but it was certainly the case in the 5th century. The priest serving one of these churches was the priest of that title, and, similarly, the church which he served was that priest’s title. When several priests were attached to the same church, only the first, or principal one, had the title; he alone was the presbyter cardinalis. This practice explains how it is that the Roman presbyterium did not give rise to a cathedral chapter, but to cardinal priests, each attached to his title. As the higher
