The Interpretation of the Rite of Church Dedication in the 9th Century Anonymous Treatise «Quid Significent Duodecim Candelae»

During the Carolingian liturgical reforms, which were based on the idea of the uniformity of ceremonies and their semantic content, a significant number of the liturgical commentaries appeared. Nonetheless, the genre of comments on the liturgical rite of consecration of the church, like the rite itself, appeared long before the Carolingian era, during this period it becomes an important part of the ecclesiological thought, devoted to reflections on the sacred of the place, liturgical time and the role of the clergy in salvation. This work is devoted to the examination of one of these texts - the anonymous treatise "Quid significent duodecim candelae". Thus, the main purpose of this paper was to clarify the semantic meaning of the rite in the interpretation of an anonymous author. In the course of the work, we examine the author’s interpretation of the rite and theological aspects through which the author’s understanding of the ritual's actions takes place. We also attempted to identify the connection between the interpretation of the rite and the historical context of the era: the transformation of the role of bishops, the practice of the penitence and the translation of relics. The study of sense-making in liturgical commentaries, although such sources should be approached with great caution and the need to take into account the traditions of interpretation, allows us to a better understanding of the identity of the medieval author, meaning the place of the Christian community in the history of salvation.