Epitaphs, aers and procovete

Epitaphs, aers and pocrovete form a separate subcategory in the larger ensemble of religious embroideries. As they are directly linked to the performing of the liturgy, they are also called liturgical veils. They play well-defined roles during the religious service and are adorned with famous scenes from the life of Jesus Christ, in close connection with the specific moments from the liturgical service when they are used. Their size varies depending on their functions. The largest one is always the epitaph, whose iconographic theme (embroidered or painted) is in all cases the scene of „The lamentation over Jesus”..

While somehow similar from an iconographic viewpoint, the epitaph and the aer - both liturgical veils - are distinguished by their separate functions and different dimensions. The aer is actually one of the three pocrovete, the largest of them, designed to cover the religious vessels when they are placed upon the altar, or to be worn on the shoulders of the priest who carries the alms plate during the ceremony of the presentation of the ‘holy gifts’.

The Aer, as it is called by the Greeks, or the atmosphere, as it is called in Slavonic, symbolises, when it is set upon the altar, the sky upon which the Star shone, that which guided the Three Wisemen towards the stable in Bethlehem where Jesus was born. When it is worn on the priest’s shoulders, when he presents the holy gifts, it signifies the dead body of Our Saviour, and when it covers the holy vessels, as they lie on the communion table, it symbolises His tombstone.

The word pocrovat derives from the Slavonic word ‘pokrovu’, possibly kin to the Serbian ‘pokrovac’, both words meaning ‘cover’, a function which is accomplished by both of the small veils in question.

The craftsmanship of the embroideries reaches in some of the Romanian 15th and 16th century epitaphs, aers and pocrovete the heights of perfection, both from a chromatic and compositional viewpoint, as from a technical one.


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