Septuagesima
SEPTUAGESIMA
The third Sunday before the first Sunday in Lent; so called because it was about 70 days before Easter.
Fuente: Theological Dictionary
Septuagesima
(Lat. septuagesima, the seventieth).
Septuagesima is the ninth Sunday before Easter, the third before Lent known among the Greeks as “Sunday of the Prodigal” from the Gospel, Luke, xv, which they read on this day, called also Dominica Circumdederunt by the Latins, from the first word of the Introit of the Mass. In liturgical literature the name “Septuagesima” occurs for the first time in the Gelasian Sacramentary. Why the day (or the week, or the period) has the name Septuagesima, and the next Sunday Sexagesima, etc., is a matter of dispute among writers. It is certainly not the seventieth day before Easter, still less is the next Sunday the sixtieth, fiftieth, etc. Amularius, “De eccl. Off.” , I, I, would make the Septuagesima mystically represent the Babylonian Captivity of seventy years, would have it begin with this Sunday on which the Sacramentaries and Antiphonaries give the Introit “Circumdederunt me undique” and end with the Saturday after Easter, when the Church sings “Eduxit Dominus populum suum.” Perhaps the word is only one of a numerical series: Quadragesima, Quinquagesima, etc. Again, it may simply denote the earliest day on which some Christians began the forty days of Lent, excluding Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday from the observance of the fast.
Septuagesima is today inaugurated in the Roman Martyrology by the words: “Septuagesima Sunday, on which the canticle of the Lord, Alleluja, ceases to be said”. On the Saturday preceding, the Roman Breviary notes that after the “Benedicamus” of Vespers two Alleluias are to be added, that thenceforth it is to be omitted till Easter, and in its place “Laus tibi Domine” is to be said at the beginning of the Office. Formerly the farewell to the Alleluia was quite solemn. In an Antiphonary of the Church of St. Cornelius at Compi gne we find two special antiphons. Spain had a short Office consisting of a hymn, chapter, antiphon, and sequence. Missals in Germany up to the fifteenth century had a beautiful sequence. In French churches they sang the hymn “Alleluia, dulce carmen” (Gu ranger, IV, 14) which was well-known among the Anglo-Saxons (Rock, IV, 69). The “Te Deum” is not recited at Matins, except on feasts. The lessons of the first Nocturn are taken from Genesis, relating the fall and subsequent misery of man and thus giving a fit preparation for the Lenten season. In the Mass of Sunday and ferias the Gloria in Excelsis is entirely omitted. In all Masses a Tract is added to the Gradual.
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FRANCIS MERSHMAN Transcribed by Paul Soffing In Memory of Frederick Geiger
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XIIICopyright © 1912 by Robert Appleton CompanyOnline Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. KnightNihil Obstat, February 1, 1912. Remy Lafort, D.D., CensorImprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
Fuente: Catholic Encyclopedia
Septuagesima
(seventieth), the third Sunday before Lent. The reason of its application to the day is uncertain. Some liturgical writers e.g. Pamelius trace it to the association of the ancient monastic Lent of seventy days with the seventy years’ captivity of Israel in Babylon. The following is more probable: There being exactly fifty days between the Sunday next before Lent and Easter day inclusive, that Sunday is termed Quinquagesima, i.e. the fiftieth; and the two immediately preceding Sundays are called from the next round numbers Sexagesima, the sixtieth, and Septuagesima, the seventieth. The observation of these days and the weeks following appears to be as ancient as the time of Gregory the Great. Some of the more devout Christians observed the whole time from the first of these Sundays to Easter as a season of humiliation and fasting, though the ordinary custom was to commence fasting on Ash Wednesday. See Eden, Dict. of the Church, s.v.; Blunt, Dict. of Theology, s.v.