Clothing Definitions — definitions of garments and clothing terms from Apparel Search
The cowl — from the Latin cuculla — is a long, outer garment with wide sleeves, worn by Catholic monks when participating in the liturgy. Developed in the Middle Ages as a more practical alternative to wearing a cloak, cowls became the formal garment for those in monastic life, giving warmth to people who often spent long hours in unheated and drafty churches. They are most commonly bestowed upon the monk at the time of his making solemn, lifetime vows, and are generally worn in conformity with the color of the monk's tunic. This page explains the cowl's place in the monastic habit, which orders wear it, and the color conventions that go with it.
The cowl (from the Latin, cuculla) is a long, outer garment, with wide sleeves, worn by Catholic monks when participating in the liturgy. Developed in the Middle Ages as a more practical alternative to wearing a cloak, they became the formal garment for those in monastic life. They were worn to give warmth to people who often spent long hours in unheated and drafty churches.
They are most commonly bestowed upon the monk at the time of his making solemn, or lifetime, vows. They are generally worn in conformity with the color of the monk's tunic, with the Benedictines wearing black, while other groups which also follow the Rule of St. Benedict, e.g., the Camaldolese and Cistercians wear some form of white. The garment, without a hood, is also worn by nuns, in the same manner.
It should be noted that those orders which are not part of the Benedictine tradition, e.g., the Carthusians, do not make use of this garment.
| The above article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/cowl). Modified by Apparel Search 5/13/06 |
The monastic habit is a complete, prescribed outfit — tunic, belt or cincture, scapular and, for choir, the cowl — in which each piece marks the wearer's state of life. The cowl is the most formal layer: its wide sleeves and full length are impractical for manual work, which is exactly the point. It is choir dress, worn for the liturgy, where the community appears in its corporate, prayerful character rather than as individual workers. Bestowing it at solemn vows underlines that change of state: the monk receives the garment of the choir at the moment his commitment becomes lifelong.
The garment also records medieval practicality. A religious community spent hours each day singing the offices in stone churches that were cold for most of the year, and a long, wide-sleeved woollen garment that went over everything else was working clothing for that task — the liturgical descendant of the cloak it replaced, refined by centuries of use into a symbol of the monastic life itself.
A cowl is a long outer garment with wide sleeves, worn by Catholic monks when participating in the liturgy. Its name comes from the Latin cuculla, and it developed in the Middle Ages as a more practical alternative to wearing a cloak, giving warmth during long hours in unheated, drafty churches.
Cowls are most commonly bestowed upon the monk at the time of his making solemn, or lifetime, vows, when the garment becomes his formal dress for monastic life. The cowl, without a hood, is also worn by nuns in the same manner.
Cowls are generally worn in conformity with the color of the monk's tunic. Benedictines wear black, while other groups that also follow the Rule of St. Benedict, such as the Camaldolese and Cistercians, wear some form of white. Orders outside the Benedictine tradition, such as the Carthusians, do not use the garment.