Chapel
.
This word has a highly romantic
origin. It is associated with the story of St. Martin’s sharing his cloak with a beggar.
“Cloak,” in late Latin, is
cappella, a little
cloak, or cape, from
cappa, cloak, cape, cope.
The Frankish kings preserved St. Martin’s
cloak as a sacred relic. They had it carried
before them into battle, and used it to give
sanctity to oaths. It was preserved in a
sanctuary, under the care of special ministers
called
cappellani, or chaplains, and from the
ministers the name came to be attached to the
building, in old Norse French
capele, Provençal
capella, Italian
cappella, and thence to any
sanctuary containing relics, and so to any
private sanctuary or holy place. The title of
“Chapel” to the internal regulations of a
printing-office, originated in Caxton’s exercising
the profession in one of the chapels in
Westminster Abbey, and may be considered
as an additional proof, from the antiquity of
the custom, of his being the first English
printer.