Angelus - Angelus Bell

Angelus Bell

The Angelus, in all its stages of development, was closely associated with the ringing of a church bell. The bell is still rung in some English country churches and has often been mistaken for, and alleged to be a remnant of, the curfew bell. The Angelus is replaced by Regina Coeli during Eastertide, and is not said on Good Friday or Holy Saturday.

Where the town bell and the bells of the principal church or monastery were distinct, the curfew was generally rung upon the town bell. Where the church bell served for both purposes, the Ave and the curfew were probably rung upon the same bell at different hours.

The ringing of the Angelus in the 14th century and even in the 13th century must have been very general. The number of bells belonging to these two centuries which still survive is relatively low, but a considerable proportion bear inscriptions which suggest that they were originally intended to serve as Ave bells. Many bear the words Ave Maria; or, as in the case of a bell at Helfta, near Eisleben, in Germany, dated 1234, the whole sentence: Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum.

Bells inscribed with Ave Maria are also numerous in England, but there the Angelus bells seem in a very large number of instances to have been dedicated to St Gabriel, the angel mentioned in the prayer (Luke 1:26-27). In the Diocese of Lincoln alone there are nineteen surviving mediaeval bells bearing the name of Gabriel, while only six bear the name of Michael, a much more popular patron in other respects.

In France, the Ave Maria seems to have been the ordinary label for Angelus bells; but in Germany the most common inscription of all, even in the case of many bells of the 13th century, the words O Rex Gloriæ Veni Cum Pace ("O King of Glory, Come with Peace"). In Germany, the Netherlands, and in some parts of France, the Angelus bell was regularly known as the Peace bell, and pro pace schlagen (to toll for peace) was a phrase popularly used for ringing the Angelus.

In the Philippines, the ringing of church bells is still done for the Angelus every 6:00 pm. In the past, Filipino families at the sound of the bell would kneel before their home altars and pray the Angelus. The rite is called the orasyón, from the Spanish oracion, (prayer/litany/recitation), and children playing outside must come home before the family prays the Angelus. In traditional Spanish-Filipino families, the Angelus is recited in Spanish.

The Irish national broadcaster Raidió Teilifís Éireann airs the Angelus bells at noon and 6:00 pm every day on the national radio station RTÉ Radio 1 and at 6:00 pm on the national television station RTÉ One. This consists of a bell ringing for a minute, accompanied by images of people pausing in contemplation (filmed in North Kildare) in the television version. Foggy Dew, an Irish rebel ballad commemorating the Easter Rising, has the line "the Angelus bell o'er the Liffey swell rang out through the foggy dew."

With regard to the manner of ringing the Angelus, it seems sufficient to note that the triple stroke repeated three times with a pause between seems to have been adopted from the very beginning.