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Arms of Archbishops
Archbishopas fall into three categories: residential metropolitans, residential non-metropolitans, and titular archbishops. There is no heraldic distinction among these three except that residential metropolitans may display a pallium in addition to what is prescribed. The prescribed ornaments for the coat of arm of an archishop are green galero with 20 fiocchi, 10 on each side, and a double transverse processional cross behind the shield. It is sometimes claimed that the tassels and chords of archbishops are green interlaced with gold (like the pectoral cross cords used in a bishop's choir dress) this is incorrect. The papal instruction of 1832 specifically states just green. As with all residential ordinaries, archbishops may marshall their see's arms with their personal arms.
Some archbishops are termed archbishop ad personam. These bishops have been granted the rank, style, and dignity of an arcbhishop, but do not occupy an archepiscopal see nor are they metropolitans. They remain like all other suffragan bishops subject to a metropolitan although they hold a rank equal to them, and are for all intents and purposes archbishops. Likewise, archbishops who are residential non-metropolitans, that is, are suffragan to a metropolitan archbishop, are considered archbishops just as bishops who are archbishop ad personam. Both of these groups make use of the ornaments of archbishop.
By virtue of their see, a small number of archbishops are holders of the special priviledges of wearing the vestments of a cardinal. Over the course of the last few centuries, this priviledge was given to the sees of Gnesen (Poland), Mohilev (Russia), Pisa (Italy), Prague (Czech Rep.), Salzburg (Austria), and Warsaw (Poland). Today, all of these sees except Pisa and Salzburg are defacto cardinalates thus rendering this priviledge pointless. Of the remaining two, only Salzburg, which has had this priviledge since 1587, still makes use of it today. Heraldically, this means that instead of a green galero with 20 fiocchi, the archbishop of Salzburg uses a red galero with 20 red fiocchi. Confusion with arms of a cardinal is avoided by the fact that cardinals have 10 more fiocchi than a priviledged archbishop.
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Archbishop Timothy Dolan |
Archbishop Alois Kothgasser |