Sedia gestatoria Father, so passes the glory of the world). The custom of carrying the newly elected pope, and formerly in some countries, a newly elected bishop to his church, can be traced back centuries and is comparable with the Roman use of the "sella curulis", on which newly elected consuls were carried through the city. Magnus Felix Ennodius, Bishop of Pavia, records in his "Apologia pro Synodo", "Gestatoriam sellam apostolicae confessionis", alluding to the Cathedra S. Petri, still preserved in the choir of St. Peter's at Rome. This is a portable wooden armchair, inlaid with ivory, with two iron rings on
Litter (vehicle) habit must have proven quite persistent, for the Third Council of Braga in 675 AD saw the need to order that bishops, when carrying the relics of martyrs in procession, must walk to the church, and not be carried in a chair, or litter, by deacons clothed in white. In the Catholic Church, Popes were carried the same way in Sedia gestatoria, which was replaced later by the Popemobile. A palanquin is a covered litter, usually for one passenger. It is carried by an even number of bearers (between two and eight, but most commonly four) on their shoulders, by