Focus on this artwork and discuss the Feast of the Chair of Saint Peter.
Early martyrologies indicate that two liturgical feasts were celebrated in Rome, centuries before the time of Charles the Bald, in honour of earlier chairs associated with Saint Peter, one of which was kept in the baptismal chapel of Old St. Peter's Basilica, the other at the catacomb of Priscilla. The dates of these celebrations were January 18 and February 22. No surviving chair has been identified with either of these chairs. The feasts thus became associated with an abstract understanding of the "Chair of Peter", which by synecdoche signifies the episcopal office of the Pope as Bishop of Rome, an office considered to have been first held by Saint Peter, and thus extended to the diocese, the See of Rome.According to historian Anton de Waal, although both feasts were originally associated with Saint Peter's stay in Rome, the ninth-century form of the Martyrologium Hieronymianum associated the January 18 feast with his stay in Rome, and the February 22 feast with his stay at Antioch.  The two feasts were included in the Tridentine calendar with the rank of Double, which Pope Clement VIII raised in 1604 to the newly invented rank of Greater Double.
In 1960 Pope John XXIII deleted the January 18 feast from the General Roman Calendar, along with seven other feast days that were duplicate feasts of a single saint or mystery. The February 22 celebration became a Second-Class Feast. This calendar was incorporated in the 1962 Roman Missal of Pope John XXIII, whose continued use Pope Benedict XVI authorized under the conditions indicated in his motu proprio Summorum Pontificum. Traditionalist Catholics who use older calendars continue to celebrate both feast days: Saint Peter's Chair at Rome on January 18 and the Chair of Saint Peter at Antioch on February 22.
In the new classification of holy days introduced in 1969, the February 22 celebration has the rank of Feast.
Old St. Peter's Basilica Bishop rank of Feast Bishop of Rome Rome Pope John XXIII catacomb of Priscilla General Roman Calendar Saint Peter motu proprio Tridentine calendar Traditionalist Catholic Pope martyrologies episcopal office Anton de Waal Second-Class Feast Summorum Pontificum 1962 Roman Missal Pope Clement VIII Pope Benedict XVI Charles the Bald See of Rome St. Peter's Basilica Antioch synecdoche rank of Double Martyrologium Hieronymianum