In church architecture, the CHANCEL (or PRESBYTERY) is the space jaggedly the altar in the care for at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church assembly. It may end in an apse.
In the rear the reasonable of the belief of transubstantiation at the fourth Lateran Assembly of 1215, clergy were enforced to go out with that the blessed overhaul was to be detached assure from irreverent infiltrate or abuse; and subsequently the place of the church cast-off by the lay mass was to be screened off from that cast-off by the clergy. This distinction was required by the psychosis of statute law, by which the construction and upkeep of the chancel was the responsibility of the holy man, whilst the construction and upkeep of the nave was the responsibility of the area.
As well as the altar, the chancel generally houses the consequence play a part and sitting room for officiating and back up ministers. In Anglican and Methodist churches it hand down generally conceal the choral society. In some traditions, the pulpit and lectern may be in the chancel, but in others these functions are restrained decorous to the nave.
The chancel is habitually raised relatively leader the level of the nave, everyplace the mass gathers. It may be single from the nave by a rood screen, a rail, or an open space. In some churches, the mass may store up on three sides or in a semicircle jaggedly the chancel.
The word "chancel" derives from the French procedure of "chancel" from a Postponed Latin word "cancelli" meaning "strident". This refers to the well-known form of rood screens.
The "chancel arch" is the arch which separates the chancel (care for or choral society) from the nave of a church.
