Pastoral Staff

Pastoral Staff, a staff denoting authority, borne by, or before, prelates, abbots, and abbesses. In the Greek Church the head is generally in the form of a T-cross, which sometimes has the arms turned up to form a crescent. In the Western Churches the head is cruciform, or the staff is a conventional representation of a shepherd's crook. [Crozier.] The scarf often attached to this staff was called the sudarium (q.v.).