Ăn/te-lū'can, a.

a. [Lat. antelucanus, of ante, before, and lux, light.] Being before light;—a word applied to assemblies of Christians, in ancient times of persecution, held before light in the morning.

This practice of antelucan worship possibly having reference to the ineffable mystery of the resurrection (all the evangelists agreeing in the awful circumstance that it was very early in the morning, and one saying, “whilst it was yet dark”), it happens, remarkably enough, that we find confirmed and countersigned by the first open antagonist to our Christian faith. De Quincey.