Brotherhood, the relation or union of brothers, friends, partners, associates, and the like.

a civil sense, denotes a guild, association, or society of individuals, united into a body for one common interest or advantage.

Roman Catholic countries, signifies a society for the improvement of devotion. Of these there are several. 1. The fraternity of the rosary, founded by St Dominic. It is divided into two branches, called the common rosary, and the perpetual rosary; the former are obliged to confess and communicate every first Sunday in the month, and the latter to repeat the rosary continually. 2. The fraternity of the scapular, whom the blessed Virgin, according to the sabbatine bull of Pope John XXII, has promised to deliver out of hell the first Sunday after their death. 3. The fraternity of St Francis's girdle; these are clothed with a sack of a gray colour, which they tie with a cord, and in processions walk barefooted, carrying in their hands a wooden cross. 4. That of St Austin's leathern girdle comprehends a great many devotees. Italy, Spain, and Portugal, are the countries where we see the greatest number of these fraternities, some of which assume the name of arch-fraternities. Pope Clement VII instituted the arch-fraternity of charity, which distributes bread every Sunday among the poor, and gives portions to forty poor girls on the feast of St Jerome, their patron. The fraternity of death buries such dead as are abandoned by their relations, and causes masses to be celebrated for them.