Compositional Procedure in Machaut's ‘Hoquetus David’

1980 ◽  
Vol 16 ◽  
pp. 99-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Leech-Wilkinson

Guillaume De Machaut's Hoquetus David has long been regarded as an exceptional work (for sources, see the bibliography appended to this article). Sections of hocket had been included in motets since the twelfth century (see Sanders 1974), and the technique still played an important part in the isorhythmic structure of Machaut's own motets. Surviving examples of hockets as independent compositions, however, are few. From the thirteenth century there are the seven consecutive pieces in Bamberg 115 (ed. Aubry 1908, nos. 102–8), five of them based on the same chant, together with isolated pieces in Montpellier 196 (ed. Rokseth 1935–9, no. 5) and Paris 11411 (no. 3). On the other hand, the numerous references in theoretical treatises to hocket as an independent form on a par with motets and organa suggest that hockets as separate pieces were not uncommon during the thirteenth century. For the fourteenth century, however, the picture is far less clear. Jacob of Liège, writing around 1330–40, states that modern composers use hocket only in motets, having abandoned the old duplex, contra-duplex, triplex, and quadruplex forms (ed. Bragard 1973, 89); and the fact that the Hoquetus David appears to be the only surviving example supports this.

Author(s):  
Peter Coss

In the introduction to his great work of 2005, Framing the Early Middle Ages, Chris Wickham urged not only the necessity of carefully framing our studies at the outset but also the importance of closely defining the words and concepts that we employ, the avoidance ‘cultural sollipsism’ wherever possible and the need to pay particular attention to continuities and discontinuities. Chris has, of course, followed these precepts on a vast scale. My aim in this chapter is a modest one. I aim to review the framing of thirteenth-century England in terms of two only of Chris’s themes: the aristocracy and the state—and even then primarily in terms of the relationship between the two. By the thirteenth century I mean a long thirteenth century stretching from the period of the Angevin reforms of the later twelfth century on the one hand to the early to mid-fourteenth on the other; the reasons for taking this span will, I hope, become clearer during the course of the chapter, but few would doubt that it has a validity.


Traditio ◽  
1943 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 79-137 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dom Anselm Strittmatter

The following Latin version, hitherto unpublished, of the Byzantine Liturgies of St. Basil and St. John Chrysostom was generously placed at my disposal by my confrère, the late lamented Dom André Wilmart, O.S.B., who about seventeen years ago discovered and transcribed it from a manuscript purchased at London in 1899 by the Bibliothèque Nationale:Nouv. Acq. lat. 1791Since the manuscript was written in the second half of the twelfth century, this translation is—to put it roughly—at least as old as that of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom (= X) made at Constantinople about 1180 by the Pisan interpreter, Leo Tuscus, or that of the Liturgy of St. Basil (= B) made shortly afterward by Nicholas of Otranto. But it is important to note at the outset that the present translation represents a considerably earlier redaction of the Liturgies than do the two aforesaid versions, for we have here, as in the earliest of our manuscripts, theBarberinum S. Marci(=BSM), and several others, the prayers of the celebrant only and a corresponding minimum of rubrics. Of special significance, moreover, are the two following facts: first, the precedence given to B, an arrangement found in comparatively few manuscripts, among them the oldest which we know; and secondly, the occurrence in this same Liturgy of ancient rubrics and of the ancient form of at least one exclamation of the deacon, which point to a very early recension as the original from which the translator worked. On the other hand, over against this ancient form stands a relatively modern text, for not only are certain prayers which appear in the most ancient manuscripts only, missing from this translation, but in those few prayers also in the tradition of which it is possible to distinguish an older from a more recent set of readings, it is the latter which are almost invariably found. Similarly, the indication of certain acclamations by the initial words only (an ancient trait) and the writing out of the ἐκΦωνήσ∊ις in full (a very late practice) constitute another combination of ancient and recent features. But to attempt on the basis of these characteristics to fix the date of either the original or the translation, is to face possibilities only, concerning which it would be useless to speculate.


2021 ◽  
pp. 98-116
Author(s):  
Alicia Walker

Focusing on Early and Middle Byzantine (fourth-to-twelfth-century) objects, images, and texts, this essay explores the tension between, on the one hand, efforts of the Byzantine church and state to discourage and control bodily adornment and modification and, on the other hand, the extensive evidence of widespread and immoderate engagement with these practices. The enhancement and manipulation of Byzantine bodies is considered as both a real and a metaphoric phenomenon. Evidence culled from secular and sacred, written and material sources demonstrates the importance of bodily adornment and modification to our understanding of Byzantine material and visual culture.


1961 ◽  
Vol 56 ◽  
pp. 42-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. M. Metcalf

The Byzantine coinage in the twelfth century was of three kinds. There were gold nomismata, with a purchasing power which must have been a good deal greater than that of a present-day five-pound note, and also nomismata of ‘pale gold’—gold alloyed with silver—of lower value; at the other extreme there were bronze coins, smaller than a modern farthing, which were the coinage of the market-place; intermediate, but still of low value, there were coins about the size of a halfpenny, normally made of copper lightly washed with silver. The silvered bronze and the gold were not flat, as are most coins, but saucer-shaped. The reason for their unusual form is not known. Numismatists describe them as scyphate, and refer to the middle denomination in the later Byzantine system of coinage as Scyphate Bronze, to distinguish it from the petty bronze coinage. Scyphate Bronze was first struck under Alexius I (1081–1118). Substantive issues were made by John II (1118–43), and such coinage became extremely plentiful under Manuel I (1143–80) and his successors Isaac II (1185–95) and Alexius III (1195–1203). After the capture of Constantinople in the course of the Fourth Crusade, the successor-states to the Byzantine Empire at Nicaea, Salonica, and in Epirus continued to issue scyphate bronze coinage, although in much smaller quantities, until after the middle of the thirteenth century.


2021 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 231-246
Author(s):  
Jonathan Jacobs

Abstract This study addresses the views of two Byzantine commentators regarding Targum Onqelos: R. Samuel Roshano of the twelfth century and R. Meyuhas ben Elijah of the thirteenth. R. Samuel explicitly refers to the translation forty-six times; R. Meyuhas makes explicit reference to it 104 times. But there are differences between the two commentators in their relation to the Targum: R. Samuel never mentions the name Onqelos, while R. Meyuhas does so explicitly; R. Samuel systematically cites the text of the Targum, while in most cases in R. Meyuhas’ commentary, there is no accurate citation. The qualitative difference is in their respective relationships with the Targum: all of R. Samuel’s references to it signal his agreement; R. Meyuhas, on the other hand, while frequently agreeing with Onqelos, also brings the Targum as one of two possible alternatives and sometimes openly challenges its interpretation.


Author(s):  
Russell Hopley

This chapter examines the responses of three important medieval Maghribī dynasties to the dilemmas posed by nomadic populations dwelling in their midst. These dynasties include the Almoravids in al-Andalus in the twelfth century, the Almohads in the Maghrib in the thirteenth century, and the Ḥafṣids, successors to the Almohads in Ifrīqiya, during the fourteenth century. The aim is to shed light on the challenges that nomadic populations posed to political legitimacy, and to suggest, paradoxically perhaps, that the presence of unruly nomads in the medieval Islamic west, and the effort to contain them, served an important role in each dynasty's attempt to gain political legitimacy in the eyes of the Muslim community.


2020 ◽  
pp. 379-393
Author(s):  
Haym Soloveitchik

This chapter discusses the laws regulating usury (ribbit). In the course of studying ribbit, more specifically, the problem of personal surety in usury contracts, certain peculiar developments in Provençal halakhic thought came to the author's attention which were not explainable by indigenous forces. The geographical distribution of the discussion seemed oddly disproportionate, the fictions too blatant, the types of problem that were raised seemed inappropriate for the period, and the terminology was occasionally alien. The author was compelled to look outside Jewish law for possible stimuli. Placing the Jewish developments within the context of twelfth-century Provençal law shed light on a number of seemingly inexplicable points. The Jewish literature, on the other hand, provided new information about the Gentile law of the time and yielded fresh corroboration for theories of the penetration of Roman law in Provence. However, at the same time this material seemed to point to an earlier date for certain legal developments than is generally accepted. It is these findings that the author wishes to bring to the attention of the scholars of Provençal law.


Author(s):  
Barbara Bombi

This book is concerned with the modalities, namely the modes and procedures, of Anglo-papal diplomacy in the first half of the fourteenth century, when diplomatic affairs between England and the papacy intensified following the transfer of the papal curia to southern France in 1305 and on account of the on-going Anglo-French hostilities, which resulted in the outbreak of the Hundred Years’ War in 1337. On the one hand, the book investigates how diplomatic and administrative practices developed in England and at the papal curia from a comparative perspective, whilst, on the other hand, it questions the legacy and impact of international and domestic conflicts on diplomatic and administrative practices....


Traditio ◽  
1959 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
pp. 428-443
Author(s):  
Frank Pegues

The fourteenth century was the great century of college-founding in western Europe. The previous century and a half had witnessed the origins and early growth of the great studia generalia in Italy, France, England and Spain. This previous age had also seen the creation and endowment of the first colleges within the universities, a development which was to make the college system the dominant organizational characteristic of the medieval universities. The College des Dix-Huit was set up at Paris in the last years of the twelfth century; the most celebrated of all colleges, the Sorbonne, was endowed in the thirteenth. Almost at the same time, Merton College came into being at Oxford. But what had been a slow growth in the thirteenth century became a phenomenal expansion and multiplication of colleges in the fourteenth century. These colleges, vastly increased in number, were almost invariably and naturally attached to the old centers. The college founded by Aubert de Guignicourt at Soissons is almost unique simply because it was a provincial college. Because provincial colleges were so rare, this particular foundation deserves examination.


1987 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 75-110 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janet Coleman

With the revival of Roman and the development of canon law in the twelfth century a doctrine of supreme and universal jurisdiction began to be expounded with increasing vigour by the papacy. By the thirteenth century those learned in Roman and canon law began to distinguish in more subtle ways between jurisdiction on the one hand and holy orders on the other; between the capacity to make law and to discover law; between legislating and adjudicating; and, most importantly, between ruling and owning. Jurisdiction had become one of a cluster of terms used to define aspects of rulership, authority, prelacy, and imperium. It combined the idea of rightful administration with the legitimate and authoritative use of coercive force.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document