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‘La contenance italienne’: the motets on Beata es Maria by Compère, Obrecht and Brumel*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 December 2008

M. Jennifer Bloxam
M. Jennifer Bloxam
Affiliation:
Williams College, Williamstown, Massachusetts
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Extract

Musicians have recognised distinct national styles of musical composition and performance for centuries, and even today our understanding of the development of musical style in virtually every period rests in large part on observations of the contact and melding of national idioms. From the suppression and absorption of Gallic chant by Roman plainsong during the time of Charlemagne, through the wedding of French, Italian and German styles accomplished by Bach, to the joining of north Indian classical musical elements with modern avant-garde music by Philip Glass and other minimalist composers, our telling of music history is in large part analysis of a continuing process of musical colonialisation.

Type
Research Article
Information
Early Music History , Volume 11 , October 1992 , pp. 39 - 89
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

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References

1 This phrase occurs in Le Franc's poem Le champion des dames, written between c. 1438 and 1442, and entered the mainstream of modern musicological scholarship through the translation by Reese, Gustave in Music in the Renaissance (New York, 1954), pp. 12–13Google Scholar.

2 For an insightful critique of commonly held assumptions about la contenance angloise, see Fallows, D., ‘The Contenance Angloise: English Influence on Continental Composers of the Fifteenth Century’, Renaissance Studies, 1 (1987), pp. 189–208CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 Ibid., p. 194.

4 For an investigation addressing aspects of Italian influence on northern composition in the first half of the fifteenth century, see Arlt, W., ‘Musik und Text im Liedsatz frankoflämischer Italienfahrer der ersten Hälfte des 15. Jahrhunderts’, Schweizer Jahrbuch für Musikwissenschaft, 1 (1981), pp. 23–69Google Scholar. A useful overview of the reciprocal influences between north and south in the first decades of the century remains Reese, , Music in the Renaissance, pp. 10–33Google Scholar.

5 Osthoff, H., Josquin Desprez, 2 vols. (Tutzing, 1962–1965), i, pp. 127–8Google Scholar. It should be noted that Josquin had arrived in Milan by 1459.

6 Lowinsky, E. E., ‘Scholarship in the Renaissance’, Renaissance News, 16 (1963), pp. 260–1Google Scholar.

7 Glixon, J., ‘The Polyphonic Laude of Innocentius Dammonis’, The Journal of Musicology, 7 (1990), pp. 40–1Google Scholar.

8 See Wilson, B., ‘Music and Merchants: The Laudesi Companies of Republican Florence, ca. 1270–1494’ (Ph.D. dissertation, Indiana University, 1987), esp. pp. 65–130Google Scholar. William F. Prizer, in a paper entitled ‘Court Piety, Popular Piety: The Lauda in Renaissance Mantua’ delivered at the annual meeting of the American Musicological Society in Chicago, November 1991, emphasises processions as occasions at which court culture and the artisan culture met, with important consequences for music in both spheres. I am grateful to Professor Prizer for sharing this paper with me.

9 D'Accone, F., ‘The Musical Chapels at the Florentine Cathedral and Baptistry during the First Half of the 16th Century’, Journal of the American Musicological Society, 24 (1971), p. 3CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 The use of laude at rappresentazioni sacre is documented in Osthoff, W., Theatergesang und darstellende Musik in der italienischen Renaissance (15. und 16. Jahrhundert), Münchner Veröffentlichungen zur Musikgeschichte 14, 2 vols. (Tutzing, 1969), i, pp. 30–8Google Scholar.

11 See the Inventory of BolC Q15 by de Van, G., ‘Inventory of Manuscript Bologna, Liceo Musicale, Q 15 (olim 37)’, Musica Disciplina, 2 (1948), pp. 246–7Google Scholar, in which In natali Domini is identified as a lauda. Margaret Bent is preparing a study of BolC Q15; a summary of the dating of the layers in the manuscript is given in ‘A Contemporary Perception of Early Fifteenth-Century Style: Bologna Q15 as a Document of Scribal Editorial Initiative’, Musica Disciplina, 41 (1987), pp. 185 and 198Google Scholar.

12 All extant settings of In natali Domini are edited in the excellent study by Diederichs, E., Die Anfänge der mehrstimmigen Lauda vom Ende des 14. bis zur Mitte des 15. Jahrhunderts, Münchner Veröffentlichungen zur Musikgeschichte 41 (Tutzing, 1986), pp. 324–9Google Scholar. Both the three- and four-voice settings of In natali Domini contain numerous unprepared dissonances and other crudities of part-writing probably resulting from the as yet unrefined layered process of composition here employed. The sonority of the chordal triad does, however, prevail.

13 Jeppesen, K. and Brøndal, V., Die mehrstimmige ilalienische Laude um 1500 (Leipzig, 1935), pp. xx–xxvGoogle Scholar.

14 A discussion, plate and transcription of this piece are included in Damilano, P., ‘Laudilatine in un antifonario bobbiese del Trecento’, Collectanea Historiae Musicae, 3 (1963), pp. 15–57Google Scholar. Verbum caro factum est may trace its origin to the conductus In hoc anni circulo, as proposed by Hughes, Dom A., ‘In hoc anni circulo’, The Musical Quarterly, 60 (1974), pp. 37–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

15 Modern editions of the settings of Verbum caro factum est here mentioned are found in Luisi, F., Laudario Giustinianeo, 2 vols. (Venice, 1983), ii, pp. 194–211Google Scholar. For a critical assessment of this edition, see the review by Glixon, Jonathan in Journal of the American Musicological Society, 41 (1988), pp. 170–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar. A comparison of the variants in the monophonic tune as it appears in its many polyphonic arrangements is provided in Diederichs, Die Anfänge der mehrstimmigen Lauda, pp. 332–3.

16 Modern editions of Dammonis's arrangements are found in Jeppesen, , Die mehrstimmige italienische Laude, pp. 106–7Google Scholar, and Luisi, , Laudario Giustinianeo, ii, pp. 212–20Google Scholar.

17 A comparable evolution, from a fund of melodies to which counterpoints were improvised into a fully notated four-part polyphony, characterises the rise of the frottola in the latter part of the fifteenth century, as shown by Prizer, William in ‘The Frottola and the Unwritten Tradition’, Studi Musicali, 15 (1986), pp. 3–37Google Scholar.

18 On Josquin's italianate songs, see Gallico, C., ‘Josquin's Compositions on Italian Texts and the Frottola’, Josquin des Prez: Proceedings of the International Josquin Festival-Conference, ed. Lowinsky, E. E. and Blackburn, B. J. (London, 1976), pp. 446–54Google Scholar. Compère's two frottolesque songs are discussed in Finscher, L., Loyset Compère (c. 1450–1518): Life and Works, Musicological Studies and Documents 12 (Rome, 1964), pp. 242–3Google Scholar.

19 Lockwood, L., Music in Renaissance Ferrara 1400–1505 (Cambridge, MA, 1984), pp. 233–40Google Scholar.

20 Finscher, , Loyset Compère, pp. 161–6Google Scholar.

21 Johannes Wolf, in the critical notes to his edition of Beata es Maria by Obrecht, identified this text as the responsory for the Marian antiphon Virgo Galilaea, referring to Analecta hymnica, ed. Blume, C., Dreves, G. M. and Bannister, H. M., 55 vols. (Leipzig, 1886–1922; reprint, New York, 1961), xxi, p. 182Google Scholar (see Werken van Jacob Obrecht, ed. Wolf, J. (Leipzig and Amsterdam, 1908–1921; reprint 1968), vi: Motetlen, pt 2, p. x)Google Scholar. Barton Hudson followed Wolf's lead in his description of this text as it appears in Brumel's motet; see Antoine Brumel: Opera omnia, ed. Hudson, B., 6 vols., Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae 5 (n.p., 1969–1972), v, p. xxxGoogle Scholar. In Finscher, , Loyset Compère, p. 162Google Scholar, the melody and text are designated as the repetitio (refrain) of the cantio Virgo Galilaea, referring again to Analecta hymnica, xxi, p. 182. Although Finscher cites Damilano,‘Laudi latine’, the article that led this author to the source of this cantus firmus, he does so without further comment.

22 Damilano, ‘Laudi latine’.

23 The central role in the cultivation and collection of the late medieval lauda repertory played by Benedictine establishments in Italy, specifically those belonging to the Congregation of S. Giustina, is explored by Cattin, G., ‘Tradizione e tendenze innovatricinella normativa e nella pratica liturgico-musicale della Congregazione de S. Giustina’, Benedictina, 17 (1970), pp. 254–99Google Scholar.

24 A plate of the lauda Beata es Maria is found in Damilano, ‘Laudi latine’, tavola iii.

25 Ibid., pp. 20–1.

26 See the transcription of this lauda in Damilano, ‘Laudi latine’, p. 50.

27 Melk, Stiftsbibliothek, MS 1087 (olim 932), p. 110 The text of the refrain matches that of Turin K.I.2, but the order of stanzas is shuffled and some lines changed, stanza 4 is omitted and two verses are added.

28 Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale, MS VI.G.3, fol. 275r. The version of the tune preserved herein omits the phrase ‘sanctorum melodia’ and shows considerable disagreement in pitch content.

29 See the edition in Loyset Compère: Opera omnia, ed. Finscher, L., 5 vols., Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae 15 (Rome, 1958–1972), iv, pp. 8–10Google Scholar.

30 Suggested by Finscher, , Loyset Compère, p. 161Google Scholar.

31 Although the Marian prayer ‘Ave Maria gratia plena’ was universally known and employed in a wide variety of liturgical and devotional functions (see Leclercq, J., ‘Ave Maria’, Dictionnaire d'archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie, 15 vols. (Paris, 1907–1950), x/2, pp. 2043–62)Google Scholar, Compère's inspiration for the selection of this particular prayer may have derived from the lauda spirituale genre. This text was a favourite among northern Italian composers of polyphonic Latin laude; for example, Petrucci's, Laude libro primo (Venice, 1508)Google Scholar and Laude libro secondo (Venice, 1507/8) together include no fewer than ten settings of the ‘Ave Maria’ prayer, making it by far the most popular single text in these publications.

32 For an edition of the text and melody of the sequence Ave Maria gratia plena, see The Utrecht Prosarium, ed. de Goede, N., Monumenta Musica Neerlandica 6 (Amsterdam, 1965), pp. 63–4Google Scholar.

33 Finscher, , Loyset Compère, p. 162Google Scholar, identified the source of the cantus firmus for the opening couplet, but did not observe that the two lines following also derived their cantus prius factus from the sequence.

34 I am grateful to Leeman Perkins for bringing this quotation to my attention.

35 The development of the Litany is summarised by Huglo, M. in ‘Litany’, The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Sadie, S., 20 vols. (London, 1980), xi, pp. 75–8Google Scholar.

36 The numerous Litany settings from the sixteenth century tend to retain the recitational melodic character evident in the treatment of Litany texts in the later fifteenth century; see Roth, J., Die mehrstimmigen lateinischen Litaneikompositionen des 16. Jahrhunderts, Kölner Beiträge zur Musikforschung 14, ed. Fellerer, K. G. (Regensburg, 1959), pp. 69–74Google Scholar.

37 The mensuration sign indicated for those sections of Compère's Ave Maria gratia plena in duple metre varies between sources: SienBC K.I.2 and TarazC 2 provide C; ToleBC 21 indicates C2; and the nine remaining sources employ ￠.

38 The rhythmic realisation of laude remains problematic; solutions range from Riemann's theory of Vierhebigkeit, implemented by Liuzzi, F. in La lauda e i primordi della melodia italiana (Rome, 1934)Google Scholar, to the ‘modified mensural’ system devised by Anglès, H. in ‘The Musical Notation and Rhythm of the Italian Lauda’ Essays in Musicology: A Birthday Offering for Willi Apel, ed. Tischler, H. (Bloomington, IN, 1966), pp. 51–60Google Scholar. Damilano's interpretation of the note shapes in Turin F.I.4 often results in the lilting triple metre of rhythmic mode 1 (see Damilano, ‘Laudi latine’, pp. 45–57); this realisation appears to be confirmed by Compère's adoption of this rhythm in Ave Maria gratia plena.

39 Finscher, , Loyset Compère, pp. 165–6Google Scholar. Finscher was guided in his proposed dating by termini ad quos non for the sources of the motet then known.

40 D'Accone, F. A., ‘A Late 15th-Century Sienese Sacred Repertory: MS K.I.2. of the Biblioteca Comunale, Siena’, Musica Disciplina, 37 (1983), pp. 121–70Google Scholar. D'Accone argues that Matteo Ghai, a French scribe commissioned by the Sienese patrician Alberto de Francesco Aringhieri, copied two collections of music, one for Vespers and the other for Mass, between February and July 1481; these were later rebound into the single volume now known as SienBC K.I.2. According to D'Accone, five other scribes added items up until the early sixteenth century, but the motet in question exists in the earlier layer in Ghai's hand. For a facsimile of this manuscript, see Siena, Biblioteca Comunale degli Intronali, MS K.I.2, introduction by F. A. D'Accone, Renaissance Music in Facsimile: Sources Central to the Music of the Late Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries 17 (New York, 1986).

D'Accone bases his hypothesis on the intersection of payment records to copyists and surviving inventories of books from the cathedral of Siena. The proposed dating is not without problems: the evidence of the watermarks remains to be assessed, and implications for the attribution and chronology of certain pieces explored (for some preliminary thoughts on one such examples, Sancti Dei Omnes, see below, n. 50).

41 The preservation of an apparently earlier version of Ave Maria gratia plena, in SienBCK.I.2 would appear to support D'Accone's dating of the manuscript.

42 On the possibility that attributions may identify not the original composer but another composer's revision, see Atlas, A., ‘Conflicting Attributions in Italian Sources of the Franco-Netherlandish Chanson, ca. 1465–ca. 1505: A Progress Report on a New Hypothesis’, Music in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: Patronage, Sources and Texts, ed. Fenlon, I. (Cambridge, 1981), pp. 249–93Google Scholar.

43 See the edition by Finscher, , Loyset Compère: Opera omnia, ii, pp. 25–6Google Scholar.

44 See the discussion of Ad honorem tuum, Christe by Finscher, in Loyset Compère, pp. 166–71Google Scholar. An edition is found in Finscher, , Loyset Compère: Opera omnia, iv, pp. 1–5Google Scholar. Fincher suggests a date of 1503 for this motets, on the basis of the date of its only source and the mention of Pope Julius in its text. But names invoked in motets were easily and often changed, and the style of Ad honorem tuum, Christe, which is most akin to that of Ave Maria gratia plena, strongly suggests that it is also earlier than was previously suspected.

45 The possibility of the equation of ‘Aloysio’ with Compère was raised by Prizer, W. F., ‘Music at the Court of the Sforza: The Birth and Death of a Musical Center’, Musica Disciplina, 43 (1989), p. 156Google Scholar.

46 The authoritative study of Compère's biography remains Finscher, , Loyset Compère, pp. 13–23Google Scholar.

47 See Cummings, A., The Politicized Muse: Medici Festivals, 1512–1537 (Princeton, NJ, forthcoming 1991)Google Scholar, ch. 12. I am grateful to Professor Anthony Cummings for bringing this occasion to my attention, and for providing excerpts from his book prior to its publication.

48 Prizer, ‘Music at the Court of the Sforza’, pp. 154–5. Galeazzo Maria Sforza also witnessed the above-mentioned sacra rappresentazione by Belcari during a visit to Florence in March 1471 (Cummings, The Politicized Muse, ch. 12); if Compère was in the duke's service then (see above, p. 61), he would probably have attended this performance.

49 On the disciplinati of Milan, see Meloni, P. L., ‘Topografia, diffusione e aspetti delle confraternite dei disciplinati’, Risultati e prospettive della ricerca sul movimento dei disciplinati: Convegno internazionale di studio, Centro di Documentazione sul Movimento dei Disciplinati (Perugia, 1972), tavola iiiGoogle Scholar.

50 See the list of sources for O genetrix gloriosa in Finscher, , Loyset Compère, p. 46Google Scholar.

Another piece held in common by the Milanese choirbooks and SienBC K.I.2 is the four-voice litany-motet Sancti Dei omnes, currently included in the corpus of music assigned to Jean Mouton. Like Compère's Ave Maria gratia plena, Sancti Dei omnes survives both in MilD 3 and in the earliest layer of SienBC K.I.2, as well as in at least eight other sources (see the list of sources in Josquin Desprez: Werken, ed. Smijers, A. (Amsterdam, 1951–), Motetten v/46, pp. xi–xivGoogle Scholar, to which should be added SienBC K.I.2. An edition of Sancti Dei omnes is found therein, pp. 28–36). Sancti Dei omnes opens with a prevailingly homophonic and syllabic setting of the Litany invocation. ‘Sancti Dei omnes, orate pro nobis’; this phrase and its music are then treated as a refrain, returning four times over the course of the piece. A tendency to a recitational melodic character is also apparent, as is a concern for variety of texture achieved through the liberal use of answering duets. Although richer in melodic and rhythmic invention and more adept contrapuntally, the composer of Sancti Dei omnes seems to be experimenting with the same ideas that occupy Compère in Ave Maria gratia plena. Sancti Dei omnes is first attributed to Mouton in VatS 42, a manuscript from the Papal Chapel copied between 1503 and 1512; the only conflicting assignment is to Josquin, occurring in ToleBC 13, a Spanish source from the mid-sixteenth century. Mouton, however, is not documented in Italy until 1515 (Lockwood, L., ‘Jean Mouton and Jean Michel: French Music and Musicians in Italy, 1505–1520’, Journal of the American Musicological Society, 32 (1979), pp. 193–217)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and while he may have visited earlier, it is highly unlikely that this composer could have created such a thoroughly italianate piece as this prior to 1481, the year it was apparently entered in SienBC K.I.2, when every indication is that he was at that time a young man just beginning his career as a singer, teacher and later maître de chapelle at the church of Notre Dame in Nesle, outside Paris (the possibility that Mouton may have visited Italy prior to 1515 is acknowledged in Lockwood, ‘Jean Mouton and Jean Michel’, pp. 211–12; such a visit seems most likely to have occurred after the composer became attached to the French royal court at some time during the first decade of the sixteenth century). Moreover, the inclusion of Sancti Dei omnes in MilD 3 and VerBC 758 (both dated c. 1500) is highly suspect: neither source gives an attribution for the piece, the Veronese manuscript preserves no other work by Mouton, and none of the Milanese choirbooks transmit any other music believed to be by this composer. Both sources, however, contain a number of motets by Josquin. It can only be suggested here that Sancti Dei omnes may indeed be the work of Compère's colleague in Milan, the young Josquin; certainly, in their musical kinships and similar transmission histories, Ave Maria gratia plena and Sancti Dei omnes appear to derive from a common milieu. D'Accone, in ‘A Late 15th-Century Sienese Sacred Repertory’, pp. 144–5, foresaw the question of attribution raised by the appearance of this motet in SienBC K.I.2. Further investigation into the question of Mouton's authorship of Sancti Dei omnes is clearly needed, but cannot be pursued here. Worth noting, however, is the fact that at least ten motets bear conflicting attributions to Josquin and Mouton, and that the likelihood of mistaking one composer's work for the other's was acknowledged as early as 1521 by the poet Teofilo Folengo (see Brown, H. M., ‘Mouton, Jean’, The New Grove Dicitionary, xii, p. 657)Google Scholar.

51 Litany-motets by Gaffurius include O beate Sebastiane, Virgo Dei digna and Salve mater Salvatoris in MilD I, and Solemnitas laudabilis in the fragmentary MilD 4. The flowering of the polyphonic Litany setting during the sixteenth century is discussed in Roth, Die mehrstimmigen lateinischen Litaneikompositionen.

52 Summaries of the lives of St Quentin and St Louis of France are found in Butler's Lives of the Saints, ed. Thurston, H. and Attwater, D., 4 vols. (London, 1956), iv, pp. 229–30, and iii, pp. 394–8Google Scholar, respectively. Ludovicus is named in TarazC 2, VatC 234, VatS 15 and VerBC 758, and St Quintinus appears in BerlS 40021, VatC 234, VerBC 758, WarU 2016, WrocU 428 and Motetti A. SienBC K.I.2, MilD 3 and ToleBC 21 include neither saint, and the names included in BarcBC 454 are in a cursive hand that cannot be read from microfilm.

53 SienBC K.I.2, for example, names St Bernardine of Siena; BerlS 40021 includes St Frederick of Regensburg, WarU 2016 invokes St Lambert of Maastricht and WrocU 428 appeals to St Kilian, all three saints popular in German-speaking territories; and TarazC 2 calls on Prudentius, the Spanish Bishop of Troyes.

54 Regarding Quentin and Louis of France in the calendar of Paris, see Perdrizet, P., Le calendrier parisien à la fin du moyen âge (Paris, 1933), pp. 209–12 and 246Google Scholar. Compère's association with the church of St Quentin is discussed in Finscher, , Loyset Compère, pp. 16 and 19Google Scholar.

55 On Louis of Anjou and Louis Morbioli, see Butler's Lives of the Saints, iii, pp. 357–9, and iv, pp. 359–60. Of these two additional candidates for the identity of Ludovicus, Louis of Anjou appears to be more likely, especially in light of the fact that all manuscripts naming Ludovicus also appeal to Francis, the patron saint of the Franciscan order.

56 Lockwood, , Music in Renaissance Ferrara, pp. 162–4 and 207–10Google Scholar.

57 The possibility that Obrecht may have come to know Compère's motet while in Bruges cannot be ruled out: Compère's music was circulating north of the Alps prior to the mid1480s, and the vigorous Italian merchant community in Bruges may have furnished both a conduit and an audience for polyphony based on laude.

58 An excellent survey of Obrecht's cantus firmus technique is Sparks, E., Cantus Firmus in Mass and Motet 1420–1520 (Berkeley, CA, 1963), pp. 245–311Google Scholar.

59 The other multiple cantus firmus motets by Obrecht are O beate Basili, Homo quidam, Salve crux arbor vitae, Laudemus nunc Dominus and Factor orbis. For a discussion of these compositions, see Bloxam, M. J., ‘A Survey of Late Medieval Service Books from the Low Countries: Implications for Sacred Polyphony, 1460–1520’ (Ph.D. dissertation, Yale University, 1987), pp. 312–66Google Scholar.

60 On the date of the Missa de Sancto Donatiano, see Strohm, R., Music in Late Medieval Bruges (Oxford, 1985), pp. 146–7Google Scholar.

61 The possibility that Obrecht may have composed Beata es Maria during the period in Bruges immediately preceding his first excursion to Italy cannot be ruled out; see above, n. 57.

62 A useful summary of the sources of Obrecht's music is Picker, M., Johannes Ockeghem and Jacob Obrecht: A Guide to Research, Garland Composer Resource Manuals 13 (New York, 1988), pp. 57–87Google Scholar.

63 See the edition of O beate Basili by Wolf, in Werken van Jacob Obrecht, iv: Motetten, pt 2, pp. 85–94Google Scholar.

64 The cantus firmi in O beate Basili are discussed in detail in Bloxam, M. J., ‘Sacred Polyphony and Local Traditions of Liturgy and Plainsong: Reflections on Music by Jacob Obrecht’, Plainsong in the Age of Polyphony, ed. Kelly, T. F. (Cambridge, 1992, pp. 157–61)Google Scholar.

65 Obrecht's Quis numerare queat and Laudes Christo redemptoris are edited by Wolf, in Werken van Jacob Obrecht, viii: Motetten, Pt 3, pp. 120–30, and iv: Motetten, pp. 75–84, respectivelyGoogle Scholar.

66 See the discussion of this manuscript in Lockwood, , Music in Renaissance Ferrara, pp. 224–6Google Scholar.

67 On VatS 15, see Census-Catalogue of Manuscript Sources of Polyphonic Music, iv, pp. 29–30. Compère's Quis numerare queat is edited by Finscher, in Loyset Compère: Opera omnia, iii, pp. 9–14Google Scholar.

68 This explanation for the appearance of this corpus of motets by Compère in VatS 15 was first suggested by Rifkin, Joshua in ‘Compère, Loyset’, The New Grove Dictionary, iv, p. 596Google Scholar.

69 This proposal seems to find confirmation in the sources themselves: in the VatS 15 reading of Quis numerare queat, it is France that is exhorted to pour forth prayers, while in Petrucci's Motetti A it is Italy whose prayers are tendered. See Finscher, , Loyset Compère, p. 121Google Scholar.

70 On the French occupation of Italy in 1494–5, see LaBande-Mailfert, Y., Charles VIII et son milieu (1470–1498): La jeunesse au pouvoir (Paris, 1975), pp. 265–438Google Scholar. Finscher, (Loyset Compère, p. 121)Google Scholar suggested the Peace of Vercelli established by Charles VIII and Ludovico il Moro in October 1495 or the French occupation of Milan in April 1500 as possible inspirations for Compère's Quis numerare queat, but these events postdate the composer's stay in Rome, when the six motets in VatS 15 were probably delivered to a Papal scribe.

71 Brumel's Beata es Maria is edited by Hudson, in Antoine Brumel: Opera omnia, v, pp. 18–21Google Scholar.

72 Finscher, , Loyset Compère, p. 164Google Scholar.

73 See the recent summary of Brumel's life by Hudson, Barton in ‘Brumel, Antoine’, The New Grove Dictionary, iii, p. 378Google Scholar.

74 Suggested by Lockwood, , Music in Renaissance Ferrara, p. 208Google Scholar.

75 Kenney, S., ‘In Praise of the Lauda’, Aspects of Medieval and Renaissance Music: A Birthday Offering to Gustave Reese, ed. LaRue, J. (New York, 1966), pp. 495–6Google Scholar. See also Diederichs, , Die Anfänge der mehrstimmigen Lauda, pp. 140–55Google Scholar.

76 Diederichs suggests the possibility of cantus prius facti in some works by Lantins and Lymburgia; see Die Anfänge der mehrstimmigen Lauda, pp. 140–55.

77 A modern edition of Arnold de Lantins's In tua memoria is found in van den Borren, C., ed., Polyphonia Sacra: A Continental Miscellany of the Fifteenth Century (University Park, PA, 1963), pp. 267–8Google Scholar.

78 See the inventory of BolC Q15 by G. de Van, ‘Inventory’, in which each composition is identified by genre.

79 Luisi, Laudario Giustinianeo, i, tavola 37, provides a list of sources containing the text Vergene bella; on p. 247 he notes that a fifteenth-century Roman source indicates this text could be sung to the lauda Sacrosanta immortale et degna spina.

80 Arlt, ‘Musik und Text’, p. 56, and Fallows, D., Dufay (London, 1982), p. 129Google Scholar.

81 See Arlt, ‘Musik und Text’, pp. 56–8, for a partial transcription of the lauda by Frater Pauperculus and further discussion of Dufay's Vergene bella and its reception as a lauda.

82 Luisi, , Laudario Giustinianeo, ii, p. 236Google Scholar. The text identified as a cantasi come for the lauda La charne m'è nimicha is ‘Invidia al ciel nimicha’, surely a reference to the poem set by Dufay.

83 The literature concerning the motetti missales repertory is considerable; the most important recent contribution is Ward, L. H., ‘The Motetti Missales Repertory Reconsidered’, Journal of the American Musicological Association, 34 (1986), pp. 491–523CrossRefGoogle Scholar, wherein earlier authors are cited. A connection between the motetti missales and the Ambrosian rite of Milan is generally assumed, although Jeremy Noble has argued convincingly for their more general function in conjunction with votive masses not necessarily governed by the Ambrosian liturgy; see ‘The Function of Josquin's Motets’, Tijdschrift van de Vereniging voor Nederlandse Muziekgeschiedenis, 35 (1985), pp. 17–18Google Scholar.

84 The most detailed explorations of the origins of the texts and tunes employed in the motetti missales repertory are Finscher, , Loyset Compère, pp. 89–117Google Scholar, and Noblitt, T. L, ‘The Ambrosian Motetti Missales Repertory’, Musica Disciplina, 22 (1968), pp. 85–93Google Scholar.

85 Finscher, , Loyset Compère, pp. 95, n. 24, and 114, n. 45Google Scholar.

86 For a modern edition of O genetrix gloriosa by Finscher, , see Loyset Compère: Opera omnia, iv, pp. 29–30Google Scholar. The contributions of the second copyist to SienBC K.I.2 are summarised in D'Accone, ‘A Late 15th-Century Sienese Sacred Repertory’, pp. 135–43, wherein this date of copying is suggested.

87 Stephan, W., Die burgundisch-niederländische Motette zur Zeit Ockeghems, Heidelberger Studien zur Musikwissenschaft 6 (Kassel, 1937; repr. 1973), pp. 68–70Google Scholar.

88 Finscher, , Loyset Compère, pp. 184–8Google Scholar.

89 Ward, ‘The Motetti Missales Repertory Reconsidered’, pp. 508–15.

90 Ibid., pp. 511–12.

91 The poetic and musical analysis of this section of O genetrix gloriosa is modelled on that presented by Finscher, , Loyset Compère, p. 185Google Scholar.

92 A wide selection of lauda texts in the vernacular are found in d'Ancona, A., La poesia popolare italiana (Livorno, 1906; repr. Bologna, 1967)Google Scholar.

93 See the edition by A., Smijers in Werken van Josquin des Pres: Motetten (Amsterdam, 1922), i/2, pp. 1–4Google Scholar; a partial list of sources appears on p. xiii. Additional sources are cited by Noble, Jeremy in ‘Josquin Desprez’, The New Grove Dictionary, ix, p. 729Google Scholar.

94 Noblitt, T., ‘Die Datierung der Handschrift Mus.ms.3154 der Staatsbibliothek München’, Die Musikforschung, 27 (1974), p. 49Google Scholar. Noblitt's new dating, upsetting as it does previously held assumptions about the date of Josquin's Ave Maria … virgo serena, has not gone unchallenged: Noble, in ‘Josquin Desprez’, p. 719, states that Noblitt's study ‘rests on questionable assumptions’. As yet, however, no one has refuted Noblitt's analysis of the manuscript.

95 See Noblitt, ‘Die Datierung’, in conjunction with Noblitt, , ‘Das Chorbuch des Nikolaus Leopold (München, Staatsbibliothek, Mus. Ms. 3154): Repertorium’, Archiv für Musikwissenschaft, 26 (1969), pp. 169–208CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

96 The possibility of a Milanese connection is further suggested by the inclusion of Ave Maria gratia plena in MilD 4, one of the codices assembled by Gaffurius for Milan Cathedral. Thomas Noblitt has noted, however, that filiation study reveals the transmission of Josquin's Ave Maria gratia plena in MilD 4 to be contaminated and thus distant from the archetype; see his ‘Textual Criticism of Selected Works Published by Petrucci’, Quellenstudien zur Musik der Renaissance I, ed. Finscher, L., i: Formen und Probleme der Überlieferung mehrstimmiger Musik im Zeitalter Josquins Desprez, Wolfenbütteler Forschungen 6 (Munich, 1981), pp. 207 and 234–5Google Scholar.

97 For information on the date and circulation of this poem, see Mone, F. J., Lateinische Hymnen des Mittelalters, 3 vols. (Freiburg, 1853–1855), ii, p. 5Google Scholar, and V., Leroquais, Les livres d'heures manuscrits de la Bibliothèque nationale, 3 vols. (Paris, 1927)Google Scholar, i and ii, passim. On the inclusion of accessory texts in horae, see Wieck, R. S., Time Sanctified: The Book of Hours in Medieval Art and Life, with essays by L. R. Poos, V. Reinburg and J. Plummer (New York, 1988), pp. 103–10Google Scholar.

98 The preservation of nine illuminated fifteenth-century French horae in the Biblioteca Trivulziana in Milan lends weight to this suspicion, although none can be definitively associated with Galeazzo Maria and their contents remain to be investigated (C., Santoro, I codici miniati della Biblioteca Trivulziana (Milan, 1958), pp. 110–19)Google Scholar. Also suggestive is a fifteenth-century French hora containing the poem set by Josquin preserved today in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan (S.P.II.162); the core of this library was assembled by Cardinal Borromeo during the late sixteenth century, and drew substantially on books once in the Sforza collection (see Marcora, C., I libri d'ore della Biblioteca Ambrosiana (Milan, 1973), pp. 66–71)Google Scholar. And although horae were generally not included in the inventories of the Milanese ducal library, an inventory of that collection made in 1426 includes two volumes, now lost, containing prayers to the Blessed Virgin in French and Latin, both commencing with the text ‘Douce dame’, a poem celebrating the five joys of the Virgin (Pellegrin, E., La bibliothèque des Visconti et des Sforza dues de Milan, au XVe siècle, Publications de L'Institut de Recherche et d'Histoire des Textes 5 (Paris, 1955), pp. 253–4)Google Scholar.

99 Prizer has drawn attention to the importance of the Joys of the Virgin in the Italian confraternities and their laude in ‘Court Piety, Popular Piety’. The anonymous motetti missale Gaude flore virginale preserved in MunBS 3154 employs a text of this type also used in several laude, and motetti missales by Compère and Weerbeke also incorporate poetry with repeating acclamations (see in particular Compère's Missa Galeazescha and Ave Domine Jesu Christe, and Weerbeke's Ave mundi Domina).

100 This quotation in Festa's motet was identified by Lowinsky, E. E., The Medici Codex of 1518: A Choirbook of Motels Dedicated to Lorenzo de' Medici, Duke of Urbino: Historical Introduction and Commentary, Monuments of Renaissance Music 3 (Chicago, 1968), p. 140Google Scholar.

101 W. Kirsch observes the frequency of such snippets of triple metre in the motets of this period, noting that the metrical change is often prompted by expressions of joy, hope or appeal; see ‘Zur Funktion der Tripeltaktigen Abschnitte in den Motetten des Josquin-Zeitalters’, Renaissance-Studien: Helmuth Osthoff zum 80. Geburtstag, ed. Finscher, L., Frank-furter Beiträge zur Musikwissenschaft 11 (Tutzing, 1979), pp. 145–57Google Scholar. These sentiments are, of course, those generally expressed in the lauda repertory.