Tours, Bibliothèque municipale, 149

Cantus Siglum

F-TOm 149

Holding Institution

Tours, Bibliothèque municipale (F-TOm)

Manuscript/Printed

Manuscript

Summary

One part of a two-volume breviary from the church of St. Martin (Tours, France). 13th or 14th century. Staff notation. Cathedral cursus. 592 folios. Temporale ends at Saturday after Pentecost. Twelve lacunae.

Liturgical Occasions

Ff. 1-377: Temporale. 1r, First Sunday of Advent; 70r, Christmas; 101v-102v, Epiphany; lacuna; 103r, Epiphany; 124v, Ferial Office; lacuna; 125r, Ferial Office (Sunday); 167v-176v, Septuagesima to Sexagesima; lacuna; 177r-180v, Sexagesima; lacuna; 181r, Sexagesima; 194r-224v, Ash Wednesday to Friday in Second Week of Lent; lacuna; 225r, Saturday in Second Week of Lent; lacuna; 226r-238v, Third through Fourth Sundays of Lent; 240r, Fourth Sunday of Lent; 279r-298r, Maundy Thursday to Holy Saturday; lacuna; 298x, Holy Saturday; 299r-305v, Easter to Easter Monday; lacuna; 309r, Easter Saturday; 364v, Pentecost.
Ff. 378-540: Sanctorale. 378r, Andrew; 402r, the Return of Martin's relics; 413r, Stephen; 441r, special Memorial Office for Martin; 480v, Purification; 503v, Annunciation.
Ff. 541-550: Common of Saints (fragmentary). 541r, Apostles [complete]; 548r, One Martyr [Vespers only]; lacuna; 549r, One Confessor [partial Matins only]; lacuna; 550r, One Confessor also Bishop [partial Matins only]).
Ff. 551-572: completely blank. Ff. 573-582r: complete texts of some Canticles (573r, Exodus 15: 16-19 [end only] and Habakkuk 3: 2-19; 574r, Deuteronomy 32: 1-48; 576r, Benedicite; 577r, Magnificat and Nunc dimittis) and Prayers (577r, Te deum; 578r, Athanasian creed; 579r, Litany). Ff. 582v-592v: Memorials (prayers and chant texts without music) observed throughout the liturgical year, organized by weekday, and text for Martin beginning "Summe sacerdos et vere pontifex" (589r).

Description

Tours 149 corresponds quite closely in its organization and selection of chants to the Notre Dame breviary (F-PN lat. 15181). However, its sanctorale is quite limited: the only unusual Offices are for the church's patron, St. Martin. The commemoration of the return of his relics after the Danish invasion (Relatio S. Martini, 402r) appears to have been celebrated on December 14. The antiphons sung in Matins for this feast, however, belong to the "standard" series rather than the "new" series composed by Odo of Cluny (see Fickett below). The latter may have been reserved for Martin's Nativity (November 11) or the Translation of his relics (July 4), not included in this volume.

Another set of chants (Suff. S. Martini, 441r) was intended to be sung on some days, from the Octave of Epiphany until Septuagesima, as a memorial to Martin. The final sanctoral feast in the manuscript (Subventio S. Martini, 531r) appears to have been celebrated on May 12 in remembrance of the concealment of his relics during the Danish invasion.

Half of the manuscript's ten prosulae may also be found in F-PN lat. 15181 ("Fac deus munda," "Familiam custodi," and "Facinora nostra" for the responsory "Descendit de caelis" [cao6411], 78v-79r; "Inviolata integra" for "Gaude Maria virgo" [cao6759], 487v; "Sospitati dedit" for "Ex ejus tumbae" [cao6679], 394v). In addition, "Inviolata integra" has been transposed to end on F instead of C and appended to a responsory in mode 1, "In patre manet" (cao6922), 90v. The end of this prosula is actually the final section of the respond of cao6759 and it is included in both cases. cao6411 is ornamented with an unusual prosula on the Octave of Christmas, "Amplexus parietem," 92v. Other unusual prosulae occur on ff. 68v, 89r, and 467r.

Some of the manuscript's differentiae are notated in variant forms, necessitating their identification by a system of numbers and letters (for main differentia group and variant group, respectively). Some variants are minor, being no more than the adding of an identical final pitch to accommodate an extra syllable; others, for example in mode 2, are more substantial.

Distinctive features of the antiphons for the ferial Office in this source led Dom Jean Claire to include references to it (under the siglum TUR[onense]) in his study of Latin liturgical chant before the introduction of the eight-mode system (see below). According to Dom Claire, the church of St. Martin in Tours was "celebre par sa fidelite aux vieux usages liturgiques" (p. 18). Of particular interest are the Tours antiphons that use Claire's "timbres" L and N: they end on B but are assigned a differentia that is associated with mode 8. Question marks in the index signify uncertainty in the assignment of mode and/or differentia.

In a paper presented on November 9, 1985, at the Annual Meeting of the American Musicological Society in Vancouver, Jeremy Noble identified this source as one of those he had found to contain the melody for the Epiphany Genealogy "Factum est autem" in the form in which Josquin quotes it in his polyphonic setting of this text. This led him to suggest that "both of Josquin's genealogy motets may have been composed for the French royal chapel to sing at St. Martin's some time during the late 1470's, though not in the same year." (Prof. Noble's paper, "The Genealogies of Christ and Their Musical Settings," remains unpublished.) It is interesting to examine the various arrangements of the two weeks before Christmas (ff. 36v-41r) that differ according to the day of the week on which Christmas is celebrated. When the music is notated for the celebration of Lauds during this time (ff. 47v-53v), the absence of rubrics specific to any day require the indexer to select one of the arrangements described above. The first seems the best (ff. 36v-37v), with Christmas on a Monday, because it is the same arrangement in which the music for the Christmas vigil is given (ff. 65v-70r), that is, with Christmas vigil combined with the fourth Sunday of Advent.

The church of St. Martin in Tours is mentioned by name in certain rubrics (ff. 1r, 377v, and 582v). The illumination of major initials is lavish for the first Matins responsories of important feasts, including some apparently unrelated scenes in the bottom margin (ff. 72r, 389v, 414r, and 482r). These interesting works of art (for example, among those that survive, a man and woman kneeling in prayer on 389v, a crane- like bird on 482r) seem unfortunately to have been the target of many of the mutilations that the manuscript has suffered (bottom sections of folios torn away: ff. 2, 102, 125, 213, 252, and 264; entire folios missing: between ff. 102-103, 176-177, and f. 239, apparently removed after the folios of the manuscript were numbered). There is also a leaf between ff. 298 and 299 that appears to have been glued to f. 298; only those folios that remain visible (ff. 298r and 298x) were indexed.

Selected Bibliography

• Claire, Jean. "Les repertoires liturgiques latins avant l'octoechos: I. L'Office ferial romano-franc." Etudes gregoriennes 15 (1975): 5-192.
• Fickett, Martha V. Chants for the Feast of St. Martin of Tours. Ph.D. diss., The Catholic University of America, 1983.
• Fickett, Martha V. "Matins Antiphons for St. Martin's Feast: A 'New' Series by Odo of Cluny." Paper read at a meeting of the Capital Chapter of the American Musicological Society, March 26, 1994.

Notes on the Inventory

The inventory for F-TOm 149 was prepared at The Catholic University of America by Charles T. Downey.

Full/Partial Inventory

Full Inventory

Complete Source/Fragment

Complete source