Tantum Tunes
  • ValeriaValeria
    Posts: 7
    Does anyone know if Saint Thomas Aquinas composed music to go along with his text for Pange Lingua/Tantum Ergo?

    If not, where did the two tunes we commonly hear today come from?
    I know only as much as the Wikipedia entry says--one tune is originally Mozarabic, the other Gallican. That is to say, I don't know very much at all.

    Other questions I have, if one is particularly daring, are: Were they taken from other chants? If so, which? Is one notably older than the other?

    Thanks!
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,151
    Do you mean the plainchant ("Gregorian") tunes or the hymn tunes (guessing plainchant tunes)?
  • ValeriaValeria
    Posts: 7
    Yes, sorry--I am talking about the plainchant melodies. Thank you for asking. Hopefully this is clear enough!
  • BenBen
    Posts: 3,114
    Not that this helps get to the answer faster, but I think it's fascinating that there are actually fifteen distinct melodies for the tantum, found in Ante benedictionem section of the cantus selecti. I'm on my phone, and can't easily find a link right now, but on musical sacra's main site, there is a PDF of the cantus selecti. It has many chants that you might not find elsewhere.

    If you have an interest in this topic, I would definately encourage you to check it out, it's quite interesting seeing the various melodies.
    Thanked by 1Valeria
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,500
    There's the Dominican hymnal too. This sounds like a job for OPs and/or Ben Whitworth
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,151
    As far as I know from my own looking into the matter, it is not clear just which melodies for Pange Lingua/Tantum Ergo are the oldest. Some are variants, even modal variants, or others, and for these it is very difficult to know which came first.
  • RoborgelmeisterRoborgelmeister
    Posts: 139
    But a clue might be that since St. Thomas took the meter of Pange lingua gloriosa to compose his own Pange lingua, of which the Tantum ergo is just verse five and six, that perhaps the Pange melody was what he had in mind. Now, just find out what version the Dominicans were singing in the 13 c... Just a random thought.
  • CHGiffenCHGiffen
    Posts: 5,151
    It's not at all clear and, in fact, highly unlikely that St. Thomas "took the meter"(87. 87, 87) to compose (musically) his own Pange Lingua Gloriosi. Yes, the Tantum Ergo Sacramentum comprises stanzas 5&6 of the larger hymn text, and was extracted as a hymn for the Veneration of the Blessed Sacrament sometime after the entire Pange Lingua Gloriosi was written. Indeed, many sources say that St. Thomas composed his hymn in 1263 at the request of the Pope, to fit the tune of the 6th century Venantius Fortunatus hymn "Pange lingua gloriosi proelium certaminis" - and thus, apparently, to a tune much earlier in time than the 13th century.

    Here is an ancient setting, different from the ones most of us know. The notation is Aquitanian.
    san_lesmes5-Vida de San Lesmes.jpg
    250 x 288 - 33K
    Thanked by 2M. Jackson Osborn Valeria
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,500
    Agreed; I have it on good authority that Thomas indeed took an existing, very specific tune and wrote the hymn to it.
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