Is this the earliest notated polyphony?
  • Ben_WhitworthBen_Whitworth
    Posts: 90
    A very interesting report on medievalists.net tells how Giovanni Varelli, a PhD student at Cambridge, has identified some odd signs on a manuscript (probably German, probably c. 900) as a second part to accompany the plainsong antiphon Sancte Bonifati. Some undergraduates have made a recording of it. [Warning: video starts automatically and you may get some stupid ad.]

    Kudos to Mr Varelli for the find. On the basis of the contents of the manuscript he suggests the very beginning of the tenth century as the terminus a quo for the composition of the vox organalis. This would put it the better part of a century earlier than the next decipherable polyphonic manuscript, the Winchester Troper. I must say I would like to see his terminus ad quem, as I can't see any obvious reason why the vox organalis couldn't be a much later addition to the MS. No doubt he will discuss this at greater length in his thesis.

    Bottom line: it is a very beautiful piece of music, which our generation is the first in many centuries to hear.
    Thanked by 6Earl_Grey CHGiffen HeitorCaballero M. Jackson Osborn ZacPB189 bonniebede
  • HeitorCaballero
    Posts: 92
    Thanks for this posting!
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,424
    It is a bit disingenuous to hold that forms of rudimentary polyphony and organum did not precede the first notation of it by some centuries, if not from the beginning. This would be rather like asserting that there were no sung texts before the emergence of Frankish notation. The witnesses to the contrary are legion. This is human nature and is readily observed in the music of the most primitive societies. (Many thanks for contributing this!)
    Thanked by 3Ben_Whitworth melofluent CHGiffen
  • Ben_WhitworthBen_Whitworth
    Posts: 90
    The full article is in Early Music History. He's done the palaeography, so his dating looks pretty secure; and he touches on the point raised by Jackson above, re. the "prehistory" of polyphonic singing.
    Thanked by 3CHGiffen M. Jackson Osborn Cantus67
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