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Glorious Antiphonal 13th century
Reproduced with the kind permission of the State Library of South Australia

 

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State Library of South Australia
Adelaide
Australia

Glorious Antiphonal
13th century

This magnificent thirteenth-century Antiphonal originated in central Italy, possibly near Bologna. It is written on vellum—animal skin which has been stripped of its hair and put through a series of processes to refine it to an even surface.

This manuscript contains the text and music for the sung responses in the church services of a central Italian monastery celebrating the birth and life of Christ from Christmas Eve to the end of the feast of the Epiphany (January 13). This period was part of the Church’s temporal cycle, which determined the appropriate services for each day to honour the life of Christ. It appears that St Stephen was the patron saint of the monastery in which the manuscript originated, and illustrated here is the elaborate illuminated letter ‘S’ which begins the first service for the feast of Saint Stephen. The beginning of each service is marked with an illuminated initial letter, painted in lovely colours and gilded. The services were at set hours of the day and night, and each had its own name: Matins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline. Instructions for these services are to be found in red throughout the text, in abbreviated Latin which is difficult for a contemporary reader to understand.

This manuscript is very large (57 x 39.5 centimetres). The volume was meant to stand on a lectern so that all members of the choir could see it and sing from it together. The symbols for the music pre-date the musical notes used today, and are known as neumes. The Antiphonal was purchased in 1945 for £77.10.0 (equivalent to AUD $155.00), a considerable sum of money then, at the sale of the library of Arthur Bryant Triggs, grazier and antiquarian collector, from Yass, New South Wales.