Affinity between chant and image: A study of late fourteenth-century Florentine antiphonary/gradual (Baltimore: Walters Art Museum, ms. W153)

This dissertation explores the relationship of chant to illumination in Baltimore: Walters Art Museum, ms. W153, a choir book created in Florence in the 1380s. Divided into an Antiphonal section and a Gradual section, the manuscript contains the Divine Office and the Mass for all the feasts associated with St. Peter and St. Nicholas of Bari. The text and music of the chants are analyzed separately and then compared to demonstrate how the chant emphasizes certain words and phrases. This is accomplished both by the prolongment of their performance and by the descriptive behavior of the melody, what is termed "word painting".; The manuscript includes eight historiated initials, six devoted to St. Peter, and two to St. Nicholas. The spiritual concepts of St. Peter as key-bearer, leader and priest are emphasized by parallel presentation in image and chant. In addition they allude to the primacy of the pope. Since the manuscript was created after the War of Eight Saints during the reign of Pope Urban VI (1378--1389), this allusion to the pope signifies a renewal of normal relations between Florence and the papacy. The manuscript's two historiated initials devoted to St. Nicholas implicitly honor the archbishop of Bari, Pope Urban VI, with whom Florence settled for peace. Although W153 addresses the concerns of Florence in the late 1380s, revisions by later scribes reveal that it was still in use after the Council of Trent. This study examines these revisions to assist in the determination of the manuscript's original textual and musical contents of the hymns Aurea luce, Beate pastor Petre, Miris modis, and the sung scripture following the Introit for the feast of SS. Peter and Paul.