Liturgical Sequences in Medieval Manuscript Fragments in the Swedish National Archives : Repertorial Investigation, Inventory, and Reconstruction of the Sources

466 Pages·2015·4.15 MB·English

by  Gunilla Björkvall

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Liturgical Sequences
n
I n Europe, throughout the Middle Ages, a sequence was sung before i
l
l
the reading of the Gospel in the Roman Mass at the most prominent
a in Medieval Manuscript Fragments
feasts of the liturgical year. The genre is remarkable through its often
b
large scale compositions, poetic language and peculiar melodies. Different jö in the Swedish National Archives
liturgical traditions gradually developed their own sequence repertories, r
k Repertorial Investigation, Inventory,
with different stylistic forms. v
a and Reconstruction of the Sources
The scarcity of preserved manuscripts has long impeded an assessment
l
of the diffusion of the genre in Sweden. This situation radically changed l Gunilla Björkvall

with the recent cataloguing of numerous parchment leaves cut from me-
L
i
dieval books and used in the binding of 16th century accounts, during the t
u
r
reign of Gustav Vasa and his sons. In spite of their fragmentary state the g
i
c
leaves contain a surprisingly rich sequence material. a
l

S
e
q
The first part of this volume focuses on the repertories, listing all the se- u
e
quences found for each specific feast. If possible, both the earlier European n
c
e
and later Swedish transmission of a sequence is sketched. s

i
The second part is an inventory and close description of all the frag- n

M
ments containing sequences. The fragments date from the 12th through the
e
15th century, originating above all from sequentiaries, graduals or missals. d
i
e
The enclosed cd contains about 2 060 images covering the entire se- va
l
quence material used in the investigation.
M
a
n
GUNILLA BJÖRKVALL is Dr. Phil. in Latin. She is Former Senior Lectur- u
s
c
er (1988–2007) at Stockholm University, and Former Researcher (1995– r
i
p
2004) at the Swedish National Archives, cataloguing medieval fragments t

F
used as covers for sixteenth century accounts. She is currently engaged in r
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the Corpus Monodicum project, Würzburg University, as text editor. m
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s

KUNGL. VITTERHETSAKADEMIEN
Box 5622, SE-114 86 Stockholm, Sweden kungl. vitterhets historie
www.vitterhetsakad.se
och antikvitets akademien
Distribution: http://vitterhetsakad.bokorder.se
handlingar
ISBN 978-91-7402-433-3
historiska serien 31
ISSN 0083-6788
KVHAA Handlingar Historiska serien 31

LITURGICAL SEQUENCES
IN MEDIEVAL MANUSCRIPT
FRAGMENTS IN THE SWEDISH
NATIONAL ARCHIVES
Repertorial Investigation, Inventory, and
Reconstruction of the Sources
Gunilla Björkvall
Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien
Handlingar Historiska serien 31
Björkvall, Gunilla. 2015. Liturgical Sequences in Medieval Manuscript Fragments in the Swe-
dish National Archives: Repertorial Investigation, Inventory, and Reconstruction of the Sources.
Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien (KVHAA), Handlingar, Historiska
serien 31. Stockholm 2015. 459 pp.
Abstract
This study deals with the liturgical chant genre sequences sung all over Europe in the Middle
Ages. The history of the sequence in Sweden, insufficiently known due to lack of sources, can
now be more precisely described, thanks to numerous parchment fragments from dismantled
books and used as covers for 16th century accounts, now in the Swedish National Archives. The
investigation comprises two main parts: 1) a repertorial analysis with outlook on the Euro-
pean background and later Swedish liturgical traditions, 2) an inventory of all the fragmentary
sources with a summary description and a reconstruction of codices in which scattered leaves
are placed in their original order. Most fragments come from sequentiaries, graduals or missals
dating to the 12th through the 15th century. The repertories often contain sequences from both
the eastern and western European traditions, as well as some internationally distributed items
of the new style, and a number of presumably Swedish compositions.
Keywords
Latin, medieval mass, liturgical chant, sequences, medieval fragments, parchment covers,
Swedish 16th century accounts, reconstruction of manuscripts, sequence repertories, Swedish
liturgical traditions
© 2015 Gunilla Björkvall and KVHAA, Stockholm
ISBN 978-91-7402-433-3
ISSN 0083-6788
Publisher: Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien
(KVHAA, The Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities),
Box 5622, SE-114 86 Stockholm, Sweden, www.vitterhetsakad.se
Distribution: eddy.se ab, Box 1310, SE-621 24 Visby, Sweden,
http://vitterhetsakad.bokorder.se
Cover image: Sequ 19, sequentiary, s. 15, Västerås, (Fr 7491, 1r).
End of the sequence Virtus sancti spiritus for St. Ansgar, beginning
of Adest dies celebris for St. Peter the martyr.
Graphic design: Lars Paulsrud
Printed in Sweden by Elanders 2015
In memory of Toni Schmid

CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................... 11
INTRODUCTION ........................................................... 13
Preliminaries ......................................................................... 13
The goal of the investigation ......................................................... 15
Appendices I and II ................................................................. 15
Previous research ..................................................................... 16
The sequence as genre ................................................................ 21
Laurenti David ...................................................................... 25
Epiphaniam domino ................................................................ 26
Gratulemur dulci prosa ............................................................. 28
The typology of sequence manuscripts .............................................. 31
Dating the fragments ................................................................ 33
Repertories ............................................................................ 35
Preliminaries ........................................................................ 35
The European background .......................................................... 36
A Swedish repertory reconstructed, and the influence of Lund ..................... 37
Regional Swedish sequence repertories ............................................. 41
The Uppsala tradition 43 | The Linköping tradition 44 | The Strängnäs tradition 46 |
The Västerås tradition 46 | The Åbo tradition 47 | The Skara tradition 48 |
The Växjö tradition 49
The religious orders ................................................................. 52
The Cistercians 52 | The Franciscans 53 | The Dominicans 56 | The Birgittines 58 |
The Johannites 61
Paleography .......................................................................... 61
The secondary provenance of the accounts ......................................... 65
Special cases ........................................................................... 68
Sequ 3 .............................................................................. 68
Sequ 37, Sequ 51 and Gr 107 ....................................................... 72
The musical notation ................................................................ 75
Decoration ............................................................................ 77
REPERTORIAL INVESTIGATION ................................ 79
Preliminaries ........................................................................ 79
The Christmas cycle ................................................................. 82
Advent ............................................................................. 82
Christmas and the Circumcision .................................................. 83
Stephen, John the Evangelist, Innocents and Epiphany ............................ 87
The Easter cycle ...................................................................... 91
Pascha .............................................................................. 91
Ascension and Pentecost ........................................................... 95
Trinity, Corpus Christi, the Transfiguration and Common Sundays ........ 100
Saints’ feasts ........................................................................... 105
January .............................................................................. 105
February ............................................................................ 108
March ............................................................................... 111
April ................................................................................ 112
May ................................................................................. 112
June ................................................................................. 115
July .................................................................................. 120
August .............................................................................. 128
September ........................................................................... 134
October ............................................................................. 136
November ........................................................................... 139
December ........................................................................... 144
The feasts of the Cross ................................................................ 146
The Dedication of a Church ......................................................... 148
Special masses ......................................................................... 151
Commune sanctorum ................................................................ 154
Marian feasts ......................................................................... 160
INVENTORY AND RECONSTRUCTION
OF THE SOURCES .......................................................... 181
Preliminaries ......................................................................... 181
Sequentiaries ......................................................................... 185
Graduals .............................................................................. 295
Missals ................................................................................. 332
Other types of sources ................................................................. 373
Concluding remarks ................................................................. 382
APPENDIX I:
ARCHIVAL SIGNATURES AND
PICTURE NUMBERS ...................................................... 389
Sequentiaries ......................................................................... 390
Graduals .............................................................................. 412
Missals ................................................................................. 420
Other types of sources ................................................................. 429
APPENDIX II:
ALPHABETICAL LIST OF THE
SEQUENCES AND CONDENSED LIST
OF THE FRAGMENTARY SOURCES ............................. 433
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................. 451
Manuscript sources and early prints ............................................... 451
Printed sources, literature and abbreviations ..................................... 452
About the author .................................................................... 459
Cd: Contents
The enclosed cd contains about 2 060 images covering the entire sequence material used in this
investigation. The images do not claim professional quality, but represent a working material.
Each image has received an invidual number (see Appendix I on p. 389) and is put in a folder la-
belled with a capital letter (C–T), one folder is labelled Vimmerby. The series of numbers are not
essential, and reflect when the photographs of the fragment collections in the different archives
and libraries were taken. Each image number is followed by x and a second number defining the
leaf, with the addition r = recto, or v = verso, which may be augmented into ra = recto, upper half
or left half, rb = recto, lower half or right half, etc.
The index is organized in accordance with the classification system used in the inventory in the
book: sequentiaries, graduals, missals, other types of sources.
Conditions of use
The cd is protected by copyright law. All commercial use of the contents is prohibited. All rights
belong to the author, Gunilla Björkvall, and the publisher, The Royal Swedish Academy of Letters,
History and Antiquities. When copying the contents, the source must always be stated. Altering
the text, images or computer software is not allowed.