The sources of fourteenth-century polyphony in the light of the latest discoveries. First part

Abstract

Studies on Italian Medieval music of the last decade have been characterized by a new impulse toward research. This has been made possible on the one hand by the discovery of new and important documentary and musical sources and on the other by the constant clarification of the web of intercrossing relationships - the role of musicians, musical chapels, religious Orders, musical archives, trade - that convey a remarkably more elaborate picture of Medieval musical life. It is at the same time important to notice that methods apparently distant from this field of study, as ethnomusicology and anthropology, have recently become closer to these studies. These contributions have enabled us to reconsider the already known aspects of musical philology in a new light and to read the well known phenomena of alteratio of textual traditions in a wider sense, as the development of a 'history of thought' through the production of musical events.

The first part of the essay intends to assess the amount of sources of Italian fourteenth-century polyphony and of the specific studies concerning them. Manuscripts and fragments recovered in Italy and abroad from 1985 to date and the specialiazed bibliography produced from the same date are examined. In particular: a) new Italian sources of polyphonic fourteenth-century music; b) new foreign sources connected to Italian sources or containing a repertory also found in Italian sources; c) mew sources for the study of simple poliphony in the Veneto.