Graduals (Chants)
Music--Manuscripts
Illumination of books and manuscripts--Specimens
Manuscripts, Latin--Specimens
Manuscripts, Latin--New York (State)--Buffalo
Parchment; ; f. 1; 5 lines of text and music, with the text copied in a formal gothic hand and the music in black square notation on 4-line red staves. Initial S of the height of one line of text and one of music, in dusty rose, infilled with stacked aroid flowers in petals of dark blue, red, green and gray, the whole set on a very spiked gold ground, with a leafy extension in rose and blue; a gold ball in the margin. The initials E and G, the height of one line of text and two (of the four lines of the staves) in white-decorated blue or red, set against a ground of negatively-designed leaves on grounds red and blue or blue alone; the letters X, L, and A (directly following the decorated initials) in elaborate gothic format against a ground of negatively patterned leaves in the ink of the text. On the recto, in the center of the outer margin, the folio number in red roman numerals, "CL." Small round label in the upper innermost corner of the verso, "Elson n. 17."
Written towards the end of the 15th century in Italy, and most likely in Lombardy given the spiky gold ground around the major initial; the rayed gold ball above that initial also occurs in the northern parts of Italy. Belonged to Louis Charles Elson (1848-1920) who was a professor of music theory and history at the New England Conservatory of Music from age 34 onwards; he had begun studying music with his mother, then went on to study in Leipzig; he composed songs, operetta and works for the piano, but mainly he studied and wrote on the history of music; he published in a number of Boston newspapers, and was the editor-in-chief of Modern Music and Musicians (1912; 20 vols.) and of the University Musical Encyclopedia (1912-14; 10 vols.), among the ca. 50 items that he published over the course of his life. The collection of medieval fragments of music that had belonged to Louis Charles Elson was acquired in 1924 by the Grosvenor Library in Buffalo NY; this library, together with the Erie County Library and the Buffalo Public Library merged in 1953 to form today's Buffalo and Erie County Public Library. This fragment was n. 17 in the Elson collection.
Bibliography: De Ricci. Census, p. 1212, no. 24
Gradual with the end of the sung parts of a mass for many martyrs, and the introit for another mass for many martyrs.
Catholic Church
Rare Book Room of B&ECPL (repository)
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