Peregrine provenance – historiographical problems of the tonus

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Peregrine provenance – historiographical problems of the tonus

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Historiographical Problems of theTonus Peregrinus

MATTIAS OLOF LUNDBERG

The forms and liturgical functions of the collateral psalm tonetonus peregrinus (hereinafter referred to as t. p.”) are well known to any student of Western psalmody. The question of its “ origin, on the other hand, is commonly approached not only with opacity but sometimes also with a sense of impropriety, or even a manifest lack of interest. Vague assertions about Jewish or “eastern” provenance and drastic simplifications seem to suffice for the purposes of modern historiography. This is all the more surprising as early twentieth-century ethnomusicology, in alliance with contemporaneous research into synagogal traditions, led to some important and relevant insights, even if these should be regarded as tentative rather than conclusive. Modern musicology seems therefore to have sidestepped two once widely discussed problems in the historiography of Gregorianism: 1.) the extent to which the t. p. is set aside from the other psalm tones; and 2.) whether or not it can be said to have a more immanent Jewish ancestry than that possessed by the main corpus of Western psalmody?

No theorists before 1700 discuss the origins of the t. p. directly, but the question has been subject to much discussion and considerable disagreement since the first stirrings of modern musicology in the eighteenth century. The gentleman-scholar Roger North, in hisMemoires of Musick, being some Historio-criticall collections of that subject(1728), had little confidence that any knowledge of early psalmody could ever be established: “That there was a frequent usage of singing Psalmes and Hymnes from the beginning of Christianity, wherein consisted a

Historiographical Problems of theTonus Peregrinus

great measure of their devotion is without all doubt. But what that manner of singing was is

hard to determine, and to refer to the Jewish psalmody, from whence it is supposed to have

been derived, isignotum per ignotius.”1 French musicologists of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries advanced the theory that

the t. p. was an indigenous remnant of the Gallican chant tradition.2 theory presents This

fundamental problems, as a result of which it has been relegated to the sidelines of

historiography rather than surviving to become part of modern musicology. In 1895 Peter

Wagner established that the Roman rite used the same antiphons with the same liturgical

application in Roman chant at a time when there was little exchange between the two (Roman

and Gallican) traditions.3 This strongly suggests that both traditions used the t. p. as a

recitation formula and that this tone did not ultimately originate on European soil. Of a similar

kind is the anecdote found in an anonymous monasticTractatus de musica plana et

mensurabili,4which injects a slightly humorous note into the mystery of the origins of the t. p.

According to this manuscript, a rather unmusical abbot accidentally invented the tone when

joining in the singing of an antiphon of Psalm 113. The historical relevance of this anecdote

is that it shows that the origins of the t. p. were not known to its author or, one may assume, to

most of his contemporaries. Following on from the theories of nineteenth-century historians and archaeologists,

musicologists of the Romantic era attempted to trace the roots of Christian music back to the

ancient Roman world. However, the theory that early psalmody was an organic continuation

1 . Roger North,being some Historio-criticall Collections of that SubjectMemoires of Musick, [1728], ed. J. Wilson (London: Novello, 1959), 335. 2 . taking the 1900 Congrès international de musique as his only source, states: “er [der t. p.] soll Weisenbäck, von fränkischen Sängern nach Rom gebracht worden sein” (“it [the t. p.] is supposed to have been brought to Rome by Frankish singers”) (Andreas Weissenbäck,Sacra musica – Lexikon der katholischen Kirchenmusik [Klosterneuburg bei Wien: Verlag der Augustinus-Druckerei, 1937], 383.) 3 Peter Wagner,Einführung in die gregorianischen Melodien, 3 (Leipzig: Breitkopf and Härtel, 1921), 108. . 4 III: “Tractatus de musica plana et mensurabili” Anonymous . (15th century), inScriptorum de musica medii aevi(nova series), 3, ed. E. Coussemaker (Milan: Bollettino Bibliografico Musicale, 1931), 457–58.

Historiographical Problems of theTonus Peregrinus

of Hellenistic and Roman art, as proposed by Wagner,5 Gevaert,6 more recently Torben and

Christensen7 has now definitively been refuted by modern research into the cultures of the , Near East;8 the formula is now generally rather,believed to be of Hebrew origin. From the beginning of the twentieth century two main theories have prevailed, although neither has been supported by historical evidence strong enough to place the question beyond doubt. Arguing from philological premises, many scholars have independently suggested that the t. p. predates the eight regular psalm tones. Idelsohn found chants resembling the psalm tone in his process of collecting Jewish folk-melodies, while Werner was the first scholar to draw attention to an almost identical recitation formula employed by Yemenite Jews for Psalm 1139 —the same psalm for which the tone has been used in the Western Church.10 new This research completely supersedes the views on these matters held by early twentieth-century German musicologists, including Wagner.11 Examples 1 a and b show two common forms of the t. p.; on account of its predominance in northern Europe, the variant given in Example 1b is often referred to as the Germanic dialect. Conversely, the reading in Example 1a is sometimes called the Roman dialect.12 Example 2 is a Sephardic folk-tune to the text of Psalm 24 from the Idelsohn collections.13

5 . 1908. 6 . 1895. 7 . 1967. 8 . Heinrich Besseler,Die Musik des Mittelalters und der Renaissance(Potsdam: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft Athenaion, 1931), 35–40; and Regina Randhofer, “Psalmen in jüdischen und christlichen Überlieferungen – Vielfalt, Wandel und Konstanz,”Acta Musicologica70, no. 1 (1998): 45–78. 9 Psalm .in the original Masoteric numbering, which was re-established by the Protestant churches in the 113 sixteenth century, corresponds to Psalm 112 in the Vulgate numbering. 10 Eric Werner, .Liturgy and Music in Synagogue and ChurchThe Sacred Bridge – The Interdependence of during the First Millennium Dobson, 1959), 466; and Heidi Zimmermann, (London:Tora und Shira – Untersuchungen zur Musikauffassung der rabbinischen Judentums Europäischer Verlag der (Bern: Wissenschaften, 2000), 309. 11the Hartker Codex convinced Wagner that “Es ist eine phantastische Behauptung, analysis of Philological . daß der Tonus Peregrinus aus der Synagoge stamme” (“it is a fantastic claim that thetonus peregrinusoriginated in the synagogue”), and that the t. p. sprang directly fromtonus8; Wagner,Einführung3, 108. 12 .Gallicus, “Praefatio libelli musicalis de ritu canendi vetustissimo et novo” (ca. 1460), in 1a: Johannes Scriptorum de musica medii aevi(nova series), 4, ed. E. Coussemaker (Milan: Bollettino Bibliografico Musicale, 1931); 1b: Anonymous III, “Tractatus de musica plana et mensurabili.” 13 . Abraham Z. IdelsohnJewish Music – Its Historical Development, (Holt, 1929; reprint New York: Dover, 1992), 63.

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