The OED provides two relevant definitions for “gradual”: 1) “An antiphon[1] sung between the Epistle and the Gospel at the Eucharist, so called because it was sung on the steps of the altar or while the deacon was ascending the steps of the ambo;” and 2) “A book of such antiphons.” [2] Both these definitions apply to this project: the leaves titled [Italian 15th Century Gradual] are pages from a gradual that are written representations of particular sung graduals.
The gradual as a musical form is thought to be the oldest genre within the Catholic tradition of the Mass Proper, with their origins lying in the performing of a responsorial psalm during the first parts of a mass.[3] These chants are sung by a soloist in alternation with the larger church choir.[4] The evolution of the Gregorian gradual developed across Europe along two lines: “by the fixing of elements that were originally flexible; and by the expansion in the number of texts, but not in the number of melodies.”[5] Sitting between the first and second scriptural readings, the gradual became a fixed and integral part of the mass of the medieval period in Europe. There is what has been termed a ‘core repertory’ of 105 graduals that date as far back as the 8th century.[6] The repertory contains a high percentage of lyrics taken from psalmic verses, more than any other part of the Mass Proper. [7]
Medieval graduals produced in this geographical region and during this period of time are usually written in neumatic notation with Latin lyrics. These particular leaves have their Latin lyrics written in littera textualis, a Gothic black letter script that was the most popular form of writing in northern Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries.[8] Scholars know about a period of renewal of choir books (including antiphonaries, graduals, and some psalters) in Italian churches in the 15th and early 16th centuries, and it is possible these leaves are part of this history.[9]
Learn more about music manuscripts of the medieval period here.
Learn more about the musical notation used in these leaves here.
[1] Antiphon is defined as “a versicle or sentence sung by one choir in response to another.” “antiphon, n.” OED Online. Oxford University Press, March 2015. Web. 17 April 2015.
[2] “gradual, n.” OED Online. Oxford University Press, March 2015. Web. 17 April 2015.
[3] Susan Boynton, “Plainsong,” in The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Music, edited by Mark Everist (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011): 15.
[4] Boynton, “Plainsong,” 15.
[5] Michel Huglo and David Hiley. “Gradual (ii).” Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press, accessed April 21, 2015,http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/11577.
[6] James W. McKinnon. “Gradual (i).” Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press, accessed April 21, 2015,http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/11576.
[7] McKinnon, “Gradual (i).”
[8] “writing and writing materials.” In The Oxford Dictionary of the Middle Ages. : Oxford University Press, 2010. http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780198662624.001.0001/acref-9780198662624-e-6158.
[9] Marco Gozzi, “Italy to 1300,” in The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Music, edited by Mark Everist (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011): 128.