Italian Music Incunabula: Printers and Type

By Mary Kay Duggan

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1992.
This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of California Press
• Release date: Nov 15, 2023
• ISBN: 9780520334182

Mary Kay Duggan

Enter the Author Bio(s) here.

Book preview

Italian Music Incunabula

Italian

Music Incunabula

Printers and Type

Mary Kay Duggan

University of California Press

Berkeley Los Angeles Oxford

University of California Press

Berkeley and Los Angeles, California

University of California Press, Ltd.

Oxford, England

© 1992 by

The Regents of the University of California

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Duggan, Mary Kay Conyers.

Italian music incunabula: printers and type / Mary Kay Duggan, p. cm.

Revision of the author’s thesis (Ph. D.—University of California, Berkeley, 1981)

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 0-520-05785-6 (alk. paper)

1. Music printing—Italy. 2. Incunabula—Italy—Bibliography.

3. Printing—Italy—History—Origin and antecedents. 1. Title.

ML112.D8 1992

686.2'84'0945— dc20 89-20270

CIP

MN

Printed in the United States of America 123456789

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. @

Contents 1

Contents 1

Illustrations

Tables

Note on Abbreviations and Conventions

Preface

PART I A History of Italian Music Incunabula

I. Introduction

II. Italy and the Beginnings of Music Printing

III. Early Music Type and Typefounders Music Type

Music Typefounders

IV. Italian Music Incunabula

Space for Music

Printed Staves

Music Printed from Woodcuts

Music Printed from Type

PART II Italian Music Type and Printers Italian Music Type Specimens

v. Rome Ulrich Han (Stephan Planck), Ri

VI. Parma Damiano Moilli and Bernardo Moilli, R2 (M)

VII. Venice Theodor Franck of Wrzburg, Ml

Ottaviano Scoto, R3, R4

Bernardino Benali, R5, R6

Simone Gabi, called Bevilaqua, R7, R8

Johann Hamman, R9, Rio, R11, G1

Battista Torti, R12

Cristoforo de Pensi, R13

Teodoro Ragazzoni, R14

Rinaldo de Novimagio, R15

Filippo Finzi, R16, R17

Johann Emerich of Speier, R18, R19, R20, R21 (M)

Andrea Torresani, R22, R23

Giovanni Battista Sessa, R24

Giorgio Arrivabene, R25

viii. Milan Christoph Valdarfer, Al, R26

Leonard Pachel, R27, R28, A2

Antonio Zarotto, A3 (R)

IX. Pavia Francesco Girardengo, R29

x. Bologna Dionysio de Odo, R30

XI. Brescia Bonino Bonini, R31

Giacomo Britannico, R32

XII. Naples Christian Preller, R33

XIII. Incipient Music Type Francesco Benedetti and Guillaume Le Signerre

XIV. Directory of Type Specimens

PART III Music Books and Their Locations

XV. Bibliography of Italian Music Incunabula Introduction

Abbreviations of Libraries Holding Music Incunabula

Abbreviations of Sources

Descriptive Bibliography

XVI. Indexes and Concordance Chronological Index

Index of Printers by Location

Concordance

Appendices

1. Documents Relating to Jacomo Ungaro

2. Nonliturgical Italian Music Incunabula

3. Directory of Latin Place-Names and Monastic Orders Used in Italian Music Incunabula

Glossaryaccidental—sign of chromatic alteration introduced for a single note (see Table i, B rotundus, B naturalis, B quadratus).

Bibliography

Indexaccidentals 6, 8, 27, 132, 135, Table 1

Illustrations

Fig. 1. Graphic forms of the basic time value in roman plainchant. 5

Fig. 2a-b. The virga cum orisco in manuscript form. Antiphonal, second half of fifteenth century.

Perugia, Archivio di San Pietro, Ms. L. 7

Fig. 3. The production of incunabula with printed music, by decade. 16

Fig. 4. The terminology of a piece of modern type and its printed image. 23

Fig. 5. a. A sixteenth-century font of music type with many kerned sorts, composed for printing a specimen, b. A kerned virga with a bent stem. 23

Fig. 6. Graduate Romanum. Venice: Johann Emerich of Speier for Luca Antonio Giunta, 1499/1500, f. LIL 30

Fig. 7. Graduate Romanum. Venice: Johann Emerich of Speier for Luca Antonio Giunta, 1499/1500, f. LIL 31

Fig. 8. Sketches of the displaced type in Emerich’s Graduate, 1499/1500, f. LIL 31

Fig. 9. a. Hypothetical body sizes of music type R21. b. A flat printed below a note. 31

Fig. 10. Graduate Romanum. Venice: Johann Emerich of Speier for Luca Antonio Giunta, 1499/1500, f. V. 32

Fig. 11. Hypothetical body size of virga in Emerich’s R21. 32

Fig. 12. Hypothetical body size of staff type for Emerich’s R21. 33

Fig. 13. Examples of kerned text types in Emerich’s Graduate. 33

Fig. 14. Missale Ambrosianum. Milan: Antonio Zarotto, 23 III 1475, f. [CVIII]. 45

Fig. 15. Missale Ambrosianum. Milan: Antonio Zarotto, 23 III 1475, f. [xlvi]. 46

Fig. 16. Missale Romanum. Naples: Matthias Moravus, 1477, f. [106]. 47

Fig. 17. Missale Ordinis Praedicatorum. Naples: Matthias Moravus, 29 III 1483, f. [37]. 48

Fig. 18. Bartolome Ramis de Pareja, Musica

Utriusque Cantus Practica. Bologna: Baltasar di

Hyrberia, 5 VI 1482, f. b6v . 52

Fig. 19. Bartolome Ramis de Pareja, Musica

Utriusque Cantus Practica. Bologna: [Baltasar di Hyrberia and Heinrich von Koln], 12 V 1482, f. b6v. 53

Fig. 20. Missale Ordinis Praedicatorum. Venice:

Nikolaus von Frankfurt, 1484, f. o6v. 54 Fig. 21. Missale Romanum. Pavia: Francesco

Girardengo and Giovanni Antonio Beretta, 6 VI 1491, f. n5‘. 54

Fig. 22. Missale Strigoniense. Venice: Erhard Ratdolt, 18 III i486, f. LXXVIlf. 55

Fig. 23. Missale Parisiense. Venice: Johann Hamman and Johann Emerich of Speier, 10 XI 1487, f. m3’. 56

Fig. 24. Missale Strigoniense. Venice: Johann

Hamman, 1 II 1493/1494, f. ri. 57

Fig. 25. Missale Romanum. [Venice: Bernardino

Benali? for Luca Antonio Giunta, ca. 1490], f. 03' 58

Fig. 26. Missale Strigoniense. Venice: [Johann

Emerich of Speier for] Johann Paep, 1500 or 1502, f. m 1. 59

Fig. 27. Missale Valentinum. Venice: Johann

Hamman, 1 VI 1492, f. 06. 62

Fig. 28. Missale Romanum. Venice: Johann

Emerich of Speier, 13 VIII 1494, f. k4 (mis-signed I4). 63

Fig. 29. Missale Ambrosianum. [Milan: Giovanni

Antonio d’Onate, 1494], f.v 10. 66

Fig. 30. Mis sale Romanum. Venice: Johann

Emerich of Speier, 28 IV 1493, f. 131 (17,4"). ⁶7

Fig. 31. Missale Romanum. Rome: Ulrich Han, 12 X 1476, f. [104]. 84

Fig. 32. Pontificate Romanum. Rome: Stephan

Planck, 20 XII 1485, f. [cxvi]. 86

Fig. 33. Missale Romanum. Rome: Stephan Planck, 27 X 1494. f. [Ixxvi]. Slightly larger than scale. 87

Fig. 34. Graduate. Parma: Damiano Moilli and Bernardo Moilli, 10 IV 1477, f. xiiii. Reduced scale. 91

Fig. 35. Graduate. Parma: Damiano Moilli and Bernardo Moilli, 10 IV 1477. Mensural Credo. 92

Fig. 36. Francesco Niger, Grammatica. Venice: Theodor Franck of Wiirzburg for Johann Santritter, 21 III 1480, f. 98. 100

Fig. 37. Proposed body size of the longs in

Mi. 100

Fig. 38. Francesco Niger, Grammatica. Venice: Theodor Franck of Wiirzburg for Johann Santritter, 21 III 1480, f. 97’. 101

Fig. 39. Mis sale Romanum. Venice: Ottaviano Scoto, 29 XII 1481, f. 94. 103

Fig. 40. Missale Ordinis Praedicatorum. Venice: Ottaviano Scoto, 24 XII 1482, f. m3. 104

Fig. 41. Missale Romanum. [Venice: Bernardino Benali? for Luca Antonio Giunta, ca. 1490], f. O5. 107

Fig. 42. a. Missale Romanum. Venice: [Simone Gabi, called Bevilaqua, for] Paganino Paganini, 27 IV 1487, f. n4‘. b. Missale Romanum. Venice: Bevilaqua for Paganini, 10

III 1499, f. n4‘. in

Fig. 43. Missale Romanum. Venice: Simone Gabi, called Bevilaqua, 31 I 1497/1498, f. 109. 112

Fig. 44. Missale Romanum. Venice: Battista Torti, 29 X 1489, f. miv. 121

Fig. 45. Missale Romanum. Venice: Battista Torti, 29 X 1489, f. m6. 121

Fig. 46. Missale Romanum. Venice: Cristoforo de Pensi, 31 X 1489, f. m2’. 123

Fig. 47. Missale Romanum. Venice: Teodoro Ragazzoni, 15 XII 1489, f. n5. Reduced in size. 125

Fig. 48. Missale Romanum. Venice: Filippo Pinzi, 29 III 1494, f. 13’ (lxxxiiiv). 128

Fig. 49. Liquescent note forms in 21, used in Emerich’s Graduate. 133

Fig. 50. Kerned and abutting music and text types inR2i. 134

Fig. 51. Missale Ordinis Praedicatorum. Venice: Andrea Torresani, 30 XII 1496, f. i8v.

Reduced in scale. 143

Fig. 52. Missale Romanum. Venice: Giovanni Battista Sessa, 8 X 1497, f. cxii. 146

Fig. 53. Missale Romanum. Venice: Giovanni Battista Sessa, 1490, f. 06 (cx). 147

Fig. 54. Liber Catechumeni. Venice: Giovanni Battista Sessa, 31 VII 1498, f. D6V. 148

Fig. 55. Missale Romanum. Venice: Giorgio Arrivabene, 29 V 1499, f. p3‘. 150

Fig. 56. Missale Romanum. Milan: Christoph Valdarfer, 1 IX 1482, f. [i4]. 153

Fig. 57. Missale Ambrosianum. Milan: Christoph Valdarfer, 15 III 1482, f. [109]. Not to scale. 154

Fig. 58. Psalterium Ambrosianum. Milan: Leonard Pachel and Ulrich Scinzenzeller, 28 IV i486, f. m4. 158

Fig. 59. Rituale Ambrosianum. [Milan: Antonio Zarotto, ca. 1487], f. e5v. Larger than scale. i63

Fig. 60. Missale Auscitanum. Pavia: Francesco Girardengo, 1495, f. k2. 167

Fig. 61. Ordo ad Catechumeni Faciendum. Bologna: Dionysio de Odo, 20 III 1487, f. [37]. 170

Fig. 62. Missale Ordinis Carmelitarum. Brescia:

Bonino Bonini, 14 VIII 1490, f. m4‘ (88v). 172

Fig. 63. Missale Romanum. Brescia: Giacomo Britannico and Angelo Britannico, 1 IX 1492, f. 08. 174

Fig. 64. Combined types as used in Preller’s Missale Romanum. 176

Fig. 65. Missale Romanum. [Naples: Christian Preller for Antoine Gontier?, ca. 1490], f. m. i77

Fig. 66. Giovanni Spataro, Hones to Defensio. Bologna: Francesco Benedetti, 16 V 1491, f. Ei. 180

Map 1. Approximate distribution of plainchant notation in Europe at the advent of printing. 2

Map 2. Europe at the advent of printing. 4

Map 3. The ecclesiastical provinces of Germany, with the diocese of Constance. 12

Tables

1. Plainchant notation of the fifteenth century 6

2. Mensural notation 9

3. Distribution, by country, of incunabula with printed notes and staves 15

4. Italian music incunabula 17

5. Distribution of Italian music incunabula by place 17

6. Production by city of all Italian incunabula compared to Italian music incunabula 18

The most important Italian shops printing music incunabula 19

8. Production of Italian music incunabula by decade 19

9. Music types of Christopher Plantin’s shop 25

10. Music types of the Le Be typefoundry (ca. 1620 inventory) 26

11. Italian incunabula with space for music 44

12. Italian incunabula with printed staves but no notes 50

13. Staff techniques of Johann Hamman 61

14. Staff techniques of Johann Emerich of Speier 61

15. Italian music incunabula printed from woodcuts 65

16. Classification of music types in Italian incunabula 69

17. Small type fonts in Venice 69

18. The relationship of book production to stem length of Roman Large Missal types 70

19. German music printers in Italy 73

20. Venetian incunabula music type fonts by size and year 74

21. Samples of descriptions of music type 79

22. Music books printed by Johann Hamman 114

23. Early book production of Hamman and Emerich 116

24. Music books of Johann Emerich of Speier 131

25. Formats of Emerich’s editions 132

26. Music incunabula of Pachel 157

27. Music books of Zarotto 161

Note on Abbreviations and Conventions

For abbreviations of sources frequently cited, see Part III, pp. 196-99. References to Italian music incunabula are by short title (e.g., Missale Ro- manum) and by Duggan number (e.g., D 103) as found in the Descriptive Bibliography. References to fifteenth-century Italian music types are by classification number. The method of describing types by measurement is explained at the opening of Part II, and a key to classification numbers is provided in the directory to Part II.

For complete illustrations of the musical examples given here in detail, see the author’s dissertation.

The Venetian calendar began the new year on 1 March. Dates in the text have been converted to modern style; for example, a Venetian incunabulum dated February 1483 is cited as February 1483/ 1484.

For Italian names, modern spelling is used following the practice of Gedeon Borsa’s Claris Ty- pograpborum Librariorumque Italiae 1465—1600 (Baden-Baden: Valentine Koerner, 1980). German names follow the practice of Ferdinand Geldner in Die deutschen Inkunabeldrucker: Ein Handbuch der deutschen Buchdrucker des XV. Jabrhunderts nach Druckorten (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1968—1970).

The following monetary values are used: 20 soldi = 1 lira; 124 soldi or 6 lire 4 soldi = 1 ducat. A ducat, a florin, and a scudo were roughly equivalent.

Preface

From the moment I first saw Berkeley’s copy of the giant Graduate Romanum printed by Johann Emerich of Speier, I was captivated by the complexities and beauty of this early masterpiece of music printing. An attempt to clarify the historical position of the book and the technological processes used to print it made me aware of a lack both of organized information on fifteenth-century music printers and their music types and of adequate descriptions of the liturgical editions that formed the major part of their publishing programs. This book serves as a beginning in the provision of that information, focusing on the Italian contributions. The significant early and prolific work of music printers in Germany and Switzerland is the subject of my current research, and I look forward to one day adding studies of the rest of Europe for a balanced picture of the early printing of music.

I am grateful to the directors and staff of many European libraries, including the Biblioteca Mar- ciana and Fondazione Cini in Venice, the Biblioteca Ambrosiana and Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense in Milan, the Biblioteca Vaticana in Vatican City, the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich, the Orszagos Szechenyi Konyvtar in Budapest, the Bib- liotheque Nationale in Paris, and the British Library in London, for allowing me liberal access to their collections of incunabula and photographic services. Among the collections in this country, those at the Henry E. Huntington Library, the Library of Congress, and the Music Library of the University of California at Berkeley were most valuable.

Special thanks must go to Ursula Altmann, who graciously allowed me access to the manuscript files of the Gesamtkatalog der Wiegendrucke at the Deutsche Staatsbibliothek in East Berlin. Luigi Sa- marati, director of the Biblioteca Comunale at Lodi, was most helpful in making the 1477 Graduate available for examination at his library.

I gratefully acknowledge the generosity of the Martha Baird Rockefeller Fund for Music in providing me with a grant that made possible a year’s stay in Venice with extended trips to nearby libraries.

It is a pleasure to thank the numerous persons who have helped me in my task. The late Vincent Duckies provided the initial encouragement to explore the subject of early music printing. Fredric J. Mosher directed the project from beginning to end and made invaluable contributions to method and style. I received valuable help from Robert D. Harlan, Daniel Heartz, Richard L. Crocker, Roger Levenson, Bernard Rosenthal, Donald Krumme!, Joseph Kerman, James Mosely of St. Bride Institute (London), John Emerson, Paul Needham of the Pierpont Morgan Library, Michael L. Turner of the Bodleian Library, and Alan Nelson.

Special thanks are owed to Mary H. Silloway, Marcella Genz, and Janice Braun for their assistance in programming and editing the phototypesetting of the Descriptive Bibliography and the indexes of Part III.

Finally, I thank my daughters, Kathleen and Marie Christine Duggan, who so willingly agreed to accompany me to Venice for a year of school while I pursued my research goals.

PART I

A History of Italian Music Incunabula

I. Introduction

Music notation placed such difficult demands on the new craft of printing that its initial appearance in an impression from metal type came a full twenty years after the first printed alphabetic texts. As early as 1457, printers in Mainz had designed a psalter to include music, but they dealt with the problem of printing notes and staves by inserting blank spaces where the notes and staves of prescribed plainchant would be added by hand. By the 1470s a handful of printers were able to produce a font of metal music type and use it to print music exactly on any line or space of a four- or five-line staff. By the end of the century dozens of such types for both plainchant and mensural music had appeared in the notational styles of different geographic areas.

Music incunabula are here defined as those incunabula or fifteenth-century printed books that contain printed notes and staves, printed notes, printed staves, or blank spaces for the insertion of manuscript music. While books containing blank space for music might not seem appropriately classified as music incunabula, that category has often been included in such studies as Meyer-Baer’s Liturgical Music Incunabula, because the books may exist in copies with music added by hand or printed in a second shop. In any case, the present study is concerned primarily with those books that contain printed music. Books with space for music receive little discussion, but they are included in the Descriptive Bibliography in Part III.

Music incunabula may seem at first to be only a small part of the total estimated 25,000-30,000 incunabula. That total, however, includes many small pamphlets and single leaves. The 156 Italian music incunabula and the 200 to 300 printed elsewhere in Europe are most often impressive volumes of folio or large folio size, printed in two colors, with woodcut illustrations. The largest of them, the 1499 Graduale (D 17), is thought to be the largest book printed in the fifteenth century.

Music was printed in three kinds of incunabula: liturgical books for the Catholic church, books of music theory, and books containing secular music for performance. Most music incunabula are found in the first category. The major services of the Catholic church were the Mass and the canonical hours of the Divine Office. By far the most common music incunabulum is the missal, the book of the textual and musical portions of the Mass to be read and sung by the priest. In contrast, fifteenthcentury printers rarely took up the challenge presented by books of elaborate plainchant performed by the choir at Mass (the gradual) or at the Divine Office (the antiphonal). The breviary, the book of prayers of the priest for the Divine Office, rarely contained music. Other liturgical books printed with music in Italy in the fifteenth century include collections of several special services such as baptisms and funerals under such titles as Agenda, Liber Catechumeni, Ordo ad Catechumenum Faciendum, Rit- uali Romanum; books for single services, such as Liber Baptismalis, Manuale Baptisterium; books for particular officiants, such as the Pontificale for use in cathedrals by a bishop; processionals; and psalters. Most Italian printed liturgical books followed the Roman rite, established for the diocese of Rome. Other music incunabula for monastic or local uses, modifications of the standard rite codified by cathedral chapters or monastic orders, include

1. Frederick R. Goff, "A Few Footnotes to Konrad Haebler’s Handbucb der Inkunabelkunde," in Essays in Honour of V. Scholderer, ed. Dennis E. Rhodes (Mainz: Pressler, 1970), p. 178.

2. For definitions of kinds of service books, see the glossary.

fifteen (litanies, missals, psalters, rituals) for the Ambrosian rite celebrated in Milan and some neighboring dioceses, and books for local uses in Italy (Aquila, Messina), France (Auch, Besanon, Clermont-Ferrand, Nantes), Spain (Burgos, Segovia, Toledo, Valencia), Hungary (Pecs, Esztergom), and England (Salisbury). Italian music incunabula were published for use by several monastic orders: Augustinian, Carmelite, Franciscan, Benedictine, and Dominican.1

The major determinant of the design of early printed books was the design of the manuscript copy text. So too for music: the look of early printed products conformed to the appearance of manuscript books. The sizes of liturgical books were usually large or folio format for the priest at the altar and extra large folio for the choir to share at the music stand, although the introduction of printing was to revolutionize standard sizes and make the small missal and regular folio choirbook common by the sixteenth century. Music bookhands in use at the point of transition from the manuscript to the printed book were selected according to the function of the text and the geographical location in which it was to be read. Scripts for plainchant (the monophonic music of the Catholic liturgy) and for mensural or measured music (liturgical or secular, monophonic or polyphonic) and tablature systems for notating finger positions of stringed or keyboard instruments were all in existence. Red ink for plainchant staves and for the rubrics of service books was standard at the introduction of printing, as were liturgical points of decoration such as the initials that began services on major feasts and the illustration of the Crucifixion scene that preceded the Canon of the Mass. A review of the major characteristics of manuscript music books will provide a foundation for discussing their imitators in print.

Plainchant notation could be roman, gothic, ambrosian, or byzantine. The choice of script was a function of geographic and political boundaries, as we have said, although the inroads of the republic of Venice into the Byzantine Empire and the accompanying establishment of Benedictine monasteries there blurred the eastern boundaries of roman plainchant more than is generally realized. Map i, with its division of Europe into areas using different chant notation, shows clearly enough why most music printers in Italy chose to use roman plainchant type exclusively. It was a strictly commercial decision. The map also pinpoints the Ambrosian enclave around Milan that encouraged music printers of that area to design plainchant type for the local rite.2 Only one gothic plainchant font was used in Italy in the fifteenth century, that of German printer Johann Hamman, used in an Agenda Pataviensis for export to Passau across the Alps in Bavaria.

Since the area of Italy during the time period under consideration does not conform to that of the twentieth century, it will be useful to clarify its fifteenth-century political and geographical boundaries. In the later fifteenth century, Italy was a term used to denote an assemblage of independent states, joined in an uneasy equilibrium by the Peace of Lodi (1454), with boundaries still subject to fluctuation (see Map 2). There were three main states in the north: the Republic of Venice, the duchy of Milan, and the city-state of Florence, by then a territorial state. The Papal States in the center of the peninsula were a significant power. Below them were the two kingdoms of Naples and Sicily, separate during the second half of the century. In addition there were a number of smaller states, including Mantua under the House of Gonzaga, the two Tuscan republics of Siena and Lucca, and the territories of the House of Este: Modena, Reggio, and Ferrara, the last a feudatory of the papacy. The Republic of Venice was at the height of its expansion on the mainland, extending as far west as Brescia and Bergamo in Lombardy, and in the east into the coastal regions of the upper Balkan peninsula. Since the fall of Constantinople in 1453, the Turks had been a constant menace to the island holdings of Venice in the Mediterranean, including Crete and Cyprus, and the Genoese fleet had successfully challenged Venetian naval supremacy in the Adriatic and the Mediterranean. For the purposes of this book, Italy will be defined as including the territory of the modern nation plus that part of Yugoslavia which belonged to the fifteenth-century

4. For a definition of the boundaries of that enclave, see the map by Michel Huglo in Fonti e paleografia del canto am- brosiano, Archivio Ambrosiano 7 (Milan: Scuola Tipografica di San Benedetto, 1956), p. 111.

Republic of Venice and in which the Mis sale Ro- manum in the Glagolitic language (22 II 1483; see Part III) is thought to have been published.

The basic neumes (from the Greek neuma, "note or sign") of the plainchant notations that were cut into metal type in Italy in the fifteenth century are illustrated in Table 1. The last column provides a transcription of the neumes into modern notation. The Latin names and the shapes of the simple and compound neumes provide a point of reference for the discussion of written or printed neumes in later chapters. The information encoded in neumes serves two functions: coordination of melodic inflections with syllables of text, and identification of the directions of melodic movement within the inflections represented by the neumes.3 The earliest notation meticulously observed the function of syllable marker, but since neumes were not drawn on a staff it lacked precision for specifying melodic movement from note to note.4 By the end of the fifteenth century, at the other extreme, less careful scribes began to ignore the primary role of plainchant notation as syllable marker and to separate neumes into isolated virgas that functioned solely as pitch indicators. This process would accelerate with the advent of printing. While a few exacting printers, especially Johann Emerich in his 1499 Graduate (see Fig. 7), managed to maintain the visual appearance of compound neumes and to print them carefully over the appropriate syllables of text, others such as Dionysio de Odo in his Ordo ad Catecbumeni Faciendum used two or three type designs and carelessly distributed the notes over the text (see Fig. 61).

Within a single plainchant notation, variation could occur to challenge the designer of music type. Each style of plainchant notation has a common note that represents the basic time value of a chanted syllable of text (see Fig. 1). In roman notation of the fifteenth century the common note could be one of two basic forms, the stemmed virga used in much of Italy or the punctum used in Spain,

southern Italy, and part of France.5 A notehead could be sharply pointed at the top and bottom or smoothly right-angled, straight on each side or gently curved, provided with a long or a short stem or no stem at all, filled in with ink or left hollow. The Italian printer working for Spain or France could vary the fonting of his type to increase the number of stemless characters and nearly eliminate stemmed ones.

Gothic plainchant notation was used in Italy during the fifteenth century only at the far north and east, along the borders of the Republic of Venice, and in such occasional strongholds of disparate liturgical tradition as the patriarchate of Aquileia, centered in the old Roman city at the head of the Adriatic that for centuries rivaled the power of Venice.6 The lozenge was the common note of gothic notation, and its style varied just as did the square of roman notation. The missals printed for Hungary in the fifteenth century with staves and without notes contain a variety of