undifferentiated longs and unmeasured ligatures

parchment

RISM B/IV 1: A 13th century parchment manuscript meas. 165 x 131 mm. and containing 121 folios, with 6 unnumbered paper flyleaves at the front and 2 at the back. A red half-leather binding with mottled paper front and back over pulp boards and gold tooling on the spine dates from the 19th century. The contents of this miscellany, which was written in England in 1267, include "Les Enseignements Trebor de vivre sagement" by Robert de Ho, the life of Saint Alexis and a bestiary, also in French, and some musical additions on f. 116-120v. The script is a neat English minuscule with red initials and green filigree written in two columns for the verse and straight across the page for the prose. The notation appears to belong to the same period as the literary works, and is generally written in undifferentiated longs and unmeasured ligatures. The last monody, however, after a few undifferentiated longs, decides to alternate longs and rhombs: it is clearly in the first rhythmic mode. The polyphony does not seem to make use of rhombs, however, though the English form of the conjunctura and the duplex longs with strokes protruding above and below the body of the note are clear evidence of the British origin of the notation. The four-line staves are red, and a yellow line divides the parts in the pieces which use score notation. The polyphonic compositions consist of a motet, a conductus and an organum, though this too is written in note-against-note style.

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