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Reflections of war and violence in early and high medieval saints' offices

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 February 2014

ROMAN HANKELN
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Abstract

Changing attitudes towards violence and war are important markers of medieval European cultural development and, as such, have been the focus of numerous historical studies. Saints' offices have not, however, been analysed along these lines, an unjustified neglect given their central place in the daily cultural life of ecclesiastical institutions, not to mention the large range of related scholarly topics they represent. Offered here is an overview of these topics, beginning with an examination of offices with roots in Merovingian and Carolingian times, and proceeding to later offices originating in the crucial time of the first crusades and beyond. How is violence described in chants with texts drawn from the Old and New Testaments? How is it handled in chants based on later hagiographic literature? Is Christian military violence legitimised in these chants? How are enemies portrayed? How are the messages of these texts articulated in their musical settings? Answers to these questions might place the sacred monophony of the Latin Church into its proper context, that is, as a means of socio-political reflexion during the Middle Ages.

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Research Article
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Plainsong & Medieval Music , Volume 23 , Issue 1 , April 2014 , pp. 5 - 30
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

The strong deeds of the Maccabees are read out and sung of in church services. While they fought for the laws of their fatherland, they did so also for their inheritance and their heirs. But [the crusaders] in truth set out not on their own behalf, nor on that of those close to them, but for the kingdom of heaven alone, and they fought manfully and won, for God helped them.Footnote 1

This passage from the prologue of the anonymous twelfth-century Historia Peregrinorum praises the deeds of those taking part in the Third Crusade and compares them to characters from the Old Testament, namely Judas, who held the honorary war-name ‘Maccabeus’ (‘the Hammerer’), and his brothers, Jonathan and Simeon, who were known during the Middle Ages as Jewish war heroes. Indeed, they had successfully resisted the introduction of the Hellenistic way of life under the Seleucid ruler Antiochus Epiphanes IV (reign: 175–164 bc), and his successors, as reported in the two deuterocanonical libri Macchabeorum.Footnote 2 Especially during the crusades, the Maccabean brothers were viewed as religious warriors and ideal knights, and pronouncements of the Church and crusade historiography such as the Historia Peregrinorum refer to them repeatedly.Footnote 3 Although the Maccabees were not honoured with a Christian saints' feast – such is not to be expected – their story was commemorated in one of the historiae of the summer temporale. The readings and chants of the weeks of October were taken from the Books of the Maccabees, which were performed after extracts from the Books of the (victorious) Judith and Esther had been read and sung.Footnote 4 The themes of the chants include war as an existential threat and armed resistance under the leadership of God.Footnote 5

War and violence figure importantly not just in the office chants of the October temporale, but also in many other parts of the Latin plainchant repertoire, particularly chants honouring the saints. Relatively well known are the numerous new alleluias and sequences sung at Masses on saints' feasts; less well known are the many chant-cycles for the Divine Office, or historiae, for the same occasions. It must be recalled that, in the Middle Ages, the saints functioned as figures manifesting religious and political ideals in concentrated form.Footnote 6 Saints' legends concern key positive values, but they also established boundaries, reinforced stereotypes of the enemy and legitimated them, all against a broader Christian backdrop. Based as they generally are on legends and reports of miracles, the chants of historiae helped articulate a variety of socio-political issues, including matters of war and violence.

The field of historia studies has developed considerably over the last three decades, with research concentrating mainly on editorial work, repertoire studies, analyses of melodic styles and structural questions.Footnote 7 Issues of theological and/or socio-historical meaning and function of the chant texts, and their bearing on the formation of the melodies, have only rarely been considered. Focusing on themes of war and violence, this article aims to show how historiae, in both their texts and their music, served to represent such ideas in liturgy. By examining them in ways developed here, we seek a better understanding of their original cultural-historical dimension.

The texts: war and the Old Testament

Old Testament models in the offices of the temporale

Many biblical texts describe God's presence and impact on a human history replete with violence and war,Footnote 8 such themes being especially prominent in the Old Testament.Footnote 9 The presence of the divine is perpetuated in saints' offices especially in the psalms, the recitation of which is central to the hours. Many office chants also refer to Old Testament models and contexts in their descriptions and interpretations of war. Among the most intriguing issues the books of the Old Testament raise is their characterisation of God as a God of wrath and revenge.Footnote 10 He is the highest commander, the one who grants victory but also metes out defeat.Footnote 11 These topics are central to one of the responsories from the Office of the Maccabees referred to earlier, Congregati sunt inimici (Text 1).Footnote 12 God's help is here invoked in the face of powerful enemies who represent an existential threat. Indeed, in the Old Testament the survival of whole peoples is frequently at stake, as articulated in the text of R. Miserere, Domine, populo tuo (Text 2) from the Esther historia. Text 3, the verse of the R. Judas Simoni, was also part of the Maccabean Office. It is taken from the first book of the Maccabees, an extract from the battle oration of Judas Maccabeus before the battle against Gorgias.

Old Testament models in the offices of the sanctorale

Chant texts based on the Old Testament develop, among other war-related topics, themes of the threat of merciless enemies, armed resistance and death in battle for one's people and one's faith. All three themes are also encountered in saints' offices in specifically Christian versions. The antiphon Principes et populi (Text 4) illustrates how, in a later office, the Old Testament theme of enemy threat is developed in reference to Christ.

The words ‘principes et populi … convenerunt’ are taken from Ps. 2, the theme of which is the struggle between the heathens and the anointed one, who, with God's help, emerges victorious.Footnote 18 The antiphon introduced and closed the recitation of this very psalm.Footnote 19 In such cases, the ‘liturgical vicinity’ of antiphon and psalm was frequently used to interconnect the Old Testament context of the psalm and the antiphon's Christological theme, rendering these texts especially significant from the perspective of salvation history. The text of this particular antiphon blames Christ's crucifixion on heathens and unbelievers and, with this, it articulates a boundary. This articulation gains considerable weight once we consider the antiphon's liturgical context: it was part of the Office of the Holy Lance, written at the court of Emperor Charles IV in 1355, a historia known widely across Bohemia and Germany in the late Middle Ages.Footnote 20

Metaphors of war in the New Testament

Cosmic warfare

This is another aspect of the theme of war in saints' offices, developed in a large array of war metaphors, many with New Testament backgrounds. The Apocalypse here figures prominently, as in the Office of St Michael, in which some chants refer to the famous battle between the Archangel and Satan (see Text 5).

At the very centre of the cosmic war metaphors however stands the Passion of Christ. Especially in the context of the Constantinian turn c.313, the utter defeat at Golgotha received a drastic theological and rhetorical reinterpretation as a triumphant victory over Satan.Footnote 22 Consequently, the cross, symbol of love and non-violence, experienced a remarkable transformation into a sign of victory.Footnote 23 The hymns Pange lingua … proelium and Vexilla regis, by Venantius Fortunatus (d. c.600), are surely among the most famous examples of this shift. A small selection of antiphons and responsories demonstrates the results of this transformation. The responsory, Ecce crucem Domini (Text 6), for example, celebrates Christ's passion and resurrection in military terms, that is, as a victory: the cross appears as a battle-standard.

Numerous other chant texts transpose this military imagery from a specifically Christological context to ones involving saints or relics. From the Office of St Martin (first transmitted in the tenth century) comes the antiphon, Ego signo crucis (Text 7), which identifies the cross as a symbol of protection. The cross was, however, occasionally likened to an offensive weapon, as in the responsory Armati vexillo crucis sung on feasts of the cross (Exaltatio or Inventio Crucis) (see Text 8).

While it is probable that ‘the enemy’ (acc. sing.) referred to in the responsory Armati vexillo crucis is Satan, the antiphon Per signum crucis (from the same offices) uses ‘the enemies’ (dat. plur.) (see Text 9). The cross-symbol thus transcends the confines of the spiritual or cosmic battle, and is in the antiphon invoked against one's opponents. In the fourteenth-century office in honour of St Wenceslaus, ‘the enemy’ is again taken to mean human military forces (see Text 10).

Spiritual battle: ‘milites Christi’

A side aspect of the cosmic war metaphor can be found in the idea of inner ‘spiritual battle’ already known from the Old Testament,Footnote 25 but receiving much of its later significance in the letters of St Paul, who wrote about the Christian's spiritual resistance to the Devil. Benedict of Nursia, in the prologue to his Rule, may well have had Paul's writings in mind when he described the monastic life as spiritual military service. Indeed, in the Benedict office the saint is identified as the leader of a glorious army of monks (‘dux gloriose agminis monastici Benedicte’).Footnote 26 But St Paul intended the metaphor ‘miles Christi’ to have a strictly spiritual meaning,Footnote 27 an understanding that follows from the Christian commandment to refrain from violence, as reflected in the antiphon, Beatus Martinus dixit Iuliano (Text 11), from the St Martin's Office.

It was in this particular sense that the term ‘miles Christi’ was used in the liturgies in honour of saints of various kinds, most often confessors.Footnote 29 As regards the martyrs, however, secular forces may temporarily subdue them, but in principle they remain undefeated ‘soldiers of Christ’. To give but one example, St Vincentius fights with the weapons of faith, the ‘arma spiritualia’ (Text 12).

In chants in honour of St Mauritius and the Theban Legion, some of which are based on a fifth-century passio, a slightly different attitude towards military service is encountered. The antiphon Nos pugnare adversus (Text 13) is first documented in practical sources at the end of tenth century. The text shows where the boundaries are drawn: to make war on Christians is forbidden, but war on the ‘impios’, the godless, is legitimate as ‘just’ war.Footnote 30 The antiphon Pugnavimus semper pro iustitia (Text 14) from a later office in honour of St Mauritius accentuates this point.

Fighters for faith and fatherland: sainted rulers

From the eleventh century on, several offices were written in honour of sainted rulers including Oswald of Northumbria, Edmund of East Anglia, and Olaf and Erik, the later patron saints of Norway and Sweden respectively. They are depicted as model kings, dying for their people as martyrs in the tradition of the imitatio Christi. Here, a significant shift in the attitude toward war is evident. The martyr's spiritual battle is placed in the context of resistance to attacking heathens, sometimes even to Christian tyrants: St Edmund of East Anglia, for example, died because he refused to submit himself and his kingdom to a heathen aggressor. This makes him ‘father of the fatherland’, as the fourth antiphon of First Vespers of the eleventh-century office formulates (see Text 15). In the third Matins responsory from the same office, Miles Xpisti Ædmundus, a ‘clericalised’ variant of the well-known verse from Horace (‘dulce et decorum est pro patria mori’), serves as the repetenda (see Text 16). The twelfth Matins responsory from the eleventh-century English office in honour of St Oswald, O regem et martyrem Oswaldum (Text 17), commemorates the martyrdom of an entire army.

The chants of St Oswald's Office are largely based on the Venerable Bede's Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (written c.731) which refers to Oswald as a saint but not a martyr.Footnote 35 It has been argued, not without some plausibility, that Bede did so in order to keep warfare away from religious connotations.Footnote 36 The earliest references to Oswald as a martyr come from vitae written by Ælfric (d. 1010) and Drogo of Bergues (d. 1070), the latter of whom also wrote the continental office in honour of the saint.Footnote 37 The roughly contemporary continental and English Oswald Offices seem to be the first to document the shift from the earlier stages of Oswald hagiography, in which warfare and martyrdom are kept separate, to the eleventh-century position in which both sides converge. This conforms to a broader historical development: the theme of martyrdom was increasingly developed with regard to those killed in religious war, particularly during the First Crusade.Footnote 38

In this later epoch, sainted kings such as Charlemagne and Stephen of Hungary were no longer officially venerated as martyrs, but rather as confessors who, on occasion, waged war on those with other beliefs. Some chants in their offices legitimise military action as missionary ministry. Such is the case with the responsory Fusa prece mentis bone (Text 18), from the twelfth-century Office for Charlemagne, and the responsory Gloriosus cultor Dei (Text 19), from the twelfth-century office in honour of Stephen of Hungary.

King Eric of Sweden was revered as a martyr. Examples 20-2 come down to us in a version of his office dating from c.1400 and they describe Eric's armed mission against the Finns. The first antiphon, Pugil fortis fidei (Text 20), gives the reason for Eric's embarking on war: zeal for his faith. The topic of the second antiphon, Pacem offert hostibus (Text 21), is the destruction of the king's enemies who, we assume, did not accept his offer of peace and refused to convert to Christianity. In the third antiphon, Plorat strages hostium (Text 22), the king mourns the death of his enemies: they would be eternally damned because they had not been baptised.

Despite the violent outcome, armed mission is depicted here as motivated by faith and brotherly love.Footnote 39 This seems to be based on the Augustinian idea that the use of force against heretics was legitimate if it leads to their conversion. Augustine's idea would in the Middle Ages come to be enforced by military means, and modern historians have examined such incidents under the catchword ‘compelle intrare’.Footnote 40 Texts of the kind surveyed above illustrate the presence of a medieval, Augustinian view of war in the saints' offices in addition to that encountered in the Old Testament.

Punishing saints

The chant texts discussed so far concern men who would be called saints participating in war during their lifetimes. These figures become, however, truly powerful and thus dangerous to their enemies only after their deaths, when they advance into an otherworldly source of military or punitive action.Footnote 41 The third Lauds antiphon from the thirteenth-century office in honour of St Henry, Furti reus multiplicis custos (Text 23), identifies the saint as protector of his church, the cathedral of Bamberg. Similarly, St Edmund is shown as acting on behalf of ‘his’ institution in the first two Lauds antiphons of his office (Texts 24–5).

Music

The preceding has shown how topics of war and violence were incorporated into the texts of historiae; it remains to indicate how the music of historiae participates in their articulation. An interpretative endeavour arguing in favour of an articulating function of plainchant settings must confront contradictory opinions about the relationship between music and texts. Depending on the personal experiences, methodological perspectives and aesthetic expectations of the one doing the describing, the text–music relationship may be characterised as neutral or something more specific.Footnote 43 When Ritva Jonsson and Leo Treitler combined their philological and musicological expertise in a 1983 collaborative study of this relationship, they concluded that ‘a chant melody records a reading of its text’, that it is a response to both the text's structure and meaning.Footnote 44 Approaching chants in historiae as products of conscious compositional choices and solutions to problems posed by their texts opens a path leading to a more nuanced view of the interdependence of music and meaning. With this in mind, the following section seeks to test the plausibility of such an analytical approach by examining two case studies which address two central principles of text-music relationship.

First principle: music as a declamatory tool

Plainchant is characterised by a parallelism between the text's formal syntactic structure and the phrasing of the musical setting: syntactically and semantically coherent portions of text are represented in musically coherent phrases and/or subphrases. Melodic phrase structure and musical caesurae clarify the text's declamation and thus its meaning.Footnote 45 In the later repertory of historiae, the text–music relationship was intensified as a result of developments in melodic style and tonality.

Text 26, the R. Rex sacer Oswaldus, is from the previously discussed eleventh-century English office in honour of St Oswald which relates the story of his victory over the British king Caedwalla (Cadwallon) at Heavenfield. In the hexametric text, and according to the Venerable Bede, Oswald erected a large cross on the battlefield before the troops engaged.Footnote 46 As will become evident in the analysis of this responsory, the office's melodic style differs from that of traditional Gregorian Chant (see Ex. 1).Footnote 47

Ex. 1

R. Rex sacer Oswaldus (St Oswald's Office, England, eleventh century).

The tonal structure of Rex sacer Oswaldus is concentrated on a few central pitches: the final D, the upper fifth a and upper octave d. The final and cofinal (a) clearly mark the cadences and caesuras.Footnote 49 In contrast to the rigid tonal framework, the approach to melody is flamboyantly ornamental. Large interval leaps, leap combinations and sometimes lengthy scale passages are the most significant characteristics of this later style. The traditional melodic formulas of Gregorian Chant are lacking.

Here also the tension between tonality and melody intensifies the musical impact and contributes to a clear articulation of the text. The form of the responsory takes as its point of departure the caesuras of the Leonine hexameter, a formal-syntactical orientation not unlike the older plainchant style.Footnote 50 Initially, each half-verse corresponds to a musical phrase. A number of relatively short musical units emerge, ending with rhymes: phrases 1–2 / hexameter 1: ‘Oswaldus’ : ‘feriturus’; phrases 3–5 / hexameter 2: ‘erexit’ : ‘superauit’. The second half-verse of hexameter 2 is set so elaborately that it takes up two phrases, 4 (‘et in hoc signo’) and 5 (‘superauit’). It seems likely that this, the central message of the text, received this musical elongation intentionally.

Given the strict control of melodic space – that is, a gamut divided into a low register from D to a, and a high register from a to d – tonal contrasts in the melodic setting are of significance. The statements made in the text are obviously coordinated with the registers, and contrasts in the text correspond to contrasts in register. Phrases 1 and 2 introduce Oswald and his foes; both phrases use the lower register. At the start of hexameter 2, phrase 3, the king erects the cross as a sign of hope. One hears the high a–d register exclusively and for the first time, a clear contrast to the preceding (lower-range) phrases. The climax of the chant occurs in phrase 4, which combines both registers. The chant's ambitus is fully articulated for the first time on ‘signo’. The melisma is rather exceptionally shaped, moving quite rapidly from the lower end of the ambitus to its peak on d, first using the leap-combination D–a–c, and then, after a short return to the cofinal a, the singular leap a–d.

The text of the verse adds – almost as a punch line – a huge dimension of salvation history: Oswald's victory under the Cross of Heavenfield is compared to Constantine's victory at the Milvian Bridge.Footnote 51 The verse melody brings to mind the climactic setting of ‘signo’ in phrase 4 of the respond. At the start of the verse the D–a–c leap-combination returns, and in the second half the top-note (d) of the ambitus is touched again. The musical high points of the responsory are reached at the erection of the cross (‘erexit’, phrase 3) as a sign (‘signum’, phrase 4) for Christian hope (‘spem’, phrase 3), all concentrated in the repetendum, which is further emphasised by repetition after the verse. In the verse, Oswald's representation as an ‘alter Constantine’ receives hardly less musical attention.

It is interesting to observe how the musical realisation deals with the theme of military victory. In phrase 5 the verb ‘superavit’ appears exposed at the very end of the text. This emphasis is reflected musically through the dynamic musical setting: a melisma which rapidly traverses a major sixth a–C in a zigzag shape, employing a series of downward leaps.Footnote 52 The verb ‘superavit’ occurs in the last phrase of the respond, where tradition dictated a return to the register of the modal final. The strict tonal organisation of this piece amplifies the impact of this return: the half-cadences at the ends of phrases 3 and 4 in the second hexameter are on the cofinal a. This creates a longer arch of musical tension which resolves only with the cadence on D in phrase 5 at the end of the respond.

Considering the respond as a whole, this final phrase indeed has the function of a concluding musical relaxation. It sets the verb ‘superavit’ as the result at the end of a text–music process which starts in phrase 3 with the erection of the cross, cross and victory being associated with one another musically. Not only the words, but also the musical setting, show that the victory is the consequence of Oswald's public gesture of hope. Thus, the setting offers a ‘reading’ of the text which addresses military victory not in isolation but dependent upon unswerving faith in a situation of crisis. Linked to this is the religious idealisation of St Oswald in the verse. Musically this interpretation is achieved by way of tonal organisation, and by employing contrasts: contrasts in register and text setting, syllabic and/or melismatic.Footnote 53

Second principle: musical association

The second principle of music-text interaction, mentioned earlier, is concerned with the associative characteristics of music, that is, its capacity to connect different texts and contents. For this just one example must suffice.Footnote 54

Between 1160 and 1180, the office in honour of the patron saint Olaf was written in the city known today as Trondheim, the seat of the Norwegian archdiocese of Nidaros. In the Lauds of this office, the Benedictus antiphon Imperator grecus was sung. Its text is based on one of the first reports in the Miracula sancti Olavi.Footnote 55 As shown in Text 27, its theme is the saint's assistance in battle.

Most chant melodies in the Office of St Olaf were not newly composed, but instead were based on the office in honour of the Church Father Augustine, which was perhaps written by Walter, prior of the convent of Augustinian canons at Arrouaise near Arras before 1162.Footnote 56 The Olaf antiphon Imperator grecus is based on the Benedictus antiphon for St Augustine, In diebus illis, which stems from the end of Possidius's Vita Augustini. In diebus illis, too, describes a scene of battle (see Text 28 and Exx. 2a and 2b).

Ex. 2a

A. Imperator grecus (St Olav's Office, 1160–80).

Ex. 2b

A. In diebus illis (St Augustine's Office, twelfth century, first half).

Both texts describe the same fundamental situation, namely existential threat posed by barbarians, but the situations are resolved in opposite ways: negatively in the Augustine antiphon – the hero dies; positively in the Olaf antiphon – the Christians are liberated. There are hints, however, that the two texts were not viewed as different as might first appear. A first hint comes from the specific liturgical context in which the antiphons were performed in both offices, that is, (after the respective antiphons) in connection with the Benedictus Canticle, the song of Zacharias (Luke 1:68–79). The text mentions the theme of liberation in several of its passages.

The performative juxtaposition of the texts with the Benedictus Canticle evidently classifies not just the Olaf antiphon, but also the Augustine antiphon under the theme of ‘liberation’.

A second hint: Augustine's biographer Possidius reports that during the siege of Hippo Augustine prayed to God to free the besieged city, or grant his servants the strength to endure their misery, or if neither of these alternatives were acceptable, to ‘take [him] from this world’.Footnote 59 Possidius comments: ‘The Lord was not going to withhold from His servant the answer to his prayer. He obtained in due time what he had asked for through his tears both for himself and for his city.’Footnote 60 Possidius's Vita thus interprets Augustine's death as an act of heavenly mercy. The antiphon alludes to this positive view: in spite of the misery of war, Augustine dies ‘in peace’ (‘obdormivit in pace’).

In the twelfth century, the Norwegian editors chose to use a battle miracle of their patron Olaf as the text for a melody that described the death of Augustine. This could have happened because both texts were thought to have dealt with one and the same theme, namely liberation by God. If this hypothesis is correct, then the music serves as an indicator of the contemporary interpretation of the two antiphon texts.

Plainchant and history

The chants of saints' offices are capable of reflecting central aspects of medieval experiences and views of war, enemy stereotypes and concepts of religiously legitimate warfare. Some of these draw a strict boundary, particularly as they set up Christians and those with other beliefs in opposition. By doing so, they also establish identity – in the same vein as the idea of ‘holy’ war, which, as historians tell us, creates togetherness in defining ‘the others’.Footnote 61

The music of these chants is by no means indifferent to the content of the texts, as I have indicated, but at the same time uses only the normal stylistic vocabulary of its period. Because of this, music plays a role in integrating the theme of war into the liturgical, spiritual context. Traditional musical stylistics lead to a musical ‘normalisation’ of war, and to its legitimation within the framework of the liturgy. Within its prescribed boundaries, ecclesiastical music takes part in the articulation of our subject matter.

The war imagery of these chants, fuelled by biblical metaphors, cannot be seen as straightforward war propaganda in the medieval church service. The use of war metaphors in liturgy was, however, open to use and transposition into a real-political context.Footnote 62 In this respect, office chants are part of a larger cultural–political area where religious and secular spheres converge: liturgical celebrations were a regular part of war ritual, especially during the crusades.Footnote 63 As is well known, saints' images and relics were used as insignias of leadership and as war-standards;Footnote 64 often reported is the belief in the real presence of the saints during military operations (as described in the Olaf antiphon, Ex. 27). The passage from the Historia Peregrinorum, for example, cited at the beginning of this article, refers to the help of Saints Mercurius, Georgius and Theodorus militarily during the crusade.Footnote 65

The chants discussed above were not thematically isolated from other ecclesiastical texts, such as prayers or benediction formulas which occasionally have a public, ecclesio-political function, as for example the blessing formulae for armies, knights and standards. Historians have long considered liturgical texts of these kinds valuable evidence for the development of crusade ideology.Footnote 66 These scholars have not, however, taken thematically related chants into full consideration, even when they were part of the same services that contained these benedictions or orations.Footnote 67 Let us consider just one example of this thematical parallelism, a portion of the blessing of the banner (‘Benedictio vexilli’) from the so-called Ratold sacramentary (c.980). It refers to the cross in the real political sense, that is, as encountered in some of the chants discussed above.

There is no doubt, moreover, about the thematic and sometimes also literal parallelism of the chant texts even to medieval historiography, and not only when Old Testament passages are quoted.Footnote 69 Analysing orations which frequently can be found before battle accounts in chronicles written between 1000 and 1250, John Bliese described several topoi which functioned as motivations for war. One is the notion that one fights for a worthy cause. This implies the legitimation of war as a struggle for justice, a war for the fatherland and the Christian faith. References to the help of God and the saints are mentioned as another topos of battle orations, as well as the idea that those falling during a just battle will earn the glory of martyrdom.Footnote 70 As I have shown, all these topics can be found in the chants of historiae. Liturgical plainchant should thus be taken seriously, as a reflection of and point of reference for the political thought of the Middle Ages.Footnote 71 And yet there is another aspect which invites further reflection: medieval clerics spent their lives surrounded by and participating in the singing of ecclesiastical music, that is, mainly plainchant. We may assume that the textual and musical statements of these chants, characterised by careful concentration and musical interpretative structuring, also played a significant role in these clergymen's intellectual world. The more frequently performed chants of the annual cycle may even have functioned as musical proverbs, or shortcuts to saints' vitae or to biblical themes and passages. It is a matter of speculation whether Pope Innocent III, for example, had the V. Accingimini et estote filii potentes (CAO 6478b) in mind before quoting the Maccabees passage on which this verse is based in one of his crusade writings.Footnote 72 As the passage cited at the beginning of this study illustrates, plainchant was clearly involved in communicating messages of considerable political relevance to those capable of understanding the liturgical texts.

Appendix 1 Feasts and chants

Abbreviations:

arch=archangel. – CAO I or II+number: feast/office-number in CAO I and II. – CAO III or IV+number: number of the (normalised) text edition in the respective volumes of CAO. – conf=confessor. – Cid: Cantus Identification number. LMLO: siglum for the specific office-version in Andrew Hughes, Late Medieval Liturgical Offices: Resources for Electronic Research, Vol. 1 Texts, Vol. 2 Sources and Chants, Subsidia Mediaevalia, 23–4 (Toronto 1994, 1996). – mart=martyr.

Dates in parentheses are based on the earliest source of the office in CAO and/or the Cantus Index. For an index of the examples, see Appendix 2.

Augustinus, conf, Aug. 28.

On dating and authorship see: Berschin, Historia S. Augustini.

Ex. 28 A. In diebus twelfth century Cid 202402. Transcribed from Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, lat. 14816, f. 262v.

Carolus magnus imperator, conf, Ian. 28. LMLO CA51.

Ex. 18 R. Fusa prece V. Leone twelfth century. Transcribed from Aachen, Domarchiv G 20, f. 28v.

Cf. Michael McGrade, Affirmations of Royalty: Liturgical Music in the Collegiate Church of St. Mary in Aachen, 1050–1350 (Chicago, 1998; UMI microfilms), 216 and fn. 57, with a divergent translation of this responsory text.

Crux

Exaltatio Crucis, Sept. 14. CAO I 110; II 922, 110.

Inventio Crucis, May 3. CAO I/II 92.

Ex. 6 R. Ecce V. Crux (eleventh century). Text ed.: CAO IV 6581, 6581a.

Ex. 8 R. Armati (eleventh century). Text ed.: CAO IV 6119.

Ex. 9 A. Per signum (ninth century). Text ed.: CAO III 4264.

Edmundus rex, mart, Nov. 20. LMLO ED61.

Probably composed at Bury Abbey during Abbot Baldwin's time, 1065–97; see Rodney M. Thomson, ‘The Music for the Office of St Edmund King and Martyr’, Music & Letters, 65 (1984), 189–93, at 189 and 190.

Ex. 15 A. Princeps before 1087. Transcribed from New York, Pierpont Morgan Library MS 736 on p. 177. Compare the transcription of this antiphon from First Vespers by Thomson, ‘The Music for the Office of St Edmund’, 192 (and fn. 25), where the preceding antiphons are also given. These Vespers antiphons are additions to the office which were written by Abbot Warner of Rebais during a visit at Bury before 1087, see ibid., 192.

Ex. 16 R. Miles Xpisti 1065–97. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Digby 109, p. 74.

Ex. 24 A. Qvidam maligne 1065–97. Cid 204169.

Ex. 25 A. Facto autem 1065–97.

Both antiphons transcribed from Oxford, Bodleian Library, Digby 109, pp. 93–4.

Ericus rex, mart, May 18. LMLO ER21.

Ex. 20 A. Pugil fortis c.1400.

Ex. 21 A. Pacem offert c.1400.

Ex. 22 A. Plorat strages c.1400.

Edition of the three antiphons in Ann-Marie Nilsson (ed.), St Eriks hystoria (Stockholm, 1999), 67–8; I have adopted her translations (pp. 141–2).

Henricus imperator, conf, July 15. LMLO HE92.

On repertory and history see Roman Hankeln, ‘“Properization” and Formal Changes in High Medieval Saints' Offices: The Offices for Saints Henry and Kunigunde of Bamberg’, Journal of the Plainsong and Medieval Music Society, 10/1 (2001), 3–21.

Ex. 23 A. Furti reus twelfth century München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, clm 18392 (Tegernsee, fourteenth century), f. 31r–v.

Historia de Esther, summer temporale. CAO I 975 133 135; II 1094 135.

Ex. 2 R. Miserere (ninth century). Text ed.: CAO IV 7159.

Historia Maccabeorum, summer temporale. Rep.: CAO I 977 137; II 1132 137.

Ex. 1 R. Congregati V. Disperge (ninth century). Text ed.: CAO IV 6326, 6326a.

Ex. 3 V. Accingimini (ninth century). Text ed.: CAO IV 6478b.

Lancea Domini, Second Friday after the Easter Octave. LMLO XL11.

Ex. 4 A. Principes fourteenth century Cid 203961. Ed. Franz Machilek, Karlheinz Schlager, Theodor Wohnhaas, ‘“O felix lancea”: Beiträge zum Fest der Heiligen Lanze und der Nägel’, Jahrbuch des historischen Vereins für Mittelfranken, 92 (1984/5), 43–107, at 85.

Martinus, conf, Nov. 11. CAO I 116; II 116 1172 1254.

Ex. 7 A. Ego signo ninth century Text ed.: CAO III 2587.

Ex. 11 A. Beatus ninth century Text ed.: CAO III 1644.

Music edition of both antiphons in Martha Fickett, ed., Historia Sancti Martini (Ottawa 2006), 36 and 38.

Mauritius, mart, Sept. 22. CAO I/II 111.

Ex. 13 A. Nos pugnare (tenth century). Text ed.: CAO III 3959.

According to Walter Lipphardt, the antiphon is part of Regino's tonary, but I was unable to find this item in Coussemaker's facsimile, used by Lipphardt. See Walter Lipphardt, ed., Der karolingische Tonar von Metz (Münster, 1965), 167; Edmond de Coussemaker, ed., ‘Tonarius Reginonis Prumensis’, Scriptorum de Musica Medii Aevi, vol. 2 (Paris, 1867), 1–73.

Ex. 14 A. Pugnavimus (fourteenth century). Cid 204003. Transcribed from Einsiedeln, Kloster Einsiedeln, Musikbibliothek Ms. 611, f. 224v (fourteenth century).

Michael, arch, 8 May, 29 Sept. CAO I113 II 924 113.

Ex. 5 R. Factum est (ninth century). Text ed.: CAO IV 6715.

Olavus rex, mart, Iul. 29. LMLO OL21.

Ex. 27 A. Imperator grecus twelfth century. Transcribed from the fragment of a thirteenth century noted breviary, today attached to Stockholm, Riksarkivet, Smålands handlingar, 1551: 12:2 / Räkenskap för Rälla ladugård, 2A. (=Fr 22225 in the Medeltida Pergamentomslag-catalogue; the siglum in the Catalogus codicum mutilorum is: Br 269.) The fragment uses square notation with f-, c- and b-clefs on lines. This source was not part of the latest transcription of the office by Eyolf Østrem, The Office of Saint Olav: A Study in Chant Transmission (Uppsala, 2001). Compare his transcription on pp. 382–4.

Oswaldus rex, mart, Aug. 5. LMLO OS93.

Cf. David Hiley, ‘The Office Chants for St Oswald king of Northumbria and martyr’, in A Due: Musical Essays in Honour of John D. Bergsagel & Heinrich W. Schwab, ed. Ole Kongsted, Niels Krabbe, Michael Kube, Morten Michelsen, and Lisbeth Larsen (Copenhagen, 2008), 244–59.

Ex. 17 R. O regem V. Inter eleventh century. Transcription of the main part in Hiley, ‘The Office Chants for St Oswald’, 254.

Ex. 26 R. Rex sacer V. Ut C. eleventh century.

Responsories transcribed from Cambridge, Magdalene College, F.4.10, f. 261r and 259r.

Stephanus rex, conf, Sept. 2. LMLO ST31.

Ex. 19 R. Gloriosus 1190–1270. Music edition in Laszlo Dobszay, ed., Historia sancti Stephani regis 1190–1270 (Ottawa, 2010), 4–5.

Vincentius, mart, Ian. 22. CAO I 46; II 46.

Ex. 12 A. In cuius (eleventh century). Text ed.: CAO III 3217.

Wenceslaus dux, mart, Sept. 28. LMLO WE51.

Ex. 10 A. Signo crucis fourteenth century.

Text ed. Guido Maria Dreves (ed.), Historiae rhythmicae. Liturgische Reimofficien des Mittelalters, Erste Folge, Analecta hymnica, 5 (Leipzig 1889), 261.

About dating, see Dreves, Historiae, 263, and also Machilek et al., ‘“O felix lancea”’ 53.

Appendix 2 Index of chants cited

References

1 ‘Et dum in Ecclesia legitur, et cantantur fortia facta Machabaeorum, qui quamvis pro patriis legibus, tamen et pro suis heredibus et hereditatibus pugnaverunt; isti vero non pro sua, neque pro aliquo suorum, sed solummodo pro regno coelorum abierunt, et viriliter pugnaverunt, et vicerunt, adjuvante eos Domino.’ ‘Historia Peregrinorum euntium Jerusolymam ad liberandum sanctum sepulcrum de potestate ethnicorum’, Recueil des historiens des croisades, 3 Historiens occidentaux (Paris, 1866), 165–229, at 173. About the date of the Historia Peregrinorum (‘noch vor 1196’), see Chroust, Anton, Tageno, Ansbert und die Historia Peregrinorum. Drei kritische Untersuchungen zur Geschichte des Kreuzzuges Friedrichs I (Graz, 1892), 80, accessed as www.archive.org/stream/tagenoansbertun00chrogoog/tagenoansbertun00chrogoog_djvu.txtGoogle Scholar. See also Schreiner, Klaus, Märtyrer, Schlachtenhelfer, Friedenstifter: Krieg und Frieden im Spiegel mittelalterlicher und frühneuzeitlicher Heiligenverehrung (Opladen, 2000), 22, fn. 57CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Christoph Auffarth quotes this passage but ignores the role of ecclesiastical music in communicating the story of the Maccabees. See his ‘Die Makkabäer als Modell für die Kreuzfahrer. Usurpationen und Brüche in der Tradition eines jüdischen Heiligenideals. Ein religionswissenschaftlicher Versuch zur Kreuzzugseschatologie’, in Tradition und Translation: Zum Problem der interkulturellen Übersetzbarkeit religiöser Phänomene. Festschrift für Carsten Colpe zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. Christoph Elsas et al. (Berlin, 1994), 263–390, at 373, fn. 37.

2 On the position of the books of the Maccabees in the ecclesiastical canon, see Schreiner, Märtyrer, 17–19, and Dunbabin, Jean, ‘The Maccabees as Exemplars in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries’, in The Bible in the Medieval World: Essays in Memory of Beryl Smalley, ed. Walsh, Katherine and Wood, Diana (Oxford and New York, 1985), 31–41, at 31Google Scholar.

3 On medieval interpretations and uses of the Maccabees in general, see Auffarth, ‘Die Makkabäer als Modell’; Dunbabin, ‘The Maccabees as Exemplars’; and Keller, Hagen, ‘Machabaeorum pugnae. Zum Stellenwert eines biblischen Vorbilds in Widukinds Deutung der ottonischen Königsherrschaft’, in Iconologia sacra: Mythos, Bildkunst und Dichtung in der Religions- und Sozialgeschichte Alteuropas. Festschrift für Karl Hauck zum 75. Geburtstag, ed. Keller, Hagen and Staubach, Nikolaus (Berlin and New York, 1994), 417–37Google Scholar. See also Schreiner, Märtyrer, 30–7. The Teutonic Order regarded the Maccabees as model. See Green, Dennis H., The Millstätter Exodus: A Crusading Epic (Cambridge, 1966), 234Google Scholar, which reviews the literature.

4 Hughes, Andrew, Medieval Manuscripts for Mass and Office: A Guide to their Organization and Terminology (Toronto, 1982), 61, n. 416Google Scholar.

5 The Historia Macchabeorum of the summer temporale should not be confused with the feast of the Septem fratres Macchabei on 1 August, which commemorates the martyrdom of the seven brothers and their mother, reported in 2 Maccabees 7:1–42. See Schreiner, Märtyrer, 2–17. About the locally restricted cult of these martyrs, mainly in Cologne, see ibid., 41–9.

6 On the socio-political functions of saints, see Hankeln, Roman, ‘A Blasphemous Paradox? Approaches to Socio-political Aspects of Plainchant’, Political Plainchant? Music, Text and Historical Context of Medieval Saints' Offices, Institute of Mediæval Music, Musicological Studies 111, ed. Hankeln, Roman (Ottawa 2009,), 1–11, esp. 6–7 with further referencesGoogle Scholar.

7 See Hughes, Andrew, The Versified Office: Sources, Poetry, and Chants, 2 vols., The Institute of Mediæval Music, Musicological Studies 97, parts 1–2 (Lions Bay, BC, 2011)Google Scholar; see also Fassler, Margot E. and Baltzer, Rebecca A., eds., The Divine Office in the Latin Middle Ages. Methodology and Source Studies, Regional Developments, Hagiography Written in Honor of Professor Ruth Steiner (Oxford, 2000)Google Scholar; and Berschin, Walter and Hiley, David, eds., Die Offizien des Mittelalters. Dichtung und Musik (Tutzing, 1999)Google Scholar. The series ‘Historiae’ devoted to saints' offices from The Institute of Mediæval (Musicological Studies) has now reached its twenty-second volume.

8 This is true not only for the Old, but the New Testament. See Gilchrist, John, ‘The Papacy and War Against the “Saracenes” 795–1216’, The International Historical Review, 10 (1988), 174–97, at 187CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

9 For a useful summary about Old Testament attitudes to war, see Hess, Richard S., ‘War in the Hebrew Bible: An Overview’, in War in the Bible and Terrorism in the Twenty-first Century, ed. Hess, Richard S. and Martens, Elmer A. (Winona Lake, IN, 2008), 19–32Google Scholar. About the omnipresence of the topic of war in the Bible, see ibid., 19, which, however, emphasises a broadly anti-war attitude in the Old Testament (see esp. 32).

10 For an overview about the so-called imprecatory psalms, to cite an extreme example, see Hossfeld, Frank-Lothar, ‘Das göttliche Strafgericht in Feind- und Fluchpsalmen. Der Psalmenbeter zwischen eigener Ohnmacht und dem Schrei nach göttlicher Parteilichkeit’, in Krieg und Christentum: religiöse Gewalttheorien in der Kriegserfahrung des Westens, ed. Holzem, Andreas (Paderborn, 2009), 128–36Google Scholar. Cf. the treatment of the topic of peace in the psalms in Elmer A. Martens, ‘Toward Shalom: Absorbing the Violence’, in War in the Bible, 33–57, especially 36–7.

11 About the Old Testament image of God as a warrior deity, see (for example) Green, The Millstätter Exodus, 193 ff.

12 This article will employ following general abbreviations: A.=antiphon. CAO=René-Jean Hesbert, Corpus antiphonalium officii, 6 vols., Rerum ecclesiasticarum documenta, Ser. maior, 7–12 (Rome, 1963, 1965, 1968, 1970, 1975, 1979). Cid=Identification Number in the Cantus database at http://cantusdatabase.org/. Ps.=psalm. R.=responsory. V.=verse.

13 For bibliographical and liturgical information about this and the following examples, see Appendices 1 and 2.

14 Cf. Ps. 48:7 iuxta LXX, Biblia sacra iuxta vulgatam versionem, ed. Weber, Robertus, Gryson, Roger, et al. (Stuttgart, 1994), 828Google Scholar (hereafter Vulgata).

15 Ps. 58:12 iuxta Hebr., Vulgata, 841. Ps. 58,12 iuxta LXX, Vulgata, 840.

16 Cf. Esther, 13:15–17, Vulgata, 726.

17 Cf. 1 Machabees 3:58–9, Vulgata, 1441.

18 Cf. Ps. 2 iuxta LXX, verse 2, Vulgata, 770. See the interpretation of Ps. 2 in comparison with a related paragraph from the Apocalypse in Tobias Nicklas, ‘Der Krieg und die Apokalypse. Gedanken zu Offb 19, 11–21’, in Krieg und Christentum, 150–65, at 157–8.

19 See Machilek, Franz, Schlager, Karlheinz, Wohnhaas, Theodor, ‘“O felix lancea”: Beiträge zum Fest der Heiligen Lanze und der Nägel’, Jahrbuch des historischen Vereins für Mittelfranken, 92 (1984/5), 43–107, at 85Google Scholar.

20 Ibid., 52.

21 This text is compiled from several passages from the Apocalypse, namely Apoc. 8:1, Vulgata, 1889; Apoc. 12:7, Vulgata, 1893; Apoc. 5:11, Vulgata, 1887; and Apoc. 12:10, Vulgata, 1893.

22 See (for example) Baldwin, Robert, ‘‘I Slaughter Barbarians’: Triumph as a mode in Medieval Christian Art’, Konsthistorisk Tidskrift, 59 (1990), 225–42, at 225Google Scholar.

23 Schreiner writes in this context about a ‘Politisierung des Kreuzes’, Schreiner, Klaus, ‘Signa victricia. Heilige Zeichen in kriegerischen Konflikten des Mittelalters’, in Zeichen – Rituale – Werte: Internationales Kolloquium des Sonderforschungsbereichs 496 an der Westfälischen Wilhelms-Universität Münster, ed. Althoff, Gerd (Münster, 2004), 259–300, at 261Google Scholar.

24 Cf. Fontaine, Jacques, ed., Sulpice Sévère, Vie de Saint Martin, vol. 1 (Paris, 1967), 260: ‘crastina die … securus’Google Scholar.

25 Cf. Job 7:1, Vulgata, 737. See the overview in Evans, Michael, ‘An Illustrated Fragment of Peraldus's Summa of Vice: Harleian MS 3244’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 45 (1982), 14–68, at 17–19Google Scholar.

26 See A. Oramus te, CAO III, no. 4715.

27 Cf. Tim. 2:3–4, Vulgata, 1837. Eph 6:11, Vulgata, 1814. On the development of the term ‘miles Christi’ and its use in a secular context, see Wang, Andreas, Der ‘Miles Christianus’ im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert und seine mittelalterliche Tradition. Ein Beitrag zum Verhältnis von sprachlicher und graphischer Bildlichkeit (Frankfurt a.M., 1975), 21–37Google Scholar. On the negative attitude of the early Christian Church towards military service, and the opposition of ‘militia saecularis’ to the ‘militia Christi’, see Erdmann, Carl, Die Entstehung des Kreuzzugsgedankens (Stuttgart, 1936), 3, 13, 185Google Scholar; and Levison, Wilhelm, ‘Die mittelalterliche Lehre von den beiden Schwertern’, Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters, 9 (1951), 14–42, at 25Google Scholar.

28 ‘Christi ego miles sum: pugnare mihi non licet.’ Fontain, Sulpice, 260. The non-violent figure of St Martin is later transformed into a political saint and war patron. See Schreiner, Klaus, ‘Schutzherr, Schlachtenhelfer, Friedensstifter. Die Verehrung Martins von Tours in politischen Kontexten des Mittelalters’, Rottenburger Jahrbuch für Kirchengeschichte, 18 (1999), 89–110Google Scholar. See also Hoch, Adrian S., ‘St Martin of Tours: His Transformation into a Chivalric Hero and Franciscan Ideal’, Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, 50 (1987), 471–82Google Scholar.

29 See, for example, the R. Miles Christi gloriose, CAO IV, no. 7155.

30 Regarding this Augustinian concept of just war, see (for example) Johannes Brachtendorf, ‘Augustinus: Friedensethik und Friedenspolitik’, in Krieg und Christentum, 234–53, at 239, 242–3. War is legitimised in order to restore peace and order, and to protect the Christian faith. The high Middle Ages filled this legitimation more and more with offensive meaning. Even a spiritual personality like Catherine of Siena thought about war against non-believers as legitimate, see Schreiner, Märtyrer, 129–30.

31 The antiphon text is based on a passage from the passio ascribed to Eucherius, Bishop of Lyon: ‘Pugnavimus semper pro iustitia, pro pietate, pro innocentium salute.’ See the ‘Passio Acaunensium martyrum auctore Eucherio episcopo Lugdunensi’, in Passiones vitaeque sanctorum aevi Merovingici et antiquiorum aliquot, Krusch, Bruno, ed., Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Scriptorum Rerum Merovingicarum 3 (Hannover 1896), 20–41Google Scholar, at 36, lines 14–15 (hereafter Krusch, Passio).

32 The text is taken word for word from the fifth-century passio. See Krusch, Passio, 36, lines 14–15.

33 ‘numquam relictae militiae probra sustinui, eo quod honestum mihi esset pro patria mori’ from Abbo, Life of St Edmund, in Three Lives of English Saints, Winterbottom, Michael, ed. (Toronto, 1972), 65–87Google Scholar, at 75, lines 26–7 (hereafter Abbo). Erdmann, Die Entstehung des Kreuzzugsgedankens, 29, mentions the passage from Abbo's vita as an example of the taking over of secular warrior ethics (‘weltliche Kriegerethik’) into the ideas of martyrdom and sanctity. ‘super mel et favum’, Ps. 18:11, Vulgata, 790.

34 The continuation after the verse is remarkable. Before the verse, the army is the main subject of the repetendum, afterward Oswald. The king is shown as primus inter pares among his soldiers.

35 The same is true of the earlier martyrologies and (for example) Alcuin, 's ‘Versus de patribus regibus et sanctis Euboricensis ecclesiae’, in Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, vol. 1, Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Poetarum Latinorum Medii Aevi 1, ed. Dümmler, Ernst (Berlin, 1881), 169–206Google Scholar. See also Gunn, Victoria A., ‘Bede and the Martyrdom of St Oswald’, in Martyrs and Martyrologies: Papers Read at the 1992 Summer Meeting and the 1993 Winter Meeting of the Ecclesiastical History Society, ed. Wood, Diana (Oxford, 1993), 57–66Google Scholar. On the dating, see Venerabilis Bedae historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum: textum secundum editionem, quam paraverant B. Colgrave et R.A.B. Mynors / Beda der Ehrwürdige, Kirchengeschichte des englischen Volkes, ed. Spitzbart, Günter (Darmstadt, 1982), 2–3Google Scholar.

36 Cf. Hare, Kent G., ‘Heroes, Saints, and Martyrs: Holy Kingship from Bede to Aelfric’, A Journal of Early Medieval Northwestern Europe, 9 (2006), §22 (accessed at www.heroicage.org/issues/9/hare.html, 22 September 2011)Google Scholar.

37 On Ælfric see Hare, ‘Heroes’, §22. See also ‘Vita auctore D. Drogone monacho’, in Acta Sanctorum Augusti, … Tomus II …, ed. Sollerius, Joannes Baptistaet al. (Antwerp, 1735, accessed at http://acta.chadwyck.co.uk/ 22 September 2011), 94–103, at 94, 99Google Scholar. See also Graus, František, Volk, Herrscher und Heiliger im Reich der Merowinger; Studien zur Hagiographie der Merowingerzeit (Prague, 1965), 419Google Scholar. About Drogo, see Bayart, Paul, Les Offices de Saint Winnoc et de Saint Oswald d'après le manuscrit 14 de la Bibliothèque de Bergues (Lille, Paris and Lyon, 1926), esp. 33Google Scholar.

38 See Herbers, Klaus, ‘Politik und Heiligenverehrung auf der Iberischen Halbinsel: Die Entwicklung des “politischen Jakobus”’, Politik und Heiligenverehrung im Hochmittelalter, ed. Peterson, Jürgen (Sigmaringen, 1994), 177–275, at 237Google Scholar, and fn. 310 for further literature.

39 In a late thirteenth-century version of St Eric's office, his mission of the Finns is mentioned in the same breath with his royal office as legislator: ‘He improved the laws of Sweden and with his sword forced heathen peoples to serve Christ. Alleluia’ (‘Correxit Swecie leges, servire coegit Christo perfidie gentes, quas ense subegit, alleluia’), St Eriks hystoria, ed. Nilsson, Ann-Marie (Stockholm, 1999), 50 (English trans., p. 138)Google Scholar. About the date, see ibid., 19. See also the following Psalm, Domine in virtute.

40 The expression is based on the report of the feast in Luke 14:16–24 ‘et compelle intrare, ut impleatur domus mea’ (‘force them to come in’). See Maier, Hans, ‘“Compelle intrare”: Rechtfertigungsgründe für die Anwendung von Gewalt zum Schutz und zur Ausbreitung des Glaubens in der Theologie des abendländischen Christentums’, in Heilige Kriege: religiöse Begründungen militärischer Gewaltanwendung: Judentum, Christentum und Islam im Vergleich, ed. Schreiner, Klaus and Müller-Luckner, Elisabeth (München, 2008), 55–69, at 57–9Google Scholar. See also Riley-Smith, Jonathan, ‘Crusading as an Act of Love’, History, 65 (1980), 177–92, at 186–7CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

41 About violence committed by saints, see (for example) Geary, Patrick J., Living with the Dead in the Middle Ages (Ithaca, NY, 1994), 116Google Scholar. See also chapter 4, ‘La violence sacrée des saints’ in Flori, Jean, La guerre sainte: la formation de l'idée de croisade dans l'Occident chrétien (Paris, 2001), 101–24Google Scholar. About the role of saints as aids in battles in Spain, see O'Callaghan, Joseph F., Reconquest and Crusade in Medieval Spain (Philadelphia, 2003), 193–9Google Scholar, which emphasises that saintly participation in battle is not mentioned before the twelfth century (p. 199). Erdmann remarks that the idea that saints participate actively in the defence of their churches and clerics was already known at the beginning of the Middle Ages, but it receives special prominence during the conflicts with non-Christians in the ninth and tenth centuries. Erdmann, Die Entstehung des Kreuzzugsgedankens, 23, as well as his examples 80f. and 115.

42 Compare the passage in Abbo, 83, lines 7–9, 21–4. The incursion, described in both the vita and the antiphons, is depicted in a famous cycle of illuminations in New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, Ms. 736, fol. 18v, see http://utu.morganlibrary.org/medren/single_image2.cfm?imagename=m736.018v.jpg&page=ICA000077570.

43 On this debate see Roman Hankeln, ‘St. Olav's Augustine-responsories: contrafactum technique and political message’, in Political Plainchant?, 171–99, at 176–9.

44 Jonsson, Ritva and Treitler, Leo, ‘Medieval Music and Language: A Reconsideration of the Relationship’, Studies in the History of Music, 1: Music and Language (New York, 1983), 1–23, at 22Google Scholar.

45 In this context, see the following contributions concerning the text-music-relationship: Gunilla Björkvall and Andreas Haug, ‘Text und Musik im Trinitätsoffizium Stephans von Lüttich. Beobachtungen und Überlegungen aus mittellateinischer und musikhistorischer Sicht’, in Die Offizien, 1–24; Björkvall and Haug, ‘Performing Latin Verse: Text and Music in Early Medieval Versified Offices’, in The Divine Office, 278–99. The issue was already raised in Wagner, Peter, Einführung in die Gregorianischen Melodien: Ein Handbuch der Choralwissenschaft. Dritter Teil: Gregorianische Formenlehre: Eine choralische Stilkunde (Leipzig 1921, repr. Hildesheim/Wiesbaden 1962), 284–5Google Scholar.

46 According to the office texts, Oswald's resistance was against savage hordes, barbarians. Oswald's opponent, Caedwalla, king of the Britons, was in fact baptised although Bede characterised him as a godless tyrant. See Spitzbart, Bede, 208, ch. III, 1, and the commentary of Wallace-Hadrill, J.M., Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People: A Historical Commentary (Oxford, 1988), 84Google Scholar.

47 On the style of the Oswald offices, see Hiley, David, ‘The Office Chants for St Oswald King of Northumbria and Martyr’, in Musical Essays in Honour of John D. Bergsagel & Heinrich W. Schwab, Danish Humanist Texts and Studies 37, ed. Kongsted, Ole, Krabbe, Niels, Kube, Michael, Michelsen, Morten and Larsen, Lisbeth (Copenhagen, 2008), 251–6Google Scholar.

48 Compare the text-transcription in Hiley, ‘The Office Chants’, 244–59, at 256. Cambridge, Magdalen College, F.4.10 (thirteenth century), the source used for the transcription here, gives (on f. 259r) the word ‘senas’ instead of ‘sevas’, which seems to be a scribal error. In the two other musical sources Hiley mentions, namely Cambridge, Trinity College O.3.55 (twelfth century) f. B1, and Dijon, Bibliothèque Municipale 657 (c.1200), f. 45v, the word ‘seuas’ appears; Hiley's transcription gives ‘sevas’.

49 On this modern concept of tonality, see David Hiley, ‘Das Wolfgang-Offizium des Hermannus Contractus. Zum Wechselspiel von Modustheorie und Gesangspraxis in der Mitte des 11. Jahrhunderts’, in Die Offizien, 129–42, at 135–8. See also Hiley, ‘The Office Chants’, 254–5 concerning the tonal structure of two other Oswaldresponsories.

50 Compare the following with the observations made on hexameter settings in Stephen of Liége's office in honour St Lambert in Björkvall and Haug, ‘Performing Latin Verse’, 286–92.

51 Hiley, ‘The Office Chants’, 256, reports that the reference to Constantine's victory in this chant and a responsory from the Flemish Oswald office was not part of the earlier Oswald literature (Bede, Reginald, Drogo). The simile is also absent in Alcuin's Versibus de patribus regibus et sanctis Euboricensis ecclesiae, mentioned above. Thus, unless new evidence turns up, it can be assumed that the explicit link to Constantine was introduced for the first time in these historiae chants.

52 On this zigzag shape as a symptom of modern style, see Hankeln, Roman, ‘Old and New in Medieval Chant: Finding Methods of Investigating an Unknown Region’, in A Due: Musical Essays in Honour of John D. Bergsagol and Heinrich W. Schwab (Copenhagen, 2008), 161–80, at 174–5 and 178–80Google Scholar.

53 For additional examples of the increased intensity of text–music interaction of this later style, see Nils Holger Petersen's analysis of the responsories from the twelfth-century Canute Lavard historia in the present volume. See also Hankeln, Roman, ‘Exulta civitas Ratisbona!… – Reflexe politisch-sozialer Identität in den Offiziumsgesängen zur Ehre der Regensburger Stadtpatrone und ihr mittelalterlicher europäischer Kontext’, in Städtische Kulte im Mittelalter, ed. Ehrich, Susanne and Oberste, Jörg (Regensburg 2010), 217–35, at 227–34Google Scholar; and Hankeln, , ‘Schwerter und Pflugscharen: Zum Reflex des Geschichtlichen in der liturgischen Einstimmigkeit des Mittelalters’, in Musik des Mittelalters und der Renaissance, Festschrift Klaus-Jürgen Sachs zum 80. Geburtstag, ed. Kleinertz, Rainer, Flamm, Christoph and Frobenius, Wolf, Studien zur Geschichte der Musiktheorie 8 (Hildesheim, 2010), 93–114, at 105–11Google Scholar.

54 For another example see Hankeln, ‘Schwerter und Pflugscharen’, 98–105. On the relevance of contrafactum technique in a related twelfth-century historia from Nidaros, see Heinzer, Felix, ‘Zum Text des Offiziums’, in The Nidaros Office of the Holy Blood. Liturgical Music in Medieval Norway, ed. Attinger, Gisela and Haug, Andreas (Trondheim, 2004), 90–3Google Scholar.

55 Cf. Metcalfe, Frederick, ed., Passio et miracula Beati Olavi: Edited From a Twelfth-century Manuscript in the Library of Corpus Christi College (Oxford, 1881), 77Google Scholar.

56 This is a recent hypothesis by Berschin, Walter; see his ‘<Walter von Arrouaise?>, Historia S. Augustini. Das Augustinus-Offizium des XII. Jahrhunderts’, in idem, Mittellateinische Studien, vol. 2 (Heidelberg, 2010), 313–24, at 324Google Scholar.

57 Antiphonale sacrosanctae Romanae ecclesiae pro diurnis horis (Rome, 1912), 7. Compare Luke 1:68–79, Vulgata, 1608.

58 www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/ (accessed 15 September 2011).

59 See ‘Acta alia, sive secunda vitae pars … auctore S. Possidio’, Acta Sanctorum Augusti …, Tomus VI, ed. Pinius, Joanneset al. (Antwerp, 1743), 247–441Google Scholar, at cap. 65, col. 439E (hereafter AASS Aug. VI). For an English translation, see Possidius, , ‘The Life of Saint Augustine’, trans. Hoare, F.R., in Soldiers of Christ. Saints and Saints' Lives from late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, ed. Noble, Thomas F.X. and Head, Thomas (University Park, PA, 1995), 31–73, at 63Google Scholar.

60 Possidius, ‘The Life of Saint Augustine’, 63. ‘Nec suum sane Dominus Famulum fructu suæ precis fraudavit. Nam et sibi ipsi, et eidem civitati, quod lacrymosis depoposcit precibus, in tempore impetravit.’ AASS Aug. VI, col. 439E–F.

61 See Klaus Schreiner, ‘Einführung’, in Heilige Kriege, vii–xxiii, at xxiii. On establishing of identity through delimitation as an act of violence, Martens, ‘Toward Shalom’, 41.

62 Evans, ‘An Illustrated Fragment of Peraldus's Summa of Vice Peraldus, 19 ff. (for example), points out the significance of the imagery of spiritual warfare for manuals of chivalry.

63 Cf. Riley-Smith, Jonathan, The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading (London, 1986, repr. 2009), 83Google Scholar.

64 After the ‘re-invention’ of the true cross in 1099, the relic was regularly carried into battle until it disappeared in the battle of Hattin in 1187. See Riley-Smith, The First Crusade and the Idea of Crusading, 98. On the role of the cross in medieval contexts of war, also see Schreiner, ‘Signa victricia. Heilige Zeichen’, 261–72; and Flori, La guerre sainte, 147–52. On images of the Archangel Michael on the field standards of Henry I and Otto I during their operations against the Hungarians, and their significance for a new attitude towards war, see Erdmann, Die Entstehung des Kreuzzugsgedankens, 18.

65 ‘et visibiliter mittente eis in adjutorium sanctos suos bellatores, quorum animae in coelo jam collocatae erant, videlicet Mercurium multotiens, aliquando Georgium, necnon et interdum Theodorum, aliquando totos tres cum suis dealbatis exercitibus, videntibus non solum Christi militibus, sed etiam ipsis inimicis paganis; unde exterrebantur et in fugam convertebantur.’ Historia Peregrinorum, 173. About saints as helpers in crusade battles, see (for example) Auffarth, ‘Die Makkabäer als Modell’, 371.

66 See (for example) the ‘Exkurs 1. Benediktionen für Kriegszeiten, für Waffen und Ritter’ in Erdmann, Die Entstehung des Kreuzzugsgedankens, 326–35. See also Tellenbach, Gerd, Römischer und christlicher Reichsgedanke in der Liturgie des frühen Mittelalters (Heidelberg, 1934), 52–71Google Scholar.

67 See the texts for various blessings of armour and knight in Franz, Adolph, Die kirchlichen Benediktionen im Mittelalter, 2 vols. (Freiburg, 1909; repr. Graz 1960), II:293–7Google Scholar. The services employ the A. Speciosus forma, CAO III, no. 4989, A. Scuto circumdabit (not found in CAO or the Cantus database), and a number of related psalms. The A. Per signum crucis (CAO III, no. 4264) was sung during a ceremony with the rubric ‘Modum signum crucis affigendi’ given after a Meissen source from 1512 (Franz, Die kirchlichen Benediktionen, 306).

68 See Jackson, Richard A., ed., Ordines coronationis Franciae: Texts and Ordines for the Coronation of Frankish and French Kings and Queens in the Middle Ages, 2 vols. (University Park, PA, 1995, 2000), vol. 1, Ordo XV (c.980), no. 68Google Scholar. This benediction was transmitted at the end of some Frankish and French coronation ordines. Compare the relevant formulae of Ordo XXIIA (1250–70), no. 69, and Ordo XXIII (1364), no. 108. Here the banner was that of St Denis, later associated with the famous ‘Oriflamme’. About it, see Schreiner, ‘Signa victricia. Heilige Zeichen’, 282–3. Erdmann also gives this text, together with another benediction of a standard (Erdmann, Die Entstehung des Kreuzzugsgedankens, 331–3).

69 About the influence of Old Testament models on medieval historiography, see (for example) Green, The Millstätter Exodus, 203 ff., especially 228–95.

70 Bliese, John R.E., ‘Rhetoric and Morale: A Study of Battle Orations from the Central Middle Ages’, Journal of Medieval History, 15 (1989), 201–26Google Scholar.

71 As part of a religious cult, plainchant may be interpreted as a reflection of political history. See Geary, Living with the Dead in the Middle Ages, 116–24, at 124: ‘Medieval religion was an expression of a perception of the world’ (from Chapter 6, ‘Coercion of saints in medieval religious practice’).

72 About Innocent's quotation and the employment of the Maccabees in the crusade writings of other popes, see Gilchrist, John, ‘The Lord's War as the Proving Ground of Faith: Pope Innocent III and the Propagation of Violence (1198–1216)’, in Crusaders and Muslims in Twelfth-Century Syria, ed. Shatzmiller, Maya (Leiden, 1993), 65–83, at 75Google Scholar, and fn. 47.

Figure 0

Ex. 1 R. Rex sacer Oswaldus (St Oswald's Office, England, eleventh century).

Figure 1

Ex. 2aEx. 2a A. Imperator grecus (St Olav's Office, 1160–80).

Figure 2

Ex. 2aEx. 2b A. In diebus illis (St Augustine's Office, twelfth century, first half).