The motet cycles known as motetti missales are among the most intriguing repertoires of late-fifteenth-century polyphony. This series features a new critical edition of the six cycles by Loyset Compère, Gaspar van Weerbeke, and Franchinus Gaffurius included in the Milanese Libroni and of the two anonymous cycles transmitted in the Leopold Codex (Munich MS 3154). For the first time this corpus is presented with uniform editorial criteria, facilitating the comparison of mensural choices and other compositional strategies. Furthermore, the introduction of each volume thematizes the peculiar characteristics of each cycle, in terms of textual choices, use of preexisting material, and musical design, allowing for a new assessment of the motetti missales that goes beyond the homogenizing stereotypes of earlier literature and accounts for the individual contributions of the various composers. The editors’ insight in this repertoire is the result of two interdisciplinary research projects financed by the Swiss National Fund and carried out at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in 2014–21. The anonymous motet cycle Ave, Domine Iesu Christe, transmitted uniquely in Librone 1 of the Milanese Libroni, consists of eight motets for four and five voices on Christological texts; the first four, each of which begins with the words “Ave, Domine Iesu Christe,” take their text from a prayer to Christ popular in contemporary prayer books. Despite the anonymous transmission, several notable stylistic features of the cycle—including use of the technique of “split tenors”—suggest a possible attribution to Loyset Compère (ca. 1450–1518). All eight motets bear loco rubrics indicating their placement in the mass liturgy.

How did Catholicism sound in the early modern period? What kinds of sonic cultures developed within the diverse and dynamic matrix of early modern Catholicism? And what do we learn about early modern Catholicism by attending to its sonic manifestations? Editors Daniele V. Filippi and Michael Noone have brought together a variety of studies — ranging from processional culture in Bavaria to Roman confraternities, and catechetical praxis in popular missions — that share an emphasis on the many and varied modalities and meanings of sonic experience in early modern Catholic life. Audio samples illustrating selected chapters are available at the following address: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.5311099. Contributors are: Egberto Bermúdez, Jane A. Bernstein, Xavier Bisaro, Andrew Cichy, Daniele V. Filippi, Alexander J. Fisher, Marco Gozzi, Robert L. Kendrick, Tess Knighton, Ignazio Macchiarella, Margaret Murata, John W. O’Malley, S.J., Noel O’Regan, Anne Piéjus, and Colleen Reardon.

First published in 2004, Medieval Italy: An Encyclopedia provides an introduction to the many and diverse facets of Italian civilization from the late Roman empire to the end of the fourteenth century. It presents in two volumes articles on a wide range of topics including history, literature, art, music, urban development, commerce and economics, social and political institutions, religion and hagiography, philosophy and science. This illustrated, A-Z reference is a cross-disciplinary resource and will be of key interest not only to students and scholars of history but also to those studying a range of subjects, as well as the general reader.

A study of a religious organization for youths (aged 13-14) founded in Florence in 1411 that is firmly grounded on archival and contemporary documents, and covers a variety of fields of interest.

This book focuses on the public life of the ancien regime over the course of more than 300 years, from the late fifteenth century to the French Revolution. Not merely a narrative of that crowded history, it offers both a reconstruction and an analysis of a variety of religious and cultural movements, from the Renaissance and the Wars of Religion to the Counter-Reformation and the Enlightenment, within the social and political context of Toulouse, a regional capital and a city with a strong local tradition. Professor Schneider takes up a wide range of early modern topics: popular culture, religious riots, municipal government, lay piety, and spiritual kinship, and he also treats learned academies, poor relief, social conflict, civic festivals, Jansenism, and urbanism. He discovers that despite the formation of a new elite in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries—an elite composed of powerful royal magistrates attached to the Parlement of Toulouse and wealthy pastel merchants—the cultural and social ties binding this elite to the urban populace persisted, and the city's public life maintained its local character. Schneider shows that in the late seventeenth century, however, these "vertical" ties began to break down; elites began to turn away from local concerns, and Toulouse's public life was fundamentally transformed. He points to several factors influencing this transformation: the local effects of absolutism, the appeal of Parisian culture and academic life, and the increased social tensions between the prosperous and the poor. By the eighteenth century, Toulouse, once considered a municipal republic, had become a cosmopolitan city. Relating developments in Toulouse to changes occurring elsewhere in France, this book heightens our understanding of the complex cultural ramifications of the rise of the increasingly centralized, absolutist state.

Listening to Confraternities offers new insight into the contribution of these mixed social groups to the soundscape of early modern European cities and the impact of the sounds and musics generated by their devotional activities on those who heard them.