The nature and classification of Traditional Religious Songs in Irish.

Abstract

INTRODUCTION In the earlier sources of ecclesiasticalliterature, the scanty details of early Irish chant are conveyed primarily through the lives of the saints. From these details it is difficult to discuss the precise musical nature of the chant. However, it is possible to state that church chant was an integral part of rnonastic life from the time of St Patrick. The type of chant in use at this time would appear to have been a form of Gallican chant which gave way to the more ornate, intricate Roman chant in the twelfth century. With the official establishment of the Anglo-Roman liturgy in 1172, the old Irish liturgy was suppressed. From a study of the texts of two seventh-century hymns, Aloys Fleischmann discusses their possible musical formo The first hymn, Sen Dé, written probably in the late seventh century, is irregular from the point of view of metre, rhyme and stress. The second seventh-century hymn, Celebra Juda by St Cummain, shows a typically Irish structure with end rhymes, and an interesting feature is the alleluia refrain sung after every two lines, suggesting a form of litany with a recurring melodic formula. The repetition of rhe alleluia after each verse is a device also found in two hymns of the seventh-century Bangor Antiphonary. The Antiphonary of Bangor -an antiphonary written between 680 and 691 at the monastery of Bangor, Co. Down-contains the only remnants of that era of chant prior to the Romanizing movement. Of the rwelve hymns in this antiphonary, eight appear to be peculiarly Irish since they do not appear in any other source. The hymn Sancti ~nite «probably composed in the 6th century» is one of rhese to be discussed in this paper. The Liber Hymnorum is a twelfth-century literary source of oId Irish and HibernoLatin hymns. lt also refers to the hymn Sancte ~nite with a note on its history in the Preface, and two other hymns in this collection refer specifically to psalmody and hymn-singing. lt is evident that this early chant was accompanied by a small eighr-stringed harp which was hung from the girdle. The latest reference to this practice was made in the twelfth century by Giraldus Carnbrens is, who describes the clerics devoutly playing on their harps. In the later sources of ecclesiasticalliterature, a closer insight into the musical nature of this early chant is given through the musicoliturgical MSS, the earliest being The Drummond Missal of the eleventh century. This sole instance of the earliest type of inflection marks and neumes, ... show]s] little trace of an indigenous mode of music-writing, being to a great extent reflections of the mode used contemporaneously in England or in France as the case rnight be. Later examples of neumes are, on the whole, confined to the-extant liturgical books of the various orders which carne to settle in Ireland from the twelfth century onwards. The fourteenth-century Red Book ofOssory contains, among various statutes and constitutions, fif. teen pages of sixty Latin religious verses called Cantilenae. These verses, in honour of the Holy Spirit, the Virgin Mary and Christ, were written by Bishop Ledrede who came from London to Ossory in 1317. Some eight of these bear a popular tune title to which they were sung. Six of the titles are