Skip to content
IUScholarWorks Journals
11.04.21, Kelly and Mugmon, Ambrosiana at Harvard

11.04.21, Kelly and Mugmon, Ambrosiana at Harvard


Ambrosian or Milanese chant refers to the musical tradition of the Archdiocese of Milan, Italy, from the time of Saint Ambrose in the fourth century to the present day. Although Ambrosian chant throughout its history had many points of contact with Gregorian chant and was strongly influenced by it, especially in the Carolingian period, this musical tradition remains a distinct phenomenon that accompanies the rites and ceremonies of the Milanese church to this day. Although research on Gregorian chant has been prolific in the last half century, Ambrosian chant, except for the work of very few scholars, has been relatively neglected. In October 2007, Harvard University sponsored a conference on Ambrosian chant with special reference to three manuscripts of that chant housed in Harvard's Houghton Library. The music faculty at Harvard is to be commended for bringing the need for such research again to the fore and for publishing the papers of that conference. The editing by Kelly and Mugmon is meticulous and the editors are generous in the large number of helpful illustrations they provide.

Medieval manuscripts of Ambrosian or Milanese chant are divided into two classes: winter antiphoners (pars hiemalis) and summer antiphoners (pars aestiva). The first contains the pieces for both the Mass and the Office from the feast of St. Martin (November 11) until the end of the Holy Saturday vigil; and the second or summer volume, the feasts from Easter Sunday to the third week of October. The three Harvard manuscripts of Ambrosian chant are: 1) Houghton Library MS Type 299, twenty folios from a summer manuscript written in the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century; 2) Houghton MS Typ 388, a twelfth-century winter antiphoner, and one of the earliest complete manuscripts of Ambrosian chant in existence; 3) Houghton Library MS Typ 389, eighty-three folios of a summer manuscript from the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century. Scholars of Gregorian chant might find the two manuscripts from the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century too late to be of interest, but students of Ambrosian chant will find them valuable. The first fully notated manuscripts of Ambrosian chant come from the twelfth century, very late compared to their Gregorian counterparts. Since the area where Ambrosian chant was sung is a small and contained one, i.e., Milan and its environs, there is more consistency in the repertoire used and more conformity in the copying of manuscripts and thus in passing on the musical and liturgical traditions.

There are nine essays in the book: two studies of the Houghton manuscripts, three on topics that use these manuscripts but go beyond them, and four essays on other aspects of Ambrosian chant not necessarily specific to these manuscripts.

Jessica Berenbeim and Matthias Rüder in "Milanese Chant in the Monastery?" show convincingly that the twenty folios of Houghton MS Typ 299 belonged to a larger manuscript now found in the city of Gallarate in the Archivio di Santa Maria Assunta. In addition, they demonstrate this manuscript's relationship to one found in Novara in Northern Italy because of a similar liturgical and musical makeup. What is unique about these manuscripts is that they are "hybrids," i.e., they contain a mixture of Ambrosian and monastic elements that seem juxtaposed. That raises the question of what kind of liturgy the Benedictine monasteries in the city of Milan and the region around it had been using in previous centuries. Since there is evidence as far back as the last half of the eighth century for the existence of important Benedictine monasteries in Milan, the questions raised by MS Typ 299 are not insignificant.

Matthew Mugmon, in "Long-lost Siblings? Houghton's Summer Manuscript and its Possible Counterpart?" treats of Houghton MS Lat 389, the eighty-four folios from the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century, and relates this manuscript to one found in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana from the same period, MS M 99 sup., also a summer volume. He judges they were both written by the same scribe. His study points out the need for a systematic catalog of Ambrosian Chant manuscripts and their interrelationship.

Three articles deal with larger questions about Ambrosian chant and its transmission. The first, by Anna Zayaruznaya, "In Defense of Green Lines, or the Notation of B-flat in Early Ambrosian Manuscripts," is an intriguing and informative essay. The author deals with Houghton MS lat 388 but only from the point of view of the addition of red lines in it (or green in other twelfth-century Ambrosian chant manuscripts) to indicate the B-flat. Her indisputable conclusion--contrary to the generally held view--is that these lines were inserted when the manuscripts were first notated and lays to rest the theory they were added by later hands.

Sasha Seim in "The Making and Breaking of Restrictive Chants: A Closer Look at the Melodiae of Ambrosian Chant" contributes to an understanding of the extremely long melismas that can occur in Ambrosian chant. She notes, for example, that these melismas progress mostly by stepwise movement, suggesting, I would say, ornamentation rather than equal note value and equal melodic importance. Into that movement, however, she points out the role of melodic intervals when they occur and especially double notes that indicate a point of emphasis or landing. Further studies of this sort will be needed for scholars to become attuned to how these and other long melismas must have been sung and force a new approach to chant performance practice.

In a solid essay, "Responsory Verse Formulae in the Ambrosian Winter Repertory," John McKay uses the Houghton manuscripts to examine the winter responsories and especially the formulae used in the verses.

Four essays take the occasion of the Harvard Conference to enlarge the general research on Ambrosian chant, some looking back to the period before the manuscripts were written, others expanding the scope by looking forward to even latter manifestations of this chant.

Thomas Forrest Kelley in his contribution, "The Notation of Ambrosian Chant in the Eleventh Century," uses his vast knowledge of Beneventan chant to point out the existence of Ambrosian chant pieces in Beneventan Gregorian manuscripts already in the eleventh century, that is, before the complete Ambrosian repertoire was written down in the twelfth century. He thus raises the question of whether there was already some kind of notation used by the Milanese before the complete manuscripts came into being. Since there are other Ambrosian pieces in eleventh-century Gregorian manuscripts in Northern Italy, one could speculate that the Milanese scribes, on request from churches celebrating feasts of Milanese saints, used Gregorian chant notation to share these melodies with cantors of the Gregorian tradition. I cannot imagine that for two centuries the Milanese cantors were not aware of the neumatic notation being used so commonly in the territories that surrounded them.

Angelo Rusconi's essay "Ambrosian Chant: New Manuscripts and New Problems" points out the trove of later Ambrosian manuscripts from the Renaissance and Baroque periods and the need for a deeper study of these later modifications. It would be of special interest to know the effects that the Council of Trent had on Ambrosian chant. The preoccupation of the bishops with the intelligibility of the text when sung resulted in the Ratisbonne version of Gregorian chant that held sway till the Solesmes ones were promulgated in the 1930s. What of Ambrosian chant?

Michel Huglo, the eminent chant scholar from whom we all have learned so much, presented a paper on "Psalmody in the Ambrosian Rite: Observations on Liturgy and Music." This is a rich article that, at first glance, might seem disjunct. He begins by stating that Ambrose must be credited with introducing a new way of rendering the psalms by having a soloist sing the verses and the people chant a short refrain or responsory after each verse. Although there is much disagreement among scholars about Ambrose's contribution, I believe Huglo's interpretation of those early texts is a convincing one.

He then points out the existence of three psalters of Milanese origin: Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 343 (third quarter of the ninth century) and two later psalters from the Vatican Library: Vat. lat. 82 and Vat. lat. 83. They contain all 150 psalms divided into three groups of fifty and then broken into subgroups of ten psalms, with a oration after each psalm. The nine Canticles from the Old Testament recited in the Ambrosian and almost all Byzantine liturgies and then an Ambrosian hymnary follow. Drawing on his vast knowledge of pre-Carolingian sources, Huglo traces this division back to the time of Augustine and notes its persistence in pre-Carolingian times in the West. He sees this division as the basis for the cursus of psalmody recited in Milan on weekdays. This cursus arranges psalms one to 108 consecutively at the Morning Hour Monday through Friday over two weeks. Saturday and Sunday were excluded and used only canticles. The remaining psalms (109-150) were sung as in the Roman Rite at Vespers over all seven days with the same psalms repeated each week.

There is no doubt that this early use of the psalter divided into three groups of fifty psalms was known to the Milanese and used in Milan in the Carolingian period. It was certainly the starting point for the way they divided up the psalms from one to 108 over ten days. But the pre-Carolingian tradition cannot account for the peculiarities of this division of the week-day cursus. Such an arrangement over two weeks is not traditional. The subdivision into tens becomes lost at the beginning and the end of the arrangement; Saturdays and Sundays are not included in the recitation but keep an old tradition of using only canticles; the remaining psalms (109-150) are extended over seven days, not five, on a one-week cycle. This is an extraordinarily creative arrangement of the Psalter that has no precedent and that many Milanese scholars judge, I feel rightly, comes from the Carolingian reform movement. Many of these scholars considered the liturgical tradition at Milan in pre-Carolingian times a "cathedral" one, that is, one in which the people were expected to participate and thus where the pensum was shorter, without the monastic concern to recite all the psalms consecutively.

Huglo also does not mention the thesis of the German scholars of Maria Laach that these psalters were used for the vigils of saints. A group of the cantors from the Cathedral in Milan would go on the day before the feast to a church where the saint was especially venerated and sing a form of ancient vigils consisting of the complete psalter and the nine canticles. These scholars point out that examples of this monastic tradition for vigils can be found before the Carolingian period, especially in Jerusalem.

There are too many other stimulating ideas in Michel Huglo's article to do justice to them all here. I can only express my gratitude to him and refer the reader to the article.

A special word of appreciation must be extended to Professor Terrence Bailey. His contributions to the study of Ambrosian chant through the last decades stand alone in breath and extent. One cannot do research in the field without taking into account the work he has accomplished. In his essay here, "Christmas Masses in the Ambrosian Liturgy," he notes that in the Carolingian period the Christmas liturgy in Milan, which previously had only one Mass, was enlarged with two other Masses, one at midnight and one at dawn, as in the Roman rite. He rightly notes that these two new Masses were not formed by adapting Gregorian models but by "cobbling" together pieces from the Ambrosian repertory regardless of their previous function. He finds that dating their introduction into the Ambrosian rite is more difficult. I might call his attention to early Sacramentaries from the late ninth and early tenth centuries that provide orations and sometimes readings. They usually include one or two of the newly introduced Masses for Christmas. In his extensive writings, Bailey is well aware of the large number of additions to the Ambrosian rite made during the Carolingian period, most often using pieces with Gregorian parallels.

Finally, the impression and hope one receives at the end of reading these nine essays is that this book will stimulate a renewed interest in Ambrosian chant research. For this impetus all chant scholars should be grateful.