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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2016
The Christmas octave in the Sarum rite included the singing of prosae on Christmas Day and on the three days following Christmas – the feasts of St Stephen, St John the Evangelist and the Holy Innocents. After the Vespers preceding each of these three days, a procession was made to an appropriate altar in the church, during which a responsory was sung with its prosa and wordless melismas after each prosa verse, with two responsory prosae based upon the melody from Christmas. These processions featured, in turn, the deacons, the priests and the choirboys, vested in silken copes and carrying lighted candles, going to the altar of St Stephen, of St Peter and All Apostles, and of Trinity and All Saints (the Lady Chapel). Rubrics indicate their special character, especially for St Stephen, described as solemnitas diaconorum, but also for all three, described as being for the sake of deacons, priests and choirboys in turn. Processions to altars in Salisbury Cathedral were strictly limited to one each year; these processions took up those three altars, which then had no further processions on their proper days. The processions had been established during the initial building-phases of the cathedral, when only these three altars existed. This exceptional series of processions emphasised the distinct importance of the Christmas octave and honoured the hierarchy of the choir, who served the liturgy throughout the year.
1 For a comprehensive account of the processions of the Sarum Rite, see Bailey, Terence, The Processions of Sarum and the Western Church, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Studies and Texts 21 (Toronto, 1971); for the processions at Vespers, see 18–19, 48–51Google Scholar.
2 See Kelly, Thomas Forrest, ‘Neuma Triplex’, Acta Musicologica, 60 (1988), 1–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
3 I retain the Latin form prosa, the term used in all the Sarum books, in order to avoid confusion with the possible meanings of ‘prose’.
4 This series of responsories together with their exceptional ceremonies was not unique to the Sarum rite; for example, at Hereford, the three days were celebrated by the three grades of the choir as at Salisbury with copes and lighted candles, but only one of these had a prosa to the responsory; this observance, however, may have been adopted from Salisbury, even though Hereford maintained a use distinct from Sarum. See Frere, Walter Howard and Brown, Langton E.G., eds., The Hereford Breviary (London, 1904), 151–61Google Scholar.
5 I have surveyed most of the manuscript processionals listed in Bailey, Processions, 3–11. The details of the processions are summarised from the earliest manuscripts in Frere, Walter Howard, The Use of Sarum, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 1898, 1901Google Scholar; reprint, Farnborough, 1969). The manuscripts from early to late are very consistent in their rubrics for these processions, with two slight exceptions discussed below. I have cited these processions mostly from the printed sources, since they represent the culmination of the tradition; their melodies and rubrics can be seen in Processionale ad usum Sarum (Richard Pynson, 1502), facsimile, The Use of Sarum, I (Clarabricken, Ireland, 1980).
6 The relationship between these two prosae is described thoroughly in Steiner, Ruth, ‘The Responsories and Prosa for St Stephen's Day at Salisbury’, The Musical Quarterly, 56 (1970), 162–82, at 177–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Her article also includes a detailed musical discussion of the responsories of this day.
7 Thomas Forrest Kelly, ‘Melisma and Prosula: The Performance of Responsory Tropes’, Liturgische Tropen: Referate zweier Colloquien des Corpus Troporum in München (1983) und Canterbury (1984), Münchener Beiträge zur Mediävistik und Renaissance-Forschung 36 (Munich, 1985), 163–80.
8 The procession before Mass on Christmas Day went out of the west gate of the choir and around the outside of the entire choir clockwise, out to the cloister and around it, then back into the church, around the font and up the centre aisle and into the choir again. This is the more extensive route of a procession for major feasts, but one which did not go outdoors and around the outside of the whole cathedral as on major feasts of the spring and summer, presumably to avoid bad weather. See the description in Henderson, W.G., ed., Processionale ad usum insignis ac præclaræ ecclesiæ Sarum (Leeds, 1882Google Scholar; reprint, Farnborough, 1969), 11.
9 Haec prosa, scilicet Felix Maria, et duae sequentes non cantentur ad Matutinas, sed ad processionem hujus diei: ut in eadem processione ordinatum est. Et nota quod sunt aliqua festa ubi prosae notantur, de quibus altaria habentur in Ecclesia Sarum: ideo prosae dicantur ad processionem ad Vesperas, et non ad Matutinas, suis locis: videlicet; in hebdomada Nativitatis Domini: in die sancti Andreae ad secundas Vesperas: in festo sancti Nicolai ad primas Vesperas, et ad Matutinas cum novem Responsoriis: in Inventione sanctae Crucis ad secundas Vesperas. Nunquam enim dicitur prosa ad Matutinas per totum annum, sed ad Vesperas, et ad processionem, excepto die sancti Stephani, cujus servitium committitur voluntati Diaconorum; et excepto die sancti Johannis, cujus servitium committitur voluntati Sacerdotum; et excepto die sanctorum Innocentium, cujus servitium committitur voluntati Puerorum; et excepto die sancto Nicolai, quando dicitur prosa Sospitati ad Matutinas. Breviarium ad usum insignis ecclesiae Sarum, ed. Francis Procter and Christopher Wordsworth, 3 vols. (Cambridge, 1878–86), clxxvi–clxxvii. This is simply a peculiarity of liturgical books: a text is spelled out in one occurrence, even though it is not performed completely there, but referred to another time for its full performance. A more extreme example of cross-referencing is the ninth responsory of Christmas Matins, Verbum caro factum est, which is sung again in the Matins of the feast of the Circumcision, and at the procession before Mass on the same day. The procession before Mass includes an extensive prosa with vocalised melismas, much like those of the previous week. The rubric at Matins in the breviary says that its text is found ‘above at Christmas, and it is said here without prosa’, yet the prosa does not occur on Christmas, but only before the Mass on the Circumcision, found only in the processional.
10 Henderson, Processionale, 15, 17, 19, seems to indicate that these processions would be held only if the feast fell on a Sunday; however, the rubric si dominica fuerit pertains to the procession before Mass in the day; the processions at first Vespers are described in separate paragraphs and do not contain this rubric. Neither do the rubrics for the other Vespers processions in the year make such a limitation.
11 ‘R. Sancte Dei pretiose, ut supra ad processionem, et dicatur cum sua prosa, et cum Gloria Patri ab omnibus Dyaconis, scilicet in ecclesia Sarum, propter solennitatem dyaconorum’ (Breviarium Sarum, ccx). This rubric, ‘scilicet in ecclesia Sarum’, suggests that the ceremony was proper to Salisbury Cathedral as opposed to the whole Sarum rite. This is further suggested by the continuation of this rubric, which provides alternative arrangements for ‘Ecclesiis parochialibus’.
12 ‘Chorus vel organa respondeant cantum prosae super literam post unumquemque versum, A.’ Only some of the manuscript processionals include mention of the possibility of the organ playing the melisma.
13 That this procession begins at the altar of St Nicholas is indicated in its early source with roots at Old Sarum. It is not mentioned in the later processionals, which merely indicate that the deacons convene, but this may imply going to the altar next to the sacristy for copes and candles. For the location of the altars at Old Sarum, see Hope, Sir William St John, ‘The Sarum Consuetudinary and its Relation to the Cathedral Church of Old Sarum’, Archaeologia, 68 (1917), 119–21, pl. XXICrossRefGoogle Scholar.
14 Wordsworth, Christopher, Salisbury Processions and Ceremonies (Cambridge, 1901), 75Google Scholar, points out that in the fifteenth-century processional, Ms 148 of Salisbury Cathedral, the designation ‘apostolorum’ seems to be an alteration, perhaps of ‘S. Petri’, suggesting that St Peter was the original dedication of this altar.
15 Cf. Harris, Max, Sacred Folly: A New History of the Feast of Fools (Ithaca, 2011), 173–4CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
16 ‘Salve’ refers not to Salve Regina, but to Salve sancta parens, the most common introit for the Lady Mass; thus, since the high altar is dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, it must carry a different dedication. Even so, it is the location of the daily Lady Mass and is rightly called the ‘Lady Chapel’.
17 Processionale (1502), fols. 14r–15r.
18 ‘Deinde dicatur prosa in superpelliceis ab omnibus qui voluerit si placet et chorus respondeat cantum prose super litteram A’ (Processionale (1502), fol. 15v).
19 Et eat processio in omni festo sanctorum, ad primas vesperas post memorias, que habentur semel per annum, quorum altaria sunt in ecclesia, cum propriis responsoriis vel de communi cum versiculo et oratione de sanctis (Processionale (1502), fol. 131v).
20 Frere, Use of Sarum, I:124. For a recent evaluation of Frere's work, see Pfaff, Richard William, The Liturgy in Medieval England: A History (Cambridge, 2009)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; for the relation of Old Sarum to Salisbury, see Mahrt, William Peter, ‘The Role of Old Sarum in the Processions of Salisbury Cathedral’, in The Study of Medieval Manuscripts of England: Festschrift in Honor of Richard W. Pfaff, ed. Brown, George Hardin and Voigts, Linda Ihram, Arizona Studies in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance 35 (Tempe, AZ, 2010), 129–41CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
21 The best attempt at identifying and locating the altars at old Sarum is Hope, Sir William St John, ‘The Sarum Consuetudinary and its Relation to the Cathedral Church of Old Sarum’, Archaeologia, 68 (1917), 119–21, pl. xxiCrossRefGoogle Scholar.
22 Frere, Use of Sarum, 1:223; this passage occurs only in Frere's source H, GB-Lbl Harleian 1001, from the fourteenth century.
23 St John Hope, ‘The Sarum Consuetudinary’, pl. xxi.
24 The move from Old Sarum on the hill to new Salisbury on the plain and the construction of the cathedral there is particularly well described in Binski, Paul, Becket's Crown: Art and Imagination in Gothic England, 1170–1300 (New Haven, 2004), 62–77Google Scholar. See also Cocke, Thomas and Kidson, Peter, Salisbury Cathedral: Perspectives on the Architectural History, Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England (London, 1993)Google Scholar. Tatton-Brown, Tim and Crook, John, Salisbury Cathedral: The Making of a Medieval Masterpiece (London, 2009), 8–63Google Scholar, give an account of the progress of the construction of the cathedral. Tatton-Brown has long been cathedral archeologist, and on the basis of detailed study of masonry construction, tree-ring analysis and many other criteria, he has provided precise information. The first portion of the cathedral that was completed was the far eastern end, including the three easternmost altars. Services there began late in 1225 (p. 48); services began about 1244–5 in the choir and presbytery (p. 63), allowing access to most of the other altars. By 1266 the chapter house and cloister were finished (p. 84), so that the processions on high feast days could have begun to use the cloister.