New texts for old music: Three early thirteenth-century Latin Motets

Abstract

This article investigates the compositional dynamics of creating texts for the music of pre-existing clausulae in three early thirteenth-century Latin motets in the Florence manuscript (Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Plut. 29.1). In general, early Latin motets are considered very faithfully to respect their clausula models. Norman Smith (1989) perceived only slight rhythmic variants between motets and clausulae, variants for which an explanation remained 'elusive'. Through the analysis of three case studies, I propose that certain variants between clausulae and motets represent alterations artfully effected in the process of texting clausula models. I draw attention to the variety of ways in which creators of motets responded to and modified their borrowed clausulae. The pre-existing music of a clausula could inspire the structure, line lengths, rhyme schemes, and even semantics of a poetic text. A clausula model might also and at the same time be reworked to complement or facilitate particular features of a newly designed motet text. © 2012 The Author.