A Catalogue of the Liturgical-Musical Fragments of the Bishopric Of Sigüenza (11th-16th Centuries)

Abstract

This study presents for the first time the catalogue and analyse of a valuable collection of 44 liturgical fragments (11th-16th centuries), located in various archives in the province of Guadalajara. Altogether, the sources offer a wide overview of the worshipping activity carried out in the Diocese of Siguenza from its restoration, between 1121 and 1124, until the Council of Trent. The importance of this Church in the Iberian context lies in its frontier position between Aragon and Castile, which would make it in a privileged witness of the confluence of diverse liturgical and musical practices. The methodological approach proposed here presents a marked interdisciplinary aspiration including different fields of study such as: musicology, liturgy, history or palaeography. Among the most outstanding elements of this fragmentary corpus is the discovery of an antiphonary with a proper Office of St James the Apostle, dated ca. 1100, and therefore, in an earlier version than the Codex Calixtinus, with which it shares interesting textual and melodic concordances. The other great point of attraction is a bifolio of polyphonic music from the beginning of the 14th century, with excerpts of four compositions in Franconian notation.