Augustine's De Musica

Abstract

Augustine's less well known works, his treatise De Musica.' Although in the Renaissance period, following the rediscovery of the treatise, Augustine was once again acknowledged as a Christian musical theorist,2 our own age does not immediately see him in this light. Carpaccio's reference long remained obscure. Written as part of a projected series of works on the liberal arts, Augustine's De Musica deals not with practical music making but with music as a speculative science. At the time of his baptism at Milan in 387 Augustine began a series of works on the liberal arts, each of which was to be reinterpreted from a Christian perspective. It was as part of this series that the treatise De Musica was written, but only after Augustine's return to North Africa.3 Since the work betrays the influence of both the Neo-Platonic and Neo-Pythagorean traditions and stresses the value of music in its ethical and paedeutic aspect, modern discussion has tended to focus on the philosophical antecedents to Augustine's theories.4 My aim here is to stress also the personal element that links Augustine's philosophical speculations on the nature of music to his own experience of the Ambrosian music of the Milanese church at the time of his conversion. Here the treatise will be presented as Augustine's extended intellectual justification for an intensely felt emotional response to music.