The Early Music Collection of the Bibliotheca aulica Salisburgensis: An Initial Investigation

Abstract

The University Library of Salzburg, which holds much of the former Archiepiscopal Court Library of Salzburg (Bibliotheca aulica Salisburgensis, hereafter B.A.S.), contains almost no early polyphonic or instrumental music. Nevertheless, recent research has determined that the B.A.S. included a corpus of printed and manuscript polyphony from the first half of the sixteenth century. The present paper examines the dispersal of this collection, which began in the 1840s, and traces the location of the identifiable polyphonic music books from the B.A.S. by following their transfer through the rare book trade in the mid-nineteenth century. This process has resulted in identification of an additional twenty-two extant printed editions, thereby increasing the total number of identified extant printed editions with a B.A.S. provenance from nine to thirty-one. The paper then, as far as currently possible, reconstructs and discusses the polyphonic music collection of the B.A.S.