HERCULEAN LABOURS: JOHANNES MARTINI AND THE MANUSCRIPT MODENA, BIBLIOTECA ESTENSE, MS α.M.1.13

Abstract

Modena, Biblioteca Estense, MS α.M.1.13 (ModD) is a collection of masses compiled in Ferrara around 1480 for the court of Ercole I d'Este. Although several scholars have argued that the changes in ModD were the result of composers reworking their own music or intervention by the scribe, the situation is far more complex. Through a careful examination of the textual and musical changes in ModD, this essay substantiates three hypotheses: that ModD had a separate and independent editor (Johannes Martini) apart from the scribe who copied it (Fra Filippo), and that both tampered with the music to a different extent; that the reasons behind the changes were in part politically and religiously motivated; and finally that several of the masses in ModD contain sections written by someone other than their original composer, a practice that may have been more common than we currently believe.