The Poems of Orlando Di Lasso's Prophetiae Sibyllarum and Their Sources:Peter Bergquist

The Poems of Orlando di Lasso's "Prophetiae Sibyllarum" and Their SourcesAuthor(s): Peter BergquistSource: Journal of the American Musicological Society, Vol. 32, No. 3 (Autumn, 1979), pp.516-538Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the American Musicological SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/831253 .

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STUDIES AND REPORTS T

The Poems of Orlando di Lasso's Prophetiae Sibyllarum and Their Sources

By PETER BERGQUIST

O RLANDO DI LASSO'S

Prophetiae Sibyllarum (Sibylline Prophecies) is a cycle of motets in which are set twelve six-line Latin poems and a three-line pro-

logue, all of which are in dactylic hexameter throughout.' Each of the twelve poems contains what purport to be prophecies of the coming, life and mission of Christ as foreseen by the sibyls of antiquity, and the title of each poem identifies by location the sibyl who presumably delivered that prophecy. The style of the poems is oblique, allusive, even obscure; no progression of mood or idea through the cycle is apparent. Particular ideas do recur, such as the birth of the Savior to the Virgin Mary and the salvation Christ brings to sinful man. Lasso's music is notable for its extraordinary chromaticism, which goes far beyond the norm for most of his other music, and discussion of the work has tended to center on this aspect to the exclusion of any other, with the partial exception of the chapter in Wolfgang Boetticher's study of the composer.2 The literary background of the poems and the iconographic symbolism associated with them are of considerable interest in their own right, in addition to what they reveal about the chronology and sources of Lasso's music, and these will be the subject of the present study.

The Prophetiae are set apart from most of Lasso's work by the nature of their sources as well as their style. The cycle was one of the compositions which Lasso presented to his employer and patron, Albrecht V of Bavaria, as a private gift, like the seven Penitential Psalms. The primary source is the set of four partbooks now in the Oesterreichisches Nationalbibliothek in Vienna, Ms. mus. 18744, which contain the Prophetiae and also the Sacrae lectiones ex propheta Job (Sacred readings from the prophet Job), the earlier of the composer's settings of the latter texts. Lasso copied the music himself, and each partbook was decorated with a portrait of him and miniatures of each of the twelve sibyls (see Fig. i) by Hans Mielich, the Bavarian court painter who later supplied the famous illuminations in the manuscript of the

1 The only modern edition at present is Orlando di Lasso, Prophetiae Sibyllarum, ed. Joachim Therstappen (Das Chorwerk, 48), Wolfenbiittel, 1937.

2 Wolfgang Boetticher, Orlando di Lasso und seine Zeit (Kassel, 1958), PP. 7I-9. The chromatics are most successfully discussed, in my opinion, in William J. Mitchell, "The Prologue to Orlando di Lasso's Prophetiae Sibyllarum," Music Forum, II (1970), pp. 164-73-


STUDIES AND REPORTS 517

Persica Libyca

Delphica Cymmeria

Figure i. The twelve sibyls by Hans Mielich (?), from the cantus partbook of Orlando di Lasso's Prophetiae Sibyllarum. Original size of each minitature c. 67 x 50 cm. (Vienna, Oesterreichisches Nationalbibliothek, MS Mus. 18744, rectos of fols. 24-35. Reproduced by kind permission.)


5 8 JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MUSICOLOGICAL SOCIETY

Samia Cumana

Hellespontica Phrygica

Figure z, continued.



Europea Tiburtina

Erythraea Agrippa

Figure i, continued.


520 JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MUSICOLOGICAL SOCIETY

Penitential Psalms. 3 The portraits in the alto and tenor books have the caption "Orlando di Lasso at the age of twenty-eight years."4 Lasso was born in 1530 or 1532, so the manuscript would date from 1558-6o or very soon after- wards.s The Sacrae lectiones ex propheta Job were published in 1565,6 but the Prophetiae remained unpublished until after Lasso's death, appearing only in

I6oo00 in an edition prepared by his son Rudolph.7 How much before the date of the manuscript the Prophetiae were com-

posed has been a matter of some dispute. Boetticher has proposed a date of about 1550-2, when Lasso was in Naples, pointing to the presence near Naples of the hill and cave of the Cumaean Sibyl as a probable influence which supports such an early date, in addition to internal stylistic evidence.8 Adolf Sandberger and Edward Lowinsky prefer a date nearer that of the

manuscript, after Lasso's return to Flanders,9 which occurred no later than the beginning of 1555,10 and Alfred Einstein says the date must have been between 1555 and I56o. 1 By that time Lasso could have seen depictions of the sibyls in Rome, such as Michelangelo's famous frescos in the Sistine Chapel and the twelve sibyls of Pinturicchio in the Borgia Apartments of the Vatican, since the composer spent about two years as maestro di cappella at St. John Lateran before his return north. (We shall see, however, that these art works were by no means the closest pictorial influence on the composer and the manuscript.) He would also have become acquainted with the chromatic experiments of Rore and Vicentino in the early I55os, and he would have heard about the debates in 1551 between Vicentino and Lusitano over the modern use of the ancient chromatic and enharmonic genera. Sandberger

3Horst Leuchtmann, Orlando di Lasso (Wiesbaden, 1976), I, pp. 124-5, n. 144, concludes that the Vienna manuscript is possibly in Lasso's hand, but that this cannot be proved beyond doubt. He also accepts Mielich as the illuminator "in all probability," evidently for lack of ultimate proof. It should be noted that Leuchtmann's research on Lasso's biography supersedes all previous studies, whose inaccuracies and misinterpretations he frequently and painstakingly corrects.

4 The portrait in the tenor book is reproduced in Boetticher, "Orlando di Lasso," MGG, VIII, cols. 253-4; a reproduction in color is the frontispiece of Leuchtmann. The portrait that was once in the cantus book was removed some time before the Nationalbibliothek acquired the manuscript.

s Leuchtmann, I, pp. 72-81, reexamines the evidence concerning Lasso's year of birth and concludes that both 1530 and 1532 are possible; the conflicting evidence allows no decision for one or the other, despite the preference for 1532 in recent studies.

6 i565~ in the list of publications in Boetticher, p. 753. 7 Boetticher, p. 806, no. I6ooa. 8 Boetticher, pp. 73-4- 9 Adolf Sandberger, "Mitteilungen iiber ein Handschrift und ein neues Bildnis

Orlando di Lassos," Gesammelte Aufsiitze zur Musikgeschichte (Munich, 1921), I, p. 58; Edward E. Lowinsky, Secret Chromatic Art in the Netherlands Motet (New York, 1946), p. 93, and Tonality and Atonality in Sixteenth-Century Music (Berkeley, 1961), p. 88.

10 Boetticher, p. 37; Leuchtmann, I, pp. 46 and 92, does not dispute this dating. 11 Alfred Einstein, The Italian Madrigal (Princeton, 1949), II, p. 480.


STUDIES AND REPORTS 5 2

suggests that Lasso may even have been present at the debates, though this is not known with certainty.12

Boetticher thus proposes that Lasso's Prophetiae predate the older com- posers' chromatic pieces, but the opposite assumption, that the young Lasso followed the lead of his elders, seems more plausible. Joachim Therstappen suggested on stylistic grounds that the cycle is a mature work, perhaps from as late as 1585, but this is contradicted by the date of the manuscript, which Therstappen apparently considered a secondary source of late date,'3 seem- ingly unaware of Sandberger's detailed description of it.14 Leuchtmann adds another cogent argument for a date after 1555, that after Lasso's return from Italy he was in a new stage of his career, in which he had to establish himself afresh after his Italian successes: he was in need of a new patron. 15 For this reason he was publishing as much music as he could, and he would hardly have failed to publish such substantial works as the Prophetiae and the Lectiones from Job had they been ready for the press. Both cycles thus must have been completed as we now know them only after his arrival in Munich, as gifts for Albrecht. External evidence about the provenance of the poems should of course be taken into account in any attempt to resolve such questions, and the present study intends to provide as much of this evidence as possible. To lay a proper foundation, though, the beginnings and subsequent develop- ment of the Christian tradition of Sibylline writings must first be examined.

A noted classical scholar has said, "By sibyls people in antiquity meant women who in a state of ecstasy proclaimed coming events, generally un- pleasant, spontaneously and without being asked or being connected with any particular oracle site."'6 In the earliest flourishing of the sibylline cult, from the eighth to sixth centuries B.C., there was considered to be only one sibyl, of great antiquity, who travelled much and saw much. As various cultic centers were established several sibyls grew out of the one, each with her own site. Two of the most famous were the Erythraean sibyl, near the Aegean coast of Asia Minor, and the Cumaean sibyl near Naples. The sayings of the sibyls, usually composed in Greek hexameters, were written down in ancient times but for the most part have not survived to the present. Sibylline writings came into Christian tradition by way of the Hellenized Jews, especially those in Alexandria. From the third century B.C. they began to compose books of so-called sibylline writings of an apocalyptic, anti- Roman character. Christians in the second century A.D. reworked and add-

12 Sandberger, "Vorwort" to Orlando di Lasso, Sdmtliche Werke, 2nd ed. (Wiesba- den, 1968), II, p. xxiv.

13 Therstappen, preface to Lasso, Prophetiae sibyllarum (Das Chorwerk, 48), p. 4- 14 Sandberger, "Mitteilungen." Lowinsky, Secret Chromatic Art, p. 93, also makes this criticism of Therstappen's dating. 15 Leuchtmann, I, pp. i27-9. 16 Alfons Kurfess, "Christian Sibyllines," in Edgar Hennecke, New Testament Apocrypha, ed. Wilhelm Schneemelcher, trans. Robert McL. Wilson (Philadelphia, 1965), II, p. 703. The following summary of early sibylline cults and writings is drawn largely from this source.



ed to some of the Hebrew sibylline books and wrote additional books themselves. The Christians presented the sibyls as prophets of the coming of Christ to the heathen, complementary to the Old Testament prophets who proclaimed Him to the Hebrews. The pseudo-Oracula sibyllina in this form circulated widely in the early Christian era, and the church fathers quote and refer to them many times, but the original Greek texts were lost to the Middle Ages and known only through these scattered quotations and refer- ences.

In his Divinae institutiones, Book I, chapter 6 (about 300 A.D.), Lactantius established the number of sibyls as ten, basing his statement on the lost Libri rerum divinarum of the historian Marcus Varro. They are named as in the poems set by Lasso, except for the European and Agrippan sibyls, who were added to the series in the fifteenth century. Writers immediately following Lactantius also referred to sibyls. Isidore in his Etymologiarum, Book VIII, chapter 8, repeats Lactantius's list of ten in somewhat condensed form. Au- gustine in The City of God, Book XVIII, chapter 23, speaks of the Erythraean sibyl as the one who prophesied most plainly about Christ, particularly the Last Judgment. She is probably the sibyl referred to in the sequence Dies irae, line 3: "teste David cum sibylla." The Cumaean and Tiburtine sibyls were also celebrated individually by various writers. Virgil's Fourth Eclogue spoke of a prophecy by the Cumaean sibyl which Augustine (City of God, X, 27) and many others took to refer to the coming of Christ, while the report of a prophecy of Christ to Augustus Caesar by the Tiburtine sibyl was widely believed and circulated.

Written accounts of the sibyls seem not to have gone beyond what had been said by the Patristic writers until the fifteenth century. Pictorial representations can be traced back at least to the eleventh century. A manuscript of Hrabanus Maurus's De universo, Montecassino MS 132, accompanies the passage in which Hrabanus repeats Isidore's text almost verbatim (Book XV, chapter 6) with miniatures of the ten sibyls. Other representations of sibyls in groups of two, six and eight may be found prior to the fifteenth century,'7 but only after the middle of that century did the sibyls become frequent subjects of artistic and literary works. The publication of Lactantius's Divinae institutiones in 1465, with six further editions following to 1478, was undoubt-

edly a major stimulus to this activity.18 In 1481 another important sibylline publication appeared in which the number of sibyls was increased to twelve, the Discordantiae sanctorum doctorum Hieronymi et Augustini by Filippo Bar-

17 Lothar Freund, Studien zur Bildgeschichte der Sibyllen in der neueren Kunst (Ham- burg, 1936), PP- 4-5, describes the Montecassino miniatures; elsewhere in the same book he describes the other art works referred to in this study. Other important accounts of the sibyls in Western art are in Xavier Barbier de Montault, Iconographie des Sibyls," Revue de l'art chritien, XIII and XIV (I869 and I870-I), and Emile Male, Quomodo sibyllas recentiores artifices repraesentaverint (Paris, I899). Recent summaries such as that in Louis Rdan, Iconographie de l'art chritien (Paris, 1956), II, part I, pp. 420-30, seem not to go beyond the earlier authorities.

18 Male, p. 23.



bieri'9 (Philippus de Barberiis, born about 1426, Siracusa; died shortly before 13 June 1487, Palermo), who held high positions in the Dominican order, was Inquisitor of Sicily, and at one time negotiated with the King of Spain on behalf of Church and Inquisition.20 Discordantiae ... is the title of the first of four miscellaneous treatises included in that publication. The second is Sibyllarum et prophetarum de Christo vaticinia (Prophecies of Christ by the sibyls and prophets), in which the twelve sibyls are each depicted in a woodcut under which is printed a brief description of her dress and physical appearance, followed by her prophecy. A few of the sibyls are depicted with what may be symbolic attributes, but these have no relation to the accom- panying prophecy or to the complete set of twelve symbols in the northern block-book to be discussed below. On the verso of each sibyl is a correspond- ing Old Testament prophet with his prophecy. The correspondence of twelve sibyls to the twelve minor prophets would be an obvious reason for the increase from ten to twelve, though Barbieri's prophets include Isaiah, Jeremiah (twice) and King David rather than all twelve minor prophets. The ordering of the twelve sibyls does not correspond to that of Lasso's motet cycle, as shown in Table I, where the ordering of the sibyls in all the important sources is compared.21 Following this publication, numerous representations of twelve sibyls may be found in Western European art, and Barbieri's treatise was evidently the main source for such depictions. The brief texts under the woodcuts were not written by Barbieri, since they existed pre- viously; the other portions of the treatise are presumably his own work.

It appears, however, that Barbieri was not the first but only the most influential depictor of twelve sibyls; he may have popularized but he did not originate the expanded number. The earliest recorded appearance of a series of twelve seems to be in the Roman palace of Cardinal Giordano Orsini (d. 1438), who had them painted on the walls of his reception room. The paint- ings have not survived, but they are described in a manuscript from the second third of the fifteenth century.22 Another appearance which predates Barbieri is even more significant for its relationship to the Lasso manuscript. This is a German block-book of about 1470-5 which comprises twenty-four woodcuts; it was apparently modelled on an earlier version which most prob-

19 Rome: [Johannes Philippus de Lignamine], I December 1481; no. 3386 in Ge- samtkatalog der Wiegendrucke (GWD). GWD 3385 is essentially identical but without sixteen of the woodcuts found in GWD 3386.

20 "Filippo Barbieri," in Dizionario biografico degli Italiani (Rome, 1964), VI, pp. 217-21.

21 The ordering given here is as in the copy of the 1481 Discordantiae in the Hunt- ington Library. The copy in the Library of Congress, Rosenwald Collection, appears to be incorrectly gathered and has the sibyls in a different order as a result. I do not know if other copies may be similarly flawed.

22 Brussels, Biblioth~que royale, MSS 3553-67, cited and quoted in extenso by Freund, pp. 21-4. On p. 22 Freund gives the date of Orsini's death as 1348, an obvious typographical error which was unfortunately repeated by Therstappen, p. 2. The correct date is confirmed by Ludwig Pastor, The History of the Popes (London, 1923), I, p. 273.



TABLE I ORDER OF APPEARANCE OF THE TWELVE SIBYLS IN SOURCES FROM 1470 TO 1560

1505, 1510, 1514, 1545,

Source 147o-5 1481, 1482 1488 6555 t56o

I. Persica Persica Persica Persica Persica 2. Libyca Libyca Libyca Libyca Libyca 3. Erythraea Delphica Delphica Delphica Delphica 4. Cumana Cymmeria Cymmeria Cymmeria Cymmeria 5. Samia Erythraea Samia Samia Samia 6. Cymmeria Samia Hellespontica Cumana Cumana 7. Europaea Cumana Cumana Hellespontica Hellespontica 8. Tiburtina Hellespontica Phrygia Phrygia Phrygia 9. Agrippa Phrygia Tiburtina Europaea Europaea

10. Delphica Europaea Europaea Tiburtina Tiburtina 11. Hellespontica Tiburtina Agrippa Agrippa Erythraea I2. Phrygia Agrippa Erythraea Erythraea Agrippa

SOURCES

147o-5 P. Heitz, ed., Oracula sibyllina (Strasbourg, 1903) 1481 Filippo Barbieri, Discordantiae sanctorum doctorum Hieronymi et Augustini (Rome, 148 1) 1482 Filippo Barbieri, Tractatus sollemnis et utilis (Rome, 1482) 1488 Filippo Barbieri, De animorum immortalitate (Naples, [c. 1488]) 1505 Filippo Barbieri, Quattuor hic compressa opuscula (Venice, [c. 1505]) 15 o Filippo Barbieri, Quattuor hic compressa opuscula (Oppenheim, [c. I 5 o]) 1514 Filippo Barbieri, Opusculum de vaticiniis sibillarum (Oppenheim, [c. I5141) 1545 Sixt Birken, ed., Oracula sibyllina (Basel, 1545)

t555 Sixt Birken and Sdbastien Castellion, ed., Sibyllinorum oraculorum Libri VIII (Basel,

1555) i56o Orlando di Lasso, Prophetiae sibyllarum, in Vienna, Nationalbibliothek, MS Mus.

18744 [c. 1560]

ably stems from Holland or Flanders but which no longer exists. 23 The book is essentially a picture book with texts carved into the woodcut as captions. Twelve cuts depict the sibyls, each seated on a throne and displaying a symbolic attribute (see Fig. 2).

Each print contains a short text which gives the age of the sibyl (except for the Phrygian sibyl), states her origin or a classical authority who mentions her, tells the subject of her prophecy, and gives the prophecy (see Table 2 for the symbols and ages of the sibyls). All but one of the prophecies are the same as those which appear later in Barbieri. The attribute in each picture relates directly to the subject and content of the prophecy. The ages and symbols in this series correspond exactly (except for the age of the Samian sibyl) to those in the miniatures in the Lasso partbooks, though their order in the latter is different. Each symbol refers to an event in the life of Christ, and in the block-book the sibyls appear in chronological order according to these symbols, so that the series begins with the Proclamation to the Heathen,

23 Arthur M. Hind, An Introduction to a History of Woodcut (New York, 1963; re- print of i935 ed.), I. p. 248. The block-book is reproduced in facsimile in Oracula Sibyllina: nach dem einzigen, in der Stiftsbibliothek von St. Gallen aufbewahrten Exemplare, ed. Paul Heitz (Strasbourg, 1903)-


4W

Persica Libyca

mmmt-fuo r -,iaCttuvm

umtfifmr

ErllWreaf tmar

Eta

II

Erythraea

Figure 2. Miniatures of the first three sibyls from the facsimile edition (Strasbourg, 1903) of the 1470-5 block-book. Original size c. i8o x i20 mm. (Reproduced by permission of The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.)

V) Cj

C:

•7

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TABLE 2 AGES AND SYMBOLS OF THE TWELVE SIBYLS

Sibyl Age Symbol Meaning

Sibylla persica 30 Carries lantern; treads "The Veiled Light that came to the Heathen" serpent underfoot

S. libyca 24 Torch in hand "The Clear Light that came to the Hebrews" S. erythraea 15a White rose "The Annunciation" S. cumana 18 Egg-shaped objectb "The Birth of Christ" S. samia 24C Cradle "The Child in the Manger" S. cymmeria 18 Drinking or sucking horn "The Holy Family" (the child nursing) S. europaea 15 Raised sword "The Slaughter of the Innocents and Fight into Egypt" S. tiburtina 20 Outstretched hand held by "The Mocking of Christ"

the wrist by the sibyl S. agrippa 30 Scourge "The Scourging of Christ" S. delphica 20 Crown of thorns "The Crown of Thorns" S. hellespontica 50 Cross "The Crucifixion" S. phrygia d Triumphal banner "The Resurrection"

Sources: 1470-5, iS6o (for source abbreviations see Table i) a Omitted in 1470-5. b This symbol is less clear and more variable than the others. The object may be a basin in which the newborn would be washed. c Samia's age is given as 15 in IS6o. d Neither source gives her age: according to 1470-5 she is aged (vetula).

ON h,,

0

z 0

o

z

0

0

o0

oj



continues through the Annunciation, Birth, Flight to Egypt, Passion, Cruci- fixion, and concludes with the Resurrection. A woodcut on each page facing the sibyl illustrates in its upper half the event prophesied, while the lower half depicts an Old Testament prophet with his prophecy of the event and an Evangelist and his words which refer to the event. This logical ordering of the sibyls does not seem to recur in any subsequent publication, including Barbieri's treatise and the Lasso motets, even though the symbolism associated with individual sibyls recurs.24 The block-book is apparently unique among the literary sources in this respect, but its ordering is so logical that it probably represents the original state of the cycle, which was later lost sight of.

Barbieri's treatise seems to have been assembled without knowledge of the tradition represented by the block-book, which may be assumed to be northern; Barbieri apparently presents an Italian tradition which did not include the chronological order of symbols and prophecies. I have found no trace of a common source for the two traditions. Barbieri's treatise was highly popular and was reprinted four times in the following thirty years. The second edition of the same collection of treatises appeared about 1482 in Rome under the title Tractatus sollemnis et utilis, with the same ordering of the sibyls and the same prophecies.25 Three of the descriptions of the sibyls were revised, but the text is largely the same otherwise. The woodcuts are complete- ly new, and the prophets are omitted altogether, not to return in any later edition. Another edition from Naples (c. 1488) revised the text significantly. In this publication the four treatises of the 1481 and 1482 collections are appended to two larger treatises with the whole appearing under the title of the first treatise in the book, De animorum immortalitate. 26 A prefatory note to the Discordantiae states that the Rome publication was full of mistakes, and that Barbieri asked for a new edition by a learned man who would under- stand the text.27 The Discordantiae then appear much as in 1481 and 1482 except for some changes in the treatise on the sibyls. The order of the sibyls is again different (see Table i) and no woodcuts are included, but the prophecies are the same except for that of Hellespontica, which now has the same prophecy as in the block-book. Other portions of the sibyl treatise are greatly expanded. Barbieri must have had a hand in this publication, since he was in Sicily for the last two years before his death in 1487, which preceded the publication by less than a year.

Subsequent editions are unquestionably posthumous. The next one

24 The order seems, however, to recur in French art works of the I6th century, according to Rdan, p. 426. Leuchtmann, I, p. I26, n. 145, notes the presence of symbolic attributes and numerals in the Lasso manuscript and observes that they must be taken over from the painter's source, but he does not try to explain them.

25 Rome: Herold & Reissinger, [c. 1482]; GWD 3387. 26 Barbieri, De animorum immortalitate (Naples, [c. 1488]); GWD 3388, where the

date is given as c. 1490. However, the copy in the Huntington Library has a hand- written mark of ownership dated I May 1488. 27 Barbieri, De immortalitate, fol. h5r.



brought out the original collection of four treatises by itself again, under the title Quattuor hic compressa opuscula. 28 The texts of the sibyl treatise have been subject to some revision, but the order of the sibyls is again as in 1481 and 1482, except that Erythraea is moved from fifth to twelfth (see Table i). The text is divided into chapters, and a new set of woodcuts appears, with the few symbolic attributes similar to those of the 1481 edition. The most important addition is that of the poems of Lasso's motet cycle, which evidently appear in this publication for the first time. The text of the poems is essentially the same as in later sources, differing mainly in punctuation and spelling.29 The poems in several instances echo the prophecies under which they appear, e.g. that of the European sibyl, though at least one poem, that of the Samian sibyl, seems to have been placed incorrectly, since it derives rather from the prophecy of the Libyan sibyl. The Venetian publication contains no in- dication of the source of the poems; they simply appear without further com- ment as a new portion of the pre-existent treatise. Any statement about their presumed author or date of composition is necessarily speculative, but it seems most probable that they were written for this edition of Barbieri's treatise by an Italian humanist, most likely in Venice near the time of publication. They are not likely to predate the first edition of Barbieri some twenty years before, since the tradition of twelve rather than ten sibyls was not very widespread in Italy earlier than that.

The entire treatise was reprinted in Oppenheim, Germany, about 1510o, and a separate printing of the treatise on the sibyls followed.30 The text is the same as in the Venice edition, including the poems, and the woodcuts are obviously copied from that source. Thus the poems came north very soon after their presumed first appearance in print, but they seem then to drop out of sight for some thirty years. A German translation of the treatise on the sibyls was printed in Oppenheim in 1516, but without the Latin poems, and it was followed by new editions in 1531, i534, 1535, and I537.31 The sibylline and other pseudo-prophecies, such as those of Paracelsus, became very popular and widespread in the vernacular after 15oo, and the sophisticated Latin poems would have found no place in the more popular books, so it is likely that the poems were not published again for some years, since Bar-

28 Barbieri, Quattuor hic compressa opuscula (Venice, [c. 1505]); Reichling no. 418. 29 It should be noted that the text as given in Therstappen's edition in Das Chor-

werk contains a considerable number of errors that are found in none of the sources mentioned in this study. These errors were noted by Alfons Kurfess, who in "Si- byllarum carmina chromatico tenore modulata," Aevum, XXVI (1952), pp. 485-94, suggested emendations, many of which were in accordance with the sources even though he was not acquainted with them. Kurfess also commented sharply on the ineptness of Therstappen's German translation.

30 Barbieri, Quattuor opuscula (Oppenheim, [c. I51o]), Hain-Coppinger 2454; Barbieri, Opusculum de vaticiniis sibillarum (Oppenheim, [c. I5'14). 31 The 153 I edition appears in facsimile in Albert Ritter, ed., Collectio vaticiniorum (Berlin, 1923). The dates given are all those before 1545 listed by Ritter, the National Union Catalog, and the British Museum Catalog of Printed Books.



bieri's treatise did not reappear after 1514 in its original language. When the poems surfaced again, they were in a quite different context.

The publications of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries which dealt with sibyls were several degrees removed from the ancient Hebrew and Christian pseudo-Oracula sibyllina, which were known only indirectly for centuries, as mentioned above. A manuscript of the ancient poems was dis- covered in the sixteenth century, however, and the original Greek text, edited by Xystus Betuleius (Sixt Birken) was printed by Johannes Oporinus in Basel in 1545. At the end of this book, following an epilogue to the reader from the editor, the printer added a further note: after the book was finished, his erudite friend Gilbert Cousin gave him some Latin songs of the sibyls that he had recently found in an old book (presumably Barbieri's treatise in one of its later printings), which are added here as a bonus.32 There follow on the last four pages the twelve poems of Lasso's Prophetiae, after which the book ends with its colophon.33 A Latin translation of the Oracula by Sebastien Castellion (Chateillon) followed in 1546 from the same press, but without the twelve poems.34 In 1555, after the death of Birken, Castellion oversaw Opo- rinus's publication of a revised bilingual edition of the Greek and Latin texts of the Oracula, with the two languages on facing pages. This time the poems were again added, on pages 291-4, with the same heading as in 1545, Sibylla- rum de Christo vaticinia (Prophecies of Christ by the sibyls). In both the 1545 and 1555 editions the order of the poems in the 1505 Venice edition is main- tained, which is identical to that of Lasso except for the interchange of the last two poems, "Erythraea" and "Agrippa" (see Table i). This change was probably made by Lasso because "Agrippa" ends somewhat in the manner of a doxology, more conclusively than "Erythraea." Lasso's setting cannot be performed in the order "Agrippa-Erythraea", that of the printed sources of the poems, since the former ends in a full cadence and the latter in a half cadence in the sixth mode.3 The three-line prologue was of course added by or for Lasso; it does not appear in any print of the poems.

32 Oracula sibyllina, ed. Sixt Birken (Basel, 1545), fol. P3r: "Absoluto iam hu- cusque opusculo, oblati nobis sunt a D. Gilberto Cognato, viro et erudito, et amico nostro singulari, diversarum Sibyllarum carmina aliquot, Latinitate iam olim donata, et ex vetustissimo codice descripta, quae hic subiicere operae precium duximus." Gil- bert Cousin or Cognatus (I5o6-c. 1570) was a humanist from Franche-Comtd, for some time secretary to Erasmus, and had a long association with Basel during which many of his writings were published there by Oporinus and other printers.

33 Andrd Pirro, Histoire de la musique de lafin du XIVe sie'cle lafin du XVIe (Paris, 1940), p. 342, noted this publication of the poems, a reference which appears to have escaped Boetticher's notice. I am indebted to Dr. Reinhold Schlotterer for calling it to my attention.

34 Castellion was a prominent associate of Calvin for a time, but broke with him on doctrinal grounds; his numerous literary works include a somewhat heterodox translation of the Bible.

35 On the modality of the Prophetiae, see Bernhard Neier, Die Tonarten der klassi- schen Vokalpolyphonie (Utrecht, 1974), P- 452.



The poems as they appear in 1545 and 1555 reproduce the text essentially as it had been printed earlier except for spelling and punctuation. The later editions are preferable, since their punctuation makes better sense of the texts. It may be presumed that Cousin edited the poems for their 1545 appearance; the 1555 version differs only minimally. These two versions and the versions of Lasso's partbooks are collated in the text of the poems as given in the Appendix, where an English translation is also provided.

It should be noted that the poems are not translations of any part of the pseudo-Oracula sibyllina, despite assertions to the contrary by some recent writers. Indeed, had they been such, their separate appearance in the 1555 edition would have been redundant after the complete Latin translation of the Oracula. The poems of course were published some forty years before the Oracula, so any direct dependence on the latter is highly unlikely, although it is remotely possible that their author might have had access to a manuscript of the Oracula in the original Greek. The 1545 edition of the Oracula suggests that the poems are translated into Latin (see n. 32 above), but present evidence makes this assertion implausible. The poems are in the spirit of the Oracula but are not extracted from them.

The question of course arises, which if any of the printed versions of the poems was Lasso's source? Comparison of Lasso's manuscript with the printed versions does not yield an unequivocal answer, but the following may be noted:

I. The words of the poems are almost identical in all sources; one of the few dif- ferences is in poem VIII, line 3, where the early prints have complerant, while the two later prints and Lasso have complerent. 2. Punctuation differs substantially between the later and earlier prints, but Lasso included almost no punctuation at all in any partbook, so this tells us very little.

3. Nowhere does Lasso's text agree with the early prints and disagree at the same time with the later ones.

4. Two instances of disagreement among the partbooks themselves (IV, 2, and VIII, 6) are probably due to careless copying.

5. The added syllable in X, 4 ("Bethlemitica" rather than "Bethlemica") was evidently the doing of Lasso or someone who may have copied the poems for him from a book (his access to the poems could have been at second hand rather than direct from a printed source). The added syllable destroys the scansion but cannot be omitted from Lasso's setting.

6. Lasso's cadences are never placed so as to ignore or contradict major punctuation marks in the two later prints. Not every comma receives a cadence, and a few cadences occur at syntactically logical points where one or both editions do not punc- tuate, but Lasso clearly understood the sense of the text in the same way as it appeared in the 1545 and 1555 prints.

The texts themselves thus indicate that Lasso found the poems in either the 1545 and 1555 printing, and it is indeed more likely that he would have found them in a recent publication than in one forty or more years old.

As to the choice between the 1545 and 1555 prints, the texts themselves


STUDIES AND REPORTS 5 3 1

are not conclusive, nor is any external evidence, but probability seems to favor the 1555 print, which is dated in August of that year, near the time when Lasso settled in Antwerp. The fact that all editions of the poems after the very first were northern argues strongly that Lasso found the poems in the north, as does the northern tradition represented in Mielich's miniatures. In that case, Lasso's return north and the 1555 publication soon after seem to make the latter the most probable source, since the 1545 edition would have been more than ten years old, and the more recent edition presumably would have been more available. Lasso could have encountered the poems in Ant- werp before his employment in Munich began some time in 1557,36 but Leuchtmann's argument noted above in favor of composition in Munich seems decisive on that score. In sum, it is not impossible that the motets were composed in Italy and the poems taken there from the 1545 print or even an earlier one, but the probabilities are all in favor of composition north of the Alps, most likely in Munich between 1557 and 1560, with the 1555 print as the source of the poems.

Lasso and Mielich clearly collaborated on the manuscript, and in so doing combined two distinct traditions about the sibyls. Their manuscript is to my knowledge the only place where the iconographic tradition of the block-book and the poems from Italy appear together. This is not to say that the traditions really intermingle: the poems have little if any relationship to the pictorial symbols, and the latter are of course distorted by their illogical ordering, which followed that of the poems.37 These incongruities are further height- ened by the presence in the manuscript of the Lectiones from Job, which are very different in subject and style from the Prophetiae sibyllarum.38 Nonethe- less, the manuscript is a remarkable expression through art, poetry and music of artistic and literary traditions which extended back centuries before Lasso and Mielich, which were especially vigorous in the century before the cycle's composition, and which Lasso and Mielich brought together in their gift to their patron.

APPENDIX

(pp. 532-7; Notes, p. 538)

36 Leuchtmann, I, pp. 99-107, determines that no evidence establishes Lasso's presence in Munich before 1557, and he thus rejects the hypothesis advanced by Sandberger, Boetticher and others that Lasso's employment began in 1556.

37 Examination of depictions of the sibyls between the block-book and Mielich might establish whether the change in order occurs in art works prior to the manuscript, but such an inquiry is beyond the scope of this study.

38 In the manuscript the Job motets are decorated with abstract ornamental ini- tials, but have no miniatures.



Carmina chromatico quae audis modulata tenore, Haec sunt illa quibus nostrae olim arcana salutis Bis senae intrepido cecinerunt ore Sibyllae.

I. PERSICA.

Virgine matre satus, pando residebit asello, lucundus princeps, unus qui ferre salutem Rite queat lapsis: tamen illis forte diebus Multi multa ferent, immensi fata laboris. Solo sed satis est oracula prodere verbo: Ille Deus casta nascetur virgine magnus.

II. LIBYCA.

Ecce dies venient, quo aeternus tempore princeps, Irradians sata laeta, viris sua crimina tollet, Lumine clarescet cuius synagoga recenti: Sordida qui solus reserabit labra reorum, Aequus erit cunctis, gremio rex membra reclinet Reginae mundi, sanctus, per saecula vivus.

III. DELPHICA.

Non tarde veniet, tacita sed mente tenendum Hoc opus. hoc memori semper qui corde reponet, Huius pertentant cur gaudia magna prophetae Eximii, qui virginea conceptus ab alvo Prodibit, sine contactu maris. omnia vincit Hoc naturae opera: at fecit, qui cuncta gubernat.

IV. CIMMERIA.

In teneris annis facie praesignis, honore Militiae aeternae regem sacra virgo cibabit Lacte suo: per quem gaudebunt pectore summo Omnia, et Eoo lucebit sidus ab orbe Mirificum: sua dona Magi cum laude ferentes, Obiicient puero myrrham, aurum, thura Sabaea.



Polyphonic songs which you hear with a chromatic tenor, these are they, in which our twice-six sibyls once sang with fearless mouth the secrets of salvation.

I. PERSICA.

The son of a virgin mother shall sit on a crook-backed ass, the joyful prince, the only one who can rightly bring salvation to the fallen; but it will happen in those days that many shall tell many prophecies of great labor. But it is enough for the oracles to bring forth with a single word: That great God shall be born of a chaste virgin.

II. LIBYCA

Behold the days will come, at which time the immortal prince, sowing abundant crops, shall take away their crimes from men, whose synagogue will shine with new light; he alone shall open the soiled lips of the accused, he shall be just to all; let the king, holy, living for all ages, recline his limbs in the bosom of the queen of the world.

III. DELPHICA.

He shall not come slowly (but this work must be held with quiet thought), he who will ever store this in a mindful heart, why his prophets may announce great joys of this exalted one, who shall come forth conceived from the virginal womb without taint of man. This conquers all the works of nature: yet he has done this who governs all things.

IV. CIMMERIA.

In her tender years, distinguished with beauty, in honor the holy virgin will feed the king of the eternal host with her milk; through whom all things will rejoice with uplifted heart, and in the east will shine a marvelous star: Magi bringing their gifts with praise shall present to the child myrrh, gold, Sabaean frankincense.



V. SAMIA.

Ecce dies, nigras quae toilet laeta tenebras, Mox veniet, solvens nodosa volumina vatum Gentis Judaeae, referent ut carmina plebis. Hunc poterunt clarum vivorum tangere regem, Humano quem virgo sinu inviolata fovebit. Annuit hoc coelum, rutilantia sidera monstrant.

VI. CUMANA.

Iam mea certa manent, et vera, novissima verba, Ultima venturi qu6d erant oracula regis, Qui toti veniens mundo cum pace, placebit, Ut voluit, nostra vestitus carne decenter, In cunctis humilis. castam pro matre puellam Deliget, haec alias forma praecesserit omnes.

VII. HELLESPONTICA.

Dum meditor quondam vidi decorare puellam, Eximio (castam quod se servaret) honore, Munere digna suo, et divino numine visa, Quae sobolem multo pareret splendore micantem:

Progenies summi, speciosa et vera Tonantis, Pacifica mundum qui sub ditione gubernet.

VIII. PHRYGIA.

Ipsa Deum vidi summum, punire volentem Mundi homines stupidos, et pectora caeca, rebellis. Et quia sic nostram complerent crimina pellem, Virginis in corpus voluit demittere coelo Ipse Deus prolem, quam nunciet Angelus almae Matri, quo miseros contracta sorde levaret.

IX. EUROPAEA.

Virginis aeternum veniet de corpore verbum Purum, qui valles et montes transiet altos. Ille volens etiam stellato missus Olympo, Edetur mundo pauper, qui cuncta silenti Rexerit imperio: sic credo, et mente fatebor: Humano simul ac divino semine gnatus.



V. SAMIA.

Behold, the joyful day which shall lift the black darkness will soon come and unravel the knotty writings of the prophets of the Judean tribe, as the people's songs tell.

They shall be able to touch this glorious ruler of the living, whom an unstained virgin will nurture at a human breast. This the heavens promise, this the glowing stars show.

VI. CUMANA.

Now my most recent words shall remain certain and true, because they were the last oracles of the king to come, Who, coming for the whole world with peace, shall be pleased, as he intended, to be clothed fitly in our flesh, humble in all things. He shall choose a chaste maiden for his mother; she shall exceed all others in beauty.

VII. HELLESPONTICA.

Once while I was reflecting, I saw him adorn a maiden with great honor (because she kept herself chaste); She seemed worthy through his gift and divine authority to give birth to a glorious offspring with great splendor: the beautiful and true child of the highest Thunderer, who would rule the world with peaceful authority.

VIII. PHRYGIA.

I myself saw the high God wishing to punish the stupid men of the earth and the blind heart of the rebel. And because crimes shall thus fill our skin, God himself wished to send from heaven into the body of a virgin his son, which the angel shall announce to the fostering mother, so that he may raise the wretches from the uncleanness they have contracted.

IX. EUROPAEA.

From the body of a virgin shall come forth the pure word eternal, who shall cross valleys and high mountains. He, willingly sent even from starry Olympus, will be sent into the world a pauper, who shall rule all creation with silent power. Thus I believe and shall acknowledge in my heart: He is the child of both divine and human seed.



X. TYBURTINA.

Verax ipse Deus dedit haec mihi munia fandi, Carmine qu6d sanctam potui monstrare puellam, Concipiet quae Nazareis in finibus, illum Quem sub came Deum Bethlemica rura videbunt. O nimium felix, coelo dignissima mater, Quae tantam sacro lactabit ab ubere prolem.

XI. ERYTHRAEA.

Cerno Dei natum, qui se demisit ab alto, Ultima felices referent cum tempora soles: Hebraea quem virgo feret de stirpe decora, In terris multum teneris passurus ab annis, Magnus erit tamen hic divino carmine vates, Virgine matre satus, prudenti pectore verax.

XII. AGRIPPA.

Summus erit sub came satus, charissimus atque, Virginis et verae complebit viscera sanctum Verbum, consilio, sine noxa, spiritus almi: Despectus multis tamen ille, salutis amore, Arguet et nostra commissa piacula culpa: Cuius honos constans, et gloria certa manebit.



X. TYBURTINA.

The truthful God himself gave me these gifts of prophecy, that I might proclaim in song the holy virgin who shall conceive in Nazareth's bounds that God whom Bethlehem's lands shall see in the flesh. O most happy mother, worthy of Heaven, who shall nurse such a child from her holy breast.

XI. ERYTHRAEA.

I behold the son of God, who sent himself from on high, when the joyful days shall bring the last times. He whom the comely virgin shall bear from the Hebrew lineage, he who shall suffer much on earth from his tender years on, he shall nevertheless be here a great seer in godly prophecy, the son of a virgin mother, truthful and of a wise heart.

XII. AGRIPPA.

The highest and dearest shall be born in the flesh the son of the true virgin, and the holy word shall fill the womb of the maiden through the pure intention of the nurturing spirit; although contemptible to many, he, for love of our salvation, will censure the sins committed by our guilt; his honor shall remain constant and his glory certain.



NOTES TO THE APPENDIX

The Appendix gives the Latin texts of the twelve poems, generally following 1555 (for source abbreviations see Table I above, p. 524) but collating 1545 and z56o. The three-line prologue, written by or for Lasso, is taken from 156o. The order of the last two poems follows z56o rather than

5555; the poems are numbered only in i6oo. The translations are by Peter Berg- quist, and attempt to convey as exactly as possible the sense of each line.

Emendations

passim v for u, i forj III: 3 cur: cor in all sources. (See Alfons Kurfess, "Sibyllarum carmina

chromatico tenore modulata," Aevum, XXVI (1952), p. 486, where this emendation is proposed.)

Variant readings

1:4 no comma (1545) 11:3 sinagoga (i56o) IV:2 regem, (545) IV:2 cibavit (z56o, tenor) IV:4 eoo (z545) IV:6 puero, (1545) V:6 sydera (i56o) VI:3 mundo, ('545)

VII:I quondam, (1545) VIII:5 alma (i56o) VIII:6 lavaret (z56o, bass) IX:5 rex erit (i555) IX:6 natus (156o) X:4 Bethlemitica (156o) XI:2 foelices (z545)

Critical commentary

IX:2 Qui takes verbum as its antecedent, though gender does not agree: see Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short, A Latin Dictionary (Oxford, 1879 and reprints), p. 151o s.v. qui, II, A, 4.

XII:3 Spiritus scans as nominative, though its sense is genitive.

University of Oregon

The assistance of a research grant from the University of Oregon in the preparation of this study is gratefully acknowledged. I wish also to thank the staffs of the Henry Huntington Library, San Marino, California, and the Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, D.C., for their cordial and courteous assistance when I visited their collections. Film and information supplied by the Oesterreichisches National- bibliothek, Vienna, the Library of Congress, the Beinecke Rare Book Library of Yale University, and the Newberry Library, Chicago, are also gratefully acknowledged.


The Poems of Orlando Di Lasso's Prophetiae Sibyllarum and Their Sources:Peter Bergquist

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