Studies in the History of the Cadence

Caleb Michael Mutch

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the

requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

2015

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 ABSTRACT

Studies in the History of the Cadence

Caleb Michael Mutch

This dissertation traces the development of the concept of the cadence in the history of

music theory. It proposes a division of the history of cadential theorizing into three periods,

and elucidates these periods with four studies of particularly significant doctrines of musical

closure. The first of these periods is the pre-history of the cadence, which lasted from the dawn

of medieval music theory through the fifteenth century. During this time theorists such as John

of Affligem (ca. 1100), whose writings are the subject of the first study, developed an analogy

between music and the classical doctrine of punctuation to begin to describe how pieces and

their constituent parts can conclude. The second period begins at the turn of the sixteenth

century, with the innovative theory expounded by the authors of the Cologne school, which

forms the subject of the second study. These authors identified the phenomenon of musical

closure as an independent concept worthy of theoretical investigation, and established the first

robustly polyphonic cadential doctrine to account for it. For the following three centuries

theorists frequently made new contributions to the theorizing of the cadence in their writings,

as exemplified by the remarkable taxonomy of cadences in the work of Johann Wolfgang

Caspar Printz (1641-1717), the subject of the third study. By the early nineteenth century,

however, cadential theorizing had largely ossified. Instead, authors such as A. B. Marx (1795-

1866), on whose writings the fourth study focuses, only drew upon the concept of the cadence

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as was necessary in their treatments of newly emerging theoretical concerns, especially musical

form.

In order to elucidate and corroborate this historical framework, the dissertation’s

chapters undertake close readings of the doctrines of musical closure put forth by John of

Affligem, the Cologne school, Printz, and Marx. The theoretical contributions contained in

these sources are interpreted and contextualized in light of the non-musical discourses upon

which they draw, and through interrogation of the relationship between the cadential ideas

they espouse and contemporaneous musical practice. In doing so, the dissertation reveals

discontinuities in the concepts and functions of cadential doctrines in historical music theories,

and provides new possibilities for understanding and experiencing musical structure.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF EXAMPLES ................................................................................................................................iv

LIST OF FIGURES .....................................................................................................................................vi

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ....................................................................................................................... vii

INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................................................... 1

CHAPTER 1. MUSICAL CLOSURE, GRAMMATICO-RHETORICAL DOCTRINE,

AND CHANT: JOHN OF AFFLIGEM ..................................................................................... 14

1.1 The Analysis of Speech Structure in Classical Rhetoric ........................................................ 16

1.2 The Grammatical Doctrine of Punctuation in Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages ......... 24

1.3 Grammatical and Rhetorical Elements in Musical Discourse before John of Affligem ....... 34

1.4 John of Affligem and the Application of the Distinctiones to Music ....................................... 46

1.5 The Transmission of the Doctrine ................................................................................................ 66

1.6 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................... 70

CHAPTER 2. POLYPHONIC CLOSURE IN THE RENAISSANCE:

THE COLOGNE SCHOOL ........................................................................................................ 72

2.1 The Term Clausula Formalis ........................................................................................................... 75

2.2 Precedents of the Cologne School’s Theory ............................................................................... 85

2.3 The First Stage: Three-voice Cadences in the Opus aureum and Musica ................................. 91

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 2.4 The Second Stage: Four-voice Cadences in the Musica and Tetrachordum musices ............. 102

2.5 Triadic Tonality and Cochlaeus’s Sixth Rule ........................................................................... 106

2.6 Cadential Doctrine and Compositional Practice ..................................................................... 122

2.7 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................... 137

CHAPTER 3. MID-BAROQUE CLAUSULA DOCTRINE:

PRINTZ AND HIS PREDECESSORS ..................................................................................... 140

3.1 German Cadence Theory before Printz .................................................................................... 142

3.2 A Ramist Theory of Cadence ...................................................................................................... 154

3.3 Printz’s contribution .................................................................................................................... 165

3.3.1 Voice-specific Cadences ....................................................................................................... 166

3.3.2 Cadence and Mode: Propria/Peregrina .............................................................................. 171

3.3.3 Perfect/Imperfect Cadences ................................................................................................. 175

3.3.4 Totalis/Dissecta ...................................................................................................................... 177

3.3.5 Desiderans/Acquiescens....................................................................................................... 181

3.3.6 The Sedes ................................................................................................................................. 192

3.3.7 An Inchoate Theory of Phrases ........................................................................................... 199

3.4 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................... 202

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CHAPTER 4. A. B. MARX, BIOLOGY, FORM, AND CADENCE .................................................. 205

4.1 The Roles of Cadence in Music-theoretical Discourse before A. B. Marx ............................ 206

4.2 A. B. Marx’s Conception of Cadence ......................................................................................... 216

4.3 Form and Cadence in Marx’s Music Theory ............................................................................ 225

4.4 Organicism and Marx’s Theory of Form .................................................................................. 238

4.5 Changes in the Nineteenth Century .......................................................................................... 247

4.6 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................... 258

BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................................................... 264

APPENDIX.............................................................................................................................................. 283

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 LIST OF EXAMPLES

Example 1.1 “Tribus miraculis ornatum diem,” antiphon for the feast of Epiphany ................... 44

Example 1.2 “Petrus autem servabatur,” antiphon for the feast Vincula Petri ............................... 53

Example 1.3 “Homo quidam erat dives et,”

antiphon for the feast of the second Sunday after Pentecost ................................................ 59

Example 1.4 “Erat Petrus dormiens inter,” antiphon for the feast Vincula Petri ............................ 61

Example 1.5 “Transeuntes autem primam et,” antiphon for the feast Vincula Petri...................... 64

Example 1.6 “Ecce nomen Domini,” antiphon for the feast Nativitas Domini ................................ 67

Example 1.7 Melodic ending formulas from Wollick, Opus aureum, f. F4v ..................................... 69

Example 2.1 Three-voice clausulae from [Cochlaeus], Musica (ca. 1505), f. C5r ............................. 96

Example 2.2 A two-voice clausula from Ornithoparchus,

Musice active micrologus, IV.4, f. L4v ......................................................................................... 97

Example 2.3 Clausulae on mi ............................................................................................................... 100

Example 2.4 Four-voice clausulae from Cochlaeus, Musica (1507), f. F4v ..................................... 103

Example 2.5 Cochlaeus’s Sixth Rule ................................................................................................... 107

Example 2.6 Additional type of mi cadence from Galliculus, Isagoge, f. C3v ................................ 121

Example 2.7 Schlick, “Mein Lieb ist weg” ......................................................................................... 126

Example 2.8 Isaac, “I[nn]sbruck, ich muss dich lassen” .................................................................. 130

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Example 3.1 Four-voice clausula from Johannes Cochlaeus,

Tetrachordum musices, f. F1r (1512) ........................................................................................... 143

Example 3.2 Ramus, Dial. lib. duo, x. (Cambridge: John Hayes, 1672 edition) ............................. 158

Example 3.3 Printz, Phrynis Mitilenaeus, I.8 (from the 1696 edition) .............................................. 164

Example 3.4 A Cadence on mi, from Phrynis, I.8, §43, p. 31 ............................................................ 174

Example 3.5 Phrygian-related cadences ............................................................................................ 185

Example 3.6 Heinrich Schütz, “Aus tiefer Not schrei ich zu dir,” SWV 235 (Dresden, 1661) .... 191

Example 3.7 The Sedes Subintellecta, from Phrynis, I.8, §31, p. 29. .................................................. 194

Example 3.8 Caesuras, from Phrynis, I.8, §57, p. 33. ......................................................................... 200

Example 4.1 Marx’s Two Harmonic Masses ..................................................................................... 217

Example 4.2 Marx’s Trugschluss .......................................................................................................... 221

Example 4.3 A synopsis of Marx's theory of form............................................................................ 227

Example 4.4 Marx’s Satz and Periode .................................................................................................. 229

Example 4.5 Marx’s Period and the Piece in Two Parts .................................................................. 231

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 LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 3.1 Cadence Categories in Precursors of Printz.................................................................... 144

Figure 3.2 Ramus's Cadential Types.................................................................................................... 163

Figure 3.3 Clausulas with respect to mode ....................................................................................... 171

Figure 3.4 Totalis and Dissecta cadences ........................................................................................... 177

Figure 4.1 Marx’s Fourth and Fifth Rondo Forms ............................................................................ 232

Figure 4.2 Marx’s Fourth and Fifth Rondo Forms ............................................................................ 233

vi
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Of all the help and encouragement I have receive along the dissertating road, David

Cohen’s has been the most formative. He has been a sage guide to the recesses of historical

music theory, lavish with his feedback, and selfless with his time. My thanks to him are many,

and profound. Benjamin Steege has also been a great help in my latter years of graduate school,

and I’ve benefited from his graciousness, attention to argumentation, and perspective on the

field. I’m very grateful for his support.

There are many other people from the Columbia community I wish to thank. Joseph

Dubiel and Ellie Hisama, for guiding my way through the program; Elaine Sisman and Susan

Boynton, for their support and their feedback on my work; Anne Gefell and Gabriela Kumar,

for their unfailing goodwill in the departmental office; and Elizabeth Davis and Nick Patterson,

for their consummate librarianship. To Kate Heidemann, David Gutkin, Nicholas Chong, Ben

Hansberry, Will Mason, and the rest of my grad school colleagues, thanks for your camaraderie.

I’d also like to acknowledge the valuable experiences I had outside the walls of my

school. The classes I took with William Rothstein inform me both as a historian and an analyst,

and my dissertation is much the better for his presence on my committee. Nathan Martin has

been a wonderful mixture of mentor, colleague, and friend, and I thank him for his

encouragement and generosity. Thanks, too, to Richard Kurth for piquing my interest in the

history of music theory, and for his mentoring over the years.

To my family, both by birth and marriage, my deepest gratitude for your unflagging

support and encouragement. Most of all, to my wife, Sarah Godbehere, thank you for your

steadfast loving-kindness. Your forebearance these last years has meant the world.

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 INTRODUCTION

Of all the uses to which humans have put music, of all the qualities and potencies they

have imputed to it, there is perhaps no attribution loftier than the traditional doctrine of the

music of the spheres. Beginning with Plato’s famous Myth of Er in his Republic and lasting even

until Kepler’s day, philosophers, astronomers, and musically inclined scholars held that the

celestial bodies emit sounds which create a harmonious concord.1 Since the deity was held to

motivate the spheres’ revolutions in their fixed, sempiternal courses,2 the celestial bodies

supposedly sounded their music endlessly, ever moving seamlessly from the end of one orbital

revolution to the beginning of the next. Yet this eternal, immutable perfection cannot be

experienced in the sublunary realm. As the fifth-century B.C.E. philosopher-scientist Alcmaeon

put it, “Humans perish on account of this: they are unable to connect the beginning to the end.”3

At the end of the course of our allotted years of life, we are unable to return to infancy and

begin again. Similarly, all music here on earth must come to an end.4

1 Plato, Republic, 617b.

2“. . . summus ipse deus, arcens et continens ceteros in quo sunt infixi illi qui uoluuntur stellarum
cursus sempiterni” (Cicero, Somnium Scipionis, IV). All translations are mine, unless otherwise noted.

3 “τοὺς ἀνθρώπους φησὶν Ἀλκμαίων διὰ τοῦτο ἀπόλλυσθαι, ὅτι οὐ δύνανται τὴν ἀρχὴν τῶι
τέλει προσάψαι” (Alcmaeon, frag. 2 [H. Diels and W. Kranz, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, vol. 1, 6th
edn. {Berlin: Weidmann, 1951}, 215]).

4It is worth noting that even the musical performance that may come closest to escaping the
bonds of finitude, the rendition of John Cage’s “As Slow as Possible” being performed in Halberstadt,
Germany, is invariably described in the popular press in terms of when it will conclude (see, for instance,
Maura Judkis, “World’s longest concert will last 639 years,” The Washington Post [November 21, 2011],
and Daniel J. Wakin, “John Cage's Long Music Composition in Germany Changes a Note,” The New York
Times [May 6, 2006]).

1
 This dissertation takes as its subject musical closure, and the diversity of ways in which,

over the centuries, writers on music have engaged with the phenomenon of the conclusions of

musical pieces and their constituent parts. It proposes a new narrative of how conceptions of

the cadence developed from the eleventh through nineteenth centuries, by drawing upon

detailed analyses of crucial doctrines of cadence found in music theory texts, and by comparing

those ideas with contemporaneous musical compositions. In doing so, it presents material that

will be of interest to a range of scholars. Those who focus on the analysis of compositions will

gain fresh insights into past conceptions of musical closure that may provide access to new

possibilities for hearing a composition’s musical structure and sectional divisions. For

historians of theory, the dissertation offers a new interpretive framework for the concept of

cadence, comprising three previously unidentified periods of cadential theorizing with

important discontinuities of doctrine and practice separating them. As for modern Formenlehre,

many recent theories of form refer back to eighteenth and nineteenth-century doctrines of

formal design, either to demonstrate the superiority of contemporary perspectives, or to

challenge current theory to take into consideration historically-sensitive ways of understanding

formal types.5 Yet these sorts of appeals to the past have not occurred with respect to the

concept of cadence. To crafters of modern theories of form, this dissertation presents

opportunities both to be challenged by older conceptions of closure and to make well informed

decisions about when to depart from those conceptions in favor of modern understandings of

5 James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy, Elements of Sonata Theory (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2006), 605; Scott Burnham, “The Second Nature of Sonata Form,” in Music Theory and Natural Order
from the Renaissance to the Early Twentieth Century, ed. Suzannah Clark and Alexander Rehding
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 117, n. 8.

2
cadence. Discussion of the broader intellectual contexts of these cadential doctrines shows how

the latter have not depended solely on developments in musical practice, but were also

influenced and shaped by concepts and methodological procedures drawn from their wider

intellectual environment.

Before proceeding further, a few words about the terminology of cadence and closure

are in order. The meaning of the words “cadence” and “closure” (and related terms in other

languages) varies significantly in different periods and places, and one of this dissertation’s

endeavors is to tease out the nuances of such terminology in different texts. For now, however,

let the term “musical closure” provisionally be understood to refer to the general function of

marking the conclusion of a formal unit (or other stretch of musical utterance) and establishing

to some degree a definite impression of arrival and/or conclusion, by whatever means are

appropriate to the style of the music in question.6 “Cadence,” in contrast, here refers to a

stereotyped succession of at least two sonorities, normally composed of three or more voices,

that produces the effect of closure, as just defined. Thus, monophonic chant cannot have

cadences, but does have musical closure. The related idea of “ending” will be used to

differentiate a conclusion that is not motivated by the music before it from the concepts of

“closure” and “cadence,” which are understood to close off some amount of preceding material

(though the precise amount that is thereby concluded is often ambiguous).

That is not to say, however, that all theories of cadence advance this understanding of

the concept. Indeed, many cadential theorists focus either on characterizing the function of

6 My understanding of closure here is similar to Mark Anson-Cartwright’s first definition of

closure, but without his restriction to the tonal repertoire (“Concepts of Closure in Tonal Music: A Critical
Study,” Theory and Practice 32 [2007]: 3).

3
concluding formal units, or on describing the musical configurations which constitute cadential

progressions. That is to say, they dedicate their attention to the questions of where cadences are

made, or how they are constructed. Our provisional definition of the cadence encompasses both

of these facets, of course, but it is important to note that most innovative cadential doctrines

show signs of originality in only one of these two areas, and leave the other either unstated or in

an entirely traditional form. Thus, the questions of how and where cadences are made can cast

significant light on theorists’ priorities and contributions, and we will return to them as we

consider different historical theories of cadence.

The contribution I seek to make in this dissertation will become clearer in the light of a

review of the scholarly literature of the past few decades that has addressed the concept of

cadence. The vast majority of this literature may be fruitfully analyzed as falling into three

broad categories: wide-ranging encyclopedia articles, analyses of musical closure in a given

repertoire, and studies of cadential doctrine in particular periods. The most thorough example

of the first category is a pair of related articles on “Clausula” and “Kadenz” by Siegfried

Schmalzriedt in the Handwörterbuch der musikalischen Terminologie.7 Schmalzriedt’s purpose is to

describe all the ways in which the given terms have been used over the centuries. The

crowning achievement of his articles is a table of 81 terms in Latin and Italian, followed by an

exposition of what the terms mean and who employed them. His treatment offers a valuable

overview of a great number of the meanings with which the terms “clausula” and “cadence”

(and their cognates) have been associated over the centuries, and he does not neglect peripheral

7 Siegfried Schmalzriedt, “Clausula” and “Kadenz” in Handwörterbuch der musikalischen

Terminologie, ed. Hans Heinrich Eggebrecht (Wiesbaden: F. Steiner, 1972‒).

4
uses of the terms, such as the seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century tendency to describe a

trill-like melodic ornament as a “cadence.”8 Yet the concision of Schmalzriedt’s articles entails

several deficiencies: his focus on providing definitions for terminology minimizes the extent to

which the conception of a single term, like “clausula formalis” can change over the course of the

nearly three centuries in which the phrase was used. Additionally, Schmalzriedt’s articles are

unreliable witnesses to matters of chronology and intellectual priority: the sources Schmalzriedt

cites to demonstrate his terms often transmit the cadential doctrine of earlier theorists in nearly

identical form, yet Schmalzriedt rarely acknowledges the antecedent sources, resulting in a

misleading impression as to just when the usage in question first appeared.9

The second category of literature consists of a few works that seek to theorize the

practice of musical closure in particular corpora of compositions. One example of this approach

is an article by Kevin Moll, in which he proposes a list of ten defining elements of cadences in

French mass settings of the fourteenth century.10 He considers aspects of the music such as text

setting, pulse, counterpoint, and consonance. By appealing to his defining elements, Moll

makes claims for where and whether one should understand cadences to occur in this music.

His criteria also allow him to apply the label of cadence to progressions that are not normally

identified as fourteenth-century cadences by modern scholars. Based on this, Moll concludes

8 See, for example, Michael Praetorius, Syntagma musicum, III, 137-9, and Étienne Loulié, Éléments
ou principes de musique, 67.

9 Schmalzriedt often cites Walther’s Lexikon to define terms first proposed more than fifty years
earlier by Printz in his Phrynis Mitilenaeus, and also cites Ornithoparchus’s nearly verbatim version of
Schanppecher and Wollick’s cadential doctrine with no reference to the latter.

Kevin Moll, “Voice Function, Sonority, and Contrapuntal Procedure in Late Medieval
10

Polyphony,” Current Musicology 64 (Spring 1998): 32.

5
that musical closure in that corpus is more flexible than is commonly acknowledged, though it

still adheres to an easily discernible set of music elements.11

Jennifer Bain theorizes how cadences work in a yet more restricted repertoire: the music

of Machaut. Her central contribution, like Moll’s, is to broaden the notion of what serves as a

cadence. She emphasizes progressions that occur at conclusions of textual units, and argues

that they should be considered as cadences even if they come to rest on imperfect sonorities.

These “imperfect-sonority cadences” are at once points of provisional arrival and cues

indicating that a more complete, “perfect-sonority cadence” is required at a later point in the

piece.12 Bain also argues for a more inclusive approach to the definition and identification of

cadences in Machaut’s music than is provided by the standard theory. The latter stipulates, as

required features of a cadence, a progression of imperfect to perfect dyads exhibiting conjunct

and contrary motion, and thus effectively limits cadential progressions to three: minor third to

unison, major third to perfect fifth, and major sixth to octave. Bain, however, points out several

examples in Machaut’s oeuvre in which both structural voices leap, or move in some other

unusual way, to a perfect consonance which is the final sonority of a whole piece, arguing that

such cases prove the existence, in this repertoire, of a broader range of cadential possibilities

than that allowed by the standard theory.

Such studies of cadential practice in specific bodies of music are mostly limited to pre-

tonal music. When it comes to music of the common-practice period, recent and current

11 Ibid., 37-40.

12 Jennifer Bain, “Theorizing the Cadence in the Music of Machaut,” Journal of Music Theory 47, no.
2 (Fall, 2003): 343-346.

6
theoretical and analytical work does not usually attempt a redefinition of the cadence; rather,

most such work adopts without question those prevailing concepts of cadence that are the

result of a centuries-long development. One exception to this is William Caplin, who has

dedicated a substantial article to theorizing the classical cadence.13 Yet his work is markedly

different from the projects of Moll and Bain: rather than offering a novel theory of how cadences

function in a given musical repertoire, Caplin articulates how he believes the concept of the

cadence should function in discourse devoted to classical music, a functioning largely

instantiated in the theory of form published earlier in his book Classical Form.14

Two fine examples of the third category, studies of cadential doctrines of particular

authors or eras, are Elisabeth Schwind’s monograph Kadenz und Kontrapunkt: Zur

Kompositionslehre der Klassischen Vokalpolyphonie, and Markus Waldura’s tome Von Rameau und

Riepel zu Koch.15 Schwind takes as her focus sixteenth-century polyphony, but, rather than

deducing cadential function from the repertoire, she undertakes a close reading of

contemporaneous theoretical texts to gain insight into how composers may have conceptualized

musical closure. Waldura’s text is less oriented towards compositional practice. Instead, he

William E. Caplin, “The Classical Cadence: Conceptions and Misconceptions.” Journal of the
13

American Musicological Society 57, no. 1 (Spring 2004): 51-118.

14 Idem, Classical Form (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998).

15 Elisabeth Schwind, Kadenz und Kontrapunkt: Zur Kompositionslehre der Klassischen Vokalpolyphonie
(Hildesheim: Olms, 2009); Markus Waldura, Von Rameau und Riepel zu Koch: Zum Zusammenhang zwischen
theoretischem Ansatz, Kadenzlehre und Periodenbegriff in der Musiktheorie des 18. Jahrhunderts.
Musikwissenschaftliche Publikationen, ed. Herbert Schneider, no. 21 (Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlag,
2002).

7
aims to elucidate eighteenth-century ideas of cadence and phrase structure by investigating a

wide range of contemporaneous music-theoretical texts.

Poundie Burstein’s work includes an example of a very different kind of study of the

concept of the cadence.16 Rather than surveying the dicta of multiple theorists, Burstein here

elucidates one aspect of cadence in a single theorist’s work, to wit, Heinrich Schenker’s

auxiliary cadence (Hilfskadenz). He thoroughly investigates Schenker’s texts and analytic

examples and offers a compelling interpretation of a concept that previously had been poorly

explained by commentators. Burstein finds that the essence of the auxiliary cadence is a

cadential progression in which the tonic harmony, which in Schenker’s view normally initiates

cadences, is omitted. One major difference between Burstein’s project and those of Schwind

and Waldura is that he aims explicitly to change analytic practice. His article contains

numerous examples of Schenker’s use of the auxiliary cadence, and he structures his argument

in such a way that Schenkerians can easily put his conclusions to work in their own analyses.

The present dissertation differs significantly from these three categories of cadence-

related literature. In that it evaluates the concept of the cadence over a broad chronological

sweep, it bears resemblances to the first category, encyclopedia articles. Yet the significantly

greater depth of inquiry found in this work leads to substantial differences from such articles,

including more accurate accounts of historical precedence, concern for the relationship between

theory and practice, and scrutiny of the ways in which cadential theorists drew on non-musical

discourses. In that its primary object of study is cadential doctrine, this dissertation does not fit

16 L. Poundie Burstein, “Schenker’s Concept of the Auxiliary Cadence,” in Essays form the Third
International Schenker Symposium, ed. Allen Cadwallader (Hildesheim: Olms Verlag, 2006), 2-6.

8
the second category, in which authors try to infer cadential functioning in a given musical

corpus. The third category is the closest match, yet this work’s investigation of cadential

doctrines from many different centuries results in several characteristics which are significant

departures from other examples of that category. The most notable of those characteristics are

this dissertation’s analysis of the history of cadential discourse into three previously

unidentified periods, and the attention paid to conceptual similarities and discrepancies

stretching across centuries. The first of these three periods comprises the pre-history of the

concept of the cadence, and it extends from the dawn of music theorizing in the West (ca. 900

CE) to the start of the sixteenth century. The second period begins with the earliest texts to

present a theory of the cadence proper (understood as a polyphonic progression) in the early

sixteenth century, and lasts about 300 years, until the beginning of the nineteenth century. The

final period stretches from the nineteenth century to the present. Thus, this dissertation

features both scope and depth of investigation in a way unmatched by previous studies of the

concept of the cadence, and consequently is able to offer new insights into the object of its

inquiry.

The methodology of this work centers upon close analysis of primary texts. The

foundational body of material for this study consists of written accounts, belonging to what we

now call “music theory,” that theorize musical closure, and, in particular, selected texts which I

consider to be particularly noteworthy instantiations of trends in that theorization. These texts,

however, are clearly not the only sources relevant to the study of the cadence.

Contemporaneous compositions can provide important an important resource both for

clarifying ambiguities in a given text, and also for testing the degree of fit between theoretical

9
pronouncements and actual practice; while they are not central to this dissertation’s project,

they will be drawn upon when helpful. Nor is consideration of primary texts limited to musical

texts. From their earliest appearances in medieval texts, discussions of musical closure have

been informed by other areas of knowledge, such as the “trivial” arts of grammar, rhetoric, and

dialectic. Consequently, this dissertation examines the intellectual traditions upon which music

theorists drew, and considers the concept of cadence in relation to developments in the broader

intellectual life of Western Europe.

The first of this study’s four chapters examines the first period of theorizing musical

closure, during which a concept of a robustly polyphonic cadential progression had not yet

arisen. Focusing on the conceptualization of closure in medieval chant, it finds that discussions

of the subject from the earliest centuries of this period are limited to brief analogies between

segments of pieces and the idea of punctuation. It was not until the turn of the twelfth century,

in John of Affligem’s De musica, that a substantial theory of musical closure arose, in which

three different concluding phenomena are aligned with three degrees of syntactic closure in a

given chant’s text. We will see that John’s breakthrough is due to his adaptation of the full

conceptual richness of the late classical doctrine of punctuation, in which there are three types

of marks with different syntactical and performative implications. This chapter contextualizes

John’s ideas within that grammatico-rhetorical tradition, and also demonstrates the significant

ways in which John’s theory of closure surpassed that of his musical predecessors. It then

proceeds to consider the problematic relationship between John’s doctrine and actual chant

melodies, before concluding by tracing the centuries-long survival of John’s ideas in later

theoretical texts.

10
 The second chapter considers a little-known cadential doctrine that established our

second period, and the first epoch of theorizing the cadence proper. In the first period, accounts

of closure had only discussed concluding formulae being constituted of one or two independent

voices, even when three- and four-part compositions had become common. In contrast, a new

body of doctrine, of nebulous authorship, arose in early-sixteenth century Cologne that treated

what it called the “clausula formalis” as a simultaneous conjunction of three or even four

melodic gestures, each of which was stereotypically associated with a particular vocal part.

This conception of the cadence proved very attractive, and persisted in the German tradition for

the next two hundred years. Even longer lasting, however, was the period of cadential

theorizing that the Cologne school initiated. As we will see, a confluence of significant factors

accounts for the disjuncture separating the texts in the Cologne orbit from earlier theories of

closure. One such factor is the identification of the cadence as an important, self-standing object

of theoretical study: conclusive progressions are no longer discussed in the context of long lists

of contrapuntal possibilities, but instead have entire chapters dedicated to their explication.

Another significant factor is the aforementioned insistence on theorists’ part on describing

cadences as being constituted of three or four voices, even as they struggle to account for the

behavior of these newly added voices. Another significant feature is the imputation of the idea

of structural closure to contrapuntal progressions through the adoption of the term clausula (or

“close”). Yet in spite of the implications of this onomastic choice, the Cologne school theorists

also initiated a long-lived relational ambiguity between the function of musical closure and

those musical successions which qualify as clausulae formales. This ambiguity results from the

Cologne school’s lack of articulation of an explicit connection between the clausula progression

11
and the structure of an accompanying text. The second chapter tests different possibilities for

interpreting the link between the clausula formalis and the function of closure by applying them

to contemporaneous compositions; it then proposes a flexible approach to engaging with this

ambiguity that builds upon a rarely noticed contemporaneous division of clausulae progressions

into two classes: those capable of ending entire pieces, and those which are not.

The third chapter delves into the most elaborate efflorescence of the type of cadential

theorizing initiated by the Cologne school: that of Johann Wolfgang Caspar Printz. In the last

quarter of the seventeenth century Printz proposed a system of nine polyphonic cadential types,

and developed a detailed conceptual apparatus to support them. As this chapter elucidates,

part of the motivation for the profusion of cadential types in Printz’s system was his tacit

adherence to pedagogical principles that trace their origin to the educational reform movement

established in the mid-sixteenth century by Petrus Ramus. Printz’s doctrine also contains many

features with rich musical implications which this chapter teases out. These include one of the

earliest articulations of the idea that listeners can understand one progression to be implied,

even as they hear another (as in an evaded cadence), a related emphasis on the role of the bass

line in cadential functioning, and an incipient theory of hierarchical formal structure.

The final chapter turns to the significant change in cadential theorizing that occurred

around the turn of the nineteenth century. Ever since the days of the Cologne school, authors

had treated the cadence as an important element of music theory, devoting chapters to its

nature and proper compositional disposition. By way of a comparison of the writings of H.C.

Koch and A.B. Marx, this chapter contends that by the turn of the nineteenth century the

concept of the cadence ceased to function as an autonomous element of theoretical concern, and

12
instead became subordinate to the newly ascendant concept of musical form. This change was

due in part to a growing predilection for organicist metaphors in music theory, which gave rise

to a new focus on formal concerns, and an attendant reformulation of the role of cadences in

that discourse. This chapter argues that at the end of the eighteenth century, music theory

underwent a transition analogous to the contemporaneous transformation of natural history

into biological study. By examining cadential discourse in light of this analogy, new insight will

be gained into the decreasing prominence of cadential theorizing in this third period, and the

related elevation of musical form into a central element of music-theoretical study, a status

which it continues to hold nearly two centuries later.

13
 CHAPTER 1

MUSICAL CLOSURE, GRAMMATICO-RHETORICAL DOCTRINE, AND CHANT:

JOHN OF AFFLIGEM

Musical discourse in the West has drawn heavily upon the disciplines of grammar and

rhetoric from the time of its medieval revival in the ninth century. Today the most famous

appropriation from these disciplines for musical ends is likely the seventeenth century’s

development of a doctrine of musical figures (Figurenlehre), borrowing from a tradition in

rhetoric.1 Yet in earlier centuries writers on music instead drew primarily upon methods of

analyzing and demarcating the structure of prose, methods which developed during Antiquity

in the disciplines of rhetoric and grammar. Rhetorical theorists focused on developing a

vocabulary for analyzing speech into its constitutive phrases and sub-phrases, whereas

grammarians formulated a system of punctuation marks to assist the parsing of written texts.

Both of these approaches proved useful to medieval music theorists as they attempted to

describe chant melodies in terms of phrases, their component parts, and their conclusions.

This chapter elucidates the first sophisticated theory of musical closure by

demonstrating its dependence on much older theories of prosal phrase structure and

punctuation. To do so, we will begin by examining accounts representative of the state of

rhetorical and grammatical theory in Antiquity, and will consider how the early medieval

reception of these ideas combined the two into a somewhat uneasily conglomerate theory of

1See, for example, Patrick McCreless’s survey of music-theoretic appropriations of rhetorical

ideas (McCreless, “Music and Rhetoric,” in The Cambridge History of Western Music Theory, ed. Thomas
Christensen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 847-79.

14
punctuation. Thereafter our attention turns to medieval discussions of music. We will see that

writers from the early centuries of the medieval efflorescence of music theorizing did not draw

upon the full apparatus of punctuational concepts and terminology available to them, tending

instead to use that apparatus merely to refer to phrases or phrase demarcations in general

terms. Indeed, it was not until the De musica of John of Affligem (ca. 1100 C.E.) that the full

conceptual power of the ancient world’s rhetorical and grammatical doctrines of phrase

structure and punctuation were put to use in the field of music, giving rise to a number of ideas

about music that continue to resonate today. Particularly noteworthy examples include

discussion of the role of performance in the delineation of musical structure, the question of

what constitutes a complete musical thought, and the earliest articulation of the idea that a

musical event can feign closure, a musical phenomenon which later developed into time-

honored progressions such as the deceptive and evaded cadences. I therefore offer a careful

consideration of John’s treatment of grammatico-rhetorical concepts and musical closure,

examining the particular strands of thought upon which he drew, the alterations he made to

those ideas, and the innovative development in the theory of music which resulted; the

relationship between John’s theory and musical practice is also examined. The chapter

concludes with a demonstration of the surprising longevity of the analogy between different

forms of punctuation and musical endings first developed by John of Affligem, finding that

theorists were still articulating variants of it as late as the middle of the eighteenth century.

15
1.1 The Analysis of Speech Structure in Classical Rhetoric

Given the connotations of duplicity and self-serving manipulation of the audience that

the term ‘rhetoric’ invokes today, it may come as a surprise that the origins of the field of

rhetoric are inextricably linked to pedagogy. The first practitioners of rhetoric for whom

historical attestation exists were itinerant “wise men,” or sophists (σοφισταί [sophistai]), who

traveled the Greek-speaking world of the fifth century, B.C.E., and were famously critiqued and

lampooned by Plato in many of his dialogues. Because they were not natives of the cities to

which they traveled, they could not seek direct political power. Rather, they delivered “show

piece” speeches in public, in which they attempted to attract paying students, and instructional

speeches in private to those students.2 A recurring claim of many of these self-proclaimed

sophoi, such as Protagoras and Gorgias, was that they could convincingly argue either side of an

argument, and, thus, that they could teach their students to deliver compelling speeches and

gain political power.3

This first generation of rhetoricians seems to have guarded the secrecy of their teachings

for reasons of financial self-interest, and this appears to have been the governing model well

2 On the pedagogical and commercial orientation of the sophists, see Laurent Pernot, Rhetoric in
Antiquity, trans. W. E. Higgins (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2005), 12-15.

3 Indeed, many of the “show piece” speeches demonstrated the orator’s skill by attempting to
accomplish the seemingly impossible, often by facetiously rehabilitating the image of reprehensible
characters or casting aspersions on heroes. This genre of praising or blaming came to be known as the
genre of “epideictic,” or display, oratory. For more contextualization of the early sophists and their
thought, see George A. Kennedy, A New History of Classical Rhetoric (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1994), 17-21.

16
into the fourth century B.C.E.4 Indeed, the Greek tradition of writing handbooks (τέχναι

[technai]) addressing the subject of rhetoric in detail only began with the Rhetorica of Aristotle

(384-322 B.C.E.), which he likely wrote in the years about 330 B.C.E. In this treatise and in

similar texts from following generations, Aristotle and later rhetoricians develop a theory of the

structure of speech (λέξις [lexis]), analyzing it into sentences and constituent phrases. Aristotle

proposes a hierarchy of two levels. The higher level of syntactic unit he calls the “period”

(περίοδος [periodos], pl. περίοδοι [periodoi]), which he defines as follows: “I call the period an

utterance (λέξις) that has its own beginning and end, and an easily comprehensible

magnitude.”5 These periods may be made up of shorter clauses, called “colons” (κῶλα [kōla],

sing. κῶλον [kōlon]), that is, “members,” as of a body; alternatively, periods can also be simple

(ἀφελής [aphelēs]), consisting of a single colon.

At some point in the following two centuries a new, still shorter unit was added to the

hierarchy of period and colon.6 This was the “comma” (κόμμα [komma], pl. κόμματα

[kommata]), that is, a “cutting,” “incision,” or “articulation” of the utterance into brief segments.

These concepts clearly establish a hierarchical organization of word grouping, but they are far

from strictly defined. Given the amount of information provided in Aristotle’s treatise and the

4 It was not until the early fourth century that the first formal school of rhetoric was founded, by
Isocrates (436-338 B.C.E.), and his letters, the sole contemporaneous extant source, merely hint at his
pedagogical program.

“λέγω δὲ περίοδον λέξιν ἔχουσαν ἀρχὴν καὶ τελευτὴν αὐτὴν καθ᾽ αὑτὴν καὶ μέγεθος
5

εὐσύνοπτον” (Aristotle, Rhetorica, III.9, 1409a34-b1).

6 Perhaps the earliest extant Greek texts to use the term “colon” is the De compositione verborum of
Dionysius of Halicarnassus (fl. 20 B.C.E.), but the presence of the concept in the Roman tradition of
rhetoric in the later second century B.C.E. makes it clear that Dionysius was not the first author to use the
term (Dionysius of Halicarnassus, De compositione verborum, XXVI, ll. 12-3).

17
scanty number of extant Greek rhetorical works which survive from the following three

centuries, one cannot reconstruct with certainty precisely how any author would or would not

employ these concepts in practice. Rather, the vagueness of the definitions offered suggests that

students learned the concepts of period, colon, and comma not primarily through such

definitions, but empirically and inductively, through their instructors’ examples and gradual

honing of the students’ intuitions.7 Consequently, we should not expect lucid, precise

explanations of this conceptual triad, but rather we should hold fast to its basic hierarchical

relationship while attending to the broader implications of the terms’ definitions.

Perhaps surprisingly, the concepts of the period, colon, and comma were not often

introduced in later rhetorical treatises as a broadly applicable means of breaking down and

comprehending entire passages. Instead, they usually served as a tool in discussions of literary

style, which was one of the chief concerns of rhetorical education in Greco-Roman Antiquity.

Since young students of rhetoric learned to recognize and create different kinds of style through

analyzing exemplary passages and composing imitations of them, it was important to be able to

recognize common techniques of manipulating normal speech to produce heightened effects.

The most well-known of these techniques became codified in lists of “tropes” (tropoi) or “figures

of speech” (exornationes verborum), such as antithesis, asyndeton, and climax. Yet from the time

of Aristotle rhetoricians had used the period and colon (and later the comma) as another means

7 For instance, Augustine of Hippo employs the comma, colon, and period to analyze scriptural
excerpts in his De doctrina christiana, but offers only examples of their use, rather than substantive
explanations of the terms (De doctrina Christiana, IV.7, §§11, 13). This passage circulated widely by the
tenth century as an appendix to many copies of Cassiodorus’s Institutiones (R. A. B. Mynors,
“Introduction,” in Cassiodori Senatoris Institutiones, ed. R. A. B. Mynors [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1937],
xxx-xxxix).

18
of describing unusual, marked structuring of words, including successive colons of similar

length (parisosis or isocolon), clauses containing antithetical thoughts (antithesis), and similarity

or dissimilarity of the final syllables of successive phrases (paromoiosis).8 Consequently, later

rhetoricians, such as pseudo-Cicero, often set their treatments of the period, colon, and comma

in the midst of lengthy lists of these figures of speech.9

Despite the paucity of extant Greek treatises from the first and second centuries B.C.E.,

our knowledge of rhetorical doctrine during that period is not impoverished. Starting in the

later second century B.C.E. a Roman tradition of rhetoric arose which doubtless borrowed

heavily from Greek rhetoric of the day. As Harry Caplan notes, the rhetorical treatises written

during the initial decades in which that field was being established in Rome have not survived

intact, and thus the pseudo-Ciceronian Rhetorica ad Herennium (ca. 90s B.C.E.) is the oldest

Roman rhetorical text to survive in its entirety.10 This treatise presents and explains in detail a

fully formed doctrine embracing the conceptual triad of period, colon, and comma, or

continuatio, membrum, and articulus, as the anonymous author translates the terms. Because of

the longstanding erroneous attribution of the Rhetorica ad Herennium to Cicero, this work was

tremendously influential in the medieval period; consequently, it is worthwhile to investigate

its transmission of Greek rhetorical doctrine in some detail.

8 Aristotle, Rhetorica, III.9.

9 [Cicero], Rhetorica ad Herennium, IV.xiii.19-xliii.56.

[Cicero], Rhetorica ad Herennium, trans. Harry Caplan in Loeb Classical Library 403 (Cambridge:
10

Harvard University Press, 1954), vii.

19
 Adhering to tradition, Pseudo-Cicero presents the three terms as a hierarchy in which

commas compose colons, which in turn compose periods. Concerning the comma/articulus

(which Cicero calls “incisum,”) pseudo-Cicero writes: “It is called a ‘comma’ (articulus) when

individual words are separated by pauses in choppy speech,11 e.g. ‘By [your] sharpness, voice,

expression, you terrified your enemies.’”12 This stipulation that every comma is comprised of

an individual word (“by your sharpness” is one word in Latin) is much more restrictive than

the Greek conception of commas as merely being “shorter than colons.” As for the

colon/membrum, pseudo-Cicero invokes a two-colon norm reminiscent of Aristotle’s first type of

period (the περίοδος ἡ ἐν κώλοις): “‘Colon’ (membrum orationis) means an element (res) that is

briefly concluded without the articulation of the complete thought (sententia), which is

continued with a fresh start by another colon, in this way: ‘You were at once benefiting your

enemy . . .’ That is what we call one colon. This should then be taken up by another [colon], in

this way: ‘and you were injuring your friend.’”13 The last category, the period/continuatio, is

11“Choppy speech” is my rendering of caesa oratione. Lewis and Short’s A Latin Dictionary glosses
this phrase as “asyndeton,” which is the rhetorical device in which conjunctions are omitted (s.v.
“caedo”). The examples given by pseudo-Cicero all exhibit asyndeton, but adopting that word in the
translation would give an incorrect impression that the Latin text involved that degree of technical
terminology.

12“Articulus dicitur cum singula verba intervallis distinguuntur caesa oratione, hoc modo:
‘Acrimonia, voce, vultu adversarios perterruisti’” ([Cicero], Rhetorica ad Herennium, IV.xix.26). Translation
adapted from Caplan’s edition, p. 295.

“Membrum orationis appellatur res breviter absoluta sine totius sententiae demonstratione,
13

quae denuo alio membro orationis excipitur, hoc pacto: ‘Et inimico proderas.’ Id est unum quod
appellamus membrum; deinde hoc excipiatur oportet altero: ‘Et amicum laedebas’” (ibid.).

20
described much more concisely: “A ‘period’ (continuatio) is a compact and uninterrupted

crowding together of words with completion of the thoughts.”14

The definitions of these latter two, the colon and the period, both employ the concept of

the sententia (thought or idea), which merits discussion. Through the rest of Antiquity and well

into the Middle Ages rhetorical theorists relied on a poorly defined set of terms having to do

with meaning—most notably sententia, sensus, and significare—in their discussions of both

rhetorical and grammatical matters having to do with the analysis of speech. No consistent

differentiation exists in the grammatical corpus between the nouns sententia and sensus; while

some authors, like Isidore of Seville, do attempt to employ them in distinct ways, other authors

use them interchangeably. One of the most common usages of these terms is to invoke the

semantic referent of a given group of words. Another important one refers to a thought, with

overtones of something resembling our modern sense of syntactic structure. For instance,

Pseudo-Cicero’s definition of the colon stipulates that it concludes “without the articulation of

the complete thought (sententia).” To my knowledge, authors from Antiquity and the medieval

period never spell out what distinguishes completion from incompletion in the realm of

thought and meaning. Many authors do, however, provide examples of complete and

incomplete thoughts, and in each example which I have evaluated the author’s indication of

whether the thought is complete aligns with my intuition of whether the syntax of the text is

closed off. Due to the lack of conflicting evidence, I choose to assume that the meaning of

“completion” and “incompletion” in these texts roughly corresponds to ours. (An important

14 “Continuatio est densa et continens frequentatio verborum cum absolutione sententiarum”

(ibid., IV.xix.27).

21
proviso, however, is that grammatical texts from Antiquity and the medieval period do not

appear to have a direct correlate to our modern idea of the simple sentence. The nearest

analogy to our sentence is the concept of the periodus, but classical orators often developed

tremendously long periods, which we would identify as compound—or even run-on—

sentences.) Thus, the sententia or (sensus) of a collection of words like “The severed hand of

Cicero, being displayed in the Rostra” is Cicero’s hand itself, but the words also would be

considered to comprise an incomplete sententia. It is also worth noting that some authors seem

to employ “sententia” or “sensus” to indicate the verbal entity itself—the ordered series of

words—rather than the referent of those words. The verb significare and its derivatives are used

to denote the action of words whereby they represent, express, or convey a thought. From text

to text the precise nuances of these terms can vary, of course, so we will reflect upon their

meanings when the implications are significant.

Through the rest of Antiquity rhetorical theorists increasingly came to rely upon these

ideas of meaning and sense when discussing the comma, colon, and period. For instance, even

though Quintilian (ca. 30-ca. 100 C.E.) adapted these terms to serve his description of prose

rhythm, in which orators or writers employ formulaic metrical patterns at the ends of sentences,

he still describes the comma and colon as “thoughts” (sensus).15 More specifically, the colon is

an incomplete thought that is rhythmically closed, whereas the comma is a thought that is not.16

15 The subject of prose rhythm is addressed in more detail in the next chapter, section 2.1.

16“In my opinion a comma is a thought which is not closed off by a finished rhythm, and which
commonly is a part of a colon (comma est, ut mea fert opinio, sensus non expleto numero conclusus,
plerumque pars membri)” (Quintilian, Institutio oratoria, IX.4.cxxii); “a colon is a thought which is closed
off by rhythms, but is disconnected from the whole substance [of the speech] and completes nothing in

22
Martianus Capella (fl. 410s-20s C.E.) further intensified the role of signification, and thus

thought, in his definitions of the period, colon, and comma, describing both the colon and

comma as “a portion of a speech which signifies” (pars orationis significans). The former signifies

in many words (i.e., more than one) something complete, and the latter signifies something

incomplete in fewer words.17

These conceptions of the comma and colon demonstrate the increasing importance of the

role of thought (sententia) in these late-antique definitions. Pseudo-Cicero’s description of the

comma as a word distinguished by pauses has completely disappeared, and his rather

mechanical focus on the grouping of more or fewer words in the colon and period has been

largely suppressed in favor of a more insightful description of thought-units that comprise

more or less information, and have greater or lesser degrees of completion. Of course, in both

conceptions the main criterion for judging between period, colon, and comma ends up being the

conclusion (or lack thereof) of the meaning of the words in question; nevertheless, some authors

present their concepts as consisting primarily of analyses of verbal structures per se, while

others more explicitly take account of the semantic content of the thoughts expressed. This

shifting emphasis between analyzing words and analyzing thoughts will continue to be

important in the consideration of punctuation immediately to come.

itself (membrum autem est sensus numeris conclusus, sed a toto corpore abruptus et per se nihil
efficiens)” (ibid., IX.4.cxxiii).

17 “A colon is a part of speech which expresses in many words something completely (membrum
est pars orationis ex pluribus verbis absolute aliquid significans)” (Martianus Capella, De nuptiis, V, §528,
p. 184); “a comma, however, is a part of speech which expresses in two or more words something not yet
complete (caesum autem est pars orationis ex duobus aut pluribus verbis <non>dum quicquam absolute
significans)” (ibid.).

23
1.2 The Grammatical Doctrine of Punctuation in Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages

From a modern reader’s perspective, the development of a system of punctuation would

seem to have been almost necessary for classical culture. Greek scribes, and Roman scribes

from the second century C.E. onwards, wrote in continuous script (scriptura continua), in which

all the letters of a text were spaced at roughly equal distances from each other, a practice that

gave no indications of distinctions between words, let alone larger sense units.18 In a context

like this, scribes could have relied on punctuation as a way to help readers intuit the text’s

syntactic structure, or even to give aspiring orators indications of appropriate points at which to

breathe or to pause for emphasis. And indeed, such a system of punctuation was developed

and propounded in grammatical textbooks, as we shall see. Yet it is crucial to note that the

practice of punctuation in Antiquity was very different from that of our day. As the

paleographer M. B. Parkes has shown, punctuation marks were never written concurrently with

texts by the original scribes before the sixth century C.E.; rather, they were added to texts by

readers as they attempted to parse the string of letters presented to them in the scriptura

continua style of writing.19

Given this ad hoc nature of early punctuation, it is perhaps unsurprising that in

Antiquity and the medieval period there was often a large discrepancy between the practice of

punctuation and contemporaneous explanations of how punctuation functions. Scribes in

18Concerning the Latin adoption of scriptura continua and gradual adoption of word spacing in
the medieval period, see Paul Saenger, Space between Words: the Origins of Silent Reading (Stanford, Cal.:
Stanford University Press, 1997), 9-17.

M. B. Parkes, Pause and Effect: An Introduction to the History of Punctuation in the West (Berkeley
19

and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993), 9-13, 16.

24
different locations and periods employed many different signs in a wide variety of ways, and

could even vary their practices substantially within a single manuscript. Although the doctrine

of punctuation developed by grammarians was widely transmitted and conceptually neat, it

did not adapt by expanding to include the variety of functions that scribes desired, so it became

increasingly irrelevant in the medieval period. The development of the practice of punctuation

from Antiquity to the Renaissance has been masterfully explained by Parkes, and music

historians like Leo Treitler have proposed compelling theories of the dependence of early

musical notation on medieval punctuation marks.20 Yet as we shall see, the most sophisticated

medieval theories of musical closure utilize the concepts developed in the doctrine of

punctuation, and largely ignore the complexities of scribal practice. Consequently, we will turn

our attention on this doctrine, focusing on the watershed punctuational theory of the late

Roman grammarian Aelius Donatus (fl. mid-fourth century C.E.).

Before proceeding, there are two things one should note about terminology: first, in this

chapter I retain punctuation-related terms in their original language because authors’ choice of

terminology is often significant and reveals trends of word selection and doctrinal influences.21

Translating the substantial number of synonyms using the same English words or phrases

would obscure the differences; translating the synonyms differently would suggest to the

20Parkes, Pause and Effect; Leo Treitler, “The Early History of Music Writing in the West,” Journal
of the American Musicological Society 35, no. 2 (Summer 1982): 269-73; ibid., “Reading and Singing: On the
Genesis of Occidental Music-Writing,” Early Music History 4 (1984): 186-208.

21 For example, in Latin texts, earlier authors use both the terms “positura” and “distinctio,” with
a tendency to prefer “positura” when discussing the general phenomenon of punctuation marks. In
Isidore’s writing the term “distinctio” has fallen out of fashion, but by the time of John of Affligem
“distinctio” has replaced “positura” as the term of choice.

25
English reader a greater variety of concepts than is actually in play. Secondly, most

grammatical authors use the term distinctio (originally stigmē in Greek) to indicate all three

punctuation marks in general, and also to refer specifically to the most final punctuation mark,

the plena distinctio (teleia stigmē).

As is the case with Latin rhetorical theorists, Donatus drew upon a much older Greek

tradition in the creation of his grammar textbook. This tradition stretches back to Dionysius of

Thrax (ca. 100 B.C.E.), whose Ars grammatica (Treatise on Grammar) was the foundational text of

the Greco-Roman grammatical project, and contains the oldest extant theory of punctuation.22

Surprisingly, despite the path-breaking stature of Dionysius’s Ars grammatica, its teachings on

punctuation do not appear to have become integral to the art of Greek grammar: virtually none

of the extant Greek grammatical works transmits any form of its punctuation doctrine, other

than the Byzantine-era family of commentaries specific to this text.23 Indeed, it was not until the

flourishing of Roman grammar in the mid-fourth century C.E. that the doctrine of punctuation

was again discussed in a clear and thorough fashion. At least six independent treatises from

about this period contain statements concerning punctuation, and many more treatises gloss

and amplify those six. Of the six treatises, the Ars maior of Aelius Donatus was by far the most

influential in later times, and its treatment of punctuation contains all the elements of classical

theory that were employed by authors in succeeding generations.

22 Dionysius of Thrax, Ars Grammatica, 6.

23Several fragments attributed to a certain Melampodos transmit pieces of this doctrine, but they
are not sufficient to explain the system of punctuation on their own. These fragments are printed in M.
Hubert, “Corpus stigmatologicum minus,” Archiuum Latinitatis Medii Aeui (Bulletin du Cange) 37 (1970):
13.

26
 Because Donatus’s account of the punctuation marks presents largely the same

information as that of Dionysius Thrax, but in an expanded and clarified fashion, we will

proceed directly to his account:

There are three positurae or distinctiones, which the Greeks call θέσεις (theseis)24: distinctio,
subdistinctio, and media distinctio. A distinctio is where a complete thought (sententia) is
finished; we place its mark by the top of the letter. A subdistinctio is where not much of
the thought remains [unsaid], which [remainder], although necessarily separate, is soon
to be provided (inferendum); we place its mark by the bottom of the letter. A media
distinctio is where almost as much of the thought remains as has already been said, and
yet it is necessary to breathe; we place its marks by the middle of the letter. In reading, a
complete thought is called a “period;” its parts are “colons” and “commas.”25

At the core of the doctrine of punctuation which Donatus borrows from Dionysius Thrax is a

system of three “marks” (positurae;26 stigmai, sing. stigmē in Dionysius’s Greek). All take the

form of simple dots, like the period in modern punctuation, and differ only by their position on

the page: one sits beside the top of a [capital] letter (˙), another beside the bottom of a letter (.),

and the final beside the middle of a letter (·). The first of these, the distinctio, seems to

correspond quite closely to the modern sense of the period mark: it indicates the conclusion of a

24 Curiously, no Greek texts seem to survive that use the term in this manner (The Greek-English
Lexicon of Liddell, Scott, and Jones offers only Donatus’s Latin text as a source for this meaning of the
term θέσις [s.v. “θέσις”]), which suggests that Donatus (or an earlier scholar) was drawing in part upon
a non-extant Greek textual tradition.

25 “Tres sunt positurae uel distinctiones quas θέσεις Graeci uocant, distinctio, subdistinctio,
media distinctio. distinctio est, ubi finitur plena sententia: huius punctum ad summam litteram ponimus.
subdistinctio est, ubi non multum superest de sententia, quod tamen necessario separatum mox
inferendum sit; huius punctum ad imam litteram ponimus. media distinctio est, ubi fere tantum de
sententia superest, quantum iam diximus, cum tamen respirandum sit: huius punctum ad mediam
litteram ponimus. in lectione tota sententia periodos dicitur, cuius partes sunt cola et commata”
(Donatus, Ars grammatica 612).

26 Although Donatus’s introductory sentence treats positura and distinctio as equivalent, I prefer to
employ the term “positura” when discussing this grammatical doctrine, and reserve “distinctio” to refer
specifically to the mark that concludes a complete thought.

27
complete thought (plena sententia). Here the term “sententia” functions in multiple ways,

referring to the words on the page beside which the mark is place, to the semantic referent of a

group of words, and to the quality of closure exhibited by those words. The distinctio, in

contrast, refers to the written mark itself, and not to the semantic or verbal unit that it

demarcates. The second mark, the subdistinctio, indicates a minor division in the flow of the

thought, and Donatus suggests that it comes towards the end of a given thought.27 The last

type, the media distinctio, refers to breathing. In contrast to the previous two positurae, which

mark minor or major divisions of thought, the media distinctio comes into play at the point when

suitable thought divisions are furthest away: “when almost as much of the phrase remains

[unsaid] as has already been said.” Donatus’s further association of this mark with breathing is

noteworthy, since it inserts seemingly incongruous performative concerns into a doctrine that,

at least explicitly, is concerned explicitly with the realm of thought and meaning, and the

analysis of the degree of something resembling syntactic closure. This importation of issues of

breathing into punctuational matters is doubtless due to the Greek tradition’s conception of the

analogous mark (called the mesē stigmē), in which the sign is used to indicate where one should

breathe.28

The last sentence of the passage by Donatus merits special attention, because it lays the

ground for a new conceptual relationship between the positurae and rhetorical analysis that

music theorists later exploited. (In the ancient and early medieval grammatical and rhetorical

Donatus’s description of the subdistinctio adds to Dionysius Thrax’s description of the

27

analogous mark, which describes it merely as the sign of an incomplete thought (Dionysius of Thrax, Ars
Grammatica, 6).

28 Ibid.

28
texts no such relationship is to be found: the two conceptual triads of period, colon, comma and

distinction, subdistinction, and medial distinction seem to occupy parallel universes, isolated

from each other.) In our excerpt’s final sentence, Donatus briefly mentions the period, colon,

and comma, and states that the first consists of the latter two. Although this simple statement

does not assert any explicit connection between these rhetorical terms and the doctrine of

positurae, Donatus’s decision to place it immediately after his discussion of punctuation suggests

that he sees some connection between the two terminological triads. And indeed, there are

intriguing similarities between the first two positurae, in particular, and the concepts of the

period and colon, in that both categories make reference to the concept of the thought and its

completion or incompletion; the positurae could be used to indicate the period, colon, and

comma. Yet there are two significant reasons to be wary of these conceptual similarities. The

first has already been mentioned: there is no evidence that authors before Donatus had drawn

any connection between the two. The concepts of the period and colon belonged to the study of

rhetoric, whereas the punctuation marks arose in the field of grammar; the fact that the concepts

belonged to different disciplines may be responsible for the lack of connections made between

them.29 The second reason is that the rhetorical and grammatical concepts do not correspond

perfectly to each other. “Period” and “colon” were primarily used in the analysis of figures of

speech in the heightened language of oratory or orations, and refer either to a given group of

29 This is one of several respects in which Donatus blurs the strict delineation between the fields
of rhetoric and grammar that had been championed by Quintilian (Institutio II.i.4-6, cited in James J.
Murphy, Rhetoric in the Middle Ages [Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1974;
reprint ed. Tempe, Arizona: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2001], 33). For more
on Donatus’s blending of rhetoric and grammar in book III of the Ars maior, see Murphy, Rhetoric in the
Middle Ages, 32-4.

29
words or to the thought that those words express. The distinctio and subdistinctio, in contrast,

appear to have served a more pedestrian function: they seem to have been invented to assist

readers in their attempts to sound out the text by parsing the string of letters into words and

units of thought. The terms do not signify a group of words or a thought; rather, they refer to

physical marks, which in turn indicate either the end of an incomplete component of a thought

or the word that completes a thought.

Surprisingly, this fleeting incursion of rhetorical concepts into a grammar text proved to

be tremendously long-lived, which can be seen in the fact that practically all accounts of the

positurae in the seven centuries after Donatus at least preserve his mention of the period-colon-

comma triad.30 But many do more than that. For the mere implication of a relationship

between that rhetoric-derived triad and the positurae made by Donatus did not remain long

remain the status quo, due to the wide circulation of the Etymologiae of Isidore of Seville (ca.

560-636). Here, in a dramatic change from all extant punctuation doctrine prior to this, each

kind of punctuation simply is a different phrase type, and yet at the same time is also the

written mark that indicates the phrase:31

M. Hubert discusses the grammatical reception of these three terms and other related triads
30

exhaustively (“Le vocabulaire de la «ponctuation» aux temps médiévaux: un cas d’incertitude lexicale,”
Archiuum Latinitatis Medii Aeui [Bulletin du Cange] 38 [1971-2]: 80ff.).

31 R. W. Müller speculates that this aspect of Isidore’s doctrine may, in fact, be older: he posits
that it could come from the lacuna in Charisius’s grammatical treatise, or perhaps from the Bobbienser
Mischhandschrift. Unfortunately, Müller does not elaborate his claim or provide any support for it.
Based on this author’s acquaintance with Isidore’s discussion of music and its substantial divergences
from earlier musical texts, it seems entirely possible that Isidore himself is responsible for the innovations
found in his treatment of punctuation. Thus, this author sees no reason to accept Müller’s hypothesis as
it stands (Rudolph Wolfgang Müller, “Rhetorische und syntaktische Interpunktion: Untersuchungen zur
Pausenbezeichnung im antiken Latein,” Ph.D. diss., Eberhard-Karls-Universität zu Tübingen, 1964, 75).

30
 A positura is a mark written to distinguish meaning (sensus) through colons, commas,
and periods. When it is added appropriately, it shows us the meaning of a reading.
They are called positurae either because they are notated with positioned (positis) points,
or because the voice is lowered (deponitur) there for a [brief] span of time appropriate to
the distinction. The Greeks call them θέσεις, and the Latins positurae. The first positura
is called subdistinctio, and also “comma.” The media distinctio follows; it [is] also [called]
“colon.” Last is the distinctio, which closes an entire thought (sententia); it [is] also
[called] “period,” the parts of which, as we have said, are colons and commas. The
difference [between these colons and commas] is shown by points placed in different
positions. For when at the beginning of the utterance there is not yet a complete unit
with regard to its meaning, and yet it is necessary to breathe, a comma is made, that is, a
sense fragment; its mark is placed by the bottom of the letter, and it is called a
“subdistinctio,” from [the fact] that it receives a point below (subtus), i.e., by the bottom of
the letter. Where, however, in the sequel the group of words (sententia) manifests its
meaning, but something of the group’s fullness yet remains left over, a colon is made;
we mark the middle of the letter with a point, and we call it a “media distinctio,” since we
place the point by the middle of the letter (ad mediam litteram). But when, speaking step
by step, we effect a complete closure (clausula) of the thought, there is a period; we place
a point by the top of the letter, and this is called a “distinctio,” that is, a disjunction, since
it has marked off (separavit) a complete thought.32

As this account of the positurae demonstrates, Isidore’s association of punctuation marks with

closure of thought, or lack thereof, is traditional, and one can see similarities between it and the

classical punctuation theory that stretches all the back to Dionysius Thrax. Yet Isidore’s

conflation of rhetorical phrase with punctuation mark leads to fundamental differences from his

32 “Positura est figura ad distinguendos sensus per cola et commata et periodos, quae dum ordine
suo adponitur, sensum nobis lectionis ostendit. Dictae autem positurae vel quia punctis positis
adnotantur, vel quia ibi vox pro intervallo distinctionis deponitur. Has Graeci θέσεις vocant, Latini
posituras. Prima positura subdistinctio dicitur; eadem et comma. Media distinctio sequens est; ipsa et
cola. Ultima distinctio, quae totam sententiam cludit, ipsa est periodus; cuius, ut diximus, partes sunt cola
et comma; quarum diversitas punctis diverso loco positis demonstratur. Ubi enim initio pronuntiationis
necdum plena pars sensui est, et tamen respirare oportet, fit comma, id est particula sensus, punctusque
ad imam litteram ponitur; et vocatur subdistinctio, ab eo quod punctum subtus, id est ad imam litteram,
accipit. Ubi autem in sequentibus iam sententia sensum praestat, sed adhuc aliquid superest de
sententiae plenitudine, fit cola, mediamque litteram puncto notamus; et mediam distinctionem vocamus,
quia punctum ad mediam litteram ponimus. Ubi vero iam per gradus pronuntiando plenam sententiae
clausulam facimus, fit periodus, punctumque ad caput litterae ponimus; et vocatur distinctio, id est
disiunctio, quia integram separavit sententiam” (Isidore, Etymologiae I.20).

31
predecessors. In the classical punctuation doctrine of Donatus and others, the full distinctio

indicates the end of a completed thought. In Isidore’s theory, the term distinctio all at once

refers to the mark (figura) which is placed after a given word, to the collection of words

(pronuntiatio) that is thus demarcated, and therefore also to the completed thought (tota

sententia) which those words express. Once the positurae take on these additional meanings of

word-group and thought, Isidore’s retention of the performative implications of breathing for

the comma seems all the more incongruous. Indeed, grammarians in the four centuries after

Isidore tended to minimize this aspect of the traditional punctuation doctrine, often going so far

as to omit it entirely.33

Isidore’s account of the positurae is also noteworthy because it strives toward a more

complex understanding of sensus and sententia than in earlier texts. As we have noted, authors

like Donatus and Cassiodorus use the terms in practically indistinguishable ways, to refer to the

referents of a group of words, something resembling the syntactic structure of those words, and

to the words themselves. Isidore often exhibits a similar degree of ambiguity. For instance, in

the opening sentences of the quotation one could translate sensus as “meaning,” or, just as

plausibly, as “structure.” Similarly, his definition of the distinctio as something that “closes an

33 Four related Donatus commentaries from the ninth century all minimize the concept of
breathing, and each does so in a different way. Sedulius Scottus gives the Donatus lemma, but does not
mention breathing at all in his commentary; he later quotes the entirety of Cassiodorus’s account of the
positurae, which is one of the few pre-Isidore sources not to mention breathing (In Donati artem maiorem
52-3). Murethach’s only acknowledgment of breathing is that he glosses “it is necessary to breathe
(respirandum sit)” with “pause (repausandum),” which shifts the emphasis from respiration to the
articulation of the meaning (In Donatem 44). The Ars Lavreshamensis does not include the phrase “and yet
it is necessary to breathe” in the lemma, so the issue of breathing never arises (185). Lastly, Remigius’s
commentary rephrases Donatus, rather than giving lemmas, and he never mentions breathing at all
(Commentum 230-1). See the bibliography for full citations of these sources.

32
entire sententia” could equally well refer to “group of words” or “thought.” Yet later in the

passage, Isidore clearly attempts to articulate a more sophisticated understanding of these

ideas. There, he establishes what seems to be a mutually exclusive contrast between

“sententia,” which refers only to a collection of words, and “sensus,” which indicates the

semantic referent of those words: “Where, however, in the sequel the group of words (sententia)

manifests its meaning (sensus), but something of the group’s fullness yet remains left over, a

colon is made . . .” Here it makes little sense to think of “sententia” and “sensus” being

interchangeable; instead, a group of words invokes those words’ semantic referent, but it is

lacking the words necessary for it to attain the fullness (plenitudo) of something approaching

syntactic closure. Unfortunately, Isidore does not consistently employ these terms in a way that

reinforces this sophisticated understanding, but this passage does demonstrate his efforts to

articulate notions of groupings of words, meaning, and syntactic structure as distinguishable,

though related, concepts.

In spite of all this theorizing about the three-mark system of punctuation, few scribes

during the medieval period actually used it; the positurae of late Antiquity remained a topos of

scholarly erudition rather than a practical necessity of literate education.34 Consequently,

although there are numerous concise descriptions of the positurae in a variety of texts surviving

from the seventh through eleventh centuries, many of these accounts consist merely of

quotations from older sources.35 In light of this, a set of four related, ninth-century

34 For an account of alternatives to the three-mark system employed in the early medieval period,
see Parkes, Pause and Effect, 24-8.
35 See texts reprinted in Hubert, “Corpus stigmatologicum minus,” 77-8, 82-3, 92-4, 99.

33
commentaries on Donatus’s Ars maior offers an unusually detailed view of how medieval

scholars explained this traditional element of grammatical doctrine.36 While these four

commentaries do offer a few interesting expansions of Donatus’s concise description of

punctuation, such as an emphasis on the links between the spatial orientation of the positurae

with the sense of a given phrase,37 they do not reinterpret Donatus’s ideas in any particularly

substantive ways. Furthermore, none of the punctuation-related insights unique to these

commentaries were adopted by writers discussing music. Consequently, we will pass over the

details of these four texts and proceed to our consideration of how these concepts from the

disciplines of grammar and rhetoric were adopted and adapted in early music treatises.

1.3 Grammatical and Rhetorical Elements in Musical Discourse before John of Affligem

Isidore’s Etymologiae (ca. 600 C.E.) marks an important turning point not only in the

history of punctuation doctrine, but also in music. Subsequent to Isidore’s brief discussion of

36 Of the medieval grammars to which I have had access, only the Donatus commentaries concern
positurae. For a concise description of genres of medieval grammars, see Vivien Law, Grammar and
Grammarians in the Early Middle Ages (London: Longman, 1997), 132-3.

37 With regard to the distinctio, Donatus’s text posits no explicit connection between space and
meaning: “A distinctio is where a complete thought (plena sententia) is finished; we place its mark by the
top of the letter (ad summam litteram)” (Ars maior, 612). To this lemma Murethach adds, “And since the
highest point (summa)—that is, the fullness (plenitudo)—of the meaning is there, for that reason we place
its mark by the highest point of the letter (Et quia summa, id est plenitudo, sensus est ibi, ideo ad
summam litteram ponimus punctum)” (In Donatem maiorem, 43).
Concerning the media distinctio, Donatus writes that it occurs “where almost as much of the
thought remains [to be said] as has already been said, and yet it is necessary to breathe; we place its mark
by the middle of the letter” (Donatus, Ars maior, 612). Remigius of Auxerre simply states that “it is called
media distinctio because the midpoint (medietas) of the meaning is there (Media distinctio dicitur, quia
medietas sensus ibi est)” (Remigius of Auxerre, Commentum Einsidlense in Donati artem maiorem 230-1). Cf.
Murethach, In Donatem maiorem 43 and Ars Lavreshamensis 185, which repeat the same sentiment with
almost identical words.

34
music in this work, which offers nothing of especial relevance to the present study, the writing

of technical treatments of music evidently ceased until the ninth century.38 Indeed, virtually

nothing music-related survives from that period, be it music notation, treatises on music, or

general commentary on the role of music in society. In the ninth century a new body of music

treatises arose that attempted to theorize the growing body of liturgical chant, and from the

start many of these works drew upon concepts and terminology from rhetoric and grammar. In

particular, the concepts of period, colon, and comma all found their way into musical treatises,

as did the positurae.

One of the earliest contributions to the field of medieval music theory was the Musica

enchiriadis, which likely dates from the second half of the ninth century,39 and the family of

anonymous treatises associated with that work.40 In a fashion similar to the rhetorical analysis

of speeches (which became common in later music theory texts), the Musica enchiriadis proposes

a terminology for identifying the segments (particulae) which make up a given song:

The segments of a song are its colons or commas, which divide the song by their
endings. But colons are made by two or more commas uniting appropriately, although
it sometimes is the case that it could be called a comma or colon indiscriminately. And

38For a concise introduction to Isidore’s music-specific contributions, see Calvin M. Bower, “The
Transmission of Ancient Music Theory into the Middle Ages,” in The Cambridge History of Western Music
Theory, ed. Thomas Christensen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 148-9.

39 Concerning the dating and background of the Musica enchiriadis, see Raymond Erickson,
“Introduction,” in “Musica enchiriadis” and “Scolica enchiriadis”: Translated, with Introduction and Notes,
trans. Raymond Erickson, ed. Claude V. Palisca (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), xix-liv; Nancy
C. Phillips, “Musica and Scolica Enchiriadis: The Literary, Theoretical, and Musical Sources” (Ph.D. diss.,
New York University, 1984), 1-17; Charles M. Atkinson, The Critical Nexus: Tone-System, Mode, and
Notation in Early Medieval Music (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 118-36, and David E. Cohen,
‘Notes, Scales, and Modes in the Earlier Middle Ages’, in The Cambridge History of Western Music Theory,
ed. Thomas Christensen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 323-331.

40For more on the complicated textual tradition whence this work comes, see Phillips, “Musica
and Scolica Enchiriadis,” 377-419.

35
 commas themselves are made through an arsis and a thesis, i.e. a raising and a lowering
[of the voice]. But sometimes in a comma the voice is lifted up and lowered by a single
arsis and thesis, and at other times [it is raised and lowered] more frequently. The
difference between the highest and lowest pitch of a comma is called “interval”
(diastema). At one time these intervals are rather small, like that which we call “a
[whole] tone,” and at another [they are] larger, so that they have the distance
(intervallum) of two or three or successively some [other] number of [whole] tones.
Moreover, just as colons consist of commas, so we say that intervals are the ranges of
commas. But the ranges of colons, or of some whole melody, we call “systems”
(sistemata).41

The basic framework of analyzing melodies into colons which consist of two more commas is

unmistakable. And while this text does not invoke the third term of the comma-colon-period

triad, another treatise in the Enchiriadis family, the Scolica enchiriadis, does associate “the entire

melody” (totum melum) with the period in its closely related discussion of these terms.42 Other

elements of the Musica enchiriadis’s discussion, such as linking the comma to arsis and thesis

and to the idea of melodic range, are entirely foreign to the traditional rhetorical employment of

these terms. The innovative ways in which early medieval music theorists employed these

concepts from Antiquity may be a manifestation of the oft-noted Carolingian tendency to adapt

41 Particulae sunt sua cantionis cola vel commata, quae suis finibus cantum distingunt. Sed cola
fiunt coeuntibus apte commatibus duobus pluribusve, quamvis interdum est, ubi indiscrete comma sive
colon dici potest. At ipsa commata per arsin et thesin fiunt, id est levationem et positionem. Sed alias
simplici arsi et thesi vox in commate semel erigitur ac deponitur, alias sepius. Discrimen autem inter
summam et infimam vocem commatis appellatur diastema. Quae diastemata nunc quidem minora sunt,
ut est illud, quod vocamus tonum, nunc maiora, ut duum triumve ac deinceps aliquot tonorum habentia
intervallum. Porro autem sicut cola commatibus constant, sic commatum spacia dicimus diastemata.
Quae in colis vero spacia fuerint vel integro quolibet melo, sistemata nominamus (Musica enchiriadis IX,
pp. 22-3).

42 Scolica enchiriadis, 85. Mathias Bielitz argues that the concept of the colon in the Musica
enchiriadis is functionally equivalent to that of the period in rhetoric, but does not take into account the
explicit discussion of the period in the related Scolica enchiriadis, an omission which makes his contention
less convincing (Musik und Grammatik: Studien zur mittelalterlichen Musiktheorie [München and Salzburg:
Musikverlag Katzbichler, 1977], 155-6).

36
purposefully old ideas and terminology to serve new ends.43 Yet it also may be the case that

these innovations are not so purposeful, but instead demonstrate the mixed results of scholars

struggling to theorize musical practice and drawing upon other domains of doctrine, such as

grammar and rhetoric, in their attempts to describe it.

The concepts of the comma, colon, and period were not the only rhetorico-grammatical

ideas employed in early medieval music treatises. Indeed, nearly every treatise from between

850 and 1100 that invokes that triad also employs the term distinctio.44 In many of these texts the

term refers simply to the constituent segments of a melody, much as the terms “comma,”

“colon,” and “period” were originally used in rhetorical treatises, but without that triad’s

hierarchical differentiation.45 A few treatises do draw explicit connections between the term

distinctio and the concept of dividing a larger unit, be it either musical or verbal. None of these

43 See, for one example, Cohen, “Notes, Scales, and Modes,” 307-9, and passim. Atkinson’s The
Critical Nexus offers an extended reflection on Carolingian reception of ideas from Antiquity.

44One exception to this is the Regula rhythmicae by Guido d’Arezzo. For helpful tables which set
out the adoption of these and other terms, see Calvin M. Bower, “The Grammatical Model of Musical
Understanding in the Middle Ages,” in Hermeneutics and Medieval Culture, ed. Patrick J. Gallacher and
Helen Damico (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989), 134-6; Karen Desmond, “Sicut in
grammatica: Analogical Discourse in Chapter 15 of Guido’s Micrologus” Journal of Musicology 16 (1998):
470-1; and Dolores Pesce, “A Historical Context for Guido d’Arezzo’s Use of Distinctio,” in Music in
Medieval Europe: Studies in Honor of Bryan Gillingham, ed. Terence Bailey and Alma Santosuosso
(Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007), 148-50.

45 Dolores Pesce contends that “in medieval grammar, distinctio refers to a major division of a
sentence, that is, a grammatical unit,” and mistakenly attributes the punctuating sense of the term to the
field of rhetoric (ibid., 147). For a brief survey of several medieval music treatises that use distinctio in this
sense, see ibid., 151-3. Furthermore, Calvin Bower states that the term refers to phrases, and never
connects it to the concepts of division and punctuation (“Grammatical Model,” 134).
Pesce’s article as a whole aims at an elucidation of Guido d’Arezzo’s puzzling usages of the term
distinctio. Guido often uses the term in a new sense that involves differentiating modes from each other,
and Pesce dedicates much of her article to this meaning, which is outside the concerns of this chapter (“A
Historical Context,” 153-62).

37
texts before John of Affligem’s, however, invoke the three types of punctuation that figured

prominently in grammatical treatments of the subject ever since Dionysius Thrax. Rather, their

choice of the term distinctio seems to be motivated by its etymology: authors often use it in a

general sense to refer to the act of distinguishing things from each other, and the term is

frequently employed in conjunction with the verb from which it derives, distinguo (to

distinguish or divide).

One example of the conceptual complications that can arise in relation to this term is the

pseudo-Odonian dialogue De musica, which may date from the late tenth century.46 This text

attempts to adapt the concept of the distinctio to serve musical ends, and draws an analogy

between music and speech to demonstrate:

A distinctio in music is that amount (quantum) of any song we are in the course of
performing (continuamus) which is [i.e., has just been] pronounced at the point when the
voice has come to rest. Moreover, just as one portion of a speech, or two or more,
completes the meaning (sensus) and comprises a complete thought (sententia)—as when I
say “What are you doing?” [and] you reply, “Reading” or “Corroborating a reading” or
“Seeking a certain idea”—so too one, two, or more of these parts of music complete a
versicle, an antiphon, or a responsory; nor do they [thereby] lose the signification of
their numbers.47

46Concerning the authorship of this treatise and the following treatise to be discussed, see Michel
Huglo, “L’Auteur du ‘Dialogue sur la musique’ attribué à Odon,” Revue de Musicologie 55, no. 2 (1969):
119-171. For the dating of the De musica, see ibid., 144, n. 1.

47Distinctio vero in musica est, quantum de quolibet cantu continuamus, quae ubi vox
requieverit, pronuntiatur. Item sicut una pars locutionis aut duae vel plures sensum perficiunt, et
sententiam integram comprehendunt, ut cum dico quid facis? respondes lego, sive lectionem firmo, sive
aliquam sententiam quaero: ita una, duae vel plures ex his musicae partibus versiculum, antiphonam vel
responsorium perficiunt, nec tamen suorum numerorum significationem amittunt ([Odo], De musica, pp.
275-6).

38
Upon examining this analogy closely, however, it seems that the author of the De musica has not

fully absorbed the explanatory potential that the concept of the distinctio offers: indeed, his text

contains a less than coherent admixture of suggestive ideas, rather than a clear comparison

between a musical phenomenon and its language-based counterpart. The initial description of

an amount (quantum) of a song demonstrates that “Odo” is primarily using the term distinctio to

refer to a portion of a melody that is demarcated by “the point when the voice has come to

rest.” While this phrase is somewhat ambiguous, and could refer to drawn-out durations (or

some other characteristic), the verb requiesco (to come to rest) also means “to stop” or “to let

rest,” which suggests that “Odo” is referring to brief silences between distinctiones.48 If this

reading is correct, then these pauses would surely involve the singer inhaling, and consequently

recall the media distinctio’s original association with the performative concern of breathing.

After the initial definition of the distinctio the author sets forth a partially articulated

analogy between speech and music that is inflected with thought-related terminology borrowed

from the rhetoric-grammatical tradition. Here, Pseudo-Odo’s use of sensus and sententia could

be interpreted along the lines of Isidore’s, with “sensus” invoking syntactic structure, and

“sententia” referring to the words themselves. Yet the brevity of the passage makes it difficult

to be sure that “Odo” intended to draw such a conceptual distinction. It is more likely that our

anonymous author simply meant to indicate something akin to syntactic structure in both cases,

and used different phrases merely for the sake of verbal variety (variatio).49 Pseudo-Odo’s larger

48 Lewis and Short, A Latin Dictionary, s.v. “requiesco.”

49 The redundant connotations of completeness provided by the verb “perficio” and the adjective
“integer” occuring in short succession (“sensum perficiunt, et sententiam integram comprehendunt”)
reinforce this contention.

39
point appears to be that the groups of words he provides as samples (“‘What are you doing?’

‘Reading.’”, etc.) are each syntactically closed (integra sententia/perfectus sensus), and are

composed of two distinctiones. In the same way, “Odo” argues that many collections of notes

both comprise complete musical utterances (versicles, antiphons, and the like), and may be

composed of more than one musical distinctio. Even though this description of a complete

thought comprising several constituent sections seems highly suggestive of the hierarchical

relationship of colon to period (or comma to colon, as in the Enchiriadis family’s employment of

the terms), “Odo” surprisingly never appeals to these terms.

In her brief discussion of this quotation, Karen Desmond identifies yet another way in

which the passage invokes an analogy between music and speech. With reference to Pseudo-

Odo’s association of the distinctio with vocal performance, Desmond writes: “He also provides a

practical definition for the distinctio, a familiar definition in grammatical texts. In his

Etymologiae, Isidore of Seville defines the period, which he had earlier equated with the

distinctio, as follows: ‘periodos autem longior esse non debet quam ut uno spiritu proferatur’ (‘a

period ought not to be longer than can be delivered in a single breath’).”50 She goes on to

speculate that Isidore’s definition may ultimately derive from Quintilian’s exhortation that a

period should not be too long to be spoken in one breath.51 While a close reading of Isidore’s

discussion of the punctuation marks reveals that he associates the need for breathing with the

comma/subdistinctio rather than the period/distinctio, such a conflation of his later definition of

50 Desmond, “Sicut in Grammatica,” 472-3. Her Isidore quotation comes from Etymologiae, vol. 1,
II.xviii.1.

51 Desmond, “Sicut in Grammatica,” 473.

40
period with the term distinctio surely would have been within the realm of the possible for the

medieval reception of Isidore’s text.

In contrast to the somewhat muddled nature of the De musica’s treatment of the

distinctio, a more musically developed discussion of the term occurs in the Dialogus de musica

which Gerbert also mistakenly attributed to Odo, and which may be based upon the pseudo-

Odonian De musica.52 Although this treatise does not obviously invoke the concept of

punctuation, it uses the term “distinctio” to more fruitful ends: “It is clear that the distinctiones,

i.e. places (loca), in which we pause in a song and in which we divide a song, ought in a [given]

mode to end with the same notes on which songs of that mode can begin. And where a mode

begins better and more frequently, there it is accustomed to begin and/or end its distinctiones

better and more fittingly.”53 Before turning to the striking musical features of this passage, let

us briefly address how it adapts traditional grammatico-rhetorical ideas. Pseudo-Odo’s

emphasis on the places where a song is divided strongly suggests that he is using the term

distinctio to refer to punctuation. Yet whereas the language of the first sentence aligns the

distinctio with breaks between melodic segments (where breathing would presumably occur),

the second sentence’s reference to the beginnings and endings of distinctiones demonstrates that

Pseudo-Odo also uses the term to indicate the melodic segments themselves. Distinctly absent

is any connection between the distinctio and the completion of a thought, or lack of such

52Michel Huglo reports Wantzloeben’s assertion of the dependence of the Dialogus on the De
musica, but remains skeptical (“L’Auteur du Dialogue,” 144, n. 1, 150).

53 “Distinctiones quoque, id est loca, in quibus repausamus in cantu, et in quibus cantum

dividimus, in eisdem vocibus debere finiri in unoquoque modo, in quibus possunt incipi cantus eius
modi, manifestum est. Et ubi melius et saepius incipit unusquisque modus, ibi melius et decentius suas
distinctiones incipere vel finire consuevit” ([Odo], Dialogus, VIII, p. 257).

41
completion, and there is also no indication of a hierarchy of distinctio punctuation types.

Mathias Bielitz, in his seminal study of the relationship between music and grammar in the

Middle Ages, also notes that the author’s choice of the verb “pause” (repauso) evokes the

grammatical tradition.54 In particular, this verb is suggestive of the writings of Cassiodorus, a

late Roman, Christian author whose Institutiones was widely read by medieval scholars. Bielitz

notes that Cassiodorus defines the positura/distinctio as an “exposed pause (aperta repausatio) of

moderated speech,” and elsewhere associates “pausatio” with the periodus.55

In a striking departure from traditional doctrines of punctuation and rhetoric, Pseudo-

Odo draws an explicit connection between the concept of the distinctio and melodic pitches.

Shortly after this passage, Pseudo-Odo further develops the relationship between the distinctio

and the beginning or end of a melody, writing that “Many distinctiones ought to end on the

same note (vox) which ends the mode, the authorities say . . . For beginnings, too, are very

frequently and properly found on the same note which ends the song.”56 Of course, very few

chant melodies consistently begin their distinctiones on the modal final; indeed, a chant which

“Odo” cites to explain the concept (transcribed in Example 1.1, which we will soon consider in

detail) begins only a third of its distinctiones on the final. It seems that “Odo” wants chant

54Bielitz translates the term “repausatio” simply as “Pause,” ignoring the ‘re-’ prefix. Since the
pertinent sources give little support to attempts to understand the term as a “re-pausing,” rather than a
simple “pause,” I have adopted Bielitz’s reading.

55 “Positura sive distinctio est moderatae pronuntiationis aperta repausatio” (Cassiodorus,

Institutiones, p. 95); Bielitz, Musik und Grammatik, 188.

56 “Plures autem distinctiones in eam vocem, quae modum terminat, debere finiri, magistri
tradunt . . . Nam et principia saepius et decentius in eadem voce, quae cantum terminat, inveniuntur.”
([Odo], Dialogus, VIII, p. 257-8).

42
melodies to be more modally unified than they actually are. Bielitz interprets Pseudo-Odo’s

pairing of modal final with beginnings and endings of distinctiones to indicate that the notes of

the scale have developed a functional significance, and then proceeds to argue that this passage

exhibits a strong bonding of key (Tonart) and division (Gliederung), which exhibits “the essence

of tonality” (das Wesen der Tonalität).57 Here Bielitz seems guilty of clear interpretive overreach,

since one surely cannot reduce a concept as complex as tonality to the pairing of final pitch and

phrase boundaries. Nonetheless, the significance of associating formal and/or textual

articulation in this repertoire with that note which over time comes to define a given mode (or

key) should not be underestimated in the study of the history of musical closure.

Pseudo-Odo evidently felt that his innovative importation of pitch concerns into the

discourse of the distinctio might be unclear to his readers, for he saw fit to provide an example,

the antiphon Tribus miraculis ornatum diem, from the second vespers office of the feast of

Epiphany. To demonstrate that many distinctiones end on the modal final, he writes out the

words of the antiphon, and interrupts to point out each distinctio: “Tribus miraculis—here [is]

one distinctio—ornatum diem sanctum colimus—here [is] another—hodie stella magos duxit ad

praesepium—here [is] the third—hodie vinum ex aqua factum est ad nuptias—here [is] the fourth—

hodie a Iohanne Christus baptizari voluit—here [is] the final one.”58 His text does not include any

57 Bielitz, Musik und Grammatik, 191. Immediately after this quotation Bielitz relates Pseudo-
Odo’s idea to modern tonic-dominant relationships, an act which confirms that he intends das Wesen der
Tonalität to invoke the modern concept of tonality, rather than merely the “essence of the [medieval]
mode.”
58 “Tribus miraculis; ecce una distinctio: ornatum diem sanctum colimus; ecce alia; Hodie stella

magos duxit ad praesepium; ecce tertia: Hodie vinum ex aqua factum est ad nuptias; ecce quarta: Hodie a
Iohanne Christus baptizari voluit: ecce ultima” (ibid., 258).

43
musical notation, but fortunately this chant is very common, and may be found with only slight

variations in many collections of antiphons. Example 1.1 presents a transcription of the chant’s

melody from a fourteenth-century antiphoner, with bar-lines added to indicate Pseudo-Odo’s

divisions.

Example 1.1 “Tribus miraculis ornatum diem,” antiphon for the feast of Epiphany59

59 Transcribed from Einsiedeln, Kloster Einsiedeln - Musikbibliothek, 611, f. 38v, a fourteenth

century antiphoner from Einsiedeln. This monastery is about 100 kilometers from Saint Blaise in the
Black Forest, the source of the manuscript of the Dialogus upon which Gerbert based his edition (Huglo,
“L’Auteur du Dialogus,” 127, 144, n.1 ). For more on this antiphoner, see
http://cantusdatabase.org/source/374029/ch-e-611.

44
 A cursory inspection of the figure reveals that all but one of the distinctiones identified by

“Odo” end on D, the final note of the entire chant.60 Thus far the claim of pseudo-Odo” that

“where a mode begins better and more frequently, there it is accustomed to begin or end its

distinctiones better and more fittingly” appears to be borne out by his example. Yet a closer

examination of the words quoted with the transcribed antiphon demonstrates just how

complicated it can be to interpret a term like distinctio. As we have mentioned, Pseudo-Odo’s

reference to how a distinctio is begun or ended clearly seems to indicate that he is using distinctio

to refer to a melodic segment in this context, for it makes no sense to speak of the musical

analogue of a punctuation mark having a beginning or end. His discussion of “Tribus

miraculis,” however, seems to refute this reading: here, what “Odo” identifies as the final

distinctio is not, in fact, the final phrase of the antiphon, but is instead the final division between

phrases, that is, the point at which “we pause in a song and in which we divide a song,” in

Pseudo-Odo’s words.61 Despite the terminological and conceptual inconsistencies that

characterize this quotation, the transcription of the antiphon does provide support for Pseudo-

Odo’s larger point that melodic segments usually (but not always, as the penultimate one

proves) end on the modal final. Intriguingly, the Einsiedeln manuscript contains erasures

60One should note that the first of Pseudo-Odo’s distinctiones, after “tribus miraculis,” fits the
melody well, but is not the only way to divide the text. It also works to posit a division one word later,
after “ornatus,” in which case the opening two lines would translate as “We revere this day, which is
adorned by three miracles.” Either parsing of the text works satisfactorily, but the chant melody’s
emphasis on “miraculis” clearly reflects the translation shown in Example 1.1.

61Consultation of more than a dozen antiphoners—from Italy, near the Black Forest, and other
regions of Europe—has revealed a great deal of uniformity in the chant’s constitution: not one of these
manuscripts contains a version of the text that ends with the words “baptizari voluit.”

45
corresponding with the start of the Example 1.1’s fourth and fifth systems. It appears that these

segments of the melody originally began on D, which conforms better with other manuscripts’

versions of the melody and also with Pseudo-Odo’s comment that distinctiones often begin on

the modal final as well.62

We have seen that the treatises attributed to Odo resonate with a considerable number

of ideas from the fields of grammar and rhetoric. “Odo” borrows a more potent set of concepts

from language in his discussion of music than does the author of the Musica enchiriadis, but he

does not deploy it in a systematic fashion that takes advantage of the hierarchy of different

types of distinctiones, understood either as punctuation marks or as segments of speech/music.

Yet such a development would eventually occur, and it brings us to the main theorist of this

chapter, John of Affligem.

1.4 John of Affligem and the Application of the Distinctiones to Music

It was not until the turn of the twelfth century that a developed system of musical

“punctuation” arose in the De musica (ca. 1100) of John of Affligem. John’s contribution consists

of a fully articulated system of three musical distinctiones to parallel the three found in writing,

or at least in the grammarians’ analysis of language. The relevant passage occurs in a chapter in

which John is discussing the musical modes (modi), which some people incorrectly (abusiue) call

62For two other fourteenth-century versions of this melody, see Graz, Universitätsbibliothek, 29
(olim 38/8 f.), f. 61v, and Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France - Département des Manuscrits, lat. 15181,
f. 170v.

46
“tones” (a multivalent term often used to refer to the musical modes in medieval writings).63

John sets out to dispel the confusion by explaining the different phenomena to which the term

“tone” has been improperly applied, so that he can establish what the modes actually are. It is

in this context that John writes his ground-breaking treatment of the distinctiones. This

significant passage is composed of five sections, which we will consider in turn, beginning with

the first:

Or surely those [marks] which Donatus calls “distinctiones” are called “tones” (toni) for
their similarity to the tones; for just as in prose there are considered to be three
distinctiones, which also can be called “pauses” (pausationes), namely, the colon (or
member), comma (incise), and period (ending or circuit), in such a way [there are] also
[three] in song. In prose, to be sure, when [something] is read in a suspended manner
(suspensive), it is called a colon. When the thought (sententia) is divided by a suitable
point (per legitimum punctum), [it is called] a comma. When the thought is led to its end,
it is a period.64

John begins by describing the prose-based distinctio, or punctuation mark. His linking of

distinctio to the triad of the period, colon, and comma is a marked departure from earlier music

treatises. Furthermore, his descriptions of these three distinctiones are brief, and they seem to

assume that the reader already knows what the purpose of the marks is. This suggests that by

the early twelfth century there was a greater familiarity with the grammatical doctrine of the

punctuation marks, both because John knowingly makes use of the full apparatus of marks, and

63For more on the meanings of the term “tonus,” see Charles Atkinson, “Tonus in the Carolingian
Era: A Terminological Spannungsfeld,” in Quellen und Studien zur Musiktheorie des Mittelalters, vol. 3, ed.
Michael Bernhard (Munich: Verlag der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2001), 19-46.

64“Vel certe toni dicuntur ad similitudinem tonorum, quos Donatus distinctiones vocat; sicut
enim in prosa tres considerantur distinctiones, quae et pausationes appellari possunt, scilicet colon id est
membrum, comma incisio, periodus clausura sive circuitus, ita et in cantu. In prosa quippe quando
suspensive legitur, colon vocatur; quando per legitimum punctum sententia dividitur, comma, quando
ad finem sententia deducitur, periodus est” (John of Affligem, De musica X, p. 79).

47
because he expects his readers to be somewhat familiar with them. Yet John does not assume

complete familiarity, as his brief definitions and subsequent sample sentence demonstrate. The

definitions exhibit Isidore’s characteristic fusion of grammar-based punctuation and rhetoric-

derived analysis of an utterance into sections: John refers to dividing a thought by a “point”

(punctum), which seems almost certainly to be a reference to the doctrine of punctuation marks,

but his descriptions of the colon and period also explicitly refer to a thought (sententia) and its

completion. What constitutes a complete thought is, in typical classical and medieval fashion,

left unexplained. John does, however, provide a parsed sentence as an example, which we will

soon consider, and his analysis of when that thought concludes aligns with modern intuitions of

syntactic closure.

As for the details of John’s definitions, conspicuously absent is the ninth-century

interpretation from Donatus commentaries that correlates the spatial disposition of the three

kinds of punctuation marks with different degrees of completion of the thought. Rather, the

vocabulary and doctrine hearken back to sixth and seventh centuries, to the period of

Cassiodorus and Isidore. John’s definition of the colon (“suspensive legitur”) shares the

element of “suspension” found in Cassiodorus’s discussion of the subdistinctio, which he defines

as being “always placed at that point in a comma where it is recognized that the utterance [in

progress and here] suspended (suspensus) is now to be resumed.”65 John gives no indication of

what it sounds like for something to be read “in a suspended manner”; regardless of whether

this might refer to vocal pitch, pausing/breathing, or some other quality, it is clear that issues of

65“Primo de subdistinctione dicamus, quae ibi semper apponitur, ubi in commate sermo
suspensus adhuc reddendus esse cognoscitur” (Cassiodorus, De orthographia, 146).

48
textual delivery are a feature of John’s doctrine of the distinctio. Similarly to the colon’s

resemblance to Cassiodorus’s ideas, John’s sense of comma as a division into two suitable parts

(“per legitimum punctum sententia dividitur”) is a less explicit version of Isidore’s definition of

the colon, which divides the sententia into a first part that manifests its meaning and a second

part that completes the fullness of the thought: “in sequentibus iam sententia sensum praestat,

sed adhuc aliquid superest de sententiae plenitudine.” This interpretation, of course, assumes

that John adapted Cassiodorus’s and Isidore’s concepts of the subdistinctio/comma and media

distinctio/colon, but connected each concept to the other term. As curious as this reversal is, it is

not unique: in the Remegius of Auxerre’s ninth-century Donatus commentary, he initially

expounds the standard understanding of comma and colon, but then at the end of the passage

of distinctiones states that the comma is longer than the colon: “Colons and commas are parts of

the same utterance, but we say that a colon is in smaller parts . . . A comma, however, is in

larger ones . . .”66 This same switched understanding of comma and colon later went on to

become common in discussions of punctuation in grammar treatises of the twelfth and

thirteenth centuries.67 John’s account, however, lacks these later treatises’ introduction of yet

another synonymous triad of terms, to wit, “versus” (distinctio), “punctus” (media distinctio or

subdistinctio), and “metrum” (subdistinctio or media distinctio).

66“Sunt enim eiusdem dictionis partes, sed in minoribus partibus colon dicimus . . . Comma vero
est in maioribus . . .” (Remegius of Auxerre, In Donati artem maiorem, quoted in Hubert, “Corpus
stigmatologicum minus,” 81).

Petrus Helias, B.N. ms. lat. 15121, quoted in Hubert, “Corpus stigmatologicum minus,” 104;
67

Alexander de Villa Dei, Doctrinale IV.11, quoted in Hubert, “Corpus stigmatologicum minus,” 124.

49
 After these definitions John offers an example for further clarification, a passage from

the third chapter of the gospel according to Luke: “As an example: ‘In the fifteenth year of the

reign of Tiberius Caesar’—here, [and] in all the [four subsequent] brief clauses, occurs a colon.68

Then, where it is added ‘under the high-priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas,’ there occurs a

comma. And at the end of the verse, where it is ‘the son of Zachariah in the wilderness,’ there

occurs a period.”69 Due to the significant length of the Lucan passage and its familiarity to his

readers, John omits two parts of the sentence. The complete sentence reads: “In the fifteenth

year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar [colon], with Pontius Pilate governing Judea [colon], Herod

being the tetrarch of Galilee [colon], his brother Philip tetrarch of the region of Ituraea and

Trachonitis [colon], and Lysanius tetrarch of Abiline [colon], under the high-priesthood of

Annas and Caiaphas [comma], the word of God came to John, the son of Zachariah, in the

wilderness [period].”70 The first division, the colon, comes at the end of a lengthy dependent

clause, which describes the time when the main action occurred. John’s description of the colon

occurring “in all these brief clauses” (hic in omnibus punctis) is no doubt a reference to the

compound nature of this dependent clause, which contains four ablative absolute constructions

Harold S. Powers’s interpretation of this elliptical sentence, which refers to Luke 3:1-2 (verses
68

which contain a string of six successive prepositional and participial phrases), informs my translation
(“Language Models and Musical Analysis,” Ethnomusicology 24, no. 1 [January 1980], 50).

69Verbi gratia: Anno quinto decimo imperii Tiberii Caesaris, hic in omnibus punctis, colon est;
deinde ubi subditur: Sub principibus sacerdotum Anna et Caipha, comma est; in fine autem versus ubi
est Zachariae filium in deserto periodus est” (John of Affligem, De musica X, p. 79).

70 “Anno autem quintodecimo imperii Tiberii Caesaris procurante Pontio Pilato Iudaeam
tetrarcha autem Galilaeae Herode Philippo autem fratre eius tetrarcha Itureae et Trachonitidis regionis et
Lysania Abilinae tetrarcha sub principibus sacerdotum Anna et Caiapha factum est verbum Dei super
Iohannem Zachariae filium in deserto” (Luke 3:1-2).

50
(the latter three of which involve understood participles), in addition to the initial ablative

construction. According to John, the comma of the second division indicates that “the thought

is divided by a suitable point.” In the case of this sentence, the aptness of the division seems to

rely on the fact that it demarcates the initial temporal contextualization from the subsequent

main clause. The final division, the period, closes the syntactic structure of the thought in an

obvious fashion.

Once John has established the role of the distinctiones in prose, he adapts that doctrine to

serve musical ends, while leaving ambiguous the precise relationship between textual and

musical structure (an issue which we will address later). Drawing upon the now-familiar

concepts of comma, colon, and period, John proposes three classes of melodic closure that

correspond roughly to the three punctuation marks:

Similarly, when a melody rests in a suspended manner (per suspensionem) a fourth or a

fifth from the final note, it is a colon. When [the melody] is led back to the final note in
the middle, it is a comma. When it arrives on the final note at the end, it is a period. As
in this antiphon [transcribed in Example 1.2]: “Moreover Peter” (colon) “was being kept
in jail,” (comma) “and prayer was being made” (colon) “on his behalf without ceasing”
(comma) “by the church to God” (period). By this, in fact, it can be seen that the modes
are not altogether improperly called “tones,” and that not unsuitably do they share a
name [with] the “distinctions” or “accents,” whose varieties they imitate.71

71 “Similiter cum cantus in quarta vel quinta a finali voce per suspensionem pausat, colon est;
cum in medio ad finalem reducitur, comma est; cum in fine ad finalem pervenit periodus est. Ut in hac
antiphona: Petrus autem colon, servabatur in carcere comma, et oratio fiebat colon, pro eo sine
intermissione comma, ab ecclesia ad Deum periodus. Qua in re animadverti potest, quod modi non
omnino abusive toni vocantur, nec incongrue distinctionum seu accentuum nomen sortiuntur, quorum
varietates imitantur” (John of Affligem, De musica X, pp. 79-80).

51
John’s musical period occurs when the melody concludes on the note of the modal final.72

John’s colon, corresponding to what earlier writers called the subdistinctio, happens when the

melody pauses on a note that doesn’t sound final, specifically, a note a fourth or fifth above the

note that would sound final. His comma, which corresponds to the media distinctio, occurs when

the melody lands on the final note, but does so before the conclusion. This concept is similar to

Pseudo-Odo’s observation that many distinctiones end on the modal final, and yet is a more

precise claim. For instance, John acknowledges that some distinctiones, such as his colon, do not

normally end on the modal final. Also, John’s statement that the comma ends in such-and-such

a way represents a more “prescriptivist” claim about how music ought to work, whereas “Odo”

merely describes how chant melodies often progress.

To elucidate the musical distinctiones, John refers to the antiphon “Petrus autem

servabatur.” He simply quotes the text of the antiphon, and, while a few of the manuscripts of

this treatise include neumes, these are probably later scribal additions.73 Yet the melody that

John had in mind is not impossible to reconstruct. The antiphon in question was fairly

widespread, both temporally and geographically, and was commonly associated with the feast

of The Chains of Peter (vincula Petri), the feast of Peter, and the feast of Peter and Paul.74 Not

surprisingly, a number of melodic variants occur across the manuscripts that notate this

antiphon. Example 1.2 presents my transcription of the version found in an early twelfth-

72Although in this passage John does not explain what he means by the “final” (finalis vox), his
discussion of the modes in later chapters clarifies that he does indeed use this term to refer to the
standard four final notes (D, E, F, and G) of medieval modal theory (De musica, XI, p. 83-90).

73 See the apparatus criticus on p. 79 of Smits van Waesberghe’s edition of the De musica.

74 See http://cantusdatabase.org/id/004286?page=1.

52
century antiphoner from just outside Paris, which makes it fairly close in both time and space to

John of Affligem.75 Each bar-line marks one of John’s distinctiones: the order of distinctiones is

colon, comma, colon, comma, period. These divisions in the melody, at the very least,

correspond perfectly with the melody John knew: each colon ends a fifth above the modal final,

each comma ends on the final, and the last note of the melody, and thus the period, is also the

modal final.

In John’s definitions of the three musical distinctiones, it is worth noting what he states

explicitly, and what remains assumed. First, all three are defined by musical factors, without

Example 1.2 “Petrus autem servabatur,” antiphon for the feast Vincula Petri76

75 Calvin Bower has presented a similar transcription of “Petrus autem servabatur” (“The
Grammatical Model,” 137). His source is a thirteenth-century antiphoner from Worcester. That
manuscript is further in time and distance from John of Affligem, and its version of “Petrus autem
servabatur” lacks the words “pro eo”; both of these factors suggest that the version found in the
manuscript from St. Maur-de-Fossés is closer to the melody to which John was referring. Harold Powers
has also transcribed a version from an antiphoner from Lucca, which is even further from Affligem. This
melody does include the phrase “pro eo,” but misses the conjunction “et.” Otherwise, the melody is
mostly the same as that of the St. Maur-de-Fossés antiphoner, with minor variants (Powers, “Language
Models and Musical Analysis,” 50). Incidentally, this text (with minor variants) also appears in the
modern Antiphonale Romanum for the Lauds liturgy of the same feast, but with an entirely different
melody, which is in the third mode (Antiphonale sacrosanctae Romanae ecclesiae pro diurnis horis [Rome:
Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, 1912], 672-3).

76 Transcribed from Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France - Département des Manuscrits, lat.
12044, ff. 166v-167r, an early twelfth-century antiphoner from the Cluniac monastery of St. Maur-de-
Fossés, outside of Paris. For more on this manuscript, see http://cantusdatabase.org/source/374051/f-pn-
lat-12044.

53
reference to the chant’s text. According to John’s definition, whenever the melody is led back to

the modal final in the middle (such as on the word “et”), it constitutes a comma. Of course, his

analysis of the antiphon makes abundantly clear that these musical criteria operate in

conjunction with a rhetorical analysis of the text into units of suitable length. (“For him” (pro eo)

and “by the church” (ab ecclesia) could each be colons, since they end a fourth or fifth above the

final, but they are presumably too short for John to count them as independent units.) Second,

John defines the comma and period as occurring “in the middle” (in medio) and “at the end” (in

fine), but he is not explicit about what is being concluded. Within the context of this section of

John’s discussion of the distinctiones, the most likely explanation is that he is referring to a given

chant melody (cantus), which is, after all, the subject of the first sentence of the section. Yet if

this were the case, then the musical period would only occur once in any chant, regardless of its

text’s length or complexity. Considering that John only has three punctuational categories

available to him, this would largely write off a third of his conceptual apparatus. Every time

the melody rests on the modal final, it would be a comma, except for the very last time.

There is, however, another possible interpretation of John’s understanding of the comma

and period. This reading pays heed to the larger context of this passage, namely, its function as

the second half of an analogy between grammatical and musical distinctiones. In his discussion

of punctuation in speech, John states that the comma occurs when a thought (sententia) is

divided, and the period comes at the conclusion of the thought. While some utterances can be

only one thought long, it is obvious that many most speeches and texts will comprise more than

one thought, or period. “Similarly” (similiter), John tells us, switching to the musical half of the

analogy, when the melody rests on the modal final in the middle [of the text’s thought], it is a

54
[musical] comma, and it is a [musical period] when the modal final occurs at the end [of the

thought]. In this interpretation the period, rather than being conceptually impoverished, exists

in a dynamic tension with the comma, with the distinction between the two resting on the

identification of whether the thought being expressed by the chant’s text is complete or

incomplete. Thus, in “Petrus autem servabatur,” one needs to evaluate whether a complete

thought is concluded after “Peter, moreover, was being kept in jail” (Petrus autem servabatur in

carcere). Let us again remember that our modern concept of a simple sentence does not appear

to have a direct correlate in grammatical thought of John’s day, and that the ancient conception

of the periodus often included many more clauses than today’s sentences in English.

Consequently, it should not surprise us that John reserves the period for the conclusion of the

antiphon, even though “Peter, moreover, was being kept in jail” comprises a simple sentence by

modern standards.

In both of these interpretations, the musical comma emerges as the most conceptually

interesting of the distinctiones. With this concept John insightfully identifies a parallel between a

particular musical event, in which a musical unit comes to rest on the modal final without being

complete, and a particular linguistic phenomenon, where, in Cassiodorus’s words, “no words

are lacking, but the [thought] is gradually proceeding to fulfillment.”77 Hence, both melodic

resting on the modal final and a rhetorician’s proper performance of suspensions of the

utterance (sermo suspensus) are capable of helping listeners perceive that a significant division in

the text’s structure is occurring. John’s passage is, in fact, the first time that any author alludes

77 “. . .nullus sermo deest, sed gradatim tendit ad plenam . . .” (Cassiodorus, De orthographia 146).

55
to music’s ability to feign closure, to perform a gesture that sounds like it should be associated

with a strong conclusion, but turns out not to be. It is by drawing upon the grammatical

doctrine of punctuation, the positurae or distinctiones, that John first identifies the phenomenon

of a musical event sounding complete on a lower level, while simultaneously being incomplete

on a higher level. This kind of perceptual experience developed to great effect in later

polyphonic music, and underpins such familiar phenomena as the half cadence of tonal music.78

In the excerpt’s final section John adds a new terminological triad to the rhetorical triad

of member/incise/circuit and the hybrid rhetorical-punctuational triad of colon/comma/period

drawn from Isidore: “That which in prose some grammarians call colon, comma, and period, in

melody the musicians name interval (diastema), system (systema), and completion (teleusin).

‘Interval’ means a separating decoration which occurs when a melody does not pause on its

final note, but [instead] pauses appropriately on another note. ‘System’ indicates a connecting

decoration, [which occurs] whenever a fitting pause of the melody is made on the final note.

‘Completion is the end of the melody.”79 These three terms “diastema,” “systema,” and

“teleusin” are Greek or Greek-derived, and the employment of the first two in a rhetorico-

musical context is not original to John. As we have seen, the ninth-century Musica enchiriadis

78Of course in John’s case the perceptual complexity arises from a combination of musical and
textual parameters, whereas later polyphonic devices, like half and deceptive cadences, communicate
simultaneous completion and incompletion through musical means alone. Yet in the chant theory of
John’s day, it is not clear that one can speak of “purely musical” concerns divorced from any
considerations of the chant text, so the distinction may be less meaningful than it initially seems.

79 “Quod autem in prosa grammatici colon, comma, periodum vocant, hoc in cantu quidam
musici diastema, systema, teleusin nominant. Significat autem diastema distinctum ornatum, qui fit,
quando cantus non in finali, sed in alia decenter pausat; systema coniunctum ornatum indicat, quotiens
in finali decens melodiae pausatio fit; teleusis finis est cantus” (John of Affligem, De musica X, p. 80).

56
mentions the diastema and systema in the context of its brief discussion of melodic sections.

After the anonymous author introduces the concepts of the comma and colon (understood in

their original rhetorical sense as phrases, not punctuation),80 he informs the reader that “the

distance between the highest and lowest note of a comma is called ‘interval’ (diastema),” and

that the melodic ranges of colons or an entire melody are called “systems” (sistemata).81 John is

obviously putting these borrowed terms to a different use, redefining them as mere equivalents

of the punctuation types. The third term, teleusin, seems to have no precedent in any significant

musical or grammatical texts. John (or whoever originally coined it) doubtless derives it from

the Greek word τελέω (teleō), a verb which denotes the act of completing or fulfilling, likely by

way of the derivative noun τέλεσις (telesis), which means “event” or “fulfillment.”82 This term

did not gain much traction in music-theoretical circles, and its appearances in later texts are

largely restricted to quotations or paraphrases of this passage.83

80 The Musica enchiriadis never extends the analogy past the level of the colon. The Scolica
enchiradis (another treatise in the Enchiriadis family of texts), however, does briefly use the term periodus to
refer to an entire melody (Scolica enchiriadis, 85).

81 “Discrimen autem inter summam et infimam vocem commatis appellatur diastema” (Musica
enchiriadis, IX, p. 22). Concerning the sistemata, see ibid., p. 23. See also the closely related discussion of
these terms in Scolica enchiriadis, pp. 85-6.

82 Henry George Liddell and Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, revised by Sir Henry Stuart
Jones and Roderick McKenzie (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1940), s.vv. τελέω and τέλεσις.
A thirteenth-century author who paraphrased and commented on John’s account of the distinctio
was clearly baffled by this coinage, offering the following as a supposed explanation for teleusin: “Celeuma
is a sailor’s cry or a song for the dead, as says Papias” (“Celeuma est clamor nautarum sive carmen super
mortuos, ita dicit Papias” [Jerome of Moravia, Tractatus de musica, XX, p. 154]).

83One such example, in addition to the previously mentioned Tractatus de musica by Jerome of
Moravia, is the fourteenth-century Cantuagium of Heinrich Eger von Kalkar (V, pp. 57, 63).

57
 Thus far John has described two different ways that melodic segments can conclude (on

the final, or on the fourth or fifth above it), two different syntactical locations for these

conclusions (at the conclusion of a melody or during its course), and correlated these with the

punctuation/phrase-types of the colon, comma, and period. He has also cited the antiphon

“Petrus autem” as an example, and it fits his descriptions perfectly. Yet in this passage John

leaves ambiguous precisely how these descriptions relate to musical practice. Is he describing

how pieces work, or how good pieces work? Is he offering advice to those thinking of

composing new melodies, or giving implicit advice about performance? Or are such practical

questions even relevant to John’s project?

When we turn our attention to practical concerns such as these, it quickly becomes clear

that the corpus of chant is much more complex than John’s claims make it out to be. Not all

antiphons from John’s day, let alone pieces from other genres of chant or other periods, follow

the melodic dictates which John lays out. Indeed, in a later chapter of his treatise which

addresses “the best kind of melodic motion” (optima modulandi forma), John acknowledges as

much: “The best kind of melodic motion is this: where the verbal meaning makes a distinctio,

there the melody receives a pause on the final (pausatio finalis). You can examine this rule in the

antiphon ‘Cum esset desponsata.’ On the other hand, he who set (modulatus est) the verses

‘Homo quidam erat dives valde’ did not observe it well, for this same versicle never touches the

final at [its] true distinctio.”84 As one might expect, “Homo quidam erat dives” (an antiphon

84“Optima autem modulandi forma haec est, si ibi cantus pausationem finalis recipit, ubi sensus
verborum distinctionem facit. Quod considerare potes in hac antiphona Cum esset desponsata. Hoc
autem praeceptum non bene inspexit, qui versiculos illos modulatus est quorum initium est Homo
quidam erat dives valde. Nam iste idem versiculus nusquam in recta distinctione finalem contingit” (John
of Affligem, De musica XIX, p. 120).

58
from the Lauds office of the second Sunday after Pentecost), transcribed as Example 1.3, does

not easily fit into standard modal categories. Its melody concludes on G, and its range extends

from C to d, suggesting that it is most likely in the eighth mode. Yet the two strongest

syntactical divisions of the text, which come at the ends of the fourth and final systems, coincide

with notes a third apart. Even if one of these two ending notes corresponds to what John would

call the finalis, the other cannot relate to it in any of the ways John proposes for the colon, comma,

Example 1.3 “Homo quidam erat dives et,”

antiphon for the feast of the second Sunday after Pentecost85

85 Transcribed from Worcester, Cathedral - Music Library, F.160 (olim 1247), f. 93v; facs. as
Paléographie musicale 12 (Tournay : Desclée & Cie, 1922), 187. John’s citation of the antiphon ends with the
words “dives valde,” rather than “dives et.” No chants found in the Cantus database contain this series
of words, and it is easy to imagine a regional variant in which the word “valde” was set under the G-F-G
at the end of the first line of the transcription.

59
or periodus. Clearly John’s melodic prescriptions do not apply across the board, and John

acknowledges as much by his reference to this antiphon.

Yet an informal survey of medieval manuscripts reveals that a surprisingly large

proportion of chant melodies can be analyzed as conforming to John’s theory. True, John gives

no principles for determining where best to locate divisions of the colon and comma, and thus

the resulting flexibility makes it possible for the modern analyst to posit divisions

tautologically, only in places that support John’s theory (or in those that frequently contradict

it). One could even go as far as Calvin Bower, and argue that our analysis of a text’s

grammatical structure reveals which melody notes would have been emphasized.86 On the one

hand, it becomes evident when one reads books printed in previous centuries that we cannot

assume that our intuitions of where to place punctuation marks—that is, of grammatico-

syntactic structure— always map neatly onto those of readers from 300 years ago, let alone

those of readers of nearly a millennium ago.87 For a brief example, consider again “Petrus

autem” (Example 1.2), the text of which ends with four successive prepositional phrases. Other

than by appealing to the notes upon which those phrases end, which would beg the question,

86“Thus one of the first principles in interpreting these melodies must be analysis of the
grammatical structure of the underlying text in order to determine which pitches will be stressed through
lengthening (Bower, “The Grammatical Model,” 139, emphasis original). Bower does admit later that the
relationship between text and musical structure is more balanced than he had made it out to be (ibid.,
143).

87 As an example of how much punctuational practice can change over time, consider this
seventeenth-century quotation that strikingly diverges from modern expectations: “The ordinata
adscendens imperfectior cadence occurs / when / after everything / which is proper to a perfecta totalis
cadence has been arranged / except for the last interval / instead of a falling fifth or rising fourth, one sets
a rising second [Ordinata adscendens imperfectior ist / wenn / nach dem alles gesezt ist / was zu einer
perfecten Clausula formali totali gehöret / das lezte Intervallum ausgenommen / an statt der absteigenden
Qvint oder auffsteigenden Qvart, eine auffsteigende secunda gesezet wird]” ([Johann] Wolfgang Caspar
Printz, Phrynis oder Satyrischer Componist, vol. 1 [Quedlinburg: Christian Okels, 1676], VII, §17, ff. C2 r-3v).

60
how does one justify positing divisions before the first and third of these phrases, rather than

elsewhere? John’s account does not provide enough information to say why his analysis is

superior to other possible divisions of the text. On the other hand, if John’s central claim is to

offer any insight into his time’s understanding of the relation between melody and verbal

syntax, then we should expect to find melodic arrivals on the appropriate notes coinciding to at

least some degree with points in the text that could plausibly have been understood as syntactic

divisions.

As an attempt to get a preliminary and informal idea of whether other melodies follow

John’s principles, let us consider Example 1.4, which presents a transcription of “Erat Petrus

dormiens inter,” the antiphon that immediately follows “Petrus autem” in the St. Maur-de-

Fossés antiphoner. Similarly to “Petrus autem,” John would likely identify it as being a

specimen of the first mode, D authentic (or perhaps the second, D plagal, due to its limited

Example 1.4 “Erat Petrus dormiens inter,” antiphon for the feast Vincula Petri88

88 Transcribed from Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France - Département des Manuscrits, lat.
12044, f. 167r.

61
ambitus of C to a).89 Unlike the former antiphon, its medial closes are somewhat less

compatible with John’s theory. The opening words “Erat Petrus dormiens,” which have the

same ascending contour as the first colon of “Petrus autem,” conclude on the note a fourth

above the final, in conformance with John’s dictates.90 After that, however, the conformance

becomes less apparent. We cannot be certain exactly how John would have divided the text of

this antiphon into colons and commas, so the divisions marked in Example 1.4 represent merely

one possible parsing. The possible division after “milites” ends on the note a third above the

final, in violation of John’s norms; admittedly, there is not a strong break in the syntax at this

point, and John may have analyzed the words “inter duos milites vinctus catenis duabus” as

consisting of one comma.

In either case, a syntactical division clearly occurs after “catenis duabus,” yet the melody

closes on the note a major second below the final. John’s theory cannot account for this feature,

in spite of the fact that plainchant repertoire often emphasizes the subtonic in this way. For

instance, many of the chant melodies for this feast exhibit syntactic divisions coinciding with

the subtonic, such as “Simon Bar Jona” (mode 3) and “Exiens Petrus apostolus” (mode 1).

Furthermore, “Angelus Domini astitit” concludes on a D in this antiphoner, but all the medial,

“comma-like” closes occur on the note E. While this could represent a bold departure from

John’s norms, the final D may also be a scribal error, in which case the emended melody would

John discusses the modes in chapters ten through twelve of the De musica, wherein he defines
89

mode on the basis of modal final and ambitus (pp. 76-96).

90 Another French antiphoner from the twelfth century (albeit the last decade of that century) has
a version of this chant in which the melody for the word “dormiens” ends two notes earlier, on the
second A. This alteration produces a melodic opening with greater similarity to that of “Petrus autem”
(Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France - Département des Manuscrits, lat. 1090, f. 192 r-v).

62
adhere to the principles John sets forth. And indeed, many other medieval manuscripts show

this antiphon concluding on the note E.91 If this hypothesis of a scribal error is correct, then the

most consistent mismatch between John’s principles and these chants is closure of internal

phrases on the note below the final. Were we to make an addendum to John’s text stating that

the comma can conclude on either the final or the note below it, then these antiphons would

match the revised principles to a very high degree.

Thus far all the chants considered have been in authentic modes (or perhaps plagal, in

the case of “Erat Petrus dormiens inter.”) In view of the correlation between the colon

concluding a fourth or fifth above the final and the higher ambitus of authentic modes than

plagal ones, one might suppose that his dictates would apply better to chants in authentic

modes. Yet pieces in plagal modes often have plausible syntactic divisions on notes that are

concordant with John’s principles. Example 1.5 provides a transcription of a mode 4 (E plagal)

antiphon, “Transeuntes autem primam et,” from the same feast in the St. Maur-de-Fossés

manuscript. Perhaps the most significant departure between this chant and the authentic-mode

Examples 1.2 and 1.4 is that all three syntactical units (whose conclusions are indicated by the

bar lines) come to rest on the melody’s final pitch. John’s theory informs us that an ending

made on the modal final but not at the conclusion of a piece (or of a textual thought/sententia, in

our alternate interpretation) demarcates a comma, which occurs when “the thought is divided

by a suitable point.” From a grammatical perspective, one might wish to differentiate the

relative degrees of conclusiveness of the conclusion of the first phrase, which marks the end of a

91Of the fifty-one modally identified cases of this antiphon listed in the CANTUS database, all the
melodies except for that in our manuscript are labeled as being in the fourth mode, which strongly
supports the hypothesis that its intended final is E (http://cantusdatabase.org/id/001411).

63
participial phrase modifying the understood subject of the immediately following main verb,

and the end of the second, which merely sets off a relative clause; in an Affligem-based reading,

however, both endings are equally commas because each comes to rest on the modal final

without completing a thought in the text (or bringing the chant to completion). Indeed, all three

phrases of the antiphon conclude with essentially the same melodic figure, which occurs for the

first time with the word “custodiam” in the first phrase. Thus, even though this chant’s phrases

conclude on notes approved by John’s theory (unlike Example 1.4’s “Erat Petrus dormiens

inter”), its repeated ending formula makes it difficult to affirm the connection John draws

between different levels of syntactic closure and different types of melodic conclusions.

What, then, does John’s theory have to say about melodies that deviate from his

strictures? As previously mentioned, his main discussion of the distinctiones leaves the

Example 1.5 “Transeuntes autem primam et,” antiphon for the feast Vincula Petri92

92 Transcribed from Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France - Département des Manuscrits, lat.
12044, ff. 167r.

64
relationship between his theory and actual practice entirely ambiguous. Fortunately, John’s

aforementioned discussion of “the best kind of melodic motion,” quoted in conjunction with

Example 1.3, sheds some light on this relationship. The wording even of the passage’s very first

line strongly suggests that John sees the degree to which a melody adheres to his rules as an

indicator of its artistic quality: the “best” (optima) kind of melodic motion occurs where a chant’s

melodic and textual closure coincide. John does not go so far as to uphold explicitly this

principle as a model for future composers, but he does criticize the man who “set” (modulatus

est, which usually means “s/he sang,” but here seems more to invoke the act of creation) the

melody which begins “Homo quidam erat dives valde.”93 That is not to say, however, that John

was proposing an aesthetic criterion for those interested in evaluating already existing chant.

Rather, we can conclude that John expected his treatise to be read by those wanting to know

how to compose, on the basis of the content of the De musica’s eighteenth chapter, which

provides “Precepts for composing song” (Praecepta de cantu componendo) (precepts which make

no mention, however, of John’s punctuational doctrine). This strongly suggests that John’s

comments on the “best kind of melodic motion” were intended as a guide for aspiring

composers.94

Thus, we can view John’s doctrine of melodic punctuation as something of an attempt to

compensate via melodic means for the deleterious effects of music on the comprehension of

93 John of Affligem, De musica XIX, p. 120.

94 Mathias Bielitz disagrees with this conclusion, noting that the phrase “cantus pausationem
finalis recipit” (“a song receives the pause [proper to] the final”) “diverges from a strictly compositional
approach,” and that the words “forma modulandi” (“kind of melodic motion,” literally “form of
modulating”) is rather abstract for practical use in describing the course of a melody (Musik und
Grammatik, 225).

65
text. Setting a liturgical text to music presents obstacles to its proper apperception. Not only

can a beautiful melody distract both performer and listener from the religious import of the

words; the constraints of a composed melody also prevent the performer from freely employing

the full range of techniques developed in rhetoric for orally clarifying a reading’s meaning.

John implicitly proposes to regulate the composition of melodies such that they clearly express

the chant’s textual structure, and the points in a liturgical text where the completion of a

thought does and does not inhere.

1.5 The Transmission of the Doctrine

John of Affligem’s application of the doctrine of punctuation marks to music proved to

be of lasting interest for theorists of later centuries. John’s treatise was copied often and was

widely circulated, which no doubt contributed to the initial transmission of his treatment of the

distinctiones.95 In the following generations theorists incorporated this passage into their own

treatises, often quoting it verbatim in its entirety. For example, Jerome of Moravia, who died

sometime after 1271, included it (and many other excerpts from John’s treatise) in his Tractatus

de musica.96 It is also in the Speculum musicae (ca. 1325-50) often attributed to a certain “Jacques

de Liège,” though here John’s sample sentence and antiphon are not mentioned.97

95 See pp. 4-18 of Smits van Waesberghe’s edition of the De musica.

96 Jerome of Moravia, Tractatus de musica, XX, pp. 153-4.

97Jacobus Leodiensis, Speculum musicae VI.35, p. 88. On the dating and authorship of this treatise,
see Karen Desmond, “New Light on Jacobus, Author of Speculum musicae” Plainsong and Medieval Music 9,
no. 1 (2000): 19-40.

66
 In the following generations authors began to take more liberties with John’s passage.

Gobelinus Person (1358-1421) reworded some of John’s sentences and omitted the sentence in

which John links modes, tones, distinctions, and accents.98 His most significant departure,

however, is that he replaces John’s citation of the antiphon “Petrus autem servabatur” with a

reference to a different antiphon, namely, “Ecce nomen Domini,” an antiphon often used in the

liturgy for the feast of Christmas Day. (See Example 1.6 for a transcription of this melody.)

Person states that a colon occurs after “Emmanuel,” a comma after “per Gabrielem,” and a

period at the conclusion, where “magnus rex” is said.99 These divisions yield the same results

Example 1.6 “Ecce nomen Domini,” antiphon for the feast Nativitas Domini100

98 Gobelinus Person, Tractatus musicae scientiae, p. 188.

99 Person, Tractatus, 188. Another fourteenth-century antiphoner contains an entirely different

setting of this melody, yet it also has the final on “Gabrielem” and “rex,” and the note a fifth above on
“Emanuel” (see Klosterneuburg, Augustiner-Chorherrenstift - Bibliothek, 1011, f. 69v).

Transcribed from Einsiedeln, Kloster Einsiedeln - Musikbibliothek, 611, ff. 69v-70r, a

100

fourteenth-century antiphoner from the monastery of Einsiedeln, Switzerland. For more on this
manuscript, see http://cantusdatabase.org/source/374029/ch-e-611.

67
as in John’s example, “Petrus autem servabatur.”101 Person’s choice to cite a different antiphon

suggests that he expected his readers to be unfamiliar with John’s antiphon, and demonstrates

that he was much more interested in communicating the substance of John’s ideas to his readers

than in merely parroting a tidbit of musical lore.

Invocations of the analogy between musical closure and punctuation are not limited to

the medieval period. Music theorists kept returning to this explanatory tool for centuries

thereafter; indeed, perhaps the most developed account of this analogy occurs in the eighteenth

century, in Johann Mattheson’s Der vollkommene Capellmeister (1739).102 One treatment of the

punctuation-closure analogy from the intervening centuries illustrates the variety of uses to

which theorists put this idea. This particular treatment is by Nicolaus Wollick (ca. 1480-after

1541), and it occurs in the Opus aureum (1501), which, incidentally, also contains an unrelated

discussion of polyphonic closure which we will examine in the following chapter. At the end of

the second of the volume’s four books Wollick inserts a “little treatise” (tractatulus) teaching

how one ought to read “readings and histories,” which refers to chanted delivery of the lessons

texts of Matins services.103 Unlike John of Affligem, who prescribes the conclusions of phrases

in an otherwise unregulated chant melody, Wollick is describing a practice of recitation

formulaes in which phrases consist of a monotonic, syllabic declamation of text except for when

101 One could also posit a syntactic division after the word “Israhel,” in which case the new
phrase would deviate from John’s system by concluding a step above the modal final. This possible
division, however, would obscure the syntactic connection between the main verb “apparuit” and its
subsequent subject, “magnus rex.” Consequently, Person’s analysis, which conforms to John’s principles,
is quite defensible on syntactic grounds alone.

102 Johann Mattheson, Der vollkommene Capellmeister, II.9 (see §22 in particular).

103 Nicolaus Wollick, Opus aureum, f. F4r-v.

68
they conclude.104 He begins by setting out how the voice should move at each of four

punctuation marks in a given text: three of these derive from the familiar positurae of Antiquity,

and the fourth is called the interrogativum, which corresponds to the modern notion of the

question mark. As for the three older marks, the subdistinctio or comma has become the virgula,

the media distinctio or colon is the comma, and the distinctio or periodus is now the “periodus or

colon,” though Wollick only uses the latter term elsewhere in this passage. Example 1.7 presents

a transcription of Wollick’s example summarizing the two manners (modi) in which the voice

can move in each of these situations.

Thus far Wollick’s account has been strictly mechanical, eschewing any consideration of

grammatical matters in favor of a practical focus on recognizing the punctuation marks and

pairing them with their proper melodic realizations. Yet Wollick is not content to end his

discussion on such an intellectual bare note. Instead, he concludes with a brief summary of the

Example 1.7 Melodic ending formulas from Wollick, Opus aureum, f. F4v

syntactical characteristics of these punctuation marks, in terms that harken back to much earlier

texts: “The concept (notitia) of these four marks (since many can be found in most [texts]) is held

104 David Hiley, Western Plainchant: A Handbook (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993), 47-58.

69
[to be] of such a sort, and these are: [1] the virgula or suspension (suspensivum) ought to be

observed when neither the thought (sententia) nor the construction appear complete; [2] the

comma ought to be observed when the construction is complete, but the purpose (intentio) is still

left hanging; [3] the interrogativum ought to be observed when the utterance proceeds in a

questioning manner; [4] the colon ought to be observed when neither the construction nor the

meaning (sensus) lack anything more.”105 Excepting the addition of the interrogativum mark and

a few terminological alterations, Wollick presents a traditional view of the punctuation marks

that evaluates the relative state of completion of the individual clause (at a local level) and the

overall thought (at a global level). This is the distinction that John of Affligem introduced to the

discourse of music, and which stretches all the way back to Cassiodorus in the sixth century

C.E. Though so much had changed, both musically and educationally, between John’s day, at

the turn of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and that of Wollick at the start of the sixteenth

century, the analogy between punctuation and musical closure was still a valuable explanatory

tool for authors seeking to describe musical practice.

1.6 Conclusion

Over the course of nearly a millennium, discourse concerning punctuation developed

from its origins in antique Greek grammar texts to the relatively sophisticated doctrine of

rhetorical phrase types and sense closure found in Isidore’s Etymologies and developed in ninth-

105Noticia profecto istorum quattuor (quia vt in plurimum plura reperiri possunt) punctorum ita
habetur, et sunt hec: [1] Virgula siue suspensiuum obseruari debet quando nec sententia nec constructio
exstat perfecta; [2] Comma obseruari debet quando constructio est perfecta, sed adhuc pendet intentio; [3]
Interrogatiuum obseruari debet quando oratio procedit interrogatiue; [4] Colon obseruari debet quando
neque constructio neque sensus magis dependet (ibid., f. F4 v).

70
century Donatus commentaries. This body of doctrine proved useful for the earliest theorists of

chant, as the tentative mention of distinctiones in several ninth and tenth century texts

demonstrates. Yet it was not until John of Affligem’s De musica that a highly developed

application of punctuation doctrine to music emerged, with a well-articulated analogy between

each type of distinctio and a corresponding musical event. It was this analogy that permitted

John to begin to articulate the new insight that chant has the capacity to sound simultaneously

complete on one level and incomplete on another, and thus the grammatical concept of

punctuation proved instrumental in the elucidation of a highly significant aspect of musical

language.

John of Affligem’s theory of musical closure occupies a clear position in the dichotomy

of how closure happens versus where it occurs (a dichotomy introduced in the introductory

chapter). His is unambiguously a theory of where, and pays almost no attention to how musical

closure is effected. He gives no specification whatsoever about what musical events occur

leading up to the conclusion of a phrase, and no specification about what happens when that

phrase concludes, other than mentioning a pitch or choice of possible pitches. In contrast,

nearly all of John’s explanatory efforts go towards describing where cadences occur. John

conceives the temporal span of a given chant largely in terms of its verbal text, and defines

phrase conclusions in terms of the text’s syntactical divisions. Thus, John’s distinctio-inspired

account of closure lies toward one extreme of the how vs. where dichotomy. We will now

examine a theory which operates at the other extreme of this dichotomy: the early sixteenth-

century cadential doctrine of the Cologne school, which is the subject of the following chapter.

71
 CHAPTER 2

POLYPHONIC CLOSURE IN THE RENAISSANCE: THE COLOGNE SCHOOL

Consider, for a moment, the state of musical composition in the late fifteenth century.

The Franco-Flemish school of composition is in its glory, with Ockeghem, Obrecht, and Josquin

all composing actively. With regard to musical closure, conventional ending formulas are

ubiquitous, primarily a variety of progressions which sound similar to perfect authentic

cadences,1 but also several others, including the descending-fourth (that is, the so-called

“plagal”) cadence.2 As the previous chapter demonstrated, theories of monophonic closure, like

that developed by John of Affligem, worked well for addressing chant, but they clearly cannot

begin to explain the complexities of closure in Franco-Flemish polyphonic music. Furthermore,

the music theory of the intervening centuries was not much of an improvement. The most

pertinent theoretical tradition of that time was contrapunctus, or “counterpoint,” which

provided a series of principles governing the arrangement of two voices in a strict note-against-

note fashion. These principles covered matters such as which intervals appropriately follow a

given interval, how the voices should move with respect to each other (preferably by contrary

motion), and whether the same interval may occur twice in succession (yes for imperfect

1 Such progressions accompany the essential dyadic progression of major sixth to octave—an
imperfect consonance resolving to its “closest” perfect consonance—with a low contratenor or bassus
voice which adds both a fifth below the tenor in the first of those dyads, and also a unison, a lower
octave, or (more rarely by this time) an upper fifth to the tenor in the second of the two sonorities.

Concerning the origin of the term “plagal cadence,” see Caleb Mutch, “Blainville’s New Mode,
2

or How the Plagal Cadence Became ‘Plagal,’” Eighteenth-Century Music 12, no. 1 (March 2015): 69-90.

72
consonances, no for perfect ones).3 The contrapunctus tradition was able to stipulate that

imperfect consonances should progress to perfect ones,4 and that pieces should begin and end

on perfect consonances, but it only spoke of dyads. In the mid-fifteenth century theorists of

faburden or fauxbourdon began to describe three-voice textures.5 Yet this approach does not

present a significant conceptual departure form contrapunctus theory, since one added voice

relates to the original line by a simplified version of the familiar contrapuntal rules, and the

other simply mirrors the original line at the fourth above or below. Developments in musical

practice clearly called for a new theory of musical closure that could stipulate what composers

should do with three, or even four, truly independent voices at ending points.

Given this musical situation, it is perhaps surprising that the first radically new theory

of musical closure did not arise until the first decade of the sixteenth century. In an approach

that is without precedent, this body of doctrine describes cadences not as successive dyads, but

as three- or four-voice combinations of stereotyped melodic figures. The new doctrine,

furthermore, found its home in a new genre of treatise, namely, a textbook-like compendium of

both traditional learned topics and practical compositional advice that was intended for

grammar-school students. The pedagogical orientation of this genre is undoubtedly due to the

3 See Sarah Fuller, “Organum – Discantus – Contrapunctus in the Middle Ages,” in The Cambridge
History of Western Music Theory, ed. Thomas Christensen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002),
477-8, 490-6; and Klaus-Jürgen Sachs, Der Contrapunctus im 14. und 15. Jahrhundert: Untersuchungen zum
Terminus, zur Lehre und zu den Quellen (Wiesbaden: F. Steiner, 1974).

4 Concerning the intellectual background of this concept, see David E. Cohen, “‘The Imperfect
Seeks Its Perfection’: Harmonic Progression, Directed Motion, and Aristotelian Physics,” Music Theory
Spectrum 23, no. 2 (Autumn 2001): 139-169.

Fuller, “Organum – Discantus – Contrapunctus in the Middle Ages,” 496-8; Brian Trowell,
5

“Faburden and Fauxbourdon,” Musica Disciplina 13 (1959): 43-78.

73
fact that the authors of these treatises were all associated with the university in Cologne, both as

students and teachers. Their doctrine would be worthy of study solely due to its status as the

earliest truly polyphonic theory of musical closure; it is all the more significant that it arose in

association with the polyphonic vocal style of the so-called “high Renaissance” period. This

style’s increased employment of “triadic” sonorities and frequent use of dove-tailed textures

also provide challenges to the interpreter of contemporaneous music theory, encouraging us to

consider important issues such as whether the Cologne school’s doctrine provides evidence of

triadic thinking, and to what extent their concept of a closing progression corresponds with our

idea of cadence.

This chapter will undertake a thorough investigation of the Cologne school’s doctrine of

musical closure. It will begin by considering the curiously little-explained meaning of the

compound term clausula formalis, which these authors introduced to describe polyphonic

closure. Further contextualization follows, in the form of a brief survey of the diverse mixture

of theoretic traditions upon which the authors of the Cologne school drew to create their theory,

most notably the corpus of conservative treatises cultivated in Germany and a newer form of

contrapuntal pedagogy associated with Italian writers. After this background has been

explained, the chapter turns to a detailed discussion of the doctrine of closure itself, examining

the rules for three- and four-voice closes in turn. The presence of four-voice progressions raises

the question of whether this theoretical tradition provides evidence of triadic thinking in early

sixteenth century Germany; a careful evaluation of this issue follows. This chapter concludes

with a brief study of the role of the clausula formalis in contemporaneous compositional practice,

suggesting the value of future research in this area.

74
2.1 The Term Clausula Formalis

From its first articulation of the concept of musical closure, the Cologne school referred

to it using the term clausula formalis. Curiously, even though these authors are apparently the

earliest to use this compound term, they never define it or explain what its constituent words

mean. This lack of explicitness is unfortunate, since each of the terms clausula and formalis has a

multiplicity of meanings and possible interpretations, which have implications for our

understanding of the concept in question. It will be worthwhile, therefore, to begin the study of

the clausula formalis by exploring the web of meanings the term would have invoked at the start

of the sixteenth century.

The employment of the term clausula in music texts predates the Cologne-school

theorists’ use of it by more than five hundred years. The word itself is older yet: in Classical

Latin it generally means “conclusion” or “ending,” and is derived from the verb “to close”

(claudere). Perhaps its first musical use occurred in the text Alia musica, a work whose

complicated textual history begins about the second half of the ninth century. The Alia musica

uses the term in an inchoate effort to elucidate the concept of modal ambitus, presumably to

refer to the idea of a melody closing off a given amount of musical space.6 Yet the treatise had

little circulation, and this meaning never gained wide currency. It was far more common for

treatises in the following centuries to use clausula to refer to the concept of the musical interval,

or to employ it as a glossing synonym for the term “period” (periodus) as used to denote the

musical phrase, a terminological-conceptual complex which the previous chapter discusses in

6 Alia musica, 116.

75
detail.7 John of Affligem’s De musica (ca. 1100) is representative of the terminological melee of

this period. Throughout the bulk of his treatise John uses clausula to refer to intervals, even

though that meaning was falling out of favor; indeed, he is one of the last authors to use the

term in that sense. But John also uses the term in the second sense in his discussion of the

analogy between music and prose. There, he glosses the word periodus with the words

“clausula or circuit,” the latter of which is a near-literal translation of the Greek περίοδος

(periodos).8 This gloss is not original to John; rather, its origin lies at least as far back as the

grammatical treatise De arte metrica by Bede (ca. 672-735).9 Several other medieval treatises also

quote it, one of which is at latest from the early twelfth century, but it is difficult to assert

whether their authors knew the phrase independently or whether they were merely quoting

John.10 In the centuries after John this sense of clausula came to replace entirely the intervallic

meaning, as treatises such as Anonymous IV demonstrate.11

It was not until the late fifteenth century that the meaning of clausula began to shift

again. Sometime before 1475, the Franco-Flemish theorist and composer Johannes Tinctoris (ca.

1435-1511) defined the term in his proto-dictionary of music, the Diffinitorium musicae, which

7 See chapter 1, sections 1 and 3-4.

8“. . . periodus [id est] clausura sive circuitus” (De mus. 79). Most manuscripts of John’s treatise
read “clausura” rather than “clausula,” and this alternate spelling is transmitted by later authors.
“Clausula” is clearly the word intended, as its spelling in Bede demonstrates.

9 Bede, De arte metrica, XII, 188, 51.

10 One such source is a fragmentary text edited by Gerbert and attached to the end of his edition
of Hucbald’s De harmonica institutione (p. 125). Another is the “Ecce modorum sive tonorum” of the
Enchiriadis tradition, which exists in many manuscripts dated to the twelfth century.

11 See, for example, Montpellier Organum Treatise, 33; Anonymous IV, 46; Pseudo-Bede, Musica
quadrata seu mensurata, 926.

76
was published in the Veneto region in 1495.12 Tinctoris describes a clausula thus: “A clausula is

a little part (particula) of any section of a song, at the end of which is found either general repose

or completion (perfectio).”13 The association of clausula with conclusion is unmistakable in the

case of both “general rest” and “completion”: in the former a situation analogous to today’s

“grand pause” ends the particula, whereas in the latter the particula concludes on a perfect

(perfectus) sonority that has the ontological quality of completion (perfectio).14 Tinctoris’s

definition leaves it rather unclear how much music he considers to count as a clausula. As we

shall see in section 2.3, the Cologne school makes clear that a clausula formalis consists of three

sonorities, which could well be the approximate amount of music Tinctoris had in mind when

he defined “clausula” as “a little part of a song.” Thus, in both temporal scope and association

with ending, the Cologne school’s employment of the term clausula is substantially closer to that

of Tinctoris than to those of their medieval predecessors. Furthermore, several later treatises

penned by members of the Cologne school quote Tinctoris’s definitions, which demonstrates

12 Tinctoris’s understanding of the clausula also initiated a tradition of Italian cadential theorizing
that differs from the Cologne school’s doctrine in several respects, including an exclusively two-voice
understanding of the progression, and a far greater emphasis on deploying cadences such that they
reinforce the text’s structure. For more on this Italian tradition see section 3.1 of the following chapter,
Elisabeth Schwind, Kadenz und Kontrapunkt: Zur Kompositionslehre der Klassischen Vokalpolyphonie
(Hildesheim: Olms, 2009), 209-14, and Anne Smith, The Performance of 16th-Century Music: Learning from the
Theorists (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 71-74).

13 “Clausula est cujuslibet partis cantus particula in fine cujus vel quies generalis vel perfectio
reperitur” (Tinctoris, Diffinitorium musicae, III, p. 180). I have adopted Karol Berger’s translation of quies
as “repose” (Musica Ficta: Theories of Accidental Inflections in Vocal Polyphony from Marchetto da Padova to
Gioseffo Zarlino [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987], 129).

14 This interpretation of the meaning of “perfectio” is supported both by Tinctoris’s definition of

the term in the Diffinitorium musicae (XIV, p. 186), and his use of the term in his Liber de arte contrapuncti
(II, p. 16, and VI, p. 28).

77
their authors’ familiarity with his dictionary.15 For example, Andreas Ornithoparchus, in his

Musice active micrologus (1517), provides an almost verbatim quotation of the definition, and

then goes on to add: “or it is a uniting (coniunctio) in perfect consonances of voices which

progress in various fashions,” which makes explicit the new connection between the term and

the effect of closure.16

Yet the word clausula did not have exclusively musical meanings. Rather, the term had

acquired a strong association with the phenomenon of closure more than 1500 years before

Tinctoris’s day, in the field of rhetoric. Authors who were concerned with rhetoric began to

discuss how speech should express closure through rhythmic means starting with Aristotle, in

his Ars rhetorica (ca. 320s).17 Starting in the early first century BCE, rhetoricians such as Cicero

(106-43 BCE) adapted and developed this Greek tradition into a Latin doctrine of prose rhythm,

in which metrically identifiable patterns of long and short syllables became associated with

15 See, for example, Wollick’s quotations of Tinctoris’s definition of circulus (Enchiridion [1512],
V.5, f. H4v), and Cochlaeus’s quotation of Tinctoris’s definition of sonus (Tetrachordum musices [1511], I.6, f.
A4r).

16 “. . . “Uel est vocum diuersimode gradiencium in consonantijs perfectis coniunctio” (Musice

active micrologus, IV.5). See also Wollick, Enchiridion [1512], VI.5, f. L2v, and Galliculus, Isagoge, IX, f. C2r.
Gallus Dressler also gives a nearly verbatim quotation of Tinctoris’s definition in the early 1560s, a
testament to the lasting currency and appeal of Tinctoris’s thought in Germany (Praecepta musicae poeticae,
VIII, p.136).

17 Aristotle, Rhetoric, III.8-9.

78
expressing the conclusions of thoughts.18 To refer to these formulaic metrical patterns Cicero

used the term clausula.19

In the later Antique period the Latin language’s system of metric demarcation shifted

from a quantitative basis to a stress-oriented one. In Cicero’s day syllables in spoken Latin

varied in duration, and meter was conceptualized as patterned sequences of longer and shorter

syllables. By the early fifth century this system had been replaced by one familiar to today’s

English speakers, in which syllables do not vary in duration, but in stress, which is

accomplished by volume and other means.20 Soon after this shift in practice came the fall of the

Roman Empire in the West, and the fundamental changes in education and scholarship that

resulted from it. Because none of Cicero’s discussions of prose rhythm were known in the

medieval period, and the mutilated form of Quintilian’s Institutions that survived (the so-called

textus mutilatus) had only limited circulation, medieval rhetoricians had little direct access to

classical doctrine. Consequently, when rhetoricians of the twelfth century began to develop a

theory of prose rhythm as a part of the ars dictaminis, or art of letter writing, the resulting

The Latin rhetoricians also borrowed and adapted their Greek predecessors’ terminology of
18

period, colon, and comma in their analyses of sentence structure, as the previous chapter narrates in
detail.

19 For Cicero’s discussion of this topic see De oratore, 2, 59, 240; 3, 44, 173, 3, 46, 181; 3, 50, 192; and
also Orator, 64, 215 ff. Quintilian, too, discusses the subject, but in a less concrete manner (Inst. 8, 5, 13; 9,
3, 77; 9, 4, 50; 9, 4, 70; 9, 4, 101). For a detailed treatment of the role of these texts in the enigmatic field of
classical prose rhythm, see Steven M. Oberhelman, Prose Rhythm in Latin Literature of the Roman Empire—
First Century B.C. to Fourth Century A.D. Studies in Classics, 27 (Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen Press,
2003).

“At the time of St. Augustine [354-430 CE], according to Augustine himself, the difference
20

between long and short syllables had completely disappeared” (Dag Norbert, Introduction to the Study of
Medieval Latin Versification, trans. Grant C. Roti and Jacqueline de La Chapelle Skubly [Washington, D.C.:
Catholic University of America Press, 2004], 81).

79
doctrine was significantly different from that of their classical predecessors.21 While they

maintained the conceptual framework of the formulaic pattern of syllables, this pattern was

now of stressed and unstressed syllables, a concept very likely adopted from the field of poetry,

which had been structuring speech based on stress since the time of Augustine.22 Furthermore,

an important terminological change had occurred as well. By this date, in the context of speech

the term clausula had come to refer only to the sentence; a new term, cursus, arose to refer to the

phenomenon of rhythmic prose and to the different patterns of accentuation.23

By the fifteenth century the ars dictaminis had largely ossified; indeed, in as much as it

survived at all, it mostly existed in rhetorical treatises in the form of collections of stock

sentences which could be used to address members of different governmental and ecclesiastical

ranks. Yet even as the medieval doctrine of cursus faded into obscurity, the Roman rhetorical

tradition of Antiquity was being rediscovered and circulated more widely than ever before. In

1416-7 Poggio Bracciolini discovered and copied the complete text of Quintilian’s Institutions,

and in the following decades other scholars recovered nearly the entire corpus of Cicero’s

writings.24 These rediscoveries came at an opportune time, for they helped to launch the

21 Concerning the ars dictaminis, see James J. Murphy, Rhetoric in the Middle Ages: A History of
Rhetorical Theory from St. Augustine to the Renaissance (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California
Press, 1974), 194ff.

22 Norbert, Introduction to the Study, 23.

23For a thorough account of medieval cursus doctrine and a modern interpretation of the practice,
see Tore Janson. Prose Rhythm in Medieval Latin from the Ninth to the Thirteenth Century. Studia Latina
Stockholmiensa, 20 (Stockholm: Almquist & Wiksell International, 1975). See also Murphy, Rhetoric in the
Middle Ages, 248-53.

Murphy, Rhetoric in the Middle Ages, 357-60. Cicero’s De oratore and Orator, his two texts that
24

address prose rhythm in the most detail, were discovered a mere five years after Quintilian (ibid., 360-1).

80
intellectual and cultural movement to which historians later applied the term “humanism,” and

coincided with the start of the era known as the Renaissance. Indeed, with the invention of

movable type and the printing press in the mid-fifteenth century, classical rhetorical texts began

to circulate widely.

Could Cicero’s doctrine of the clausula have directly inspired the conception of the

clausula formalis? Unfortunately, no evidence survives that can prove this conclusively. All of

Cicero’s texts that address phrase rhythm had been published by the start of the sixteenth

century, and perhaps even by the time that Tinctoris wrote his definition of the clausula in his

Diffinitorium (1495). Yet discussion of prose rhythm and related topics still found no place in a

rhetorical textbook first published in 1501 in Cologne, the city where the doctrine of the clausula

formalis originated.25 Numerous humanists who could have been familiar with Cicero’s doctrine

circulated through Cologne in the later 1490s, such as Heinrich Mangold, Hermann von dem

Busche, and Jakob Canter aus Groningen, but details of these men’s private teaching activities

unsurprisingly do not appear to have survived.26 Thus, we are left with tantalizing possibilities

for a direct connection between the flourishing humanistic activities of the Renaissance and the

formation of a new doctrine of musical closure, but no more than possibilities.

25 This text is the Aerarium aureum poetarum of Jacobus Magdalius Gaudensis (Köln: Quentel,
1501). The term “aureum” (golden), which also occurs in the title of the Cologne school’s foundational
work (Opus aureum musicae), does not indicate a dependence between the two works. Rather, it occurs in
at least eight works published in Cologne in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, and likely is
due to the great popularity of the late medieval work Legenda aurea, by Jacobus de Voragine. Concerning
the wide circulation of the latter work, see Sherry L. Reames, The Legenda Aurea: A Reexamination of its
Paradoxical History (Madison, Wisc.: University of Wisconsin Press, 1985), 3-4.

26Carl [or Karl] Otto, Johannes Cochlaeus der Humanist (Breslau: Verlag von G. P. Aderholz’
Buchhandlung, 1874), 7; Hans Rupprich, Humanismus und Renaissance in den deutschen Städten und an den
Universitäten. Deutsche Literatur, Reihe 8, 2 (Leipzig: P. Reclam, 1935), 26-7.

81
 As for the term formalis, it too was frequently used in non-musical settings, particularly

in philosophical texts and by authors importing philosophy’s Aristotelian-scholastic terms and

concepts into their discussions of other fields. Linguistically speaking, the adjective formalis

directly derives from the common Latin noun forma, or “form”; in this capacity it was widely

employed, either to refer to notions of visual shape, configuration, and appearance,27 or to more

abstract concepts of form. (One should note that the idea of “musical form” in our modern

sense long postdates the sixteenth century, and certainly was not invoked by the term

formalis.28) In Aristotelian thought, the concept of “form” operates in opposition to that of

“matter”: in this context, most broadly and basically, an entity’s form is that organizing

principle which makes that thing what it is, precisely by organizing or “informing” an

appropriate amount of appropriate matter so that that matter becomes that thing. Matter, then, in

this metaphysical scheme, is simply whatever “receives” a form so as to acquire the

organization which that form bestows, an organization that causes that quantum of matter to be

the specific kind of thing of which the form is the form. A thing’s form, together with the

concept of its appropriate matter, constitutes its essence.29 Music texts of the fourteenth and

27 Another common Medieval meaning of forma that derives from this sense is “beauty.”

28As we will see in section 4.1, even in the late eighteenth century Koch’s use of the term
“formalis” in his discussions of instrumental genres still does not indicate musical form.

29 See Aristotle, Physics, II.1, 193a9-b21, and Aquinas, Commentary of the Metaphysics of Aristotle V,
l.2 n.2 for the medieval reception of formalis, particular in the context of the “formal cause.”

82
fifteenth centuries often employed the term in a strict, Aristotelian fashion, one such example

being the Speculum musicae attributed to a certain “Jacques de Liège.”30

When it comes to a clausula being formalis, however, it seems quite clear that the

metaphysical concepts of matter and form are not being invoked. There is another possible

meaning, however. This alternate sense of formalis has very little currency in music texts, but it

more logically applies to cadential activity. The key difference is that this definition stresses

regularity over essentiality: R. E. Latham’s second definition of formalis is “in accordance with

normal procedure; regular,”31 which doubtless derives from the medieval usage of forma, in

which it can mean a “rule of life” or a “norm.”32 In this same sense du Cange’s seventeenth-

century dictionary of Middle and Late Latin tells us that formalia verba are those “which, in

formulaic verbal expressions (formis), or especially in the typical sorts of enunciations of

religious rites (sacri τύποι), are of this kind, [for example]: ‘Our Serenity, Holiness, Gentle One,”

etc.”33 Thus, the term clausula formalis likely suggested a little part (particula) of a musical phrase

(courtesy of Tinctoris) that contains a formulaic, regular (formalis) succession of sonorities

and/or melodic lines.

Jacobus Leodiensis, Speculum musicae II.2, f. 37v, p. 10 and VI.27, p. 64. On the dating and
30

authorship of this treatise, see Desmond, “New Light on Jacobus,” 19-40.

31 Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, ed. R. E. Latham (London: Oxford University
Press for the British Academy, 1981), s.v. “formalis.”

Mediae Latinitatis lexicon minus, ed. J. F. Niermeyer & C. van de Kieft, revised J.W.J. Burgers
32

(Leiden & Boston: Brill, 2002), s.v. “forma.”

33“FORMALIA Verba, quæ in Formis, seu sacris τύποις ut plurimum scribebantur, cujusmodi
sunt: Nostra Serenitas, Pietas, Mansuetudo, etc.” (du Cange et al., Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis,
http://ducange.enc.sorbonne.fr/FORMALIA1, accessed October 22, 2012).

83
 The question of how best to translate this term remains. Based on the previous

paragraphs, “formulaic” seems to be the best translation for formalis. As for clausula, most

recent translators render it as “cadence.”34 The danger with this choice is that it communicates

that a clausula formalis in the early sixteenth century is what we today think of as a cadence, an

implication which fails to do justice to the complexity of the situation, as this chapter

demonstrates.35 Similarly, translating formalis as “formulaic” would efface the philosophical

overtones of the term, and would rather heavy-handedly clear away the semantic web

attending the term formalis in favor of one simplistic interpretative claim. To avoid these

pitfalls, this chapter translates the term clausula formalis as “formal close.” This rendering (more

specifically, “formall Cloſe”) is the translation selected by John Dowland in his 1609 English

translation of an early text by the Cologne school.36 More important than this historical

precedent, however, is the fact that the term “formal close” preserves a sense of distance

between the sixteenth-century concept of the clausula formalis and today’s use of the term

“formulaic” and understanding of the concept of the cadence.

34 See, for example, Johannes Cochlaeus, Tetrachordum Musices, trans. Clement A. Miller ([Dallas]:
American Institute of Musicology, 1970), 79-80, and Benito V. Rivera, “Harmonic Theory in Musical
Treatises of the Late Fifteenth and Early Sixteenth Centuries,” Music Theory Spectrum 1 (Spring, 1979): 83-
4.

35 Without endorsing his contention unreservedly, it is apposite to mention Carl Dahlhaus’s claim
that “to feel close to things past is to misconstrue them, while to understand them is to sense their
remoteness” (Carl Dahlhaus, Foundations of Music History, trans. J. B. Robinson [Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1983], 63).

Ornithoparchus, Andreas Ornithoparchus his Micrologus, or Introduction . . ., trans. Iohn Douland

36

(London: Thomas Adams, 109), IV.5, pp. 84-5.

84
2.2 Precedents of the Cologne School’s Theory

Of the two main traditions upon which the authors of the Cologne school drew to craft

their new theory, the Italian line, associated with writers like Gaffurius, is much more widely

known today. In contrast, the German theoretical tradition, represented by treatises like the

Flores of Hugo Spechsthard von Reutlingen and the Lilium musicae planae of Michael

Keinspeck,37 has not attracted much notice, likely because of its more conservative tendencies

and the limited transmission of its texts. For example, one of the most influential German

treatises for the Cologne school is the Musica (1490) of Adam von Fulda, a text which seems to

have circulated only in a single manuscript copy for nearly three centuries before being printed

by Gerbert.38 Like many other Northern European treatises of the fifteenth century, this work

covers a wide variety of traditional theoretical topics, and does so in a fairly concise fashion.39

Its first book contains speculative topoi such as the etymology of musica, a lengthy section

extolling the value of music (the laus musicae), and an account of music’s founders (the

inventores musicae artis).40 The following books comprise concise treatments of the pitch aspect

37Karl G. Fellerer, “Die Kölner Musiktheoretische Schule des 16. Jahrhunderts,” in Renaissance-
Muziek 1400-1600: Donum Natalicium René Bernard Lenaerts, ed. Jozef Robijns (Leuven: Katholieke
Universiteit Seminarie voor Muziekwetenschap, 1969), 125.

38Peter J. Slemon, “Adam von Fulda on Musica plana and Compositio. De musica, Book II: A
Translation and Commentary” (Ph.D. diss., University of British Columbia, 1994), 20.

For a list of eight works with similarities in content and ordering, see Slemon, “Adam von
39

Fulda on Musica plana,” 33-4.

Adam von Fulda, Musica, I.1-7, pp. 332-41. In this passage Adam uses the term “inventatores,”
40

which was likely intended to be “inventores,” as at I.6 and I.7 (p. 340).

85
of monophony and polyphony (musica immensurata), its rhythmic aspect (musica mensuralis), and

numerical proportions.

Considering that a polyphonic theory of musical closure arose in Germany a mere

decade later, Adam pays surprisingly little attention to matters of simultaneities. There is no

book devoted to counterpoint, and what space Adam does dedicate to polyphonic concerns all

occurs in the course of the second book’s treatment of musica immensurata. The most significant

treatment of polyphony comes in the eleventh chapter of that book, which consists of a list of

ten compositional principles.41 A few of these are similar to precepts promulgated in Italian

lists of contrapuntal rules, which will be discussed shortly. Yet the bulk of Adam’s principles,

which he describes as “rules of the ancients” (regulae antiquorum), are surprisingly idiosyncratic:

many of them have no obvious precedent, and later authors do not adopt them.42 For example,

rule five consists of an exhortation for composers to memorize the twelve intervals of music.43

The only rule that does address the issue of musical closure is the first one: “In every song at

least one voice is appointed to be adapted to a correct tone. Moreover, to adapt to a tone

(namely, of the eight tones) is this: it is to place cadences (clausulae) beautifully and appositely,

for as the rise and fall of speech is set off by the period, so is the tone by a perfection.”44 The

41 Ibid., II.XI, p. 352-3.

42 Peter Slemon discusses Adam’s ten rules in detail in “Adam von Fulda on Musica plana,” 92-
104.

43 Adam von Fulda, Musica, II.XI, p. 353.

44 “In omni cantu ad minus una vox dicitur aptari vero tono; hoc est autem aptare tono, scilicet
octo tonatos, id est, clausulas pulcre localiterque ponere, sicut enim accentus prosae per punctum
ornatur, sic tonus per octo” (ibid., translated by Harold Powers in “Mode,” New Grove Online,
http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/43718pg3). Powers evidently reads

86
first clause quite clearly indicates polyphonic composition, while the remainder of the quotation

mentions placing cadences properly. Unfortunately, Adam provides no further information on

the topic, and the reader is left guessing as to what Adam considers a clausula to be, and what

distinguishes a beautifully located clausula from one that is less beautifully placed.

Yet despite the predominantly conservative content of this treatise and its paltry

consideration of polyphony, it occupies an important place in the development of the genuinely

new theory of the Cologne school. Wilibald Gurlitt claims that the Musica was a foundational

text for that school’s treatises, and a comparison of its contents reveals many similarities with

the latter half of the Opus aureum (1501), the earliest published work by the Cologne school.45

Most prominently, the substantial preface to part three of the Opus aureum is copied verbatim

(until the final sentence) from the preface to the third book of Adam’s Musica.46 Other textual

concordances abound throughout the third and fourth parts of the Opus aureum, revealing its

author’s close reliance on Adam’s treatise. Many similar concordances exist between the first

two books of the Opus aureum and Michael Keinspeck’s Lilium musicae planae (1496). Thus, the

conservative tradition of German theory treatises, and Adam of Fulda’s Musica in particular,

constitutes and important part of the foundation upon which the Cologne school erected its

music-theoretic doctrine.

the final word of the quotation as an erroneous replacement of “perfectionem” with “octo”; the latter
term makes little sense in the context, and the former resonates with Tinctoris’s invocation of the term
“perfectio” in his definition of clausula.

45Wilibald Gurlitt, “Die Kompositionslehre des deutschen 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts,” in
Musikgeschichte und Gegenwart: ein Aufsatzfolge, vol. 1, ed. Wilibald Gurlitt (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner
Verlag, 1966), 82-4.

46 Wollick, Opus aureum, III, preface, f. F5r; Adam von Fulda, Musica, III, preface, p. 359.

87
 The other theoretical strand that informs the Cologne school’s cadential innovations is

the aforementioned Italian tradition of contrapuntal teaching. Although the pedagogical

approach of this tradition dates at least as far back as Prosdocimo de’ Beldomandi’s

Contrapunctus (1412), the most important contrapuntal sources for the Cologne school are

undoubtedly the Liber de arte contrapuncti of Johannes Tinctoris and the Practica musice (1496) of

Gaffurius. The third book of the latter treatise comprises a wide-ranging treatment of

counterpoint, including discussion of the treatment of dissonances, the use of musica ficta in

counterpoint, and the possible voicings of four-voice chords.47 The final book of the Opus

aureum, which treats counterpoint, draws upon book three of the Practica musice in important

ways; indeed, with the important exception of the new cadential doctrine, nearly every

significant part of the Opus aureum’s last book is an abbreviated reworking of material from the

Practica musice.48 For example, the eleventh chapter of book three of the Practica musice, which is

entitled “On the Composition of Diverse Parts of Counterpoint” (De Compositione diuersarum

partium contrapuncti), consists of a so-called Contratenorlehre, which is a method of describing

how to add a third voice to a given interval formed by the other two voices, and then a fourth

voice to these three; the fifth chapter of the Opus aureum, “On the Formation of Counterpoint”

For a detailed discussion of doctrines of counterpoint ca. 1500, see Schwind, Kadenz und
47

Kontrapunkt, 13-83.

48Interestingly, the trio of German authors who published on the Cologne school in the 1950s and
1960s (Wilibald Gurlitt, Karl Fellerer, and Klaus Wolfgang Niemöller) focused on medieval German
influences on the Cologne school, and do not appear to have drawn connections between the Cologne
school and non-German theorists such as Gaffurius. Elisabeth Schwind, however, has conscientiously
shown the dependence of the 1507 edition of Johannes Cochlaeus’s Musica on Gaffurius’s work (Kadenz
und Kontrapunkt, 136-42).

88
(De formatione contrapuncti), contains a much more concise Contratenorlehre, which dispenses

with the fourth voice.49

Of all the theoretical elements which the Opus aureum borrows from treatises in the

Italian contrapuntal tradition, it is those treatises’ lists of contrapuntal rules that provide the

conceptual structure upon which the Opus aureum erects its cadential material. One such list is

found in the third chapter of book three of Gaffurius’s Practica musice. The chapter describes the

“eight mandates or rules of composition” (de octo mandatis sive regulis contrapuncti), of which the

first and last rules address what sort of intervals should start and end a composition, and the

middle six discuss permissible dyadic successions.50 In contrast to later works by the Cologne

school, which quote Gaffurius’s rules verbatim,51 the Opus aureum’s iteration of the list of

contrapuntal rules is one of the places in which its author demonstrates the most freedom in his

adaptation of tradition: of the seven rules, only three are adaptations of Gaffurius, one of

Tinctoris, and three are not accounted for in earlier contrapuntal lists.52

Both the Italian contrapuntal tradition and the new German cadential doctrine treat their

subject matters as regulations for the disposition of two (or more) voices to each other, and both

address the issue of closure. Tinctoris’s work is significant for our purposes not only because of

49 Gaffurius, Practica musice, III.11, ff. DD8r-EE1v; Wollick, Opus aureum, IV.5, f. H3v-4r.

50Gaffurius, Practica musice, III.3, ff. DD1r-3r.

51 See Johannes Cochlaeus, Musica (ca. 1505), f. C4r-v; id. Musica (1507), f. E4r-F1r; id. Tetrachordum
musices, f. E6r-v.

52 Rule 1 corresponds to Tinctoris’s first contrapuntal rule (Liber de arte contrapuncti, III.1), rule 2 is
similar to Gaffurius’s fourth rule (Practica musice III.3), rules 3 and 4 are conceptually very similar to
Gaffurius’s rules 7 and 3 (ibid.), and the last three rules are unique.

89
its aforementioned definition of the term “clausula” as “a little part of any section of a song, at

the end of which is found either general repose or completion (perfectio),” but also for the

concept of the perfectio which he begins to articulate. The perfectio, in Tinctoris’s words, is “a

conclusion of an entire song or of its parts (particulae).”53 While he does not make explicit how

one should construct a perfectio, the way in which he employs the term in his contrapuntal

doctrine accords well with later understandings of the clausula: the perfectio can never arrive on

a dissonance, and multiple perfectiones should not be made successively on the same note.54

Furthermore, Tinctoris provides musical examples to accompany his discussion of the perfectio,

and these progressions, in both two and three voices, contain conclusive progressions that fit

the cadential descriptions of the Cologne school.55

As for Gaffurius’s treatment of the issue of closure, only the final two of his contrapuntal

rules concern endings, and these are exclusively two-voice phenomena. The pith of these rules

is as follows:

The seventh rule is that when we seek a perfect concord from an imperfect one, as at a
termination of a song or any harmonic part of it, it is necessary to move in such a way as
to obtain the nearest perfect concord by contrary motion (diuersis motibus) in each part. . .
. The eighth and final rule is that every song ought to be ended on a perfect concord,
viz. either on a unison (as is the custom for the Venetians), or on an octave or a fifteenth,
which every school of musicians frequently observes for the sake of a completed
harmonic moderation. For, as the Philosopher attests, the end is the perfection of any
thing.56

53“Perfectio est totius cantus aut particularum ipsius conclusio” (Tinctorius, Diffinitorium musicae,
XIV, p. 186).

54 Idem, Liber de arte contrapuncti, III.5, III.7, pp. 149-153.

55 Ibid.

“Septima regula est quod quando ex concordantia imperfecta perfectam petimus

56

concordantiam tanquam cantilenae terminationem: vel alicuius partis eius harmonicae: ad

90
As Gaffurius’s many examples make clear, these two rules dictate the motions of two voices, the

tenor and discantus, at endings of pieces or their constituent parts. These voices move from a

given imperfect consonance to the closest perfect consonance by contrary or oblique motion,

dictates that by Gaffurius’s day had become traditional in the Italian contrapuntal tradition. It

is to this regulative approach to a simple, dyadic framework, developed by the Italian

contrapuntists, that the Cologne school would append its striking doctrinal developments.

2.3 The First Stage: Three-voice Cadences in the Opus aureum and Musica

In the history of music theory, as is true for all intellectual history, efforts to pin down

conceptual developments to one person alone often do not do justice to the complexity of the

situation.57 Even so, the original authorship of the Cologne school’s polyphonic theory of

musical closure is unusually complex. The first treatise to contain this doctrine is the Opus

aureum musice castigatissimum . . ., which was first published in Cologne in 1501, and was

reprinted four times over the next eight years. Heinrich Quentel published the treatise, which is

divided into four parts (partes), under the authorship of Nicolaus Wollick (ca. 1480-after 1541).

But as Wollick writes in the dedicatory note at the end of the book, he was not the sole author of

propinquiorem perfectam diuersis vtriusque partis motibus acquirendam concurrere necessum est. . . .
Octaua et vltimam Regula est quod omnis Cantilena debet finiri et terminari in concordantia perfecta
videlicet aut in vnisono vt Venetis mos fuit. aut in octaua aut in quintadecima: quod omnis musicorum
scola frequentius obseruat gratia harmonicae mediocritatis perficiendae. Est enim Finis teste Philosopho
vniuscuiusque rei perfectio” (ibid., ff. DD2 v-DD3r).

57A well-known example of this is Rameau’s formulation of the fundamental bass, the
component conceptual parts of which were nearly all present in treatises of the previous century, as
Thomas Christensen argues (Rameau and Musical Thought in the Enlightenment [Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press 1993], 43-70).

91
its material. In describing the treatise as a whole, which he calls “these little works” (hec

opuscula), Wollick notes that he wrote the “Gregorian” work (gregorianum [opusculum]), whereas

the “figured” work (figurativum [opusculum]) was by Malcior de Wormatia (born ca. 1480),

hereafter known as Melchior Schanppecher.58 Although this does not specifically address the

fourth, counterpoint-dedicated part (pars) of the treatise, Klaus Wolfgang Niemöller has

convincingly argued that Schanppecher is most likely the author of this final section, and

Niemöller’s contention will be adopted here.59

Although no evidence survives that would explain specifically how Schanppecher’s

contribution come to be combined with Wollick’s gregorianum writings, there is information on

the relationship of the two men. As Niemöller has shown, both were students at the University

of Cologne: Schanppecher matriculated in 1496, and Wollick in 1498. Furthermore, in a later

work, the Enchiridion (1509), Wollick describes Schanppecher as his teacher.60 The nature of this

teaching relationship, whether it was collaborative, and whether it even focused on music must

remain a mystery. Nevertheless, it does establish that Wollick’s composite work was not the

result of borrowing from a widely circulating manuscript, but instead arose from personal

interaction.

The other significant early member of the Cologne school is Johannes Cochlaeus (1479-

1552). This theorist wrote a treatise entitled Musica, which underwent several revisions over the

“Quamobrem cum hec opuscula musice artis (meum videlicet gregorianum, At malcioris de
58

wormatia figuratiuum) imprimenda forent . . .” (Wollick, Opus aureum, postscript, f. H5v).

59Klaus Wolfgang Niemöller, Nicolaus Wollick (1480-1541) und sein Musiktraktat (Köln: Arno Volk-
Verlag, 1956), 158-161.

60 Wollick, Enchiridion, III.3; quoted in Niemöller, Nicolaus Wollick, 47.

92
course of four published versions between ca. 1504 and 1515. Little scholarship has been done

on this text, as it has a difficult textual tradition: the first two editions bear neither an author’s

name nor a date, and all four editions are distinct in content.61 Furthermore, only the edition

from ca. 1505 has been published in modern times, and it was published as an anonymous

treatise in installments by Hugo Riemann over a century ago.62 Cochlaeus also studied at the

university in Cologne starting in 1504, and received his Master of Arts degree in 1507.63

Unfortunately, the precise nature of his relationship with Schanppecher and Wollick is not

documented. Cochlaeus joined the Montana Bursa, a college-like subdivision of Cologne’s

university, and Schanppecher belonged to, and taught for, this Bursa. Yet Schanppecher had

left Cologne to go to the university in Leipzig in 1502 and may not have returned until 1505.64

Wollick was in Cologne until at least 1507, before he departed to Metz and then Paris, but his

membership in the Corneliana Bursa somewhat decreases the likeliness of his interactions with

Cochlaeus.65 As such, it is possible that Cochlaeus may have relied on the text of the Opus

Two papers that touch on Cochlaeus’s Musica were read at the 2010 Medieval-Renaissance
61

Music Conference in London, England: Ruth DeFord’s “Two Recently Identified Writings on Musical
Practice by Johannes Cochlaeus,” (July 7, 2010), and Susan Forscher Weiss’s “Publishing Music Treatises
by Students at the University of Cologne in the Early Sixteenth Century (July 7, 2010).

62Hugo Riemann, ed., “Anonymi Introductorium Musicae (c. 1500),” Monatshefte für Musik-
geschichte 29, no. 11 (1897): 147-54; 29, no. 12 (1897): 157-64; 30, no. 1 (1898): 1-8; 31, no. 2 (1898): 11-19.
Klaus-Jürgen Sachs is preparing an edition of Cochlaeus’s treatises, to be published by Olms Verlag.

Clement A. Miller, “Cochlaeus, Johannes,” New Grove Online,

63

http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/06024; Fellerer, “Die Kölner

musitheoretische Schule,” 121.

64 Ibid.

Klaus Wolfgang Niemöller, “Wollick, Nicolaus,” Grove Music Online,

65

http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/30521; id., Nicolaus Wollick, 38. 47. Of

93
aureum in the preparation of the first edition of his Musica (ca. 1504), rather than personal

contact with its authors. Yet in 1505-7, Cochlaeus, Schanppecher, and Wollick were all active in

the university in Cologne; it seems quite likely that they would have interacted at some point

over this period, and that such contact would have informed Cochlaeus’s later revisions of his

theory. In any case, Cochlaeus was at the very least intimately familiar with the doctrine of the

Opus aureum, and his musical writings draw heavily from it, while also expanding and adding

to it.

As for the doctrine developed by these men, its first occurrence is at the end of the Opus

aureum. The text is as follows:

Every song, with respect to the discant, tenor, and bass, wants to be closed (clausulari)
only by formal closes (clausulae formales).
Each close of the discant, being constituted of three notes, will always come upon
(habebit) its last note from below [i.e. the discant’s formula rises], but every close of the
tenor, constituted of the same number of notes, will come upon its last note from above
[i.e. the tenor’s formula descends].
The closes of the added voice (contrapunctus) are formed in various ways, yet this course
of progression (processus) is observed to occur the same way in every cadential arrival
(positio).
Rule: [1] Every discant, on whatever note it makes a cadential arrival (ponatur), always
ought to have its penult placed a sixth above the tenor, and the bass a fifth below the
tenor on the same note [i.e. the penult], as here:
It must, however, be noted most diligently that [2] if the tenor closes (clauditur) on mi,
the discant ought to be joined to it as above, but the penult of the counterpoint [i.e. the
bass] ought to be placed a third and not a fifth below the tenor. But if the tenor takes up
the discant’s close, let the discant take the tenor’s formula [3] by closing (clausulando)
from a third to a unison with the tenor (and the penult of the added voice will remain on
the third) or even [4] by closing from a fifth to a third, in such a way, however, that the
bass closes from a sixth with the tenor to an octave, and is placed a tenth below the
discant.66

course, Schanppecher and Wollick themselves were members of different Bursae, so such interactions
obviously were possible.

“Omnis enim cantilena quo ad discantum, tenorem et bassum non nisi formalibus clausulis vult
66

clausulari.

94
Such a dense and abstract verbal explanation of the phenomenon of musical closure would be

clearer with musical examples. Schanppecher’s text calls for one example explicitly with his

phrase “as thus” (ut hic), and the pages over which this quotation spreads contain five empty

staves (three with five lines and two with ten lines) which are obviously intended to furnish

notated examples. This omission is not isolated: only the first two books of the Opus aureum

have musical notation, and the final two have gaps or empty staves throughout.67 Furthermore,

Wollick’s later treatise, which was a slightly adapted form of the Opus aureum published as the

Enchiridion musices (1509), had only verbal descriptions of these closes, and did not even have

empty staves.

Fortunately we can turn to Cochlaeus’s Musica for contemporaneous musical examples

of this cadential doctrine. The second edition of this treatise (ca. 1505) contains the same

doctrine as the Opus aureum, but in a rephrased and sometimes expanded form, and also

includes a musical example, transcribed as Example 2.1.68 These four examples include every

Omnis clausula discantus ex tribus notis constituta semper habebit ultimam sursum. Sed omnis
clausula tenoris ex totidem notis constituta habebit ultimam deorsum.
Clausulae contrapuncti diversimode formantur, iste tamen processus in omni positione
communiter observatur.
Regula: Omnis igitur discantus, in quacumque clave ponatur, semper eius penultima debet poni
in sexta supra tenorem et bassus in eadem nota in quinta infra tenorem, ut hic:
Est tamen summopere advertendum, quod, si tenor clauditur in mi, discantus debet sibi iungi ut
supra. Penultima autem contrapuncti poni debet in tertia et non in quinta infra tenorem. Sed si tenor
discantus clausulam assumpserit, capiat discantus formulam tenoris clausulando de tertia in unisonum
cum tenore, et stabit penultima contrapuncti in tertia, vel etiam clausulando de quinta in tertiam, ita
tamen, ut bassus cum tenore clausuletur de sexta in octavam sitque positus sub discantu in decima”
(Wollick, Opus aureum, IV.6, ff. H4v-5r).

This situation is not unique to one book or printing, either: all of the editions of the Opus
67

aureum have empty staves.

The first (ca. 1504) and fourth (1515) editions of the Musica each have only extant copy; I have
68

been unable to consult either of these.

95
progression stipulated by the text of the Opus aureum: I have inserted bracketed numbers into

the translated text to facilitate comparison.

Together, the text and example present an understanding of cadence far removed from

ours. A “cadence” consists of three voices, each of which has its own characteristic melodic

formula, a formula or clausula. These are comprised of three notes, the last two of which are the

penult (penultima), and the final, or ultimate (ultima). After his initial acknowledgment that a

clausula consists of three notes, Schanppecher only mentions the final two, and it is not until the

next decade that Andreas Ornithoparchus explicates that a clausula consists of an ultima,

penultima, and antepenultima.69 The emphasis on a three-note clausula would seem to be tailored

to the discant’s formula, which usually contains a suspension, both in contemporaneous

musical practice and musical examples in treatises. Example 2.2 reproduces one of Andreas

Ornithoparchus’s early examples of a two-voice clausula: in this case the discant’s formula is

articulated by the tenor, which creates a 2-3 suspension with the discant. Such syncopations at

points of cadential arrival pervade compositions of the sixteenth century, but German theorists

Example 2.1 Three-voice clausulae from [Cochlaeus], Musica (ca. 1505), f. C5r 70

69 Ornithoparchus, Musice active micrologus, IV.5.

70 The text in Example 2.1 is a translation of the text under Cochlaeus’s example.

96
of the first half of that century, in contrast to Italian theorists, do not make explicit connections

between syncopation and closing formulas.71 Indeed, the first text by a German author to

discuss the matter appears to be the Praecepta musicae poeticae (1563-4) of Gallus Dressler.72

Another significant aspect of the theory that Schanppecher treats lightly is the role of the third

voice (the contrapunctus or bassus). He is very clear that the discant’s clausula ascends and the

tenor’s descends, each by a step, but never offers a similar characterization of the bassus.

Although this voice is under-theorized in the Opus aureum, and largely functions as a part to be

added to the tenor-discant framework in whichever way seems most convenient, it is important

to note that Schanppecher still treats it as an integral part of the clausula formalis and provides

no indication that it may be omitted.

As the name “tenor’s formula” (formulam tenoris) indicates, the tenor and the discant

each by default employ their proper cadential gestures, but these are subject to permutation

between the voices: the tenor can “assume” the characteristic ascent of the discant, in which

case the discant will reciprocate by taking up the tenor’s descending line. Schanppecher

Example 2.2 A two-voice clausula from Ornithoparchus, Musice active micrologus, IV.4, f. L4v

71 Pietro Aaron’s discussion of cadentiae in 1516 implies the metric organization of syncopations
(De inst. harm. III.36), and Stephano Vanneo explicitly discusses syncopations by 1533 (Recanetum de
musica aurea, III.16-7).

72 Dressler, Praecepta musicae poeticae, VIII, p. 138. This work only circulated in manuscript form.
The first printed work in the German world to discuss syncopations appears to be the Melopoiia (1592) of
Sethus Calvisius, which, not incidentally, is the work which transmitted Zarlino’s theory to the German
world (XIII, G4r-8r).

97
describes this situation as an exchange of melodic gestures which are independent, and which

are strongly characterized by their retained associations with their “default” voices. This

strongly suggests that Schanppecher views the clausula formalis not as a progression of three-

note chords, but as a combination of independent melodic elements. The question of whether

the clausula should be considered a chordal phenomenon is significant, and will be addressed

again later.

Although the melodic formula of the discant ascends while that of the tenor descends,

they do not always do so in the same way: the sizes of the steps by which the voices move

varying depending on where in the gamut the clausula occurs. Schanppecher discusses two

different possibilities for cadential disposition. The first, unnamed (and presumably default)

option is characterized by a descending whole tone in the tenor’s melodic formula. When the

tenor closes on C or F the discant moves by an ascending semitone to close on the octave above,

as the first progression of Example 2.1 demonstrates. When the tenor ends on D, G, or A,

however, Schanppecher’s description suggests that the discant should move from a minor sixth

above the tenor on the penult to the octave, an ascent of a whole tone. This progression raises

some interpretive issues, for numerous factors outside of the Cologne school’s clausula formalis

doctrine suggest that musicians usually replaced it with the progression of a major sixth to the

octave, wherein the discant’s penult was raised by a semitone. General discussions of

contrapuntal rules by Schanppecher and Cochlaeus note that the octave always follows the

major sixth, and that the minor sixth more frequently moves obliquely to the perfect fifth.73

73 Wollick, Opus aureum, IV.4, f. H3r; Cochlaeus, Musica (ca. 1505), f. C4v.

98
Furthermore, notated examples of clausulae formales in Cologne school treatises usually show

progressions ending on C or F; Elisabeth Schwind argues that this tendency suggests that

authors recognized that it was usual for the discant to ascend by semitone, and that it must

have been conventional to avoid accidentals in musical examples.74 Curiously, even though

authors of the Cologne school always treated the topic of musica ficta in their sections on

plainchant, they almost never drew explicit connections between the note alterations suggested

by ficta principles and polyphonic practice, including the clausula formalis.75 The fact that Italian

theorists like Pietro Aaron did address chromatic alterations of polyphonic cadentiae starting in

the 1510s makes the German theorists’ reticence seem all the more unusual.76 Schwind contends

that this divergence is due to the authors of the Cologne school being concerned with abstract

contrapuntal relationships in their discussions of clausulae, whereas Aaron and the Italians dealt

more with issues of specific musical realizations.77

The second dispositional possibility occurs when “the tenor closes on mi” (tenor clauditur

in mi), i.e., when the tenor descends by a semitone to E or B. In this situation the discant

ascends by a whole tone, resulting in a progression from a major sixth to an octave, as in the

second progression of Example 2.1. This progression merits additional attention by

74 Schwind, Kadenz und Kontrapunkt, 157.

75The one exception to this is a passing mention by Cochlaeus of how musica ficta affects clausulae.
This occurs at the end of his discussion of plainchant in the Tetrachordum musices (II.10, f. C1v, cited in
Berger, Musica Ficta, 145).

76Aaron, De inst. harm. III.39-42. For more on the place of ficta in Germany and Italian cadential
doctrines, see Berger, Musica Ficta, 122-54.

77 Schwind, Kadenz und Kontrapunkt, 156-7.

99
Schanppecher because of its implications for the bassus voice. When the tenor descends by a

whole tone, as in the first progression of Example 2.1, one can add a third voice a fifth below the

tenor’s penult; this note will then move to a unison with the tenor or an octave below it, creating

what modern theory would call a V-I progression. Although Schanppecher’s text does not

mention it, Cochlaeus’s example offers two other possible resolutions. In the first, the bassus

leaps by octave, landing a fifth above the tenor; this characteristically fifteenth-century

progression was largely obsolete by the time of the Opus aureum. In the second, the bassus

ascends by a step, yielding an imperfect sonority which sounds to modern listeners like the

conclusion of a deceptive cadence-like progression. When the tenor descends by a semitone,

however, placing a fifth below its penult yields a diminished fifth. This would create the

progression possibilities shown in Example 2.3a. Musica ficta of the day offered no quick fixes

to this problem, as adding both a D# and an F# to the penult sonority would entail altering both

of the contrapuntally primary voices to accommodate the conceptually supplemental bassus

Example 2.3 Clausulae on mi

100
voice.78 Instead, the bassus moves from a third below the tenor’s penult to a fifth below its final,

as in Example 2.3b, rendering consonant sonorities which have no need of ficta.

This progression as a whole presents something of an interpretive challenge. Today’s

listeners, who usually assume that the lowest voice of a “root position” chord indicates chordal

identity, might be inclined to identify the progression as a plagal cadence (should the listener

accept the legitimacy of such a cadence) in A minor, or perhaps a half cadence in a modal, D-

centric context. Yet as Bernhard Meier and many other scholars have observed, sixteenth-

century music theory uniformly describes the progression in Example 2.3b as occurring “on mi,”

and they do not conceptualize the final bass note (or any of its notes) as a structural element.79

Indeed, theorists of later generations associated progressions such as this as with the Phrygian

mode.80 As the musical function of the lowest voice changed over the following decades,

theorists continually re-addressed the issue of cadences in which the tenor descends by a

semitone, and this progression still demanded attention from theorists close to two centuries

later, as the following chapter demonstrates.

78 Even when the conceptual priorities of voices changed, this putative solution remained
unattractive to some theorists: over 170 years later after the Opus auruem, Wolfgang Caspar Printz
addressed this very proposal in disapproving terms in his Phrynis Mitilenaeus. By his day, however, the
objection appears to have been that the sharps violated the bounds of the cantus durus and cantus mollis
scale systems (see 5.3.2, in the following chapter).

79 Bernhard Meier, The Modes of Classical Vocal Polyphony: Described According to the Sources, trans.
Ellen S. Beebe (New York: Broude, 1988), 96-9.

80 Herbst, Musica Poetica, VII, f. K4r, p. 71.

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2.4 The Second Stage: Four-voice Cadences in the Musica and Tetrachordum musices

Thus far Schanppecher has been responsible for all the significant theoretical activity:

Wollick’s contribution appears to be limited to getting Schanppecher’s work published, and

Cochlaeus’s only significant innovation is his musical example. Yet in the years following 1506

the balance of theoretical labor shifts. There is no evidence that Schanppecher ever wrote about

music after his contribution to the Opus aureum, although there is record that he wrote an

introduction to astronomy.81 As mentioned before, Wollick’s only further musical publication

was the Enchiridion musices, in which the discussion of musical closure largely consists of a

barely adapted version of the Opus aureum. It is Cochlaeus’s Musica of 1507 that brings new life

to the Cologne school’s doctrine of closure. Prior to this edition, the Musica contained a

paraphrased (and often amplified) version of Schanppecher’s cadential doctrine, with the

significant addition of completed musical examples.82 The 1507 version represents a departure

from the prior two editions. First, the text provides much more information about itself: its final

page states the date and location of its publication, and a verse on the title page indicates that

the author is Cochlaeus. More significantly for cadential concerns, the 1507 text extends the

theory of musical closure to four voices.

This four-voice doctrine also takes the form of a list of lists, and they build directly upon

the three-voice propositions. Each of the first four consists of a stipulation of how a fourth

81 Niemöller, Nicolaus Wollick, 46.

82 This is certainly the case with the second edition of the Musica. I have not been able to consult
the first edition, but Ruth DeFord states that the second edition is an expanded version of the first
(DeFord, “Two Recently Identified Writings”). Based on this it seems safe to assume that the first edition
either has no cadential doctrine, or that it does not depart dramatically from the text of the second
edition.

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voice, called the altus, should be added to the corresponding three-voice example. Example 2.4

is a transcription of Cochlaeus’s four-voice example as it is found in both his 1507 Musica and

his Tetrachordum musices of 1511. (The only difference between the two is in the examples’

underlaid labels, indicated by “[Musica]” for the former, and “[Tm]” for the latter.) In each

progression, the top and lower two voices in the penultimate and final sonorities are identical to

those of the corresponding three-voice progression in Example 2.1 (with the exception of

progression hh, which here is transposed down a fourth and divested of its alternate resolutions

in the bassus voice). There are substantial discrepancies in the antepenultimate sonorities, and

neither Schanppecher nor Cochlaeus prescribes the disposition of antepenultimate notes. Even

though both authors are apparently convinced that cadences are necessarily composed of three

events, they do not seem to have come upon a satisfactory theory of how the antepenultimate

sonority should be constructed.

In each of these four rules, Cochlaeus, after adding the bass to the discant-tenor duo,

dictates the interval between the alto and the tenor or bass voice in the penultimate and final

Example 2.4 Four-voice clausulae from Cochlaeus, Musica (1507), f. F4v

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sonorities. The disposition of the altus voice differs from progression to progression, but in each

case there is a 5/3 or diminished 6/3 chord on the penult, and an open fifth or 5/3 chord at the

end of the progression. For instance, the third rule reads: “But if the tenor has the discant’s

formula (formula), such that the bass stands a third below the tenor on the penult while the

discant comes together on a unison with the tenor, then the alto will be able to place its penult a

third or a sixth above the tenor, and its final note a fifth above the tenor, as here: ([example]

kk).”83 The associated example, progression kk of Example 2.4, matches Cochlaeus’s

description, and also shows an additional resolution for the altus, namely, a third above the

tenor in the final sonority. The most likely explanation for this discrepancy is accidental

omission, since in Cochlaeus’s next published text, the Tetrachordum musices, the text

accompanying this same example explicitly acknowledges the possibility of the altus resolving a

tenth above the bassus.84 As for the text of the rule, the “if clause” of the rule precisely describes

the situation described in both Schanppecher’s and Wollick’s third three-voice rules, wherein

the tenor rises (using the discant’s formula) and the discant descends to meet it at the unison

(using the tenor’s formula). The concluding clause stipulates how to add a fourth voice to the

existing three voices.

In the final two rules the altus voice no longer functions as a contrapuntal voice added to

the three-voice framework. Here is the fifth rule in the 1507 Musica: “But when the tenor makes

83 “Quod si tenor. discantus formulam obtinuerit, ita quod bassus penultima terciam sub tenore
occupauerit, commeante discantu cum tenore in vnisonum. poterit tunc altus penultimam suam collocare
in tercia aut sexta supra tenorem. Ultimam vero in quinta supra eundem ut hic kk” (Cochlaeus, Musica
[1507], f. F4r).

84 Cochlaeus, Tetrachordum musices, f. F1r.

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a sixth or octave with the discant on the penult, but a sixth on the last note, then the bass will

place its penult a third below the tenor, joining with it at the fifth below on the final note. The

alto then very beautifully assumes the discant’s form (forma), occupying on the penult a sixth

against the bass and an augmented fourth (intensa quarta) against the tenor, and duly places its

final note an octave above the bass and a fourth above the tenor.”85 The altus has adopted the

discant’s melodic formula, just as the tenor did in the third and fourth progressions. Indeed,

this progression, mm in Example 2.4, is in large part a permutation of progression ll, in which

the tenor and alto have switched parts. This alteration demonstrates that the altus voice is not

merely an accessory, contrapuntal voice, but can adopt other voices’ melodic formulas, and

thereby partake in the melodic framework that defines the clausula. Nevertheless, the altus

voice does not appear to have acquired a distinct melodic identity in the minds of sixteenth

century theorists: in circumstances when the other voices’ characteristic melodic formulas are

recounted, the alto’s clausula is described as “arbitrary, since it proceeds by various motions.”86

It is not until the early seventeenth century, with Joachim Burmeister, that a theorist attributes

to the altus voice its own characteristic cadential formula, consisting of a repetition of the note a

fifth or twelfth above the bass’s final.87 It is striking that even a full century after authors of the

85“Atuero dum tenor cum discantu sextam vel octauam seruauerit in penultimam Sextam vero in
vltima. tunc bassus penultimam suam in tercia sub tenore constituet. in vltima cum eodem conueniendo
in quintam: altus vero perpulcre tunc discantus formam assumet. in penultima sextam ad bassum. et
quartam ad tenorem intensam obtinens. vltimam vero in octaua supra bassum atque in quarta supra
tenorem rite disponet” (ibid., f. F4r-v).

86 “Hujus clausula arbitraria est, eo quod variis incedat motibus . . .” (Beurheusius, Eratomatum,
II.5, p. 112). See also Galliculus, Isagoge, IX, f. C2r.

87 Burmeister, Musica poetica, V, p. 36.

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Cologne school allow the altus to resolve to the third above the bass, such a resolution still is not

conceived to be normative, even though it is conducive to producing triadic sonorities. The

precise nature of the relationship between the Cologne school’s doctrine and the generation of

triadic sonorities has been postponed thus far; it is now time to take up that subject.

2.5 Triadic Tonality and Cochlaeus’s Sixth Rule

The final rule from the 1507 Musica is unlike the previous ones. In this rule Cochlaeus

does not invoke language of forma or formula;88 indeed, the only voice to be associated with a

direction is the tenor, which resolves upwards (sursum) in this progression, in what is easily

recognized as the discant clausula, though Cochlaeus does not identify it as such. Instead, he

relates the disposition of the voices in a string of intervallic relations:

But if the discant makes a third with the tenor (which resolves upwards) on the penult,
and [then] does the same on the last note, then the contratenor gravis [i.e. the bassus] will
maintain under them a fifth against the discant and a third against the tenor on the
penult, and an octave against the latter and a tenth below the former on the final note.
The alto will be able to set its penult at the unison with the tenor [recte: discant] or at a
fourth above the discant. In like manner, it can raise its final note a third above the
discant, or at the unison with the tenor, or it can be at a fourth lowered below the tenor,
while keeping a fifth against the bass, as in: ([example] nn).89

88 Cochlaeus makes substantially more use of the terms forma and formula in his 1507 Musica than
does Schanppecher in the Opus aureum, which perhaps gives greater significance to its absence from the
sixth rule (see the Appendix).

89 “Quod si discantus cum tenore (sursum concludente) terciam constituerit in penultima. itidem
et in ultima. tunc contratenor grauis in penultima sub illis seruabit. ad discantum quidem quintam. ad
tenorem vero terciam. in vltima autem ad hunc octauam. ad illum vero decimam custodiet. Altus vero
poterit penultimam suam ordinare ad vnisonum cum tenore [recte: discantu] vel ad quartam supra
discantum Pariter et vltimam supra discantum in terciam eleuare potest aut in vnisono cum tenore vel
sub tenore ad quartam depressam. ad bassum tamen quintam custodientem. hoc modo nn” (Cochlaeus,
Musica [1507], f. F4v).

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Example 2.5a reproduces the transcription of Cochlaeus’s example of the sixth rule. Benito

Rivera has pointed out a discrepancy between the textual description of the altus part and the

musical example.90 I have adopted his emendation of the text, which has the advantage of

avoiding parallel unisons between the altus and tenor. The remainder of Example 2.5 realizes all

six possible configurations of the altus voice according to Cochlaeus’s text.91 Progression f,

however, would not have been countenanced as a valid realization due to its parallel octaves.

Why did Cochlaeus avoid mentioning the voices’ stereotyped melodic gestures? The

most likely reason is that the musical phenomena he was describing stray in some ways from

the voices’ characteristic lines. The bass voice moves in its accustomed fashion and the tenor

adopts the discant’s formula, resolving upwards. The discant voice should normally

reciprocate by resolving downwards, according to the tenor’s formula. Yet this never happens.

In Example 2.5c the altus adopt the tenor’s formula, and thus all three melodic figures are

Example 2.5 Cochlaeus’s Sixth Rule

90 Rivera, “Harmonic Theory,” 84.

91Rivera realizes only progressions c, e, and g. There is no indication of his grounds for omitting
progressions b and d (ibid.).

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present. In the remaining progressions, however, the discant does not articulate any traditional

melodic gesture: its penult is a fifth above the bassus, as is normal for the tenor’s formula, but

then it ascends by step to a tenth above the bassus, rather than descending to the octave above it.

In doing so, it omits the discant-tenor motion from a major sixth to octave (or minor third to

unison) that has defined every clausula thus far.

The sixth rule’s absence of the tenor’s complete characteristic formula, and the resultant

lack of contrary motion to the octave or unison, suggests that Cochlaeus’s clausula formalis is

governed by some principle other than the combination of formulaic melodic gestures. If one

glances at Cochlaeus’s example of the sixth rule in Example 2.5, it appears that both sonorities

contain complete triads. Could Cochlaeus have dispensed with the melodic stereotypes

because the discant-tenor framework’s resolution to an octave or unison makes it difficult to

create sonorities with thirds (or tenths) above the lowest voice, and that such sonorities were

more important to him than this conceptual framework? Benito Rivera has argued precisely

this point, and furthermore has claimed that this privileging of sonorities with thirds indicates

awareness of and preference for complete triads. If Rivera is correct, this would be highly

significant. It would mean that Cochlaeus recognized, on some level, triadic sonorities more

than a century before Lippius articulated the concept of the trias harmonica.92 This would also

link the earliest evidence of triadic thinking in the context of compositional precepts with the

earliest articulation of a polyphonic theory of musical closure, a connection which would make

the work of the Cologne school substantially more significant to the history of music theory

92 Lippius, Disputatio musica tertia, ff. B2r ff..

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than it is commonly held to be. This hypothesis will be carefully evaluated over the following

pages, first through evaluating Rivera’s argument, and then through inspecting the claim’s

validity in other treatises by the Cologne school.

It is in an article proposing the emergence of harmonic theory around the turn of the

sixteenth century that Benito Rivera argues for a triadic interpretation of Cochlaeus’s theory. In

his discussion of the sixth four-voice rule, and of its progressions that lack the tenor’s

characteristic melody, Rivera writes: “The explanation for such an ‘anomaly’ can only lie in the

composer’s apparent determination to achieve complete triadic sonorities at the expense of

‘proper’ intervallic progressions. The discant had to conclude on the third rather than on the

tonic, precisely in order to produce a complete triad. It would seem, therefore, that to the extent

that one could speak formerly of a theory of intervallic progression, one can now speak of a

quasi-embryonic theory of triadic progression.”93 The sixth rule certainly is anomalous: this is

emphasized even by the relatively superficial fact that it is the only one of Cochlaeus’s

progressions to have not three but two sonorities. Yet Rivera’s interpretation of the significance

of that “anomaly” is far from inevitable, and at least two significant objections to Rivera’s

argument exist. The first is that preferring sonorities with thirds and fifths above the bass is not

at all the same thing as conceptualizing those sonorities as triads. The second objection is that

Cochlaeus’s writings do not clearly support Rivera’s assertions that achieving full sonorities

(regardless of their conceptualization) had replaced the significance of the tenor-discant

framework. Each objection will be addressed in turn.

93 Rivera, “Harmonic Theory,” 84.

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 The first objection arises from Rivera’s assertion that the writings of the Cologne school,

among others, demonstrate the emergence of triadic thinking. Rivera asserts that “by the early

sixteenth century, a good number of treatises . . . reveal in their treatment of counterpoint the

advanced metamorphosis of the dyadic structure into something clearly triadic. Indeed several

treatises form this period imply not only a theoretical understanding of triadic construction,

but, in fact, also a triadic orientation to polyphonic composition.”94 It is certainly true that this

period of time saw a shifting of compositional style in which composers increasingly concluded

entire movements and pieces with 5/3 sonorities, rather than with open fifths and octaves, as in

previous centuries. Yet favoring a sonority that includes a third and a fifth above the lowest

note is not at all the same thing as conceptualizing that sonority as a pre-existing, structural unit

with an identity of its own. The latter conception did not arise until Lippius drew an analogy

between the 5/3 sonority and the trinity, yielding the phrase trias harmonica.95 In the sixteenth

century theorists still conceived of such sonorities as resulting from combinations of dyads, or

from the mediation of a large, structural dyad by an intervening note, as in the writings of

Gaffurius and Zarlino.96 Thus, it is clear that Rivera’s assertion of triadic thought is not

warranted.

94 Ibid., 81.

95 Lippius, Disputatio musica tertia, ff. B2rff..

96 David E. Cohen discusses the role of harmonic mediation in Gaffurio and Zarlino in more
detail and clarifies that, while it is an important predecessor of the concept of the triad, it is merely an
anticipation of it (“Ramos to Rameau: Toward the Origins of the Modern Concept of Harmony,” paper
presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Music Theory, New Orleans, Nov. 4, 2012).

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 There is, however, an important intermediate stage in this shift from dyads to triads that

can shed light on the Cologne school’s theory, and it relies upon the differentiation of imperfect

and perfect consonances. Since the dawn of western European polyphonic theorizing in the

ninth century CE, perfect consonances have been associated with musical propriety and unity,

whereas dissonances and imperfect consonances (a concept that arose several centuries later)

have been treated as if they were less suitable for inclusion in music.97 And indeed, for many

centuries thereafter only perfect consonances were found at the conclusions of pieces and their

component parts. From at least the time of Dufay, however, composers began to alter existing

polyphonic closing formulas by replacing the concluding perfect consonance with an imperfect

sonority. It is likely that this technique caused listeners to expect closure, but then disrupted the

fulfilment of that expectation by substituting the inconclusive imperfect sonority for the final

perfect consonance, similarly to how deceptive and evaded cadences function in music of the

common practice period. As this technique became more common, it appears that the mere

presence of an imperfect consonance in a given sonority gradually lost its disruptively

inconclusive character: over time the “full” sound of the 5/3 sonority in particular came to be a

desirable sound on its own merits. At that point composers began to employ that sonority at

the ends of pieces, in spite of its previous association with disruption and inconclusiveness. It is

an unfortunate fact that the relative paucity of dateable and localizable German compositions

from the late fifteenth century would make it rather difficult to assert with confidence at what

97 For one of the earliest accounts of the role of consonance in polyphonic theory, see Musica
enchiriadis, XVII, pp. 48-50. Concerning the metaphysical valuation of consonance and dissonance in this
treatise and in antiquity, see David E. Cohen, “Boethius and the Enchiriadis Theory: The Metaphysics of
Consonance and the Concept of Organum,” (Ph.D. diss., Brandeis University, 1993), especially 518-33.

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point this change in compositional practice occurred, and in what regions.98 If future

scholarship is able to come to such conclusions, however, it would be a significant boon to our

abilities to interpret the significance of imperfect sonorities for individual composers and

theorists.

This narrative suggests that the older the music, the more unlikely it would be for a

resolution to an imperfect sonority to suggest closure in the day of its composition. Yet as we

have seen in Schanppecher’s discussion of the clausulae formales, the Cologne school’s earliest

account of polyphonic closure mixes together resolutions to imperfect and perfect sonorities,

with no apparent attempt to distinguish between their effects. There is, however, one passage

in which Cochlaeus distinguishes the two. In his discussion of the first three-voice rule (in

which the discant and tenor move normatively to the octave—see the first measure of Example

2.1) in the Musica, he allows the bass to rise by step, from a fifth below the tenor to a third.

Concerning this progression, Cochlaeus writes: “It cannot, however, be conducted this way at

the end of the entire song. For one ought to bestow perfection not to beginnings, but to

endings.”99 This stipulation makes clear that Cochlaeus considers such a progression to lack

perfection in some respect, but he does not offer further detail. The most obvious possibility is

that the presence of an imperfect consonance in the final sonority renders it inappropriate for

98 The earliest composition (not specific to Germany) to end on a sonority which includes a third
above the lowest note that I have found is by Dufay, placing the origin of the technique at November
1474 at the latest. This is not to say, of course, that Dufay was the first one to use the technique, nor to say
that the technique had necessarily achieved broad acceptance across all geographical regions and musical
genres by 1500 (Guillaume Dufay, “O Proles Yspanie/O Sidus Yspanie,” Opera omnia vol. 1, 14-19).

99 “Hoc modo tamen in fine totius cantilene deduci non poterit: Namque perfectionem non
principiis sed terminationibus attribuere oportet” (Cochlaeus, Musica [ca. 1505], f. C5r; Musica [1507], f.
F3v).

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ending a piece. Yet it is also possible that the bass’s unconventional ascent by step is what

makes this progression defective; if that is the case, then a 5/3 sonority could still end a piece.

Unfortunately, Cochlaeus’s text does not offer any other clues to help adjudicate the matter, and

no other early text by the Cologne school addresses the matter.

The fact that the theorists of the Cologne school did not comment definitively on the

effects of cadential progressions which end on imperfect sonorities at a period in which such

progressions had recently been perceived as defective could suggest that the imperfect

sonorities already sounded perfectly stable and even preferable, as in Rivera’s hypothesis.

Alternately, it could suggest instead that the authors of the Cologne school may have simply

lacked the language to conceptualize the effect of disrupted cadential progressions of this

kind.100 Even though Cochlaeus intuited that not all such progressions functioned identically,

and that some clausulae were not suited for the ends of compositions, the language and

terminology developed by the Cologne school was only really able to describe how such

clausulae should be constructed with respect to their constituent intervals, and could not easily

specify where in the course of a composition individual clausula forms should be utilized.

From the preceding discussion of the difference between the conception of the triad and

preference for imperfect sonorities, it is clear that Rivera’s hypothesis of triadic awareness

cannot stand. Yet his specific claim that early sixteenth-century writings, including those of the

Cologne school, demonstrate a preference for triadic sonorities could easily be rephrased to

avoid that problem. Even though those theorists did not conceptualize the triad as such, it is

100 Indeed, it was not until the 1560s, however, that German authors developed a terminology
with which to distinguish between cadential progressions of greater and lesser closure (Dressler,
Praecepta musicae poeticae, VIII, p. 138-9, 146-51).

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worthwhile considering the extent to which they privileged sonorities which include imperfect

consonances, both 5/3 sonorities and simple octaves-plus-thirds, in place of the older

convention of perfect consonances at endings. It is to this topic that we now turn.

An initial examination of Examples 2.1 and 2.4 makes it clear that “the composer,” by

which Rivera presumably means Cochlaeus, was not at all determined to create complete 5/3

sonorities in any of the three-voice progressions, nor in the first three four-voice ones. Many of

these progressions end with open fifths, and some in bare octaves. Furthermore, one of the

possible progressions described by the sixth rule, Example 2.5c, lacks a fifth in its final sonority;

while a chord with a third but no fifth lends the effect of imperfect consonance to a sonority, it

does not suggest that the complete 5/3 sonority was highly important. Thus, the desire for

complete 5/3 sonorities is certainly not characteristic of the operating procedure of “the

composer” in general.

Indeed, of the ten examples of three- and four-voice cadential progressions that

Cochlaeus gives in his 1507 Musica (see Examples 2.1 and 2.4), only one of them is amenable to

Rivera’s interpretation, namely, the four-voice progression of the “anomalous” sixth rule. Since

a reading of Cochlaeus’s text that seeks evidence of 5/3 sonorities relies so heavily upon this

final rule, it is worthwhile to consider how later texts in the Cologne school treat that kind of

progression. The first text after the 1507 Musica to discuss closure in a significant way is

Cochlaeus’s Tetrachordum musices, first published in 1511.101 This treatise varies substantially

from the Musica texts: Cochlaeus added to and subtracted from the material of the 1507 Musica

101As previously mentioned, the clausula doctrine in Wollick’s Enchiridion of 1509 consists merely
of a rephrased version of Schanppecher’s text in the Opus aureum, and offers nothing new to this study.

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to create the Tetrachordum, and recast much of the retained theoretic content. On a large,

structural level, the Tetrachordum does not include Cochlaeus’s semi-independent booklets on

plainchant (cantus choralis) and rhythm and its notation (cantus figurabilis) that were bound with

many copies of the 1507 Musica.102 The Tetrachordum’s discussion of counterpoint also omits

many topics covered in the Musica.103 The new material that Cochlaeus adds to the Tetrachordum

is generally more apt to so-called “speculative” theory (musica speculativa or theorica), covering

topics like historical instruments (such as the kithara), the Davidic psalms, and songs written in

ancient Greek metrical schemes.104 The most plausible reason for exchanging practice-oriented

contrapuntal topics for speculativa material such as this is that Cochlaeus used the Tetrachordum

to rework his ideas to appeal to students who were interested in music as a component of a

formal, university or pre-university education; in this reading, the Musica’s greater emphasis on

practical matters suggest that Cochlaeus wrote it with composers and other practitioners of

music in mind.105 Cochlaeus’s adaptation of the Musica text also extended to the rearrangement

of the order of some chapters, the addition of new prefatory material for each book of the

treatise, and the recasting of the Musica’s propositional style into a more catechetic form.

102 For more on these two works, see DeFord, “Two Recently Identified Writings.”

103Folios E1r-F3v of the 1507 Musica are mostly absent in the Tetrachordum, with the notable
exception of the list of fourteen rules of counterpoint, which is present in nearly identical form in both
texts (Musica, ff.E4r-F1r; Tetrachordum, f.E6r-v).

104 Cochlaeus, Tetrachordum, ff. A5v-B1v, F2v-4r.

105This hypothesis is supported by the fact that the Tetrachordum musices does not include
Cochlaeus’s discussion of the bass’s stepwise, ascending resolution in the Musica’s first three-voice rule
(see the Appendix).

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 Each of these alterations suggests that Cochlaeus was concerned with improving the

pedagogical experience of his music theory. This impression holds in his treatment of closure.

The Tetrachordum uses the same musical examples of clausulae formales as the 1507 Musica (such

recycling of examples was very common in the Cologne school), yet its discussion of these

progressions is entirely distinct. To begin with, the Tetrachordum borrows very few phrases

from the Musica: even though the former text describes the largely the same theoretic substance

as the latter one, it does so with wording that is both appreciably different and generally more

concise. More significantly, of the 10 cadential rules described in the 1507 Musica, only three

align perfectly with those of the Tetrachordum. For example, here is the fourth of the four-voice

rules in the 1507 Musica (cf. Example 2.4kk): “But if the discant and the tenor, [the latter] vested

with the discant’s formula, make a third with each other on the final note and a fifth on the

penult, then the low contratenor will place its penult a sixth below the tenor, with its final note

coming together with the tenor at the octave. But the high contratenor can hold a third or an

octave above the bass on the penult, and a fifth above the bass on the final note, as in: (ll).”106

In the Tetrachordum musices Cochlaeus rephrases and condenses the rule, and also removes one

of the optional altus notes: “In the fourth close the alto, [being an augmented fourth] below the

tenor, will ascend with it into a fourth, but will make a third against the bass on the penult and

106“Si vero discantus et tenor (forma discantus indutus) terciam adinuicem in vltima seruauerint.
et in penultima quintam tunc contratenor grauis penultimam suam in sexta sub tenore disponet
conueniente vltima eius in octauam cum tenore Contratenor vero acutus poterit in penultima terciam aut
octauam supra bassum occupare. obtinendo quintam supra bassum in vltima: hoc modo ll” (Cochlaeus,
Musica [1507], f. F4r).

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a fifth on the final note.”107 In the former account the altus voice can be either a fourth below or

a third above the tenor on the penult, while the latter permits it to be only the fourth below.

Cochlaeus’s musical example, which is the same in both texts (with the exception of the labels of

the example’s sections) shows alto notes on both D and G, which suggests that the text of the

Tetrachordum might be omitting this part of the description accidentally. The preceding rule

supports the hypothesis that Cochlaeus was being unsystematic: here the Tetrachordum’s version

matches the example, whereas the Musica overlooks one of its possible resolutions. There does

not appear to be any consistent pattern to such discrepancies between the two texts: some

alterations add additional possibilities, while others remove them; some changes fit the musical

examples better, others worse.

The sixth four-voice rule from the Musica, however, is different. Discussion of this

progression, upon which Rivera’s argument relies, is entirely absent in the Tetrachordum musices.

Furthermore, Cochlaeus changes the underlaid labels of the four-voice musical example:

whereas the final two progressions are labeled “mm” and “nn” in the Musica, the Tetrachordum

stretches the words “[Example] of the fifth rule” (quinte regule), under both progressions, in

spite of the fact that its discussion of the fifth rule does not touch upon the final progression at

all. What could the significance of this omission be? A possible, though scarcely convincing

explanation appeals to a desire for brevity: since Cochlaeus discusses clausulae formales, and

counterpoint in general, more concisely in the Tetrachordum than the Musica, perhaps he omitted

107 “In quarta clausula. Altus sub tenore / cum ipso in quartam simul ascendet / Ad Bassum vero
seruabit terciam in penultima / quintam vero in vltima” (Cochlaeus, Tetrachordum, f. F1r).

117
the final rule because he felt it was too long. Yet Cochlaeus does include a version of every

other rule from the Musica, so that hypothesis is suspect.

A more plausible explanation for the omission of the sixth rule looks to precisely those

features that distinguish it in Rivera’s view. As noted, the Cologne school’s conceptual

apparatus of stereotyped melodic gestures does not easily accommodate the sixth rule’s

progression, with its lack of contrary motion to an octave or unison. This characteristic, which

supports Rivera’s hypothesis of the significance of 5/3 sonorities, may be the reason why

Cochlaeus suppresses it in the Tetrachordum. Many of the features that distinguish the Musica

from the Tetrachordum, such as its emphasis on counterpoint, the more verbose treatment of

closes, and the presence of the sixth rule, suggest a practice-directed orientation that could

support discussion of a progression that occurs in actual music but is theoretically awkward,

whether due to its lack of explanatory voice-formulas or due to the presence of an imperfect

consonance in its final sonority. When Cochlaeus revised the Musica to produce the

Tetrachordum musices, which is somewhat more speculative and streamlined in nature, he may

have decided that the sixth rule’s nonconformance to the principles of clausulae was

inappropriate for his pedagogical aims in the Tetrachordum.

There is a counter-argument to the argument that the sixth rule is entirely aberrational,

however. In his article, Rivera provides a second example of a theorist proposing a rule

wherein the progression has no contrary motion to an octave or unison. Rivera’s source is the

Compendiaria musice (1516) of Michael Koswick; the rule in question is as follows: “Third rule. If

the tenor should take the formula of the discant, the discant can be placed a third above it [at

the penult], and from there it may end on a unison or on a third above the tenor. On the other

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hand, the bass must cadence from a third beneath the tenor to an octave below.”108 Rivera

appears not to have observed that Koswick copied his discussion of clausulae verbatim from the

Tetrachordum’s section on three-voice closes. This third rule exhibits one of the discrepancies

between the Musica and the Tetrachordum. The text of the Musica, its musical example (see

Example 2.1), and the text of the Opus aureum all declare that this progression’s discant

concludes at the unison with the tenor, and only there. In the Tetrachordum Cochlaeus allows it

to end a third above the tenor, which would result in those two voices eschewing contrary

motion to a unison in favor of an ascent by parallel thirds. This alternate resolution supports

the reading that 5/3 sonorities were favored (either for their deceptive effect or because they had

become the preferred sonority for conclusions), and works against the streamlined,

pedagogically simplified view of the Tetrachordum musices proposed above. Yet, as mentioned

earlier, the Tetrachordum’s adaptations of the Musica’s clausula resolutions do not in the least

demonstrate a systematic effort “to achieve complete triadic [or 5/3] sonorities at the expense of

‘proper’ intervallic progressions,”109 a fact which the suppression of the Musica’s sixth rule only

supports. Thus, although the text of Cochlaeus’s Tetrachordum does offer one alternate

resolution that works against the Cologne school’s emphasis on characteristic melodic gestures

which move in contrary motion to the unison or octave, the text on the whole fits the school’s

conventions better than Cochlaeus’s earlier Musica. Consequently, Rivera’s claim that

“Cochlaeus’ description of several four-voiced cadences marks even more clearly the collapse of

“Tertia regula. Si tenor discantus formam assumpserit: discantus potest supra ipsum in tertia
108

disponi/ex qua in unisonum/aut in tertiam supra tenorem finietur. Bassus vero in tertia sub tenore/in
octavam deorsum claudatur” (Koswick, Compendiaria, f. L5v; trans. by Rivera, “Harmonic Theory,” 83).

109 Rivera, “Harmonic Theory,” 84.

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the dyadic structure in favor of a triadic sonority” is not an accurate assessment of Cochlaeus’s

Tetrachordum musices, and is a questionable claim to make even of the 1507 Musica alone.

Furthermore, this alleged favoring of complete 5/3 sonorities over dyadic progressions is

entirely absent in later treatises which show the influence of the Cologne school. For example,

the Musice active micrologus (1517) of Andreas Ornithoparchus contains the usual discussion of

the four vocal parts and characteristic voice motions.110 Ornithoparchus, however, shows no

signs of trying to adapt the theory to produce complete 5/3 chords. Similarly, Johannes

Galliculus’s Isagoge de compositione cantus (1520) operates within the same four-voice framework

and invokes the same stereotyped melodic gestures as does Ornithoparchus. His main

cadential innovation is an additional way of closing (alius modi claudendi) on mi: “There is also

another manner of closing [on mi], when, namely, the tenor and cantus move from a sixth to the

equisonant octave, and then the penultimate note of the baritonans, having been led from a

third below to a third above the tenor, concords as sweetly and smoothly as possible. And

against [that], the high tenor, having been lead from a third [above] the tenor to a fifth,

produces a good harmony whose value (negocium) is apparent.”111 Example 2.6 presents a

transcription of his example of this technique.112 The cadential type in question does not occur

at the end of the example, as one might expect, but rather in measures 4-5. This suggests that

110 Ornithoparchus, Musice active micrologus, IV.5, ff. L3r-M1r.

111 Galliculus, Isagoge, IX, f. C3r-v.

112The tenor of Galliculus’s example contains one more measure than the other three voices. I
have adopted Arthur Moorefield’s emendation, since it aligns the parts to produce the cadence on mi that
Galliculus describes (Gesamtausgabe der Werke der Johannes Galliculus, vol. 4, ed. Arthur A. Moorefield
[Ottawa: Institute of Mediaeval Music, 1992], 24-5). The disposition of the tenor and tenor acutus parts is
Galliculus’s.

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Galliculus may have felt that this type of clausula failed to provide complete closure, but he

offers no further information with which to support or refute this possibility. As for the close

itself, it produces a complete 5/3 sonority, but not in a way that clearly indicates “the collapse of

the dyadic structure”: the discant and tenor voices still exhibit their characteristic motions,

expanding from a sixth to the octave, and the alto (or high tenor, as Galliculus calls it) moves

freely to sound the fifth of the final proto-triad. The bass (baritonans) voice is the only one that

varies. Curiously, Galliculus has it retain its characteristic rising fourth, but transposed so that

the final note is a third above the triad, thus, in effect, completing the triad. Taken as a whole,

Galliculus’s theory of closure sometimes, but not always, yields complete 5/3 chords, and it

hews closely to the stereotyped melodic formulas. Thus, it does not fit Rivera’s description of a

theory that eschews traditional dyadic resolutions in favor of triads.

Rivera’s hypothesis that the theory of the Cologne school provides evidence of the

formation of triadic awareness is certainly attractive. Not only does that theory coincide

temporally with the development of the style of vocal polyphony that we think of as

characteristic of “the Renaissance,” but it also characterizes closure as a phenomenon of three or

Example 2.6 Additional type of mi cadence from Galliculus, Isagoge, f. C3v

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even four voices, in contrast to the previous dyadic conception—which, however, it preserves

even while moving beyond it in regard to the number of voices involved. Yet, as we have seen,

there was no conception of the “triad” as a structural unit in the sixteenth century, and

furthermore, careful consideration of the Cologne school’s complex textual tradition casts

serious doubt on the weaker claim that its authors privileged complete 5/3 sonorities. The

theoretical apparatus of Schanppecher, Cochlaeus, and writers for many generations afterwards

insisted on describing clausula as a complex of melodic gestures that by default yield open fifths

or even bare octaves.113 While exceptions to this rule do exist, exceptions of which Rivera makes

much, it took many generations for authors to refashion this theory into a truly triad-oriented

one.

2.6 Cadential Doctrine and Compositional Practice

The theory of clausula developed by the Cologne school is unmistakably practical in

orientation. There are no ontological speculations about the nature of closure, or even a clear

explanation of what the compound term clausula formalis means.114 The emphasis is entirely on

the contrapuntal options available to the aspiring composer. This didactic disposition leads

naturally to the question of whether composers followed the advice of the Cologne school, or,

113While many accounts from Dressler onwards define the altus as able to come to rest either at
the unison with the tenor or a third above it, perhaps the earliest German author to demonstrate an
unambiguous desire for all final chords to have complete 5/3 sonorities is Conradus Matthaei (1652), who
describes the altus as functioning to fill out the harmony (“. . . die Alt-Clausul explementalis, darumb daß
sie den Gesang ausfüllet genennet werden” [Matthaei, Kurtzer Bericht, I, p. 3]).

Though, as we have seen, Ornithoparchus and others do provide a definition of “clausula”

114

borrowed in part from Tinctoris (see above, n. 9).

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more plausibly, how closely the theorists of the Cologne school modeled their precepts upon

what early sixteenth-century composers in northern Europe were already doing in their

compositions, be they sacred or secular. A thorough, systematic study of compositional

techniques at the turn of the sixteenth century that attends to the chronological development of

styles of closure in geographically specific areas would be necessary to identify the particular

configuration of cadential conventions to which the Cologne theorists were responding, and

thereby to interpret with confidence the significance of closes that come to rest on imperfect

sonorities. Such a wide-ranging study, however, is beyond the scope of this chapter;

furthermore, the frequent dovetailing of melodic lines in repertoire of and influenced by the

Franco-Flemish style adds considerably to the challenge of investigating cadential progressions

that do not end movements. As a result, the following considerations of cadence in

compositions will be limited to two somewhat homophonic pieces, both of which have German

connections. The first, a piece for lute which has three distinct melodic lines, will be compared

with the three-voice cadential rules of the Opus aureum, while the second work, in four voices,

will be compared with the four-voice rules of Cochlaeus’s Musica.

Before turning to these compositions, however, we should address again the question of

whether the Cologne school’s concept of the clausula formalis can be equated with today’s

concept of the cadence. (For even though, as we will see, the Cologne school initiated a new

period of cadential theorizing, that does not mean that they shared our modern understanding

of the cadence.) By now it is clear that Schanppecher and his colleagues describe how clausulae

are formed, and that some these progressions are identical in material features to the perfect

authentic cadence (PAC) of today’s theory, whereas others include inverted sonorities (such as

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such the fourth progressions of Examples 2.1 and 2.4) that many modern theorists would not

consider the progressions to be properly cadential at all. Scholars including Karol Berger

assume that the term clausula from Tinctoris onward is identical to the modern cadence: “Thus

Tinctoris’s understanding of the term ‘cadence’ [clausula] is no different from ours: it is a device

signifying closure of the whole musical discourse or of its part.”115 Yet, other than their choice

of the term clausula, meaning “close,” and with its Tinctorian resonances of “the end of a little

part of a song,” the theorists of the Cologne school are for the most part strikingly reticent

concerning the issue of where a composer should (and should not) place clausulas in the course

of a composition.116 In this respect they furnish a striking contrast to the theory of John of

Affligem, who, as we have seen, draws heavily upon grammatico-rhetorical ideas of where

musical closure occurs, but offers only the barest description of how musical closure is effected.

Indeed, the Cologne theorists restrict their discussion of specific parts of pieces to the endings of

entire songs, and even that commentary is minimal: Schanppecher indicates that a clausula

formalis should come at the end of every song, and Cochlaeus states that a piece should not end

with a progression in which the bass rises by step.117 From this we can extrapolate that some

progressions identified as clausulae formales are capable of concluding a piece, while others are

not. Yet it remains unclear whether we ought to understand a clausula formalis to occur every

115 Berger, Musica Ficta, 129.

116 Ornithoparchus advises students to “place formal closes in their songs as often as possible”
(“vt in cantilenis suis formales clausulas quam sepissime ponant” [Musice active micrologus, IV.5, f. L4r]),
but this scarcely seems like the most musically nuanced of advice.

117 Wollick, Opus aureum, IV.6, f. H4v; Cochlaeus, Musica [ca. 1505], f. C5r; Musica [1507], f. F3v.

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time the proper combination of intervals occurs, or only at major sectional divisions, or

somewhere in between those two options.

The following analyses pay attention to each progression that could conceivably qualify

as a clausula formalis in order to evaluate whether it seems musically sensible to understand

formal closes as occurring wherever the appropriate sonorities exist. In doing so I will often

invoke my own sense of where I hear “cadences,” understood as progressions combining

stereotyped ending formulas and the formal function of closure, to occur. While it is true that

involving my own musical sensibility in these considerations removes any chance of attaining a

“pure” comprehension of the Cologne school’s understanding of the clausula formalis, it is

highly unlikely that such a pure, unmediated comprehension is even a possibility. Given the

unavoidable reality of the interpreter’s presence, it seems defensible to bring both historical and

musical interpretation to bear on the theories of the Cologne school.

The first piece, transcribed in Example 2.7, is a composition for solo instrument and lute

by Arnolt Schlick (ca. 1460-after 1521), a widely traveled German organist and composer who

likely originally came from the area around Heidelberg.118 It comes from the collection

Tabulaturen etlicher Lobgesang und Lidlein uff die Orgeln und Lauten, which was published in

Mainz in 1512. I will begin by considering the first progression that matches Schanppecher’s

descriptions of cadential possibilities. The first of these occurs in measure 8, where a D5/3

sonority moves to three Gs. While this progression exactly matches Schanppecher’s first rule, it

seems unlikely that it would have been considered a clausula formalis. From a modern

118Hans Joachim Marx, "Schlick, Arnolt," Grove Music Online, Oxford Music Online, Oxford
University Press, accessed January 23, 2013,
http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/24903.

125
perspective, the fact that it resolves on a weak beat and also occurs so quickly after a grand

pause suggests that this progression does not actually close off a section of music; although

such analytic language would obviously have been foreign to Schanppecher, his connection of

the clausula formalis to the action of closing (clausulari) suggests that he may have considered

this progression to be something other than a proper close.

The cadential progressions in measures 18-9 and 20-1 present clearer examples of the

first rule. Both resolve on strong beats, and both feature the discant’s conventional syncopation

(7-6 against the tenor, 4-3 against the bass), which was prevalent in cadences of the time, and

Example 2.7 Schlick, “Mein Lieb ist weg”119

Arnolt Schlick, “Mein Lieb ist weg,” in Tabulaturen etlicher Lobgesang und Lidlein uff die Orgeln
119

und Lauten (Mainz: P. Schöffer, 1512); ed. Gottlieb Harms (Klecken: Ugrino, 1924), 45.

126
which the authors of the Cologne school never addressed. The second of these two closes

resolves as we might expect: all the voices move to the pitch-class G and hold that note for half

of the next measure. The first cadential progression, however, resolves differently. Its bass

resolves up by step; this is one of Cochlaeus’s alternate resolutions in the first three-voice rule,

and it is the one that he indicates should not finish pieces, due to its imperfection.120 Thus, it

seems likely that this progression signaled the deferral of complete closure to its listeners, or at

least to Cochlaeus. Furthermore, the solo part immediately moves away from its note of

resolution, and the accompanying lines soon follow. Although this creates a substantially

different effect from the cadence two measures later, the Cologne school had not yet developed

a conceptual apparatus further to characterize this phenomenon, which modern theory would

label as an evaded cadence.

The role of the progression in measures 5-6 is less clear. The progression has potential to

effect closure, in that it both ends on a long note that lands on a strong beat, and also is followed

by a rest. The downward-resolving lowest voice suggests Schanppecher’s fourth rule, in which

“the bass closes from a sixth with the tenor to an octave,” and yet the tenor does not have those

intervals above the bass; nor does the discant match the fourth rule’s stipulations. The

progression of major third to perfect fifth in the bass and tenor is traditionally understood as a

contrapuntal cadence formula, but the authors of the Cologne school do not draw an explicit

connection between this dyadic progression and the clausula formalis.121 Thus, this is either a

120 Cochlaeus, Musica (ca. 1505), f. C5r; Musica (1507), f. F3v.

121 The third of Schanppecher’s contrapuntal rules does state that, among other progressions, the
major third ought to seek the perfect fifth (Opus aureum, IV.4, f. H3r), but this progression does not feature
further in the Opus aureum.

127
clausula formalis that departs entirely from the Cologne school’s dictates, or is not a clausula at

all. While there is no way to adjudicate definitively between these two possibilities, it is worth

considering the triadic status of this progression: unlike every other cadence in this piece, the

final sonority of this putative clausula is a full triad, rather than open fifths or octaves. This fact

suggests that this piece was composed in a style in which cadential progressions were required

to come to rest on perfect sonorities; consequently, triadic sonorities would not function as

concluding entities, and this progression would not be a clausula formalis. Furthermore, the

discant syncopation so characteristic of musical practice of the time, and which is present in

many of the piece’s other clausulae, is entirely absent from mm. 5 and 6. None of these factors

can render a definitive analysis, of course, but together they do suggest that this progression

would not be considered a clausula formalis.

The piece concludes with the cadential progression of mm. 25-6 (a progression which

also occurs in mm. 13-4). This cadence exemplifies Schanppecher’s closure “on mi” from his

second rule: the tenor-discant framework resolves from an F-D sixth to an E-E octave, with the

bass moving from a third to a fifth below the tenor. While the theory of the Opus aureum

suggests that this type of close is entirely conventional, it is, in fact, less frequently encountered

as a final cadence in contemporaneous repertoire.122 By this time the “perfect cadence”-like

progression of the first rule, in which the lowest voice rises a fourth or falls a fifth, had already

become established as the highly preferred, but not sole, means of concluding a piece.

122 For instance, of the 29 pieces in the Tabulaturen, this is the only one to end with such a cadence.

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 This analysis of the potential clausulae formales in Schlick’s “Mein Lieb” allows us to

formulate a hypothesis about the role of the clausula formalis. According to this reading there

are only three fully functional clausulae in the piece: at measures 13-4, 20-1, and 25-6.

Furthermore, even though measures 1-6 are demarcated by a rest in all voices, the progression

ending them does not qualify as a proper formal close. From this we can extrapolate that

Schlick may have reserved proper clausulae formales for the ends of long stretches of music, and

thus he may have understood them to have functioned syntactically, effecting the closure of

musical sections.

Before moving on, it is also worth mentioning the strikingly Phrygian characteristics of

this melody. The solo line has an ambitus of C4 to D5, closes on an E, and prominently

articulates the C above that E several times throughout the course of the piece; all these features

fit the Phrygian mode well. Furthermore, there is a close correspondence between the melody’s

cadential notes and those notes identified as characteristic of the Phrygian mode by theorists of

later generations. In the early 1560s Gallus Dressler describes the Phrygian mode’s cadential

notes as follows: “[The Phrygian mode] usually ends on the note E; it therefore receives

principal closes on E mi, B mi, [and] C fa, and less principal closes on G sol [and] A re.”123 This

melody, of course, concludes on E, and the notes upon which it closes with the syncopated

discant formula are the principal close notes E (m. 14) and C (m. 10), and the less principal close

notes A (m. 19), and G (m. 21). Even though this theoretic description is forty years older than

the composition, the degree to which the two align is remarkable, and suggests that

“Regulariter exit in clave E, igitur principales recipit clausulas mi in clave E, mi in B, fa in clave

123

C. Minus principales sol in clave G, re in clave A” (Dressler, Praecepta musicae poeticae, IX, pp. 156-7). For
more on Dressler’s cadential terminology, see chapter 3, section 1 of this dissertation.

129
compositional conventions for Phrygian-mode music may have been fairly stable in the mid-

sixteenth century.

The second piece, “I[nn]sbruck, ich muss dich lassen,” is by Heinrich Isaac (ca. 1450-

1517) (see Example 2.8). It is a four-voice, strophic song with German lyrics (only the first

verse’s lyrics are reproduced here), that was composed sometime between the early 1480s and

Example 2.8 Isaac, “I[nn]sbruck, ich muss dich lassen”124

Heinrich Isaac, “I[nn]sbruck, ich muss dich lassen,” in Weltliche Werke, ed. Johannes Wolf
124

(Wien: Artaria & Co. and Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel, 1907), no. 12, p. 15.

130
1515.125 Compared to “Mein Lieb ist weg,” this song’s features suggest a later date of

composition: for one, the unusual, modally motivated cadences of “Mein Lieb” are no longer

present; for another, in “Innsbruck” cadential progressions often come to rest on sonorities

containing thirds and fifths above the bass, unlike the concluding open fifths and octaves found

in Schlick’s composition. The first cadence of the piece occurs in measures 3-4. This

progression, which occurs in identical form in measures 11-2, follows the dictates of Cochlaeus’s

fifth rule: although Cochlaeus’s illustration (Example 2.4) shows the discant resolving up by

step to the note a tenth above the bass, his verbal description allows for the downwards

resolution shown here.126 The next cadential progression, in measures 6-7 and 14-15, is an even

closer match: it precisely fits Cochlaeus’s description of the fourth four-voice rule, and Isaac’s

progression is even at the same pitch level as Cochlaeus’s musical illustration (see Example 2.4).

The remaining cadential progressions all feature descending fifths in the lowest voice:

the first occurs in measures 8-9; the second is at measures 18-9 and 22-3. Both progressions

align with Cochlaeus’s first rule, and in both cases one voice, this time the alto, matches

Cochlaeus’s verbal description and not the musical example, in that it leaps down by a third to

125Isaac worked in and then periodically returned to Innsbruck from the 1480s through 1515
(Reinhard Strohm and Emma Kempson, “Isaac, Henricus,” Grove Music Online, Oxford Music Online,
Oxford University Press, accessed January 23, 2013,
http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/51790), so biographical details are not
helpful for establishing a likely date of composition.

126 “But when the tenor shall make a sixth or an octave with the discant on the penult, but a sixth
on the last note [Atuero dum tenor cum discantu sextam uel octauam seruauerit in penultiam {sic}, Sexta
vero in vltima]” (Cochlaeus, Musica [1507], f. F4r-v).

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resolve to the note a third above the tenor.127 As for the first progression, measures 8-9,

although it fulfills all of Cochlaeus’s contrapuntal requirements, it is another situation where

one cannot be sure that it would have been considered a clausula formalis. Two significant

matters to consider are the length of the unit it concludes, and the formal location of that unit.

With the exception of measures 8-9, every formal unit in the piece that is demarcated by rests is

three or four measures long. Measures 8-9 articulate only three chords before the antepenultima

of the putative clausula formalis arrives. Furthermore, this two-measure unit occurs immediately

between the larger unit of measures 1-7 and that unit’s near-exact repetition in measures 10-15.

As such, to my ears it sounds more like an appendix to the end of the phrase, rather than a

distinct phrase with a substantial cadence of its own.

This progression offers a useful contrast to measures 5-6 in “Mein Lieb ist weg.” In that

piece the initial six measures are set off by rests in all voices, and they sound like a fairly self-

sufficient unit. Yet due to the lack of a proper clausula progression at their end, we understood

these measures as lacking closure. In contradistinction to this, the progression in measures 8-9

of “Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen” fulfills all the intervallic requirements of a clausula formalis,

yet does not conclude a significant span of music. If the authors of the Cologne school would

have identified such a progression as a formal close, it would suggest that they considered the

clausula formalis to be defined by its “material,” contrapuntal aspects, rather than by its potential

function of concluding phrases. If, on the contrary, they considered a concluding function to be

essential to the clausula formalis, then they would have been unlikely to consider the progression

127 “[The added voice’s] final note can be located a third or a fifth above the tenor [At eius vltima
poterit in tercia seu in quinta supra tenorem collocari]” (ibid., f. F4 r).

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of mm. 8-9 to be a formal close. My personal inclination when evaluating potential clausulae in

music of this period is to approach progressions on a case-by-case basis, rather than holding

that all progressions of a certain type are necessarily cadential. I also draw inspiration from

Cochlaeus’s aforementioned comment that a formal close in which the bass ascends by step

should not be used at the end of a song.128 From this I extrapolate that there could be two

differing kinds of clausula formalis function in music of that period: a weaker class, which

embraces all (or at least the majority) of progressions that meet the contrapuntal criteria, and a

stronger class, which includes only those progressions that are capable of concluding major

sections or entire compositions in a given body of repertoire. This hypothesis admittedly

represents a reformulation of Cochlaeus’s thought, but it also leads to a listening strategy that is

sensitive both to the marked sound that any clausula formalis progression may have had for

listeners in the early sixteenth century, and also to the possibility that composers may have

relied on specific formulations of the clausula formalis when they wanted to conclude significant

spans of music.

Thus far we have considered the contrapuntal progressions in “Innsbruck, ich muss dich

lassen” to see how they align with the Cologne school’s cadential doctrine. Since the Cologne

authors, in contrast to John of Affligem, say nothing about the relationship between textual

structure and musical phenomena, considering the song’s text-music relations cannot give

dependable insight into our authors’ understanding of how the clausulae formales work.

Nonetheless, since Isaac’s piece is texted, let us briefly consider how the textual structure can

128 Cochlaeus, Musica (ca. 1505), f. C5r; Musica (1507), f. F3v.

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inform our own, modern understanding of the song’s cadential functioning, without making

claims about the Cologne school’s ideas. The text’s three strophes each map their clauses onto

the verse structure in substantially the same way, so our consideration of the first verse’s

organization applies to the remaining verses as well. The verse itself is made of six lines, the

last of which Isaac repeats in his setting:

Innsbruck, ich muß dich laßen, Innsbruck, I must leave you,

ich far dohin mein straßen, I am travelling my roads
in fremde land dohin. to a foreign land.
Mein Freud ist mir genomen, I am deprived of my joy,
die ich nit weiß bekummen, which I do not know how to regain,
wo ich im elend bin. where I am, in misery.

Perhaps the most interesting issue raised by considering the text is the progression in mm. 8-9,

which set the end of the text’s third line. From a strictly contrapuntal perspective this

progression is a clausula formalis, though, as we noted, it comes so quickly after the cadence in

mm. 6-7 that it may sound more like an appendix. From a textual perspective, however, it

completes a thought left hanging in m. 7, and is the strongest ending in the poem to that point.

From an Affligemian perspective on the text, “lassen” (m. 4) might be a comma, “Strassen” (m.

7) a colon, and “dohin” (m. 9) a period. Applying that reading to the music, the progression in

mm. 8-9 would not merely conclude the preceding two measures, but also the entire piece to

that point. Similarly, “bin,” the final word of the first verse, would conclude the final three

lines, and perhaps even the entire verse (in a more expansive understanding of the period’s

scope). The fact that mm. 19-23 consist of a near-exact repetition of mm. 15-9 (only the final alto

note differs), including the text, presents a bit of an ambiguity for text-cadence relations.

Doubtless biased by teleological assumptions, I hear the second cadence as more conclusive,

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and thus would read the bare-fifths conclusion in m. 19 as somewhat lacking, in a way that the

repetition and 5/3 triad conclusion in m. 23 rectifies.

Clearly an approach to cadential structure that fuses the Cologne school’s contrapuntal

detail with John of Affligem’s attention to textual structure has much to offer for the analysis of

polyphonic song. The sense of cadential hierarchy it gives rise to is attractive, as is the potential

for musical units to be viewed as cumulative, rather than merely successive. Such a fusion,

however, never came to be in the writings of the Cologne school or writings by authors of the

following generations. If one were to speculate as to why these strands of thought never were

woven together, at least two potential explanations come to mind. One is that compositional

practice at the time was likely even less disposed to correlate specific cadential types with

punctuation than was chant practice. Another explanation is that the imitative textures popular

in the earlier sixteenth century made it much more difficult to map textual structure onto

specific musical simultaneities than had been the case in chant. In any case, the authors of the

Cologne school, despite their innovations, leave us wishing for more theoretical content than

they chose to provide.

Through careful investigation of the warren of texts that comprises the early output of

the Cologne school, we have found that Schanppecher, Wollick, and Cochlaeus considered

closure to consist primarily of combinations of melodic formulas, most of which are associated

with individual voices. The discant and tenor voices, which normally resolve to an octave or

unison, characterize the progression, and indicate its tonal focus. To this pair the composer can

add further, “contrapuntal” voices (contrapuncti). These additional voices can combine with the

discant-tenor framework in numerous ways, rendering the final sonority either a perfect or an

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imperfect sonority. While it has been argued that these authors arranged their progressions to

create triads, or at least 5/3 sonorities, at the ends of progressions, the textual tradition does not

convincingly support this hypothesis.

Bringing the Cologne school’s cadential apparatus to bear on compositions from the

early sixteenth century has accentuated a crucial issue in the interpretation of the clausula

formalis. In particular, the question of whether the progression of mm. 8-9 in “Innsbruck, ich

muss dich lassen” would have been considered a formal close is analogous, I believe, to the

question of whether today’s concept of “cadence” is equivalent to the clausula formalis. If any

succession of two sonorities that meet the contrapuntal requirements constitutes a formal close,

as the Cologne school’s texts imply, then the clausula formalis is much more similar to Rameau’s

concept of cadence than it is to today’s idea, which is more dependent on the function of closure.

If, on the other hand, the authors of the Cologne school tacitly assumed a connection between a

true formal close and the ending of a “little part of any section of a song” (cuiuslibet partis cantus

particula), in Tinctoris’s phrase, then it would be fair to say that the clausula formalis is

functionally equivalent to our concept of cadence.

As is all too often the case, there is no way to prove what the authors of the Cologne

school would have made of these issues. The best response to this indeterminacy, I believe, is to

listen with sensitive ears and evaluate with an open mind the different interpretive possibilities,

rather than holding that all such progressions are undoubtedly clausulae formales, or assuming

that their concept of the formal close is identical to our notion of the cadence. Hence, when

listening I try to attend to the contrapuntal configuration of the clausula formalis whenever it

occurs, but I also remain open to the possibility that large-scale closure may operate using a

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more restricted set of contrapuntal options. This approach, of course, is but one of many

possibilities, and many avenues remain open for further research into the relation between the

Cologne school’s doctrine and contemporaneous compositional practice.

2.7 Conclusion

We have seen that the authors of the authors of the Cologne school drew upon a variety

of sources and ideas in their work: the German speculative tradition, Italian contrapuntal

teaching, Tinctoris’s term “clausula,” and musical practice of the day. We have also observed

the many innovations contained in the Cologne school’s doctrine of musical closure, including

its extension of contrapuntal concerns to four voices, its differentiation of cadences based on the

scale degree of resolution (namely, the “clausulae on mi”), and the ways in which its approach is

conducive to triadic thinking, even though it does not manifest that thinking itself. This

doctrine, however, does not merely represent a departure from earlier attempts to grapple with

the nature of musical closure; it also initiates a number of attitudes and practices in the

theorizing of the cadence that persisted for centuries thereafter, and thus it launches a new

period in the history of the cadence.

One of the most notable changes instituted by the Cologne school is the identification of

the concept of the cadence as an important object of theoretical inquiry. When earlier theorists

acknowledged pieces and their parts conclude with special kinds of contrapuntal

progressions—and many theorists did not even acknowledge this—they addressed those

concluding phenomena in the context of lists of general contrapuntal possibilities. Cadential

progressions were not isolated as a phenomenon worth exploring in detail; they were merely

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another item in the enumeration of composers’ contrapuntal options. In contrast, the authors of

the Cologne school saw fit to dedicate entire chapters in their texts to the subject of the clausula

formalis, and developed entire lists of contrapuntal principles to explain the correct employment

of clausulae. In doing so, they established a three-century-long tradition of defining the cadence

as an object meriting thoughtful attention, and as a locus of theoretical innovation.

Another significant change found in the Cologne school’s cadential doctrine is the

consistent contention that cadences are made of three, or even four, independent voices. One of

the nearest approximations of a three-voice description of musical closure in the preceding

decades occurred in the tradition of faburden, or fauxbourdon, which described the resolution of a

6/3 sonority to an 8/5 one. Yet in this tradition the two upper voices are not at all independent,

but rather they always proceed locked at the interval of a fourth apart. The authors of the

Cologne school, on the other hand, developed a theoretical apparatus capable of describing the

motions of four truly independent voices. Even as they struggled to identify characteristic

behaviors for the third and fourth voices, Schanppecher, Cochlaeus, and company insisted that

clausulae consist of at least three voices. This conception of the cadence became the norm in

German theory, and, while Italian and French theory defined cadences primarily in terms of

dyads for many decades thereafter, by the seventeenth century a polyphonic, and later

harmonic, understanding of cadences was standard.

Yet another related change initiated by the Cologne school is their development of a

robust theory of how cadences are to be constructed. Compared to John of Affligem, they both

offer more examples of closing phenomena, and provide substantially more detail (in terms of

voices and also number of events they comprise) about those progressions. Although the

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Cologne school’s theorizing focuses to a great degree on how to make cadences, their theory

does not completely eschew issues of where cadences should be placed. In addition to

Cochlaeus’s rather isolated differentiation of progressions based on whether they can occur at

the ends of pieces, it is also important to not to minimize the significance of such progressions

being named “formal [i.e., formulaic] closes.” Even as the Cologne theorists failed to articulate

a satisfactory account of where to place cadences, they still thematized the closure-related

nature of cadences, thereby leaving unfinished work for later theorists to take up.

All of these significant changes which are found in the cadential doctrine of the Cologne

school established a new paradigm for the theorizing of the cadence that lasted for three

centuries. Theorists kept turning their attention to the concept of the cadence, with some

providing new details on specific polyphonic configurations that effect closure, and others

offering a fuller account of where to locate different types of cadences. We will now turn from

considering the Cologne school’s initiation of a new period of cadential theorizing to what may

be the fullest efflorescence of that theorizing, the mid-baroque cadential doctrine of Johann

Wolfgang Caspar Printz.

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 CHAPTER 3

MID-BAROQUE CLAUSULA DOCTRINE:

PRINTZ AND HIS PREDECESSORS

In 1676-7, Johann Wolfgang Caspar Printz (1641-1717) published the first two parts of

his Phrynis Mitilenaeus. This lengthy treatise compiles much of the German music theory of the

preceding generation, and is one of the early manifestations in the field of music of the

seventeenth century’s encyclopaedizing urge. It is also distinguished by its narrative structure,

in which chapters of music-theoretical doctrine are worked into a fictional framework involving

the eponymous protagonist, Phrynis Mitilenaeus.1 Printz’s goal in the treatise is to make the

tenets of musica poetica accessible to aspiring German composers who could not read treatises in

Italian or Latin,2 and, by means of his fictional interludes, perhaps even to make the experience

of learning enjoyable for his readers.

Yet Printz’s aims are not limited to translating traditional knowledge into German. On

the contrary, he presents an innovative perspective and new ideas on many issues, including

the analysis of rhythm in terms of poetic feet and the relative lengths of sections of music.3 Of

1Concerning this fictional structure, see Thomas Huener, “Wolfgang Caspar Printz’ ‘Phrynis
Mitilenæus’: a Narrative Synopsis of Musica poetica” (Ph.D. diss., University of Iowa, 1989), especially pp.
55-62, and also the conclusion of this chapter.

2 Ibid., 57.

3 On Printz’s theory of rhythmic feet, see William E. Caplin, “Theories of Musical Rhythm in the
Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries,” in The Cambridge History of Western Music Theory, ed. Thomas
Christensen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 662, 666; on his discussion of the length of
sections (numeri sectionales), see Werner Braun, Deutsche Musiktheorie des 15. bis 17. Jahrhunderts, vol. 2
(Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1994), 364-5.

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more pertinence to this study, one of Printz’s most significant and idiosyncratic innovations is

his naming and describing of numerous kinds of cadence, many of which had never before been

considered to constitute distinct cadential types. Indeed, Printz presents what is likely the most

comprehensive account of cadences in German theory. He synthesizes the theories of cadence

espoused by his predecessors and also proposes new types of cadence and descriptions of their

qualities, no doubt in response to the changes in musical practice underway in the last third of

the seventeenth century. As a result, the efflorescence of cadential theory found in Phrynis

Mitilenaeus provides us with an invaluable source for understanding how musical closure was

understood to function during those years in which the modal system still held sway in

pedagogical circles, even as contemporaneous compositions strike us as being more and more

well served by simple major-minor interpretations.

Printz’s theory is worth studying not just because of its status as an unusually well

developed account of cadential theory, or because of its chronological placement at the time

when elements of common-practice tonality were increasingly coming into play. Equally

noteworthy is the way in which his various categories of cadence are logically organized.

Printz lays out his theory of cadence types in a strictly systematized order that derives from the

intellectual movement known as Ramism. This was a pedagogical tradition dating to mid-

sixteenth century France that stressed recasting instructional materials and the entire

educational process so that students could learn material more quickly, efficiently, and

ultimately, more economically. Printz sets forth his theory of cadence in accordance with

Ramist procedure, and, as this chapter demonstrates, this structure is not a passive receptacle

for knowledge; rather, it shapes Printz’s cadential ideas in ways that can seem counterintuitive

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to modern readers. Because of the significance of Ramism for Printz’s doctrine of cadence, this

chapter investigates both the substantive aspects of his theory and the formal, Ramist-inspired

aspects which structure those claims.

In order to contextualize the novelties of Printz’s cadential doctrine, this chapter begins

with a summary of earlier German theories of cadence. It then demonstrates the dependence of

the categorial organization of Printz’s doctrine on Ramism. Detailed consideration of the

substance of Printz’s cadential ideas follows; after seeing how Printz transmits traditional

cadential ideas, this chapter investigates his novel classification scheme, teasing out the

theoretical and practical implications of his often terse or equivocal descriptions. It concludes

by examining two of the most innovative of Printz’s cadential concepts, namely, the two types

of cadential “seats” (sedes expressa and sedes subintellecta), and his doctrine of the musical section,

which may be the earliest account of an inchoate theory of phrase structure.

3.1 German Cadence Theory before Printz

Printz’s theory of cadences was highly original, but his originality did not lie in creating

an intellectual edifice ex nihilo. Rather, he synthesized and developed a body of cadence

doctrine that German theorists had been shaping since the early years of the sixteenth century.

This section will briefly summarize the important developments in cadential theory upon which

Printz drew, focusing on how cadences were made (through characteristic voice patterns), where

they were made (by the relationship of cadence to mode), and by what means cadences were

characterized (as perfect or imperfect, with different meanings for the terms over time). See

Figure 3.1 for a synoptic view of these categories and the authors discussed.

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 As the previous chapter has demonstrated, Melchior Schanppecher’s contribution to the

Opus aureum musicae of 1501 initiated a long-lived practice of conceiving of cadences as

combinations of stereotyped melodic figures, each of which was associated with a voice type.

More specifically, the discant’s cadence melody closes with an ascending step, the tenor’s with a

descending step, while the bass has an ascending fourth or descending fifth at the end, and the

alto is variable.4 When all four motions are combined, they form a progression of root-position

triads which later theorists would call a perfect authentic cadence, as Example 3.1 demonstrates.

Theorists also emphasized that voices could swap their melodies; for example, the tenor could

sing the discant’s cadence figure, while the discant, in invertible counterpoint, took up the

tenor’s gesture. This manner of describing cadences remained popular in Germany for

generations, and is present in the treatises of both Johann Herbst (1588-1666) and Conradus

Example 3.1 Four-voice clausula from Johannes Cochlaeus,

Tetrachordum musices, f. F1r (1512)

4 Schanppecher described only the tenor, discant, and bass (Opus aureum musicae, IV.6, ff. Hiiiiv-
vr). The first text to add the alto and to offer four-voice examples was Johannes Cochlaeus’s Musica of
1507 (f. Fiiiir-v).

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Matthaei (1619-1667), two of the most significant German theorists in the generation before

Printz.5

The other important manner in which German theorists conceived cadences was by

relating them to modes. Their approach was to characterize all the notes which occur in a given

cadence by just one pitch or pitch class, and then to evaluate the extent to which that note is

related to the mode. Nearly all theorists who discussed the matter referred to cadences that do

not come to rest on a note integral to the mode as “foreign” (peregrina), a term first

Voice patterns Integral/foreign to Perfect/Imperfect

mode
Melchior
Schanppecher X
(b. ca. 1480)
Opus Aureum musicae
(1501)
Gallus Dressler
(1533-1580s) X X
Praecepta musicae
poeticae (early 1560s)
Sethus Calvisius
(1556-1615) X X
Melopoiia (1592)
Johannes Crüger
(1598-1662) X X
Synopsis musica (1630)
Johann Herbst
(1588-1666) X X
Musica poetica (1643)
Conradus Matthaei
(1619-1667) X X X
Kurtzer . . . Bericht
(1652)

Figure 3.1 Cadence Categories in Precursors of Printz

5 Herbst, Musica poetica, VII, pp. 58-63; Matthaei, Kurtzer Bericht, I, §§11-19, pp. 3-7.

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systematically applied to cadences by Gallus Dressler (1533-1580s) in the early 1560s.6 No such

term for cadences proper to the mode, however, gained wide acceptance; many authors simply

avoided giving a name to such cadences, while others made up their own terms. For example,

Conradus Matthaei writes, “‘Proper cadences’ are those which are made on the three notes of

the mode’s fifth, and indeed on the lowest, highest, and middle note [of that fifth]. These three

notes (which elsewhere are called the ‘harmonic triad’) must be placed in every song (even in

poor melodies). ‘Foreign cadences’ are those which are made from an alien triad, and are led

into a different mode.”7 The mention of three notes in a proper cadence does not refer to which

three notes should comprise a given simultaneity in a cadence, but rather to three different

cadences, one of which arrives on the modal final, while the other two arrive on the notes a fifth

and third above the final.

Oddly, when these theorists implicitly reduce all the notes of a cadence to one, they

never articulate which note or which voice they mean, nor the method they use to determine it.

Nor do they address the tension between their acknowledgment that each voice has its own

6 Dressler, Praecepta musicae poeticae, IX, pp. 154, 156. A slightly earlier employment of the term in
connection with cadences is that of Hermann Finck (Practica musica, f.Ss3v, Ss4v). Finck does not explain
his two, fleeting uses of the term in this sense, but an earlier section of his text (f.Pp4 r), which discusses
the tonus peregrinus, strongly suggests that he borrows the term from chant theory, where it had been
applied to irregular modes and differentiae since the fourteenth century (see, for instance, Eger von
Kalkar, Cantuagium, 62). Benito Rivera also points out that the term “peregrina” was used by Quintilian
to refer to “foreign words” (verba peregrina) (Joachim Burmeister, Musical Poetics, trans. Benito V. Rivera
[New Haven.: Yale University Press, 1993], 149).

“Propriae Clausulae sind: welche gemacht werden in den dreyen Clavibus der Quinten eines
7

Modi, und zwar im untersten/ im höchsten und mittelsten. Diese drey Claves (welche sonsten Trias
Harmonica genennet werden) müssen in einem jeden Gesange (auch nur in schlechten Melodien)
befunden werden. Peregrinae Clausulae seyn/ welche aus einer frembden Triade gemacht/ und in einen
andern Modum herein geführet werden” (Kurtzer Bericht I, §5 & 7, p. 2).

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important cadential figure and the implication that a cadence is defined by only one note. Each

cadence simply is said to arrive on a note that is integral to the mode, or on one that is not. The

texts of the treatises are not helpful; fortunately, several theorists provide musical examples that

are more illuminating. Johann Herbst and Johannes Crüger (1598-1662) both show the precise

pitches upon which the different cadence types can be made, and in both cases, the pitches

shown range from around middle C to a tenth higher, which corresponds to the tessitura of the

discant voice in other musical examples.8 Furthermore, Crüger’s examples consist of successive

transpositions of a written-out cadential figure, in which the final note corresponds to the single

note shown in Herbst’s examples; this melodic fragment is the usual discant formula, complete

with its characteristic syncopation. These clues suggest that theorists understood the final note

of the discant voice’s cadential figure to be the regulative voice when they sought to relate

cadences to modes, though they can do no more than suggest it given the lack of explicit

evidence.9

The conceptual framework of cadences belonging to or foreign to a mode derives from

Gioseffo Zarlino (1517-1590).10 In his Istitutione harmoniche of 1558, he divides cadences into

8 Herbst, Musica poetica, VII, p. 67-8; Crüger, Synopsis musica, XV, f. L3r-v.

9Lori Burns comes to the same conclusion in her discussion of Herbst’s cadence theory,
appealing to “Herbst’s practical realization of the modal cadence formulas” (Bach’s Modal Chorales
[Stuyvesant, N.Y.: Pendragon Press, 1995], 191).

10 Pietro Aaron proposed a similar distinction between cadences on more and less normative
notes of a given mode in 1525 (Trattato della natura, IX-XX). Aaron’s division of modes into regular and
irregular notes, however, was much less systematic than Zarlino’s, and scarcely any later theorists appear
to have been inspired by his treatise. As with the term peregrina, “irregolari/irregularis” was borrowed
from chant theory, where it originally referred to modes of unusual ambitus and ending (St. Martial’s
Anonymous, VIII).

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“regular” (regolari) and “irregular” (irregolari); regular cadences are those which are found on

the notes of the octave which bounds the mode, on the note that divides that octave into the

mode’s fifth and fourth, and the note that divides the fifth into the mode’s major and minor

thirds. Irregular cadences are those found on any other note.11 Helpfully, he states that

cadences should principally be made in the tenor, since it is the basis of the piece, though he

acknowledges that they can occur in other voices.12 Zarlino’s ideas were transmitted to the

German-speaking world by Sethus Calvisius (1556-1615), who rendered an adapted form of

them into Latin in his Melopoiia of 1592. Calvisius did not consistently employ translations of

Zarlino’s regolari and irregolari cadences, but he did add new terminology: cadences made on

the modal final are primary (primariae), those on the fifth above it are secondary (secundariae),

and those on the third above the final are tertiary (tertiae, emended by later authors to

tertiariae).13 Calvisius himself did not clearly state that all cadences other than these are foreign,

or peregrina, but this division became a commonplace in authors of the following generation.14

This entire set of terms proved popular with later authors, and was adopted by Johannes

Lippius, Johannes Crüger, and Conradus Matthaei.15 Lippius, however, introduced a significant

11 Zarlino, Istitutione harmoniche, IV.18, p. 320.

12 Ibid., p. 321.

13 Calvisius, Melopoiia, XIV, f. H3v.

14 Calvisius does use the term “peregrina” once, but in a different context than his discussion of
the relation between cadences and modes; here it is lumped together with “improper” (impropria) and
“imperfect” (imperfecta), and thus it seems to function as a general epithet of faultiness rather than a
technical term (Melopoiia, XVII, f. I1r).

15 Lippius, Synopsis musicae novae, f. H2v; Crüger, Synopsis musica, XV, f. L1v; Matthaei, Kurtzer
Bericht, I, §5, p.2.

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conceptual alteration to the content of these terms: instead of relating the cadence types to the

modal final, he assigned one to each note of the Trias harmonica, or the triad, a concept which he

crystallized in 1610.16 This redefinition yields the same notes as Zarlino’s system, but it shifts

the emphasis from modal finals and proportionally derived notes above them to the unity of the

triad. In doing so, Lippius brings a concrete musical meaning to the previously abstract

connection between the triad and the mode that it anchors, by associating the cadence scheme

of a given piece with the triad that is proper to that piece’s mode.17 Later theorists such as

Crüger and Matthaei found this explanation more attractive, and it entirely replaced Zarlino’s

justification in German theory.

Yet Calvisius’s set of terms was not the only one which Germans used to describe where

cadences could be made. In addition to coining the term peregrina, Gallus Dressler also

proposed a classification system that roughly corresponds to Calvisius’s terminological trio.

His also consists of three categories of cadence, ranked in terms of centrality to the mode: the

principal (principalis), less principal (minus principalis), and the aforementioned foreign cadence

(peregrina).18 Unlike the theory of Zarlino and Calvisius, there is no systematic pattern to

Dressler’s categories: modes have two to four principal cadences, zero to two less principal

ones, and the remaining notes in each mode are foreign. Due to this irregularity, Dressler offers

Lippius, Disputatio musica tertia, ff. B2rff. A more widely available version of Lippius’s theory
16

from 1612 may be found in his Synopsis musicae novae, ff. F4r-F7v.

17For more on Lippius, the triad, and modes, see Joel Lester, Between Modes and Keys: German
Theory 1592-1802 (Stuyvesant, N.Y.: Pendragon Press, 1989), 41-5.

18 Dressler, Praecepta, IX, pp. 154-162.

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vague descriptions of each type, and then defines each mode’s principal and less principal

cadences by extension.

If Dressler’s cadence categories seem messy, then those of Zarlino and Calvisius are

suspiciously neat. The musical practice of the mid- to late-sixteenth century did not employ all

modes equally, and certainly did not cadence identically in every mode, as theorists’ grapplings

with the Phrygian mode, among others, demonstrate.19 Zarlino’s cadence locations are clearly

influenced by his penchant for system building via the harmonic and arithmetic mediation of

large intervals; the irregularity of Dressler’s cadence categories must be derived from an effort

to tailor them to match musical practice rather than theoretic simplicity. Yet this effort to be

more faithful to how modes were employed did not prove as attractive to later theorists as did

Zarlino’s system. Even theorists who preserved Dressler’s terms, such as Johann Herbst,

changed the word’s meanings to reflect Zarlino’s theory: Herbst’s principal (principalis) cadence

is made on the modal final, the less principal (minus principalis) is on the note the fifth above it,

and a newly added category, “related” (affinales oder virgulares), refers to cadences a third above

the final.20 Thus, in the century after Dressler there was one basic conception of where in a

mode cadences should occur, even though there was no such unanimity of terminology.

19 For example, Pietro Aaron’s attempts to apply modal theory to polyphony yield a remarkably
non-systematic set of melodic ending points. For a thorough explication, see Harold S. Powers, "Is Mode
Real? Pietro Aron, the Octenary System, and Polyphony," Basler Jahrbuch für historische Musikpraxis 16
(1992): 9–52.

20Musica poetica, VII, p. 68. Burmeister also employs Dressler’s terms in his Musica Poetica of 1606,
but he defines them in a way distinct from both Dressler’s and Herbst’s. See Burmeister, Musica Poetica,
IX, and Rivera’s introduction to his translation of Burmeister’s treatise (Musical Poetics, liii-lvi).

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 The last way in which some German theorists classified cadences was in terms of their

perfection or imperfection. The concept of perfection (vollkommenheit/perfectio) had been

employed in musical discourse to refer to completion since the thirteenth century, and these

authors carried on that tradition.21 Yet in spite of the continuing presence of the notion of

completion, two substantially divergent senses of how perfection or completion could be

manifested occurred in the theoretic discourse in different periods, and the change between the

two indicates a shift in how people may have heard cadences. The earlier usage refers to the

quality of one of the final sonority’s intervals: an octave or unison makes a perfect cadence

(clausula perfecta), whereas a fifth or a third (and some authors include a sixth) forms an

imperfect one (clausula imperfecta). This conception is originally Italian, and entered the German

discourse through Calvisius’s adaptation of Zarlino. The Italian cadence doctrine of the

sixteenth century normally theorized cadences as if they were exclusively a two-voice

phenomenon, in spite of the fact that Italian music by no means consisted solely of duets. All

Zarlino’s examples of cadences are in two voices; in this situation it is straightforward to

classify cadences by their interval quality.22 From hints that Italian theorists left, we can safely

21For a thorough exegesis of the concept of perfection in medieval musical discourse, see David
E. Cohen, “‘The Imperfect Seeks Its Perfection’: Harmonic Progression, Directed Motion, and Aristotelian
Physics,” Music Theory Spectrum 23, no. 2 (Autumn 2001): 139-169.

22 Although Zarlino classifies cadences into two classes, the concepts of “perfect” and “imperfect”
were rigorously applied first by Calvisius. Zarlino considers the first class (octave and unison) to be
cadences in an absolute sense (assolutamente Cadenze), whereas the second class (fifth and third) consists
of imperfect cadences (Cadenze imperfette) (Ist. harm. III.53, p. 222). The idea of classifying cadences by
interval type is not original to Zarlino: in the 1530s his predecessor Stephano Vanneo proposed categories
of cadences concluding on the unison, the fifth, and the octave (Recan. de mus. aur. III.14).

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assume that their two-voice frameworks represent the tenor and discant voices,23 but their

discourse is far from explicit concerning the relationship between their theories and

contemporary compositions. German theorists who adopted this classification, most notably

Calvisius and Crüger, provide several four-voice examples of perfect and imperfect cadences.24

In these examples the octave or unison in question usually occurs between the bass and tenor

voices; only in cadences on mi (Phrygian mode cadences) does the interval lie between the tenor

and discant. This suggests that theorists were beginning to pay more attention to the lowest

voice when they considered multi-voice sonorities, and that the tenor’s descending step motion

was gradually yielding to the bass’s leap as the defining lower-voice motion in cadences.

German theorists were aware of this usage of perfection and imperfection well into the

seventeenth century due to the stature of Calvisius’s Melopoiia. Yet few authors consider it

worthy of discussion in their treatises. The most notable exception is Johannes Crüger. Yet the

observation that Crüger discusses these categories in his Synopsis musica of 1630 requires a

caveat: Crüger’s treatment of cadences contains almost no material that is original to him.

Rather, his chapter consists of a sophisticated compilation of cadence-related material from four

different chapters of Calvisius’s Melopoiia, along with a few interpolations from Lippius’s

Synopsis novae musicae of 1612. As such, Crüger’s text demonstrates that Calvisius’s categories

23 See, for example, Zarlino, Ist. harm. IV.18, p. 321. This matches the contemporary German
doctrine that the discant and tenor voices normatively cadence at the octave or cadence. Carl Dahlhaus
uses the term “Diskant-Tenor-Klausel” to describe this pairing (“Die Maskierte Kadenz: Zur Geschichte
der Diskant-Tenor-Klausel,” in Neue Musik und Tradition: Festschrift Rudolph Stephan [Laaber: Laaber-
Verlag, 1990], 89-98).

24 Calvisius, Melopoiia, XIII, ff. G4v-H1v; Crüger, Syn. mus. XV, ff. L2r-v.

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lasted several decades into the seventeenth century, but did not elicit further theoretical

developments.

Two decades after Crüger, Conradus Matthaei proposed an entirely new meaning for

the familiar perfect-imperfect binary. By this time German music theory had begun the

transition to the vernacular, so his Kurtzer doch ausführlicher Bericht von den Modis Musicis of 1652

described the categories as perfecta/vollkommene and imperfecta/unvollkommene.25 For Matthaei, a

perfect cadence consists of three sonorities, the notes of which are determined by the traditional

stereotyped voice-patterns. An imperfect cadence is a defective perfect cadence: Matthaei

explains that

imperfect clausulas are those which either remain on the penult (as in the following
example)

or which lead their ultimate sonority elsewhere. The latter clausulas are also called
“concealed clausulas” (Clausulae occultae). Such [a thing] occurs either in all voices or in
several:

25 Matthaei, Kurtzer Bericht, I, §8, p. 2.

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 26

As Matthaei’s examples make clear, the notion of “imperfection” does not refer to

imperfect consonances: indeed, the second “concealed clausula” progression in the second

example leads to a major triad that has the perfect fifth, octave, and major third one would

expect to find in one of Matthaei’s “perfect” cadences. Rather, Matthaei’s imperfection refers to

the incompletion (imperfectio) of a process, specifically, the cadential progression that the

imperfect or concealed cadence sets in motion.

Also significant is the fact that Matthaei classifies these incomplete or misdirected

progressions as cadences, albeit imperfect ones. This is a remarkable claim, especially in the

case of the first category, which ends on the penult. All authors in the previous 150 years who

put forth a theory of cadence assumed that a cadential progression requires a final chord of

arrival, or at least pseudo-arrival. (Although theorists of that time did not address meter

explicitly, their doctrine implies that cadences must be metrically complete, whereas Matthaei’s

26 “Imperfectae Clausulae sind: welche entweder in der penultima stehen bleiben als: [Example]
Oder ihre Ultimam anders wohin führen / welche auch Clausulae occultae genennet werden. Und
geschieht solches entweder in allen Stimmen oder in etlichen [Example]” (ibid., §20, p. 8).

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imperfect cadence seems to be able to end a beat too early.27) The prior generations’ notion of

cadential defectiveness or incompletion is limited to their concept of the imperfect cadence,

which requires a penultimate harmony to move to a final chord in which a third or sixth

replaced the expected unison or fifth; there is no mention of the possibility of an absent final

chord. As such, Matthaei’s concept of the imperfect cadence represents a significant innovation

in the consensus of which events constitute a cadence, and in the role that aural expectations

play in the identification of cadences.

3.2 A Ramist Theory of Cadence

Printz develops the content of his precursor’s theories of the cadence in noteworthy and

original ways, as we shall see. Yet one of the most pervasively significant aspects of his doctrine

concerns its implicit, underlying formal organization. This bears the unmistakable stamp of the

pedagogical tradition spearheaded by the innovative French educator Petrus Ramus (1515-

1572). We shall see that the Ramist principles which undergird Printz’s theory of cadence

explain many of the features that make that doctrine so unusual, such as its extraordinarily

verbose terminology, rigorously systematized exposition, and curious groupings and separation

of different cadence types.

Ramus is a significant figure in intellectual history primarily owing to his contributions

in the areas of pedagogical method and curricular streamlining, which he and his

27One of the earliest texts to address explicitly the metric placement of cadences is the second
volume of Friedrich Erhard Niedt’s Die musicalische Handleitung (Handleitung zur Variation [Hamburg: the
author, and Dohm: Benjamin Schiller, 1706], III, f. E3v).

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contemporaries and followers rightly saw as amounting to a radical reformation of education.

Ramus taught at small colleges in Paris for the first fifteen years of his career, during which

period he began his lifelong series of polemics with the conservative, Aristotle-influenced

faculty of the University of Paris. In spite of this, or perhaps because of it, Ramus was

appointed by Henry II of France to the prestigious post of Regius Professor of Rhetoric and

Philosophy in 1551.28 Much of the controversy surrounding Ramus derived from his claims that

the time-honored texts of classical antiquity were poorly organized, and that students would

learn more efficiently from newly written textbooks than by reading the works of Aristotle.

While these ideas presented a serious challenge to the authority and expertise of the highly

educated, they were attractive to those seeking to gain an education more quickly and

affordably. Thus, devotees of Ramus spread his convictions throughout Europe, and Ramism,

as his pedagogical approach is often called, became especially rooted in parts of Germany.29

Ramus’s principal and most significant innovation was in the field that he identified as

“dialectic” (ars dialectica), i.e. logic. His innovation concerned the method by which an author or

teacher should structure a given field of knowledge so that students might learn it most easily.

His focus rests upon two tools: definition (definitio) and division (distributio, divisio, and other

terms). The former is “invariably expressed in terms of the purpose or end of the discipline

28 For a biography of Ramus, see James Veazie Skalnik, Ramus and Reform: Church and University at
the End of the Renaissance in France (Kirskville, Mo.: Truman State University Press, 2002).

29 This analysis of why the academy reacted so vigorously to Ramus is drawn from Skalnik
(Ramus and Reform, 8-10) and Howard Hotson (Commonplace Learning: Ramism and its German
Ramifications, 1543-1630 [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007], 41-51, 289-92), rather than the
dismissive, and now dismissed, interpretation of Ramus’s intellectual puerility made by Walter J. Ong
(Ramus: Method, and the Decay of Dialogue [Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1958; reprint,
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004], 23-4, 214-24).

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itself;”30 the latter consists of breaking down the subject in question into its broadest constituent

parts and ordering them from most general or conspicuous or pedagogically convenient to the

least. Once that is done, those constituent parts are defined and divided, with the entire process

repeating until it produces “the most particular aspects of the subject.”31 Describing this

method, Ramus writes: “and so the most general definition shall be first; division will follow. If

the division is multiple, a partition into complete parts will come first, and a division into

species will follow. These parts and species ought to be treated anew in the same order, and

they should be defined in the places where they are distributed.”32 It is, of course, not original

to state that a subject under inquiry ought to be defined. Similarly, thinkers have advocated

division into parts as a means of understanding topics since Plato;33 Johann Sturm (1507-1589),

in particular, advocated a division-based method a few years before Ramus.34 The latter’s

particular contribution to educational theory lies in his emphasis on the systematic application

of this process. This one method of inquiry (Ramus’s sola et unica via), of which numerous

authors have written, is responsible for structuring the disposition of all material pertinent to

30 Hotson, Commonplace Learning, 45-6.

31 Ibid.

32“Definitio itaque generalissima prima erit : distributio sequetur, quae si multiplex fuerit,
praecedet in partes integras partitio, sequetur divisio in species: partesque ipsae & species eodem ordine
sunt rursus tractandae, ac definiendae quo distributae fuerint.” (Ramus, Dial. lib. duo II.18).

33See, among other passages, Plato, Phaedrus, 265d-277c, esp. 270d, and id. Sophist, 218c-231c.
Mary Louise Gill provides a comprehensive treatment of Plato’s views on dialectic and division (diaeresis)
in “Method and Metaphysics in Plato’s Sophist and Statesman,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter
2009 Edition), ed. Edward N. Zalta, http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2009/entries/plato-sophstate/.

34 Sturm’s program took root in Strasbourg and heavily informed Johannes Lippius’s highly
influential theory of music (John Brooks Howard, “Form and Method in Johannes Lippius’s ‘Synopsis
musicae novae,’” Journal of the American Musicological Society 38, no. 3 [Autumn 1985]: 524-550).

156
the discussion of a given subject.35 Furthermore, Ramus’s principle could be extended from

organizing the individual subjects that comprise an education to systematizing all existing

knowledge, as the Ramist-inspired encyclopedist Johann Heinrich Alsted (1588-1638) realized,

along with other German intellectuals of the early seventeenth century who tried and failed to

compile such an encyclopedia.36

The most famous hallmark of Ramus is closely related to this process of definition and

division. It is the branching diagram, which visually lays out a given subject’s entire series of

divisions from left to right across a page, as Example 3.2 demonstrates. Ramus was not the first

author ever to use such diagrams, for they appear in the De inventione dialectica of Rudolph

Agricola (1444-1485), but his oeuvre served to promulgate their use in an unprecedented

manner.37 Walter Ong argues that the spatial arrangement of a subject matter gradually became

an unarticulated pillar of Ramus’s intellectual project due to its pedagogical appeal: he

describes a Ramist textbook as comprising “a series of definitions and divisions having as their

real, and practically ultimate, base, classroom practicality. Ramist arts explain little or nothing.

Division, like definition, is effected in them not by insight, but by ukase [i.e. decree], and the

35Ramus, Dialecticae libri duo, II.17; Ong, Ramus, 245-62; Skalnik, Ramus and Reform, 43-6; Hotson,
Commonplace Learning, 43-7; Ian Maclean,“Logical Division and Visual Dichotomies: Ramus in the Context
of Legal and Medical Writing,” in The Influence of Petrus Ramus, ed. Mordechai Feingold, Joseph S.
Freedman, and Wolfgang Rother (Basel: Schwabe & Co. AG Verlag, 2001), 228, 234-5.

On the influence of the Ramist method on German encyclopedizing efforts in the early
36

seventeenth century, see Hotson, Commonplace Learning, 153ff.

37 Ong, Ramus, 199.

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ukase is issued in the name of the visual imagination. What goes is what can be readily and

convincingly “pictured” in at least semidiagrammatic form.”38

In the last few decades scholars have challenged Ong’s assertions. Ian Maclean has

argued that the visual dimension was not intrinsic to Ramus’s method, but was only one of

several ways to communicate divisions of a subject to readers; this point is supported by

Example 3.2 Ramus, Dial. lib. duo, x. (Cambridge: John Hayes, 1672 edition)

38 Ong, Ramus, 260. See also pages 199 and 203 concerning the unstated centrality of this method.

158
 Raphael Hallett’s noting that most of the diagrams now associated with Ramus were

first added to posthumous editions of his books by editors and printers.39 Nevertheless, in the

decades following Ramus’s death this sort of diagram became extremely popular in parts of

Europe. This is in part due to the particular attractions of the Ramist pedagogical program. As

James Skalnik has shown, Ramus’s innovations were motivated by his desire to help indigent

students to gain an education, and thus to rise out of poverty, more quickly than he had been

able to.40 This emphasis on conveying information efficiently, and Ramus’s related

championing of practical skills such as mathematics, proved particularly popular in the

merchant-dominated cities of the Hanseatic League, particularly those in north-western

Germany.41

By the 1620s and ‘30s Ramus’s ideas had diffused through Germany. Even as Ramus’s

own writings fell from favor and largely ceased to be printed in Germany,42 his approach still

shaped contemporary thought. As Hotson has pointed out, Alsted’s tremendously influential

encyclopedia, the Cursus philosophici encyclopedia of 1620, summarizes its structure and ideas by

means of a Ramist table at the end of each book and major subsection.43 He also argues that the

writings of Jan Amos Komenský (or Comenius, 1592-1670), a student of Alsted and an

Maclean, “Logical Division,” 239; Raphael Hallett, “Ramus, Printed Loci, and the Re-invention
39

of Knowledge,” in Ramus, Pedagogy and the Liberal Arts: Ramism in Britain and the Wider World, ed. Steven J.
Reid and Emma Annette Wilson (Surrey: Ashgate, 2011), 106-7.

40 Skalnik, Ramus and Reform, 157.

41 Hotson, Commonplace Learning, 79-82, 243-4, 286-94.

42 Skalnik, Ramus and Reform, 60, 162.

43 Hotson, Commonplace Learning, 184.

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important reformer of education, were profoundly rooted in the central European pedagogical

tradition which Ramus had shaped generations earlier.44 In the world of music scholarship, the

Ramist-derived branching diagram can be found in German music theory texts even as late as

the 1650s, as Matthaei’s Kurtzer doch ausführlicher Bericht demonstrates.45

Phrynis Mitilenæus reveals the extent to which Ramus’s pedagogical program still

resonated more than a century after Ramus’s death in the St. Bartholomew’s day massacre of

1572. One broad similarity is evident in Printz’s democratizing motivation for writing Phrynis.

As he indicates in the prefatory material to the work’s second edition, Printz composed the

treatise in order to make “proper knowledge” (rechte Wissenschafft) more accessible to German

musicians (Musicanten) who knew neither Latin nor Italian, an impetus which resembles the

Ramus’s emphasis on efficiently educating those of little means.46 Other, more structural

borrowings of Ramist ideas occur in the treatise as well. For instance, Printz’s definition of

music in the “Synopsis of Poetic Music” section of the treatise follows Ramus’s dictates on the

presentation of a subject: after an initial definition of music and a division of it into Theoretica

and Practica, Printz proceeds to divide each of these into successively smaller categories, which

44Hotson, “The Ramist Roots of Comenian Pansophia,” in Ramus, Pedagogy and the Liberal Arts:
Ramism in Britain and the Wider World, ed. Steven J. Reid and Emma Annette Wilson (Surrey: Ashgate,
2011), 236, 245-6, 250-2.

45 Matthaei, Kurtzer Bericht, folio between pp. 62 and 63.

[Johann] Wolfgang Caspar Printz, Phrynis Mitilenaeus oder Satyrischer Componist, vol. 1 (Dresden
46

and Leipzig: J. C. Mieth and J. C. Zimmerman, 1696), pp. 2-3, f. B1v-2r. See also Huener, “Wolfgang
Caspar Printz’ ‘Phrynis Mitilenæus,’” 57.

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he defines in the order of their division.47 In a strictly Ramist account of music, such as that

provided by the Ramist Friedrich Beurhaus in the Erotematum musicae (1580), a diagram would

follow, in which the successively branching constituents of music progress across the page.48

Printz never offers such a table to supplement his prose descriptions, yet his text certainly

reflects a Ramist orientation to the presentation of material. Indeed, when Printz turns to the

subject of cadences, he employs the same process of orderly definitions and divisions. I have

converted his main series of cadence divisions into a Ramist table in Figure 3.2, which also

includes brief summaries of Printz’s descriptions of each kind of cadence. Example 3.3 is a

transcription of one of Printz’s figures; it offers examples of almost all of the cadence types in all

the modes (the imperfecta totalis saltiva perfectior cadence is missing, presumably because it

simply a minor-resolving version of the perfecta totalis cadence).

One of the most prominent visual and conceptual features of Figure 3.2 is its repeated

bifurcations. As we have seen, such division is representative of the Ramist movement, which

has an unstated, but often noted by modern scholars, preference for dichotomies. These

dichotomies can be expressed narratively in the text, or visually in the branching diagrams so

47 Printz, Phrynis, I.5, §§2-12, pp. 16-7. All page references hereafter are to the more easily
accessible 1696 edition published in Leipzig and Dresden. Where there are two different section
references separated by a slash (e.g. §§34-6/35-7) the first refers to the 1676 edition (entited Phrynis oder
Satyrischer Componist, and published by Christian Okels in Quedlinburg), and the second to that of 1696.
The discrepancy is due to the fact that §43 from the earlier edition is shifted earlier to become §33 in the
later edition.

48 Beurhusius, Erotematum musicae, 16. Beurhaus was a seminal figure in the establishment of
Ramism in Germany through his rectorship of the gymnasium in Dortmund (Hotson, Commonplace
Learning, 27-8).

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characteristic of the Ramist movement after the death of Ramus.49 As Ong observes, the most

compelling explanation for this preference for bifurcation is the pedagogical appeal of

symmetry.50 The simplicity and attractiveness of this scheme of division is doubtless

responsible for Printz’s classification as well.

Yet the systematic application of bifurcations has some unusual effects on Printz’s

theory. It is directly responsible for one of the most prominent idiosyncrasies of Printz’s

cadence doctrine: the unusually long names of some cadence types, which are up to seven

words long (the clausula formalis imperfecta totalis ordinata adscendens imperfectior). These names

were unprecedentedly lengthy, and in spite of the great specificity they allowed, their

cumbersomeness doubtless contributed to the fact that no later theorists adopted Printz’s

terminology in its entirety.51 Yet the peculiar length of the names also made Printz’s theory

memorable, such that even some seventy-five years later Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg still saw

fit to mock the length of these names, commenting after mentioning one of the terms that he

was out of breath.52

Printz’s commitment to bifurcations has yet another unusual effect. In several situations

where a less rigidly principled approach would allow three cadence types to coexist on the

49 Hallett, “Ramus, Printed Loci, and the Re-invention of Knowledge,” 106-7.

50 Ong, Ramus, 199.

51 The theorist who most closely adheres to Printz’s cadence theory is Johann Gottfried Walther in
his Praecepta der Musikalischen Composition of 1708, but even he changes (and thereby shortens) many of
Printz’s terms (Praecepta, pp. 161-3).

52 “. . . der Athem entgehet mir . . .” (Marpurg, Abhandlung von der Fuge, 109). This passage is
referred to in Gerald Antone Krumbholz, “Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg’s Abhandlung von der Fuge (1753-
4),” (Ph.d. diss., University of Rochester, 1995), 157.

162
Figure 3.2 Ramus's Cadential Types
163
Example 3.3 Printz, Phrynis Mitilenaeus, I.8 (from the 1696 edition)
164
same level, Printz instead has one cadential progression paired with a placeholder category that

splits into two subordinate cadence types. Consider, for example, the cadence types which

Printz describes as Imperfecta totalis ordinata. When Printz discusses cadences that do not come

to rest (imperfecta) yet have a complete succession of chords (totalis), he divides them into those

that have a leap in the bass (saltiva) versus those that move conjunctly (ordinata). Three distinct

cadential progressions fall under this latter category. To the modern theorist, one of these

would be a deceptive cadence (adscendens imperfectior), while the other two of these would be

inversions of each other, one being a 7-6 suspension resolving to the tonic (descendens), the other

being a 2-3 suspension resolving similarly (adscendens perfectior). To a musical

sensibility rooted in figured-bass considerations,53 the decision to classify cadences by whether

the acoustic bass skips or moves stepwise is artistically understandable; far less compelling is

the insistence on the ontological similarity of the adscendens imperfectior and the adscendens

perfectior at the expense of the similarity of the adscendens perfectior and descendens cadences.

3.3 Printz’s contribution

The extent to which Printz couched his theory of cadence in Ramist trappings is

unprecedented. The content of his theory, however, must be considered in dialogue with his

music-theoretic predecessors. Many of Printz’s innovations are layered onto generations-old

theoretic doctrines and commitments; that being so, it is valuable to precede discussion of his

53 Printz devotes substantial attention to figured bass realization (Phrynis, II, §§21-4, pp. 124-43).

165
innovations with an account of how his theory adapted and recast those older doctrinal strands

that section 3.1 summarized.

Before entering into a detailed study of Printz’s theory, a brief introduction to his

terminology is in order. Printz uses the term clausula formalis to refer to all polyphonic cadence

types. His first bifurcation is into perfecta/vollkommene and imperfecta/unvollkommene; the former

refers to cadences that come to rest, whereas the latter does not. Both the clausula perfecta and

clausula imperfecta categories then undergo a further, identical bifurcation, into totalis and

dissecta types. The precise implications of this distinction are sometimes unclear, as will be

discussed below, but a provisional explanation is that a totalis cadence comprises a complete

cadential progression, while a dissecta cadence seems to be missing the final sonority of its

progression. Beyond these two bifurcations Printz’s system soon descends into further, unique

subdivisions, which will be discussed in due course. Readers are advised to consult Figure 3.2

and Example 3.3, above, whenever they wish to see how a specific cadence fits into the overall

organizational scheme, or to see its musical realization.

3.3.1 Voice-specific Cadences

The doctrine of characteristic voice motions which the Cologne school began more than

170 years earlier is alive and well in Phrynis Mitilenæus. Indeed, Printz presents the usual

subject matter in condensed but thoroughly traditional terms shortly after erecting his Ramist

edifice.54 In the context of his theory of cadence, this discussion functions more as an obligatory

54 Phrynis, I.8, §§32-3, p. 30.

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recounting of lore than a vital constituent of the theory. Yet this is not the only passage in

which Printz directs his attention to the melodic line of an individual voice; rather, he

innovatively considers a cadence to be characterized primarily by the particular motion that

occurs in its lowest voice. This is made obvious by the fact that many of the terms he chooses

describe motion, such as adscendens, descendens, and saltiva (leaping), and his examples make

clear that it is the lowest voice in particular that he has in mind. The clausula imperfecta totalis

saltiva imperfectior cadence type, which corresponds to a progression from V to I6, presents a

particularly new kind of cadence. Earlier German theorists such as Matthaei and Herbst

acknowledged that the cadential gesture of the bass involves a leap, but only by a descending

fifth or ascending fourth. For them a leap of a descending third from the fifth of the scale to the

third is one of the options for the altus part; if such a motion occurs in the lowest voice, then the

altus part has been shifted into the lowest sounding part, and the usual bass gesture is likely in a

higher voice.55 Printz, in comparison, does not describe this motion as an altizans (articulating

the altus part) gesture; rather, he relates it to the descending fifth or ascending fourth motion.

The descending third is a defective, or less perfect (imperfectior) form of the clausula imperfecta

totalis saltiva perfectior, which corresponds to a progression from V to a minor I chord. This, in

turn, is a faulty kind of closure, a fact communicated by its relegation to the clausula imperfecta

branch; were the final chord a major triad, then it would be perfect, specifically, a clausula

perfecta totalis. Similarly, as Richard Jacoby has pointed out, when the traditional discantus

figure lies in the bass, Printz calls it a clausula imperfecta ordinata adscendens perfectior; a cadence

55 Herbst, Mus. poet. VII, p. 59; Matthaei, Kurtzer Bericht, I, §§12-9, pp. 3-7.

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with the tenor’s figure in the bass is a clausula imperfecta ordinata descendens.56 Printz describes

neither of these cadences in such terms, but instead categorizes them simply based on the

direction of the bass’s motion. Thus, Printz’s classification represents a decisive shift in aural

orientation from that of earlier theorists, away from a polyphonic hearing that privileges

varying dispositions of stereotyped voice parts, and towards a more bass-driven sort of hearing.

The contrapuntal invertibility of these four voices and its implications for keyboard

performance suggests a link between this German theoretical doctrine and modern accounts of

the Italian partimento tradition.57 As Ludwig Holtmeier has noted, the standard cadenza doppia

of partimento theory consists of three contrapuntal voices (which are identical to the clausulas

of the bass, discant, and tenor voices of German theory). Holtmeier goes on to link inverted

forms of this cadence to segments of the descending and ascending Rule of the Octave:

“Underlying the Rule of the Octave is less a collection of interval-progression models and more

of a Durchkadenzierung (thorough [recte: through] cadentializing) of the scale by means of these

contrapuntal cadence models—above all the cadenza doppia.”58 Holtmeier then demonstrates

how the standard Rule of the Octave progression can be re-harmonized so that its ascending

scale supports a variant form of the discant’s clausula in the bass (a progression that Printz calls

a clausula imperfecta totalis ordinata adscendens perfectior), and its descending scale supports the

Richard Jacoby, “Untersuchungen über die Klausellehre in deutschen Musiktraktaten des 17.
56

Jahrhunderts,” (Ph.D. diss., University of Mainz, 1955), 24.

57For a comprehensive study of the partimento tradition, see Giorgio Sanguinetti, The Art of
Partimento: History, Theory, and Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).

58Ludwig Holtmeier, “Heinichen, Rameau, and the Italian Thoroughbass Tradition: Concepts of
Tonality and Chord in the Rule of the Octave,” Journal of Music Theory 51, no. 1 (Spring 2007): 16.

168
tenor’s clausula at its conclusion (Printz’s clausula imperfecta totalis ordinata descendens). And

indeed, the traditional discant clausula figures prominently in both Printz’s cadential

examples—particularly the upper voices—and the cadenza doppia of the partimento tradition, and

the tenor clausula could easily be added to nearly all cadences.

Yet there are also significant differences between Printz’s theory and the partimento

tradition. First, the most famous regole, or rules, that transmit the theoretical content of

partimenti restrict the term cadenza to progressions in which the bass falls a fifth or rises a

fourth.59 Thus, while Printz considered many different types of progressions to be capable of

providing closure, the Neapolitan partimento tradition largely restricts its considerations to

variants of only one of Printz’s types, the clausula perfecta totalis.60 Progressions corresponding

to the inverted forms of the cadenza doppia, to which Holtmeier calls attention, do not receive

any special emphasis in the Neapolitan regole; rather, they are described as some of the possible

ways to ascend or descend by stepwise motion. Francesco Gasparini, who was educated in

Rome, does use the term cadenza di grado to refer to progressions in which the bass descends by

step with a 7-6 suspension above; yet in in his L’Armonico pratico al cimbalo he never applies this

term to ascending-step progressions.61 The only partimento-related source I have found to

See the treatises by Fenaroli, Durante, and others edited by Robert Gjerdingen on the
59

Monuments of Partimenti website (http://faculty-

web.at.northwestern.edu/music/gjerdingen/partimenti/collections/index.htm).

60Concerning the complicated and conflicting uses of cadential classification schemes in

partimento works, see Sanguinetti, The Art of Partimento, 105-11.

61 Francesco Gasparini, L’Armonico practico al cimbalo, 4th ed. (Venice: Antonio Bortoli, 1745), VI,
pp. 24, 29.

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describe both ascending and descending progressions as cadences (“cadentiae minimae”) is a

German treatise written in 1699, the Regulae concentuum partiturae of Georg Muffat.62

Indeed, the terms “tenor clausula/clausula tenorizans” and “soprano clausula/clausula

cantizans,” which modern partimento theorists often mention,63 do not actually appear in the core

partimento works of the Neapolitan tradition. Indeed, as Robert Gjerdingen acknowledges, the

terms are borrowed from the German tradition of authors such as Johann Gottfried Walther

(1684-1748) and Andreas Werckmeister (1645-1706).64 This lineage extends back to Printz, and

several of Walther’s cadence types and terminological choices clearly demonstrate Printz’s

influence. The analytic work of Gjerdingen amply demonstrates the value of applying these

German theoretical ideas to the Italian tradition, and Sanguinetti’s research has emphasized the

degree to which Neapolitan musical pedagogy and practice permeated throughout Western

Europe.65 Nevertheless, the tradition of associating melodic formulas and entire cadence types

with individual voices does not appear to be nearly so significant in the Italian musical scene,

and this demonstrates a noteworthy way in which German musicians and authors cultivated

their own distinct music-theoretic culture.

62Muffat, Regulae concentuum partiturae, ed. B. Hoffmann and S. Lorenzetti in Collana Editoriale 10
(Bologna: Associazione clavicembalista bolognese, 1991, 1993), 114-21. This work dedicates much space
to considerations of how to resolve particular intervals, much in the way best typified by Johann David
Heinichen’s work. As a result, attempting to appeal to this work as representative of early partimento
theory en bloc is questionable.

Holtmeier, “Heinichen, Rameau,” 16; Robert Gjerdingen, Music in the Galant Style (New York:
63

Oxford University Press, 2007), 139ff.

64 Ibid., 139-40.

65 Sanguinetti, The Art of Partimento, 7-8. See also Holtmeier, “Heinichen, Rameau,” 13.

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3.3.2 Cadence and Mode: Propria/Peregrina

The relationship between cadence and mode reveals one chink in Printz’s finely

constructed system of cadence types. As is the case with most other German theorists of his

day, Printz held to the traditional teaching that there are twelve modes, in spite of the fact that

musical practice was starting to coalesce into a mere two, major and minor.66 Printz also

preserved the standard Zarlinian doctrine concerning the location of cadences within the mode,

and adopted Matthaei’s clear contrast of peregrina and propria cadence classes. Other than

glossing the usual terms Primaria, Secundaria, and Tertiaria in terms of their relative perfection

and linking of them with the concept of the Sedes (to be discussed in Section 3.3.6 of this

chapter), Printz’s account is straightforward. 67 Like Figure 3.2, Figure 3.3 translates his text

discussion into the Ramist diagram it implies.

Perfectissima und Primaria on first note of Trias

Propria Perfecta und Secundaria on the third note of Trias

Clausula Formalis
(in Ansehung des Imperfecta und Tertiaria on the middle note of Trias
Modi oder Toni)
Peregrina on a note that isn’t part of the Trias

Figure 3.3 Clausulas with respect to mode

66 On this gradual evolution, with particular attention paid to modes 3 and 4, see Harold Powers,
“From Psalmody to Tonality,” in Tonal Structures in Early Music, ed. Cristle Collins Judd (New York:
Garland Publishing, 1998), 322-33. Joel Lester points out that Johann Crüger advocated adding two
additional modes on B and E-flat in the 1654 edition of his Synopsis musica (Lester, Between Modes and
Keys, 55-9). See also his listing of two German manuscripts from 1676 or before which mention the eight
church keys (ibid., 80).

67 Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §§24-7, p. 28.

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 Later in the chapter Printz returns to the issue, and states that all the primaria clausulas

of a given mode are secundaria to the mode a fifth below it, and tertiaria to that a third below.

The exceptions to this rule are Lydian/Hypolydian and Dorian/Hypodorian, the primariae

clausulas of which cannot function as secundaria and tertiaria clausulas respectively, for those

would correspond to a mode with a final of B natural, which does not exist for Printz. Similarly,

Phrygian/Hypophrygian has no secundaria clausulas, and Mixolydian/Hypomixolydian cannot

have tertiaria ones.68 Printz’s omission of cadences on B natural is different than Zarlino’s

approach, which is to acknowledge that their cadences “sound somewhat hard,” since B “does

not have a corresponding fifth above or fourth below,” but to hold that a cadence of good effect

on this note can nevertheless be produced when there are more than two voices.69 Joel Lester

interprets this difference to mean that Printz was “retreating” from the “progressive” nature of

Zarlino’s position: according to Lester, the modal uniformity of Zarlino’s doctrine “was another

step that minimized the individual differences between the separate octave species,” whereas

“Over a century later, Printz is still troubled by the problems of a cadence on B, there re-

emphasizing the special characteristics of the individual octave species.”70 A different

explanation for the discrepancy is motivated by the fact that Printz’s cadence doctrine

presupposes the presence of a Trias harmonica above the bass of the final sonority. For Zarlino a

cadence is primarily a two-voice phenomenon, with the result that additional voices could

68 Ibid., §§34-6/35-7, p. 30-1.

69 Zarlino, Ist. harm. IV.20, 63; trans. by Vered Cohen, p. 63

70 Lester, Between Modes and Keys, 61.

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include a sixth above a bass on B instead of a fifth.71 Thus, Zarlino need not be a progressive to

Printz’s shrinking violet; instead, they could both be responding to contemporary musical

practice and theoretic conventions with sensitivity.

Thus far the doctrine is largely Zarlinian. Later in the chapter Printz returns to the

propria/peregrina pair, but this time he muddies their meaning. Printz’s concern here is with

transposed modes, and with the cadences that result from the procedure. The gist of Printz’s

argument is that propriae cadences can come only from the “natural” mode, i.e. they have no

unusual accidentals. He then provides an example to clarify, which is transcribed below as

Example 3.4. Printz asserts that “This clausula is in no way a propria secundaria of the Aeolian

and Hypoaeolian modes, and also not a propria tertiaria of the Ionian and Hypoionian modes,

but rather a peregrina clausula, and it is borrowed from the system which is transposed down a

fourth.”72

The claim that Example 3.4 is a peregrina clausula is problematic for Printz’ classificatory

scheme. In both Aeolian/Hypoaeolian and Ionian/Hypoionian the resting place (Sitz oder Stelle)

of the cadence is on one of the notes of the mode’s Trias harmonica, so it should be considered

71While cadential progressions coming to rest on a sixth are usually considered to be cases of
avoiding the cadence (fuggir la cadenza) in Zarlino’s thought, his concept of the “imperfect cadence” (or
“cadence, imperfectly speaking”) includes situations where the upper voice rises by step and the lower
descends by a third to form a sixth (Ist. harm. III.53, p. 224; see, in particular, the second progression in the
example on p. 224).

72“Diese Clausula ist keines Weges Propria secundaria, Aeolii und Hypoaeolii, auch nicht
Propria tertiaria, Jonici und Hypojonici, sondern vielmehr eine Peregrina, und entlehnet aus dem
Systemate in Quartam deorsum Transpositio” (Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §43, p. 31). This quotation is from the
1696 edition; the 1676 contains an abbreviated (and less emphatic) version of the same idea at §42.

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propria according to Printz’s earlier definition of that term.73 It is true that the F# in the melody

does not occur in the normal, “natural” gamut, and thus the entire cadence better fits the one-

sharp gamut, i.e. “the system which is transposed down a fourth.” Yet a brief perusal of

Printz’s example of cadence types (Example 3.3) turn ups a multiplicity of accidentals, including

F#, so accidentals alone do not explain Printz’s position. The better explanation is that Printz’s

understanding of the modal system in large part depends on the quality of the 5/3 chord built

on B natural remaining diminished, and therefore needing to be omitted. Throughout Example

3.3 Printz studiously avoids B-rooted triads, either omitting cadences that would require them

(most of the Phrygian cadences, as well as the Lydian dissecta acquiescens) or replacing would-be

5/3 chords on B with 6/3 triads (such as the Lydian imperfecta dissecta and Dorian ordinata

adscendens imperfectior). The blithe employment of the F# (and implied D#) in Example 3.4’s

cadence would thus disrupt one of the few consistencies in Printz’s approach to adding sharps.

In the one-sharp system to which Printz therefore assigns the cadence of Example 3.4,

the Trias harmonica of Ionian/Hypoionian, for example, is G major, so the cadential progression

would clearly be peregrina in that case, on the grounds of its root alone. The case of one-sharp

Aeolian/Hypoaeolian is more complicated: its Trias is E minor, so Example 3.4’s cadence could

Example 3.4 A Cadence on mi, from Phrynis, I.8, §43, p. 31

73 Ibid., §24, p. 28.

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be seen as a propria primaria cadence in the transposed form of that mode. Yet for Printz, the

status of this cadence in the transposed system is not the point; rather, since the cadence is

foreign (peregrina) to the natural, no-sharp gamut, its relation to the proper mode’s Trias

harmonica (Printz’s initial definition of propria cadences) becomes inconsequential. This is one of

the few instances in Printz’s theory of cadences in which such a category error occurs, and it is

not surprising that the problem arises when Printz attempts to graft an observation about

accidental-inflected music onto a traditional, diatonic teaching. In both cases it is useful to

characterize the cadential experiences as either belonging to the mode or being foreign to it, but

these terms are employed in divergent and fundamentally incompatible ways.

3.3.3 Perfect/Imperfect Cadences

Of those strands of preceding cadential theory identified above, Printz’s greatest

departure from his predecessors occurs in his employment of the perfect/imperfect binary. The

interval-specific sense founded by Zarlino is nowhere present in Printz’s account. Printz’s use

of the term is closer to Matthaei’s new definition of the terms, which evaluated whether the

expected cadential progression was complete; cadences could be rendered imperfect either by

stopping on the penultimate chord of the progression, or by having one or more voices move to

an unexpected note in the last chord.74 Printz’s use of perfecta/vollkommene and

imperfecta/unvollkommene shifts the emphasis from concrete description of notes and chords to a

74 Matthaei, Kurtzer Bericht, 8.

175
more listener-oriented perspective which focuses on the perceived quality of restfulness or

closure in a cadence: “Perfecta is that which leads the melody or concord to rest, so that a perfect

end of a perfect melody or harmony can therewith be made. . . . Clausula Formalis Imperfecta is

that which does incline to rest, but all the same does not lead the harmony to rest, so that a

perfect conclusion of a perfect melody and concord could be made with such [a clausula], but

the melody . . .indicates that it should be sung further.”75 Printz defines these terms

intensionally by offering a rest-based principle, rather than extensionally by merely

enumerating examples, as Matthaei had done. As a result, Printz’s theory is not limited to the

simple provision of labels for different cadences; rather, his invocation of “rest” implicitly

demands the listener’s evaluation of whether he or she perceives musical motion to have come

to a stop. Cadences in which the listener feels motion has stopped are clausulae perfectae, and

those in which it has not are clausulae imperfectae. This emphasis on musical rest rather than

completion of expected progressions also motivates Printz to assign some cadence types to

different categories than did Matthaei: the most notable example is the clausula perfecta dissecta

desiderans, which modern theorists would describe as a half cadence. The puzzling nature of this

cadence will be discussed below.

75 “Perfecta ist / welche die Melodey oder Zusammenstimmung zur Ruhe führet / also daß damit
ein vollkommenes Ende einer vollkommenen Melodey oder Harmonie kan gemacht werden. . . . Clausula
Formalis Imperfecta ist / welche sich zwar zur Ruhe neiget / aber doch die Harmonie nicht zur Ruhe
führet / daß mit einer solchen ein vollkommenes Final einer vollkommenen Melodey und
Zusammenstimmung könte gemacht werden / sondern die Melodey . . .daß weiter fortgesungen werden
solle / andeutet” (Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §§ 4, 11, pp. 26, 27).

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3.3.4 Totalis/Dissecta

Elements of Matthaei’s sense of the perfecta/imperfecta dichotomy are present in Printz’s

use of the terms; they are also present in a more veiled way in the next classificatory dichotomy

in Printz’s system: totalis/dissecta. To start with the totalis cadences, Printz defines the clausula

perfecta totalis as one in which the lowest voice falls a fifth or rises a fourth (see Figure 3.4).76 (He

later adds that the final two chords are both major.77) The category of clausula imperfecta totalis is

less clear, because it divides immediately into saltiva and ordinata, without having any

characterization assigned to it by Printz. Yet by examining the examples Printz gives (Example

3.3), one concludes that this category embraces cadences modeled on the clausula perfecta totalis,

except that they have been altered by change in inversion, root (where the bass ascends by step),

or quality of third above the bass. This interpretation is supported by the formally equivalent

layout of the first three levels of Printz’s cadential classification scheme (see Figure 3.2): because

both perfecta and imperfecta contain totalis and dissecta categories, imperfecta totalis should be a

variant of the perfect totalis that creates less of a sense of rest.

Totalis Dissecta
Clausula perfecta Clausula imperfecta Clausula perfecta Clausula imperfecta
totalis totalis dissecta dissecta
Lowest voice falls a [like perfecta totalis, Lowest voices falls a Lowest voice moves
fifth or rises a fourth but altered] fourth or rises a fifth; by a different
cut-off final chord interval; cut-off final
chord

Figure 3.4 Totalis and Dissecta cadences

76 For all the following definitions, see Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §§ 5-10, 12-22, pp. 27-8.

77 Ibid., §38/39, p. 31.

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 Printz’s definitions of perfecta dissecta and imperfecta dissecta both employ the word

“abgeschnitten,” which is the German equivalent of dissecta: a clausula perfecta dissecta occurs

when the bass falls a fourth or rises a fifth, “so that the falling fifth or rising fourth seems to

have been, as it were, cut off from it.”78 Printz seems to be suggesting that this bass motion,

which is the inversion of the clausula perfecta totalis’s bass, is the penultimate progression in the

perfecta totalis cadence, rendering a I-V-I progression for the “complete” perfecta totalis, and a I-V

progression for the “cut-off” perfecta dissecta.

The clausula imperfecta dissecta presents a less strictly defined situation. Printz describes

it as follows: “Clausula formalis imperfecta dissecta is when, instead of a descending fourth or a

rising fifth, another interval is placed [in the bass], so that it creates desire for the cut-off chord,”

presumably the ultimate chord of a clausula perfecta totalis.79 The reference to “instead of a

descending fourth or a rising fifth” makes clear that Printz conceives this category as a variant

of the perfecta dissecta cadence. Thus, the progression consists of two chords: a first chord,

whose bass is built on some note other than the tonic scale degree, and a second chord, which is

the dominant.

Printz places almost no restrictions on the makeup of the first chord. As long as the bass

is not on the tonic or the dominant (to extrapolate from Printz’s emphasis on the bass’s

intervallum), any harmony should be allowable. Stepwise descents and leaps of a rising fourth,

78“. . . also daß gleichsam die absteigende Quint oder auffsteigende Quart darvon abgeschnitten
zu seyn scheinet” (Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §7, p. 27).

79“Clausula Formalis Imperfecta Dissecta ist / wenn an statt der absteigenden Quart, oder
auffsteigenden Quint ein ander Intervallum gesetzt wird / also daß es den abgeschnittenen Klang
Verlangen mache” (ibid., I.8, §22, p. 28).

178
for example, are all possibilities according to Printz’s text. Printz’s musical examples, however,

present a far more constrained range of options. In each mode’s example of the imperfecta

dissecta cadence (see Example 3), the bass rises by step to arrive on a root position dominant

chord, but the upper voices exhibit a significant degree of variation. With respect to chord

types, the different predominant harmonies Printz includes are IV, ii6, and V6/V. The

relationship between the predominant harmony in the imperfecta dissecta and perfecta totalis

cadences also varies: in Aeolian/Hypoaeolian, the predominant chord is identical in both cases,

while in the Ionian/Hypoionian, Dorian/Hypodorian, and Lydian/Hypolydian modes the

imperfecta dissecta’s ii6 (or II6 in the case of Lydian/Hypolydian) chord replaces the predominant

tonic triad of the perfecta totalis cadence. In the case of Mixolydian/Hypomixolydian, the perfecta

totalis begins with a IV chord, whereas the imperfecta dissecta starts with a V6/V. Thus, Printz

allows for a diversity of progressions in his imperfecta dissecta cadence type, and does not

exemplify it merely with abbreviated reproductions of the perfecta totalis cadence. Indeed, the

relationship between the predominant harmonies of the clausula perfecta dissecta and clausula

imperfecta dissecta is similar to the relationship between the post-dominant harmonies of the

clausula perfecta totalis and the clausula imperfecta totalis: in both cases the clausula imperfecta

replaces the chord normally found in the corresponding clausula perfecta with one that is

inverted or has a different root, which may effect the lesser degree of rest to which Printz’s

definition of the clausula imperfecta refers.

Many of these imperfecta cadences appear to align well with Matthaei’s sense of

imperfecta clausulas. As mentioned above, those cadences described as clausula imperfecta totalis

all have at least one voice that moves to an unexpected note on the final chord; thus, they

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correspond to Matthaei’s clausula occulta, a subtype of his clausula imperfecta. The clausula

perfecta dissecta desiderans and clausula imperfecta dissecta cadences, both of which are similar to

contemporary half cadences, fit Matthaei’s larger category of clausula imperfecta, which remains

on the penultimate chord. The only objection to this parallel is the clausula perfecta dissecta

acquiescens, which roughly corresponds to a plagal cadence, and which will be discussed below.

Carl Dahlhaus, in his brief discussion of Printz’s theory, understands the fundamental

distinction between totalis and dissecta to be that the former is complete, whereas the latter is

interrupted.80 This interpretation, doubtless inspired by the evocative abgeschnitten, is

intuitively compelling, yet not entirely accurate. In anachronistic and convenient terms, totalis

cadences progress from a dominant harmony (root position or inverted) to a tonic or tonic

substitute (I6, i, or vi). Dissecta cadences are half cadences (preceded by I or a chord built on a

scale degree other than the tonic) or plagal cadences. Because modern theorists would not

necessarily assume that a deceptive cadence is more “complete” than a plagal cadence,

Dahlhaus’s summary can be misleading. Instead, it is better to understand totalis cadences as

those where the bass descends by fifth in the final succession (perfecta totalis) or where one or

more voices are diverted from their expected resolutions in such a cadence (the imperfecta totalis

cadences); dissecta cadences are cadences other than these, and either stop on the penult (perfecta

dissecta desiderans and imperfecta dissecta) or descend by a fourth in the bass in the final

succession (perfecta dissecta acquiescens). From this, one can generalize that a totalis cadence

contains both a dominant chord and subsequent chord, either the tonic or a tonic substitute,

80Carl Dahlhaus, Studies on the Origin of Harmonic Tonality, trans. Robert O. Gjerdingen
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 219.

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whereas a dissecta cadence lacks that progression, either because it stops on the dominant or

because it consists of a plagal cadence.

Notably absent from Printz’s treatment of totalis and dissecta cadences, and of all

cadences in general, is any substantial discussion of rhythmic or metric concerns. Such

discussion could have been especially enlightening when it comes to dissecta cadences. As we

have seen, Printz describes dissecta cadences as those in which the final note of a totalis cadence

has been “abgeschnitten,” or cut off; and indeed, the examples of the dissecta desiderans and

imperfecta dissecta cadences he provides in Example 3.3 sound distinctly interrupted to modern

ears, as their endings occur on weak beats. Yet he never addresses the rhythmic alterations that

often accompany cadences that end on dominant chords, alterations that cause the dominant to

arrive a beat later, on the strong beat upon which the tonic would arrive in a clausula perfecta

totalis. While the cadential practice of the later seventeenth century was not at all as metrically

fixed as in the music of the high classical period, the fact that Printz does not characterize

different cadence types with regard to their metrical possibilities demonstrates that his concept

of cadence was more narrowly focused on pitch, and consequently that today’s conceptions of

cadence usually involve a greater number of musical parameters, with meter being one of the

most significant additions.

3.3.5 Desiderans/Acquiescens

Printz’s definition of dissecta raises a question: in what sense can a cadence be both

perfecta and dissecta, i.e., what does it mean to hear a cadence come to rest while simultaneously

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“the falling fifth or rising fourth seems to have been, as it were, cut off from it”?81 An analogy to

the contemporary theoretical construct of the half cadence suggests itself: while the half cadence

concludes phrases, thus bringing them to rest, one also usually understands it as an aborted full

cadence, interrupted before reaching stronger closure on a withheld tonic.82 This analogy works

well for the perfecta dissecta desiderans cadence, which “desires” (desiderat) the cut-off chord, but

it is less true of the perfecta dissecta acquiescens, of which Printz explicitly says that it does not

long for that cut-off chord.83

Further investigation of these two cadence types, in which the bass falls a fourth or rises

a fifth, may help to resolve the apparent discrepancy. According to Printz’s definitions, the

desiderans (“desiring”) cadence should have smaller note values or a brief syncopation, but the

essential difference between these two types seems to be whether the ear desires the

abgeschnittene note. According to Printz’s discussion in the text, it seems that the acquiescens

(“resting”) cadence does not desire the cut-off note because the final chord of the progression is

held for a long time relative to the final chord of a desiderans cadence. Yet Printz’s musical

examples suggest that the two types of dissecta cadences do not diverge solely with respect to

duration (see Example 3.3). In each mode, the bass of the acquiescens cadence moves from the

81“. . . also daß gleichsam die absteigende Quint oder auffsteigende Quart darvon abgeschnitten
zu seyn scheinet” (Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §7, p. 27). One could argue that perfecta dissecta refers to a cadence
that would have been perfecta had it not been dissecta, but this hypothesis cannot account for the existence
of both perfecta dissecta and imperfecta dissecta cadences, since they hypothesized non-perfect meaning
describes the latter, not the former.

82Of course modern half cadences are understood to arrive normally on a strong beat; thus, the
aborted full cadential progression also undergoes a rhythmic alteration. As discussed in 3.3.4, Printz
provides no information on the metrical disposition of dissecta cadences.

83 Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §10, p. 27.

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fourth above the modal final to that final, while the bass of the desiderans cadence progresses

from the final to the fifth above it. This suggests that there is a far more significant difference

between the two types than the durational variation that Printz describes. It seems likely that

Printz intuited a difference in achievement of closure that he struggled to articulate: his names

for the cadences (“desiring” and “resting”) broadly characterize the two types’ perceptual

affects, but he was unable to describe the difference he perceived more precisely. Instead, he

may have fallen back on this durational distinction as an artificial, and perhaps musically

untenable, means to explicate the technical difference between the two cadences.

Dahlhaus interprets these progressions as demonstrating that Printz’s acquiescens

category refers to the tonal rest that comes from motion to the tonic, whereas the desiderans

yearns for the tonic.84 This seems very plausible in the case of the latter: a clausula perfecta

dissecta desiderans would be a cadence that begins as if it were a perfecta totalis, with no

inversions or other alterations (thus perfecta), but also desires a chord which has been cut off

(the final tonic of the expected tonic-dominant-tonic progression, in Dahlhaus’s terms). The

case of the former is more puzzling—what is the chord that has been cut off? Inasmuch as a

clausula perfecta dissecta acquiescens is an incomplete tonic-dominant-tonic progression, the final

sounding chord (the would-be dominant) should be able to be resolved by a triad a fifth below

it. Yet if the dissecta acquiescens concludes on the tonic, then the “tonic resolution” that should

follow it would be a fifth below, and the entire cadence would be a cut-off version of a tonic-

dominant-tonic progression in the mode a fourth below (in the subdominant key, as it were).

84 Dahlhaus, Studies on the Origin of Harmonic Tonality, 219.

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At the pause on the local dominant, that chord’s status as the global tonic would reassert itself,

and consequently the entire progression would come to rest. This interpretation seems

plausible, and accounts for the details encountered so far. (Section 3.3.6 below, however, will

address a fundamental problem with this interpretation.) Fortunately there is another, yet more

plausible interpretation, one which does not depend on invoking a foreign mode. In a later

passage of his chapter on cadences, Printz remarkably comments that the dissecta acquiescens

cadence occurs at the end of Phrygian and Hypophrygian pieces.85 This is a noteworthy

observation because Printz is one of the earliest theorists explicitly to connect a particular

manner of cadencing with a certain mode; furthermore, he never relates this cadence type to

any other mode in his verbal remarks. As Example 3.3 demonstrates, Printz’s preservation of

the twelve-mode system means that there can be no clausula perfecta totalis in Phrygian and

Hypophrygian, as the triad a fifth above the final has a diminished fifth. As a result, the dissecta

acquiescens cadence functions as the conclusive cadence in those modes.

This cadence, however, is far from the only final cadence used in Phrygian- and

Hypophrygian-identified pieces. Example 3.5 shows a variety of clausulas, all of which can be

found at the end of such compositions. The ordering of cadences 5b-g is determined by a

logical reconstruction of compositional development, which the following material elaborates.

Thus, while the ordering is informed by the dating of compositions from the sixteenth and

85 Printz, Phrynis, 31.

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seventeenth centuries, I do not claim that it does justice to complexity of compositional practice

in this period of significant modal/tonal development.86

Before considering these cadences, it is important to address what is meant by

“Phrygian- and Hypophrygian-identified pieces.” As Harold Powers has most famously

argued, the relationship between systems of modality and polyphonic compositional practice

was fraught from the first attempts to reconcile the two in the second half of the fifteenth

century.87 Over the course of the following two centuries compositional practice changed

Example 3.5 Phrygian-related cadences

86Intriguingly, forms of all five cadences of Examples 5c-g are provided by Thomas Morley in
1597 as examples of formal closes on E (A Plaine and Easie Introduction to Practicall Musicke, ff. S3v, T1v.

87See Powers, “Is Mode Real?” and idem, “Modality as a European Cultural Construct,” in
Secondo convegno europeo di analisi musicale: Atti, ed. Rosanna Dalmonte and Mario Baroni (Trento:
Università degli studi di Trento, Dipartimento di storia della civiltà europea), 207-20.

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substantially, and the gradual spread of the so-called “church keys,” not to mention the nascent

major-minor key system, casts serious doubt on the continued applicability of the traditional

twelve-mode system to pieces of that day.88 Nevertheless, the concept of the twelve-mode

system plays a prominent role in Printz’s theorizing of cadence, and it would be a loss to fail to

compare his dictates to compositional practice simply because of the modal/tonal complexity of

that practice. As a result, I have employed several criteria to determine which pieces’ final

cadences should be considered. The most historically well-founded criterion is contemporary

modal assignments, either citations of chorale melodies as belonging to certain modes, or

collections of movements ordered by mode. I have supplemented this with considerations of

the given piece’s characteristics, most notably an emphasis on the mi-to-mi species of the fifth,

and a final on E (or a transposed form of E, if the piece is not in cantus durus). Lastly, even

though there is substantial diversity of nomenclature and conceptual apparatus between

Phrygian, Hypophrygian, and the third and fourth “church keys,” there also exists significant

similarities of compositional approach to their pitch material and final cadences. This leads me

to adopt the phrase “mi tonality,” which Cristle Collins Judd coined, to refer to the collection of

these modal types.89

88Concerning the church keys, see Powers, “From Psalmody to Tonality,” 322-33. For more on
the diversity of tonal systems operating in the late seventeenth century, see Gregory Barnett, “Tonal
Organization in Seventeenth-Century Music Theory,” in The Cambridge History of Western Music Theory,
ed. Thomas Christensen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 207-55.

Cristle Collins Judd, “Modal Types and Ut, Re, Mi Tonalities: Tonal Coherence in Sacred Vocal
89

Polyphony from about 1500,” Journal of the American Musicological Society 45 (1992): 428-67.

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 Example 3.5a consists of a simplified form of Printz’s clausula perfecta dissecta acquiescens,

reproduced here for ease of reference. The next two measures, Example 3.5b, show the discant-

tenor framework of the “Phrygian” cadence,90 wherein the tenor descends by step and the

discant rises by step to form an octave. Back in the sixteenth century, when additional voices

needed to be added to this cadence, they were usually those shown in Example 3.5c.91 Although

this cadence sounds like a plagal cadence in A minor to modern listeners, due to our usual

reliance on the lowest sounding voice in determining tonal focus, in the sixteenth century the

tenor’s E was considered to indicate the modality.

This tenor-focused conception of modality began to change in the mid-seventeenth

century, however. Changes in compositional practice seem to reflect a greater emphasis placed

on the bass: the traditional sixteenth-century cadence (Example 3.5c), which closes with an A in

the bass, fell out of favor, and was replaced by the cadences shown in Example 3.5d-f. In

Example 3.5d, the tenor’s descending semitone is transferred to the bass part, and the upper

voices fill out the harmonies to make complete triads.92 Consequently, the cadence comes to

rest on an E major triad, and the modal final is now in the bass. Printz calls this type of cadence

90 As mentioned above, few, if any, theorists before Printz explicitly connect the Phrygian mode
to a particular type of cadence, so the term “Phrygian cadence” appears to be an anachronism. (Perhaps
the closest anyone comes is the example of a “final” [finalis] cadence shown by Herbst in his discussion of
only the Phrygian mode [Musica Poetica VII, p. 71].) Nevertheless, this type of cadence was clearly
understood to be proper for mi-tonality pieces, as is made clear by its presence at the end of Zarlino’s
example of the third mode (Ist. harm. IV.20, p. 323).

91 This is, in fact, a transcription of the standard four-voice cadence on mi proposed by Johannes
Cochlaeus in his Musica of 1507 (f. F4v). “Mein Lieb ist weg” (Tabulaturen etlicher Lobgesang [Mainz,
1512]), by Arnolt Schlick (ca. 1460-after 1521), concludes with this type of cadence, and is reproduced as
Example 2.7 in the preceding chapter.

92Sebastian Anton Scherer, Intonationes breves per octos tonos (Ulm, 1664), Intonationes 3 and 4 of
the fourth tone (pp. 15-6).

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a clausula formalis imperfecta totalis ordinata descendens, and Example 3.3 shows that it is one of the

three cadence types that Printz allows in the Phrygian and Hypophrygian modes.

Example 3.5e begins identically, but then includes two more chords at the end of the

progression.93 These two have a familiar sound to the modern ear, and could be characterized

in several different ways: as an “Amen”-style plagal cadence (this time in the key of E, rather

than Example 3.5c’s A minor), or as a post-cadential elaboration, by means of a double-

complete-neighbor 6/4 figure with an interpolated bass creating root position triads. In either

case, in Printz’s terms an ordinata descendens cadence is followed by a clausula perfecta dissecta

acquiescens, as comparison with Example 3.5a demonstrates. This particular succession of

chords occurs frequently at the end of Phrygian and Hypophrygian pieces in the 1660s and 70s,

and conforms well to Printz’s edicts that the dissecta acquiescens cadence concludes pieces in this

mode. Furthermore, it simultaneously emphasizes the discant-tenor framework’s progression

from a major sixth to an octave on E by placing it in the outer voices, though Printz does not

speak explicitly of this point.

Example 3.5f presents another progression that concludes mi-tonality pieces of that era.94

This one ends with the same dissecta acquiescens cadence as Example 3.5e, but without the

preceding E major triad. As a result, this progression lacks a direct statement of the discant-

tenor framework’s F-D sixth to E-E octave succession, which had characterized Phrygian and

Hypophrygian closure in the sixteenth century. The bass’s F does move to the expected E in the

An embellished form of this cadence occurs at the end of Heinrich Schütz, “Erbarm dich mein,
93

o Herre Gott” (SWV 447) (Dresden, 1664).

94 Example 3.6 provides an example of a piece that concludes with this progression, except that
the first sonority’s outer voices have been exchanged.

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next measure, suggesting the possibility of hearing Example 3.5f as a variant of 3.5d, into which

an A minor triad has been interpolated, or of 3.5e, from which the first E major triad has been

elided. With respect to the first interpretation, seventeenth century accounts of cadence do not

suggest that listeners of the day used this strategy to understand music, and Printz’s category of

the dissecta acquiescens clausula emphasizes precisely the A minor to E major progression that

this interpolative analysis minimizes. The second, elision-based interpretation does find some

support in music texts of the day,95 but if the discant-tenor framework’s progression were a

necessary conceptual precursor to the dissecta acquiescens cadence, one might expect Printz to

have made some reference to that situation. Thus, it appears that by Printz’s day closure in the

mi tonality was no longer effected exclusively (and perhaps not even primarily) by the

traditional discant-tenor framework of ascending whole tone and descending semitone that we

today call a Phrygian cadence. Rather, motion to an E major triad, either from a D-F sonority or

an A-rooted triad, seems to come to communicate closure in the Phrygian and Hypophrygian

modes.

Another type of cadence, which is shown in Example 3.5g, also occurs in mi-tonality

music of Printz’s day.96 The initial progression is the now familiar, ordinata descendens cadence

of Example 3.5d. After that comes the archetypical perfect cadence, the clausula perfecta totalis.

Christoph Bernhard discusses a musical figure he terms ellipsis, in which two consecutive
95

dissonances suggest that an intervening consonance has been elided (Bericht/Tractatus, ed. Walter Hilse,
pp. 112-4). In the case of Example 3.5f, the progression from the D/F sonority to the A minor chord
proceeds by entirely consonant intervals, so the standard Figurenlehre approach of providing a consonant
framework to explain dissonances is not obviously applicable.

Scherer, Intonationes breves, Intonatio 1 of the third tone (p. 9), but with the first sonority’s outer
96

voices exchanged.

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Printz never discusses this particular cadential event, likely because he would not have thought

that it was modally valid. One reason why that could be so is that the final harmony of the

piece, the A major chord, does not include a single E, the putative modal final. Another reason

is because this is a perfecta totalis cadence in the Aeolian and Hypoaeolian modes, and thus its

only status in Phrygian is as a borrowed, foreign (peregrina) entity, not proper to the key. To

end a piece with a progression that sounds like it belongs to a different mode would be

upsetting to modal theorists of a more conservative strain: to them, a proper cadence in the

correct mode would still be required. Nevertheless, this cadence definitely occurs at the end of

mi-tonality pieces, and, indeed, does so frequently. It is beyond the scope of this dissertation to

determine absolutely whether this cadence is best interpreted as a sign of the rise of

major/minor key relations, as an indication of the increasingly paradigmatic nature of the

perfect cadence regardless of mode, or as an integral part of the modal tradition overlooked by

Printz. In either case, the frequent occurrence of this cadence is a problem for Printz’s doctrine,

and it is emblematic of the discrepancy between musical practice and theory that came to

require a fundamental shift in cadential doctrine in future generations.

For a brief example of how contemporary composers employed cadences in the

Phrygian mode, consider Example 3.6. This setting of an old Lutheran chorale melody was

published in Dresden in 1661. The melody exhibits the range and melodic emphases

characteristic of the Phrygian mode, a reading confirmed by Johann Walther’s citation of it as a

Phrygian melody in the early eighteenth century.97 The broad outlines of Schütz’s choice of

97 Walther, Praecepta, 323.

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cadences in this chorale setting are fairly typical for chorales in this mode: an ordinata adscendens

perfectior cadence (the outer voices of which contain an inverted form of the discant-tenor

framework’s F-D to E-E progression) at the end of the repeated section, and a dissecta acquiescens

cadence at the conclusion of the piece. This particular final cadence takes the form of Example

3.5f, the type which does not articulate the discant-tenor framework’s mi-resolving progression.

For the other melodic resting points in the piece Schütz employs cadences that Printz would not

consider to be primaria in the Phrygian mode. The first phrase concludes with an ordinata

descendens cadence, but in a transposed system: the D# arises from a transposition of the

Phrygian mode’s form of that cadence by a descending fourth. The third and fourth phrases

each conclude with perfecta totalis cadences proper to the Aeolian and Mixolydian modes,

respectively. Such a series of perfect cadences borrowed from other modes is characteristic of

Example 3.6 Heinrich Schütz, “Aus tiefer Not schrei ich zu dir,” SWV 235 (Dresden, 1661)

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this section of Phrygian chorale settings, as Phrygian- specific events seem to be reserved for

moments of special significance, such as conclusions.

In light of this analysis of cadences in the mi tonality, it seems that the paradox of the

dissecta acquiescens, or “interrupted resting,” cadence can be resolved. Printz explicitly uses

“perfecta dissecta” to refer to the form of ascending fifth/descending fourth in the bass. In

many situations this corresponds to the motion away from the final at the ends of phrases, and

thus sounds like an interrupted clausula perfecta totalis, which desires the absent triad on the

modal final. In the Phrygian and Hypophrygian modes the same bass motion obtains, and thus

it seems to share in the character of being cut off. Yet here it constitutes a gesture that confirms

Phrygian character with a cadence unique to this mode, and, as such, this particular ascending

fifth progression has a sense of closure and rest unlike any other dissecta cadence.

3.3.6 The Sedes

One of the most forward looking aspects of Printz’s cadence doctrine is not incorporated

into his hierarchy of cadence types: it is his concept of Sedes subintellecta and Sedes expressa.

These two terms comprise a separate binary that Printz employs to describe the relative

experience of closure of a given cadence. Printz writes: “In order to understand this correctly

one must know that the ‘seat’ of the clausula formalis is the sonus fundamentalis (the fundamental

sound), which is required to make the clausula formalis complete and perfect. This sonus, or

sound, is either expressed (ausdrücklich gesezet) or is understood. If it is the former, it is called a

‘sedes expressa’ (an expressed seat); if it is the latter, it is called a ‘sedes subintellecta’ (an

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implied or understood seat).98 Like most of Printz’s terminology, the terms are somewhat

awkward to translate. “Sedes” is Latin for “seat”—musical chair, if you prefer; it might be best

glossed as “resting place.” “Expressa,” also Latin, means “articulated” or “expressed.” The

most important term is “subintellecta,” which refers to things that are “understood” by the

intellect, but not actually present.

These terms furnish a binary in which cadences either attain their desired resting places

or do not. In Example 3.3 above, the leftmost four cadences all are sedes expressa, while the

rightmost four are sedes subintellecta; Figure 3.2 uses daggers and asterisks to relay to which of

these two categories Printz assigns his cadences. Those cadences that are expressa conclude

with a root position triad with the modal final in the lowest voice. This strongly suggests that

the modal final is the same as Printz’s Sonus fundamentalis or Grund-Klang. In fact, Printz later

explains that “fundamental sound” is a particular pitch. Confirmation of this thesis comes with

Printz’s description of those cadences which have a sedes expressa: “. . . in these the seat is easily

recognized because it is the final sound in the lowest voice, in that it is required to make the

clausula formalis entire and full.”99

When it comes to the sedes subintellecta cadences, Printz provides an illustration to make

his meaning clearer (see Example 3.7). The four types, perfecta dissecta desiderans, imperfecta

98 “Umb dieses recht zu verstehen / ist zu wissen / daß der Sitz Clausulae Formalis sey Sonus
fundamentalis, (der Grund-Klang) welcher erfordert wird / die Clausulam Formalem ganz und
vollkommen zu machen. Dieser Sonus oder Klang wird entweder ausdrücklich gesezet / oder verstehet
sich. Ist jenes / so heisset er Sedes expressa, (ein ausdrücklicher Sitz;) Ist dieses / so heisset er sedes
subintellecta, (ein verdeckter Sitz)” (Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §§28-9, p. 28).

99 “. . . in diesen wird der Sitz leicht erkennet / weil er der letzte Klang in der Grund-Stimme ist /
als der da erfordert wird / die Clausulam Formalem gantz und völlig zu machen” (ibid., §30, p. 29).

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dissecta, ordinata adscendens, and saltiva imperfectior, are all notated in the Ionian mode, and after

each cadence Printz supplies the “understood” sedes, which in each case is a C. The first two

cases, in which the harmonies progress to a G major chord and then halt, imply that the

expected C major harmony has been omitted. The latter two, in which the final chords are an A

minor and an inverted C major triad, are more interesting yet. They suggest that Printz feels

that the root-position C major triad has been supplanted, rather than omitted. Printz describes

all four progressions individually using slight variants of the same phrase, adjusted to account

for the differences between the progressions. In the case of the third progression, the clausula

formalis imperfecta totalis ordinate adscendens imperfectior, he writes: “Ordinata Adscendens

Imperfectior [cadences] have an understood seat, because the last sound of the desired falling

fifth or rising fourth, in place of which the rising second is set, is an understood seat. [This is]

because it would make a perfect (vollkomme) clausula formalis if it were employed instead of the

last sound of said [rising] second.”100 When the progression from the G major to A minor

harmonies sounds, Printz avers that the progression’s proper resting place, C major, is

Example 3.7 The Sedes Subintellecta, from Phrynis, I.8, §31, p. 29.

“Sedem subintellectam haben . . . Ordinatae Adscendentes Imperfectiores : Denn der letzte

100

Sonus der desiderirten absteigenden Qvint oder auffsteigenden Qvart, an deren statt die auffsteigende
Secunda gesetzt ist / ist Sedes subintellecta ; Weil er die Clausulam Formalem vollkommen machte /
wenn er an statt des letzten Soni der besagten Secundae gesetzt würde” (ibid., §31, p. 29).

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understood or implied (subintellecta). In the case of the fourth progression, the final harmony

contains all the correct pitch classes, but in the “wrong” registers: an imperfect consonance

between the outer two voices, the minor thirteenth, replaces the expected bisdiapason, a

phenomenon which corresponds to Zarlino’s fuggir la cadenza,101 and which composers have

employed since at least the time of Dufay. Printz never articulates the nature of the perceptual

and/or cognitive work listeners undertake when hearing such a progression, nor even spells out

explicitly that there is any relationship between the sedes subintellecta and listeners.

Nonetheless, his choice of the term subintellecta, which denotes that its referent, sedes, is

“implied” or “understood,” and his talk of one sound happening “instead of” (anstatt) another

strongly suggest that Printz believes that it is possible for us as listeners to hear one pitch at the

same time that we cognize a mental representation of—or “hear” internally—the sedes in place

of which the sounding note occurs.

To be sure, theoretical discussion of these latter two progressions are not entirely

unprecedented. Conrad Matthaei’s examples of the clausula occulta show a similar progression,

in which a G major chord moves to an A minor triad, and two in which the final chord is F

major. Matthaei’s description of these is concise: he says that they “lead their ultimate sonority

elsewhere.”102 Nevertheless, Printz’s account is a substantial increase in sophistication from all

previous attempts to theorize incomplete cadences, and prefigures Rameau’s theory of the role

101 Zarlino, Ist. harm. III.54, p. 226.

102 “. . . ihre Ultimam anders wohin führen . . .” Matthaei, Kurtzer Bericht, I, §20, p. 8.

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of the ear in hearing/understanding (sous-entendu, a French cognate of subintellecta) sounds that

are not in fact present.103

These categories of subintellecta and expressa also shed further light on the distinction

between the clausula formalis perfecta dissecta acquiescens and desiderans. The initial hypothesis

put forth above to explain the dissect acquiescens cadence is that it consists of “a tonic-dominant-

tonic progression in the key of the subdominant (Aeolian mode) in which the final chord is left

out,” and that at the local dominant, the ear recognizes the global tonic and thus comes to rest.

Printz labels the dissecta acquiescens cadence as being sedes expressa; according to his definition,

this means that it expresses the resting point/fundamental sound of the clausula formalis. (Note

that this sound is not necessarily the modal final, since in secundaria, tertiaria, and peregrina

cadences the cadential Sitz is different from the mode’s final). If Printz conceived the dissecta

acquiescens as a cut-off totalis cadence in the Aeolian mode, then the sonus fundamentalis of that

clausula, A, is not expressed at the end of the progression. Printz clearly considers E major to

be the sedes of this cadence, which disqualifies the Aeolian interpretation of it. The clausula

formalis perfecta dissecta acquiescens comes to rest on the Grund-Klang of its progression, and the

dissecta desiderans cadence desires that Grund-Klang, but never comes to rest on it. Thus, through

the combination of his terminological choices and his concept of sedes expressa and subintellecta,

Printz carefully characterizes the perceptual experience of two formally similar but

experientially different cadences.

For more, see David E. Cohen, “The ‘Gift of Nature’: Musical ‘Instinct’ and Musical Cognition
103

in Rameau,” in Music Theory and Natural Order from the Renaissance to the Early Twentieth Century, ed.
Suzannah Clark and Alexander Rehding (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 69-92.

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 As alluded to earlier in the chapter, Printz employs the sedes to novel effect in his

discussion of the traditional categories of primaria, secundaria, and tertiaria clausulae. While

Printz maintains the longstanding association of primaria with the root of the trias harmonica,

secundaria with its fifth, and so forth, these associations yield unusual results in Printz’s theory.

Printz labels all the cadences shown in Example 3.3 as clausulae formales primariae, suggesting

that all of them should be associated with the root of the trias. Yet as Lori Burns has observed,

Printz’s clausulae formales primariae “do not necessarily resolve to the tonic, as in the I – V

progression, and there are even some primary cadences in which the tonic triad is not present . .

. In considering these cadential progressions to be primary, Printz departs significantly from

earlier definitions of primary cadences.”104 Burns is certainly right: as we have seen, earlier

theorists thought of “regular” or “proper” cadences as those in which the tenor (in Zarlino’s

case) or the discant (in seventeenth century German theory) comes to rest on the modal final, its

third, fifth, or sometimes its octave. Printz, however, establishes a new understanding of the

distinction between peregrina and propria, with its constituent categories. Burns makes this

distinction to be that in propria cadences “one part of the triad is placed in the harmonic triad of

the main mode,” whereas in peregrina cadences “no part of the triad is placed in the harmonic

triad of the main mode.”105 Yet a careful reading of Printz’s text demonstrates that his

understanding of the distinction is more conceptually sophisticated, and it involves the sedes.

104 Burns, Bach’s Modal Chorales, 202.

105 Ibid., 199.

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 In his initial discussion of the topic, Printz defines the propria clausula as “that which has

its seat or place (Sitz oder Stelle) on one part of the harmonic triad of its mode.”106 The terms Sitz

and Stelle go unremarked upon throughout his definitions of the three types of propria cadences

and the peregrina cadence. It is not until several paragraphs later that Printz clarifies that “to

understand this correctly is to know that the seat (Sitz) of a clausula formalis is its fundamental

sound (the ground-sound)”; thereafter he begins his discussion of the sedes, explaining that “this

sound (Sonus oder Klang) can be either expressed or understood.”107 Clearly Printz has replaced

the traditional association of primaria cadence and the articulation of the modal final by the

discant voice, in favor of a new understanding of a primaria cadence as that in which the modal

final is understood (subintellecta) to occur in the lowest voice, even when it does not. This is

indeed a significant departure from earlier classifications, and demonstrates a shift from a

mechanical identification of the note found in the discant to a characterization of progressions

based on their expected conclusions.

It is also worth noting that the two kinds of sedes cast a revealing light on the limitations

of Printz’s Ramist edifice, as represented in Figure 3.2. Sedes expressa cadences are not limited to

one branch of the structure and sedes subintellecta cadences to the other; in fact, many of the most

closely related cadences according to the branching structure are assigned to opposite sedes

types. As a result, Printz essentially cordons off his discussion of the sedes from his initial

106“Propria ist / die ihren Sitz oder Stelle hat in einem Theil Triadis Harmonicae ihres Modi”
(Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §24, p. 28).

107 “Umb dieses recht zu verstehen / ist zu wissen / daß der Sitz Clausulae Formalis sey Sonus
fundamentalis (der Grund-Klang) . . .” (ibid., §28); “Dieser sonus oder Klang wird entweder ausdrücklich
gesetzet / oder verstehet sich” (ibid., §29).

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Ramist narration: he does not list the cadences in precisely the same order in which they occur

in his initial systematic exposition (though the order is, admittedly, very close to identical), and

he discusses the sedes only after going into yet another cadential classification system that is

unrelated to the initial Ramist-inspired one, to wit, that of propria vs. peregrina cadences.108

These incompatible classification systems, along with the discussion of the traditional voice-

defined cadences that immediately follows, demonstrate the wide variety of ways in which

Printz conceptualizes cadences, many of which yield conflicting characterizations and

classificatory schemes.

3.3.7 An Inchoate Theory of Phrases

One final contribution Printz made to the theory of cadences was to link them to the

concept of the section (sectio). His discussion of this matter is quite brief: “Note here that

sections are named after their formal clausulas. E.g. A section is called ‘totalis perfecta

primaria’ which has a totalis perfecta primaria formal clausula.”109 After this Printz goes on to

explicate a supplementary way of classifying sections: by the extent to which two sections are

related to each other, with respect to their durations and the rhythmic nature of their

beginnings, middles, and endings.110 Printz then articulates a rudimentary sense of phrase

108 See section 4.3.2 above for an examination of Printz’s discussion of this classification system.

109“Mercke hier / daß die Sectiones von ihren Clausulis Formalibus benennet werden. z.E. Sectio
Totalis Perfecta Primaria wird genennet / welche Clausulam Formalem Totalem Perfectam Primariam
hat” (Printz, Phrynis, I.8, §44, p. 32).

110 Ibid., §§45-52, p. 32.

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hierarchy by means of the concept of caesura.111 There are two senses of caesura, which he

clearly delineates: the first is a musical division or separation, and the second is a part of a

section, articulated by caesuras in the first sense.112 With regard to the first sense, it is worth

noting that both the 1676 and 1696 editions of Phrynis clearly align letters D and E, which

indicate caesuras, above the rests in Example 3.8. This placement suggests that Printz

understands musical division to be created by lack of musical activity. As for the second sense

of caesura, Printz lays out subsections which can be classified in relation to each other by length

and rhythmic quality just like the larger sections. Printz’s example of caesuras is transcribed in

Example 3.8. Concerning this figure, Printz writes: “AB is the entire section, which has three

caesuras in the first sense, namely, C, D, E, and four in the other sense, namely, AC, CD, DE,

and EB. Of those, the first three (AC, CD, and DE) are related (relativae), because they are

similar to each other in their length and manner of progressing.”113 The term “manner of

progressing” is defined slightly before this quotation as the rhythmic character of the middle of

Example 3.8 Caesuras, from Phrynis, I.8, §57, p. 33.

111It is difficult to assert with confidence whether Printz’s concept of the sectio corresponds
perfectly to the modern idea of the phrase, in large part due to a lack of consensus as to what defines the
phrase. Printz’s sectio does end with a cadence and is composed of shorter, hierarchically nested
subsections, which are commonly understood to be necessary characteristics of the phrase.

112 Ibid., §§54-6, pp. 32-3.

113“AB ist die ganze Section, welche drey Caesuras erster Bedeutung hat / nemlich C, D, E, und
vier der andern Bedeutung / nemlich AC, CD, DE und EB, deren ersten drey AC, CD, und DE Relativae
seyn / weil sie einander an der Zeit und Modo progrediendi gleich seyn” (ibid., §57, p. 33).

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a sectio. Presumably this term refers to the entirety of an individual caesura: because these are

so brief, it would seem obtuse to differentiate between the rhythmic characters of their

beginnings, middles, and ends.

Thus concludes the discussion of sections in this chapter. Yet as Thomas Huener has

pointed out, Printz’s treatment of the subject continues elsewhere.114 Towards the end of the

treatise, Printz adds to his inchoate theory of form in the context of his treatment of rhythm.

Huener demonstrates that Printz develops his characterization of sections by their lengths: his

concept of “sectional number” (numerus sectionalis) quantifies the number of time-units

(tempora), or tactus, that occur in the section or caesura.115 This number can be either whole or

include fractions of a time-unit. Furthermore, Printz proposes a hierarchical nesting of formal

categories by means of an analogy to speech, carrying on a longstanding tradition.116 Beyond

these observations, Printz does not put his theory of sections to much use.

There is much that this incipient theory of sections does not do. It does not speculate on

the maximum, minimum, or usual lengths of sections. As a result, one cannot assert with

confidence that his concept of the sectio aligns neatly with our concept of the phrase, although

the fact that it ends with a cadence and is composed of shorter segments is suggestive. It has no

criteria for determining whether all cadences necessitate that the section concludes, and there is

no indication at all that sections in one part of a piece may function differently from those in

another part. Nevertheless, Printz’s brief account establishes a strong onomastic connection

114 See Huener, “Printz’ ‘Phrynis,’” 129-32, 136-7.

115 Ibid., 131, referencing Printz, Phrynis, III.15, p. 111.

116 Ibid.

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between cadences and sections, and thereby hints at an ontological link between them. Indeed,

Printz starts the entire chapter by defining a sectio as “a part of the melody which ends with a

clausula formalis.”117 The significance of the concept of the section is also demonstrated simply

by the fact that Printz gives heed to such issues in the first place: concerns of phrase hierarchy

and segmentation did not play a notable role in Printz’s German predecessors, and have no

place whatsoever in their discussions of cadence. Thus, although this incipient attempt to

articulate a theory of phrase which could be responsive to cadence does not amount to much in

Printz’s treatise, it marked an important early step in the development of a German theory of

form that came to fruition in the next century and a half with the writings of Koch and A. B.

Marx.

3.4 Conclusion

Let us return now to the structure that contains Printz’s cadential doctrine. We have

seen that his presentation of the different types of clausula formalis follows the Ramist method

precisely, as Figure 2’s conversion of discourse into diagram demonstrates. Figure 3 shows that

Printz’s discussion of the relationship between cadence and mode follows the same pattern. Yet

the strikingly formal structure of these elements of cadential doctrine does not extend to the

doctrine as a whole: there is no initial general definition of cadence, and no initial division of

cadence into “cadence with respect to voices” (Clausula formalis in Ansehung der Stimmen),

“cadence with respect to mode” (Clausula formalis in Ansehung des Modi oder Toni), and whatever

117 “Sectio ist ein Theil der Melodey / so sich endet mit einer Clausula Formali” (Phrynis, I.8, §1, p.
26).

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other partitions Printz might have employed to divide his subject. The individual components

are ordered, but the whole is not.

This is true not just of Printz’s doctrine of cadence, but of Phrynis Mitilenæus as a whole.

As alluded to in this chapter’s introduction, the work is one of a small number of German quasi-

novelistic music treatises from the turn of the eighteenth century, and, as Thomas Huener has

shown, is utterly unique in the extent to which it weaves detailed music-theoretic lore into a

narrative framework.118 The treatise’s storyline concerns the eponymous Phrynis, who is a

loosely fictionalized stand-in for Printz himself. The second book of the treatise intersperses

theoretical discussions with narrative episodes about Phrynis’s travels in a fictionalized Italy,

and the third book presents its doctrine largely in the form of dialogue between characters.119

The first book, however, largely consists of an independent synopsis of poetic music (Synopsis

musicae poeticae) supposedly dictated and explained to Phrynis by Rhœtus, an aged music

teacher whom he encountered during his journey.120

Thus, in the world of Phrynis Mitilenæus, the narrator (Phrynis) takes the content of his

musical forbear and sets it into a new context, his novel; within that fictional realm, it is entirely

conceivable that Phrynis adapted and improved the ideas of Rhœtus when they seemed

unclear. In our world, the author (Printz) takes the cadential content of his musical

predecessors, and recasts them in a Ramist form. And the numerous innovations and

118Huener, “Printz’ ‘Phrynis,’” 140-3. This unusual genre is not entirely extinct: Harald Krebs’s
book Fantasy Pieces has a similar narrative frame for its theoretic content (Fantasy Pieces: Metrical
Dissonance in the Music of Robert Schumann [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999]).

119 Huener, “Printz’ ‘Phrynis,’” 57-62.

120 Printz, Phrynis, I.4, p. 16.

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alterations to that content made by Printz are what make Phrynis’s doctrine of musical closure

so interesting for us today.

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 CHAPTER 4

A. B. MARX, BIOLOGY, FORM, AND CADENCE

In chapters three and four we examined two theoretical treatments of musical closure in

some detail. We found that the Cologne school established the first theory of the clausula

formalis, an initially abstruse term referring to a complex of three or more voices. We then

considered the theoretical contribution of Printz, who provides one of the most exhaustive

accounts of cadential types, together with innovative characterizations of cadences’ restfulness

and expected resolutions. In contrast, this chapter focuses on the ossification of cadential

theorizing at the turn of the nineteenth century. In that period theorists largely ceased to make

new contributions to cadential doctrine, and the concept of the cadence instead became

subordinated to the newly established theoretical topic of musical form.

This chapter takes as its subject the transition from the sort of cadential theorizing

characteristic of the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries to the new, form-oriented use of the

concept of the cadence in the nineteenth century, exemplified by the theoretic output of A. B.

Marx (1795-1866). We will begin by considering the functions that the concept of the cadence

plays in music theory texts in the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, the better to highlight

the novelties in Marx’s approach. A close reading of Marx’s pedagogically-motivated take on

cadences follows, along with a synopsis of his theory of musical forms. This consideration of

form leads us to investigate Marx’s oft-remarked use of organicist imagery, and to propose a

previously unacknowledged kinship between his theory and the field of comparative anatomy.

We will see that the life sciences changed dramatically in the years about the turn of the

nineteenth century, and that there are striking parallels between the investigation of plant and

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animal bodies during this period and the description of musical pieces. We conclude by

situating the changed functioning of the concept of the cadence within the new Formenlehre

established in the nineteenth century.

4.1 The Roles of Cadence in Music-theoretical Discourse before A. B. Marx

Let us now step back a distance from the fine detail of the preceding chapters’ analyses

of the Cologne school and Printz, and broadly consider the state of the concept of the cadence

the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries. Rather than attempting even the most highly

condensed history of all pertinent developments in cadential doctrine, let us instead examine

the roles that the concept of cadence played in music-theoretical discourse in that period.

Musical closure, in the guise of the clausula formalis, first became a distinct object of theoretic

attention with Wollick and Schanppecher’s Opus aureum of 1501. Prior to this treatise, when

theorists happened to discuss the sorts of progressions that occur at the ends of

contemporaneous compositions, and only some authors did so, they did not articulate any

explicit connection between these progressions and the idea of closure.1 Rather, the relevant

comments merely took the form of dictates for the disposition of two-voice successions, and

were integrated into broader discussions of contrapuntal issues.2 From the Opus aureum

1 As we saw in section 2.1, Wollick and Schanppecher drew in part on the ideas of Tinctoris, who
in his Diffinitorium musicae defined the clausula in terms of the idea of “completion” (perfectio) at the end of
pieces and their sections. In his Liber de arte contrapuncti he made a sketchy connection between the
perfectio and certain dyadic successions, but did not develop a coordinated doctrine of musical endings.

2 The topos of imperfect consonances “seeking” particular perfect consonances, to which several
modern commentators have drawn attention, is one example of how pre-1500 discussions of could
mention develop a doctrine that could apply to musical closure without actually making that application.
For a treatise invoking this language in the decade before the Opus aureum, see Burtius, Musices

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onwards, however, many German and Italian treatises began to have chapters devoted to the

subject of the clausula formalis or the cadenza.3 By the second half of the sixteenth century,

French theorists were beginning to dedicate chapters to what they called la cadence as well.4

Musical closure clearly had become a topic of sustained music-theoretical interest in a way it

had never been before.

This newly emerged object of inquiry came to play a variety of roles in different theories

of music. In order to begin to understand these roles, let us provisionally divide them into two

categories. In the first, the cadence is conceived as a basic compositional element, whose

disposition is stipulated by some means; this use occurs in practically all theories which employ

the concept. In the second category, which is operative in a smaller number of theories, the

concept of the cadence serves, in addition, as a means to help explain other theoretical points,

namely, harmonic succession and genre. We will consider each of these categories in turn.

We have already, in the previous two chapters, become acquainted with theories in

which the role of the cadence is of the first type, that of a basic compositional element. Indeed,

the opposition of how versus where cadences are made instantiates this type of cadential

functioning. Beginning at the turn of the sixteenth century, the Cologne school established a

theoretical discourse in which the clausula formalis serves as a special type of contrapuntal

opusculum, II.2, f. E4v. For a careful examination of this topos, see David E. Cohen, “‘The Imperfect Seeks
Its Perfection, 139-169.

3 Many such German treatises are examined in chapter three. Early Italian treatises to devote
attention to the cadenza include Aaron, De institutione harmonica, idem, Thoscanello de la musica, and
Vanneo, Recanetum de musica aurea.

4See, for instance, Michel de Menehou, Nouvelle Instruction Familière, XXI-XXVI, and Adrian Le
Roy, Traicté de Musique, ff. 13r-17r.

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formation which composers need to learn to produce correctly. Although much of our interest

in the Cologne school is due to the association which they briefly assert between the clausula

formalis and musical closure, these theorists do not develop that association. Instead, they focus

on describing the clausula formalis as a combination of melodic gestures, and thus it appears,

within the theoretical discourse, more as a contrapuntal pattern than as a formal articulation.

In the following generations this remained a dominant role of the music-theoretical

concept of the cadence. Indeed, as new cadence types and cadence-related procedures were

proposed in later years, such as the imperfect cadence and avoidance of the cadence (Zarlino’s

fuggir la cadenza),5 they were employed in much the same way, conceptualized as contrapuntally

defined procedures to be learned by composers. Yet these additional cadence types also led to

attention being paid to the question of where cadences should occur. In a manner reminiscent of

John of Affligem’s analogy between punctuation and musical closure, which we examined in

chapter two, theorists began to stipulate that the default, “perfect” cadence should align with

the conclusions of complete sentences in the text being set, whereas other, weaker cadence types

should correspond to “medial distinctions” (distintioni mezane) in the text.6 Thus, the concept of

cadence kept acting as a compositional element to be mastered by composers, but now it

entered, or rather re-entered, a semantic field involving text and the completion of meaning.

5 For the imperfect cadence, which occupies a somewhat tenuous cadential status in Zarlino’s
thought, see his Istitutioni Harmoniche, III.53, p. 221. For the evaded cadence, see ibid., III.54, p. 226. The
notion of cadences being “imperfect” had entirely solidified by the late sixteenth century, as Sethus
Calvisius’s work demonstrates (Melopoiia, XIII, f. G4v).

6 Ibid., III. 53, p. 225.

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 This role as a compositional element persisted throughout the seventeenth century. In

our examination of Printz’s theory of cadence we found many unique cadential types, novel

characterizations of cadences, and a systematic, pedagogically motivated structure governing

that information’s presentation. While some of these innovations, like the sedes subintellecta,

constitute advances in conceptual sophistication, the clausula formalis did not take on any

significantly new roles in Printz’s theory. His novel characterizations of cadences by their

degree of restfulness represent an additional layer of description added upon the cadence’s

standard role at the time: as a class of syntactically charged gestures defined by their melodic

and harmonic content, whose proper employment was necessary for successful composition,

and thus merited its own chapter in most theory treatises.

It was not until the eighteenth century that this heretofore stable, unitary role of the

concept of cadence began to undergo alterations, partly as a result of the concept’s acquisition

of additional, distinct, and more abstract theoretical functions. One example of such a

conceptual shift is Mattheson’s Der vollkommene Capellmeister, of 1739. In this text Mattheson

develops to a remarkable extent the time-honored analogy between prosal punctuation and

musical events, both cadential and non-cadential.7 In many respects this analogy seems to be

functioning just as it does in many earlier theories;8 yet although Mattheson mentions several

different kinds of cadences, in a striking departure from tradition he leaves tacit what the

musical referents of these terms are. He develops a robust theory of where in a piece composers

7 Mattheson, Der vollkommene Capellmeister, II.9, pp. 180-95.

8 See, for instance, Charpentier’s Regles de composition (ca. 1692) (ff. 13v-14r). (Concerning the
dating of this manuscript, see Lillian M. Ruff, “M-A. Charpentier's ‘Regles de Composition,’” The Consort
14 [1967]: 233.)

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should place cadences, and other features that clarify the textual structure, but neither specifies

how composers should make those cadences, nor explains that omission. Thus, in Mattheson’s

theory the concept of cadence operates within a highly traditional analogical framework, and at

the same time is able to act in a newly flexible manner, without the intervallic specifications that

had become so customary. Yet just because most other theorists of Mattheson’s time and later

decades continued to articulate the musical referents of their terms, even if less systematically

than in the seventeenth centuries, one should not assume that all cadential configurations had

simply become assumed knowledge by Mattheson’s day. Nonetheless, the lacunae in cadential

doctrines formed by components which are left tacit can tell us important things about theorists’

understanding of the concept, as we will see in greater detail when we turn to Marx’s doctrine

of the cadence.

The second category of cadential role, in which it also serves to help explain other

theoretical issues, can be seen clearly in the theoretical system of Jean-Philippe Rameau. It is, of

course, true that Rameau describes cadences in terms of his famous basse fondamentale, a fact

which yields several novelties, such as using the basse fondamentale to group together chordal

formations previously thought to be unrelated.9 Yet with regard to the cadence, these

theoretical innovations amount merely to a new way of describing the construction of the

cadence, understood as a compositional element whose disposition needs to be specified. That

is, Rameau’s new theoretical conception of chord structure necessarily produced a new

9 For a highly developed analysis of Rameau’s cadential ideas, with particular attention paid to
the fundamental bass, see Markus Waldura, Von Rameau und Riepel zu Koch. Zum Zusammenhang zwischen
theoretischem Ansatz, Kadenzlehre und Periodenbegriff in der Musiktheorie des 18. Jahrhunderts,
Musikwissenschaftliche Publikationen, ed. Herbert Schneider, no. 21 (Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlag,
2002), 177-386.

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description of cadential structure. It is only in certain comments of Rameau that we see a new

function of cadence layered on top of this traditional way of employing the concept. As well as

being a specified kind of musical event, the cadence also is elevated to serve as a model for all

harmonic progressions, a feature which commentators such as Thomas Christensen and Joel

Lester have rightly emphasized.10 Even though there were several basse fondamentale

progressions which could not be explained by Rameau’s cadential types, Rameau claimed that

“all chords and their progression” could be derived from his three kinds of cadence.11 In a late

treatise he even went so far as to claim that all music (excepting motion away from the tonic)

consists of cadences and their imitations.12

The collection of cadence-associated phenomena in Rameau’s theory, by which I mean

both cadential progressions and other progressions derivable from cadences, thus functions as a

model for harmonic succession, and also as an implicit tool for evaluation. When one considers

Rameau’s claims about the cadence, it appears that any pair of successive chords which cannot

be related to a cadence struggles to be explained at all, and thus would not seem to be permitted

within Rameau’s conception of music. Yet no Ramellian cadence or imitation thereof can

explain an ascending third in the basse fondamentale, and, similarly, cadences are unable to

10Thomas Christensen, Rameau and Musical Thought in the Enlightenment (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1993), 115, 120; Joel Lester, Compositional Theory in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1992), 116-7.

11 “. . . tous les Accords et leur progression peuvent en être tirez . . .” (Rameau, Traité, supplement,
p. 7; quoted in Christensen, Rameau and Musical Thought, 120). See also ibid., 115.

12Christensen states that this “proclamation” by Rameau occurs in the Traité, but I have been
unable to find it there (Christensen, Rameau and Musical Thought, 115). It does, however, occur in the Code
de Musique Pratique (XI, p. 140).

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explain motion by descending step, a progression for which Rameau’s larger theoretic construct

also strains to account (though, admittedly, such progressions are quite rare). Basse fondamentale

progression by descending third is also troublesome in this regard. No cadential type exists in

the Traité which can account for motion of this kind, as the cadence interrompue (descending

motion by a third from a dominante-tonique [V7]) was not introduced until Rameau’s Nouveau

Systême.13 Yet in the Traité Rameau also offers an explanation of basse fondamentale motion that is

more inclusive than the cadence-based account. In this alternate explanation, which occurs at

an earlier point in the treatise, the basse fondamentale can progress by all the intervals resulting

from the first divisions of the string (the perfect fifth and major third), as well as the intervals

Rameau derives from them (the perfect fourth, minor third, and major and minor sixths).14

Indeed, Rameau appeals to this string division process in his initial introduction of the

fundamental bass motions by perfect fifth that undergird his basic types of cadence.15 Yet

although these two explanatory strategies are related, they still remain distinct, as demonstrated

by the fact that basse fondamentale motion by third (and sixth) cannot be justified by one of

13 Rameau, Nouveau Systême, VII, p. 41.

14 Idem, Traité, II.1, p. 50; Gossett, p. 60. Note that that Rameau conceives of the fundamental bass
as an unarticulated, yet fully musical, bass part, whose notes are concrete in the sense that they occupy
specific registers. Consequently, in Rameau’s theory basse fondamentale motions by descending fifth and
ascending fourth are conceptually distinct, just as they are in an actual composition’s bass line. For more,
see Allan R. Keiler, “Music as Metalanguage: Rameau’s Fundamental Bass,” in Music Theory: Special
Topics, ed. Richmond Browne (New York: Academic Press, 1981), 84-6, 92, 97.

15“All cadences however, are reserved for the fifth alone and for the fourth which represents it [. .
. reservant toutes les cadences à la Quinte seule, et à la Quarte qui la represente]” (Rameau, Traité, II.1, p.
51; Gossett, p. 60). This translation is Gossett’s.

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Rameau’s explanatory models, that is, the cadential model, but can by the other, derived from

string divisions.

We have seen that in Rameau’s theory the concept of cadence serves two primary

purposes: its usual role as a compositional element, and also as a model of harmonic

progression. Such a dual functioning also obtains in some eighteenth-century German theories,

particularly those of Riepel and Koch. In these theoretical accounts the proper formation of

cadential types is still specified, though often in relatively brief, isolated passages.16 In addition,

just as the concept of the cadence also helped to explain chordal succession in Rameau’s work,

here it aids in the description of “parts of melody” (Theile der Melodie). That is, in both cases the

concept of the cadence is being employed to describe some other aspect of music, even as the

cadence also acts in its traditional role of a compositional element. First Riepel and then Koch

developed a doctrine of melody in which the phrase (Absatz or Satz) became for the first time a

significant object of theoretic investigation. The hundreds of pages dedicated to this topic in

Riepel and Koch are one obvious manifestation of the importance of the idea.17 A more subtle

indication of the innovative nature of this topic appears in Koch’s discussion of the constitution

of parts of melody (die Beschaffenheit der melodischen Theile). Following a centuries-old tradition,

Koch first reminds his readers that speech (Rede), its periods (Perioden), sentences (Sätze), and

16Riepel, Anfangsgründe zur musicalischen Setzkunst, vol. 1, pp. 13-4, vol. vol. 5, p. 56; Koch,
Versuch einer Anleitung zur Composition, vol. 1 (Leipzig: Adam Friedrich Böhme, 1782), II.1, §§178-80, pp.
239-44.

17 Riepel, with his unstructured style of writing, sprinkles discussion of phrases throughout the
first five volumes of his Anfangsgründe. Koch’s treatment of the subject largely occurs in the last quarter
of the second volume of the Versuch ([Leipzig: Adam Friedrich Böhme, 1787], II.3, §77, p. 342 ff.) and in
most of the third volume.

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parts of speech (Redetheile) are analogous to a composition’s melody (Melodie eines Tonstückes),

its periods (Perioden), phrases (Sätze), and parts of melody (melodische Theile).18 An entire

utterance, verbal or musical, comes first, and then is decomposed into successively smaller

component parts. Yet in the following paragraph, when Koch turns to how his treatment of the

subject will proceed, he inverts that order: “In this section [of the book] we must necessarily

learn to know the material constitution of these parts, from which the periods of a melody are

put together, before we usefully treat their formal19 constitution, that is, the way of combining

the smaller parts of melody into a main section (Haupttheile) of the whole, or the construction of

melodic periods.”20 Proper consideration of melody cannot start with the whole; rather, it must

begin at a more immediate level. In practice Koch tends to treat the phrase (Satz) as the primary

unit of investigation, adding and subtracting measures to and from standard phrases, and

combining them in his discussion of larger musical structures.21

18 Koch, Versuch, vol. 2, II.3, §77, pp. 342-3.

19 Note that Koch’s use of “formal constitution” here indicates the principles dictating why
certain melodic parts can be connected successively; consequently, it gets at something similar to a
modern sense of musical “form.” Yet one should note that this passage appears to be the only place in
the three volumes of the Versuch in which the adjective “formelle” occurs. Furthermore, Koch is not using
the term in isolation; rather, “formelle Beschaffenheit” operates in opposition with “materielle
Beschaffenheit,” a reference to the Aristotelian-scholastic binary of form vs. matter.

20“Wir müssen nothwendig zuerst die materielle Beschaffenheit dieser Theile, aus welchen die
Perioden der Melodie zusammen gesezt werden, in diesem Abschnitte kennen lernen, ehe wir die
formelle Beschaffenheit derselben, das ist, die Verbindungsart der kleinern melodischen Theile zu einem
Haupttheile des Ganzen, oder den melodischen Periodenbau mit Nutzen vor uns nehmen können” (ibid.,
p. 343).

21For a detailed accounting of Koch’s generation of large musical structures from simple phrases,
see Elaine Sisman, “Small and Expanded Forms: Koch’s Model and Haydn’s Music,” The Musical
Quarterly 68, no. 4 (Oct. 1982): 444-59.

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 The analogical relationship between speech and music plays a second important role in

Koch’s account of the evocatively named “resting point of the spirit” (Ruhepunct des Geistes). He

begins his account of the constitution of musical parts by claiming that just as speech and the

other fine arts have their resting points of the spirit, so does melody. Although Koch does not

define this term, his subsequent discussion demonstrates that he uses it to mean the musical

articulations created both by the Cadenz22 and by less conclusive ending formulas

(Endigungsformeln). Koch’s lack of definition is not surprising, since the term is found at least as

early as the 1760s in the German translation of the works of the noted French aesthetician

Batteux; thence it doubtless came to Koch’s attention through the writings of Johann Georg

Sulzer.23 Batteux developed the concept of the “repos de l’esprit” in his Traité de la construction

oratoire, where he uses it to refer to the brief spacing that separates any action undertaken by the

spirit (by which Batteux means something like “intellect,” as the context indicates), and, in

particular, the momentary sense of rest that occurs in the listener after the pronouncement or

composition of each clause in a text.24

Since Koch sought out an analogous phenomenon in music, it is scarcely surprising that

his attention turned to the ways in which melodic parts conclude. In his theory, and also in that

of Riepel, ending formulas, whether identified as Cadenzen or not, are necessary components of

22 Koch reserves this term for what we today call a perfect authentic cadence.

23 Charles Batteux, Einleitung in die Schönen Wissenschaften, ed. [and trans.] Karl Wilhelm Ramler,
vol. 4, 3rd, augm. ed. [Leipzig: M. G. Weidmanns Erben und Reich, 1769], p. 137.

24 Idem, Principes de la litterature, vol. 5 (Paris: Desaint and Saillant, 1764), 98; idem, De la
construction oratoire (Paris: Desaint and Saillant, 1763), 273-5. For more on Batteux’s repos de l’esprit, see
Michael Spitzer, Metaphor and Musical Thought (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004), 214.

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the different types of melodic sections (Einschnitt, Absatz, Schlußsatz, and so forth).25 As the new

theoretical object of melody, which is understood as a regulated concatenation of melodische

Theile, emerges, one can observe the concept of musical closure play a new, supporting role. It

serves to guarantee the coherence and identity of a given section of melody by demarcating its

bounds: the Ruhepunct des Geistes after which it begins, and the Ruhepunct by which it is

concluded. The conception of cadence as a compositional element identified with a special type

of harmonic progression is not play at this point in the treatise; rather, it is cadence, and closure

more generally, that is a feature which helps listeners to parse and comprehend melodic

structure.

4.2 A. B. Marx’s Conception of Cadence

Musical closure serves quite a different purpose in the theory of A. B. Marx, which he

sets forth most completely in his monumental four-volume treatise Die Lehre von der

musikalischen Komposition (1836-47).26 Cadence is no longer conceptualized as a contrapuntal

configuration, as it usually had been since the turn of the sixteenth century. Neither is the

cadential progression treated as a fundamental, autonomous element of musical composition,

and no chapter of the treatise is devoted to the subject. Instead, Marx employs the concept of

the Schluss, a term which can refer either to “cadence” specifically or “closure” more generally,

25 Waldura, Von Rameau und Riepel zu Koch, 34-9, 410-5, 594-7.

26 Marx’s treatise went through at least ten printed editions, being republished as late as 1903. I
will make reference to the first edition (Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, 1837) and third edition (Leipzig:
Breitkopf und Härtel, 1846) of the treatise’s first volume, since the third edition contains some significant
revisions to Marx’s cadential ideas. All references to the third volume will be to the the first edition
(Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, 1845).

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in a novel manner that merits detailed explication. The first subsection of the treatise which

Marx dedicates to the issue of the Schluss occurs some forty pages into the treatise in its first

edition, and relies upon several original concepts which Marx has introduced in the preceding

pages. Consequently, we will begin with an overview of the necessary background, and then

proceed to his discussion of the Schluss.

The first necessary idea is that of the Masse, which Marx also calls Tonmasse and

Harmonie. After a substantial discussion of the composition of monophonic melody, Marx

introduces the concept of harmony as the basis of two-voice composition. To do so, he initially

generates a major triad with its octave by exhorting his readers to listen for those notes which

are immediately above a given pitch and go well with it. Shortly thereafter he abandons this

method in favor of an appeal to the field of acoustics.27 Marx invokes a fundamental pitch and

its first eleven overtones (excepting the sixth overtone, which he withholds for future

consideration), and then divides those notes into two different collections (see Example 4.1).

The first mass, or tonic mass, consists of the fundamental and those sounds that agree with it; its

pitches are indicated by a superscript “1” in Example 4.1. After noting that the overtones D5

and F5 are not amenable to combination with the fundamental C, Marx proposes that they be

Example 4.1 Marx’s Two Harmonic Masses28

27 Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 1, p. 41; 3rd ed., p. 56.

28 Ibid., 42; 3rd ed., p. 57.

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combined with the overtone G3 to form the second mass, or dominant mass, whose pitches

receive a subscript “2” in Example 4.1. Note that because the pitch-class B does not occur in the

first sixteen partials that Marx stipulates, there can be no B in his second, dominant mass;

consequently, the leading tone does not figure in Marx’s initial discussion of closure. As Scott

Burnham has noted, Marx “introduces only as much harmony as is needed to enter into the next

stage of composition”; indeed, the reader must wait another fifty pages before Marx introduces

full tonic and dominant harmonies in the usual sense.29

The next significant idea to be proposed in this passage is the concept of opposition or

antithesis (Gegensatz). In the discussion of monophonic melody which begins the treatise, Marx

establishes the major scale as the “first foundation for building successions of tones,” and

emphasizes the contrast between the restfulness of the tonic and the concept of the motive,

which he purports to be characterized by the non-tonic notes of the scale.30 From this he

generalizes to find the first, and fundamental, of many antitheses in the treatise: “In these we

have found an antithesis effectively pervading the whole compositional art: rest and motion,

tonic and scale.”31 As we will see in detail in the following section, this opposition between

tonic and non-tonic scale degrees forms the basis of Marx’s theory of form, as he conceptualizes

Idem, Musical Form in the Age of Beethoven: Selected Writings on Theory and Method, ed. and trans.
29

Scott Burnham (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 46. For the introduction of the tonic and
dominant chords, see idem, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 1, pp. 62-5; 3rd ed., pp. 80-2.

30 “. . . die Durtonleiter, als erste Grundlage für die zu bildenden Tonfolgen” (ibid., p. 18; 3 rd ed.,
p. 23).

“Hierin haben wir einen durch die ganze Tonkunst wirksam hindurchgehenden Gegensatz, —
31

Ruhe und Bewegung, Tonika und Tonleiter gefunden” (ibid., p. 19; the equivalent of this passage [in
different words] occurs on p. 23 of the 3rd ed.).

218
the simple, monophonic Satz as a whole which begins and concludes on rhythmically accented

tonic notes, and which is composed of scalar, non-tonic motion within those bounds.32 Marx

presents the first and second harmonic masses as exhibiting an analogously antithetical relation.

With these concepts elucidated, we are now ready to turn to Marx’s initial discussion of

the Schluss in the first edition of his treatise, wherein he writes:

We have already seen . . . that the first [harmonic] mass took up the place of the tonic, or
of the element of repose (Ruhemoment). The principal note therein is the tonic itself, and
will most effectively appear in the highest voice. For that reason we will make our
cadences (Schlüsse) with the first mass and in a position like in [example] a, provided that
we do not wish to abandon the harmony and lead both voices to the tonic, [like in
example] b.

Furthermore, we have found the second [harmonic] mass as the antithesis of the
first, just as earlier the scale was the antithesis of the tonic and moved to the tonic for
closure (Schluss). Thus the second mass will now move to the first for the effecting of
closure (c); only [the first mass’s] third note is inadmissible there [i.e. in the highest
voice], since it (as in d) would prevent the highest voice from leading to the tonic and
from letting it close in that place.33

32 Ibid., pp. 24-5; 3rd ed., pp. 30-1.

33 “Ferner haben wir schon . . . erkannt, dass die erste Masse an die Stelle der Tonika, oder des
Ruhemomentes getreten ist. Der Hauptton darin ist die Tonika selbst, und am wirksamsten wird dieser
Hauptton in der Oberstimme hervortreten. Wir werden daher u n s e r e S c h l ü s s e mit der ersten
Masse und zwar in der Stellung wie bei a machen, wofern wir nicht die Harmonie aufgeben und beide
Stimmen (b) in die Tonika führen wollen.
Wir haben ferner die zweite Masse als Gegensatz der ersten befunden, gleichwie früher die
Tonleiter Gegensatz der Tonika war und sich zum Schluss in diese hineinbewegte. So wird nun jetzt die
zweite Masse zur Bewerkstelligung des Schlusses sich (c) in die erste hineinbewegen; nur ihr dritter Ton
ist dabei unzulässig, da er (wie bei d) verhindern würde, die Oberstimme in die Tonika zu führen und
daselbst schliessen zu lassen” (ibid., pp. 46-7; the analogous, though different, discussion in the 3 rd ed. is
on pp. 61-2).

219
At this point in Marx’s exposition of his theory the concept of Ruhe is aligned very closely with

the tonic. Indeed, his invocation of the relationship between the first mass and “the tonic, or the

moment of repose” indicates that motion from the second to the first mass effects a sense of

closure analogous to the transition from motion within the scale to the tonic in a monophonic

Satz. As his discussion of progression d reveals, he holds that the upper voice in a Schluss ought

to conclude on the tonic to effect a proper sense of completion. It is only after another fifty

pages of text that Marx formally defines the imperfect cadence (unvollkommne Schluss), which

comes to rest with the upper voice a third or a fifth above the tonic.34

Yet the tonic note and first harmonic mass are not the only possible entities associated

with the quality of Ruhe. In the course of his initial treatment of the two harmonic masses, Marx

notes that when the second mass takes the form of a fifth, like G-D, it strongly resembles the

fifth of the first mass, C-G. (Other manifestations of the second mass, particularly those

involving the seventh, resemble the first mass much less.) As a result of this strong

resemblance, the second mass’s fifth “can adopt, so to speak, the nature of the first mass, and

furnish a momentary point of rest.”35 Immediately after the passage on cadences translated above,

Marx appeals to this finding in order to introduce the concept of the half cadence (Halbschluss),

34 Ibid., p. 91; 3rd ed. p. 115. In an earlier passage he had proposed different means by which to
present a Schluss in an imperfect manner. These means include having the upper voice come to rest on
the third, as well as contracting or expanding the progression’s expected rhythms (ibid., pp. 51, 53; 3 rd ed.
p. 70). As a result, having the upper voice conclude on the third is here portrayed as a deformation of the
normal cadence, rather than as a proper form of cadence in its own right.

35 “. . . können für sich allein gleichsam die Natur der ersten Masse annehmen, einen
a u g e n b l i c k l i c h e n R u h e p u n k t abgeben” (ibid., 44; this passage appears to have been excised
from the 3rd ed.).

220
which he identifies with the momentary point of rest created by the second mass.36 “Now,” he

remarks, “we are no longer limited to the single resting point of the tonic; rather, we now have a

second, though more imperfect, [one].”37

The final significant type of Schluss present in Marx’s theory, the deceptive cadence

(Trugschluss), also serves as a replacement of the expected conclusive cadence, in preparation

for what Marx calls an Anhang, an extension of a phrase or larger section which is motivated by

the Trugschluss, and which eventually leads to the initially expected strong conclusion.38 In this

type of cadence the dominant chord progresses to some non-tonic harmony. His figure

exemplifying the Trugschluss (Example 4.2) demonstrates that he conceives of this cadence type

as involving an ascending step in the lowest voice, but that it includes far more than just the

progression from dominant to submediant triad proposed by more restrictive definitions.

Example 4.2 Marx’s Trugschluss39

36 Ibid., 47; 3rd ed. p. 62.

“Wir sind also nun nicht mehr auf den einzigen Ruhepunkt der Tonika beschränkt, sondern
37

haben noch einen zweiten, wenn auch nur unvollkommnern” (ibid.; also excised from the 3 rd ed.).

38 Ibid., 197-8; 3rd ed. pp. 222-3. A few other cadential types of comparably paltry significance
occur in Marx’s discussions of modal music: he mentions two “Phrygian ways of cadencing” (phrygische
Schlussarten) (ibid., p. 363), and in the third edition of the treatise, he introduces the “church cadence”
(Kirchenschluss), a synonym for the plagal cadence (ibid., 3 rd ed., 199).

39 Ibid., 198. In the third edition’s version of this illustration, an F major 6/3 chord follows the A-
flat major triad, and the final two resolutions shown in the first edition are omitted (p. 223).

221
Indeed, the roots of the chords Marx shows as possible resolutions of the G dominant seventh

chord are not limited to A and A-flat; they also include F-sharp and G-sharp, and receive

dominant and diminished seventh chords above them. The diversity of these possible

resolutions also draws our attention to the fact that, by this point in the treatise, Marx allows far

more harmonies than merely the first and second harmonic masses. Indeed, his initial

discussion of the Trugschluss occurs nearly 150 pages after his introduction of the imperfect

cadence. In the intervening pages he has significantly expanded the range of harmonic

possibilities by means such as appealing to octave doublings in order to reinterpret the

harmonic masses as triads, harmonizing the scale to generate the remaining diatonic triads, and

introducing modulations to account for accidentals.40

Taken as a whole, Marx’s doctrine of cadences exhibits some strikingly original features.

The first is the extent to which his pedagogical convictions inform his cadential theorizing. As

Scott Burnham observes, “Instead of treating the elements of harmony, for example, as a set of

grammatical instances and attendant prohibitions to be learned by the student before any

creative activity can be attempted, Marx presents these elements in the form of ‘positive’ rules.

The stress is more on what can be done rather than what ought not be done.”41 Michael Spitzer

has developed this argument, making a case that it is due to the influence of the Swiss

pedagogue Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827) that Marx was motivated to avoid

40 See pp. 63-7 (3rd ed., pp. 81-5), where he posits triads and adds the dominant and subdominant
chords; pp. 79-81 (3rd ed., pp. 98-100), where he adds the mediant and submediant chords; and p. 149 ff.
(pp. 175 ff.), where, in the context of modulation, he first addresses adding notes foreign to the home key.

41Scott G. Burnham, “Aesthetics, Theory and History in the Works of Adolph Bernhard Marx”
(Ph.D. diss., Brandeis University, 1988), 86.

222
proscriptions and to place such value on letting students develop their natural creativity

through exercises which gradually increased in difficulty.42 This pedagogical approach is fully

in evidence in Marx’s discussion of cadential matters: he presents only the minimum of defining

principles and strictures needed at the given moment, and consistently avoids specifying

configurations to eschew. For instance, by defining the Schluss and Halbschluss in terms of the

first and second harmonic masses, Marx initially gives a great deal of specificity as to what

pitches can be used to make a cadence, yet gives the student very little information beyond that.

As his conceptual apparatus expands to include all the notes in the tonic and dominant seventh

harmonies, formal types, and chordal inversions, Marx gradually provides his readers with

more information that directs them towards realizing the standard cadential formulas of

classical music. Students’ comprehension of cadences develops and evolves alongside their

growing comprehension of the entirety of Marx’s theoretical system, and, in particular, his

formal theory, as we shall see in the next section.

Marx’s concept of the Trugschluss offers another good example of the difference between

his approach and that of other theorists. Rather than considering the deceptive cadence to be

definable merely by a conjunct ascent from the dominant in the basse fondamentale, as in

Rameau, or in the sounding bass, as in Printz’s imperfecta totalis ordinata adscendens imperfectior,43

Marx sees it as a progression from the dominant chord to some other chord that substitutes for

Michael Spitzer, “Marx’s ‘Lehre’ and the Science of Education: Towards the Recuperation of
42

Music Pedagogy.” Music & Letters 79, no. 4 (Nov. 1998): 497-512.

43 This is not to imply that Printz considers the adscendens imperfeectior to be a deceptive cadence.
He does describe it as a progression in which the ascending second is set in place of the falling fifth or
rising fourth (Phrynis, §17, p. 27), and in which the expected Sedes is not articulated, rendering it a Sedes
subintellecta (ibid., §31, p. 29).

223
the tonic that would form a perfect cadence. This chord will usually be constructed above the

pitch a semitone or whole tone above the dominant of the key in question, as Example 4.2

shows, but there is yet another possible chord that can conclude a Trugschluss. For as Marx

notes, “imperfect cadences . . . also receive this name, when they take up the place of a perfect

cadence, in order to add an appendix to the Satz first, in place of the regular end.”44 This results

in a concept of the Trugschluss which is very similar to that of Koch, who understands cadences

to be interrupted by off-tonic resolutions in the bass, the melody, or both.45 Marx, however,

includes a still greater variety of harmonic possibilities in his examples of the Trugschluss than

does Koch.

The relatively open-ended nature of Marx’s Trugschluss is emblematic of the difference

in the function of the cadence in his theory and that of Rameau. As was mentioned above,

Rameau treats the cadence both as a basic compositional element, and also as a model for all

harmonic motion. Consequently, he aims to explain the majority of chordal successions within

a given key as one of his two conclusive cadences (the cadence parfaite and imparfaite/ irreguliere),

or as imitations of those cadences; far fewer successions are derived from the non-conclusive,

“broken” and “interrupted cadences” (cadence rompuë and interrompuë), whose names suggest

their deficiency. Rameau’s theorizing, particularly of the phrase harmonique, suggests that in an

“Auch die unvollkommnen Schlüsse . . . erhalten diesen Namen, wenn sie an die Stelle eines
44

vollkommnen Schlusses treten, um statt des regelmässigen Endes erst noch einen Anhang dem Satze
zuzufügen” (Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 1, p. 198; 3rd ed., p. 223).

Koch, Versuch, vol. 2, II.3.2, §114, pp. 444-7; idem, Musikalisches Lexikon (Frankfurt am Main:
45

August Hermann der Jünger, 1802), s.v. “Tonschluß.”

224
ideal phrase each chordal succession would resemble the cadence parfaite as closely as possible.46

Marx’s Kompositionslehre takes a different approach. Since form is more important in his theory

than cadences, as we will soon see, his concept of the Schluss is restricted to occurring only at

the conclusions of formally significant sections of music, and must consist of the progression

from dominant to tonic. When other progressions are described as being cadential in nature,

they are not described as modifications of the basic Schluss, but instead either are half cadences,

or are subsumed under the broad category of the Trugschluss, the conceptual equivalent of

Rameau’s rather constrained cadences rompuës and interrompuës.47 This is doubtless because

Marx’s conception of music needs the presence of cadences to be restricted to certain locations

in a piece’s formal structure, a subject to which we now turn.

4.3 Form and Cadence in Marx’s Music Theory

We have seen that Marx’s conception of the Schluss incorporates several striking

innovations, such as his use of the harmonic masses in his initial definition, and the wide

variety of possible progressions embraced by his concept of the Trugschluss. There also exist

similarities to previous theories, of course, like his description of different cadential types, and

the cadence’s function of bringing conclusion to phrases. As salient as these similarities are,

however, Marx’s employment of the cadence differs in subtly yet fundamentally different ways

For more on the phrase harmonique, see Nathan John Martin, “Die ›phrase harmonique‹ bei
46

Rameau,” Spektrum Musiktheorie (forthcoming).

47Marx was, of course, preceded by Koch in his restriction of the Schluss/Cadenz to just one or two
progressions because of formal desiderata. Koch, however, did not propose such a widely encompassing
version of the deceptive cadence, so in that respect the contrast between Marx’s Trugschluss and Rameau’s
cadence rompuë and interrompuë is particularly novel.

225
from that of his predecessors. This discrepancy becomes most evident when we consider the

relation between cadence and form in Marx’s theory, for this reveals that the concept of the

cadence can be understood as an important means by which more complicated forms develop

from simpler ones.

As Scott Burnham has noted, Marx places form at the center of his Kompositionslehre

project in an unprecedented fashion.48 Form emerges as the object of study at almost the very

beginning of his treatise, and it remains “the final goal of his Kompositionslehre.”49 Marx’s

presentation of formal types may be profitably understood as a series of increasingly complex

forms, all of which embody the fundamental pattern of Ruhe-Bewegung-Ruhe (Rest-Motion-Rest).

Since the process by which Marx derives his many types of forms has been covered in detail by

a number of authors, we will dispense with an exhaustive summary in favor of careful

consideration of a few representative steps in the derivation process.50 (For reference’s sake,

Example 4.3 offers a schematic overview of Marx’s formal types.)

Let us begin with Marx’s two fundamental formal structures (Grundformen): the Satz and

the Gang. As we have observed, Marx views his elementary tripartite structure of Ruhe-

48 Burnham, “Aesthetics, Theory and History,” 82.

49Ibid. See also idem, “Introduction: Music and Spirit,” in A. B. Marx, Musical Form in the Age of
Beethoven, 9.

50Readers interested in a more detailed account of Marx’s account of form are referred to Scott
Burnham, “The Role of Sonata Form in A. B. Marx’s Theory of Form,” Journal of Music Theory 33, no. 2
(Autumn 1989): 249-60; idem, “Form,” in The Cambridge History of Western Music Theory, ed. Thomas
Christensen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 888; Lotte Thaler, Organische Form in der
Musiktheorie des 19. und beginnenden 20. Jahrhunderts (München and Salzburg: Musikverlag Emil
Katzbichler, 1984), 19, 30-1, 45-7, 67-72; and Birgitte Plesner Vinding Moyer, “Concepts of Musical Form
in the Nineteenth Century with Special Reference to A. B. Marx and Sonata Form,” (Ph.D. diss., Stanford
University, 1969), 85-122.

226
Example 4.3 A synopsis of Marx's theory of form
227
Bewegung-Ruhe as being instantiated most elementarily in the progression of tonic through non-

tonic scale degrees back to tonic; in his system, this progression constitutes the simplest form of

Satz, a term which Marx uses “to denote a coherent musical utterance at any level of musical

form: a phrase, a theme, or an entire movement.”51 The Gang, in contrast, is a progression that

lacks an internally motivated conclusion, and ends arbitrarily.52 As Marx writes in a late

publication, “Die Form in der Musik”: “A thought that is closed in and of itself is called a Satz.

Its conclusion is its characteristic feature. The Gang, too, must stop sometime and somewhere,

like everything; but it takes an ending only for external reasons – it does not close. The Satz

closes for internal reasons.”53 Thus, musical closure, and implicitly the concept of the cadence,

is operative at the very beginning of Marx’s Formenlehre, establishing the distinction between his

two most fundamental formal structures.

The simple Satz gives rise to the next of Marx’s forms, the period (Periode), in a

straightforward way, by having a second, complementary Satz joined to the end of it (see

Example 4.4).54 The resulting structure, in both its monophonic and polyphonic forms, is a

musical unity (Einheit) divided into two phrases by a half cadence or pause on the tonic, a

51 Burnham, “Introduction: Music and Spirit,” 14.

52 Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 1, 24; 3rd ed., p. 30.

53“Ein in sich abgeschloßner Gedanke heißt S a t z . Ein Abschluß ist das Charakteristische. Der
Gang muß auch irgend einmal und irgendwo aufhören, wie Alles; aber er nimmt ein Ende nur aus
äußerlichen Gründen, er schließt nicht. Der Satz schließt aus innerlichen Gründen” (idem, “Die Form in
der Musik,” in Die Wissenschaften im neunzehnten Jahrhundert, ed. J. A. Romberg, vol. 2 [Leipzig:
Romberg’s Verlag, 1856], 31; translated in idem, Musical Form in the Age of Beethoven: Selected Writings on
Theory and Method, ed. and trans. Scott Burnham [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997], 68).
The translation of this passage is Burnham’s.

54 Idem, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 1, 23-4, 30-33; 3rd ed., pp. 29-30, 46-7.

228
moment of “local” rest which divides the form’s Motion (Bewegung) section (indicated by the

brackets above the staves in Example 4.4) into a subsidiary Motion-Rest-Motion structure.55 Or,

in another light, it divides the piece as a whole into two shorter, elided successions of the Rest-

Motion-Rest archetype.

In his summarization of the period, Marx addresses different forms’ analogous Rest-

Motion-Rest structures. Indeed, in the third edition of the treatise, he deletes the chapter

dedicated to the full and half cadences (which we examined in section 4.2), and incorporates his

initial discussion of those concepts into his introduction to two-voice composition.56 This results

in an account of the cadence that both integrates the concept still further with formal concerns,

and also emphasizes the functional analogies between monophonic period’s resting points and

the cadences of the two-voice period. Furthermore, in both editions Marx explicitly articulates

the idea that music can be simultaneously characterized by the quality of motion on one level,

and by the quality of rest on another. Since the textual formatting of this passage does

Example 4.4 Marx’s Satz and Periode

(R=Rest, M=Motion)

55Ibid., 47-8; 3rd ed., pp. 61-3. Curiously, Marx does not appear to articulate the now common
notion that the succession of weaker cadence to stronger cadence (half cadence to perfect cadence) in the
period helps to guarantee its unity.

56 Ibid., 3rd ed., p. 61-2.

229
important communicative work, my translation transcribes the layout of Marx’s original, which

then follows:

The foundation concepts of

Rest, Motion, Rest,
Tonic, Scale, Tonic,
are arranged in monophonic and then in harmonic (for now two-voiced) periods thus:
Rest, Motion, Rest,

Rest, Motion, Rest, Motion, Rest,

Tonic, Scale, Tonic at the octave, Scale, Tonic.
Tonic harmony, Motion, Half cadence, Motion, Perfect cadence

Rest, Motion, Rest,

This complete period leads us to the two-part form, which likewise is consistent with the
same concepts and features:
Tonic harmony, Motion, Half cadence, Motion, Perfect cadence.57

57 Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 1, 54; 3rd ed., p. 72.

230
 This quotation takes us through the generation of Marx’s basic forms. As the brackets

indicate, the Rest-Motion-Rest structure that characterizes the simple Satz (ascending octave

scale), is divided by a medial, subsidiary point of restfulness (octave of the tonic or, in

polyphonic cases, half cadence) to form the next formal type, the period. Division by a cadence,

or its monophonic equivalent, is the means by which the simple form develops into the more

complex. Furthermore, at the point of division Marx’s layout of the text effectively qualifies the

music as being characterized by motion and rest at the same time. Within the context of the

period as a whole (the Rest-Motion-Rest progression above the bracket), the moment of arrival

on the half cadence (or upper octave) is in the midst of the form’s Motion section; with respect

to that moment’s arrival on the octave or half cadence, however, (as is shown below the

bracket), the event is much more stable than the surrounding music, and thus it simultaneously

has the quality of restfulness, as the “Rest/Ruhe” directly underneath the “Motion/Bewegung”

indicates spatially.

The “piece in two parts” (Tonstück in zwei Theilen), to which Marx gestures at the end of

the quotation, undergoes development analogous to that of the period. It shares the latter

form’s progression of tonic to half cadence to perfect cadence: a Rest-Motion-Rest structure

bisected by a half cadence (see Example 4.5). Yet the two-part form is a more developed form of

the period: both of its parts are themselves divided into antecedent and consequent phrases

Example 4.5 Marx’s Period and the Piece in Two Parts

231
(Vordersätze and Nachsätze) by cadences, just as the entire period was.58 This, it would seem,

amounts to saying that the two-part form consists of two concatenated periods, of which the

second concludes more conclusively than the first; yet Marx does not explain the matter in this

way, choosing instead to emphasize the shared qualities of motion and rest that the period and

two-part form share, and the subdivision by means of cadences by which both forms develop

from their antecedents.

All these basic formal types, which Marx calls Liedsätze, are covered in the first volume

of his treatise. It is not until the third volume of the work that he turns to the more complex

formal types, like the rondo forms. These higher forms all consist of artistically unified

composites of the simpler Liedsätze. In order to understand the likely motivations for and

ramifications of Marx’s approach to these complex forms, we will first consider two alternate,

simpler ways of explaining how to derive his formal categories. The first is to explain the

various formal types as a mechanical tacking-on of additional main Sätze (MS), subordinate

Sätze (SS), Gänge (G), and closing Sätze (CS) (as one can see in Example 4.3). For instance, the

fifth rondo form would result from simply adding a Gang and a closing Satz to the end of the

fourth rondo form (see Figure 4.1).

Fourth Rondo MS SS1 (G) MS SS2 G MS SS1

Fifth Rondo MS SS1 G CS SS2 G MS SS1 G CS

Figure 4.1 Marx’s Fourth and Fifth Rondo Forms

58 Ibid., 50-1, 54-5; 3rd ed., pp. 66-8, 70-1.

232
 The second possible approach to explain Marx’s derivation of his more complex formal

types is more in keeping with his approach to the simple Liedsätze: it conceptualizes rondo

forms as manifestations of the tripartite Rest-Motion-Rest archetype that are elaborated by

means of cadential divisions. Let us return our attention to his fourth and fifth rondo types,

which appear again in Figure 4.2, this time with the spatial arrangement depicting how the

forms’ constituent parts fit into the archetype of Rest-Motion-Rest. When viewed from the

perspective of the tripartite archetype, the final Rest section, which in the fourth rondo was

divided by one strong cadence into a Main Satz and a Subordinate Satz, is divided into yet more

sections by an additional cadence. Now the final Rest section matches the first one: two medial

cadences divide the section into a Main Satz, Subordinate Satz, and Closing Satz, and a Gang

(which by definition lacks an internally motivated cadence) connects the last two Sätze. And

what a transformation the final Rest section has undergone! From its starting point as a single

tonic pitch in the less developed forms, like the octave-scale Satz, it grew into a chord, then a

phrase in the tonic key. In the rondo forms it became an entire Lied form in the tonic key, and

now is a series of Satz forms which can be seen to instantiate the entire Rest-Motion-Rest

Rest Motion Rest

Fourth Rondo MS SS1 (G) MS SS2 G MS SS1

Fifth Rondo MS SS1 G CS SS2 G MS SS1 G CS

Figure 4.2 Marx’s Fourth and Fifth Rondo Forms

233
archetype on a lower level, with much of this increase in length being facilitated by the

expansion of previously simple phrases by means of medial cadences.59

Marx’s approach, however, differs from these possibilities in important ways. Instead of

arbitrarily adding Sätze to existing forms, Marx repeatedly emphasizes the necessity for more

complex forms to be artistically unified composites of simpler forms, such as the period and the

Gang. For example, in his preamble to the newly introduced category of the rondo form, Marx

contrasts unartfully juxtaposed phrases with proper rondos, which are coherently concatenated:

“Let us follow a complete, closed-off Liedsatz with another, existing for itself, [such that the

whole is] without internal strong connection. Thus we do not get a new form, but only a

succession of strung together, dissimilar Liedsätze . . . New [rondo] forms, on the other hand,

come into being when dissimilar Sätze, or Sätze and Gänge unite and are combined into (sich

einigen zu) some whole that is not a mere external juxtaposition [of parts], but is, rather,

internally coherent and bound together.”60

As his emphasis on internal coherence in the quotation suggests, Marx expresses the

progression from one rondo form to the next as being motivated by artistic necessity, “the need

59Main Satz = Rest; Secondary Satz 1 + Gang = Motion; Closing Satz = Rest (Marx, Die Lehre von der
musikalischen Komposition, vol. 3, p. 187).

60“Lassen wir einem vollkommen abgeschlossenen Liedsatz einen andern für sich bestehenden
ohne innere und feste Verbindung folgen, so erhalten wir keine neue Form, sondern nur eine Folge
verschiedner aneinander gereihter Liedsätze . . . Neue Formen dagegen entstehn, wenn verschiedne
Sätze, oder Sätze und Gänge sich zu einem nicht blos äusserlich aneinandergestellten, sondern innerlich
zusammenhängenden, festverbundnen Ganzen einigen” (Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen
Komposition, vol. 3 [Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, 1845], 91-2).

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for a more cohesive unity or a more expansive variety,” as Scott Burnham puts it.61 As an

example, Marx explains the progression from the fourth to the fifth rondo forms (shown in

Figure 4.1) as being motivated by the need to improve the fourth rondo form, with respect to

both variety and unity. The second Main Satz of the fourth form is replaced by a Closing Satz to

avoid monotony, and this Closing Satz then reappears at the end of the form in order to round

off and better unify the entire composition.62 As for the question of the origin of this motivated

need for variety and unity, Burnham compellingly interprets the motivation as expressing the

“burgeoning artistic consciousness of the developing student,” and demonstrates how this

reading is supported by Marx’s pedagogical aims.63 Burnham’s argument is excellent, but he

also uses it to downplay parallels between Marx’s theory and contemporaneous biological

thought, parallels which reward more careful consideration, as we will see later in the chapter.

Marx’s approach to the more complex forms also differs from our alternate method of

generating forms through the division of the tripartite archetype. This difference is particularly

apparent in the way he uses cadences. As we have seen, cadences figure prominently in his

descriptions of the simplest formal types, like the Satz and Gang, and also play an important

role in his derivation of more complex Liedsätze, such as the two-part form. In the third volume

of the treatise, however, Marx dedicates much of his attention to the analysis of compositions

61Burnham, “Aesthetics, Theory and History,” 119. For a compact passage in which this
tendency of Marx is manifested, see Marx, “Die Form in der Musik,” 39-42; translated in idem, Musical
Form in the Age of Beethoven, 78-82.

62Ibid., 41; Burnham, pp. 80-1. See also Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 3,
180-1, 184.

63 Burnham, “Aesthetics, Theory and History,” 124-8.

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that are representative of the formal types in question, in contrast to the theoretical exposition

that occupies much of the first volume. In these analyses Marx takes his concepts of Satz and

Gang and deploys them in a manner significantly different from how they were described in the

first volume of the treatise. Rather than treating them as fundamentally opposed, on the basis

of whether their endings are internally motivated, Marx seems to use them to characterize the

relative stability of a given musical phrase. Tightly constructed main themes are invariably

considered Sätze by Marx; beyond this point, however, his system soon starts to feel rather

haphazard. For one, the presence of the “Gang-like Satz” (gangartige Satz) and “Satz-like Gang”

(satzartige Gang) in Marx’s analyses threatens the understanding of Satz and Gang which he

established in the first volume. For instance, Marx describes mm. 9-20 of the first movement of

Beethoven’s F minor Sonata, Op. 2, no. 1, as the antecedent Satz of the sonata’s main Satz, but

also says that “it finds no closure, but rather runs, Gang-like, into the subordinate Satz.”64 The

Marx of volume one would, of course, automatically consign a phrase lacking closure to the

category of the Gang.

Another perplexing aspect of Marx’s analytic practice is his treatment of the progression

from the subordinate Satz to the Gang which may follow it. In several of his analyses he locates

the beginning of the Gang immediately after inverted V-I progressions.65 Consequently, the

entire Satz ends with a progression so weak that many theorists today would not consider it to

64“Der Nachsatz . . . findet aber keinen Abschluss, sondern läuft gangartig zum Seitensatze hin”
(Marx, Die Lehre, vol. 3, 252); trans. adapted from Burnham, Musical Form in the Age of Beethoven, 108.

65For a rondo-form example, see mm. 44-5 in the third movement of Beethoven’s third piano
sonata, op. 2, no. 3 (cf. Marx, Die Lehre, vol. 3, 179). For a sonata, see mm. 65-6 in the first movement of
Beethoven’s Piano Sonata in E-flat major, op. 31, no. 3 (cf. Marx, Die Lehre, vol. 3, 274).

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be a cadence. Yet more striking is Marx deals with the rhetorically emphasized cadence (often

the moment of “essential expositional closure,” in modern parlance) in some sonata

movements. In many analyses Marx identifies the closing Satz as beginning immediately after

this point, which accords well with modern understandings of the formal structure. Yet in his

discussions of the first movements of Beethoven’s op. 31, no. 3; op. 2, no. 1; op. 106; and op. 10,

no. 2 Marx has described the measures containing the strongest cadence in the piece thus far as

being a Gang!66 In the first volume of the treatise Marx held that Gänge end arbitrarily, without

internal motivation. These cadences, and their corresponding events in the recapitulation,

seem, at least to modern sensibilities, to be among the most motivated, unarbitrary, teleology-

inflected points in the entire movement. What can account for this apparent contradiction?

Any explanation for this oddity must rely in part on the unstable, driving nature of the

passages Marx identifies as Gänge following subordinate Sätze. These passages generally

exhibit what William Caplin would call continuational function, exhibiting fragmentation, loose

hypermetrical organization, sequences, and the like. One possible interpretation of the

conundrum is that Marx was using the term “Gang” simply to describe these qualities of loose

phrase construction, and that closure no longer figured into his concept of the Gang. A related,

and more charitable, interpretation is that Marx recognized the presence of those prominent

cadences, but actually believed that they were not motivated by the preceding music. Instead,

he focused on the continuational quality that dominates much of the Gang, and, rather than

understanding the continuational function to fuse eventually with the following cadence, he

66Ibid., vol. 3, 273-5, 279-80, 282-3. My thanks to William Rothstein for bringing this situation to
my attention.

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viewed the closure of the phrase as being of a fundamentally different nature from the rest of

the Gang. In either case, it is evident that the binaries of Satz/Gang and closed/cut-off that Marx

proposes in the treatise’s first volume operate in a substantially less clear way in the analyses

found later in the work.

We have seen in Marx’s simpler forms that the cadences play a vital role in his

fundamental formal structures of Satz and Gang, and in his derivation of a given form from its

antecedent. As for the more complex formal types, even though Marx prefers to explain them

as developing by internally motivated concatenations of simpler forms, the same approach of

dividing the Rest-Motion-Rest archetype by cadences could effectively generate the same series

of rondo and sonata forms that Marx derives, and does so using only one principle for both

simple and complex forms. Furthermore, this means of explanation emphasizes the qualities of

rest and motion in given stretches of music much more effectively than Marx’s approach to

generating the rondo forms does. As a result, even when Marx does not make explicit the fact

that cadences can explain how the rondo and sonata forms derive from simpler formal types,

we can still understand it to lie latent as an explanatory option, one that is fully manifest in his

discussion of the simpler forms, like the period and two-part form.

4.4 Organicism and Marx’s Theory of Form

Marx’s use of organicist imagery, such as “seed” (Kern), “development” or “evolution”

(Entwicklung), and “drive” (Treib), in his writing is well-known, and many scholars have

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debated its implications and significance.67 Carl Dahlhaus describes Marx’s Formenlehre as

“genetic” (genetisch) on account of its similarities to Goethe’s ideas of plant morphology; he

appeals in particular to the increasing significance of functional differentiation and

subordination of parts in Marx’s rondo forms, characteristics which Goethe uses when

distinguishing between more and less perfect organisms, as Dahlhaus demonstrates.68 Lotte

Thaler presents a more detailed version of this case, arguing for specific ways in which Marx’s

process of formal development reflects the ideas of polarity (Polarität) and intensification

(Steigerung), which undergird Goethe’s theory of plant metamorphosis; she balances this

discussion with acknowledgement of aspects of Marx’s theory that better fit Hegel’s progressive

view of history than Goethe’s process of metamorphosis.69 Scott Burnham, however, offers a

cogent critique of Dahlhaus and Thaler’s reading on the grounds that “a viewpoint which

equates Goethe’s theory with Marx’s Formenlehre (which Thaler’s does in a step by step fashion)

must thus assume that Marx thinks of musical form as a single, metamorphosing entity.”70 As

Burnham ably demonstrates, this assumption is not in keeping with Marx’s perspective, which

assigns aesthetic autonomy and value to each formal type, whereas early stages of Goethian

67Ian Bent nicely situates Marx’s nature-based imagery within the larger context of uses of
organicist concepts in nineteenth-century musical texts (Ian Bent, ed., Music Analysis in the Nineteenth
Century, vol. 1 [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993], 11-7).

Carl Dahlhaus, “Ästhetische Prämissen der ‘Sonatenform’ bei Adolf Bernhard Marx,” Archiv für
68

Musikwissenschaft 41, no. 2. (1984): 78-82.

69 Thaler, Organische Form, 66-76.

70 Burnham, “Aesthetics, Theory and History,” 122.

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development are immature (and thus deficient) versions of the mature plant to come.71 Instead,

Burnham argues that Marx’s formal derivation is primarily motivated by pedagogical ends: “It

is not musical form, or the Satz, which necessitates its own metamorphoses through each stage;

it is rather the artistic capability of the student which grows and requires new formal

possibilities.”72 This pedagogical reading explains many aspects of Marx’s Formenlehre well; yet

there are additional, previously unexamined parallels between nineteenth-century biological

thought and Marx’s writings that shed significant light on his contributions to the theory of

musical form, as we shall now see.

Although it is clearly problematic to pursue a strict analogy between Marx’s formal

derivations and Goethe’s plant metamorphosis, there are several other aspects of Goethe’s

scientific thought that can fruitfully inform our reading of Marx, while avoiding Thaler’s

interpretive shortcomings. One such aspect, which Burnham has identified, is Goethe’s

understanding of the relation obtaining between the general and the specific. As Burnham

writes: “After abandoning his notion of the concrete reality of the Urpflanz [sic], Goethe claims

that there is no such thing as a concrete exemplar of a generic class. Instead, individual plants

are seen as instances of a prototypical growth process; no single instance can serve as a model

for the general class.”73 In a similar way, Marx understands each composition as constituting a

71 Ibid., 122-3.

72 Idem, “The Role of Sonata Form,” 263.

73Ibid., 265-6. Burnham concisely alludes to this same idea in his later writing on Marx as well
(idem, “Introduction: Music and Spirit,” 9-10).

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unique manifestation of the relevant form’s “underlying and dynamic principles,” conditioned

and shaped by the musical content of the opening Satz.74

Another aspect of Goethe’s thought that illuminates Marx’s Formenlehre is his writing on

zoological morphology. The resonances between these two have been overlooked in previous

studies, and reward the careful consideration which we will now give them. Just as in his

theory of plant metamorphosis Goethe hypothesized an “archetypical plant” (Urpflanze), from

the 1790s onwards he sought to explain all vertebrate animals by relating them to an archetype

(Typus), or, more specifically, an “archetypical animal” (Urtier). Crucially, this archetype was

not a mere lowest common denominator between different species, such as a spine; rather, as

Robert Richards points out, “Goethe conceived the archetype as an inclusive form, a pattern that

would contain all the parts really exhibited by the range of different vertebrate species.”75 As

Goethe presents it in his “Outline for a General Introduction to Comparative Anatomy” (ca.

1795), the archetype is composed of three main sections, namely, the head, torso, and rear

section. In his initial description of these sections Goethe characterizes them by their organs:

the head has the brain, the torso has “the organs for inward maintenance of life and constant

movement outwards” (such as the heart and lungs), and the rear section contains “the organs of

nourishment and reproduction, as well as those of grosser elimination.”76 Later on in the

74 Idem, “The Role of Sonata Form,” 265-6.

75Robert J. Richards, The Romantic Conception of Life: Science and Philosophy in the Age of Goethe
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002), 443. Emphasis original.

76 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, “Von den Vortheilen der vergleichenden Anatomie und von den
Hinderfissen die ihr entgegen stehen,” in Zur Naturwissenschaft überhaupt, besonders zur Morphologie, 3rd
ed., vol. 1 (Stuttgart und Tübingen: J. G. Cotta, 1820), 153; partial trans. by Douglas Miller in Johann

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“Outline,” however, he recasts his archetype in terms of the skeleton, and lists many of the

specific bones one should expect to encounter in each of the main sections (an approach put into

practice in the methodology of Goethe’s drafts of tables of osteological data), even while he

draws connections between individual bones and the organs and senses they facilitate.77 In this

schema the rear main section, which he calls the “helping parts” (Hülfsorgane), comprises bodily

accessories, such as arms and legs.78

Unsurprisingly for an “Outline,” Goethe does not present us with fully worked out

examples of zoological morphology, and the epistemological status of his Urtier remains

fuzzy.79 Nonetheless, several suggestive ideas emerge from his text. The first is that any given

bodily element will be more developed in some species than in others. As Goethe points out,

even though all vertebrates and highly developed insects have tripartite bodies, with bodily

functions distributed between them in constant ways, the various animal species manifest that

archetype in a diversity of ways.80 Goethe writes: “After recognizing these parts and examining

Wolfgang von Goethe: Scientific Studies (New York: Suhrkamp, 1988), 119-20. All translations from this
work are Miller’s.

77 Ibid., 165-9; Miller, 124-6. Goethe’s osteological tabulation “was organized in such a way that
vertical rows carried the different bones from the skull and cervical vertebrae down to the vertebrae of
the tail and the bones of the extremities, while the names of the different animals he studied (lion, beaver,
dromedary, buffalo, bear, hog, elk) were written horizontally” (Rudolf Magnus, Goethe as a Scientist, trans.
Heinz Norden [New York: Henry Schuman, 1949], 90).

78 Ibid., 168-9. (Not in Miller’s partial translation.)

79On the slippery epistemology of the Urpflanze in Goethe’s thought, see Richards, The Romantic
Conception of Life, 395-6, 416, 424, Marva Duerksen, “Organicism and Music Analysis: Three Case Studies”
(Ph.D. diss., City University of New York, 2003), 24-7, and H. B. Nisbet, Goethe and the Scientific Tradition
(London: Institute of German Studies, University of London, 1972), 17-22.

80 Goethe, “Von den Vortheilen,” 151-33; Miller, 119-20.

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them well, we will find that the many varieties of form arise because one part or the other

outweighs the rest in importance. Thus, for example, the neck and extremities are favored in

the giraffe at the expense of the body, but the reverse is the case in the mole.”81 In addition to

differentiation by development of one part over the rest, Didier Hurson has shown that Goethe

considers there to be something of a hierarchy of species, in which three-part organisms are

more developed than other types, like mollusks, and even that some three-part organisms are

more developed overall than others, regardless of developmental emphasis on one part or

another.82

The zoological morphology which Goethe espouses furnishes a fruitful point of

comparison for the consideration of A. B. Marx’s formal types. Both accounts start by

proposing underlying fundamental structures that are ternary: head, torso, rear section, and

rest, motion, rest (though, of course, the relationship between the first and third part is different

in the two instances). In each theory there are many types of “organisms,” which vary in their

degrees of complexity and development. Indeed, Goethe’s concept of different animals

exhibiting more or less complex development of the Typus accords nicely with Marx’s

conception of higher forms as the original Rest-Motion-Rest structure made by more complex

81“Wenn wir die Theile genau kennen und betrachten, so werden wir finden daß die
Mannigfaltigkeit der Gestalt daher entsprintgt, daß diesem oder jenem Theil ein Uebergewicht über die
andern zugestanden ist. So find, zum Beyspeil, Hals und Extremitäten auf Kosten des Körpers bey der
Giraffe begünstigt, dahingegen beym Maulwurf das Umgekehrte statt findet” (ibid., 155-6; Miller, 120-1).

82 Didier Hurson, Les Mystères de Goethe: l’idée de totalité dans l’oeuvre de Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
(Paris: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion: 2003), 259-60. For instance, Goethe states that “in the less
developed animals the midsection has a large variety of auxiliary organs: feet, wings, and wing covers.
In the more developed animals the midsection is where the middle auxiliary organs are found: arms or
forefeet” (ibid., 154; Miller, 120).

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by the insertion of additional sections and/or cadences. Furthermore, even the less developed

species and musical forms are still autonomous and viable organisms, a feature which allows

the analogy between pieces and animals to sidestep Burnham’s critical objection to Thaler’s

plant metamorphosis reading. This analogy between morphology and Marx’s Formenlehre also

illuminates much of the organicist language in his Kompositionslehre. For instance, there are

evident similarities between Marx’s statement that “throughout [the Formenlehre] we have

found, in departing from a foundational form (Grundform), as a kernel of a whole realm of

forms, a range of conformations (Gestaltungen) . . .” and Goethe’s avowal that “I am fully

convinced that a general archetype (Typus), which is developed through metamorphosis,

progresses through all organic creatures.”83 Additionally, it is worth considering Goethe’s

morphological tenet that more perfect organisms exhibit a greater degree of differentiation in

their parts, as well as a greater degree of subordination of these parts to the whole, when

compared to less perfect organisms.84 As Carl Dahlhaus has pointed out, there are strong

similarities between this tenet and Marx’s description of the rondo forms as exhibiting a greater

degree of thematic contrast and formal integration than the Lied forms.85

83“Ueberall haben wir, von einer Grundform, Als Kern eines ganzen Formengebiets ausgehend,
eine Reihe von Gestaltungen gefunden . . .” (Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 3, 335),
translation adapted from Burnham, “Aesthetics, Theory and History,” 119; “. . . ich war völlig überzeugt,
ein allgemeiner, durch Metamorphose sich erhebender Typus gehe durch die sämmtlichen organischen
Geschöpfe durch . . .” (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Tag- und Jahres-Hefte als Ergänzung meiner sonstigen
Bekenntnisse, in Goethes Werke, vol. 35 [Weimar: Hermann Böhlau, 1892], 16).

84 Idem, “Bildung und Umbildung organischer Naturen,” in Zur Naturwissenschaft überhaupt,

besonders zur Morphologie, 3rd ed., vol. 1 (Stuttgart und Tübingen: J. G. Cotta, 1820), x-xi.

85 Dahlhaus, “Ästhetische Prämissen,” 79-80. As an example of the formal integration found in

more developed forms, consider Marx’s statement that in the Rondo forms “the subordinate Satz appears
subordinated to the main Satz” [“der Seitensatz gegen den Hauptsatz untergeordnet erscheint”] (Marx,
Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 3, 125).

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 There are, of course, significant differences between zoological morphology and Marx’s

Formenlehre as well. First, Marx’s prose is more suggestive of a single, determinate progression

from form to form, rather than a multiplicity of forms related only by virtue of their derivation

from a common Urtier. Although the analogy between the Formenlehre and zoological

morphology is attractive because it avoids implying that the less developed of Marx’s formal

types are not autonomous, Thaler and Dahlhaus are not amiss in paying attention to Marx’s

tendency to describe his Lied and rondo forms as necessarily progressing from one determinate

form to the next in a manner suggestive of the growth of a plant or the emancipation of a

Hegelian spirit of creative reason. Although the parallels between these and Marx’s prose break

down if taken too far, there is no compelling reason to discount their resonances in Marx’s

Formenlehre. And indeed, as we will see later in this chapter, attending to the organicist aspects

of Marx’s thought provides us new insights into his innovative theory of form and the role of

the concept of cadence within it.

The second difference is that the manner in which Goethe employs his tripartite Urtier

for comparative purposes diverges significantly from Marx’s use of the Rest-Motion-Rest

archetype. Although Goethe does acknowledge the role of organs in defining the three main

sections, much of his approach focuses on characterizing the bones that one can expect to find in

all vertebrates on the basis of their relative size, shape, location, and the like.86 Marx, in

contrast, does not elaborate a framework of elements common to the Motion section of all

pieces, or to either of the Rest sections, for that matter. Instead, his approach makes clear that

86 Goethe, “Von den Vortheilen,” 169-71.

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the first and final sections of his archetype are characterized by a single quality: that of

restfulness. This moment of rest can constitute a single tonic pitch, as in the simple Satz, or it

can be expanded to embrace a phrase in the tonic, an entire Liedsatz, or even a series of Sätze that

can effect a modulation to another key, as in the initial Rest section of the sonata form. In the

simpler manifestations of the Rest section, this expansion will take place by means of the

insertion of medial cadences that have the effect of dividing the overall Rest section into

subordinate progressions of Motion and Rest, progressions which must be understood to occur

at lower levels of musical structure.87 Similarly, the Motion section of pieces is characterized by

a departure from the piece’s state of rest, either by means of the non-tonic notes of the scale (in

the simple Satz), a too-high tonic pitch (in the monophonic period), a momentary rest on a non-

conclusive harmony, or phrases or Lied forms in non-tonic keys. Consequently, Marx’s

approach to his formal archetype serves his purposes well, but seems to diverge substantially

from Goethe’s compiling of lists of elements that commonly recur across different species.

Overall, it is clear that Marx did not set out to construct a theory of form modeled

rigorously upon either Goethe’s plant morphology or his zoological metamorphosis. Marx’s

account of the derivation of forms is too teleological to be a perfect match for describing the

wide range of animal species, but places too much value on early, less developed formal types

to fit precisely the Goethian metamorphosis from Urpflanze to mature plant. Nonetheless, we

should not rush to dismiss the resonances of organicist ideas evoked by Marx’s terminology

and methodology. As we shall see, considering further the parallels between musical form and

As we saw in section 4.3, Marx’s derivation of the Rest sections in more complex forms, like the
87

rondo and sonata forms, relies on a more haphazard set of procedures justified by “artistic necessity.”

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biology in Marx’s writings yields new insight into the state of musical discourse in the early

nineteenth century.

4.5 Changes in the Nineteenth Century

Goethe’s pioneering work in zoological morphology was one of the first efforts to

establish what is today known as comparative anatomy, but he was not the only thinker to

undertake this kind of work at the turn of the nineteenth century. As historians of science have

observed, new concepts of nature and approaches to its study emerged in those years, with the

result that many observers of the natural world asked significantly different questions in the

nineteenth century than had their forebears in the eighteenth.88 In the pages to come we will see

that a number of the organicist ideas invoked by Marx’s text are characteristic of these new

ways of studying nature, and that when we compare early-nineteenth-century accounts of

musical form, like Marx’s, with those from the later eighteenth century, surprising parallels

between musical discourse and the study of nature appear.

Let us begin with a brief characterization of the study of nature in the eighteenth

century. The term “biology” had not yet been coined, nor had the discipline we now think of as

biology come into focus.89 Rather, those studying nature contributed to what is usually called

88An early author to draw attention to this juncture was Émile Guyénot (Les sciences de la vie aux
XVII et XVIIIe siècles: L’Idée d’évolution [Paris: Éditions Albin Michel, 1941], 402-4, 441-5), whose work may
e

have informed Michel Foucault’s famous analysis of natural history and biology in The Order of Things:
An Archaeology of the Human Sciences (New York: Vintage Books, 1973) 125-62, 226-32, 263-79.

89William Coleman dates the first appearance of the term to the year 1800 (Biology in the
Nineteenth Century: Problems of Form, Function, and Transformation [Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1977], 1).

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“natural history,” a discipline whose practitioners sought to describe and organize all the

objects found in nature. The two most notable eighteenth-century representatives of this

discipline were Carl Linnaeus (1707-78) and Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon (1707-1788).

Linnaeus is most famous for replacing the inconsistent welter of names for plants and animals

with a new system of binominal nomenclature, which forms the basis of modern biological

terminology. While Linnaeus was certainly not the first to propose a new, more systematic way

of naming things, his method benefited from its simple and consistent means of classifying

beings. With plants he directs his readers’ attention to the organism’s fructification, and

specifically to the “number, proportion, and location of its stamens and pistils.”90 By paying

attention to these easily identifiable, external characteristics, which Linnaeus took to express the

essence of the organism, natural historians were able to group individual plants into species

with identical fructification, and then into genera exhibiting similar fructification.91 In an

analogous way, animals were grouped into species and then genera on the basis of external

characteristics, although the choice of characteristics was usually more ad hoc than in botanical

classification. Even though Linnaeus’s method could produce rather arbitrary results (and

Linnaeus admitted to surreptitiously considering more than just the reproductive system when

90“EGO . . . Sexuale Systema secundum numerum, proportionem & situm staminum cum pistillis
elaboravi” (Carolus Linnaeus, Philosophia botanica [Stockholm: Kiesewetter, 1751], 24). See also ibid., 100.

91On the essentialist, Aristotelian-informed nature of Linnaeus’s thought, see Frans A. Stafleu,
Linnaeus and the Linnaeans: The Spreading of their Ideas in Systematic Botany, 1735-1789 (Utrecht: A.
Oosthoek’s Uitgeversmaatschappij N.V., 1971), 25-31.

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forming his genera), the clarity and easy reproducibility of Linnaeus’s results led gradually to

the widespread adoption of his nomenclature.92

Buffon, in contrast, did not place the same value on nomenclatural reform. Indeed, he

was highly critical of Linnaeus’s attempts to reduce plants and animals to their essential

characteristics.93 Rather, Buffon’s particular contribution to natural history was his helming of

an extensive collection of widely read Histoires naturelles, which described a great variety of

plants and animals not in terms of their simplest defining qualities, but in a much more

exhaustive, holistic sense, including their behavior and geographic distribution. In Buffon’s

view, the idea of a continuity of characteristics extending between all living creatures was much

more important than mechanical classification based on one arbitrarily chosen feature.94 Yet as

Dirk Stemerding has observed, Buffon’s work nonetheless exhibits the same tendency to

abstract defining characteristics from the multitude of living creatures and plants, since he bases

his concept of the species on those qualities which are passed on unaltered by the process of

reproduction.95 Buffon states this pithily while explaining that the idea of species cannot be

extended to minerals: “[Since] the species is thus nothing other than a constant succession of

individuals which are similar [to each other] and which can reproduce, it is clear that this

Ernst Mayr, The Growth of Biological Thought: Diversity, Evolution, and Inheritance (Cambridge:
92

Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1982), 178-9.

93 Ibid., 181.

94 Ibid., 180-1.

95Dirk Stemerding, Plants, Animals and Formulae: Natural History in the Light of Latour’s Science in
Action and Foucault’s The Order of Things (Enschede: School of Philosophy and Social Sciences,
University of Twente, 1991), 67-8, 76-8.

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designation should only be extended to animals and plants, and that it is by an abuse of terms

or ideas that the nomenclators have used it to designate different kinds of minerals . . .”96

Nineteenth-century biology differs from earlier natural history in several crucial

respects. One such difference is the increasing emphasis placed on the internal functioning of

plants and animals. Stemerding has argued compellingly that a significant motivation for

eighteenth-century natural historians was to create organizational schemes for their often

sizeable collections of preserved plant and animal specimens. Given the state of preservation

techniques, it was much more feasible for people to classify specimens by observing the external

features of dried plants and mounted animals than it was to compare their internal workings.97

Thus, Linnaeus’s focus on fructification not only yielded results that were intuitively acceptable

to most natural historians, but also was eminently practical. About the turn of the nineteenth

century, however, observers increasingly turned their attention to the inner workings of living

organisms, and to their forms and functions.98 Rather than postulating that a single feature of

an organism could express its essence, biologists such as Georges Cuvier (1769-1832)

emphasized the interdependence of organisms’ constituent parts, writing that: “The laws which

96 “L’espèce n’étant donc autre chose qu’une succession constante d’individus semblables & qui
se reproduisent, il est clair que cette dénomination ne doit s’étendre qu’aux animaux & aux végétaux, &
que c’est par un abus des termes ou des idées, que les nomenclateurs l’ont employée pour désigner les
différentes sortes de minéraux . . .” (Georges Louis Leclerc comte de Buffon, Histoire naturelle, générale et
particuliére, avec la description du Cabinet du Roi, vol. 4 [Paris: Imprimerie Royale, 1753], 386). For
additional elaboration of this point, see also ibid., 384-6.

97 Stemerding, Plants, Animals and Formulae, 34-6, 118-9.

The relationship between form and function in nineteenth-century biology is something of a

98

commonplace in relevant intellectual histories, but is elucidated with particular sophistication by Stephen
T. Asma (Following Form and Function: A Philosophical Archaeology of Life Science [Evanston, Ill.:
Northwestern University Press, 1996]).

250
determine the relations of their organs, and which are of a necessity equal to that of the laws of

metaphysics or mathematics, are founded in this mutual dependence of the functions, and in

the aid which the functions reciprocally lend one another. This is because it is evident that the

seemly harmony between organs which interact is a necessary condition of existence of the

creature to which they belong, and that if one of these functions were modified in a manner

incompatible with modification of the others, this creature could not exist.”99 Indeed, Cuvier’s

belief in the interdependence of parts was so strong that he held that investigation of one

component could help one deduce the likely characteristics of the rest of the organism, a

conviction he put into practice in his reconstructions of fossilized skeletons.100

Furthermore, comparison of different vertebrate species’ skeletal systems offered a

significant means of gaining new insights into the relationships between animals.101 Numerous

biologists, such as Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire (1772-1844) and Johann Friedrich Meckel

(1781-1833), also dedicated their attention to the appearances of embryos at different

developmental stages, positing connections between developmental stages of an embryo from a

99 “C’est dans cette dépendance mutuelle des fonctions, et ce secours qu’elles se prêtent
réciproquement, que sont fondées les lois qui déterminent les rapports de leurs organes, et qui sont d’une
nécessité égale à celle des lois métaphysiques ou mathématiques: car il est évident que l’harmonie
convenable entre les organes qui agissent les uns sur les autres, est une condition nécessaire de l’existence
de l’être auquel ils appartiennent, et que si une de ses fonctions étoit modifiée d’une manière
incompatible avec les modifications des autres, cet être ne pourroit pas exister” (Georges Cuvier, Leçons
d’anatomie comparée, vol. 1 [Paris: Baudouin, 1800], 47). Translation adapted from Mayr, The Growth of
Biological Thought, 184.

100Mayr, The Growth of Biological Thought, 183-4; Hervé Le Guyader, Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire:
A Visionary Naturalist, trans. Marjorie Grene (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004), 13-6.

101 Ibid., 21-5, 48-52.

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given species and mature examples of other, less complex species.102 The functioning of internal

organs and systems of respiration, digestion, and the like also took on much more importance

as biologists attempted to compare how different species of organisms accomplished the same

bodily tasks, and to draw inferences from these differences.103 In Michel Foucault’s analysis,

these changes are evidence of a change from constructing a classificatory system for the

diversity of organisms confronting the natural historian to investigating the quality of life

shared by all living organisms, and the diverse means of its manifestation.104

Returning our attention to music, there are signs that the writing of music theory

underwent analogous changes in the decades before and after the turn of the nineteenth

century. When Koch describes musical pieces as wholes, his approach involves classifying

them by a somewhat haphazard mixture of instrumentation-defined genre and formal type.

Thus, the sonata and symphony genres receive separate treatments, yet Koch also details the

disposition of melodic sections within the first movement of “larger compositions,” a grouping

which encompasses the symphony, sonata, and other genres105; Marx, in contrast, merely

addresses Sonatenform as a whole, without genre-specific characterizations. Considering that

Koch’s Versuch einer Anleitung zur Composition is a compositional manual, the text’s account of

genres is directed toward giving composers guidelines within which to work, rather than a

102Ibid., 8, 101-5. See also Coleman, Biology in the Nineteenth Century, 47-53, and Paul Lawrence
Farber, Finding Order in Nature: The Naturalist Tradition from Linnaeus to E.O. Wilson (Baltimore: Johns
Hopkins University Press, 2000), 42-4.

103 Ibid., 123-35; Stemerding, Plants, Animals and Formulae, 142-6.

104 Foucault, The Order of Things, 226-32, 263-79, esp. 268-71.

105 Koch, Versuch, vol. 3 (Leipzig: Adam Friedrich Böhme, 1793), XXX.

252
diagnostic method intended to identify the category of an unknown work. The most reliable

guidelines Koch provides are of easily observable external characteristics: the overall

disposition of pieces into lengthy “main periods” (Hauptperioden) (the equivalent of a sonata’s

exposition or development), and then into constituent periods (Perioden), each of which usually

concludes with a strong cadence. Moments of moderately subjective observations do occur,

such as describing the second period of a sonata as being “sweet, expressive, and tender.”106 Yet

for the most part discussions of genre and form by Koch and his contemporaries, like Kollmann

and Galeazzi, gravitate toward describing musical organization and form in terms of periods in

certain keys that conclude with strong cadences, and to comparing different genres with respect

to their relative grandness, simplicity of subject, thematic expansiveness, and the like.107

The beginning of the nineteenth century saw the development of a remarkably different

way to describe musical compositions. As Ian Bent has compellingly demonstrated in his Music

Analysis in the Nineteenth Century, a proto-hermeneutic style of musical discourse arose in the

years about the turn of the nineteenth century.108 This new approach to describing music was

often directed toward a broad musical public, and took a variety of forms, such as E.T.A.

Hoffmann’s famous analysis of Beethoven’s fifth symphony, in which vivid metaphors for the

106 Francesco Galeazzi, Elementi teorico-pratici di Musica con un Saggio sopra l’Arte di Suonare il
Violino, vol. 2 (Rome: Michele Puccinelli, 1796), 256. Translation adapted from Bathia Churgin, “Francesco
Galeazzi’s Description (1796) of Sonata Form.” Journal of the American Musicological Society 21, no. 2
(Summer 1968), 193.

107Augustus Frederic Christopher Kollmann, An Essay on Practical Musical Composition, according

to the Nature of that Science and the Principles of the Greatest Musical Authors (London: the author, 1799), 15;
Koch, Versuch, vol. 3, 305-6, 315-6, 330-3.

Ian Bent, ed., Music Analysis in the Nineteenth Century, vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge
108

University Press, 1994), 14-9.

253
effects of the music on listeners are mixed with fine-grained technical descriptions, and Jérôme-

Joseph de Momigny’s practice of setting words to instrumental music or providing stage

directions for it, in an attempt to convey the music’s sentiments.109 In contrast to the focus on

external characteristics of phrase and modulation that is typical of the descriptions of musical

pieces in eighteenth-century composition treatises, many of those nineteenth-century analyses

which are described as “hermeneutic” by Bent attempt to penetrate deeper into the internal

qualities of music: into the mind and intentions of the composer, the effects of the music on the

inmost being of listeners, or the artistic content and meaning of the music. Even composition

manuals reflected this change, as the presence of Momigny’s analysis in his composition text

demonstrates, as do the lengthy discussions of works by Beethoven in the third volume of

Marx’s Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition.110

With these overviews of biological and music-theoretical changes in mind, certain

parallels become evident. In the eighteenth century natural historians and music pedagogues

were confronted with a variety of phenomena for which existing conceptual frameworks did

not sufficiently account. Previously unknown plant and animal specimens were brought to

Western Europe, spurring natural historians to seek each species’ defining features in order to

classify them efficiently and consistently. Similarly, compositional practice in the later

eighteenth century began to coalesce into a collection of genres which, even when they were

labeled with previously existing names, exhibited a significant degree of uniformity within each

109 Hoffmann’s analysis is translated in ibid., 145-60. Concerning Momigny, see ibid., 127-40.

For a comparatively brief example, see his discussion of the finale of Beethoven’s Waldstein
110

sonata (Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition, vol. 3, 162-9).

254
genre, leading music pedagogues to attempt to abstract those genres’ defining characteristics.

Easily observable, even quantifiable “external” features were valuable in both fields: the

number, proportion, size, and location of the stamen and pistils in Linnaeus’s system, and the

number of phrases ending with strong cadences, along with their keys in the case of Koch,

Kollmann, and others.

By the early nineteenth century, however, these approaches had in many respects run

their course. Biologists turned their attention to the internal features of organisms, such as

skeletal structures and physiological systems like respiration and nutrition, seeking insight into

the varieties and uniformities through which life could be expressed. Accounts of musical

compositions developed a new focus on their inner workings, both in terms of composers’

intentions and listeners’ perceptions. This concern with characterizing music’s quality is also

reflected in Marx’s emphasis on the qualities of motion and rest, and elaboration of a system in

which a moment may be restful within the context of a stretch of music with an overall

character of motion, and so forth. At the same time, this system’s reliance on characterizing

moments within the context of a tripartite pattern of rest-motion-rest bears similarities both to

the three-part archetype in Goethe’s zoological morphology, and to the widespread concept in

biology of the subordination of parts, which emphasizes the dependence of any given body part

on the entirety of the organism from which it comes.

How should we understand these similarities? Did Marx set out to perform

comparative anatomy on musical bodies? While, as Dahlhaus has noted, Marx was a tireless

255
reader,111 making it plausible that he had come into contact with the scientific writings of the

esteemed Goethe, the similarities between Marx’s Formenlehre and Goethe’s morphology are not

abundant and exact enough to suggest that Marx intended to construct a Goethian model of

musical morphology. Parallels between his Formenlehre and nineteenth-century biological

thought certainly exist, but they are only one component in the complex admixture of

biological, idealist-historical, pedagogical, and strictly musical concerns that Scott Burnham’s

work has admirably elucidated. Are the similarities due to a Foucauldian epistemic rupture,

which gave rise to one style of natural history (and compositional texts) before 1800, and

another kind of biology (and Formenlehre) afterward? The transition from classifying objects

based on external characteristics to uncovering the inner structures and functioning of

organisms certainly resonates with Foucault’s hypothesis of the nineteenth-century change of

episteme. Yet moving the explicative onus onto an unconscious substrate of thought has definite

drawbacks, even apart from the well-known weaknesses of Foucault’s original epistemic

hypothesis. It diverts our attention from meaningful continuities in praxis that would undercut

that hypothesis, as Dirk Stemerding has shown,112 and it can tend to shift the terms of the

discussion from active engagement with the relevant particulars to abstract debate about the

merits of Foucault’s theorizing.

While Marx was not constructing a rigorously Goethian morphology, we should not

discount the significance of the nineteenth-century tendency of Marx and others to conceive of

musical pieces as organisms, in the sense of contemporaneous biological thought. When one

111 Dahlhaus, “Ästhetische Prämissen,” 75.

112 Stemerding, Plants, Animals and Formulae, 179-81.

256
begins to think of compositions as organisms, new questions become relevant. What makes all

the different parts of a piece, its themes and key changes, cohere? What is the seed (Kern) from

which the organism developed? How can one explain the development or evolution

(Entwicklung) from this seed into a fully developed organism? What structural regularities exist

between organisms that are traditionally considered to be unrelated? How do the different

parts of the organism function, and how are those functions subsumed to the operation of the

organism as a whole? These latter questions, in particular, could easily explain why Marx

sought out an archetype undergirding all compositions, why he developed a system for

characterizing the restfulness or motion of different stretches of music, and why he built his

compositional method around the study of musical form, not received notions of genre.

And after all, it should not surprise us that ideas from biology might affect musical

discourse. Marx, and many others, surely saw the innovations and resulting cultural prestige of

biological study, and evidently desired to couch their own writings in that field’s terminology

and conceptual apparatus when it served their purposes.113 Furthermore, both biology and

Formenlehre were undergoing development in the same cultural milieu. Considering that

numerous scholars in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries made contributions in both

artistic and scientific fields, it is scarcely surprising that aspects of methodology and intellectual

habitus might be shared between fields that appear quite unrelated today.114 Thus, by appealing

Lotte Thaler discusses many other authors who adopt organicist concepts and terminology,
113

including Otto Klauwell, Salomon Jadassohn, and Hugo Leichtentritt (Organische Form, 5, 18, passim).

114 In addition to Goethe’s scientific and poetic endeavors, one could also cite Leonhard Euler
(1707-83) and Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-94) as additional exemplars of scholars who made both
scientific and music-theoretic contributions.

257
both to Marx’s intentional adoption of organicist concepts and his being situated in a

nineteenth-century context, we can attempt to chart a sort of via media between emphasizing

authors’ unwitting subservience to an undergirding frame of knowledge at the expense of their

agency, and extolling authors’ intentionality to the point of ignoring the intellectual culture in

which they are situated.

4.6 Conclusion

Those transformative years about the turn of the nineteenth century saw yet another

change: the start of our final period of cadential theorizing. Since the dawn of the sixteenth

century, with the innovations of the Cologne school, the cadence had been a mainstay of

theoretical discussion. Even as scholars differed in their opinions of how many cadences should

be postulated, and whether to describe cadences in terms of how there were constructed or

where they were located, a common understanding of the cadence as an obligatory element of

music-theoretic discourse was assumed. In Marx’s writings, however, the concept of the

cadence is deployed in a fashion that does not accord with texts from previous centuries. One

difference is the manner in which Marx presents his cadential ideas. Instead of laying out a

fully formed doctrine of the cadence, Marx gradually disperses cadential details, providing his

readers only as much information as they need at that point in their artistic formation. Another

difference is the relationship between the concept of the cadence and his theory of musical form.

In the late eighteenth century, period-ending cadences, and their keys, were crucial

258
characteristics for the delineation of genres and forms by authors such as Koch and Galeazzi.115

Marx, however, appeals to cadences not as a characteristic useful for diagnosing a given

specimen’s genre, but instead as a means by which simple formal structures develop

organically into more complex formations. The concept of the cadence has been repurposed

from an independent, necessary component of music treatises to an idea that is now dependent

on the concept of musical form, consequently is no longer an autonomous topic of theoretical

interest.

This subordination of cadential theorizing to formal concerns is unlikely to be reducible

to just one cause, but we can identify some of the factors that contributed to it. One factor is the

nineteenth-century rise in organicist metaphors for music. As this chapter has demonstrated,

nineteenth century biology and Formenlehre both sought to characterize the internal functioning

of organisms, and to uncover the structural similarities between seemingly unrelated species.

Furthermore, Marx shared many biologists’ desire to explain the developmental processes by

which a diversity of organisms become manifested. The adoption of the analogy between the

musical piece and the organism focused the attention of music scholars on the artistically

unified composition as a whole, more than on individual chordal successions.116 It also

prompted music scholars to ask new questions about the nature of that organism, questions

115Vasili Byros argues for the importance of cadences in the perception of Koch’s version of the
sonata form in “‘Hauptruhepuncte des Geistes’: Punctuation Schemas and the Late-Eighteenth-Century
Sonata,” in What is a Cadence?: Theoretical and Analytical Perspectives on Cadences in the Classical Repertoire,
ed. Markus Neuwirth and Pieter Bergé (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2015), 215-51.

Thaler identifies conceptions of the organically unified whole in the writings of Jadassohn,
116

Klauwell, Marx, Riemann, and others (Organische Form, 35-42).

259
which led to the identification of musical form as a central object of musical inquiry, and to the

increasing subordination of the concept of the cadence to the topic of musical form.

Another factor that contributed to the cadence’s subordination in our third period is the

evolution of compositional practice. During the later eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries

the regular occurrence of cadences were a particularly crucial means by which compositional

comprehensibility was communicated.117 While, as we have seen, the analogy between musical

closure and punctuation stretches back to the very origins of music theory in Western Europe, it

rings especially true in the music of the classical era, which is reflected in the diagnostic role of

cadences in many modern Formenlehre texts. In the later nineteenth century, in contrast,

regularly recurring cadences are far less necessary. Indeed, long stretches of Wagner’s music,

and even compositions by Brahms, seem at times to thematize the avoidance of usual cadential

progressions.118 Musical practice was moving away from the traditional cadential formulas, but

no alternative that was subject to easy systematization arose to take their place. For this reason

it is less surprising that the previous centuries’ tradition of cadential theorizing ceased to hold

pride of place in new music theories, and in the later nineteenth century was often relegated, in

an ossified form, to more rudimentary levels of musical education.119

117Danuta Mirka, “Punctuation and Sense in Late-Eighteenth-Century Music,” Journal of Music

Theory 52, no. 2 (Fall 2010): 238-9.

William Kinderman, “Das ‘Geheimnis der Form’ in Wagners ‘Tristan und Isolde,’” Archiv für
118

Musikwissenschaft 41, no. 3 (1983): 186-7. See Brahms’s “Intermezzo in F minor,” Op. 118, no. 4, for a fine
example of a piece that postpones a strong arrival on the tonic until the very end of the composition.

119 See, for instance, E. F. Richter’s popular textbook, which explicitly spells out how to form
cadences with full examples; even Richter’s treatment, however, is gradually meted out over the course of
the treatise, perhaps thanks to Marx’s approach (Lehrbuch der Harmonie, 3rd ed. [Leipzig: Breitkopf und
Härtel, 1860], 20-1, 27-8, 40-3, 69-70, 194-6).

260
 That is not to say, however, that cadences ceased to be mentioned in ambitious theory

texts of the third period. Even as the traditional cadential theorizing which characterized the

second period slid into obsolescence, and attention shifted instead to the entire composition,

which was seen as an organically unified whole, the concept of the cadence was still employed

by prominent music theorists as they sought to describe the musical form of entire

compositions. We will briefly consider the theoretical output of Hugo Riemann, Arnold

Schoenberg, and Heinrich Schenker, for whom the concept of the cadence served as an

explanatory metaphor for the form of whole pieces. In Riemann’s first work, “Musikalische

Logik,” he describes his “great cadence” (große Cadenz) (defined as “C-F-C-G-C”) as the

“prototype (Typus) of all musical form,” presumably because it serves as the foundation from

which he derives the functions of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis.120 The significance of these

functions for entire compositions cannot be under-estimated, since in “Musikalische Logik”

Riemann aims to explain “how the freest and most complex of harmonic and metric formations

evolve from the simplest principle of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis . . .”121 Schoenberg’s use of

the cadence to describe the formal structure of entire pieces is more straightforward: at several

points in his writings he describes a resemblance between pieces and cadences, and writes of

120 “Diese Gestalt der Cadenz ist der Typus aller musikalischen Form” (Hugo Riemann [as
Hugibert Ries], “Musikalische Logik: Ein Beitrag zur Theorie der Musik,” Neue Zeitschrift für Musik 68, no.
28 [1872]: 280; trans. Kevin Mooney as “Musical Logic: A Contribution to the Theory of Music,” Journal of
Music Theory 44, no. 1 [2000]: 101-2). For more on this cadence, see Kevin Mooney, “Hugo Riemann's
Debut as a Music Theorist,” Journal of Music Theory 44, no. 1 (2000): 81-99.

“Wir werden sehen, wie sich aus dem einfachsten Princip von These, Antithese und Synthese,
121

entsprechend dem Hauptmann’schen Octav-, Quint- und Terzbegriff, die freisten und complicirtesten
harmonischen wie metrischen Bildungen entwickeln” (ibid.; Mooney, p. 101). Translation by Mooney.

261
musical phrases corresponding to different elements in a cadential progression.122 Schenker

similarly invokes the cadence as a model for whole compositions. His concept of the Ursatz,

which embraces a tonic-dominant-tonic harmonic progression with melodic closure on the tonic

scale degree, constitutes the foundation of entire pieces, and is likened by Schenker to a cadence

(a term which Schenker uses to refer to a wide variety of V-I progressions).123 Thus, even as the

defining details of the traditional cadential categories ossified in theoretical discourse, certain

scholars repurposed the concept of the cadence, in a highly abstract fashion, for their treatments

of entire pieces and the artistic impetus which give them structure.

Through the course of this dissertation we have observed many significant changes in

the theorizing of musical closure, and the concept of the cadence. In our first period, we looked

at how John of Affligem and his peers borrowed ideas from the grammatico-rhetorical tradition

in order to grapple with the syntactic structure of chant melodies. Our second period saw the

Cologne school initiate theorizing of the concept of the cadence with their idea of the clausula

formalis, and Printz develop that concept in ways both profound and risible. In the late

eighteenth century cadences were still functioning as an obligatory element of theoretic

discourse, even as it was employed for the purposes of identifying musical genres and forms.

Indeed, it was not until the nineteenth century that the concept of the cadence began to function

122 Arnold Schoenberg, The Musical Idea and the Logic, Technique, and Art of Its Presentation, ed. and
trans. Patricia Carpenter and Severine Neff (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), 358–59; cited in
William E. Caplin, “The Classical Cadence: Conceptions and Misconceptions,” Journal of the American
Musicological Society 57, no. 1 (Spring 2004), 60.

Heinrich Schenker, Free Composition, ed. and trans. Ernst Oster (New York: Longman, 1979), 16.
123

For his most thorough discussion of cadences, see idem, Harmonielehre (Stuttgart: J.G. Cotta'sche
Buchhandlung Nachfolger, 1906), §§119-124, pp. 287-311.

262
in a new way, thereby beginning our third period. Buffeted by the forces of potent organicism-

based conceptualizations of music and changes in compositional style, the concept of the

cadence ceded its former place of importance in music theory to the newly ascendant subject of

musical form, to which it, in an ossified state, served as a mere accessory. In this capacity it

helped authors to describe the relationships between different formal types, and even to

conceptualize the formal structure of entire pieces. The concept of the cadence, a formerly

august subject of theoretical concern, was no longer an autonomous object of theoretical

interest, but instead served as an adjutant to nineteenth- and twentieth-century discourses of

musical form that laid the groundwork for contemporary music theory.

263
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