(Fr.; Provençal estampida; It. istanpitta; Lat. stantipes).
A dance and poetic form known in France and Italy during the 13th and 14th centuries. It is the only medieval dance for which both descriptions and a clearly named repertory survive. Two meanings of the word have been proposed: ‘stamping dance’, after the French and Provençal estampir, ‘to resound’ (Hibberd); and ‘low dance’, after the Latin stanti pedes, ‘standing feet’ (Moser, Sachs).
Our knowledge of the estampie is derived from both theoretical and practical sources, most of which date from the end of the 13th century and the beginning of the 14th, although some sources record material that may be as much as a century earlier. Two poetry treatises describe the estampie as a poetic and musical form, and a music treatise provides details about it as both a vocal form and an instrumental dance. The texted repertory consists of 26 poems without music (transcr. in Streng-Renkonen, Pillet and Carstens, and Riquer) and two poems with music (Kalenda maya and Souvent souspire, transcr. in McPeek; McGee, Medieval Instrumental Dances, 1989), all surviving in Old French and Old Provençal sources from the early 14th century. There are also 16 textless musical compositions identified in their sources as estampies.
In the anonymous poetry treatise Doctrina de compondre dictatz (c1300), the estampie is described in terms of both its poetic and its musical characteristics: it is a poem having ‘four coblas, a refrain and one or two envoys set to a new melody’. The Leys d'amors, a treatise compiled by Guillaume Molinier during the first half of the 14th century, acknowledges the existence of a musical form and goes on to state ‘but sometimes [estampie] refers not only to the music but also to the text, which is based on love and homage …. Such minor forms may have an envoy or not, or one may, in place of an envoy, repeat the opening or closing coblas’. Johannes de Grocheio's treatise De musica, written about 1300, discusses both vocal and instrumental estampies (his word is ‘stantipes’) in the section on secular music (musica vulgaris), as part of a discussion that includes other dance forms – round (rotundellus), carole (ductia) and nota – as well as the non-dance secular vocal forms cantus gestualis and cantus coronatus. According to Grocheio, the vocal estampie begins and ends with a refrain, varies both the text rhyme and the melodic phrases, uses a text and melody for the refrain that is different from those for the verse, and can have as many verses as the composer wishes. The elements presented in these three treatises are exemplified in the text and music of Kalenda maya (ex.1); the text is by the troubadour Raimbaut de Vaqeiras (c1155–1205).
The text of Kalenda maya conforms to the statement in the Leys d'amors that it be on love and homage; the poet pledges his love throughout the verses, and the homage is clearly spelt out in verse 5. The text is structured in verses of 14 lines of irregular length which can be separated into the four couplets (coblas) required by the Doctrina. Kalenda maya has six verses. The only other estampie to survive with both text and music, Souvent souspire (built on a variation of the Kalenda maya melody), has five, and the number of verses in the 26 estampie texts without music ranges from three to five.
All three theorists mention a refrain as part of the construction of an estampie, but none of the 28 texts identifies a separate set of lines as such. It is possible, however, that certain lines of an estampie were used in that capacity, and in Kalenda maya the last couplet of the first verse may have been the refrain. According to Grocheio, the estampie begins with the refrain, which is repeated at the end of each verse.
Kalenda maya also illustrates the variety of phrase-length and melody called for by Grocheio; the pairs of phrases are not all the same length, and the endings for each line of the third couplet are not exactly the same (they are ‘open’ and ‘closed’ endings; see Ouvert). The text and melody of the refrain also differ from those of the verse. In this last detail Grocheio contrasts the estampie and the carole with several other secular dance forms (ballade, rondeau and virelai), in which the refrain consists of a portion of the text and melody of the verse.
The instrumental estampie differs from the vocal type in some details. Grocheio, the only writer to describe it, identified it as composed of several double versicles (puncta, or ‘repeated sections’), each of which concludes with a common refrain that has ‘open’ and ‘closed’ endings. As in the texted estampie, these versicle pairs can vary in length. Whereas in the texted estampie a single verse melody made up of several pairs of versicles is repeated for each new stanza and followed by the refrain, in the untexted estampie there are many verses, each made up of a single pair of versicles with its own melody, with the common refrain repeated at the end of each versicle (compare the structure of exx.1 and 2).
The 16 textless compositions identified in their sources as estampies represent both the French and the Italian traditions: eight are in the late 13th-century Manuscrit du Roi (F-Pn fr.844, see illustration), each labelled ‘estampie’, and eight in an Italian manuscript from about 1400 (GB-Lbl Add.29987), following the heading ‘Istanpitta’ (facs. in Aubry and Reaney; ed. in Aubry, Wolf, Bokum and McGee, Medieval Instrumental Dances, 1989). All textless estampies match Grocheio's general description, but the two sets are quite different in terms of length, metre, internal formal design and melodic style. The French estampies have relatively short versicles of eight to 20 units and are in simple triple metre. Ex.2 shows a typical complete French estampie. The dances in the Italian source vary in length from 20 to over 100 units, and are in a basic duple division, either simple or compound. Ex.3 shows a single versicle from one of the longer Italian istanpitte.
The two sets of dances also differ in terms of formal structure and tonal orientation. Each verse pair in a French estampie has completely new material, and ends with a short refrain (sometimes only a few notes) and common ‘open’ and ‘closed’ endings. The formal scheme of all French estampies is as follows (A, B, C etc. = verse, R = refrain, x = first or ‘open’ ending, y = second or ‘closed’): ARx/y, BRx/y, CRx/y etc. The Italian examples, however, present several different formal schemes, none of them the same as the French. The verse pairs each contain one to three melodic sections and may combine different sections from verse to verse before proceeding to the refrain. One combination is that found in the dance Ghaetta (see ex.3), in which each new verse begins with new material (A, C, E and F), continues with a second section of either new or old material (B or D), and concludes with the common refrain and ‘open’ and ‘closed’ endings: ABRx/y, CDRx/y, EDRx/y, FBRx/y.
Variations of this organization are found in five of the other seven Italian dances, in which a single refrain follows different combinations and numbers of verse phrases: Tre fontane, for example, has the scheme ABCRx/y, DBCRx/y, ECRx/y, FRx/y, while Belicha runs ARx/y, BRx/y, CRx/y, DERx/y, FERx/y. Two of the Italian dances, Parlamento and In pro, however, have a formal scheme found in no other refrain dance. They use new melodic material for the refrain and endings of the last two verse pairs, producing the following: AR1x/y, BR1x/y, CR1x/y, DR2s/t, ER2s/t.
In addition to their formal differences, the French and Italian estampies are also quite different in terms of melodic and phrase construction. The melodies of the French dances have relatively narrow ranges and are diatonic, emphasizing a single mode. The phrases are short, and within each estampie all the phrases are generated from a small number of melodic-rhythmic motifs.
In
contrast, the melodic ranges of the Italian examples are wide, and the melodies
are not modal but based on a contrast of tetrachords that include chromatic
variation. The phrases are long and consist of a large number of
melodic-rhythmic motifs. Most interesting is the basis of their melodic construction,
which consists of a methodical exploration of the individual notes of
contrasting tetrachords. The two melodic phrases of the first versicle of Ghaetta
(see ex.3), for example, appear to be constructed from the ascending tetrachord
c', d', e', f', and the descending tetrachord b
, a, g, f
. As a melody unfolds,
each note of the tetrachord is singled out and emphasized through repetition
and variation. The two tetrachords are then explored and reconciled in the
refrain.
The construction of the Italian dances more closely resembles that of eastern Mediterranean dance than that of European music of the same period. Its formal aspects are close to those of the pesrev, an instrumental form found in Turkey and Arab countries, and its melodic ideas conform closely to the Turkish maqām system and Arab theoretical practices (Handschin, 1930–31; McGee, 1982).
Four other medieval dances have been identified tentatively as estampies on the basis of their agreement with the forms of those discussed above: two in the Robertsbridge Codex (GB-Lbl Add.28550, one named Petrone, or Retrove, the other untitled) and two in the Faenza Codex (I-FZc 117, entitled Tumpes and Sangilio; ed. in McGee, Medieval Instrumental Dances, 1989). Both sets are in two voices, a slow-moving lower part and a rapid upper one. The individual versicles in all four compositions are quite long, with complex phrase combinations similar to those of the Italian examples. The Robertsbridge Codex melodies are composed according to the more common European practice, while those in the Faenza Codex bear a closer resemblance to the Italian pieces.
The general nature of the estampie as a dance is suggested by the contrast between the estampie and the carole described by Grocheio and other theorists such as Jean Froissart (L'espinette amoureuse, 358–63): ‘And as soon as [the minstrels] had stopped the estampies that they beat, those men and women who amused themselves dancing, without hesitation, began to take hands for carolling’. Since we know that the carole was danced in the round, it is probable that the estampie was danced in the other major formation, in couples. Grocheio states that, in contrast with the energetic carole, the estampie was more suitable for dancers of all ages, but that it required irregular and complicated movement. This would tend to support the second of the two meanings given above, ‘standing’ or ‘stationary feet’: that is, a processional-type dance, perhaps the predecessor of the popular French basse danse and the Italian bassadanza of the 15th century.
MGG1 (J. Handschin; also ‘Johannes de Grocheo’, G. Reaney)
MGG2 (L. Welker)
P. Aubry: Estampies et danses royales: les plus anciens textes de musique instrumentale au Moyen Age (Paris, 1907/R)
J. Wolf: ‘Die Tänze des Mittelalters: eine Untersuchung des Wesens der ältesten Instrumentalmusik’, AMw, i (1918–19), 10–42
H. Moser: ‘Stantipes und Ductia’, ZMw, ii (1919–20), 194–206
F. Gennrich: Grundriss einer Formenlehre des mittelalterlichen Liedes (Halle, 1926)
W.O. Streng-Renkonen, ed.: Les estampies françaises (Paris, 1930)
J. Handschin: ‘Über Estampie und Sequenz’, ZMw, xii (1929–30), 1–20; xiii (1930–31), 113–32
H. Spanke: ‘Über das Fortleben der Sequenzenform in den romanischen Sprachen’, Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie, li (1931), 309–34
A. Pillet and H. Carstens: Bibliographie der Troubadours (Halle, 1933)
C. Sachs: Eine Weltgeschichte des Tanzes (Berlin, 1933; Eng. trans., 1937/R)
J. and L. Beck, eds.: Le manuscrit du roi (Philadelphia and London, 1938) [facs. of F-Pn fr.844]
L. Hibberd: ‘“Estampie” and “Stantipes”’, Speculum, xix (1944), 222–49
M. de Riquer, ed.: Obras completas del trovador Cerveri de Girona (Barcelona, 1947)
H. Husmann: ‘Kalenda Maya’, AMw, x (1953), 275–9
G. Reaney, ed.: The Manuscript London, British Museum, Additional 29987: a Facsimile Edition with an Introduction, MSD, xiii (1965)
J. ten Bokum, ed.: De dansen van het trecento: critische uitgave van de instrumentale dansen uit hs. London BM Add.29987 (Utrecht, 1967, 2/1976)
H. Wagenaar-Nolthenius: ‘Estampie/Stantipes/Stampita’, L'Ars Nova italiana del Trecento: Convegno II: Certaldo and Florence 1969 [L'Ars Nova italiana del Trecento, iii (Certaldo, 1970)], 399–409
E. Rohloff: Die Quellenhandschriften zum Musiktraktat des Johannes de Grocheio (Leipzig, 1972)
E. Jammers: ‘Studien zur Tanzmusik des Mittelalters’, AMw, xxx (1973), 81–95
G. McPeek: ‘Kalenda Maia: a Study in Form’, Medieval Studies in Honor of Robert White Linker, ed. B. Dutton, J.W. Hassell and J.E. Keller (Valencia, 1973), 141–54
A. Seay, ed.: Johannes De Grocheo: Concerning Music (Colorado Springs, CO, 1973) [trans. of De musica]
S. Levarie: Communication in JAMS, xxvii (1974), 367–9
F. Crane: ‘On Performing the Lo Estampies’, EMc, vii (1979), 24–33
T. McGee: ‘Eastern Influences in Medieval European Dances’, Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Music, ed. R. Falck and T. Rice (Toronto, 1982), 79–100
D. Stockmann: ‘Musica vulgaris bei Johannes de Grocheio (Grocheo)’, BMw, xxv (1983), 5–56
T. McGee: ‘Medieval Dances: Matching the Repertory with Grocheio's Descriptions’, JM, vii (1989), 498–517
T. McGee: Medieval Instrumental Dances (Bloomington, IN, 1989)
T. McGee: ‘Dança amorosa: a Newly-Discovered Medieval Dance Pair’, Beyond the Moon: Festschrift Luther Dittmer, ed. B. Gillingham and P. Merkley (Ottawa, 1990), 295–306
C. Schima: Die Estampie: Untersuchungen anhand der überlieferen Denkmäler und zeitgenössischen Erwähnungen (Amsterdam, 1995) [incl. edn of all estampie music and texts]
TIMOTHY J. McGEE