or other accidentals introduced. But he was
forward-looking in adopting Guido's colouring of the staff-lines (red for the F
line and yellow for the C line) or identifying them by letters or other means.(fl c1100). Music theorist. Active around St Gallen or in southern Germany, he wrote one of the most copied and cited of all medieval treatises.
The identity of this theorist has been the subject of much speculation and confusion. A monk, who identified himself simply as Johannes, dedicated a music treatise (c1100) to a Bishop or Abbot Fulgentius. The dedicatee is described in most sources as ‘episcopum Anglorum’ (‘bishop of the English’), but the modern editor of the treatise, Smits van Waesberghe, read one version of the dedication as addressed to a ‘venerabili Angelorum antistiti Fulgentio’ (‘Fulgentius, venerable abbot of the angels’). This was on the basis of a faint abbreviation sign, which occurs in only one of around 20 existing copies, the 12th-century manuscript I-Rvat Regina 1196. Smits van Waesberghe proposed that the treatise was addressed to the Fulgentius who was abbot (1089–1121) of the monastery in Afflighem, Flanders, in which the monks were sometimes referred to as ‘angels’, and that Johannes was one of them. Hence the ascription of the treatise to ‘Johannes of Afflighem’ or ‘Johannes Affligemensis’.
Another candidate for authorship was suggested by Gerbert (GerbertS, ii, 230), who knew of two manuscripts (in Paris and Antwerp, neither extant) that attributed the work to Johannes Cotton or Cottonius. This information, combined with the phrase ‘episcopum Anglorum’, led to the speculation that John Cotton was an English monk, but no Bishop Fulgentius could be traced in England.
Although biographical evidence is scant, it is possible to locate Johannes geographically through evidence in the treatise itself. On the basis of the chants cited, Huglo assigned the tonary that follows the treatise to the ‘east zone’ of his map of tonaries, the region of present-day Switzerland. Johannes showed a knowledge of notational practices peculiar to this region: the interval notation of Hermannus Contractus (chap.21), the tonal letters used only around St Gallen (chap.11), and the Romanic letters (litterae significativae) found only in manuscripts in southern Germany and Metz (chap.21). He also displayed a knowledge of Berno of Reichenau's treatise, which was little known outside Germanic lands. He mentioned the letters used only in the St Gallen area to designate the eight modes: a, e, i, o, u, H, y and ω (chap.11). His use of the Greek tribal names, such as Dorian and Phrygian, for the modes is also a German trait. The provenance of the earliest manuscripts (dating from the 12th century), apart from one from Canterbury, points to the same region: Basle University, the Michaelsberg Abbey, Bamberg, the Cistercian monasteries at Pforta and at Rein (Styria). The chants and the manuscripts seem to locate Johannes either in southern Germany or north-east Switzerland. It is just possible that the author, perhaps even an Englishman named John Cotton, studied in his youth with an English Fulgentius, who later became abbot at Afflighem, that he settled in a monastery near St Gallen, and at Abbot Fulgentius's urging wrote the treatise there.
Johannes's De musica (a convenient title supported by only one late copy) consists of 27 chapters, the last four of which comprise a tonary found in only five of the sources. The treatise is essentially a reworking and expansion of Guido's Micrologus (c1026). The sequence of topics follows Guido's: the study of music in general; the gamut and monochord division; the affinities; errors in chant and their emendation; the modes, their finals and ambitus; melodic composition; and organum. Johannes placed Guido's chapter 20, on Pythagoras's discovery of the ratios of the consonances, earlier (as chap.3). Johannes also inserted chapters on musical timbre of voices and instruments, on Greek notation, on the litterae significativae and other notational innovations, and on the differentiae, a topic that relates to his tonary (chaps.24–7). Johannes expanded Guido's treatment of the division of the monochord, defects in chant transmission and how to correct them, the ethical effects of music, and composition of melody. Of greater significance, however, is his description of a more modern practice of organum. The treatise may be dated to around 1100 on the basis of its contents and the sources.
Through the treatise Johannes aimed to teach boys how to sing chant correctly and to give them a general education in music. He avoided theoretical complications, but his book displays a reading of both classical and medieval authors, citing Plato, Virgil, Horace, Donatus, Prudentius, Amalarius, Priscian, Isidore of Seville, Martianus Capella and Boethius.
Johannes is the most illuminating of the medieval writers on the modes; he discussed how to recognize them in chant, how to apply them in composition, and their emotional and ethical effects. Not only did he distinguish them by their finals and range but also by their tenors: the tenor of the second mode is f; of the first, fourth and sixth, a; of the third, fifth and eighth, c'; and of the seventh, d'. He referred to this note also as the saeculorum, that is the note sung on that word in the lesser doxology of a psalm. He also defined the location of the beginning of the ‘Gloria Patri’ for each of the tones as c for the second psalm tone, e for the fourth, f for the first, fifth and sixth, g for the third and eighth and c' for the seventh. Johannes emphasized that in composing melodies it is necessary to return frequently to the final, particularly at a distinctio or pause that is marked in the text by punctuation and in the melody by the end of a phrase.
On
the matter of chant transposition, Johannes was conservative. He preferred to
have a chant end on a cofinal than see B or other accidentals introduced. But he was
forward-looking in adopting Guido's colouring of the staff-lines (red for the F
line and yellow for the C line) or identifying them by letters or other means.
Johannes was critical of the litterae significativae, letters placed above neumes, described in a letter by Notker Balbulus and used in a small number of manuscripts (e.g. CH-E 121), such as ‘c’ for cito (swiftly), ‘l’ for leniter (gently) or ‘s’ for suaviter (smoothly). He complained that the letters were ambiguous, for ‘c’ could also mean caute (carefully), ‘l’ leva (lift up) and ‘s’ sursum (on high).
Johannes's chapter on diaphony or organum (chap.23) has attracted the most attention of modern scholars. He prefaced the treatment of organum with a disquisition on melodic motion, in which he paraphrased portions of chapter 16 of Guido's Micrologus. He described melody as consisting of upward and downward movements, combined into figures of smaller or greater intervals, which are juxtaposed with other figures of higher or lower pitch. These motions are important for organum, because the organal part should move in a contrary direction to the chant. The two parts should close phrases in a unison or octave, the unison being preferred. The organal part could sometimes have two or three notes per syllable of the chant. These instructions are consistent with surviving 12th-century examples of polyphony.
See also Discant, Organum and (for mode diagram) Theory, theorists, fig.3,.
GerbertS, ii, 230ff [chaps.1–23]
PL, cl, 1391ff [chaps.1–23]
U. Kornmüller: ‘Der Traktat des Johannes Cottonius über Musik’, KJb, iii (1888), 1–22 [with Ger. trans. of chaps.1–23]
J. Smits van Waesberghe: ‘Some Music Treatises and their Interrelation: a School of Liège (c. 1050–1200)?’, MD, iii (1949), 25–31, 95–118
J. Smits van Waesberghe, ed.: Johannes Afflighemensis: De musica cum tonario, CSM, i (1950)
L. Ellinwood: ‘John Cotton or John of Affligem?’, Notes, viii (1950–51), 650–64
J. Smits van Waesberghe: ‘John of Affligem or John Cotton?’, MD, vi (1952), 139–53
H.H. Eggebrecht: ‘Diaphonia vulgariter organum’, IMSCR VII: Cologne 1958, 93–6
F. Zaminer: Der vatikanische Organum-Traktat (Ottob. lat. 3025) (Tutzing, 1959), 104–10
E.F. Flindell: ‘Joh[ann]is Cottonis’, MD, xx (1966), 11–30; ‘Corrigenda et Addenda’, MD, xxiii (1969), 7–11
H.H. Eggebrecht and F. Zaminer: Ad organum faciendum: Lehrschriften der Mehrstimmigkeit in nachguidonischer Zeit (Mainz, 1970)
M. Huglo: Les tonaires: inventaire, analyse, comparaison (Paris, 1971), 249ff
L.A. Gushee: ‘Questions of Genre in Medieval Treatises on Music’, Gattungen der Musik in Einzeldarstellungen: Gedenkschrift Leo Schrade, ed. W. Arlt and others (Berne and Munich, 1973), 365–433
M. Huglo: ‘L'auteur du traité de musique dédié à Fulgence d'Affligem’, RBM, xxxi (1977), 5–37
C.V. Palisca, ed. and W. Babb, trans.: Hucbald, Guido, and John on Music: Three Medieval Treatises (New Haven, CT, 1978), 85–198
J. Smits van Waesberghe, ed.: Codex Oxoniensis Bibl. Bodl. Rawl. C270 (Buren, 1979–80)
R. Jonsson and L. Treitler: ‘Medieval Music and Language: a Reconsideration of the Relationship’, Music and Language, Studies in the History of Music, i (New York, 1983), 1–23
M. Huglo: ‘Bibliographie des éditions et études relatives à la théorie musicale du Moyen Age (1972–1987)’, AcM, lx (1988), 229–72
C. Palisca: ‘An Introduction to the Musica of Johannes dictus Cotto vel Affligemensis’, Beyond the Moon: Festschrift Luther Dittmer, ed. B. Gillingham and P. Merkley (Ottawa, 1990), 144–62
CLAUDE V. PALISCA