(Gk.: ‘proem’, ‘introduction’; Lat. prooemium, proemium, premium, prohemium etc.).
A term used, like anabolē, in various musical contexts since antiquity, signifying some sense of the word ‘prelude’. Terpander (fl c675 bc) is said to have made lyric prooimia as prefaces to the public recitation of Homeric epics; the Homeric hymns were likewise termed prooimia in antiquity, although the longer hymns may well have constituted independent pieces (Allen, Halliday and Sikes, esp. pp.lxv, xciii ff). Three settings of prooimia survive from late antiquity (see Mesomedes). For further references to the prooimion in antiquity, see Alcman; Sacadas of Argos; and Stesichorus.
In Byzantine chant the prooimion (also termed koukoulion, with alternative English spellings cuculion, kukulion etc.) is the introductory strophe of a Kontakion, which differs metrically from the succeeding stanzas. The ‘Prooimiac Psalm’ (ho prooimiakos psalmos) is the introductory psalm at Hesperinos (Byzantine Vespers), Psalm ciii in the Septuagint. The simple refrains customary in the Prooimiac Psalm were greatly extended and elaborated from the 14th century (see Hesperinos; Koukouzeles, Joannes; Kladas, Joannes).
16th-century Latin humanists revived the terms anabolē and prooemium: Hans Kotter used the latter term to mean ‘prelude’ in his keyboard tablatures.
T.W. Allen, W.R. Halliday and E.E. Sikes, eds.: The Homeric Hymns (London, 2/1936/R)
R. Böhme: Das Prooimion: eine Form sakraler Dichtung der Griechen (Bühl, 1937)
H. Koller: ‘Das kitharodische Prooimion’, Philologus, c (1956), 159–206