MS 24

For the penultimate entry in this series, Elettra Conoly ‘21 and Megan Szostak ‘22 post about their research on music in Tufts Univ. MS 24, a Dominican miscellany from Northern Italy.

This manuscript is a collection of writings and chants, with the first 225 folia being copied during the 15th century, and the following fifty folia copied in the late 13th or 14th century. MS 24 is categorized as a Dominican Miscellany for a number of reasons. It contains several writings by Thomas Aquinas, a Dominican friar, as well as two musical sequences often associated with the Dominican order.

The first musical sequence, with the incipit (beginning words) ‘Ave virgo virginum’ (image 1), was copied in Northern Italy in the late 13th or early 14th century. It precedes another sequence, ‘Tibi cordis in altari’ (1,2), which was copied at the same time. Both texts and melodies most likely are of Dominican origin.

1. ‘Ave virgo virginum’ sequence, followed by ‘Tibi cordis in altari,’ which begins about halfway down the second folio with the majuscule “T.”

2. Continuation of ‘Tibi cordis.’ The facing page includes a decorated initial “P.”

3. Sixth book of the ‘Compendiae theologicae veritatis’ by Hugo Ripelin, a Dominican theologian from Strasbourg.

4. 15th century binding of MS 24.

5. Transcription of the beginning of ‘Ave virgo virginum’ melody, notated using GregorioTeX, along with an approximation of the melody and rhythm of the first phrase.