[Gradual, proper of time].

Abstract

Mediaeval manuscript choirbook on vellum. Binding of wooden boards covered with leather binding with brass bosses and clasps; 7 lines of text in a rounded Gothic hand and of music on a five-line red stave, rubric in red, some capitals in yellow; many large calligraphic initials throughout, often with elaborate penwork infill. Text much used with many pages thumbed and worn (some defective and repaired). Original foliation and litirgical contents implies the volume has been compiled from three different manuscripts. The first 83 folios (numbered xcv to ccxlvii) contain chants for the Mass for Corpus Christi (folios xcv-xcviii), the commons of the saints (clxi-ccxxx) and a troped Kyriale (ccxxxiiij-ccxllvii). The second section continues, after the mass proper for the feast of St. Mary Magdalen, with mass ordinaries (Gloria, Credo, Sanctus and Agnus Dei), some of which are troped. The third section, which has many folios palimpsested, contains mass chants for Christmas, and is decorated with crude grotesques and other pictorial decoration.