V. Influences affecting Hymnody
Once the typical hymns and sequences of the later period have been reviewed, it remains to trace the influences operating from the contemporary environment upon their evolution. The problem of possible influence of an ultimately oriental origin has already arisen in connection with earlier hymns. It has been considered in the relation of Byzantine culture to the origin of the sequence, and also in the form of Arabian influence upon the Mozarabic hymnody. In both fields the evidence is tenuous and especially in the latter where the imprint of Arabian cultural forms would seem to be most probable. In the centuries which produced the troubadours, the problem takes the form of a possible indirect influence from Arabian origins through the Provençal singers upon the evolution of the sequence.[16] It is true that the twelfth and thirteenth centuries boasted at least four hundred troubadours whose poetry is extant. The names of others are known but not their poems. As the popularity of their songs is unquestioned, an appreciable affect upon religious lyrics might be presumed. Granted that the influence of Arabian poetry may be demonstrated upon the metrical aspects of troubadour lyrics, it must still be demonstrated that the impact of the latter was felt upon the Latin hymn. Future studies may throw light upon these problems of medieval literature where obscurity now prevails. Metrical similarities undoubtedly exist between Arabian and Latin verse, as already illustrated in the field of late Mozarabic hymns. Perhaps the most convincing evidence, aside from these, is found in processional hymns, the subject of a later chapter.
Much more obvious and one distinctly to be traced is the all-pervading influence of the new religious orders upon medieval society and culture in general. Hymn writers belonging, as cited above, to the Franciscan, Dominican and other orders of friars, to say nothing of the Cistercians, played a leading role among contemporary poets; their names and themes have already been mentioned. Many others must be numbered with the anonymous majority. The veneration of the Virgin reflected so faithfully in contemporary hymns may be largely attributed to their devotion. As itinerant preachers, moreover, the friars translated hymns into the vernacular and brought them directly to their hearers, thus imparting the lessons of faith and morals.[17] It might be asserted, at least tentatively, that the friars were responsible for one of the earliest attempts to bridge the gap between the ritual and the popular use of hymns.
A less tangible influence was at work emanating from schoolmen. This was the age of the universities in which thousands of students were pursuing the studies of theology, law and medicine. Early theological discussion in the schools of Paris, prior to the founding of the universities, is implicit in the sequences of Adam of St. Victor. Later, Thomas Aquinas, Professor of Theology at the University of Paris, created a poetical counterpart in his hymns, to the prose exposition of dogma. No one else reached his stature in this particular but hundreds of European clerics having theological degrees or a partial preparation for them, were active in the church and in secular life. It is only fair to suppose that they must be included in the great anonymous group which assisted in making that unique contribution to medieval literature which was preserved in contemporary liturgical collections. Without the university-trained cleric how is it explicable that in the very age in which the vernacular languages came to their full development in speech and in literature, Latin religious verse was at a peak of expression? In the High Middle Ages the alumni of the great universities were influential in every phase of society. It is conceivable, if not demonstrable, that the clerics among their ranks played an important although hitherto unrecognized role in the evolution of Latin hymnody.
Contemporary pilgrimages take the student far afield from the centers of learning. The crusading enterprise of two centuries which carried the knightly companies of Europe and their entourage to the East was a pilgrimage of continental proportions. Local shrines favored by pilgrims abounded in the West from Canterbury and Walsingham to Campostella. What effect, if any, had this wave of religious zeal or of adventurous self-seeking upon the hymnology of the age? We know that the familiar Latin hymns of the breviary were sung by the clerics who conducted the services of religion in the crusading armies. We possess the texts of a variety of vernacular hymns and songs heard among the wandering bands who traversed the highways of Europe or traveled by sea to distant shrines. We are told of the singing of Latin hymns at the destination of pilgrimage but their texts are rare. A formal collection of Latin hymns associated with the shrine of St. James of Campostella, the Carmina Campostellana, has been edited in the seventeenth volume of the Analecta Hymnica. As might be supposed, they voice the praises of St. James, Ad honorem regis summi, “To the honor of the King,” (A. H. 17. 210) being a favorite in both Latin and vernacular versions.[18] As a matter of fact, the hymnody of pilgrimage must have been largely patronal, a conclusion supported by existing Latin texts. Unfortunately we possess no great body of Latin hymns arising from the religious impulse which animated the crusader or the devotee of local shrines. It is possible, however, that the multiplication of hymns for saints at this time may be attributed in part to the multiplication of shrines of pilgrimage. If true, an influence is seen at work, which, from the time when Ambrose built a church in Milan to receive the relics of St. Gervasius and St. Protasius and wrote a hymn in their honor, never ceased to operate in the intervening centuries.[19]
With the pilgrim we come face to face with the layman and are once more confronted with the question of lay participation in the singing of Latin hymns, which hinges upon the further question of the degree to which the layman could sing or even understand the Latin hymn, from the twelfth century onward. The pious injunctions of Alexander of Hales and Henricus de Gorichen (15th C.) to sing hymns, merely repeat a dictum of St. Apollonius regarding the observance of the Lord’s Day in the second century and must not be taken too seriously by the modern student.[20] It is indeed slight evidence for the singing of Latin hymns by the laity. The problem is in reality linguistic and revolves about the question of who was acquainted with Latin at this time. Setting aside the clergy in their numerous ranks, who are often said to have had the complete monopoly of the hymn in an age when congregational singing was unknown, one must consider the remaining classes of society from the point of view of contemporary education.
Beginning with the university it should be recalled that the text books and other sources of information were in Latin and that Latin was the medium of instruction. In this respect the aspirant for a degree in law or medicine was on a par with the would-be clergyman. Many students took degrees in two and occasionally in all three disciplines, and the majority were destined for the church if only in minor orders. On the other hand, it is certain that, as in our own day, a large number of students never attained any degree although they had the Latin qualification. In any case, the lay alumnus or former student of the universities, with a Latin training, was a familiar figure in secular affairs.
The degree and extent of elementary and secondary education upon which the university instruction was necessarily founded, have been the subject of several recent studies. It seems certain that schools for children and youth existed from the ninth century onward in cathedral and other centers and that, as Lynn Thorndike says, “in the period of developed medieval culture elementary education was fairly wide-spread and general.”[21] Without entering into the details of this program, illuminating as they are, we note that the curriculum was founded upon the Latin language and Latin studies. The contemporary growth of towns involved an expansion of education which was marked by the appearance of schools sponsored by municipal authority. The Latin school flourished everywhere. There is evidence that every social class participated to some extent in the new education although illiteracy must at the same time have been common. It seems clear that the layman who had received these early educational advantages could understand Latin hymns or read them if the texts were available. Both sexes shared elementary education and lay women as well as nuns occasionally had access to advanced instruction. Such considerations as the above presuppose a degree of familiarity especially with the breviary hymns, on the part of laymen, even if singing or chanting was restricted to the choirs and clergy.
The university movement was accompanied by the rise of the wandering scholars and poets whose verses, for example, from the Carmina Burana, are familiar today in translation. Popular entertainers, they sang their Latin lyrics at ale house doors and in the market places. They must have been at least partially understood by the populace. Other municipal entertainment was provided by the religious drama of the times which made considerable demand upon the Latin resources of the spectator who had to be somewhat bilingual if he were to enjoy the public presentation of the mystery plays.
Again, the bilingual or macaronic poetry which sprang up in the period of rivalry between Latin and the vernacular may be viewed both as a means and a result of understanding Latin hymns. Macaronic verse was both secular and religious in its forms, favorite phrases from well-known Latin hymns often being combined with the vernacular tongue. The practice might even have spread to the ritual of the Church had it not been forbidden by ecclesiastical decree.[22] The cantio of the later medieval centuries and the familiar carol offer a wealth of evidence that macaronic religious verse was extremely popular. Indeed, this may have been the earliest manifestation of actual hymn singing on the part of medieval laymen.
Even if congregational singing was not practiced, the use of Latin hymns in private devotion is well authenticated. The Horae which were included in the liturgical collections listed above, were circulated among laymen from the fourteenth century onward, and often used as text books or Primers from which children were taught to read. The variant title, Lay Folks Prayer Book, also bespeaks its popular availability.
While it would be unsound to infer a universal knowledge of Latin hymnody among the laity of Europe upon any or all of the evidence here assembled, it is logical to suppose that this treasury of verse lay within the boundaries of average education and cultural ability. Combined with the effectiveness of visual means of conveying religious truths through architecture, sculpture and stained glass, popular acquaintance with the teachings of Christian hymnody must be supposed to have overflowed the limits of clerical restriction, if indeed, any such existed.