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The Medieval Period. Year 9 Music. Medieval Culture. The Middle Ages – 1000 years of European history Covers the millennium from 450-1450 A period of cultural growth – churches and cathedrals were built, towns grew and universities were founded
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The Medieval Period Year 9 Music
Medieval Culture • The Middle Ages – 1000 years of European history • Covers the millennium from 450-1450 • A period of cultural growth – churches and cathedrals were built, towns grew and universities were founded • Sharp division between three social classes – nobility, peasantry and clergy
Nobility • Clothing
Peasantry – Occupations • Almoners: ensured the poor received alms. • Atilliator: skilled castle worker who made crossbows. • Baliff: in charge of allotting jobs to the peasants, building repair, and repair of tools used by the peasants. • Barber: someone who cut hair. Also served as dentists, surgeons and blood-letters. • Blacksmith: forged and sharpened tools and weapons, beat out dents in armor, made hinges for doors, and window grills. Also referred to as Smiths. • Bottler: in charge of the buttery or bottlery. • Butler: cared for the cellar and was in charge of large butts and little butts (bottles) of wine and beer. Under him a staff of people might consist of brewers, tapsters, cellarers, dispensers, cupbearers and dapifer. • Carder: someone who brushed cloth during its manufacture. • Carpenter: built flooring, roofing, siege engines, furniture, panelling for rooms, and scaffoling for building. • Carters: workmen who brought wood and stone to the site of a castle under construction. • Castellan: resident owner or person in charge of a castle (custodian). • Chamberlain: responsible for the great chamber and for the personal finances of the castellan. • Chaplain: provided spirtual welfare for laborers and the castle garrison. The duties might also include supervising building operations, clerk, and keeping accounts. He also tended to the chapel. • Clerk: a person who checked material costs, wages, and kept accounts. • Constable: a person who took care (the governor or warden) of a castle in the absence of the owner. This was sometimes bestowed upon a great baron as an honor and some royal castles had hereditary constables. • Cook: roasted, broiled, and baked food in the fireplaces and ovens. • Cottars: the lowest of the peasantry. Worked as swine-herds, prison guards, and did odd jobs. • Ditcher: worker who dug moats, vaults, foundations and mines. • Dyer: someone who dyed cloth in huge heated vats during its manufacture. • Ewerer: worker who brought and heated water for the nobles. • Falconer: highly skilled expert responsible for the care and training of hawks for the sport of falconry. • Fuller: worker who shrinks & thickens cloth fibers through wetting & beating the material.
Peasantry – Occupations • Glaziers: a person who cut and shaped glass. • Gong Farmer: a latrine pit emptier. • Hayward: someone who tended the hedges. • Herald: knights assistant and an expert advisor on heraldry. • Keeper of the Wardrobe: in charge of the tailors and laundress. • Knight: a professional soldier. This was achieved only after long and arduous training which began in infancy. • Marshal: officer in charge of a household's horses, carts, wagons, and containers. His staff included farriers, grooms, carters, smiths and clerks. He also oversaw the transporting of goods. • Master Mason: responsible for the designing and overseeing the building of a structure. • Messengers: servants of the lord who carried receipts, letters, and commodities. • Miner: skilled professional who dug tunnels for the purpose of undermining a castle. • Minstrels: part of of the castle staff who provided entertainment in the form of singing and playing musical instruments. • Porter: took care of the doors (janitor), particularly the main entrance. Responsible for the guardrooms. The person also insured that no one entered or left the castle withour permission. Also known as the door-ward. • Sapper: an unskilled person who dug a mine or approach tunnel. • Scullions: responsible for washing and cleaning in the kitchen. • Shearmen: a person who trimmed the cloth during its manufacture. • Shoemaker: a craftsman who made shoes. Known also as Cordwainers. • Spinster: a name given to a woman who earned her living spinning yarn. Later this was expanded and any unmarried woman was called a spinster. • Steward: took care of the estate and domestic administration. Supervised the household and events in the great hall. Also referred to as a Seneschal. • Squire: attained at the age of 14 while training as a knight. He would be assigned to a knight to carry and care for the weapons and horse. • Watchmen: an official at the castle responsible for security. Assited by lookouts (the garrison). • Weaver: someone who cleaned and compacted cloth, in association with the Walker and Fuller. • Woodworkers: tradesmen called Board-hewers who worked in the forest, producing joists and beams.
The Medieval Church • The centre of musical life in the Middle Ages
Clergy There were many different kinds of clergymen during the Middle Ages. Each one had his own duties and power. Some had vast amounts of power politically. Of course, they all shared one trait, they were the mediators of God. They were the bridge between God and the other people. Bishops were the leaders of the church. The leader of the bishops, of course, was the pope. Bishops were often very wealthy. They dressed lavishly, wearing many of the same clothes as a feudal lord. Of course, they had their own religious garments to wear also. Bishops often had their own castles from which to conduct business. In this way, they were firmly entrenched in the feudal society. They were accepted in royal courts and dallied in politics. They also had many duties. They levied taxes and settled on issues such as annulments of marriages.
Clergy • Monks lived in monasteries in groups. They usually wore brown robes with hoods around their heads. They were also well educated and could usually read and write Latin. Many monks devoted themselves to learning. Some of the first encyclopedias and histories were written by monks and then copied over by hand. Monks were often the only source of Bibles in medieval times. Bibles were also copied by hand because the printing press was not yet developed.
Gregorian Chant Clerics sing plainchant, depicted within an illuminated initial letter C in a late medieval manuscript.The whimsical little viol player is definitely outside the C, for instrumental music was taboo in the church.
Alleluia: Vidimus stellam • This example of Gregorian chant is made up of two contrasting parts followed by a return of the first at the end of the work. Consequently, this chant may be described as an example of ABA form. As outlined below, the first section begins with an alternation between the solost and choir in unison (monophonic). Note the extended phrase on the last syllable of "Alleluia," (ia). This ornamental treatment of a single syllable sung to a series of notes is known as a "melisma," an important feature of Gregorian chant. Also significant is the lack of any precise system of measured rhythm. Notice that each note is represented by a solid notehead rather than a note with any specific value. (The red-line graph in the B section has been included to draw attention to an early awareness of the structural importance of the tonic (D), dominant (A) relationship--a relationship that grows stronger as the history of music unfolds.) Glancing through the complete notation in Kamien, you will notice that the dominant (A) is the highest note, i.e., the climactic note, of the selection.
Alleluia: Vidimus stellam Means Praise God: We Have Seen His Star
