|
session 6 |
1: Ceremony and Pageantry: |
|
|
|
|
Copenhagen, Denmark: | |
|
Local Composition of Quem Quaeritis Ceremonies. | |
|
|
|
|
University of Durham, England: | |
|
The Durham Sacrament Sequence. | |
|
|
|
|
Records of Early English Drama, Toronto, Canada: | |
|
The pageant of the passion: evidence of Easter drama in Reading. | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
session 10 |
2: Germany and France: |
|
|
|
|
Charleville Mezieres, France: | |
|
Pour une réhabilitation d'Eve. | |
|
|
|
|
Maisons-Laffitte, France: | |
|
Les Jeux de Pâques en Allemagne, tradition et innovation. | |
|
|
|
|
The University of Michigan, USA: | |
|
Rubinus and Mercator: An Analysis of Grotesque Comedy in the German Easter Play. | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
session 11 |
3: Iberia and America: |
|
|
|
|
University of New Foundland, Canada: | |
|
The Catalan-Occitan Easter Play and the Kingdom of Majorca. | |
|
|
|
|
Catalonia, Spain: | |
|
Grotesque Elements in the Passion Drama in Catalan Countries. | |
|
|
|
|
Mexico D.F., Mexico: | |
|
La chapelle ouverte et Fray Jacobo Daciano: la fête de la Pasion Tzintzuntzan Michoacán. | |
|
|
|
|
Local Composition of Quem Quaeritis Ceremonies. |
|
|
|
The Latin music drama of the medieval liturgy has been studied for more than a century by liturgiological, literary, and musicological scholarship. In particular, the music dramatic representation within the liturgy of the biblical narrative of the women at the empty grave Easter morning - the so-called Visitatio sepulchri or Quem quaeritis ceremony - has caused numerous attempts to understand the origin of this practice and its function as a proper part of the liturgy or as an alien element of secularization. In the paper I will review some fundamental positions concerning the function and origin of this practice. Through two examples of such ceremonies I want to point to the complicated interplay between seemingly universal liturgical developments reflected in the pervasive transmission of the short Quem Quaeritis lines and the local composition of not only the short ceremony itself, but of the liturgy as a whole to which it belonged. |
|
The Durham Sacrament Sequence. |
|
|
|
The lost Corpus Christi plays from Durham present an example of a general problem: what plays were performed on Corpus Christi day in English cities that were too small to present a complete cycle? This paper will look at the rather slight Durham Corpus Christi evidence as part of a sequence of ceremonies in and around Durham Cathedral Priory, stretching from Maundy Thursday to Corpus Christi, which are described in The Rites of Durham. This account, probably written in secret about 1593, seems to rely on the eyewitness accounts of elderly catholics who remembered the ceremonies of the pre-Reformation cathedral. Among its luxurious detail, The Rites of Durham mentions the splendid copes worn by the Prior and monks in the processions for Ascension day, Pentecost and Corpus Christi, and one of these survives; it was certainly made for Durham Cathedral Priory, whose arms appear on the morse. Its Its nine orphreys, which were made in England (perhaps in London) in the latter half of the 15th century, all depict scriptural scenes which are also cycle episodes. Although other products of the same workshop can be identified, I have been unable to find a parallel to this iconography on any other surviving medieval vestment, and it seems probable that the orphreys were commissioned to reflect the scriptural episodes relevant to the sacrament sequence. In this case, the lost plays may have covered the same episodes. |
|
"The pageant of the passion": evidence of Easter drama in Reading. |
|
|
|
Buried among the abundant evidence of folk activity, Robin Hood games, summer lords and morris dancers in the accounts of St. Laurence, Reading in Berkshire is a significant body of evidence about Easter mimetic activity. In 1508 "the same Will[ia]m" was paid 8 s by the churchwardens of St. Laurence, Reading, "for carying & recarying of bord[es] to the church for the pageaunt of the passion on est[e]r monday & for swepyng of the church at the same time". The year before, Sybil Darling was paid 2 1/2 d "for the sepulcre & for rosy[n]n to the resurreccyon pley" while John Cook was paid 18 pence for "wryting off the fest off I[esus] & for vj hedd[es] and berd[es] to the church". An inventory of 1523 lists "a Red Chysable w[i]t[h] a narrow Cross & all thapparell[es] for good ffryday" and "a Cotte for Mary Magdeleyn of Cloth of gold". Ten years later the Chantry Priest was paid 8s 4d "for refo[u]rmyng the resurrecc[i]on play" and two years later the parish bought a bound copy of the play from him for 9s 10d. The last evidence of this play comes from the year of the dissolution of Reading Abbey when the parish received 23s 2d "at the ffirst play in East[er] weke" and 11s 2d at the "Second play". There is also evidence of a sepulchre watch and the custom of singing the passion of Palm Sunday with a bearded figure portraying a prophet. My paper will analyse the evidence from St Laurence's Reading putting it in the context of three other less well documented Easter plays in the Thames Valley from Henley and Thame in Oxfordshire and from Kingston upon Thames in Surrey. I will consider the difficulty inherent in dealing with parish accounts that are recording expenses for both regular liturgical observance and mimetic activity. |
|
Pour une réhabilitation d'Eve |
|
|
|
L'intervention portera sur la représentation du personnage d'Eve dans certains Mystères du quinzième siècle, en particulier dans le Mystère de la Passion d'Arnoul Greban, dans le Mystère de la Passion de Troyes et dans le Mystère du Viel Testament. Il sera montré comment Eve est victime du verbe diabolique et quelles sont les modalités de ce discours - rhétorique, lexique ... -; il sera montré également comment les fatistes entreprennent une certaine réhabilitation d'Eve. Une analyse de la structure des séquences dramatiques dans lesquelles apparait ce personnage complètera ce propos. |
|
Les Jeux de Pâques en Allemagne, tradition et innovation. |
|
|
|
La communication se propose d'étudier les Jeux de Pâques qui sont au point de départ du genre en Allemagne, Benediktbeuern et Klosterneuburg (Benediktbeurer Osterspiel, Klosterneuburger Osterspiel); le Jeu de Pâques de Muri (Osterspiel von Muri) sera également associé à cette étude. Nous analyserons d'abord comment ces trois textes perpétuent la tradition des Jeux de Pâques liturgiques (Osterfeiern). Nous nous demanderons ensuite en quoi ces textes inaugurent une voie nouvelle (transformation des scènes anciennes, adjonction d'autres scènes, caractérisation différente des personnages, finalité différente de la représentation). Nous essayerons de voir enfin si les thèmes que nous dégagerons pourront expliquer la forme et le contenu qui caractérisent les textes plus tardifs. Notre but sera en même temps d'examiner si l'influence des trois textes de départ n'a pas été differente. Ne pourrait-on pas opposer le groupe Benediktbeuern-Klostenburg au texte de Muri? L'étude s'efforcera de répondre à ces différentes questions. |
|
Rubinus and Mercator: An Analysis of Grotesque Comedy in the German Easter play. |
|
|
|
Mercator, the merchant who sells ointments to the Three Marys on the way to Jesus' tomb, entered into the Easter play as early as the 11th century. In the German-language Osterspiele, particularly those from Erlau, Innsbruck and Melk (late 14th - early 15th cent.) the Mercator acquired a complete household including a well developed servant/clown character by the name of Rubinus. This paper will present a performance analysis of the grotesque comedy generated by this master-servant team of Mercator and Rubinus. This analysis will include discussion of their obscene and nonsensical verbal play; the abundant physical comedy, including use of props, both implied and directly called for in rubrics; the dynamics of the performer/audience relationship; and the probable priority of improvisational performance to previously scripted text. The historical link of farcical entertainment with medical merchandizing will also be touched upon in the process of this study. The Mercator-Rubinus scene is completely intrusive. It does not function in the manner of the Mak episode in the famous Wakefield Second Shepherds Play, for there is no parodic "typing" with the Easter play in which it is embedded. One could argue that it is, indeed, an example of medieval bad taste in its juxtaposition of sacred and profane. Nevertheless the intrusive episode is extremely important in the history of low comedy. The case is made that the Mercator-Rubinus scene is a "missing link" between the professional mime theater of the late Roman Empire and such well documented Renaissance forms as the Italian commedia dell'arte. |
|
The Catalan-Occitan Easter Play and the Kingdom of Majorca. |
|
|
|
The Catalan-Occitan Easter play consists of one almost intact manuscript, BN Manuscript Didot, and four fragments whose respective provenance is Palma de Majorca, Ille near Perpignan, Vic in Catalunya and Barcelona. In addition, there are substantial portions of a passion from the Rouergue in France which seems to be very closely based on the Catalan-Occitan Easter play and to have possibly very strong associations with it. Furthermore, the Rouergue passion forms part of a very early play cycle. In the history of the theatre, the Catalan-Occitan Easter play has a very important place. It is an extremely early vernacular play. The Didot manuscript is considered to be early fifteenth century but the play itself could date from the early fourteenth century and is earlier than the first northern French passion, the Palatinus Passion. The Vic fragment too, is considered to be very early. This latter fragment has close links, even a common verse, which links it with the Vic Quem quaeritis in Latin of the twelfth century. The Catalan-Occitan Easter play stands, therefore, at the crossroads of Latin and vernacular religious, dramatic tradition. Moreover, it is also a pivotal play in the theatrical traditions of Northern France, Occitania and Catalunya. This paper explores some of these historical and geographical links. Firstly, the play is particularly interesting for its links with Perpignan, the Roussillon and the Kingdom of Majorca. Perpignan became the capital of the Kingdom of Majorca (1276-1349) which was an offshoot of the County of Barcelona and the Kingdom of Aragon. The Kingdom of Majorca comprised not only Perpignan and the Roussillon but also part of Catalunya along with the Balearic Islands and Palma and the Seigneurie of Montpellier. The Kingdom gave Perpignan a high period of commercial prosperity and also gave rise to a distinctive society one of the chief characteristics of which was a special piety of a secular nature. Part of the manifestation of this piety was dramatic representation in the vernacular. Plays of the Three Marys and the Passion are attested in the town of Pollenca in Majorca. These could well be the plays of the Vic fragment and the Didot manuscript. Not only were these plays in the vernacular but they were put on in the town square, not the church. In Perpignan and its environs, there is a continuous tradition of staging passion plays which goes back to the time of the Didot Passion. One interesting facet of dramatic activity here was the procession of the Confrerie del Sanch during Holy Week through the streets of Perpignan from the church of St James. The processions of the Confrerie began during the Kingdom of Majorca and its members were mostly gardeners but who had the special function of accompanying in their striking, hooded robes the condemned to the scaffold. By showing the special links between dramatic tradition in the Roussillon and Catalunya and between liturgical and secular dramatic practice, this paper will show the unique development of the Catalan-Occitan Easter Play. It is a story just as fascinating as that of the growth of the passion play in Northern France or of the cycle plays in England but quite different from either one. |
|
Grotesque Elements in the Passion Drama in Catalan Countries |
|
|
|
We try to study grotesque elements that we can see in the medieval Passion drama to take stock of those plays and to classify them. We analyze not only textual aspects (slang, expressions, idioms, insults, parodies ...), but different types of characters, universal lines of argument, stage effects, gestures, signs, costume, scenography, general design ...: the whole drama. We also try to study the evolution of these aspects for periods and their posterior results in redesigned plays at new times (XVI-XIX). Finally, we analyse their thrown-off aspects by the most popular plays, and we describe present Catalan Passion drama in different villages. |
|
La chapelle ouverte et Fray Jacobo Daciano: le fête de la Passion à Tzintzuntzan, Michoacán. |
|
|
|
Le propos de cette communication est d'étudier la présence de Fray Jacobo Daciano dans la région de Michoacán au Mexique, en particulier pour identifier sa possible participation dans la construction de deux chapelles ouvertes dans les villages de Tarecuato et Tzintzuntzan, où ce personnage danois a eu une intense activité missionnaire. L'intérêt de cette recherche est d'analyser la façon dont ces espaces ont été conçus pour l'évangélisation des indigènes en leur imposant une vue frontale d'origine europeenne. D'autre part, nous ferons une description spatiale de la fête de la Passion qui est toujours célébrée le vendredi Saint dans l'atrium et la chapelle ouverte du couvent de Tzintzuntzan. Lors de cet évènement, les participants se déplacent en procession dans l'atrium à la façon médiévale, en considérant la chapelle ouverte comme référence spatiale de représentation scénique de type frontal. L'atrium, la chapelle ouverte et les chapelles posas du couvent s'articulent, chaque année, en un complexe système de représentation scénique-réligieux. Nous essaierons d'expliquer comment s'est préservé au Mexique l'utilisation d'espaces exterieurs réservés pour les représentations réligieuses. La fonctionnalité de ces espaces résulterait d'une synthèse de jeux scéniques médiévaux, rennaissants et préhispaniques. Nous considérons également les possibles références spatiales que les missionnaires ont appris du théâtre réligieux médiéval et rennaissant et qui ont été appliquées au XVIème siècle dans la conception de ces espaces au Mexique. |